HP bags Palm

The major ICT news internationally last week was HP's acquisition of Palm. At home, the suspension of Faritec's shares on the JSE, and the ongoing discussions between MTN and Orascom took much of the local ICT media space.

* A negative trading update from Sekunjalo Investments.
* Faritec's shares were suspended on the JSE.
* First Technology acquired Faritec's Microsoft large account reseller business for R2.2 million.
* MTN's subscriber numbers grew by 7% in Q1 to 123.58 million, with the largest growth figures coming from Bissau, Guinea (Conakry), Iran, Rwanda and Zambia.
* Bihati Technologies, a local BEE technology business, has filed a R1.7 billion lawsuit against Telkom SA.
* Inana Nkanza was appointed country manager for EMC in southern Africa.

* Mixed quarterly figures from Mobinil (Egypt), with revenue up but profit down.

* Apple bought Intrinsity, the chip technology company behind the iPad, for $121 million.
* Apple purchased Siri, a start-up that recently announced a voice application for the iPhone.
* Digital Sky Technologies (Russia) bought AOL's ICQ instant messaging service for $187.5 million.
* Electronics for Imaging acquired Radius Solutions, a company targeting customer-focused digital printing innovation.
* Google purchased LabPixies, an Israeli developer of Web and mobile applications, for $25 million.
* HP bought Palm, ending a long drawn-out saga as to who would eventually buy the company. The deal was worth $1.2 billion.
* Western Digital acquired the Singapore-based magnetic media operations of Hoya, for $235 million.
* Google bought Foursquare, a location-based services start-up, for $100 million.
* Symantec purchased Guardian Edge ($70 million) and PGP ($300 million), two e-mail and data encryption companies.
* AT&T has disposed of its remaining 7.5% stake in Tech Mahindra.
* Excellent quarterly results from Baidu and Infineon Technologies (back in the black) and Texas Instruments.
* Very good quarterly figures from Acer, Broadcom (back in the black), Eastman Kodak, Sanmina-SCI (back in the black), Software AG and TomTom (back in the black).
* Good quarterly numbers from ARM Holdings, CACI International, Canon, Check Point Software Technologies, Ingram Micro, Lexmark, Quanta Computer, Samsung Electronics, Sharp (back in the black), TSMC and ZTE.
* Satisfactory year-end figures from Corning, Forrester Research, Rogers Communications and Softbank.
* Satisfactory quarterly results from ADP, Ariba (back in the black), LG Electronics (back in the black), SAP, Time Warner Cable and Websense (back in the black).
* Mediocre quarterly results from AOL, CDC Software and France Telecom.
* Mixed full-year figures from Kyocera, with revenue down but profit up.
* Mixed quarterly figures from Bharti Airtel, with revenue up but profit down; China Tel, with revenue up but profit down; China Unicom, with revenue up but profit down; Diebold, with revenue down but profit up; KPN, with revenue down but profit up; McAfee, with revenue up but profit down; Motorola, with revenue down but back in the black; NTT DoCoMo, with revenue down but profit up; Open Text, with revenue up but profit down; and VeriSign, with revenue up but profit down.
* Quarterly losses from Epicor, JDA Software, Sprint Nextel and Unisys.
* Allen Sangines-Krause was appointed chairman of Millicom International Cellular.
* Daniel Johannesson resigned as chairman of Millicom International Cellular.
* An IPO filing from Sabre Industries, a wireless communications equipment maker.

Faritec's shares were suspended on the JSE.

Paul Booth, MD, Global Research Partners

* International:
* A possible takeover of McAfee by HP.
* A possible buyer for Logitech International.
* Africa:
* Further developments regarding the talks between MTN and Orascom. However, Algeria is already against any deal between the two parties involving that country.
* South Africa:
* Further developments regarding Faritec and the proposed sell-off of its managed services unit to Peter Winn, the ex-Faritec services director.

* The number of smartphones is forecast to grow at a CAGR of 32% between 2010 and 2014, according to Analysys Mason.
* The worldwide applications development software market declined 2% in 2009, according to Gartner.
* Worldwide PC microprocessor shipments grew 39% in Q110, compared to Q109, according to IDC.
* RIM broke into the top five cellphone makers in Q1, just outselling Sony Ericsson to take the number four slot, reports IDC. As a result, Motorola slipped to number seven, behind Apple.

* JSE All share index: Down 1%
* Nasdaq: Down 2.7%
* Top SA share movements: Beget Holdings (-33.3%), Dynamic Cables (-24%), Labat Africa (+55.2%), Mustek (+8.3%), Poynting Antennas (+76.2%), Sekunjalo (+8%), Spescom (-8.2%) and TCS (-20%)

The Financial Mail has published its 'Top Empowerment Companies' supplement. From a technology perspective, Sekunjalo Investments, which has a major IT portfolio, came in at number one. Other rankings were GijimaAst at number 12, EOH at 15, Business Connexion at 16, Datacentrix at 19 and AdaptIT at 23.