Cisco promises big UK buys

A handful of small acquisitions, including ones by Cisco, DST, Gartner and Splunk, were the highlights of the international ICT market last week.

At home, the resignation of MTN SA's CEO was the main local ICT story.

* A negative trading update from Reunert.
* Bidvest Media acquired Retroviral Digital Communications, a company that creates online 'word-of-mouth' advertising and marketing for brands using social media.
* According to the latest World Economic Forum's Global Information Technology Report 2015, sponsored by Cisco, which measures the relative capacity of 143 economies to leverage ICT for growth and economic and social transformation, SA dropped five places, to 75, in terms of the report's Networked Readiness assessment.
* The resignation of Ahmad Farroukh, CEO of MTN SA.

* The government of the Ivory Coast (Cote d'Ivoire) has nationalised three of the country's mobile networks, and plans to merge them into a single operator. The three mobile networks, Comium, Cafe Mobile and Lap Green, were all said to be deeply in arrears on taxes and licence fees, and not expected to make good on their debts.
* The appointments of Neill Burton as F5 Networks' head of channel and alliances for the UK, Ireland and sub-Saharan Africa region; Angela Kyerematen-Jimoh heads IBM Ghana as country GM; and Wim Vanhelleputte (former CEO of MTN Ivory Coast) as Bharti Airtel's new regional executive director for one of its key business units within Africa, ie, Gabon, Congo B, Burkina Faso, Niger, Chad, Madagascar and the Seychelles.

A federal judge has thrown out a $532.9 million award against Apple and ordered a new trial on damages.

* Cisco acquired MaintenanceNet, a customer tracking software provider, for $139 million.
* Cree bought APEI, a global leader in power modules and power electronics applications.
* DST purchased Wealth Management Systems, a leading provider of technology-based rollover services and financial planning and education solutions to the retirement services industry.
* Far EasTone, in conjunction with Morgan Stanley's Private Equity business, acquired China Network Systems, a TV operator, for $2.3 billion.
* Gartner bought CloudHarmony, an independent cloud performance benchmarking provider.
* HGGC, a private equity group, purchased Selligent, a Belgium-based automated marketing software company.
* KPN acquired Netherlands-based IS Group, a cloud services provider.
* Skyview Capital bought EMC's Syncplicity business.
* Splunk purchased Caspida, an innovator in machine learning and behavioural analytics, for $190 million.
* Zealot Networks acquired ViralNova, a social media-centric publisher.
* Spice Mobility (India) made a 26% investment in Creative Functionapps Lab, a company engaged in the business of telecoms and mobile Internet and developing innovative products and solutions for the next generation of telecoms networks.
* A federal judge has thrown out a $532.9 million award against Apple and ordered a new trial on damages, in a case where a jury found the iPhone maker's iTunes software infringed three patents owned by a Texas company.
* A US appeals court has upheld the cancellation of a software patent held by Versata that previously led to a $345 million jury verdict against SAP.
* Cisco is promising to spend $1 billion in the UK tech industry through a series of corporate acquisitions, venture capital investments and education programmes in the next five years.
* Satisfactory quarterly results from CSI.
* Quarterly losses from HTC.
* The appointments of Rahul Bhatnagar as MD and CFO of Bharti Enterprises; Stephen Kam-kun as interim CEO of Hong Kong mobile operator, SmarTone; Douglas C Shepard as interim president and CEO of Harte Hanks; and Bill Veghte, a veteran Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard executive, as CEO of online polling company SurveyMonkey.
* The resignation of Robert A Philpott, president and CEO of Harte Hanks.

South Africa:
* Government's ICT spend is estimated to reach $707.6 million in 2019, after reaching a total of $615.9 million in 2014, according to Frost & Sullivan.

EMEA/Africa:
* The integrated systems market in EMEA saw weak growth in 1Q15, reporting $593.66 million in user value to account for year-on-year growth of 9.3%, according to IDC.

Worldwide:
* Worldwide combined shipments of devices (PCs, tablets, ultramobiles and mobile phones) are expected to reach 2.5 billion units in 2015, a 1.5% increase from 2014 and down from the previous quarter's forecast of 2.8% growth, according to Gartner. End-user spending on devices will total $606 billion in 2015 and will show, for the first time since 2010, a 5.7% decline in current US dollars.
* Worldwide semiconductor revenue is forecast to reach $348 billion in 2015, a 2.2% increase from 2014, but down from the previous quarter's forecast of a 4% growth, according to Gartner.
8 Worldwide PC shipments totalled 68.4 million units in Q215, a 9.5% decline from Q214, according to Gartner. This was the steepest PC shipment decline since Q313. PC shipments are projected to decline 4.4% in 2015.
* Total cloud IT infrastructure spending (server, storage, and Ethernet switch) will grow by 26.4% in 2015 and will reach $33.4 billion, accounting for a third of all IT infrastructure spending, up from 28.1% in 2014, according to IDC. Private cloud IT infrastructure spending will grow by 16.8% year over year to $11.7 billion, while public cloud IT infrastructure spending will grow by 32.2% in 2015 to $21.7 billion. In comparison, spending on non-cloud IT infrastructure will remain flat at $67 billion.

* JSE All share index: Down 0.3%
* Nasdaq: Down 0.2%
* NYSE (Dow): Up 0.2%
* S&P 500: Flat (fractionally down)
* FTSE100: Up 1.3%
* Nikkei225: Down 3.7%
* Hang Seng: Down 4.5%
* Shanghai: Up 5.2%
* Top SA share movements: AEEI (+13.1%), Ellies (+11.1%), Jasco (+8.3%), Prescient (-8.8%) and Stella Capital Partners (+28.1%)

International:
* The outcome of Symantec's talks to sell its Veritas data storage business to private equity firm Carlyle Group.
* The acquisition by Thomas H Lee Partners of eBay's enterprise business.

South Africa:
* Further developments regarding the local telecommunications industry.

Fortune magazine has published its Top 500 US-based companies list for 2015. The following is further analysis of the list from a technology perspective.

Profitability: (Top 25)
* 1: Apple
* 4: Microsoft
* 11: Google
* 14: IBM
* 16: Intel
* 18: Oracle
* 19: Verizon Communications
* 22: Comcast
* 23: Qualcomm
* 24: Cisco

Market value: (Top 25)
* 1: Apple
* 2: Google
* 5: Microsoft
* 14: Verizon Communications
* 16: Oracle
* 19: Amazon
* 20: AT&T
* 24: IBM

Assets: (Top 50)
* 20: AT&T
* 29: Verizon Communications
* 30: Apple
* 40: Microsoft
* 42: Comcast