HP Comes Back In the Smartphone Market? Really?

This morning a lot has hit the news on Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) with their return to the smartphone market introducing their latest Slate6 VoiceTab and Slate7 VoiceTab named to the respect of their screen sizes. So basically, they are fighting the war of phone screen against Samsung now? I don't think it is a good measure to be going against Samsung with screen size as I truly believe that the Samsung Note offering a 5 inch display 5.5 inch with the Note 3 is already at its max due to the limitations of a regular human's palm. Similarly the new Lenovo IdeaPhone K900 isn't selling good in the market as well being a little too big for convenience. Comparing with a Samsung Note 3 in terms of phone dimension, Samsung actually achieved a larger screen of 5.5 inches with a smaller phone. Note 3 with the dimension of 5.95 x 3.12 x 0.33 in versus the K900 with the dimension of 6.18 x 3.07 x 0.27 in being only slimmer makes a clear winner on which phone consumers would really buy that could fit in their pocket.

Back to the story of HP which I believe they just couldn't compete anymore making it a suicide game of re-entering the smartphone market even with the Android OS. Money properly wasted instead of invested is suppose. HP would have a brighter future on developing new printers especially the ones consumers are crazy about which are 3D printers and with that I believe they would have the edge then. To HP stop copying and don't be another BlackBerry. HP's strategy of selling printer inks are one of the best 

Ciena Corp vs Cisco Systems

 VERSUS 

Earnings per share (EPS) for Ciena Corp (CIEN) is currently negative and forecast to move towards the positive side starting next year after a 5 years drop in the net income. Cisco Systems (CSCO) however maintained a good EPS with it being increasing year after year but forecast to lower in 2014 (not much). Forecast would forever be forecast and many things can happen within a year especially on how fast technology moved in a year. Few years ago we were talking about mobile devices and today it all became so common that nobody cares about these powerful devices anymore.

Projected EPS for CIEN next year is only +0.05 a forecast that is so near towards the negative area? That is just not what I want to see. Furthermore, investing with Cisco would let us gain some dividends not much but compared to Ciena which gave none and potentially dividends coming in only a few years later is just not what I am looking for at the moment because I also see that the rally this year might cool off before mid of next year.

I still think even Cisco stands out far from Ciena, both would not be a good bet with the current shift in technology. If Apple is capable of producing programs such as Facetime on their devices, these operating system giants putting more on network communication research for our daily device could lower the market share of companies like Cisco. Nevertheless, Cisco still have a division on providing servers which is currently booming which then leads to cloud computing.

I believe the future is now held by the big software makers Microsoft or Apple or even the upcoming Google with their own computer operating system. I am sure network communication capabilities targeting businesses would be somewhere on top of their priority. Cisco or Ciena are not like companies such as Autodesk where they have real custom software for designing. But the market for communication and people to obtain easy/cheaper communication capabilities has expanded due to the processing power of our mobile devices now. Cisco and Ciena have to move themselves forward changing the way they integrate communications into cloud.

Strong On Intel Corp

Following up on my recent strong buy point on Intel Corp (INTC). Thanks to these 2 articles that strengthen my view point and proof to be a good buy on INTC for the future.

http://seekingalpha.com/article/1914721-intel-moving-ahead-with-the-right-strategy?source=yahoo

The link above in on how Intel has positioned themselves towards gaining share on the 'Big Data' industry such as companies like Teradata Corp (TDC). Many thanks to Vivek Gupta for making me realize there are still more to come for the Big Data industry other than what Intel has already offered.

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2013/12/25/who-are-intels-two-major-phone-customers.aspx#.Ur0GCPQW2Z8

This link is is an article of what I've already expect to see more of Intel's involvement in making chips for the mobile devices market.

Thanks

Foxconn and BlackBerry Teaming Up ?

Last week shares of BlackBerry Ltd (BBRY) jumped from a low $6 to nearing the $8 in just a couple of day and the reason to that has many people looking into the joint venture with Foxconn a benefit towards the phone maker itself but I'll have to disagree on that. In fact it seems to be the reverse where Foxconn would benefit more towards this joint  venture.

I think we all know that device sales of BlackBerry dropped pretty bad with the introduction of touch screen capabilities for other devices. With that BlackBerry has been losing lots of its market share over the years until they finally brought in the BlackBerry Z10 with a full capacitive touch screen technology that replace their old fashioned full QWERTY keyboard on device thingy. When that model came out, the company shares plunged further knowing that the demand for their new devices are low. Problems after problems and now Foxconn wants part of it and everyone is jumping in. Seriously?

