Great results but uncertain outlook. Zoom produced excellent Q3 2021 results but the burden of free users has finally hit profitability which together with an admission of slowing growth calls into question the extreme valuation. I think Zoom is a great company that provides the best video conferencing offering and has a management team that has executed exceptionally well through...
Libra has been neutered by its opponents. Libra is expected to finally launch early in 2021 but Facebook is having to make so many concessions to the forces that are arraigned against it that I think it will end up as just another digital currency that no one can be bothered to use. Libra launched as an ambitious new currency...
The smartphone market is the elephant in the room. India has continued to express its unhappiness with China in a dispute which could end up hurting Chinese companies a lot more if India continues to follow the US down this path. India has banned another 43 apps for what it calls “engaging in activities which are prejudicial to sovereignty and...
Honor is unlikely to escape. The last 18months have seen a game of cat and mouse between the US Department of Commerce and Huawei but this is quickly coming to a close and it is unlikely that selling Honor will help very much. Huawei has announced its intention to sell its Honor brand to a consortium made up of smartphone...
Microsoft pulls out the big guns. Microsoft is going after Zoom using its balance sheet, but it will need to further improve its user experience if it wants to knock Zoom out of the top slot. In its latest release of Teams, Microsoft has added a series or personal features that are aimed at family and friends calls which will...
It all comes down to the valuation. Airbnb has weathered the pandemic with exceptional management execution proving that it is a good company but whether it also is a good stock with an attractive valuation remains to be seen. Airbnb has filed its S-1 to go public and its numbers demonstrate decisive and rapid action to combat the impact of...
Another reprieve-in-name-only. Apple has given some more ground on its hotly-contested App Store fees, but this move is an attempt to split its opposition and save some face while ensuring that the flow of cream remains virtually uninterrupted. Apple has announced a cut in its revenue share from 30% to 15% for any developer making less than $1m per year...
Apple crushes the competition. Even accounting for the “Apple fanboy” element of the tech press, the new M1-powered Macs are delivering pretty much everything that Apple promised meaning that Intel, AMD, Qualcomm and Microsoft have a huge amount of ground to make-up. For Intel and AMD, this challenge is the most serious as Apple has conclusively proved that Arm-based processors...
Only a joint venture makes any sense at all. While it makes complete sense for Uber to get rid of its autonomous driving activity and start again, I think Aurora would be crazy to even consider paying good money for this worthless asset. As far as RFM is concerned, Aurora is one of the also-rans in the autonomous driving game...
Richard is founder, owner of research company, Radio Free Mobile. He has 16 years of experience working in sell side equity research. During his 11 year tenure at Nomura Securities, he focused on the equity coverage of the Global Technology sector.
Salesforce & Slack – Opportunistic strike.
Salesforce picks off a weaker player. Salesforce is paying $45.52 per share (at Salesforce’s December 1st close) to acquire Slack, in a move that values the company just 18% above its IPO price again underlining my view that the company was really struggling to make it on its own. Slack adds an interesting dimension to Salesforce and brings it more...