Strategy in TECH...
This long and complex series of intertwined legal actions between Monster LLC (and all other Monster related parties) and Beats Electronics LLC (and all other Beats related entities) seemed to be winding down. Back in 2016, I reported on the lower court ruling in favor of Beats who had filed several motions for summary judgment. It seemed as though this was the end, but in 2018, more actions ensued.
Specialty AV retailer and e-commerce site Audio Advice today launched a comprehensive – and free – home theater design tool targeted for consumers looking to craft the perfect theater for their home. Featuring an interactive 3D interface, Audio Advice’s Home Theater Designer makes it fun and easy for consumers to create plans for an acoustically correct home theater system – including precise placement of speakers, TV or projector, and seating.
Best Buy Co. Inc. (NYSE: BBY) had what appeared to be a big win this week, generating financial results that handily beat its fiscal second quarter estimates, driven largely by a huge 242.2% increase in ecommerce sales. Their fiscal second quarter, the 13-week period that ended August 1, 2020 was big, coming in at $9.910 billion – even in a COVID-19 ravaged quarter – fully 4% higher than the $9.536 billion in the same quarter in 2019.
And yet, the company’s stock value DROPPED on the announcement of their quarterly results. And in after-hours trading, Best Buy stock lost as much as 5% of its value. Why did that happen?
Sonos, Inc. (NASDAQ: SONO) announced this week that they are adding a new member to their Board of Directors. In fact, they even increased the size of the Board to make room for this new addition. The news surprised – and impressed – many market observers, as the person they are adding is Panos Panay, a top Microsoft Corp. executive. You see, if you are not familiar with Panay, there is something special about his background that makes him an intriguing addition to the Sonos Board.
By almost any measure, the housing market is in a major rebound, with the U.S. Commerce Department reporting on Tuesday that residential construction starts jumped an impressive 22.6% in July. This is the largest jump in housing starts in almost four years, according to a report by Reuters.
As part of an internal restructuring to accommodate their recent acquisition of the distribution rights to certain Onkyo brands, Voxx International Corporation announced this week that it has renamed the existing Klipsch Holding LLC to the rather generically named Premium Audio Company LLC. This is just the first change, as I’ve learned more announcements are just around the corner.
By now, most in the industry know that Crestron Electronics, the widely renowned luxury residential electronics systems manufacturer, is also a large major supplier of high quality and mission critical solutions for the corporate commercial and industrial markets. Today, the company is announcing that their two divisions worked together to create a new product called the Flex MM – a unique, flexible, unified communications solution that is just about perfect for the new Work From Home…or as Creston likes to call it…the Work from Anywhere…remotely distributed workforce.
The Florida Audio Expo announced this week that they are cancelling their February 2021 high-end audio exposition due to “the extraordinary times and continued uncertainty.” Although their announcement does not explicitly name COVID-19 or SARS-CoV2, comments by show founders make it clear, noting that they “put our customers well being first.”
Emerald Holding Inc. (NYSE:EEX) – formerly Emerald Expositions Events, Inc. – released their fiscal 2020 second quarter results this week and it’s no surprise that they were brutal, as the company continues to find itself caught in a COVID catastrophe that is killing in-person events, like the very expositions they produce. With the second quarter covering the period of April – June, the previous peak of the pandemic’s infections and deaths (since exceeded), the company performance – as expected – was really challenged, with the bulk of their various trade shows and in-person events cancelled or postponed.
But the company did have one piece of good news…the insurance companies providing event cancellation insurance to the company have begun paying against their claims.
In new economic data released by the government today, the real gross domestic product (GDP) for the second quarter of 2020 declined an astonishing 32.9%, the worst ever such reading in recorded history. This result follows a decline of 5% in the first quarter and demarks a deep and painful recession resulting from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic engulfing the United States, and the world.
