Dell defers V-day

The international ICT market was dominated last week by Dell's voting delay, Alvarion's bankruptcy decision, and the major acquisition by Baidu.

At home, Cell C's cash injection and Vodacom's quarterly update were the main local stories.

* A positive trading update from Vodacom that included the announcement that in Q2 it had added 1.3 million additional smartphones on its network, and that its revenue had grown 3%.
* A negative trading update from Datatec.
* The suspension of the listing of the Muvoni Technology Group.
* Cell C announced a R3.5 billion cash injection that will be used to enhance its network infrastructure quality, customer base and product offerings, as well as helping to maintain an appropriate capital base.
* The Department of Communications has asked independent investigators to probe possible corruption and maladministration at USAASA.

* Satisfactory half-year numbers from Sonatel (Somalia), with revenue up 10.3% and profit up 4.6%.
* The Kenyan government failed to provide additional investment in Telkom Kenya, leaving the shareholding as 70/30 in Orange's favour.
* ICANN said the ZA Central Registry bid for the dotAfrica domain has passed its 'initial evaluation'.
* IDC expects the Nigerian and Kenyan ICT markets to grow from $3.82 million in 2012 to $4.94 million by 2017. This compares to the $13.24 million in SA for 2012.

Look out for a possible merger of Cell C with Telkom Mobile.

* Accenture acquired Mortgage Cadence, a loan origination software company.
* Apple bought HopStop and Locationary, two online mapping services, in a move designed to be a formidable alternative to Google's navigation systems.
* Baidu purchased app store, 91 Wireless, in a move to strengthen its foothold in China's mobile computing sector. The deal was worth $1.9 billion.
* Facebook acquired UK-based Monoidics, a software verification start-up.
* Kaseya bought Rover Apps, a provider of innovative cloud solutions.
* PTC purchased Enigma, a provider of service life cycle management software.
* Telligent Systems acquired VMware's Zimbra unit, the self-described enterprise-class e-mail, calendar, and collaboration solution provider.
* Yahoo bought Admovate, a mobile application start-up.
* Funai, a consumer electronics firm, lost its patent lawsuit regarding LSI's patented technology.
* A federal jury said Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson, HTC and Sony did not violate four of the patents of Wi-Lan.
* Alvarion has filed for bankruptcy.
* Dell has postponed the voting decision on its future until 24 July.
* NEC will exit the smartphone business after a deal with Lenovo failed to materialise.
* India has lifted its cap on foreign ownership of local mobile networks, in a move that might kick-start the discussions between MTN and Reliance Communications.
* Very good quarterly figures from SanDisk.
* Good quarterly numbers from Google, Microsoft (back in the black), TSMC and Tata Consultancy Services.
* Satisfactory quarterly results from Amphenol, Check Point Software Technologies, Ericsson, SAP and Verizon Communications.
* Mediocre quarterly results from Ericsson, IBM, Intel, LG Display (but back in the black), TeliaSonera and Vodafone (revenue only).
* Mixed quarterly figures from eBay, with revenue up but profit down; Millicom Cellular International, with revenue up but profit down; Xilinx, with revenue down but profit up; and Yahoo, with revenue down but profit up.
* Quarterly losses from AMD, Nokia and Rambus.
* The appointments of Jeffrey Benck as president and CEO of Emulex; Weili Dai, one of its co-founders, as president of Marvell Technology Group; and James McCluney as chairman of Emulex (was CEO).

International:
* The possible acquisition by Apple of Israel's PrimeSense, a developer of chips that enable 3D machine vision, which was used to help power Microsoft's Xbox Kinect.
* The outcome of the letter sent to the Obama administration and Congress, by several organisations, including Apple, Facebook and Google, for more disclosures on the government's national security-related requests for user data.
* The possible merger of Dish and T-Mobile and/or US Cellular and NTELOS.
Africa:
* The outcome of the sale of Vivendi's stake in Maroc Telecom, following government's interest to share the stake with Etisalat.
South Africa:
* Further developments following the Telkom settlement with the Competition Tribunal.
* A possible merger of Cell C with Telkom Mobile.
* Further developments regarding the ongoing Holdsworth/Reunert battle.

* The worldwide IT outsourcing market will reach $288 billion this year, up 2.8% from 2012, according to Gartner.
* Global SME IT spending will reach $700 billion by 2017, according to IDC.
* Global technology spending will increase 2.3% this year, down from its previous 3.3% that was made in January, according to Forrester.
* Global notebook shipments dropped 13.7% in Q1 and 15.4% in Q2, the worst shipment drop ever recorded, according to Digitimes.
* EMEA PC shipments decreased 22.2% in Q2, according to IDC. HP retained its number one slot, followed by Lenovo (up from number five), Acer (was two), Dell and Asus (was three).

* JSE All share index: Down 0.5%
* Nasdaq: Down 0.3%
* Top SA share movements: Ansys (-20.8%), ConvergeNet Holdings (+9.1%), Gijima (up following 1:20 consolidation), Labat Africa (+25%), Morvest Business Group (-11.1%) and Muvoni Technology Group (-15%)

The combination of centralised computing power, whether on-premises or in the cloud, together with the proliferation of low-cost mobile devices, are changing the rules of enterprise technology. This has opened the way for a new generation of technology start-ups that are focused on business users rather than consumers, and are transforming the technologies on which complex systems are built.

These companies are starting to unsettle the technology heavyweights and need to be carefully watched. The following are a few of those on this list:

* Airware
* Apptio
* Atlassian
* Box
* Dropbox
* Cloudera
* FireEye
* GitHub
* Good Technology
* HortonWorks
* Mobile Iron
* Nimble Storage
* Pure Storage
* Zendesk