Our weekly round-up of the news you don’t want to miss:
While Microsoft’s announcement of Satya Nadella as its new CEO dominated IT-oriented news cycles this week it certainly wasn’t the only thing that happened.
Sony is getting out of the PC business.
Sony announced on Thursday that it’s going to sell off its VAIO line of PCs and get out of the PC market. The Japanese consumer electronics giant has been struggling in both the PC and TV markets and has rolled out "various reform measures" to try to make them profitable over the past two years but doesn’t expect that to happen before the current fiscal year ends in March. The VAIO brand and business will be sold to investment group Japan Industrial Partners (JIP), although Sony says it will continue to provide customer aftercare services. From now on, Sony will focus on smartphones and tablets.
Tech Data Unveils Global Mobile Division
Tech Data Corporationintroduced Tech Data Mobile Solutions – which really amounts to the company's “new again” global mobile business that was previously known as TDMobility. Tech Data’s initial foray in mobility was formed as a U.S. joint venture between Tech Data and Brightstar Corp. in April 2011 with Tech Data buying out Brightstar last November. Tech Data vet Rod Millar will lead the division as Senior Vice President, Tech Data Mobile Solutions. "Mobile products and solutions continue to be a strategic focus for Tech Data throughout our worldwide operations," said Bob Dutkowsky, chief executive officer at Tech Data. "Over the past seven years, Rod has been instrumental in the growth and development of Tech Data Mobile, our European mobile business. This new organizational structure further solidifies our commitment to the growing mobile space and better aligns our resources to this important component of our company strategy."
SDN Group recruits Startups
The Open Networking Foundation, one of several organizations promoting the adoption of software-defined networking, has dropped its membership free from $30,000 to $1,000 for startups (you have to be two years old or less to qualify), which will get the same membership bennies as their more established colleagues – which include the likes of Cisco Systems, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Intel, Google, Facebook and Oracle.
SolarWinds Earnings: Recurring Revenue jumps for N-able Parent
SolarWinds, parent of RMM vendor N-able Technologies, reported strong Q4 2013 results and says it will focus on driving new business through both subscriptions and licenses in the new year. For its Q4 2013, revenues increased 32 percent to $97.1 million YoY and net income dropped slightly to $21.9 million. In an earnings call with Wall Street analysts, SolarWinds CEO Kevin Thompson said the N-able team -- led by GM JP Jauvin -- continues to perform well and has seen increased demand across the entire portfolio. In addition to the acquiring N-able, SolarWinds also invested in application performance management (APM) vendor AppNeta and acquired database performance management specialist Confio.
Roaring Penguin announces integration with Autotask for MSPs
Roaring Penguin Software, Inc.is rolling out an integration with Autotask, along with a new messaging product, for MSPs in the latest version of its email filtering software. With the release of CanIt 9.1.0, Hosted CanIt and CanIt-Domain-PRO can now integrate with Autotask to automate monthly billing for anti-spam services. This is the first PSA integration for Roaring Penguin and the company is open to connecting with other products.
Report: Cellular M2M Tech will continue to see strong growth
According to a new report byBerg Insightthe retail industry experienced 18.4 million cellular M2M connection in 2013 and that number is expected to grow to hit 33.3 million by 2018. Cellular M2M technology frees retailers from the constraints of fixed line connectivity for their POS terminals and ATMs making them far more flexible. Berg Insight is equally bullish on the shipment forecasts for Cellular M2M device shipments, which it predicts will grow at a CAGR of 6.5 percent from 6.6 million units in 2013 to 9.1 million units in 2018.
NRF wants a collaborative approach to fighting cyber fraud
The National Retail Federation(NRF) is urging Congress to take a comprehensive approach to criminal cyberattacks in which millions of consumers’ credit and debit card numbers are stolen. NRF said retailers are willing to do their part to improve security, but that banks and card companies must also take major steps to shore up the current fraud-prone payments system.NRF Senior Vice President and General Counsel Mallory Duncan testified before a subcommittee of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee where he said the banking industry needs to start with the replacement of current cards that store consumer data on 1960s-era magnetic strips with modern cards that encrypt data on an embedded microchip and can only be used with a secret Personal Identification Number. Duncan also encouraged Congress to pass the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, which will make it easier for banks and retailers to share information about cyber threats.
