Last week saw the merger between MindSpring Enterprises and EarthLink Networks, with a combined total market value of about $3.5 billion, to create the second largest US Internet provider behind America Online. There was also the acquisition of the colour printing division of Tektronix by Xerox.
Loose remarks from Microsoft`s president saw its stocks plummet on a particularly bad Friday.
Locally, there was no real focus on any single news event in yet another short working week.
On the local front
very good year-end figures from Unihold;
very good interim (maiden) numbers from Datacentrix;
satisfactory nine-month figures from Acuity Group Holdings (very close to pro forma numbers); and
an interim loss by JemTech (prospectus showed no revenue projections, but interim figures must be well down on that expected).
[Local]
Local acquisitions, mergers, investments etc (see attachment).
Local Cautionary Notices (see attachment).
Local Listing calendar (see attachment).
On the international front
the announcement by SGI that it hopes to sell-off a majority stake in its Cray unit to a non-IT partner in the very near future,
strong rumours that MCI WorldCom may buy Sprint; and
the opening of AMR Research`s first overseas office in the UK.
[International]
International acquisitions, mergers, joint ventures etc (see attachment).
Other international news included:
the appointment of Craig Conway as the new president and CEO of PeopleSoft, following the resignation of founder and CEO David Duffield;
the resignation of David P Vesty, VP of Worldwide Sales at Progress Software, and of George T Shaheen, CEO and managing partner of Anderson Consulting, who will be joining Webvan, a small start-up company, as its CEO;
the resignation of Bill Harris, CEO of Intuit; and
the announcement that Bell Atlantic and Vodafone Airtouch are to form a new US National Wireless competitor.
Financial results
We saw excellent figures from Amstrad (back in the black) and Policy Master Group.
Losses came from Agile Software, Eltek, Fairchild Semiconductor International, Intelligent Environments Group, Liberate Technologies and Red Hat.
Good numbers were recorded by Cabletron Systems (income more than doubled, but revenue down), Charles River Associates, Corel (back in the black), Manchester Equipment, Staffware and Unique Broadband Systems; and satisfactory figures from 3Com, Cognos and National Data.
Mediocre returns came from Intermagnetics General, OEA (but back in the black) and Standard Microsystems; while very poor results came from Hadron.
Other financial news included profit warnings from Apple, Analysts International, Ciprico, Data Dimension, ICG Comms and Western Digital; share split announcements from NTL; and the announcement that Network Associates is to spin-off McAfee.com, the PC security company it acquired last December.
Stock movements
Locally
Accord (+25%)
CIH (-28.6%)
Digicore (-17.5%)
Elexir (-25%)
MB Technologies (+20%)
Micrologix (-30%)
MMW (-34.6%)
NetActive (+52.9%)
Pinnacle (+22%)
ValueCom (-25%)
WenTech (-22.2%)
Internationally
CNET (+34.3%)
Exabyte (+26.2%)
Geoworks (+17.8%)
GST Telecomms (-32.8%)
Olicom (-57.6%)
Quantum (-20.1%)
SCO (+19.4%)
Segue Software (+22.5%)
SSA (-31.2%)
Final word
The Microsoft Trial draws to an end with the closing arguments now having been presented, and we await the final outcome with curiosity, not so much with respect to the result but more from a possible move to break up the software giant. Additionally, loose remarks from Microsoft`s president saw its stocks plummet on a particularly bad Friday.
Following the massive earthquake in Taiwan, are we heading for a shortage of chip supplies, or are there sufficient alternate sources of supply? The numerous messages emanating from an assortment of different sources at the moment are somewhat confused.
Share
