19th August 1998 Archive
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SMEs set to adopt Internet big time
Meanwhile AOL plays catch up with Compuserve
A survey by Durlacher has claimed that the small and medium enterprise (SME) market is poised to adopt the Internet and electronic commerce wholeheartedly. Nick Gibson, an Internet analyst at the City based company, said that while SMEs are far more cautious than the corporate market in their approach to the Internet, the market …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 10:47
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Toshiba to reduce 64Mbit DRAM production
Will go all Flash instead
The Japanese press has reported that Toshiba is set to cut production on 64Mbit DRAMs it produces, reducing output from 80 per cent currently to 50 per cent. The reports, from Nikkei Net, said that it will switch production from the DRAMs to Flash memory, in a bid to raise margins in its semiconductor division. However, demand …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 10:51
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Kyocera white knight comes to Mita’s aid
President of company says re-structuring necessary
As exclusively revealed here in The Register last week, Japanese conglomerate Kyocera is to bale out the bankrupt photocopying firm Mita. Yesterday, Kyocera’s president Kensuke Ito confirmed that his company had put together a plan to bale out Mita, which includes a restructuring and an investigation into the viability of the …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 11:29
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IBM cuts NetFinity prices
Readies itself for new introductions
Big Blue said today it has cut prices on some of its NetFinity servers. The cuts, of up to 20 per cent, are on selected models in the 5500 and 7000 range. According to Tony John, NetFinity product marketing manager at IBM UK, the cuts are in preparation for new introductions of processors by Intel next Monday. IBM will introduce …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 11:47
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Acquisitions boost Fayrewood sales
Makes £1.45 million for year
Fayrewood spent nearly £50,000 on abortive acquisition costs for the year to April 1998, as well as successfully completing a number of acquisitions. The AIM-quoted computer equipment reseller made £1.45 million profit for the year, with an annualized turnover of £120 million after its acquisition of notebook and peripherals …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 12:00
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Electronics Boutique maps out European expansion
Will open 50 more stores in UK
High street software chain Electronics Boutique is expanding into Europe with plans to establish a network of 400 stores. The retailer currently has 156 stores in the UK, which its UK head, John Steinbrecher wants to push up to 200. In an article in the London Evening Standard, Steinbrecher said the Scandinavian software market …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 12:02
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Butler & Tanner takes investment in Fourfront
Year 2000 compliancy one of the issues
A book manufacturer has made a £50,000 investment in bespoke accountancy software company Fourfront. Butler and Tanner, a Somerset based company, but with offices in New York, Paris and Munich, produces 30 million books a year and has taken the share because Fourfront manufactures copyright accountancy software, and other …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 13:47
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Scottish entrepreneur says "Bottle of Beer"
E-commerce now includes beer, as well as pizzas
Scottish entrepreneur Chris Lynas, of Lugton Breweries, said today that it was hard to quantify how many bottles of beer he had sold over the Internet. Lynas, who has the largest independent bottling plant in Scotland, said that his use of IBM's e-commerce software had generated international sales he would not otherwise have …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 13:51
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Dell sales rocket in titanic year
Mikey Dell must be dead happy
1998 has been a bloody year for PC manufacturers. Inventory overhang, margin pressure, plummeting prices, the Asian contagion, has ensured a nasty time is being had by almost all. the outstanding exception is of course, Dell, the Austin-Texas direct PC manufacturer, which turned in an superb set of Q2 results yesterday. By its …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 14:24
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Tadpole takes out another minnow
Is it greedy, or just hungry?
Tadpole Technology, the Cambridge based specialist workstation and mobile computer systems manufacturer is taking out the competition, by taking it over. Tadpole is buying one of its US rivals, RDI, in a $6 million reverse take over. Tadpole’s directors will retain control of the board of the new group. The deal is being funded …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 14:27
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Netscape gets back in the black
Thank god for that, says Wall Street
Netscape Communications has broken even in its third quarter, surpassing Wall Street estimates. Revenues for the quarter ending July 31 were $150.2 million – a ten per cent increase on the $136 million of the same period last year. Net income for the quarter was $88,000 compared with a net loss of $45 million. Since Netscape …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 14:30
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People to suffer in year 2000
It’s not just PCs, say MPs
The millennium bug could prove fatal, not just to computers but to people as well, according to MPs on the public accounts committee, and research from bug hunters at Prove It 2000. Meanwhile, John Prescott, deputy prime minister, assured the country that the government had the problem under control. MP’s on the committee said …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 14:35
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Storage sales fly like a butterfly
But PC cards bomb like a b
US-based firm Disk/Trend expects the worldwide market for removable storage devices to hit around $3.9 billion this year and grow to in excess of $5 billion by the year 2001. Breaking the market up into five segments, magnetic rigid disk cartridge drives, PC Card rigid disk drives, floppy disk drives, small optical disk drives, …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 15:12
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HP warns of Asia job cuts
Six weeks until axe falls
Following its third quarter results showing its slimmest growth for years, Hewlett-Packard says it may have to cut jobs in the Asia Pacific region. This announcement casts doubt on the safety of over 25,000 jobs throughout Asia in 74 sales offices and 18 manufacturing plants. Richard Warmington, MD of HP's Asian operations, said …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 15:22
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Memec gets into embed with Intel
Memec wins pan-European Intel deal
UK-based chip distributor Memec Group has signed a pan-European agreement with Intel to handle the processor giant's embedded controller and flash memory products. Memec, which was established in 1974 and operates in 36 countries worldwide, will distribute the Intel products in all 12 of its European territories; in the UK, …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 15:26
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Direct sellers dream of a DVD Christmas
Just like the ones they never knew
Despite the heat of summer, direct PC vendors are already preparing their Christmas campaigns. Q4 this year is likely to be particularly busy in the consumer market as PCs with DVD drives will be widely available for the first time. DVD drives - despite being labelled as "gimmicky" by a number of retailers - are set to appeal to …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 15:38
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Compaq gets into a cluster with SCO
Resellers wanted
Compaq and SCO have announced a reseller recruitment, training and certification programme aimed at boosting sales of UnixWare NonStop Clusters. The programme, which is rolled-out in Europe this quarter, is designed to certify current Compaq and SCO Vars and distributors to sell UnixWare NonStop Clusters on Compaq servers. The …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 15:43
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Mentor ambushes bitter rival with hostile bid
Buy'em and sack'em?
An outstanding patent dispute between rival graphics emulation companies could be brought to an abrupt halt by an unexpected acquisition. Mentor Graphics shocked market watchers by launching a hostile takeover bid for Quickturn Design, the market leader in the emulation market. Mentor has offered to pay Quickturn shareholders $ …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 16:40
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Microsoft rejects DSP bids
CHS and C2000 will just have to wait
Microsoft has turned down bids from two of the UK's largest distributors to be allowed to sell OEM software. Both CHS and Computer 2000 had applied to become MS OEM product distributors, but Microsoft has turned them down after smaller OEM distributors complained. Microsoft currently has five OEM distributors - Actebis, …
Business 19 Aug 1998, 16:51
