Strategy in TECH...
News comes out of Japan that the new owners of Sharp are in the process of buying back a building the old management sold off when seeking to improve profitability by reducing overhead. Now, new management – made up of former Foxconn executives – are doing an about-face and looking to repurchase the building, in a move that has Japanese media scratching their heads.
We have been inundated with multiple reports that media server kingpin Kaleidescape has ceased operations as of the end of the day yesterday (Friday). Furthermore, all employees both internal and external, have reportedly been let go.
Le Holdings Co. Ltd. (LeEco), a Chinese company with unusual multi-business aspirations, announced this week that they had acquired Vizio, a U.S. manufacturer of affordable televisions, in a deal worth $2 billion. The deal will serve as LeEco’s entry into the U.S. market with its unusual mix of products.
The ink is barely dry on their agreement to be acquired by Britain’s Melrose Industries PLC, and already Nortek Inc. finds themselves the subject of multiple investigations by several major law firms who have publicly notified shareholders this deal may not be a good one for them. It is not clear if these law firms intend to take action yet, but if so, it could be a complicating factor in the transaction.
News comes this 4th of July holiday week that Ingram Micro, itself just recently acquired by a Chinese shipping company, has sold off AVAD, LLC and AVAD Canada Ltd., to Kingswood Capital Management, a private equity company. In an announcement from Kingswood, the company says it has brought in a new upper management team – including a new CEO, industry veteran Tom Jacoby.
Samsung announced late Wednesday that it has acquired Joyent, a relatively new start-up company that offers cloud computing services, according to a report by Recode. The specifics of the deal were not disclosed, but Joyent management has said it will be joining the Samsung management team.
Skullcandy, the lifestyle headphone company in which design is as important as performance (some would say more important), saw its stock skyrocket some 16% on Wednesday as word leaked out that the company’s founder was exploring the possibility of taking the company private in a buyout. This idea was revealed in a filing with securities regulators by Skullcandy founder Richard Alden.
In a report provocatively titled “Best Buy Isn’t Dead, but It Is Dying,” top investor service The Motley Fool (TMF) suggested that number one consumer electronics chain Best Buy’s “…best days are in the past.” Written by Rick Munarriz, the report dissects Best Buy’s last financial quarter report, as well as its future forecast.
Nortek, Inc. (Nortek) released their results for the 2016 fiscal first quarter and generally showed broad improvement,with sales gains and profit improvements in most of their segments. But not in the Custom and Commercial Air segment which had a sales decline; and especially not in their AVC segment, which saw continued sales declines and generated a loss from operations.
Bowers & Wilkins (B&W) announced this morning that they have been acquired by EVA Automation, a Silicon Valley-based technology company founded just two years ago by Gideon Yu. Yu is a well-known sports and technology executive that has launched EVA Automation with the expressed goal of “reimagining the audio/video experience by making products that will change how people interact and think about the home.”
