Research In Motion
 | |
| Type | Public |
|---|---|
| Traded as | TSX: RIM NASDAQ: RIMM NASDAQ-100 Component S&P/TSX 60 Component |
| Industry | Telecommunications, Wireless handheld devices |
| Founded | 1984 |
| Founder(s) | Mike Lazaridis |
| Headquarters | Waterloo, Ontario, Canada |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Key people | Mike Lazaridis (President & Co-CEO) Jim Balsillie (Co-CEO) |
| Products | BlackBerry, BlackBerry Enterprise Server, BlackBerry Internet Service, QNX, Ripple Emulator, Tungle.me |
| Revenue |  US$ 19.907 billion (2011)[1] |
| Operating income | US$ 4.636 billion (2011)[1] |
| Net income | US$ 3.411 billion (2011)[1] |
| Total assets | US$ 12.875 billion (2011)[1] |
| Total equity | US$ 8.938 billion (2011)[1] |
| Employees | 17,500 (July 2011)[2] |
| Website | RIM.com |
Research In Motion Limited or RIM is a Canadian multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, that designs, manufactures and markets wireless solutions for the worldwide mobile communications market. RIM provides platforms and solutions for access to information, including e-mail, voice, instant messaging, short message service (SMS), Internet and intranet-based applications and browsing. RIM’s portfolio includes the BlackBerry wireless solution, the RIM Wireless Handheld product line, software development tools and other software and hardware. It was founded by Mike Lazaridis, who currently serves as its co-CEO along with Jim Balsillie.
Contents
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History
Prior to the manufacture of the BlackBerry, RIM worked with RAM Mobile Data and Ericsson to turn the Ericsson-developed Mobitex wireless data network into a two-way paging and wireless e-mail network. Pivotal in this development was the release of the Inter@ctive pager 950, which started shipping in August 1998. About the size of a bar of soap, this device competed against the SkyTel two-way paging network developed by Motorola.
RIM's early development was financed by Canadian institutional and venture capital investors in 1995 through a private placement in the privately-held company. Working Ventures Canadian Fund Inc. led the first venture round
with a C$5,000,000 investment with the proceeds being used to complete the development of RIM's two-way paging system hardware and software. A total of C$30,000,000 in pre-IPO financing was raised by the company prior to its initial public offering on the Toronto Stock Exchange in January, 1998 under the symbol RIM.[3]Since then, RIM has released a variety of devices running on GSM, CDMA, and iDEN networks. The ubiquity of these BlackBerry devices in the corporate environment and the compulsive use of its ability to quickly send and receive e-mail has earned it the nickname "Crackberry" in a reference to crack cocaine as users feel they cannot live without it.
In 2006 Research In Motion and Information Appliance Associates reached a licensing agreement whereby RIM would offer the complete version of PocketMac for BlackBerry to Macintosh users free of charge.[4]
In October 2008, RIM was named one of "Canada's Top 100 Employers" by Mediacorp Canada Inc., and was featured in Maclean's newsmagazine.[5]
RIM announced in February 2009 that they were expanding their global operations by opening an office and training facility in North Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Just across the Harbour Bridge, ten minutes from the Sydney CBD, the new RIM offices were formally unveiled by Mr Thomas A.MacDonald, Consul General of Canada, at a ceremony attended by dignitaries from the New South Wales Government and North Sydney Council, as well as RIM’s partners and customers. The new office features training facilities, a research and development centre, a strategic partner marketing centre and technical support services.[6] Total workforce provides 12,000 jobs world wide.
In June 2009 RIM has announced they were acquiring Dash Navigation, makers of the Dash Express.[7] In August 2009, RIM acquired Torch Mobile, enabling the inclusion of a Webkit-based browser on their Blackberry devices.
On August 18, 2009, Fortune Magazine named RIM as the fastest growing company in the world with a growth of 84% in profits over three years despite the recession.[8]
On March 26, 2010, the company announced acquisition of BlackBerry applications developer Viigo, a Toronto-based company. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.[9]
RIM reached an agreement with Harman International on April 12, 2010, for RIM to acquire QNX Software Systems. "RIM is excited about the planned acquisition of QNX Software Systems and we look forward to ongoing collaboration between Harman, QNX and RIM to further integrate and enhance the user experience between smartphones and in-vehicle audio and infotainment systems," said Mike Lazaridis, President and Co-CEO at RIM. "In addition to our interests in expanding the opportunities for QNX in the automotive sector and other markets, we believe the planned acquisition of QNX will also bring other value to RIM in terms of supporting certain unannounced product plans for intelligent peripherals, adding valuable intellectual property to RIM's portfolio and providing long-term synergies for the companies based on the significant and complementary OS expertise that exists within the RIM and QNX teams today."[10][11][12]
On September 27, 2010, RIM announced the long rumoured BlackBerry PlayBook tablet computer. The BlackBerry PlayBook was officially released to US and Canadian consumers on April 19, 2011.
As of May 2010, RIM OS held 10.4% of the smartphone operating system market.[13]
On Jun 30, 2011, an investor push for the company to split its dual-CEO structure was unexpectedly withdrawn after an agreement was made with RIM. RIM announced that after discussions between the two groups, Northwest & Ethical Investments will withdraw its shareholder proposal before RIM's annual meeting.[14]
In September 2011, RIM decided to build assembly factory (hardware) in Malaysia rather in Indonesia, but Indonesia will become the Blackberry's application and market research center (software).[15]
On October 10, 2011, RIM experienced one of the worst service outages in the company's history. Tens of millions of BlackBerry users in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and North America were unable to receive or send emails and BBM messages through their phones.[16] The outage was caused as a result of a core switch failure, "A transition to a back-up switch did not function as tested, causing a large backlog of data, RIM said."[17] Service was restored Thursday 13 October, with RIM announcing a $100 package of free premium apps for users and enterprise support extensions [18][19]
Growth
| Year | Sales | Operating Income | Net Income |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2002[20] | 294,000,000 | (58,000,000) | (28,000,000) |
| 2003[20] | 307,000,000 | (64,000,000) | (149,000,000) |
| 2004[20] | 595,000,000 | 78,000,000 | 52,000,000 |
| 2005[20] | 1,350,000,000 | 386,000,000 | 206,000,000 |
| 2006[20] | 2,066,000,000 | 617,000,000 | 375,000,000 |
| 2007[20] | 3,037,000,000 | 807,000,000 | 632,000,000 |
| 2008[20] | 6,009,000,000 | 1,731,000,000 | 1,294,000,000 |
| 2009[20] | 11,065,000,000 | 2,722,000,000 | 1,893,000,000 |
| 2010[20] | 14,953,000,000 | 3,507,000,000 | 2,457,000,000 |
| 2011[20] | 19,907,000,000 | 4,739,000,000 | 3,444,000,000 |
Decline
In June 2011, the company has announced the prediction of Q1 2011 revenue which will drop for the first time in nine years and also unveiled plans to reduce jobs. It is followed by the market which the stock dropped to its lowest level since 2006.[21] Since June 2008 to June 2011, RIM's shareholders lost almost $70 billion or 82 percent as the biggest decline among communications-equipment providers, from $83 billion at 3 years before to current $13.6 billion.[22]
In July 2011, the company axed 2,000 jobs, the biggest lay-off in its history. The lay-off reduced the workforce of the company by around 11% in one stroke from 19,000 to 17,000.[23]
RIM has lost market share continously to Apple Inc. iPhone and Android phones made decline of profit and the share value. On December 16, 2011 RIM shares fell to the lowest price since January 2004 and the stock has dropped 77 percent in 2011.[24]
Patent litigation
Since the turn of the century, RIM has been embroiled in a series of suits relating to alleged patent infringement.[25]
In 2001, Research In Motion sued competitor Glenayre Electronics[26] Inc for patent infringement, partly in response to an earlier infringement suit filed by Glenayre against RIM. RIM sought an injunction to prevent Glenayre from infringing on RIM's "Single Mailbox Integration" patent.[27] The suit was ultimately settled in favour of RIM.
In June 2002, Research In Motion filed suit against 2000 start-up and competitor Good Technology.[28] RIM filed additional complaints through-out the year.[29] In March 2004, Good agreed to a licensing deal, thereby settling the outstanding litigation.[30]
On September 16, 2002, Research In Motion was awarded a patent pertaining to keyboard design on hand-held e-mail devices. Upon receiving the patent, it proceeded to sue Handspring over its Treo device.[29][31]Handspring eventually agreed to license RIM's patent and avoid further litigation in November of the same year.[32]
During the appeals, RIM discovered new prior art that raised a "substantial new question of patentability" and filed for a reexamination of the NTP patents in the United States Patent and Trademark Office. That reexamination was conducted separately to the court cases for infringement. In February 2006, the USPTO rejected all of NTP's claims in three disputed patents. NTP has appealed the decision, and the reexamination process is still outgoing as of July 2006 (See NTP, Inc. for details).
On March 3, 2006, RIM announced that it had settled its BlackBerry patent dispute with NTP. Under the terms of the settlement, RIM has agreed to pay NTP US$612.5 million in a “full and final settlement of all claims.” In a statement, RIM said that “all terms of the agreement have been finalized and the litigation against RIM has been dismissed by a court order this afternoon. The agreement eliminates the need for any further court proceedings or decisions relating to damages or injunctive relief.”[citation needed]
On July 17, 2003, while still embroiled in litigation with NTP and Good Technology, RIM filed suit against Xerox in the U.S. District of Hartford, Connecticut. The suit was filed in response to discussions about patents held by Xerox that might affect RIM's business, and also asks that patents held by Xerox be invalidated.[33]
On May 1, 2006, RIM was sued by Visto for infringement of four patents.[34] Though the patents were widely considered invalid and in the same veins as the NTP patents – with a judgement going against Visto in the U.K.[35][36] – RIM settled the lawsuit in the United States on July 16, 2009, with RIM agreeing to pay Visto US$267.5M plus other undisclosed terms.[37]
On January 22, 2010, Motorola requested that all BlackBerry smartphones be banned from being imported into the United States for infringing upon five of Motorola's patents. Their patents for "early-stage innovations", including UI, power management and WiFi, are in question.[38] RIM countersued later the same day, alleging anti-competitive behaviour and that Motorola had broken a 2003 licensing agreement by refusing to extend licensing terms beyond 2008.[39] The companies settled out of court on June 11, 2010.[40]
Acquisitions
Alt-N Technologies
Alt-N Technologies, Ltd., a software development company and division of Research In Motion (RIM) founded in 1996 by Arvel Hathcock produces and sells the MDaemon email server for Windows.[41] Alt-N Technologies develops email messaging and security server applications for the medium and small business communities.
