Tuesday, February 26, 2008
A sharp drop in profits for wireless equipment maker Ericsson reflected a tough market, Ericsson CEO Carl-Henric Svanberg said. He sees a "flatish" market ahead for the Swedish mobile communications giant but said Ericsson would "consider carefully" any assets rival Motorola might sell. Ericsson's CEO also promised cost cuts, including job reductions.
Mobile communications giant Ericsson posted a sharp decline in fourth-quarter net income, from $1.52 billion in the year-earlier period to $883.9 million. However, sales rose slightly from $8.49 billion one year ago to $8.54 billion.
Both results met the expectations of analysts, who were cautioned by the Swedish network equipment maker last October to expect a sharp profit decline.
"The market conditions have become tougher in the networks market," CEO Carl-Henric Svanberg told analysts during the company's latest conference call. In particular, the competitive landscape continues to change due to network operator consolidation , he said. Moreover, in the mature markets of Western Europe and North America last year, the company's revenues fell by 1 and 15 percent, respectively, he added.
The rapid growth of mobile communications infrastructures in emerging markets also "resulted in a higher proportion of new network builds with initial lower margins," Svanberg said. "We also had political unrest in several emerging markets, such as Bangladesh, Pakistan and Thailand."
Flat Growth Ahead
A handset joint venture with Sony contributed pretax income of $360.4 million to Ericsson's fourth-quarter results and $1.11 billion to the company's full-year report. Sony Ericsson increased its handset shipments to 30.8 million units in the fourth quarter, an 18 percent year-over-year rise, executives noted.
Sony Ericsson said it sold more than 100 million handsets in 2007. Based on the joint venture's estimate of 1.1 billion handset shipments for the total market in 2007, the company increased its market share 2 percentage points from 2006 to 9 percent.
In response to the news that Motorola is seriously considering separating its mobile handset unit from its other businesses, Svanberg said Ericsson would "consider carefully" any assets that its American rival might decide to sell, but remain cautious, as he believes it would be better for Ericsson to grow its business on its own.
"For 2008, we are finding it prudent to plan for a 'flatish' mobile infrastructure market," which is "basically the way 2007 ended," Svanberg told investors. "But industry fundamentals and consumer behavior support a positive longer-term outlook."
Cutting Costs
Svanberg noted that Ericsson has steadily improved its leading position and share of an "increasingly challenged" mobile networks market. "Our ambition is to continue to do so, irrespective of market fluctuations," he said.
To safeguard the company's competitive position, Ericsson will be taking steps to reduce its annual expenses by approximately $630 million through job reductions and other cost-cutting activities, Svanberg said. However, the new measures are not expected to exert their full effect on the company's bottom line until 2009, executives said.
Some industry observers think struggling network equipment manufacturers such as Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent, Nokia Siemens Networks and others should benefit from the higher-than-anticipated bids that American network operators submitted in the Federal Communication Commission's latest wireless spectrum auction. Given the strict network build-out deadlines that the FCC has imposed on winning bidders, Ericsson and other network equipment makers are likely to see a bump in North American orders before the end this year.
A Pakistani order to its ISPs to block Google's YouTube wound up breaking trust and hijacking YouTube's ISP address, sending global access to YouTube into a "black hole." Pakistan's attempt at censoring YouTube exposed weaknesses in the Internet architecture based on ISP trust.
In a bizarre turn of events, Pakistan's attempts to block its citizens from accessing Google-owned YouTube wound up sending the video-sharing site into a "black hole" and exposing some fundamental weaknesses of the Internet architecture.
It's not clear what YouTube video spurred the Pakistani action. Leading contenders include a film by Dutch anti-Islamic politician Geert Wilders and the incendiary political cartoons featuring the prophet Muhammad published by Dutch newspapers in 2005. The newspapers recently republished the cartoons in solidarity with the cartoonist, whose life was threatened in a plot discovered by Dutch authorities.
Whatever the reason, the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority issued an order to Pakistani ISPs to block YouTube. The nation's largest ISP, Pakistan Telecommunications Corp. Ltd. (PTCL) took steps to send all requests from Pakistan for YouTube into a "black hole." But, apparently inadvertently, the ISP hijacked YouTube's IP addresses, effectively shutting down the site for users around the world for several hours.
Google Still Investigating
"Traffic to YouTube was routed according to erroneous Internet protocols, and many users around the world could not access our site," Google announced after working around the problem. "We have determined that the source of these events was a network in Pakistan. We are investigating and working with others in the Internet community to prevent this from happening again."
BBC reporter Darren Waters, who did some of the early reporting on the story, wrote in a blog, "There will definitely be some fallout from this. It would seem that all it takes to hijack a Web site globally is for a telecoms firm to instruct its ISPs that they now run a domain, and for one of those ISPs to announce that globally. So that other ISPs follow suit in a piggyback chain of confusion."
What happened exactly? The answer has to do with some fairly low-level details in how data moves across the Internet and the "enormous responsibility large ISPs have in routing packets," said Andrew Storms, director of security operations for nCircle Network Security, in an e-mail.
Trust Agreements Violated
"When ISPs talk to each other, they use BGP (Border Gateway Protocol) to agree how traffic on the Internet should flow to be the most efficient. Part of that agreement is like showing your cards in a game of Go Fish," he said. "Comcast trusts that AT&T is telling the truth and trying to do the right thing, and vice versa."
