A million gallons of ink and four gazillion pixels have been spilt detailing or pontificating on Oracle's acquisition of Sun Microsystems.
My colleague Gordon Haff, for example, has nicely laid out Oracle's plans for Sun (as best as can be known this soon). So I'll be brief...
Oracle's interest in taking Sun's assets forward is at the very high end of expectations. In the almost-a-year since it became clear that Sun was shopping itself around, first to IBM then to Oracle, we've heard the direst of predictions. "Oracle only wants Sun to kill MySQL" and "they'd be lucky if 25 percent of Sun remains after the deal closes" are just two examples. In fact, now that the deal has closed, Oracle has laid out plans to retain most of Sun's key assets and lines of business. Java, Solaris, Sparc, storage, OpenOffice--Oracle has said clearly that it will continue these. In most cases, it's promised to invest more than Sun was investing. Sure, that's not necessarily a huge challenge, given the rolling waves of defunding that encroached on many of these projects over the years that Sun struggled. But it's exactly the opposite of what many expected.
Co-opetition continues but with much more leverage. Oracle will continue to work with IBM, Hewlett-Packard, SAP, Dell, EMC, Red Hat, VMware, and even Microsoft. These companies have too many joint customers and too many billions of dollars of revenue at stake to truly "go their own way." They have to work together--but not every day, in every account. Oracle will increasingly offer an all--or mostly--Oracle portfolio to customers that are amenable to it. While partners remain hugely important to Oracle's business, they'd darn well better be providing what the customer perceives as significant value, or else Oracle will seek to edge them out and own their erstwhile share of mind, market, and wallet. This isn't unique to Oracle. IBM, Cisco Systems, and others are doing exactly the same thing. But we expect Oracle to play this angle particularly well and aggressively.
Enterprise vs. lightweight. Oracle is making a clear distinction between enterprise software (Oracle DBMS and Fusion middleware, for example) and lightweight software infrastructure more suited to Web development. Some of Sun's software assets and technologies (most notably, Java, and maybe some parts around identity) will be pulled into Oracle's enterprise camp. But most of Sun's middleware assets--including those like MySQL, GlassFish, and NetBeans that Sun regarded as its crown jewels--will be developed and sold as more lightweight, Web-focused tools.
Open vs. open source. Oracle's model of "open" isn't the same as Sun's. In particular, it doesn't include nearly as much open source. Oracle does some open source, and the Sun acquisition brings in many more open-source assets and contributions to which Oracle can now lay rightful claim. But Oracle utterly declines to bow to the "everything on an open-source foundation" religion that Sun adopted in recent years. Key parts of Oracle's stack--the Oracle DBMS, its Fusion middleware, etc.--are decidedly closed source and are almost certain to remain that way. Oracle's model is much closer to that of IBM: encourage open source philosophically, leverage it where possible, support it where it's pragmatic to do so, but make sure to collect a toll for core pieces of "the stack."
Discipline and value. Oracle will be enormously more disciplined about the investments it makes (and doesn't make). It will also be much more disciplined and aggressive about seeking payment for value delivered. No more "build it, and they will come" daydreams. Oracle is a business, and an aggressive one. It has plenty of resources to invest--something Sun lacked in recent years--and it means to invest in a lot of Sun's areas of operations. But the investments it makes--in MySQL, in Solaris, in whatever--are not necessarily those that Sun would have made, nor with quite the same goals. To Sun's barbarian tribes, Oracle is the relentless, conquering Roman Empire.
Oracle is no longer a software company. It's an Integrated IT company. IT is maturing. It's no longer about "best of breed" point-products, or owning just one "category." De facto, enterprise customers value integration above almost all other virtues; IT businesses respond by having most systematic overall portfolios. I recently discussed how traditional boundaries and definitions have gone by the wayside as the IT industry rapidly consolidates. The new Oracle is part and parcel of this trend. Oracle now has a full-spectrum offer: servers, storage, networking, software, and services.
The fact that Oracle has decided to do most of what Sun was doing, only better, is bad news for many other vendors. It's breadth now rivals that of HP and IBM. And that means Oracle is going to be a serious (or more serious) competitor on many fronts.
SAN FRANCISCO - Apple Inc CEO Steve Jobs took the wraps off the highly anticipated "iPad" tablet and pitched it at a surprisingly low price, aiming to bridge the gap between smartphones and laptops.