Alt-N Technologies’ products are sold and supported internationally through a network of distributors and resellers.[42]
Products
Software products
- MDaemon – Multi-language SMTP/POP3 mail server software.[43][44]
- SecurityGateway – Email spam firewall server software that protects Microsoft Exchange and SMTP Servers from spam and malware.[43][45]
- RelayFax – email-to-fax and fax-to-email server software.[43]
Hardware products
- MDaemon Email Server Appliance – Integrates MDaemon and SecurityPlus for MDaemon software into a single server appliance.[46]
Industry participation
- Online Trust Alliance (OTA)[47]
- Domain Assurance Council (DAC)[47]
- Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)[47]
- Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group (MAAWG)[47]
Industry awards
- Online Trust Alliance (OTA) 2007 Online Safety Leadership Award.[48]
Certicom
Certicom Corp. is a cryptography company founded in 1985 by Gordon Agnew,[49] Ron Mullin and Scott Vanstone.
The Certicom intellectual property portfolio includes over 350 patents and patents pending worldwide that cover key aspects of elliptic curve cryptography (ECC): software optimizations, efficient hardware implementations, methods to enhance the security, and various cryptographic protocols.[citation needed]
The National Security Agency (NSA) has licensed 26 of Certicom's ECC patents as a way of clearing the way for the implementation of elliptic curves to protect US and allied government information.[50]
Certicom's current customers include General Dynamics, Motorola, Oracle, Research In Motion and Unisys.[citation needed]
On January 23, 2009, VeriSign entered into an agreement to acquire Certicom.[51] Research In Motion put in a counter-offer, which was deemed superior.[52] VeriSign did not match this offer,[53] and so Certicom announced an agreement to be acquired by RIM,.[54] Upon the completion of this transaction, Certicom became a wholly owned subsidiary of RIM, and was de-listed from the Toronto Stock Exchange on March 25, 2009.
DataViz
DataViz, Inc. is a software company located in Milford, Connecticut. They sell RoadSync, and MacLinkPlus. MacLinkPlus is a Macintosh program for converting files from one format to another. RoadSync utilizes the Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync protocol to access Exchange information which includes e-mail, calendar and contact information. On September 8, 2010, they sold their office suite Documents To Go and other assets to Research In Motion for $50 million.[55]
The Astonishing Tribe
The Astonishing Tribe (TAT) is a company with headquarters in Malmö, Sweden. Founded in February 2002 by Mikael Tellhed, Ludvig Linge, Paul Blomdahl, Karl-Anders Johansson, Per Grimberg, and Hampus Jakobsson. TAT started out as a hobby project and for the first year the company worked with TV commercials, animation, post production for film, consultancy services within image compression for embedded systems, and interactive art.TAT was acquired by Research in Motion (RIM), the maker of the Blackberry smartphone, on December 2, 2010
. They are set to bring "their talent to the BlackBerry PlayBook and smartphone platforms."[56]During the second year the company got traction in the mobile industry and started to employ people. Focus shifted completely to user interfaces, especially licensing technology for rendering and structuring of the user interface. As of September 2010 over 180 employees work for TAT at the offices in Sweden, South Korea, the United States, and the newly opened office in Japan. TAT works with some of the biggest mobile brands such as Samsung, Sony Ericsson, Orange and, Motorola. TAT also license software to other industries such as automotive and consumer electronics.
Some of the founding members have a history from the demo group Yodel
. This group made a contribution to The Party 1996 called The Astonishing Tribe
JayCut
In July 2011, RIM brought on JayCut, a Sweden-based company that is an online video editor.[57] JayCut will work with RIM to add video editing capabilities to the BlackBerry platform.[57]
Newbay
In October 2011, RIM brought on NewBay, an Irish-based company that is an online video, pics and tool for media networks editor "[5]
RIM stock option scandal settlement
In 2007 Co-CEO Jim Balsillie was forced to resign as chairman as the company announced a $250-million earnings restatement relating to mistakes in how it granted stock options. Furthermore, an internal review found that hundreds of stock-option grants had been backdated, timed to a low share price to make them more lucrative.[58]
In January 2009, Canadian regulators stated that they were seeking a record penalty of $80 million USD from the top two executives, Co-CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis. Furthermore, the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) has pushed for Balsillie to pay the bulk of any penalty and relinquish his seat on RIM's board of directors for a period of time.[59]
On February 5, 2009, several executives and directors of Research In Motion agreed to pay the penalties to settle an investigation into the backdating of stock options. The Ontario Securities Commission approved the arrangement in a closed-door meeting.
Under the terms of a settlement agreement with the OSC, RIM co-chief executive officers Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis, as well as chief operating officer Dennis Kavelman, will jointly pay a total of $68-million (CDN) to RIM to reimburse the company for losses from the backdating and for the costs of a long internal investigation. The three are also required to pay $9-million (CDN) to the OSC.
Mr. Balsillie will step down from RIM's board of directors for a year, but will remain in his executive role.[60][61]
Environmental record
In November 2011 RIM was ranked 15th out of 15 electronics manufactures in Greenpeace’s re-launched Guide to Greener Electronics. The guide ranks manufacturers according to their policies and practices to reduce their impact on the climate, produce greener products, and make their operations more sustainable. RIM appeared for the first time in 2011 with a score of 1.6 out of 10. In the Energy section the company was criticized by Greenpeace for not seeking external verification for its data on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, for not having a clean electricity plan and for not setting a target to reduce GHG emissions.[62]
RIM performed badly in the Products category, only scoring points for the energy efficiency of its products as it reports that its Blackberry charger gets the European Commission IPP 4-star rating. Meanwhile on Sustainable Operations the company scored well for its stance on conflict minerals and received points for its Paper Procurement Policy and its mail-back programme for e-waste. Nevertheless, RIM was given no points for the management of GHG emissions from its supply chain.[62]
Controversies
On Jun 30, 2011, an alleged anonymous senior RIM employee penned an open letter to the company's senior management. The writer's main objective was getting co-CEOs Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie to seriously consider his or her suggestions and complaints on the current state and future direction of the company.[63]
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Apple Inc.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about the technology company. For other companies named "Apple", see Apple (disambiguation).
 | |
| Type | Public |
|---|---|
| Traded as | NASDAQ: AAPL NASDAQ-100 Component S&P 500 Component |
| Industry | Computer hardware Computer software Consumer electronics Digital distribution |
| Founded | April 1, 1976 (incorporated January 3, 1977 as Apple Computer, Inc.) |
| Founder(s) | Steve Jobs Steve Wozniak Ronald Wayne[1] |
| Headquarters | Apple Campus, 1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, California, U.S. |
| Number of locations | 357 retail stores(as of October 2011) |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Key people | Tim Cook (CEO) Arthur Levinson (Chairman)[2] |
| Products | |
| Services | |
| Revenue | US$ 108.249 billion (FY 2011)[3] |
| Operating income | US$ 33.790 billion (FY 2011)[3] |
| Profit | US$ 25.922 billion (FY 2011)[3] |
| Total assets | US$ 116.371 billion (FY 2011)[3] |
| Total equity | US$ 76.615 billion (FY 2011)[3] |
| Employees | 60,400 (2011)[4] |
| Subsidiaries | Braeburn Capital FileMaker Inc. Anobit |
| Website | Apple.com |
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) formerly Apple Computer, Inc. is an American multinational corporation that designs and markets consumer electronics,computer software, and personal computers. The company's best-known hardware products include the Macintosh line of computers, the iPod, the iPhone and theiPad. Apple software includes the Mac OS X operating system; the iTunes media browser; the iLife suite of multimedia and creativity software; the iWork suite of productivity software; Aperture, a professional photography package; Final Cut Studio, a suite of professional audio and film-industry software products; Logic Studio, a suite of music production tools; the Safari web browser; and iOS, a mobile operating system. As of July 2011, the company operates 357 retail stores in ten countries,[5] and an online store where hardware and software products are sold.[6] As of September 2011, Apple has recently been the largest publicly traded company in the world by market capitalization[7], and the largest technology company in the world by revenue and profit.[citation needed]
Established on April 1, 1976 in Cupertino, California, and incorporated January 3, 1977,[8] the company was previously named Apple Computer, Inc., for its first 30 years, but removed the word "Computer" on January 9, 2007,[9] to reflect the company's ongoing expansion into the consumer electronics market in addition to its traditional focus on personal computers.[10] As of September 2010, Apple had 46,600 full time employees and 2,800 temporary full time employees worldwide[3] and had worldwide annual sales of $65.23 billion.[3]
For reasons as various as its philosophy of comprehensive aesthetic design to its distinctive advertising campaigns, Apple has established a unique reputation in the consumer electronics industry. This includes a customer base that is devoted to the company and its brand, particularly in the United States.[11] Fortune magazine named Apple the most admired company in the United States in 2008, and in the world in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011. Apple was also branded as the most valuable public limited company, pushing past Exxon.[12][13][14][15] The company has however received widespread criticism for its contractors' labor, environmental, and business practices.[16][17]
Contents
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History
Main article: History of Apple Inc.
1976–1980: The early years
The Apple I, Apple's first product, was sold as an assembled circuit board and lacked basic features such as a keyboard, monitor, and case. The owner of this unit added a keyboard and a wooden case.
