Intel makes $4bn investment

Locally it was also a very quiet week.

* FoneWorx is buying back the shares (30%) held by the IDC, and selling them on to the Kirsh family.
* Abraham Thomas was appointed country GM of IBM SA.
* Oliver Fortuin resigned as country GM of IBM SA.

* The ICT minister of the DRC said 3G licences have been awarded to Airtel, Africell, Oasis and Vodacom Congo.
* The Ghana Stock Exchange has suspended two IT firms, Clydestone and Transaction Solutions. The former was the first ICT company to list on the exchange.
* The appointments of Femi Adeoti as CEO of Inlaks Computers (Nigeria) African operations; and David Afugani as COO of rlg Communications (Ghana).
* Adelowo Adesola resigned as CEO of Inlaks Computers African operations.

Look out for possible new revelations in the MTN/Turkcell investigations.

Paul Booth, MD, Global Research Partners

* Avnet acquired Internix, a Japanese designer and distributor of electronic components.
* Microsoft bought Perceptive Pixel, a leader in interaction design, ie, multi-touch hardware and software technology.
* Oracle purchased Involver, a maker of software tools that let companies interact with customers on Facebook and Twitter's social media services.
* Salesforce.com acquired Goinstant, a technology start-up that provides a tool that enables end-users to remotely and jointly browse and manage the same Web page.
* Tech Data bought Brightstar Europe's 50% holding in their joint venture for $165.6 million. The latter is a distributor of mobile devices.
* Vodafone purchased TelstraClear, a New Zealand landline operator, for £430 million.
* Xerox acquired UK-based WDS, a firm that provides technical support, knowledge management and related consulting to the world's largest telecommunications brands.
* Intel invested $4 billion in ASML, the Dutch semiconductor company.
* Russia's MegaFon and Yota will merge their telecommunications operations.
* Very good quarterly figures from Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services.
* David Arnott was appointed CEO of Temenos, the Swiss banking software company.
* Guy Dubois resigned as CEO of Temenos.
* A withdrawn planned IPO by MobiTV, the mobile TV provider.

* International:
* The sell-off (76%) by Telefonica of its call centre unit, a deal that could raise EUR1 billion.
* The sell-off by TeliaSonera of its 76% stake in Yoigo, the Spanish mobile operator, in a deal that could raise over EUR1 billion.
* The IPO on the NYSE by Palo Alto Networks.
* Africa:
* The expansion by rlg Communications, a Ghana-based ICT company, into C^ote d'Ivoire, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
* South Africa:
* Possible new revelations in the MTN/Turkcell investigations.

* Mobile payments have more than doubled in popularity, reaching over 33% of survey respondents in the US, according to IDC.
* Worldwide PC shipment growth was flat in Q2 2012, according to Gartner, with HP just managing to stave off Lenovo for the number one slot. Acer took the number three slot from Dell, with ASUS coming in at five.

* JSE All share index: Down 1.3%
* Nasdaq: Down 1%
* Top SA share movements: Amecor (+11.1%), BCX-A (-8.3%), ConvergeNet Holdings (+8.8%), Datacentrix (+11.2%), FoneWorx (+8.3%), Ideco (-33.3%), Ifca Technologies (-16.7%), Poynting (-15.6%) and TCS (+100%)

Worldwide IT spending is on pace to reach $3.6 trillion in 2012, a 3% increase from 2011 spending of $3.5 trillion, according to the latest outlook by Gartner. The research firm's 2012 IT spending outlook has been revised up slightly from the 2.5% projection last quarter.

Gartner's IT spending forecast methodology relies heavily on rigorous analysis of the sales by thousands of vendors across the entire range of IT product and services.

Gartner uses primary research techniques, complemented by secondary research sources, to build a database of market size data on which to base its forecast.

The Gartner quarterly IT spending forecast delivers a unique perspective on IT spending across hardware, software, IT services and telecommunications segments.