Strategy in TECH...
The tables have apparently been turned on Sonos, Inc. which now finds itself the subject of an investigation into alleged patent infringement by the U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC). The agency decided to launch an investigation of Sonos after receiving a complaint from Alphabet, Inc.’s Google division. There is one simple question: is Sonos a patent infringer?
After two years of tussling in courts, with both sides registering a mix of wins and losses on various matters, you’d think some kind of settlement would be in order. But last week, Google intensified its patent war with Sonos by opening up yet another front with two new lawsuits on voice control and other technologies, leading me to believe that any type of settlement is yet down the road.
More and more evidence continues to emerge suggesting that the economy is undergoing a fundamental shift, a turn if you will, that will at least slow economic growth – and may lead to recession. Perhaps the clearest indicator of that is the turn taken by tech, which has lost a trillion dollars in value in just three days of trading on the stock market. For the last two-plus years, tech was the driving force behind a dramatic economic expansion during the pandemic. What is happening now?
With COVID now seemingly in decline, on Monday Google employees (Googlers?) began the process of returning to work at the company’s various headquarter and other office locations around the country. The company is requiring they work at least three days a week in the office, continuing to work remotely for the other two.
Google is hardly alone in pulling employees back to the office, Apple employees return next week and most major companies have announced dates for office life to begin again. Will this kill remote work and have an impact on the custom integration business?
I don’t think it’s possible for me to overstate the significance of what just happened last week when, in a final decision from the U.S. International Trade Commission, the full panel affirmed a commission judge’s ruling that Google had in fact infringed on five patents held by Sonos. It is a real-life version of the bible story of David versus Goliath. Make no mistake, this David’s win may change our industry in fundamental ways.
A hearing before a California federal judge brought an ugly exchange between attorneys for both Sonos and Google – with each side pointing their finger at the other and accusing them of bad faith. That attorneys got ugly against their counterparts is not in itself surprising. However, the speed with which this dispute devolved to that point was a surprise.
It must be really interesting in those Sonos and Google joint product development meetings, where the parties meet to discuss their partnership on the Google assistant technology built into Sonos products. You see, in addition to this product partnership, both companies are ensnarled in a nasty round of lawsuits accusing each other of various patent violations – with tactics and rhetoric heating up as each fired new salvos at the other just this week. On Monday, Google sued Sonos. On Tuesday, Sonos sued Google. This is getting serious…
As many integrators seek to pitch their clients on the many wonders of converting their dumb homes into “smart” homes, there are growing indicators that the promise of the smart home is not being reliably delivered up to this point…and may never be, according to one respected industry expert. And there is a growing chorus of others who appear to agree – possibly including Google, who is trying to manage expectations by relabelling the smart home as the “helpful home.”
In a new survey by Reputation Institute on corporate reputation, known as the 2019 RepTrak 100, we see wild swings in tech brands’ reputation with consumer privacy concerns finally appearing to take a major toll. With an overall all-category average reputation rating increase of +0.8 points, technology as a segment saw its collective reputation drop by 1 full point on the scale.
But the news wasn’t all bad – movie king Netflix, Inc. jumped 23 spots to come in at #1 for the first time in their history.
Eyebrows raised everywhere when privacy-concerned industry watchers discovered that Google had put a microphone in their Nest Secure home alarm system, but failed to disclose that fact. Google says is was simply an “error.” But was it?