Apple was established on April 1, 1976 by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne,[1] to sell the Apple I personal computer kit. They were hand-built by Wozniak[18][19] and first shown to the public at the Homebrew Computer Club.[20] The Apple I was sold as a motherboard (with CPU, RAM, and basic textual-video chips)—less than what is today considered a complete personal computer.[21] The Apple I went on sale in July 1976 and was market-priced at $666.66 ($2,572 in 2011 dollars, adjusted for inflation.)[22][23][24][25][26][27]
Apple was incorporated January 3, 1977[8] without Wayne, who sold his share of the company back to Jobs and Wozniak for $800. Multi-millionaire Mike Markkulaprovided essential business expertise and funding of $250,000 during the incorporation of Apple.[28][29]
The Apple II was introduced on April 16, 1977 at the first West Coast Computer Faire. It differed from its major rivals, the TRS-80 and Commodore PET, because it came with character cell based color graphics and an open architecture. While early models used ordinary cassette tapes as storage devices, they were superseded by the introduction of a 5 1/4 inch floppy disk drive and interface, the Disk II.[30]
The Apple II was chosen to be the desktop platform for the first "killer app" of the business world—the VisiCalc spreadsheet program.[31] VisiCalc created a business market for the Apple II, and gave home users an additional reason to buy an Apple II—compatibility with the office.[31] According to Brian Bagnall, Apple exaggerated its sales figures and was a distant third place to Commodore and Tandy until VisiCalc came along.[32][33]
By the end of the 1970s, Apple had a staff of computer designers and a production line. The company introduced the ill-fated Apple III in May 1980 in an attempt to compete with IBM and Microsoft in the business and corporate computing market.[34]
Jobs and several Apple employees including Jef Raskin visited Xerox PARC in December 1979 to see the Xerox Alto. Xerox granted Apple engineers three days of access to the PARC facilities in return for the option to buy 100,000 shares (800,000 split-adjusted shares) of Apple at the pre-IPO price of $10 a share.[35] Jobs was immediately convinced that all future computers would use a graphical user interface (GUI), and development of a GUI began for the Apple Lisa.[36]
When Apple went public, it generated more capital than any IPO since Ford Motor Company in 1956 and instantly created more millionaires (about 300) than any company in history[citation needed].
1981–1985: Lisa and Macintosh
The Model from Apple's "1984" ad, set in a dystopian future modeled after the George Orwell novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, set the tone for the introduction of the Macintosh.
Steve Jobs began working on the Apple Lisa in 1978 but in 1982 he was pushed from the Lisa team due to infighting, and took over Jef Raskin's low-cost-computer project, the Macintosh. A turf war broke out between Lisa's "corporate shirts" and Jobs' "pirates" over which product would ship first and save Apple. Lisa won the race in 1983 and became the first personal computer sold to the public with a GUI, but was a commercial failure due to its high price tag and limited software titles.[37]
In 1984, Apple next launched the Macintosh. Its debut was announced by the now famous $1.5 million television commercial "1984". It was directed by Ridley Scott, aired during the third quarter of Super Bowl XVIII on January 22, 1984,[38] and is now considered a watershed event for Apple's success[39] and a "masterpiece".[40][41]
The Macintosh initially sold well, but follow-up sales were not strong[42] due to its high price and limited range of software titles. The machine's fortunes changed with the introduction of the LaserWriter, the first PostScript laser printer to be offered at a reasonable price, and PageMaker, an early desktop publishing package. The Mac was particularly powerful in this market due to its advanced graphics capabilities, which had necessarily been built in to create the intuitive Macintosh GUI. It has been suggested that the combination of these three products was responsible for the creation of the desktop publishing market.[43]
In 1985 a power struggle developed between Jobs and CEO John Sculley, who had been hired two years earlier.[44] The Apple board of directors instructed Sculley to "contain" Jobs and limit his ability to launch expensive forays into untested products. Rather than submit to Sculley's direction, Jobs attempted to oust him from his leadership role at Apple. Sculley found out that Jobs had been attempting to organize aputsch and called a board meeting at which Apple's board of directors sided with Sculley and removed Jobs from his managerial duties.[42] Jobs resigned from Apple and founded NeXT Inc. the same year.[45]
1986–1993: Rise and fall
See also: Timeline of Apple II family and Timeline of Macintosh models
Having learned several painful lessons after introducing the bulky Macintosh Portable in 1989, Apple introduced the PowerBook in 1991. The Macintosh Portable was designed to be just as powerful as a desktop Macintosh, but weighed 7.5 kilograms (17 lb) with a 12-hour battery life. The same year, Apple introduced System 7, a major upgrade to the operating system, which added color to the interface and introduced new networking capabilities. It remained the architectural basis for Mac OS until 2001.
The success of the PowerBook and other products brought increasing revenue.[44] For some time, it appeared that Apple could do no wrong, introducing fresh new products and generating increasing profits in the process. The magazine MacAddict named the period between 1989 and 1991 as the "first golden age" of the Macintosh.
Following the success of the Macintosh LC, Apple introduced the Centris line, a low-end Quadra offering, and the ill-fated Performa line that was sold in several confusing configurations and software bundles to avoid competing with the various consumer outlets such as Sears, Price Club, and Wal-Mart, who were the primary dealers for these models. The result was disastrous for Apple as consumers did not understand the difference between models.[46]
During this time Apple experimented with a number of other failed consumer targeted products including digital cameras, portable CD audio players, speakers, video consoles, and TV appliances. Enormous resources were also invested in the problem-plagued Newton division based on John Sculley's unrealistic market forecasts.[citation needed] Ultimately, all of this proved too-little-too-late for Apple as their market share and stock prices continued to slide.[citation needed]
Apple saw the Apple II series as too expensive to produce, while taking away sales from the low end Macintosh.[47] In 1990, Apple released the Macintosh LC with a single expansion slot for the Apple IIe Card to migrate Apple II users to the Macintosh platform.[47] Apple stopped selling the Apple IIe in 1993.
Microsoft continued to gain market share with Windows, focusing on delivering software to cheap commodity personal computers while Apple was delivering a richly engineered, but expensive, experience.[48] Apple relied on high profit margins and never developed a clear response. Instead they sued Microsoft for using a graphical user interface similar to the Apple Lisa in Apple Computer, Inc. v. Microsoft Corporation.[49] The lawsuit dragged on for years before it was finally dismissed. At the same time, a series of major product flops and missed deadlines sullied Apple's reputation, and Sculley was replaced by Michael Spindler.[50]
1994–1997: Attempts at reinvention
The Newton was Apple's first foray into the PDA markets, as well as one of the first in the industry. Despite being a financial flop at the time of its release, it helped pave the way for the Palm Pilot and Apple's owniPhone and iPad in the future.
By the early 1990s, Apple was developing alternative platforms to the Macintosh, such as the A/UX. Apple had also begun to experiment in providing a Mac-only online portal which they called eWorld, developed in collaboration with America Online and designed as a Mac-friendly alternative to other online services such as CompuServe. The Macintosh platform was itself becoming outdated because it was not built for multitasking, and several important software routines were programmed directly into the hardware. In addition, Apple was facing competition from OS/2 and UNIX vendors like Sun Microsystems. The Macintosh would need to be replaced by a new platform, or reworked to run on more powerful hardware.[51]
In 1994, Apple allied with IBM and Motorola in the AIM alliance. The goal was to create a new computing platform (the PowerPC Reference Platform), which would use IBM and Motorola hardware coupled with Apple's software. The AIM alliance hoped that PReP's performance and Apple's software would leave the PC far behind, thus countering Microsoft. The same year, Apple introduced the Power Macintosh, the first of many Apple computers to use IBM's PowerPC processor.[52]
In 1996, Michael Spindler was replaced by Gil Amelio as CEO. Gil Amelio made many changes at Apple, including extensive layoffs.[53] After multiple failed attempts to improve Mac OS, first with the Taligent project, then later with Copland and Gershwin, Amelio chose to purchase NeXT and its NeXTSTEP operating system, bringing Steve Jobs back to Apple as an advisor.[54] On July 9, 1997, Gil Amelio was ousted by the board of directors after overseeing a three-year record-low stock price and crippling financial losses. Jobs became the interim CEO and began restructuring the company's product line.
At the 1997 Macworld Expo, Steve Jobs announced that Apple would join Microsoft to release new versions of Microsoft Office for the Macintosh, and that Microsoft made a $150 million investment in non-voting Apple stock.[55]
On November 10, 1997, Apple introduced the Apple Online Store, tied to a new build-to-order manufacturing strategy.[56][57]
1998–2005: Return to profitability
On August 15, 1998, Apple introduced a new all-in-one computer reminiscent of the Macintosh 128K: the iMac. The iMac design team was led by Jonathan Ive, who would later design the iPod and theiPhone.[58][59] The iMac featured modern technology and a unique design, and sold almost 800,000 units in its first five months.[60]
Through this period, Apple purchased several companies to create a portfolio of professional and consumer-oriented digital production software. In 1998, Apple announced the purchase of Macromedia's Final Cutsoftware, signaling its expansion into the digital video editing market.[61] The following year, Apple released two video editing products: iMovie for consumers and, for professionals, Final Cut Pro, which has gone on to be a significant video-editing program, with 800,000 registered users in early 2007.[62] In 2002 Apple purchased Nothing Real for their advanced digital compositing application Shake,[63] as well as Emagic for their music productivity application Logic, which led to the development of their consumer-level GarageBand application.[64][65] iPhoto's release the same year completed the iLife suite.[66]
Mac OS X, based on NeXT's OPENSTEP and BSD Unix was released on March 24, 2001, after several years of development. Aimed at consumers and professionals alike, Mac OS X aimed to combine the stability, reliability and security of Unix with the ease of use afforded by an overhauled user interface. To aid users in migrating fromMac OS 9, the new operating system allowed the use of OS 9 applications through Mac OS X's Classic environment.[67]
On May 19, 2001, Apple opened the first official Apple Retail Stores in Virginia and California.[68] Later on July 9 they bought Spruce Technologies, a DVD authoringcompany. On October 23 of the same year, Apple announced the iPod portable digital audio player, and started selling it on November 10. The product was phenomenally successful — over 100 million units were sold within six years.[69][70] In 2003, Apple's iTunes Store was introduced, offering online music downloads for $0.99 a song and integration with the iPod. The service quickly became the market leader in online music services, with over 5 billion downloads by June 19, 2008.[71]
Since 2001 Apple's design team has progressively abandoned the use of translucent colored plastics first used in the iMac G3. This began with the titanium PowerBookand was followed by the white polycarbonate iBook and the flat-panel iMac.[72][73]
2005–2007: The Intel transition
Main article: Apple's transition to Intel processors
The MacBook Pro (15.4" widescreen) was Apple's first laptop with an Intelmicroprocessor. It was announced in January 2006 and is aimed at the professional market.