BlackBerry Z10

They only thing I can think of that would benefit Foxconn is that they are trying to build the processors for future BlackBerry phones just to be competitive in the mobile devices industry. At this particular period of time, the joint venture with BlackBerry seems to be a good move because the company value is relatively cheap compared to other phone makers. The technique that Foxconn implemented was somewhat similar to the buying of Nokia by Microsoft Corp (MSFT) where Microsoft realized that Nokia is relatively cheap and owns a full scale production facility and well as research making it ready to run. Similar to Microsoft that wanted to build its mobile OS market share by teaming up with Nokia, Foxconn wanted to build its mobile devices microprocessor market share by teaming up with BlackBerry. Both Nokia and BlackBerry were just very good and capable companies but was put off course with slow development on their side. I believe the future of mobile devices to be fairly equal with all makers getting a good amount of market share but don't really think that BlackBerry is up for it.

In the near future we might possibly see something like

Nokia = Windows Phone, Intel Microprocessors
BlackBerry = BlackBerry 10, Foxconn
Apple iPhone X = iOS, A7 chip
Samsung = Google Android, Qualcomm

In conclusion, I still believe that BlackBerry isn't worth investing for the long term seems growth have been declining over the years. Earnings Per Share (EPS) has been declining over the  years forecast to be much less in the next 5 years with sales revenue forecast to drop as well. Every stock facts about this share are just bad and contains a lot of negativity. So are we really expecting that this company might not just go bust? Maybe Foxconn would bail them out I don't know... Just too many uncertainties for BBRY at the moment.
The current jump of $2 would just not show much towards the long term.

Amazon Phone?

No Longer Just A Shop

I really wanted to write something on cloud computing because to be honest, it has really build the path the the future of computing. So what does it got to do with Amazon (AMZN) Phone or does it even exist? I'm definitely not talking rubbish or intoxicated and leave my wordings roll to my imagination but something just struck me from reading this article into thinking Amazon really has the capabilities of building a phone.

visit http://seekingalpha.com/article/1913051-aws-and-the-amazon-phone-the-next-big-thing?source=google_news

Reading from this article, it has totally changed the way I see cloud computing to be. Remember cloud computing jargon IaaS, SaaS, DaaS, etc. It really doesn't mean a thing when regular folks like you and me read it. Well definitely not for me as I am no tech expert but with the correct education towards what these cloud computing capabilities can do, it really cautioned investors like me into thinking outside the box.

The article above suggested that Amazon might create phones that are logged on to Amazon Web Services (AWS) and the phone would use the processing capabilities of the AWS and sends back information of the phone on the the device. The device can be designed as a ultra futuristic glass that doesn't require the conventional equipment where we have a processor in it. Definitely a good way to exploit the power of cloud computing.

Something like that might just be interesting !

Amazon has begun pricing and selling their WorkSpaces cloud computing software and further developments would let us see a Sci-Fi mobile phone in the future.

Follow Up On 3D Printing Technologies

Follow up on 3D printer technologies as well as the respective companies who produces them.

http://blogs.barrons.com/techtraderdaily/2013/12/23/stratasys-rising-gabelli-ups-to-buy-on-higher-multiple-on-nylon-high-margin-materials/?mod=BOL_da_rta

Some of these counters are changed from BUY from HOLD and that makes me wonder if all this bubble is going to explode in the near future. Indeed all these companies are trading at a relatively expensive price according to P/E ratio. Stratasys (SSYS) has high P/E ratio assuming it means anything of 222 and 3D Systems (DDD) has a P/E of 63. Truly it builds up my confidence into believing what Jim Cramer said earlier on all these being a bubble due to overly price stocks.

The Coming Up Of Intel Corp

Talking about the Microsoft Surface Pro 2 the other day focuses me towards their supplier of microprocessor Intel Corp (INTC). Intel is known to be the largest chipmaker in the world with Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) following closely behind. The problem with Intel in the last couple of years is the shifting of technology towards mobile devices which makes them a weaker company for investors to look at due to their inability to come up with a chip for mobile processors such companies like ARM Holdings (ARMH) or Qualcomm (QCOM). Both Intel and Microsoft faced similar problems as being laggers in the mobility market but both indeed both still remains strong for the market share of desktop/laptop computers. But with the introduction of the 22nm microprocessors by Intel, the results are very convincing pairing it with tablet and smartphones.

The 22nm is one the most efficient microprocessors in terms of processing power, energy efficiency and known to produce better graphics. With all of that in mind, a tablet would not have to sacrifice processing power for a prolonged battery life and having a better performance in graphic acceleration just moved it one step further into competing with regular laptop computers running custom graphic cards.

Seemingly all this are just good news for Intel and bad news for its competitors when the largest chipmaker in the world is once again competitive at what it does best in the industry. Well, a little bit of economies of scale comes in when they can provide good R&D and quality products all for a cheaper price. I foresee a higher growth for Intel in the next couple of years especially with the boom in mobile devices. Many more electronic device makers such as Samsung, Sony or even Chinese mobile giants could incorporating Intel's latest chipset into their devices. To start with that we saw Lenovo using the Intel chip with their devices already earlier this year.

Intel Inside

With the roll out of the the market for their products, this has placed Intel once again on the undervalued list of stocks. As soon as the "Intel Inside" logo starts to crawl into the covers of new devices, Intel shares would definitely crawl towards new highs in the future.