Jobs, who returned to the helm last year after a much-scrutinized liver transplant, took the stage at a packed theater Wednesday and showed off a sleek, half-inch thick tablet computer with a 9.7-inch touchscreen.
The iPad can run movies, games and a gamut of applications. And taking on e-readers like Amazon's Kindle, Apple announced a digital bookstore called iBooks that will let users buy from publishers including Pearson Plc's Penguin, News Corp's HarperCollins, and Hachette Book Group.
"What once occupied half your living room can now be dropped in a bag," said NPD analyst Ned May. "It's pulling together a variety of needs [in] a universal entertainment device."
The iPad will sell from late March for as low as $499 for 16 gigabytes of storage. An extra $130 is needed to equip it with third-generation wireless capability.
"Pricing is very aggressive, so it's pretty positive from a mass adoption perspective. It was about $200 lower than what I was expecting," said Brian Marshall, an analyst with Broadpoint Amtech. Other analysts had speculated that the tablet may cost as much as $1,000.
Shares of Apple rose to as high as $210.58 after the pricing news, up 5.5 percent from their session low. The stock closed up 0.94 percent at $207.88 on Nasdaq, within reach of its all-time high of $215.59 logged on Jan 5.
Apple announced a data plan with AT&T Inc, which appeared to have beaten out Verizon Wireless for the deal. Shares of AT&T, Apple's carrier partner on the iPhone, rose 1.14 percent while Verizon Communications Inc fell about 1 percent.
Apple's biggest product launch since iPhone
The iPad is Apple's biggest product launch since the iPhone three years ago, and arguably rivals the smartphone as the most anticipated in the company's history. Wednesday's event follows months of feverish speculation on the Web and on Wall Street.
Apple hopes to sell consumers on the value of tablets after other technology companies, including Microsoft Corp and Toshiba Corp, have failed in recent years. As iPod sales wane, Apple is looking for another growth engine.
Jobs said there was a need for a new type of device that would sit between a smartphone and laptop computer, and that can perform tasks like browse the Web and play games.
"If there's going to be a third category of device, it's going to have to be better at these kinds of tasks," said the chief executive, dressed in his trademark black turtleneck and blue jeans.
The iPad has a near life-sized touch keyboard and supports Web browsing. It comes with a built-in calendar and address book, Jobs said, calling it "awesome."
Some analysts said the iPad, with its multimedia bells and whistles, is a tough competitor for Amazon's Kindle. But others noted that the Kindle costs less -- $259 for the cheapest version -- and was more tailored for long-form reading.
"This is not an e-reader -- this is a device that can be used to read books," Cowen & Co analyst James Friedland said of the iPad. "This doesn't change the game -- at the same time, Apple is a formidable competitor and our view is that over time, Apple and Amazon will emerge as the two largest players" in e-books.
Shares of Amazon took a brief hit but recovered to end 2.7 percent higher at $122.75 on Nasdaq.
In an online poll on reuters.com before Wednesday's media event, 37 percent of more than 1,000 respondents said they would pay $500-$699 for the tablet. Nearly 30 percent weren't interested, while 20 percent said they would pay $700-$899.
http://www.montrealgazette.com/technology/Apple+about+unveil+tablet/2490375/story.html
SINGAPOREAN women have coped well during the recent downturn despite facing more stress at work, going by an informal survey by the NTUC's Women's Development Secretariat (WDS).
While more than half of the 300 working women surveyed said the downturn affected them - some had pay cuts while others worked longer hours without overtime pay - they still found time for their families and pursued other commitments after work.
Close to 70 per cent of the respondents, all of whom are married, cut back on expenditure but this was in non-essential areas such as eating out and overseas holidays.
The results of the survey, taken this month, were presented by NTUC's deputy secretary-general Halimah Yacob at the first joint dialogue session between the WDS and the PAP Women's Wing (PAPWW) yesterday.
The survey provided a snapshot of the impact of the crisis on women in Singapore, Madam Halimah said.
Yesterday's dialogue at the Management Development Institute of Singapore was chaired by the leader of the PAPWW, Mrs Lim Hwee Hua, who is also a minister in the Prime Minister's Office.