At the Worldwide Developers Conference keynote address on June 6, 2005, Steve Jobs announced that Apple would begin producing Intel-based Mac computers in 2006.[74] On January 10, 2006, the new MacBook Pro and iMac became the first Apple computers to use Intel's Core Duo CPU. By August 7, 2006 Apple had transitioned the entire Mac product line to Intel chips, over one year sooner than announced.[74] The Power Mac, iBook, and PowerBook brands were retired during the transition; theMac Pro, MacBook, and MacBook Pro became their respective successors.[75][76] On April 29, 2009, The Wall Street Journal reported that Apple was building its own team of engineers to design microchips.[77]
Apple also introduced Boot Camp to help users install Windows XP or Windows Vista on their Intel Macs alongside Mac OS X.[78]
Apple's success during this period was evident in its stock price. Between early 2003 and 2006, the price of Apple's stock increased more than tenfold, from around $6 per share (split-adjusted) to over $80. In January 2006, Apple's market cap surpassed that of Dell.[79] Nine years prior, Dell's CEO Michael Dell said that if he ran Apple he would "shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders."[80]
Although Apple's market share in computers had grown, it remained far behind competitors using Microsoft Windows, with only about 8% of desktops and laptops in the U.S.[81]
2007–2011: iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad
Delivering his keynote speech at the Macworld Expo on January 9, 2007, Jobs announced that Apple Computer, Inc. would from that point on be known as Apple Inc., because computers were no longer the main focus of the company, which had shifted its emphasis to mobile electronic devices. The event also saw the announcement of the iPhone and the Apple TV.[82] The following day, Apple shares hit $97.80, an all-time high at that point. In May, Apple's share price passed the $100 mark.[83]
In an article posted on Apple's website on February 6, 2007, Steve Jobs wrote that Apple would be willing to sell music on the iTunes Store without DRM (which would allow tracks to be played on third-party players) if record labels would agree to drop the technology.[84] On April 2, 2007, Apple and EMI jointly announced the removal of DRM technology from EMI's catalog in the iTunes Store, effective in May.[85] Other record labels followed later that year.
In July of the following year, Apple launched the App Store to sell third-party applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch.[86] Within a month, the store sold 60 million applications and brought in $1 million daily on average, with Jobs speculating that the App Store could become a billion-dollar business for Apple.[87] Three months later, it was announced that Apple had become the third-largest mobile handset supplier in the world due to the popularity of the iPhone.[88]
On December 16, 2008, Apple announced that after over 20 years of attending Macworld, 2009 would be the last year Apple would be attending the Macworld Expo, and that Phil Schiller would deliver the 2009 keynote in lieu of the expected Jobs.[89] Almost exactly one month later, on January 14, 2009, an internal Apple memo from Jobs announced that he would be taking a six-month leave of absence, until the end of June 2009, to allow him to better focus on his health and to allow the company to better focus on its products without having the rampant media speculating about his health.[90] Despite Jobs' absence, Apple recorded its best non-holiday quarter (Q1 FY 2009) during the recession with a revenue of $8.16 billion and a profit of $1.21 billion.[91]
After years of speculation and multiple rumored "leaks" Apple announced a large screen, tablet-like media device known as the iPad on January 27, 2010. The iPad runs the same touch based operating system that the iPhone uses and many of the same iPhone apps are compatible with the iPad. This gave the iPad a large app catalog on launch even with very little development time before the release. Later that year on April 3, 2010, the iPad was launched in the US and sold more than 300,000 units on that day and reaching 500,000 by the end of the first week.[92] In May of the same year, Apple's market cap exceeded that of competitor Microsoft for the first time since 1989.[93]
Apple released the fourth generation iPhone, which introduced video calling, multitasking, and a new uninsulated stainless steel design, which acts as the phone's antenna. Because of this antenna implementation, some iPhone 4 users reported a reduction in signal strength when the phone is held in specific ways. After a large amount of media coverage including mainstream news organizations, Apple held a press conference where they offered buyers a free rubber 'bumper' case, which had been proven to eliminate the signal reduction issue. Later that year Apple again refreshed its iPod line of MP3 players which introduced a multi-touch iPod Nano, iPod Touch with FaceTime, and iPod Shuffle with buttons which brought back the buttons of earlier generations.[94][95][96]
In October 2010, Apple shares hit an all-time high, eclipsing $300.[97] Additionally, on October 20, Apple updated their MacBook Air laptop, iLife suite of applications, and unveiled Mac OS X Lion, the latest installment in their Mac OS X operating system.[98] On January 6, 2011, the company opened their Mac App Store, a digital software distribution platform, similar to the existing iOS App Store.[99] Apple was featured in the documentary Something Ventured which premiered in 2011.
2011–present: Post–Steve Jobs era
On January 17, 2011, Jobs announced in an internal Apple memo that he would take another medical leave of absence, for an indefinite period, to allow him to focus on his health. Chief operating officer Tim Cooktook up Jobs' day-to-day operations at Apple, although Jobs would still remain "involved in major strategic decisions for the company."[100] Apple became the most valuable consumer-facing brand in the world.[101]In June 2011, Steve Jobs surprisingly took the stage and unveiled iCloud. iCloud is an online storage and syncing service for music, photos, files and software which replaced MobileMe, Apple's previous attempt at content syncing. [102] This would be the last product launch Jobs would attend before his death. It has been argued that Apple has achieved such efficiency in its supply chain[103] that the company operates as amonopsony (one buyer, many sellers), in that it can dictate terms to its suppliers.[104] [105] Briefly in July 2011, due to the debt-ceiling crisis, Apple's financial reserves were greater than those of the US Government.[106] On August 24, 2011, Jobs resigned his position as CEO of Apple.[107] He was replaced by Tim Cook and Jobs became Apple's chairman. Prior to this, Apple did not have a chairman and instead had two co-lead directors, Andrea Jung and Arthur D. Levinson, who continued with those titles.[108]
On October 4, 2011, Apple announced the iPhone 4S, which includes an improved camera with 1080p video recording, a dual core A5 chip capable of 7 times faster graphics than the A4, an "intelligent software assistant" named Siri, and cloud-sourced data with iCloud.[109][110] One day later, on October 5, 2011, Apple announced that Jobs had died, marking the end of an era for Apple Inc.[111][112] The iPhone 4S was officially released on October 14, 2011. On October 29, 2011, Apple purchased C3 Technologies, a mapping company, for $240 million. C3 is the third mapping company Apple has purchased so far.[113]
Products
Mac and accessories
See also: Timeline of Macintosh models, List of Macintosh models grouped by CPU type, and List of Macintosh models by case type
- Mac mini, consumer sub-desktop computer and server introduced in 2005.
- iMac, consumer all-in-one desktop computer introduced in 1998.
- Mac Pro, workstation-class desktop computer introduced in 2006, replacing the Power Macintosh.
- MacBook, consumer notebook introduced in 2006, replacing the iBook, now only being sold to educational institutions.
- MacBook Pro, professional notebook introduced in 2006, replacing the PowerBook.
- MacBook Air, ultra-thin, ultra-portable notebook introduced in 2008.
Apple also sells a variety of computer accessories for Mac computers including the AirPort wireless networking products, Time Capsule, Thunderbolt Display, Magic Mouse, Magic Trackpad, Wireless Keyboard, and the Apple Battery Charger.
iPad
Main article: iPad
On January 27, 2010, Apple introduced their much-anticipated media tablet, the iPad running a modified version of iOS. It offers multi-touch interaction with multimedia formats including newspapers, magazines, ebooks, textbooks, photos, movies, TV shows videos, music, word processing documents, spreadsheets, video games, and most existing iPhone apps.[114] It also includes a mobile version of Safari for web browsing, as well as access to the App Store, iTunes Library, iBooks Store, contacts, and notepad. Content is downloadable via Wi-Fi and optional 3G service or synced through the user's computer.[115] AT&T was initially the sole US provider of 3G wireless access for the iPad.[116]
On March 2, 2011, Apple introduced an updated iPad model which had a faster processor and two cameras on the front and back respectively. The iPad 2 also added support for optional 3G service provided byVerizon in addition to the existing offering by AT&T.[117] However, the availability of the iPad 2 has been limited as a result of the devastating tsunami and ensuing earthquake in Japan in March 2011.[118]
iPod
Main article: iPod
On October 23, 2001, Apple introduced the iPod digital music player. It has evolved to include various models targeting the wants of different users. The iPod is the market leader in portable music players by a significant margin, with more than 220 million units shipped as of September 2009.[119] Apple has partnered with Nike to offer theNike+iPod Sports Kit enabling runners to synchronize and monitor their runs with iTunes and the Nike+ website
. Apple currently sells four variants of the iPod.
- iPod Shuffle, ultraportable digital audio player first introduced in 2005, currently available in a 2 GB model.
- iPod Nano, portable media player first introduced in 2005, currently available in 8 and 16 GB models. The latest generation has a FM radio, a pedometer, and a newmulti-touch interface that replaced the traditional iPod click wheel.
- iPod Classic (previously named iPod from 2001 to 2007), portable media player first introduced in 2001, currently available in a 160 GB model.