Children are suffering more mental health problems because of the pressure on them to keep up with the latest trends, a new study shows.
A survey by a British children's charity found that children are more materialistic than past generations and worry if they don't have fashionable clothes and high-tech gadgets.
Children from poor backgrounds were more likely to feel distressed if they were falling behind the latest trends.
Institute of Child Health professor Philip Graham, who was part of the research team, said commercial pressures could have worrying psychological effects on children.
"One factor that may be leading to rising mental health problems is the increasing degree to which children and young people are preoccupied with possessions; the latest in fashionable clothes and electronic equipment," he said.
"Evidence both from the United States and from the UK suggests that those most influenced by commercial pressures also show higher rates of mental health problems."
The Children's Society's chief executive Bob Reitemeier said adults had to accept some responsibility for the amount of advertising directed at young people.
"To accuse children of being materialistic in such a culture is a cop-out," he said.
"Unless we question our own behaviour as a society we risk creating a generation who are left unfulfilled through chasing unattainable lifestyles."
But the DP-1, due out next month, is an attempt by a company best known as a
pictures.Similarly, the fixed focal length 16.6-millimeter lens (a wide-angle lens comparable to 28 millimeters on a typical film S.L.R.) does not zoom but offers a high level of optical correction and compactness.
Tom Sobey, the marketing manager for the Sigma Corporation of America, said some people were comparing the DP-1 to the Leica M8, another digital camera that is not an S.L.R. Given that the price of the Leica camera body and one lens starts at about $7,500, the DP-1 seems like a bargain, even after taking into account that Leica throws in a high-quality built-in optical viewfinder.
Friday, February 22, 2008
According to the Beeb, a professor in Northhampton University in the U.K. conducted a study of 360 subjects and found that up that up to a third became “tech-addicted.” Some would get up several times a night to check emails and text messages.
“You would be surprised how many people had their PDA or Blackberry next to their bed heads,” said Professor Nada Kakabadse. “Those who are addicted will get up in the middle of the night and pick up messages on their PDAs two or three times a night.”
Although in early stages the addiction can add to a worker’s productivity, the study also suggested that those who have to get their gadget fix may find it effects their job performance as they feel they must be connected at all times and over a long period of time, that linking can cause stress and anxiety, the inability to complete other tasks as they must constantly check messages, and even cause those addicted to become more withdrawn from everyday relationships as they pursue contact online. And often, detecting the addiction can come too late and that employers should provide proper warnings and training for a more healthy use of technology.
If squat thrusts and salads aren't your thing, maintain your health with these unusual technologies, like a combo glucose meter/gaming handheld and an MP3 player that sharpens your memory.
February is recognized as American Heart Month to help raise awareness of heart disease. The American Heart Association reports that an estimated 80.7 million American adults (that's one in three) have one or more types of cardiovascular disease, including high blood pressure, coronary heart disease, or have suffered a stroke. In women, heart disease is the leading cause of deaths.
This is why it's extremely important to lead a healthy lifestyle, which means putting down that game controller or stepping away from the computer to eat a salad or do some squat thrusts. Yes, I know that doesn't sound like your type of fun, but you can stay healthy and geek out at the same time, my friends. Maintain and monitor your health while still getting your gadget fix with the help of these 10 unusual gadgets, from a combo glucose meter/gaming handheld to an MP3 player that sharpens your memory. They may be just what the doctor ordered.
SLIDESHOW:
Glucoboy
Checking your blood glucose level should be as entertaining as playing video games, right? At least, that's the idea behind the Glucoboy. This handheld blood glucose meter features a 10-second test time, 0.6 µL sample size, automatic shut-off, and 360-result memory. Even more interesting is its ability to provide access to two full-length video games and a mini-arcade when used with the Nintendo Game Boy Advance or Nintendo DS handheld. Here's how it works: to access the video games, the Glucoboy must be inserted into the cartridge slot of either gaming handheld. Then, your blood glucose test results are converted into what the company calls "Glucose Reward Points," which can be used to unlock games. The games included are Lost Star Saga and Knock 'Em Downs. Currently, Glucoboy is available in Australia for $299 ($260 USD), but the company is working to make it available worldwide.
MC Square
Don't have the sharpest memory? Then spend 15 minutes a day with the MC Square ($399)—an MP3 player-like device with goggles that claims to relieve stress, improve memory, and enhance concentration through light and sound. Developed by Daeyang E&C, the MC Square features six program modes with natural sounds like rain drops to soothe and relax your mind. Put on the earbuds and goggles, power the device, and you'll begin to see red lights flashing at your eyes. (Apparently, blood vessels in the eyelids pass red/orange light most efficiently, so that's why the company used red LEDs in the goggles.) The MC Square isn't just a stress-reducing device; it's also an MP3 player with 512MB of onboard flash memory and a mini SD card, as well as a digital voice recorder (30-hour capacity) and image and text viewer with a color OLED screen.
Now check out the rest of the products in our Top 10 Strangest Health Gadgets story, including The Xtensor, Eyesseuse Eye Spa, Crown7 Battery-Operated Smoking Device, kickTrak, InforMedix Med-eMonitor, ReliefBand, NuMetrex Heart Rate Monitor Clothing, and Soladey Ionic Toothbrush.