Read the full story in today's edition of The Sunday Times.Sometime last year, the Erie County executive’s staff ran the numbers.
They figured they would need an unprecedented $10 million from local taxpayers in 2010 to keep child care subsidies at current levels for working-poor families.
But what if some percentage of those families suddenly lost their subsidies? Would they join the welfare rolls, and how much would that cost local taxpayers?
At most, $1.4 million, the county’s Social Services Department figured. That’s because the federal and state governments pay for the bulk of the welfare grants that provide income for the poor.
In general, for every $25 the county spends, the state and federal governments spend $75 on welfare grants.
Some of the families already receive Medicaid coverage and other safety net supports. But even if many families joined the Medicaid rolls, the county’s cost increases are capped at around 3.5 percent a year. State government assumes the rest.
When County Executive Chris Collins and his Social Services Department focused on child care subsidies they considered unsustainable, they opted to drop some 40 percent of the eligible children, aware of the risk that some working- poor parents will quit their jobs and turn to public assistance because they will be better off.
Even if each of the almost 700 families signed up for safety-net programs — which Social Services experts consider unlikely — county officials knew the cost to local taxpayers would fall well below the $10 million required to keep those day care subsidies at full steam for another year.
“What kind of message is that sending?” a day care provider asked Thursday as county legislators, parents and officials in the Collins administration searched for a way to continue the subsidies for at least a few more months. The meeting ended with no solution, as the deadline fell on hundreds of families and their day care providers, who predict layoffs as well.
Erie County in late December gave affected families a 10- day warning, then extended the deadline to 30 days from the date their notice letter was printed. Subsidies will end for the vast majority of those 694 families this week or soon after.
The program’s overriding aim involves helping the working poor remain employed and able to make ends meet in low-paying jobs.
Further, Collins has brought a conservative’s view to county government, and one conservative principle involves moving people off welfare by helping them find and keep jobs.
The religious group VOICE-Buffalo expressed such a value when it urged Collins last week to soften the blow by retaining subsidies for 90 more days.
“As people of faith, we believe that the working poor should be encouraged to work,” the Rev. Paul Bossi said. “We believe in pathways out of poverty.”
Aides to Collins say don’t blame them — blame state government, which in recent years reduced Erie County’s “child care block grant.” Other New York counties are in similar straits, or soon will be, said William Graham, the county’s first deputy Social Services commissioner.
The recession created more requests for child care aid, he said. So did the state’s decision to drop a short-lived rule that single parents must seek child-support from the noncustodial parent in order to collect a subsidy.
Assemblyman Mark J. F. Schroeder, D-Buffalo, has asked the state Office of Children and Family Services to focus on Erie County’s situation, which the office is now doing. The state late last week told Erie County that it cannot require day care centers to collect pay stubs from parents to confirm eligibility for the subsidies. The rule was to go into effect Monday.
Schroeder agrees that state government bears some blame for its tendency to pass costs to counties as a way to relieve its own financial stress.
“We all have to do better in a time like this,” he said. “If there is a way that the state, through the Office of Children and Family Services and the State Legislature, can help, I stand ready to help.”
Schroeder, however, mentioned the more than $74 million Erie County will receive in federal stimulus dollars over two years to help with its Medicaid expenses. Collins has chosen to plow that money into the government’s reserve accounts to cover revenue shortfalls rather than spend it on job creation. Under the stimulus formula, Erie County collects even more if its unemployment rate worsens.
“What about using it for people who, in this case, are working and striving for their families?” Schroeder asked.
The nation’s support system for working-poor families has glitches.
The National Center for Children in Poverty, part of the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University, recently reported that small increases in income can trigger sharp reductions in benefits, leaving families no better off than before.
Erie County’s new eligibility rules provide a case in point. Families whose incomes only slightly exceed Erie County’s new limit — 125 percent of the poverty level — will have to spend thousands of dollars a year more on child care.
Erie County’s decision will cost more in the long run, and families that return to welfare will find it more difficult to climb out the second time around, said David Seith, a research analyst for the center.
“Churning is bad. It is more expensive to systems,” he said. “Gaps in employment make it more difficult to get into other jobs. When there is a gap in tenure, it really hurts.”
Erie County officials had looked at the experience elsewhere. Monroe County for a time limited child care subsidies to families earning no more than 125 percent of the poverty level, they said.
