Einhorn takes a bite of Apple

The international ICT market was quiet last week, with David Einhorn's legal victory against Apple regarding the latter's proposed cash shuffle, and some minor merger and acquisition activity, making the main stories.

At home, it was also very quiet ahead of possible reshuffles at the Department of Communications.

* Good interim figures from Mustek, with revenue up 9.7% and profit up 32.6%.
* Mixed interim numbers from Blue Label Telecoms, with revenue up 2.3% but profit down 16.9%; and Morvest Business Group, with revenue up 6.2% but profit down 84.7%.
* Positive trading updates from EOH and Mvelaserve.
* Negative trading updates from Digicore and Gijima.
* Blue Label Telecoms will issue American Depository Receipts in the US in a bid to bolster its offshore investment base.

* Telecom Namibia is connecting to the WACS cable via an agreement with NewTelco South Africa, represented by Jasco Co-location Solutions, which will establish four POPs for this purpose.
* The resignation of Paul Kukubo, CEO of Kenya's ICT Board (as of the end of his contract in August).

* SAP acquired SmartOps, a provider of inventory and service-level optimisation software solutions.
* Telrad Network bought Alvarion's carrier licensed division.
* France Telecom sold off its 20% stake in Sonaecom (Portugal).
* CSC sold off its Southeast Asia Reseller unit.
* Baidu is suing Qihoo for copyright infringement.
* David Einhorn, a hedge fund manager, was victorious over Apple and its cash shuffle proposals.
* Kabel Deutschland has ditched the purchase of Telecom Columbus. The former is the target of a possible acquisition by Vodafone.
* Good quarterly figures from AVG Technologies and Yandex.
* Good quarterly numbers from Aruba Networks (back in the black).
* Mediocre quarterly results from Analog Devices, Dell, Dish Networks, France Telecom, Garmin, HP and Intuit.
* Mixed quarterly figures from InterDigital, with revenue up but profit down; Marvell Technology Group, with revenue up but profit down; and Sina, with revenue up but profit down.
* Mixed year-end numbers from Capgemini, with revenue up but profit down.
* A quarterly loss from Leap Wireless.
* The appointments of Kenneth Asbury as CEO of CACI International; Mike Combes (ex-Vodafone) as CEO of Alcatel-Lucent; and Anne O'Leary as CEO of Vodafone Ireland.
* Dan Allen resigned as CEO of CACI International.

Blue Label Telecoms will issue American Depository Receipts in the US.

* International:
* A fine for Google under the new EU data rules.
* A possible IPO by China's 360buy, a major competitor of the Alibaba Group.
* A possible acquisition by BT Group for the football rights currently owned by ESPN.
* South Africa:
* The new CEO at Telkom.
* Further developments from the Department of Communications.

* Worldwide BI software revenue will grow 7% in 2013 and is forecast to reach $17.1 billion by 2016, according to Gartner.
* Worldwide shipments of smart connected devices (PCs, laptops, tablets and smartphones) rose 29.1% in 2012 to 1 201.1 million units, according to IDC, with Samsung taking the number one slot from Apple, and Lenovo replacing HP at number three.
* By 2015, 485 million wearable computing devices will be shipped annually, according to ABI Research.

* JSE All share index: Down 2.5%
* Nasdaq: Down 0.9%
* Top SA share movements: ConvergeNet Holdings (-9.1%), Digicor (-30%), Gijima (-8.3%), MiX Telematics (+7.6%), MICROmega Holdings (+11.5%), Muvoni (-18.2%), Net 1 UEPS Technologies (+9.8%), SecureData (-8.6%), Silverbridge (+45.7%) and TCS (-50%)

IDC has released its latest market figures for South Africa. These show a 7.7% increase for 2013 over 2012, with a further increase of 6.8% for 2014. The breakdown is as follows: