Intel, McAfee deal in spotlight

The international ICT market was dominated last week by several acquisitions by the 'big boys', including Intel's purchase of McAfee for almost $8 billion. At home, the results and activities at MTN stole much of the local ICT headline space.

* Mixed interim numbers from MTN Group, with revenue down slightly but profit slightly up.
* A full-year loss from Broadband Infraco.
* Positive trading updates from Dialogue Group, Dimension Data and Poynting Antennas.
* Bytes Technology Group has become the number one empowered ICT company in South Africa, following the achievement of an average Level 2 on the DTI scorecard for 2010.
* InoVatio Distribution was appointed SA's new distributor for Autodesk's products.

* IBM has opened an office in Ghana.

Look out for the appointment of Mark Hurd as CEO of Dell.

Paul Booth, MD, Global Research Partners

* Apple acquired Siri, a mobile application that allows users to perform Web searches by voice command on a cellphone.
* Dell bought 3Par, a data storage company, for $1.15 billion.
* Google purchased Like.com, a shopping site that allows users to search for jewellery, handbags, shoes and watches.
* HP acquired Fortify Software, a software security assurance company.
* Intel bought McAfee, the former's largest-ever takeover deal, in a move that enhances Intel's ability to combat hacking and viruses as it pushes deeper into mobile computing. The deal was worth $7.68 billion.
* Intel also bought the cable modem chip unit of Texas Instruments.
* Nokia purchased Motally, a mobile analytics company.
* Oracle acquired Phase Forward, maker of software used to manage clinical drug trials, for $685 million.
* Windstream, a rural telecommunications operator, bought Q-Comm, a fibre optic network operator, for $515 million.
* Ybrant Digital (India), an online marketing company, purchased Lycos, the search engine and Internet portal.
* Excellent quarterly results from Lenovo (back in the black).
* Very good quarterly figures from Analog Devices and NetApp.
* Good half-year figures from ZTE.
* Good quarterly numbers from Dell, Open Text and Qatar Telecom.
* Satisfactory half-year figures from China Mobile.
* Satisfactory quarterly results from Blue Coat Systems, Brocade (back in the black), CACI International, HP and Tech Data.
* Mixed quarterly figures from Salesforce.com, with revenue up but profit down.
* Quarterly losses from Intuit and Mentor Graphics.
* Li Yue was named CEO of China Mobile as Wang Jianzhou resigned from the position.

* International:
* The appointment of Mark Hurd as CEO of Dell.
* The outcome of the bidding for Taiwan's China Network Systems, which is being sold by controlling shareholder, MBK Partners. The deal is expected to be worth between $2bn and $2.5bn with Australia's Macquarie and Bain Capital being among the short-listed bidders.

* South Africa:
* A possible BEE deal from CompuClearing.

* Worldwide PC microprocessor units and shipments grew 3.6% and 6.2% in Q2 this year, according to IDC.
* The worldwide security software market is set to grow 11% this year to at least $16.5 billion, according to Gartner.

* JSE All share index: Down 1.9%
* Nasdaq: Up 0.3%
* Top SA share movements: CompuClearing (-15.5%), ConvergeNet (+31.8%), Dialogue Group (-14.3%), ISA (-7.3%), Labat Africa (-7.5%), Silverbridge (+18.8%), TCS (-25%) and Vox Telecom (+7.1%)

Global Services Media has just published its annual GS100 Companies list that defines global outsourcing and reflects the diversity and overall landscape of the service provider community in terms of company size, countries of origin and countries of delivery - it is not just a list of the largest 100 outsourcing vendors. It represents companies from 18 countries with operations in 30 countries.

The GS100 model is based on four pillars:

* Management excellence
* Customer maturity
* Global delivery maturity
* Breadth of services portfolio

There are no companies from the African continent that have made it into the list. Also notable by their absence are Atos Origin, BT Global Services, Capgemini, IBM Global Services, Logica and T-Systems.