Monroe County dropped around 560 families. Just 12 were on public assistance 90 days later.
County legislators want to wrestle $2.6 million out of Collins, the amount that his Social Services unit says would keep child care subsidies intact for another 90 days. Comptroller Mark C. Poloncarz figures the Collins team has exaggerated the problem and that the county really needs less than $2 million to continue subsidies for three months.
In 90 days, Erie County should know whether it qualifies for a new round of federal stimulus dollars for child care. But the deadline is now for the families.
Collins’ Social Services commissioner, Carol Dankert, has said she hopes parents can turn to relatives, extended relatives or social agencies to work out their day care needs and remain employed.
Jennifer Ward of Buffalo made it work. Ward, a paralegal, predicted in a Buffalo News article Jan. 6 that her monthly child care costs would triple and that she would be better off quitting work, going onto welfare and caring for her two children herself.
Since then, she has found another day care situation that requires her to pay a manageable $400 a month for the care of her two children rather than the $700 a month she had initially priced. She will remain employed but figures many other mothers will not be as fortunate. So she wrote Collins a letter to tell him that his decision was misguided:
“As a successful businessman, Mr. Collins, whose business expertise you tout as a reason for why you were the best candidate for Erie County executive, how can you possibly believe that it makes good business sense to potentially put working families into a position where they can no longer work?
“I will be interested to continue to see how all of this plays out . . . and if within the next 30 to 90 days your administration might not be forced to take a look at a bigger mess that now needs cleaning.”
mspina@buffnews.com
http://www.buffalonews.com/cityregion/story/941222.html
CHINA has cancelled all military exchanges with the United States in response to the proposed $US6.4 billion ($7.23 billion) sale of advanced missiles and helicopters to Taiwan by Washington.
Beijing has also imposed sanctions on the companies selling the arms and threatened to review co-operation on other issues.
The US responded defiantly, insisting that the sales would contribute to regional security.
The angry row escalates frictions between Beijing and Washington, who are at odds over trade, climate change and a threat by internet giant Google to leave the Chinese market in protest against computer hacking of its members' accounts.
It is a further blow to the hopes of the US President, Barack Obama, to secure Chinese support for tougher measures against Iran over its illicit nuclear program.
The State Department insisted that the arms sale contributed to ''security and stability'' between Taiwan and China.
''Such sales contribute to maintaining security and stability across the Taiwan Strait,'' said a US State Department spokeswoman, Laura Tischler. ''The US is the leading arms supplier to Taiwan and, under a 1979 act of Congress, is legally obliged to help Taiwan defend itself.''
China had warned the US that the sale would have a ''serious negative impact'' on ties between the two countries. Beijing regards Taiwan as a renegade province that is still part of its territory.
Announcing its retaliation, a Defence Ministry spokesman, Huang Xueping, said: "We made the decision out of considerations on the severe harm of the US arms sales to Taiwan.''
China's Vice Foreign Minister, He Yafei, said the arms deal would lead to an ''aftermath both sides would not prefer'' and called on Washington to reverse its ''erroneous'' decision.
Mr He said China was "strongly indignant" about the package of weapons, which includes 114 Patriot anti-missile missiles, 60 Black Hawk helicopters and two minesweepers, which was submitted to the US Congress for approval on Friday.
''The US plan will definitely undermine China-US relations and bring about a serious negative impact on exchanges and co-operation in major areas between the two countries,'' said Mr He in a statement.
There have been no signs Beijing will try to use its US dollar assets to pressure Washington, or impose broader trade penalties, both steps that would undercut China's economic strength.
But China's Defence Ministry said military exchanges would be put on hold and Beijing postponed vice ministerial-level talks on security, arms control and non-proliferation.
The military freeze could prevent a visit to China by the US Defence Secretary, Robert Gates. Military contacts between the two powers are limited, and were last suspended by China in 2008 over a previous round of US arms sales to Taiwan.
The row is the latest sign of the fraught relationship between the two superpowers.
Mr Obama's decision later this year to meet the Dalai Lama, who China regards as a dangerous separatist, has also angered Beijing.
Telegraph, London
http://www.smh.com.au/world/china-retaliates-over-us-arms-deal-with-taiwan-20100131-n6n7.html