- iPod Touch, portable media player that runs iOS, first introduced in September 2007 after the iPhone went on sale. Currently available in 8, 32, and 64 GB models. The latest generation features the Apple A4 processor, a Retina Display, and dual cameras on the front and back. The back camera allows for HD video recording at 720p.
iPhone
Main article: iPhone
At the Macworld Conference & Expo in January 2007, Steve Jobs revealed the long anticipated[120] iPhone, a convergence of an Internet-enabled smartphone and iPod.[121] The original iPhone combined a 2.5Gquad band GSM and EDGE cellular phone with features found in hand held devices, running scaled-down versions of Apple's Mac OS X (dubbed iOS, formerly iPhone OS), with various Mac OS X applications such as Safari and Mail. It also includes web-based and Dashboard apps such as Google Maps and Weather. The iPhone features a 3.5-inch (89 mm) touch screen display, 4, 8, or 16 GB of memory, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi (both "b" and "g").[121] The iPhone first became available on June 29, 2007 for $499 (4 GB) and $599 (8 GB) with an AT&T contract.[122]
On February 5, 2008, Apple updated the original iPhone to have 16 GB of memory, in addition to the 8 GB and 4 GB models.[123] On June 9, 2008, atWWDC 2008, Steve Jobs announced that the iPhone 3G would be available on July 11, 2008.[124] This version added support for 3G networking, assisted-GPS navigation, and a price cut to $199 for the 8 GB version, and $299 for the 16 GB version, which was available in both black and white. The new version was visually different from its predecessor in that it eliminated the flat silver back, and large antenna square for a curved glossy black or white back. Following complaints from many people, the headphone jack was changed from a recessed jack to a flush jack to be compatible with more styles of headphones. The software capabilities changed as well, with the release of the new iPhone came the release of Apple's App Store; the store provided applications for download that were compatible with the iPhone. On April 24, 2009, the App Store surpassed one billion downloads.[125]
On June 8, 2009, at Apple's annual worldwide developers conference, the iPhone 3GS was announced, providing an incremental update to the device including faster internal components, support for faster 3G speeds, video recording capability, and voice control. On June 7, 2010, at WWDC 2010, theiPhone 4 was announced, which Apple says is its "'biggest leap we've taken" since the original iPhone.[126]
The phone includes an all-new design, 960x640 display, Apple's A4 processor used in the iPad, a gyroscope for enhanced gaming, 5MP camera with LED flash, front-facing VGA camera and FaceTime video calling. Shortly after the release of the iPhone 4, it was realized by consumers that the new iPhone had reception issues. This is due to the stainless steel band around the edge of the device, which also serves as the phones cellular signal and Wi-Fi antenna. The current fix for this issue was a "Bumper Case" for the phone distributed for free to all iPhone 4 owners for a few months. In June 2011, Apple overtook Nokia to become the world's biggest smartphone maker by volume.[127]
On October 4, 2011, Apple unveiled the iPhone 4S, which was released in the United States, Canada, Australia, United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Japan on October 14, 2011, with other countries set to follow later in the year[128]. This was the first iPhone model to feature the Apple A5 chip, as well as the first offered on the Sprint network (joining AT&T and Verizon Wireless as the United States carriers offering iPhone models). On October 19, 2011, Apple announced an agreement with C Spire Wireless to sell the iPhone 4S with that carrier in the near future, marking the first time the iPhone was officially supported on a regional carrier's network[129].
Another notable feature of the iPhone 4S was Siri voice assistant technology, which Apple had acquired in 2010[130], as well as other features, including an updated 8 megapixel camera with new optics. Apple sold 4 million iPhone 4S phones in the first three days after its release, which made it not only the best iPhone launch in Apple's history, but the most-successful launch of any mobile phone ever[131].
Apple TV
Main article: Apple TV
The Apple TV, in its most recent revision
At the 2007 Macworld conference, Jobs demonstrated the Apple TV, (previously known as the iTV),[132] a set-top video device intended to bridge the sale of content from iTunes with high-definition televisions. The device links up to a user's TV and syncs, either via Wi-Fi or a wired network, with one computer's iTunes library and streams from an additional four. The Apple TV originally incorporated a 40 GB hard drive for storage, includes outputs for HDMI and component video, and plays video at a maximum resolution of 720p.[133] On May 31, 2007 a 160 GB drive was released alongside the existing 40 GB model[134] and on January 15, 2008 a software update was released, which allowed media to be purchased directly from the Apple TV.[135] In September 2009, Apple discontinued the original 40 GB Apple TV and now continues to produce and sell the 160 GB Apple TV. On September 1, 2010, alongside the release of the new line of iPod devices for the year, Apple released a completely redesigned Apple TV. The new device is 1/4 the size, runs quieter, and replaces the need for a hard drive with media streaming from any iTunes library on the network along with 8 GB of flash memory to cache media downloaded. Apple with the Apple TV has added another device to its portfolio that runs on its A4 processor along with the iPad and the iPhone. The memory included in the device is the half of the iPhone 4 at 256 MB; the same as the iPad, iPhone 3GS, iPod touch 3G, and iPod touch 4G.[136] It has HDMI out as the only video out source. Features include access to the iTunes Store to rent movies and TV shows (purchasing has been discontinued), streaming from internet video sources, including YouTube and Netflix, and media streaming from an iTunes library. Apple also reduced the price of the device to $99.
Software
See also: List of Macintosh software
Apple develops its own operating system to run on Macs, Mac OS X, the latest version being Mac OS X Lion (version 10.7). Apple also independently develops computer software titles for its Mac OS X operating system. Much of the software Apple develops is bundled with its computers. An example of this is the consumer-oriented iLife software package that bundles iDVD, iMovie, iPhoto, iTunes, GarageBand, and iWeb. For presentation, page layout and word processing, iWork is available, which includes Keynote, Pages, and Numbers. iTunes, QuickTime media player, Safari web browser, and Software Update are available as free downloads for both Mac OS X and Windows.
Apple also offers a range of professional software titles. Their range of server software includes the operating system Mac OS X Server; Apple Remote Desktop, a remote systems management application;WebObjects, Java EE Web application server; and Xsan, a Storage Area Network file system. For the professional creative market, there is Aperture for professional RAW-format photo processing; Final Cut Studio, a video production suite; Logic, a comprehensive music toolkit and Shake, an advanced effects composition program.
Apple also offers online services with MobileMe (formerly .Mac) that bundles personal web pages, email, Groups, iDisk, backup, iSync, and Learning Center online tutorials. MobileMe is a subscription-based internet suite that capitalizes on the ability to store personal data on an online server and thereby keep all web-connected devices in sync.[137] Announced at MacWorld Expo 2009, iWork.com allows iWork users to upload documents for sharing and collaboration.
Timeline of Apple products
See also: Timeline of Apple Inc. products, Timeline of Apple II family, and Timeline of Macintosh models
- Products on this timeline indicate introduction dates only and not necessarily discontinued dates, as new products begin on a contiguous product line.
Culture
Corporate
Apple was one of several highly successful companies founded in the 1970s that bucked the traditional notions of what a corporate culture should look like in organizational hierarchy (flat versus tall, casual versus formal attire, etc.). Other highly successful firms with similar cultural aspects from the same period include Southwest Airlines and Microsoft. Originally, the company stood in opposition to staid competitors likeIBM by default, thanks to the influence of its founders; Steve Jobs often walked around the office barefoot even after Apple was a Fortune 500 company. By the time of the "1984" TV ad, this trait had become a key way the company attempted to differentiate itself from its competitors.[138]
As the company has grown and been led by a series of chief executives, each with his own idea of what Apple should be, some of its original character has arguably been lost, but Apple still has a reputation for fostering individuality and excellence that reliably draws talented people into its employ, especially after Jobs' return. To recognize the best of its employees, Apple created the Apple Fellows program, awarding individuals who made extraordinary technical or leadership contributions to personal computing while at the company. The Apple Fellowship has so far been awarded to a few individuals including Bill Atkinson,[139]Steve Capps,[140] Rod Holt,[139] Alan Kay,[141][142] Guy Kawasaki,[141][143] Al Alcorn,[144] Don Norman,[141] Rich Page,[139] and Steve Wozniak.[139]
Numerous employees of Apple have cited that projects without Jobs' involvement often take longer than projects with his involvement.[145] Another presents the image of Jobs "wandering the hall with a flame throwerin hand, asking random people 'do you work on MobileMe?'".[146]
At Apple, employees are specialists who are not exposed to functions outside their area of expertise. Jobs saw this as a means of having best-in-class employees in every role. For instance, Ron Johnson who was Senior Vice President of Retail Operations until November 1, 2011, was responsible for site selection, in-store service, and store layout, yet he had no control the inventory in his stores (which is done company wide by then-COO and now CEO Tim Cook who has a background in supply-chain management). This is the opposite of General Electric's corporate culture which has created well-rounded managers.[147] [148]
Under the leadership of Tim Cook who joined the company in 1998 and ascended to his present position as CEO, Apple has developed an extremely efficient and effective supply chain which has been ranked as the world's best for the past four years (2007-2010). The company's manufacturing, procurement and logistics enables it to execute massive product launches without having to maintain large, profit-sapping inventories; Apple's profit margins have been 40 percent compared with 10-20 percent for most other hardware companies in 2011. Cook's catchphrase to describe his focus on the company's operational edge is “Nobody wants to buy sour milk”. [105] [149]
Users
Apple aficionados wait in line around an Apple retail store in anticipation of a new product. This branch is located on Fifth Avenue in New York City, with a glass cube housing a cylindrical elevator and a spiral staircase that lead into the subterranean store.
While this brand loyalty is considered unusual for any product, Apple appears not to have gone out of its way to create it. At one time, Apple evangelists were actively engaged by the company, but this was after the phenomenon was already firmly established. Apple evangelist Guy Kawasaki has called the brand fanaticism "something that was stumbled upon".[150] Apple has, however, supported the continuing existence of a network of Mac User Groups in most major and many minor centers of population where Mac computers are available.
Mac users would meet at the European Apple Expo and the San Francisco Macworld Conference & Expo trade shows where Apple traditionally introduced new products each year to the industry and public until Apple pulled out of both events. While the conferences continue, Apple does not have official representation there. Mac developers, in turn, continue to gather at the annual Apple Worldwide Developers Conference.
