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The revolving doors of corporate suites are always turning. New hires coming in, new executives restocking teams with teams of their own choosing, people moving to new challenges or to pasture.  It’s a constant.  This past week, however, has seen enough executive staff shifting to keep any HR team busy.  From Motorola to AMD, from the BBC to NBC and CBS, from the Washington Post to the Wall Street Journal, the corporate trees got a good shake.  Here’s the recap of who’s in and who’s out: Click to Read More

Do the Justices of the Supreme Court use TiVo or record programs on a DVR? And if they do, what do they watch? Gossip columnists stand by. There could be a story coming, probably not, almost definitely not, but it’s possible. Today, the DC based U.S. Court of Appeals denied Dish Network’s appeal for a new hearing in the Satellite provider’s long running battle with TiVo over digital video recorder (DVR)  patents.  The next stop for the case could be the Supreme Court.

The dispute underlying the appeal began in 2004 when TiVo charged DVR’s offered by Dish Network (EchoStar) violated their patents. Click to Read More

As part of an effort to fix an ailing business, Blockbuster scaled back their big spending marketing campaign to compete with Netflix mail order DVD rental service.  The first order of business for Blockbuster CEO Jim Keyes was to fix the stores.  Now rumors suggest Blockbuster is gearing up to fight Netflix again only this time the battlefront is different.   In the new frontier, instead of targeting mail-order, Blockbuster is reportedly aiming for the digital landscape.

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Nintendo’s Wii isn’t the target of many complaints.  It’s fun.  It’s accessible.  It’s playable.  What the Wii isn’t, and it doesn’t claim to be, is a high performance gaming beast.   It’s not about horsepower and bleeding edge graphics rendering.  The Wii’s creative interface and controllers put playability first and at that, it succeeds.  That doesn’t mean the Wii doesn’t aim to be more, just the opposite, it continues to chase large ambitions.

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Microsoft’s ultimatum expires on April 26th.  If no deal is struck by that date, they are threatening to take their offer to Yahoo’s shareholders and go hostile.    Is it a bluff or a promise? Only a few insiders know for sure.  But before that game of chicken can lead to an incident, two pivotal dates will first pass on the acquisition calendar: April 17th and April 22.  What happens on those two fateful April days may have a more significant impact on what happens next than just about anything else.

April 17th is the day of Google’s earnings announcement.  On the second date, Yahoo will announce results of their own.  Combined, information revealed from the pair of earnings releases will serve as a barometer for the Internet economy. Click to Read More

When Peer to Peer (P2P) Internet video broadcasters like Joost and Babelgum came on the scene they were the rage of the new thing.  Riding the wave of video sites like YouTube investors lined up to write monstrous checks.  Obscure deals were struck with talent agents.  High profile executives were hired; programming deals struck.  But in all the euphoria two weak spots were largely ignored: the requirement to download software when competing consumer behavior was predominantly browser based, and the question of how much market share could by attained when airing what are largely ubiquitous and non exclusive offerings.

A year later, those questions have come back like a nagging rash.  Adding to the itch, traditional media companies (TV and Film) have since gotten creative and ambitious in launching their own video services. (Examples: News Corp and NBC/U have Hulu, the BBC is at work Project Kangaroo in the U.K.)  In the face of those unanswered questions, and the competition, some are wondering if these high flyers are withering away. They’re asking tough questions about the whole internet video landscape.

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Electronic Arts took its offer to Take Two’s shareholders and Microsoft is on the verge of doing similar with Yahoo.  Monday, Motorola narrowly avoided adding another major proxy fight to the quarter’s tally.  Subject to an agreement announced today, dissident board member Carl Icahn and the rest of Motorola’s board of directors agreed to settle their ongoing battle over board seats and control (Press Release).

In exchange for dropping litigation (filed to gain access to corporate documents) and for his withdrawing a proxy fight for four board seats, Motorola agreed to endorse two of Icahn’s nominees to the board.  The Illinois based company also agreed to both refrain from adding anti takeover provisions like poison pills and a staggered board to the spin-off of the company’s mobile phone business; and to insure Icahn (or his board representatives) will have a significant voice in decisions regarding the spin-off (including the hiring of a CEO).  

These decisions regarding the future handset business are particularly noteworthy. Click to Read More