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Dell Technologies takes over

Dell's $62 billion takeover of EMC is complete, making it the world's largest privately controlled technology company.

Paul Booth
By Paul Booth
Johannesburg, 14 Sept 2016

The EMC/Dell deal, HPE's disposal of its software assets, and Intel's McAfee deal dominated the international ICT market last week.

At home, it was quiet.

Key local news

* Satisfactory four-month figures from Datacentrix.

* Satisfactory year-end numbers from Oakbay Investments, in which Sahara Computers contributed 44% of its revenue - R1.1 billion.

* Very good year-end figures from Pinnacle, with revenue up 37.3% and profit up 36.2%.

* Positive trading updates from Alaris Holdings, Altron and ISA.

* Huge Group has signed a memorandum of understanding for the acquisition of the ConnectNet Group for R417.9 million.

* Tencent Holdings, in which Naspers has a major stake, has become Asia's largest company by market capitalisation.

* A renewed JSE cautionary by the Huge Group.

Key African news

* The Nigerian Communications Commission has sealed the office of Nokia-Alcatel, located in Lekki, Lagos, for operating without a licence.

* The appointments of Marc Harion as CEO of Orange Egypt; and Luc Serviant as VP of Orange Business Services for the Middle East, North Africa and Turkey (MENAT) region.

* The resignations of Yves Gauthier, CEO of Orange Egypt (moving to Meditel, Morocco); and Mickael Ghossein, VP of Orange Business Services for the MENAT region.

Key international news

* Accenture acquired privately held New Energy Group, an Italian-based multinational consultancy that concentrates much of its business on offerings related to Salesforce.com solutions.

* GE bought two European 3D printing groups for $1.4 billion: Sweden's Arcam and Germany's SLM Solutions, tapping into manufacturers' growing demand for digital technologies.

* Google purchased Apigee, a technology services firm, for $625 million.

* Intel acquired Movidius, a start-up that makes chips that accelerate computer vision processing.

* Swedish payments start-up iZettle, a rival to US-based Square, bought Intelligentpos, a start-up that turns iPads into sales terminals.

* L-3 Communications purchased Australian-based Micreo, a specialised electronic warfare subsystems provider.

The Nigerian Communications Commission has sealed the office of Nokia-Alcatel.

* UK-based Micro Focus acquired the software assets of HPE for $8.8 billion. This includes UK-based Autonomy, bought for $11 billion in 2011. Other HPE assets that will be merged include software for application delivery management, big data, enterprise security, information management and governance, and the IT operations management businesses.

* Oracle purchased LogFire, a cloud logistics specialist.

* Salesforce.com bought HeyWire, a cloud messaging platform.

* French facilities management and vouchers group Sodexo acquired Inspirus, a US company that sells software to help employers develop programmes to reward and motivate staff.

* Virgin Media bought UK-based infrastructure provider Arqiva's WiFi business.

* ValueAct Capital made a 4% investment in Seagate Technology.

* A federal judge has set aside a $14 million jury verdict against Pure Storage in a lawsuit brought by EMC, ordering a new trial to determine whether a key patent at issue in the case is valid.

* French operator Altice is bidding to take over the 22.25% of SFR's shares that it does not already own. Reuters valued the deal at EUR2.35 billion.

* Dell's $62 billion takeover of EMC is complete, with Dell Technologies (the new name) now the world's largest privately controlled technology company.

* Intel will spin out its cyber security division, formerly known as McAfee, and sell a majority stake in it to investment firm TPG for $3.1 billion. TPG will own 51% of the new entity. Intel, which bought McAfee for $7.7 billion in 2011, will retain a 49% stake in the business.

* Samsung Electronics is selling 6.3 million shares in Dutch semiconductor equipment maker ASML Holding for about EUR606 million.

* Telia Company will sell its Tajikistan operation Tcell to its local partner, as part of its ongoing plan to exit Eurasia. The Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development, which holds 40% of Tcell, has agreed to pay Telia $39 million for Telia's 60% stake in the company.

* Good quarterly numbers from Descartes Systems Group.

* Satisfactory quarterly results from Carphone Warehouse and Finisar.

* Mixed quarterly figures from HPE, with revenue down but profit up; and Marvell Technology Group, with revenue down but back in the black.

* Mixed half-year figures from 3UK, with revenue down but profit up.

* Quarterly losses from Dell, SecureWorks, Sigma Designs, Verint and Volt Information Sciences.

* The appointments of William Amelio as CEO of Avnet; Michael Dell as chairman of VMware; Kjell Johnsen as CEO of VimpelCom Russia; and Mary McDowell as CEO of Polycom (as of the closing of the Siris Capital deal).

* The resignations of Peter Leav, CEO of Polycom (as of Siris deal close); Mikhail Slobodin, CEO of VimpelCom Russia; George Schlinder as CEO of CGI; and Joseph Tucci, chairman of VMware.

* The retirement of Michael E Roach, CEO of CGI.

* The death of John Ellenby, founder of GRiD Systems Corporation, whose Compass computers, launched in 1982, were forerunners of the laptops that would soon become standard business tools. He later pioneered augmented reality technology, allowing people to identify objects by pointing at them with phones.

* Planned IPOs from Telefonica's O2 (UK) and its Spanish infrastructure company, Telxius.

Research results and predictions

Worldwide:

* Shipments of wearable devices reached 22.5 million in 2Q16, according to IDC, despite a decline in shipments for one of the largest vendors. The overall market for wearable devices grew 26.1% year-over-year as new use cases are slowly starting to emerge.

* Cellular machine-to-machine (M2M) connections will reach 733 million globally by 2021, according to a recent Ovum report. The forecasts predicts cellular M2M service revenue will reach a global annual total of $67 billion in 2021, with the greatest value contributions coming from Asia and Oceania; North America; and Western Europe, worth $22 billion, $16 billion and $14 billion, respectively. Service revenue will grow at the fastest rate in the later-to-start markets of the Middle East and Africa, where the CAGR for the region will be 16.7% over the 2016-2021 period.

Stock market changes

* JSE All share index: Down 0.3%
* FTSE100: Down 1.8%
* DAX: Down 1%
* NYSE (Dow): Down 2.2%
* S&P 500: Down 2.4%
* Nasdaq: Down 2.4%
* Nikkei225: Up 0.2% (highest weekend close this year)
* Hang Seng: Up 3.5% (highest weekend close this year)
* Shanghai: Up 0.3%

Look out for

International:

* HP buying Samsung's printer division.
* A buyer for Concept Laser, a German 3D printing firm.

South Africa:

* A buyer for Broadband Infraco, with Dark Fibre Africa and Vodacom being two of the possible contenders.

Final word

Fortune magazine has published its list of 50 companies that are changing the world. The list includes:

* 12: Intel
* 19: PayPal
* 26: Salesforce.com
* 29: Accenture
* 30: Didi Chuxing (China's Uber)
* 35: LinkedIn
* 36: Smart Communications (Philippines)
* 39: Panasonic
* 47: IBM

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