Apple Store openings can draw crowds of thousands, with some waiting in line as much as a day before the opening or flying in from other countries for the event.[151] The New York City Fifth Avenue "Cube" store had a line as long as half a mile; a few Mac fans took the opportunity of the setting to propose marriage.[152] The Ginza opening in Tokyo was estimated in the thousands with a line exceeding eight city blocks.[153]
John Sculley told The Guardian newspaper in 1997: "People talk about technology, but Apple was a marketing company. It was the marketing company of the decade."[154]
Research in 2002 by NetRatings indicate that the average Apple consumer was usually more affluent and better educated than other PC company consumers. The research indicated that this correlation could stem from the fact that on average Apple Inc. products are more expensive than other PC products.[155][156]
Corporate affairs
During the Mac's early history Apple generally refused to adopt prevailing industry standards for hardware, instead creating their own.[157] This trend was largely reversed in the late 1990s beginning with Apple's adoption of the PCI bus in the 7500/8500/9500 Power Macs. Apple has since adopted USB, AGP, HyperTransport, Wi-Fi, and other industry standards in its computers and was in some cases a leader in the adoption of standards such as USB.[158] FireWire is an Apple-originated standard that has seen widespread industry adoption after it was standardized as IEEE 1394.[159]
Ever since the first Apple Store opened, Apple has sold third party accessories.[160] This allows, for instance, Nikon and Canon to sell their Mac-compatible digital cameras and camcorders inside the store. Adobe, one of Apple's oldest software partners,[161] also sells its Mac-compatible software, as does Microsoft, who sells Microsoft Office for the Mac. Books from John Wiley & Sons, who publishes the For Dummiesseries of instructional books, are a notable exception, however. The publisher's line of books were banned from Apple Stores in 2005 because Steve Jobs disagreed with their decision to publish an unauthorized Jobs biography, iCon.[162]
Headquarters
Main article: Apple campus
Apple Inc.'s world corporate headquarters are located in the middle of Silicon Valley, at 1-6 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, California. This Apple campus has six buildings that total 850,000 square feet (79,000 m2) and was built in 1993 by Sobrato Development Cos.[163]
Future plans
In 2006, Apple announced its intention to build a second campus on 50 acres (200,000 m2) assembled from various contiguous plots (east of N Wolfe Road between Pruneridge Avenue and Vallco Parkway). Later aquisitions increased this to 175 acres. The new campus, also in Cupertino, will be about 1 mile (1.6 km) east of the current campus.[164] The new campus building will be designed by Norman Foster.[165]
On June 7, 2011, Steve Jobs gave a presentation to Cupertino City Council, detailing the architectural design of the new building and its environs. The new campus is planned to house up to 13,000 employees in one central four-storied circular building (with a café for 3,000 sitting people integrated) surrounded by extensive landscape (with parking mainly underground and the rest centralized in a parking structure). There will be additional buildings such as an auditorium, R&D facilities, a fitness center and a dedicated generating plant as primary source of electricity (powered by natural gas and other more environmentally sound means).
Advertising
Main article: Apple Inc. advertising
Since the introduction of the Macintosh in 1984 with the 1984 Super Bowl commercial to the more modern 'Get a Mac' adverts, Apple has been recognized in the past for its efforts towards effective advertising and marketing for its products, though its advertising has been criticized for the claims of some more recent campaigns, particularly 2005 Power Mac ads[166][167][168] and iPhone ads in Britain.
Name
According to Steve Jobs, Apple was so named because Jobs was coming back from an apple farm, and he was on a fruitarian diet. He thought the name was "fun, spirited and not intimidating".[169]
Logos
See also: U+F8FF and Typography of Apple Inc.
The original logo with Isaac Newton under an apple tree
The rainbow "bitten" logo, used from late 1976 to 1998
The monochrome logo, used since 1998
Apple's first logo, designed by Ron Wayne, depicts Sir Isaac Newton sitting under an apple tree.
Almost immediately, though, this was replaced by Rob Janoff's "rainbow Apple", the now-familiar rainbow-colored silhouette of an apple with a bite taken out of it. Janoff presented Jobs with several different monochromatic themes for the "bitten" logo, and Jobs immediately took a liking to it. While Jobs liked the logo, he insisted it be in color to humanize the company.[170][171] The Apple logo was designed with a bite so that it wouldn't be recognized as another fruit. The colored stripes were conceived to make the logo more accessible, and to represent the fact the Apple II could generate graphics in color.[172]
This logo is often erroneously referred to as a tribute to Alan Turing, with the bite mark a reference to his method of suicide.[173][174] Both the designer of the logo and the company deny that there is any homage to Turing in the design of the logo.[172][175]
In 1998, with the roll-out of the new iMac, Apple discontinued the rainbow theme and began to use monochromatic themes, nearly identical in shape to its previous rainbow incarnation, on various products, packaging and advertising. An Aqua-themed version of the monochrome logo was used from 2001–2003, and a Glass-themed version has been used since 2003.
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak were Beatles fans,[176][177] but Apple Inc. had trademark issues with Apple Corps Ltd., a multimedia company started by The Beatles in 1967, involving their name and logo. This resulted in a series of lawsuits and tension between the two companies. These issues ended with their most recent law suit in 2007.
Slogans
Main article: List of Apple Inc. slogans
Apple's first slogan, "Byte into an Apple", was coined in the late 1970s.[178] From 1997–2002, Apple used the slogan "Think Different" in advertising campaigns. Although the slogan has been retired, it is still closely associated with Apple.[179] Apple also has slogans for specific product lines — for example, "iThink, therefore iMac" was used in 1998 to promote the iMac,[180] and "Say hello to iPhone" has been used in iPhone advertisements.[181] "Hello" was also used to introduce the original Macintosh, Newton, iMac ("hello (again)"), and iPod.[182]
Commercials
See also: 1984 (advertisement), Lemmings (advertisement), iPod advertising, and music used by Apple Inc.
Apple's product commercials gained fame for launching musicians into stardom as a result of their eye-popping graphics and catchy tunes.[183] First, the company popularized Canadian singer Feist's "1234" song in its ad campaign.[183] Later, Apple used the song "New Soul" by French-Israeli singer-songwriter Yael Naïm to promote the MacBook Air.[183] The debut single shot to the top of the charts and sold hundreds of thousands of copies in a span of weeks.[183]
Environmental record
Greenpeace has campaigned against Apple on various environmental issues, including a global end-of-life take-back plan, non-recyclable hardware components and toxins within iPhone hardware.[184][185] Since 2003 Greenpeace has campaigned against Apple's chemical policies, in particular the inclusion of PVC and BFRs in their products.[184] On May 2, 2007, Steve Jobs released a report announcing plans to eliminate PVC and BFRs by the end of 2008.[186][187] Apple has since eliminated PVC and BFRs across its product range,[188] becoming the first laptop maker to do so.[189]
In November 2011 Apple featured in Greenpeace's Guide to Greener Electronics that ranks electronics manufacturers on sustainability, climate and energy and how green their products are. The company ranked 4th out of 15 electronics companies (moving up five places from the previous year) with a score of 4.6/10 down from 4.9.[190] Greenpeace praises Apple's sustainability, noting that the company exceeded its 70% global recycling goal in 2010. It continues to score well on the products rating with all Apple products now being free of PVC vinyl plastic and brominated flame retardants. However, the guide criticizes Apple on the Energy criteria for not seeking external verification of its greenhouse gas emissions data and for not setting out any targets to reduce emissions.[190]
In the first edition, released in August 2006, Apple scored 2.7/10.[191]
In 2010, Climate Counts, a nonprofit organization dedicated to directing consumers toward the greenest companies, gave Apple a score of 52 points out of a possible 100, which puts Apple in their top category "Striding".[192] This was an increase from May 2008, when Climate Counts only gave Apple 11 points out of 100, which placed the company last among electronics companies, at which time Climate Counts also labeled Apple with a "stuck icon", adding that Apple at the time was "a choice to avoid for the climate conscious consumer".[17]
The Environmental Protection Agency rates Apple highest amongst producers of notebook computers, and fairly well compared to producers of desktop computers and LCD displays.[193][194]
In June 2007, Apple upgraded the MacBook Pro, replacing cold cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL) backlit LCD displays with mercury-free LED backlit LCD displays and arsenic-free glass,[195] and has since done this for all notebooks. Apple has also phased out BFRs and PVCs from various internal components.[186][196][197] Apple offers information about the emissions, materials, and electrical usage of each product.[198]
In June 2009, Apple's iPhone 3GS was free of PVC, arsenic, BFRs and had an efficient power adapter.[195]
In October 2009, Apple upgraded the iMac and MacBook, replacing the cold cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL) backlit LCD displays with mercury-free LED backlit LCD displays and arsenic-free glass.[199] This means all Apple computers have mercury free LED backlit displays, arsenic-free glass and are without PVC cables. All Apple computers also have EPEAT Gold status.[195] In october 2011 chinese authorities have ordered an Apple supplier to close part of its plant in Suzhou after residents living nearby raised significant environmental concerns.<[200]
Labor practices
Further information: Apple labor practices
In 2006, the Mail on Sunday reported that sweatshop conditions existed in some factories in China, where the contract manufacturers, Foxconn and Inventec, operate the factories that produce the iPod.[201] The article stated that one complex of factories that assembles the iPod (among other items), for instance, had over 200,000 workers that lived and worked in the factory, with employees regularly working more than 60 hours per week. The article also reported that workers made around $100 per month and were required to live on the premises and pay for rent and food from the company, which generally amounted to a little over half of workers' earnings.[16][202][203][204]
Immediately after the allegations, Apple launched an investigation and worked with their manufacturers to ensure that conditions were acceptable to Apple.[205] In 2007, Apple started yearly audits of all its suppliers regarding worker's rights, slowly raising standards and pruning suppliers that did not comply. Yearly progress reports have been published since 2008.[206] In 2010, workers in China planned to sue iPhone contractors over poisoning by a cleaner used to clean LCD screens. One worker claimed that he and his coworkers had not been informed of possible occupational illnesses.[207] After a spate of suicides in a Foxconn facility in China making iPads and iPhones, workers were forced to sign a legally binding document guaranteeing that they would not kill themselves.[208] In 2011 Apple admitted that its suppliers' child labor practices in China had worsened.[209]
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about the corporation. For the search engine, see Google Search. For other uses, see Google (disambiguation).
 | |
| Type | Public |
|---|---|
| Traded as | NASDAQ: GOOG FWB: GGQ1 NASDAQ-100 Component S&P 500 Component |
| Industry | Internet, Computer software |
| Founded | Menlo Park, California, U.S. (September 4, 1998)[1][2] |
| Founder(s) | Sergey Brin, Larry Page |
| Headquarters | 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, California,United States |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Key people | Larry Page (Co-Founder & CEO) Eric Schmidt (Executive Chairman) Sergey Brin (Co-Founder) |
| Products | See list of Google products. |
| Revenue | US$ 29.321 billion (2010) |
| Operating income | US$ 10.381 billion (2010) |
| Profit | US$ 8.505 billion (2010) |
| Total assets | US$ 57.851 billion (2010) |
| Total equity | US$ 46.241 billion (2010) |
| Employees | 31,353 (2011)[3] |
| Subsidiaries | Aardvark, AdMob,DoubleClick, Motorola Mobility,On2 Technologies, Picnik,Zagat, YouTube |
| Website | Google.com |
| References: [4] | |
Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) is an American multinational internet and software corporation invested in internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products,[5] and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWordsprogram.[6][7] The company was founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, often dubbed the "Google Guys",[8][9][10] while the two were attending Stanford University as PhD candidates.
It was first incorporated as a privately held company on September 4, 1998, and its initial public offering followed on August 19, 2004. At that time Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Eric Schmidt agreed to work together at Google for twenty years, until the year 2024.[11] The company's mission statement from the outset was "to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful",[12] and the company's unofficial slogan – coined by Google engineer Amit Patel[13] and supported by Paul Buchheit – is "Don't be evil".[14][15] In 2006, the company moved to its current headquarters in Mountain View, California.
Google's rapid growth since its incorporation has triggered a chain of products, acquisitions, and partnerships beyond the company's core web search engine. The company offers online productivity software, such as the Gmail email service, the Google Docs office suite, and the Google+ social networking service. Google's products extend to the desktop as well, with applications such as the Google Chrome web browser, the Picasa photo organizing and editing software, and the Google Talk instant messaging application. Google leads the development of the Android mobile operating system, as well as the Google Chrome OS browser-only operating system,[16] found on specialized laptops called Chromebooks.
Google has been estimated to run over one million servers in data centers around the world,[17] and process over one billion search requests[18] and about twenty-fourpetabytes of user-generated data every day.[19][20][21][22]Alexa lists the main U.S.-focused google.com site as the Internet's most visited website, and numerous international Google sites (google.co.in(14) is the most visited site in India, google.co.uk in the U.K, etc.) are in the top hundred, as are several other Google-owned sites such as YouTube (Alexa:3), Blogger and its related subdomain blogspot.com (Alexa:7), and Orkut.[23] Google also ranks number two in the BrandZ brand equity database.[24] The dominant market position of Google's services has led to criticism of the company over issues including privacy, copyright, and censorship.[25][26]
Contents
|
History
Main article: History of Google
Google's original homepage had a simple design since its founders were not experienced in HTML, the language for designing web pages.[27]
Google began in January 1996 as a research project by Larry Page and Sergey Brin when they were both PhD students at Stanford University in California.[28]
While conventional search engines ranked results by counting how many times the search terms appeared on the page, the two theorized about a better system that analyzed the relationships between websites.[29] They called this new technology PageRank, where a website's relevance was determined by the number of pages, and the importance of those pages, that linked back to the original site.[30][31]
A small search engine called "RankDex" from IDD Information Services designed by Robin Li was, since 1996, already exploring a similar strategy for site-scoring and page ranking.[32] The technology in RankDex would be patented[33] and used later when Li founded Baidu in China.[34][35]
Page and Brin originally nicknamed their new search engine "BackRub", because the system checked backlinks to estimate the importance of a site.[36][37][38]
Eventually, they changed the name to Google, originating from a misspelling of the word "googol",[39][40] the number one followed by one hundred zeros, which was picked to signify that the search engine wants to provide large quantities of information for people.[41] Originally, Google ran under the Stanford University website, with the domaingoogle.stanford.edu.[42]
The domain name for Google was registered on September 15, 1997,[43] and the company was incorporated on September 4, 1998. It was based in a friend's (Susan Wojcicki[28]) garage in Menlo Park, California. Craig Silverstein, a fellow PhD student at Stanford, was hired as the first employee.[28][44][45]
In May 2011, unique visitors of Google surpassed 1 billion mark for the first time, an 8.4 percent increase from a year ago with 931 million unique visitors.[46]
Financing and initial public offering
The first funding for Google was an August 1998 contribution of US$100,000 from Andy Bechtolsheim, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, given before Google was even incorporated.[48] Early in 1999, while still graduate students, Brin and Page decided that the search engine they had developed was taking up too much of their time from academic pursuits. They went to Excite CEO George Bell and offered to sell it to him for $1 million. He rejected the offer, and later criticized Vinod Khosla, one of Excite's venture capitalists, after he had negotiated Brin and Page down to $750,000. On June 7, 1999, a $25 million round of funding was announced,[49] with major investors including the venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sequoia Capital.[48]
Google's initial public offering (IPO) took place five years later on August 19, 2004. The company offered 19,605,052 shares at a price of $85 per share.[50][51] Shares were sold in a unique online auction format using a system built by Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse, underwriters for the deal.[52][53] The sale of $1.67 billion gave Google amarket capitalization of more than $23 billion.[54] The vast majority of the 271 million shares remained under the control of Google, and many Google employees became instant paper millionaires. Yahoo!, a competitor of Google, also benefited because it owned 8.4 million shares of Google before the IPO took place.[55]
Some people speculated that Google's IPO would inevitably lead to changes in company culture. Reasons ranged from shareholder pressure for employee benefit reductions to the fact that many company executives would become instant paper millionaires.[56] As a reply to this concern, co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page promised in a report to potential investors that the IPO would not change the company's culture.[57] In 2005, however, articles in The New York Times and other sources began suggesting that Google had lost its anti-corporate, no evil philosophy.[58][59][60] In an effort to maintain the company's unique culture, Google designated a Chief Culture Officer, who also serves as the Director of Human Resources. The purpose of the Chief Culture Officer is to develop and maintain the culture and work on ways to keep true to the core values that the company was founded on: a flat organization with a collaborative environment.[61] Google has also faced allegations of sexism andageism from former employees.[62][63]
The stock's performance after the IPO went well, with shares hitting $700 for the first time on October 31, 2007,[64] primarily because of strong sales and earnings in the online advertising market.[65] The surge in stock price was fueled mainly by individual investors, as opposed to large institutional investors and mutual funds.[65] The company is now listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange under the ticker symbol GOOG and under the Frankfurt Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol GGQ1.
Growth
In March 1999, the company moved its offices to Palo Alto, California, home to several other noted Silicon Valley technology startups.[66] The next year, against Page and Brin's initial opposition toward an advertising-funded search engine,[67] Google began selling advertisements associated with search keywords.[28] In order to maintain an uncluttered page design and increase speed, advertisements were solely text-based. Keywords were sold based on a combination of price bids and click-throughs, with bidding starting at five cents per click.[28]This model of selling keyword advertising was first pioneered by Goto.com, an Idealab spin-off created by Bill Gross.[68][69] When the company changed names to Overture Services, it sued Google over alleged infringements of the company's pay-per-click and bidding patents. Overture Services would later be bought by Yahoo! and renamed Yahoo! Search Marketing. The case was then settled out of court, with Google agreeing to issue shares of common stock to Yahoo! in exchange for a perpetual license.[70]
During this time, Google was granted a patent describing its PageRank mechanism.[71] The patent was officially assigned to Stanford University and lists Lawrence Page as the inventor. In 2003, after outgrowing two other locations, the company leased its current office complex from Silicon Graphics at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway in Mountain View, California.[72] The complex has since come to be known as theGoogleplex, a play on the word googolplex, the number one followed by a googol zeroes. The Googleplex interiors were designed by Clive Wilkinson Architects. Three years later, Google would buy the property from SGI for $319 million.[73] By that time, the name "Google" had found its way into everyday language, causing the verb "google" to be added to the Merriam Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary, denoted as "to use the Google search engine to obtain information on the Internet."[74][75]
Acquisitions and partnerships
See also: List of acquisitions by Google
Since 2001, Google has acquired many companies, mainly focusing on small venture capital companies. In 2004, Google acquired Keyhole, Inc.[76] The start-up company developed a product called Earth Viewer that gave a three-dimensional view of the Earth. Google renamed the service to Google Earth in 2005. Two years later, Google bought the online video site YouTube for $1.65 billion in stock.[77] On April 13, 2007, Google reached an agreement to acquire DoubleClick for $3.1 billion, giving Google valuable relationships that DoubleClick had with Web publishers and advertising agencies.[78] Later that same year, Google purchased GrandCentral for $50 million.[79] The site would later be changed over to Google Voice. On August 5, 2009, Google bought out its first public company, purchasing video software maker On2 Technologies for $106.5 million.[80] Google also acquired Aardvark, a social network search engine, for $50 million, and commented on its internal blog, "we're looking forward to collaborating to see where we can take it".[81] In April 2010, Google announced it had acquired a hardware startup, Agnilux.[82]
In addition to the many companies Google has purchased, the company has partnered with other organizations for everything from research to advertising. In 2005, Google partnered with NASA Ames Research Center to build 1,000,000 square feet (93,000 m2) of offices.[83] The offices would be used for research projects involving large-scale data management, nanotechnology, distributed computing, and the entrepreneurial space industry. Google entered into a partnership with Sun Microsystems in October 2005 to help share and distribute each other's technologies.[84] The company also partnered with AOL of Time Warner,[85] to enhance each other's video search services. Google's 2005 partnerships also included financing the new .mobi top-level domain for mobile devices, along with other companies including Microsoft,Nokia, and Ericsson.[86] Google would later launch "Adsense for Mobile", taking advantage of the emerging mobile advertising market.[87] Increasing its advertising reach even further, Google and Fox Interactive Media of News Corporation entered into a $900 million agreement to provide search and advertising on popular social networking site MySpace.[88]
In October 2006, Google announced that it had acquired the video-sharing site YouTube for US$1.65 billion in Google stock, and the deal was finalized on November 13, 2006.[89] Google does not provide detailed figures for YouTube's running costs, and YouTube's revenues in 2007 were noted as "not material" in a regulatory filing.[90] In June 2008, a Forbes magazine article projected the 2008 YouTube revenue at US$200 million, noting progress in advertising sales.[91] In 2007, Google began sponsoring NORAD Tracks Santa, a service that follows Santa Claus' progress on Christmas Eve,[92] using Google Earth to "track Santa" in 3-D for the first time,[93] and displacing former sponsor AOL. Google-owned YouTube gave NORAD Tracks Santa its own channel.[94]
In 2008, Google developed a partnership with GeoEye to launch a satellite providing Google with high-resolution (0.41 m monochrome, 1.65 m color) imagery for Google Earth. The satellite was launched fromVandenberg Air Force Base on September 6, 2008.[95] Google also announced in 2008 that it was hosting an archive of Life Magazine's photographs as part of its latest partnership. Some of the images in the archive were never published in the magazine.[96] The photos were watermarked and originally had copyright notices posted on all photos, regardless of public domain status.[97]
In 2010, Google Energy made its first investment in a renewable energy project, putting $38.8 million into two wind farms in North Dakota. The company announced the two locations will generate 169.5 megawatts of power, or enough to supply 55,000 homes. The farms, which were developed by NextEra Energy Resources, will reduce fossil fuel use in the region and return profits. NextEra Energy Resources sold Google a twenty percent stake in the project to get funding for its development.[98] Also in 2010, Google purchased Global IP Solutions, a Norway-based company that provides web-based teleconferencing and other related services. This acquisition will enable Google to add telephone-style services to its list of products.[99] On May 27, 2010, Google announced it had also closed the acquisition of the mobile ad network AdMob. This purchase occurred days after the Federal Trade Commission closed its investigation into the purchase.[100] Google acquired the company for an undisclosed amount.[101] In July 2010, Google signed an agreement with an Iowa wind farm to buy 114 megawatts of energy for 20 years.[102]
On April 4, 2011, The Globe and Mail reported that Google bid $900 million for six thousand Nortel Networks patents.[103]
On August 15, 2011, Google announced that it would acquire Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion[104][105] subject to approval from regulators in the United States and Europe. In a post on Google's blog, Google Chief Executive and co-founder Larry Page revealed that Google's acquisition of Motorola Mobility is a strategic move to strengthen Google's patent portfolio. The company's Android operating system has come under fire in an industry-wide patent battle, as Apple and Microsoft have taken to court Android device makers such as HTC, Samsung and Motorola.[106] This purchase was made in part to help Google gain Motorola's considerable patent portfolio on mobile phones and wireless technologies to help protect it in its ongoing patent disputes with other companies,[107] mainly Apple and Microsoft[106] and to allow it to continue to freely offer Android.[108]
Google Data Centers
Google Inc. currently owns and operates 6 data centers across the U.S., plus one in Finland and another in Belgium. On September 28, 2011 the company has announced to build 3 data centers worth more than $200 million in Asia (Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan) which the land has been owned by Google Inc. It will be operated between one to two years ahead.[109]
Products and services
See also: List of Google products
Advertising
Ninety-nine percent of Google's revenue is derived from its advertising programs.[110] For the 2006 fiscal year, the company reported $10.492 billion in total advertising revenues and only $112 million in licensing and other revenues.[111] Google has implemented various innovations in the online advertising market that helped make it one of the biggest brokers in the market. Using technology from the company DoubleClick, Google can determine user interests and target advertisements so they are relevant to their context and the user that is viewing them.[112][113] Google Analytics allows website owners to track where and how people use their website, for example by examining click rates for all the links on a page.[114] Google advertisements can be placed on third-party websites in a two-part program. Google's AdWords allows advertisers to display their advertisements in the Google content network, through either a cost-per-click or cost-per-view scheme. The sister service, Google AdSense, allows website owners to display these advertisements on their website, and earn money every time ads are clicked.[115]
One of the disadvantages and criticisms of this program is Google's inability to combat click fraud, when a person or automated script "clicks" on advertisements without being interested in the product, which causes that advertiser to pay money to Google unduly. Industry reports in 2006 claim that approximately 14 to 20 percent of clicks were in fact fraudulent or invalid.[116] Furthermore, there has been controversy over Google's "search within a search", where a secondary search box enables the user to find what they are looking for within a particular website. It was soon reported that when performing a search within a search for a specific company, advertisements from competing and rival companies often showed up along with those results, drawing users away from the site they were originally searching.[117] Another complaint against Google's advertising is its censorship of advertisers, though many cases concern compliance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. For example, in February 2003, Google stopped showing the advertisements of Oceana, a non-profit organization protesting a major cruise ship's sewage treatment practices. Google cited its editorial policy at the time, stating "Google does not accept advertising if the ad or site advocates against other individuals, groups, or organizations."[118] The policy was later changed.[119] In June 2008, Google reached an advertising agreement with Yahoo!, which would have allowed Yahoo! to feature Google advertisements on its web pages. The alliance between the two companies was never completely realized due to antitrust concerns by the U.S. Department of Justice. As a result, Google pulled out of the deal in November 2008.[120][121]
In an attempt to advertise its own products, Google launched a website called Demo Slam
, developed to demonstrate technology demos of Google Products.[122] Each week, two teams compete at putting Google's technology into new contexts. Search Engine Journal said Demo Slam is "a place where creative and tech-savvy people can create videos to help the rest of the world understand all the newest and greatest technology out there."[123]
Search engine
On December 1, 2011, Google updated its homepage with a new drag-down navigation bar service, omitting the older black bar seen previously.[124]
Google Search, a web search engine, is the company's most popular service. According to market research published by comScore in November 2009, Google is the dominant search engine in the United States market, with a market share of 65.6%.[125] Google indexes billions[126] of web pages, so that users can search for the information they desire, through the use of keywords and operators. Despite its popularity, it has received criticism from a number of organizations. In 2003, The New York Times complained about Google's indexing, claiming that Google's caching of content on its site infringed its copyright for the content.[127] In this case, the United States District Court of Nevada ruled in favor of Google in Field v. Google and Parker v. Google.[128][129] Furthermore, the publication 2600: The Hacker Quarterly has compiled a list of words that the web giant's new instant search feature will not search.[130] Google Watch has also criticized Google's PageRank algorithms, saying that they discriminate against new websites and favor established sites,[131] and has made allegations about connections between Google and the NSA and the CIA.[132] Despite criticism, the basic search engine has spread to specific services as well, including an image search engine, the Google News search site, Google Maps, and more. In early 2006, the company launched Google Video, which allowed users to upload, search, and watch videos from the Internet.[133] In 2009, however, uploads to Google Video were discontinued so that Google could focus more on the search aspect of the service.[134] The company even developed Google Desktop, a desktop search application used to search for files local to one's computer. Google's most recent development in search is its partnership with the United States Patent and Trademark Office to create Google Patents, which enables free access to information about patents and trademarks.
One of the more controversial search services Google hosts is Google Books. The company began scanning books and uploading limited previews, and full books where allowed, into its new book search engine. The Authors Guild, a group that represents 8,000 U.S. authors, filed a class action suit in a New York City federal court against Google in 2005 over this new service. Google replied that it is in compliance with all existing and historical applications of copyright laws regarding books.[135] Google eventually reached a revised settlement in 2009 to limit its scans to books from the U.S., the UK, Australia and Canada.[136]Furthermore, the Paris Civil Court ruled against Google in late 2009, asking it to remove the works of La Martinière (Éditions du Seuil) from its database.[137] In competition with Amazon.com, Google plans to sell digital versions of new books.[138] On July 21, 2010, in response to newcomer Bing, Google updated its image search to display a streaming sequence of thumbnails that enlarge when pointed at. Though web searches still appear in a batch per page format, on July 23, 2010, dictionary definitions for certain English words began appearing above the linked results for web searches.[139] Google's algorithm was changed in March 2011, giving more weight to high-quality content[140] possibly by the use of n-grams to remove spun content.[141]
Productivity tools
In addition to its standard web search services, Google has released over the years a number of online productivity tools. Gmail, a free webmail service provided by Google, was launched as an invitation-only beta program on April 1, 2004,[142] and became available to the general public on February 7, 2007.[143] The service was upgraded from beta status on July 7, 2009,[144] at which time it had 146 million users monthly.[145] The service would be the first online email service with one gigabyte of storage, and the first to keep emails from the same conversation together in one thread, similar to an Internet forum.[142] The service currently offers over 7400 MB of free storage with additional storage ranging from 20 GB to 16 TB available for US$0.25 per 1 GB per year.[146] Furthermore, software developers know Gmail for its pioneering use of AJAX, a programming technique that allows web pages to be interactive without refreshing the browser.[147] One criticism of Gmail has been the potential for data disclosure, a risk associated with many online web applications. Steve Ballmer (Microsoft's CEO),[148] Liz Figueroa,[149] Mark Rasch,[150] and the editors of Google Watch[151] believe the processing of email message content goes beyond proper use, but Google claims that mail sent to or from Gmail is never read by a human being beyond the account holder, and is only used to improve relevance of advertisements.[152]
Google Docs, another part of Google's productivity suite, allows users to create, edit, and collaborate on documents in an online environment, not dissimilar to Microsoft Word. The service was originally called Writely, but was obtained by Google on March 9, 2006, where it was released as an invitation-only preview.[153] On June 6 after the acquisition, Google created an experimental spreadsheet editing program,[154]which would be combined with Google Docs on October 10.[155] A program to edit presentations would complete the set on September 17, 2007,[156] before all three services were taken out of beta along with Gmail, Google Calendar and all products from the Google Apps Suite on July 7, 2009.[144]
Enterprise products
Google entered the enterprise market in February 2002 with the launch of its Google Search Appliance, targeted toward providing search technology for larger organizations.[28]Google launched the Mini three years later, which was targeted at smaller organizations. Late in 2006, Google began to sell Custom Search Business Edition, providing customers with an advertising-free window into Google.com's index. The service was renamed Google Site Search in 2008.[157]
Another one of Google's enterprise products is Google Apps Premier Edition. The service, and its accompanying Google Apps Education Edition and Standard Edition, allow companies, schools, and other organizations to bring Google's online applications, such as Gmail and Google Documents, into its own domain. The Premier Edition specifically includes extras over the Standard Edition such as more disk space, API access, and premium support, and it costs $50 per user per year. A large implementation of Google Apps with 38,000 users is at Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada. In the same year Google Apps was launched, Google acquired Postini[158] and proceeded to integrate the company's security technologies into Google Apps[159] under the name Google Postini Services.[160]
Other products
Google Translate is a server-side machine translation service, which can translate between 35 different languages. Browser extensions allow for easy access to Google Translate from the browser. The software uses corpus linguistics techniques, where the program "learns" from professionally translated documents, specifically UN and European Parliamentproceedings.[161] Furthermore, a "suggest a better translation" feature accompanies the translated text, allowing users to indicate where the current translation is incorrect or otherwise inferior to another translation.
Google launched its Google News service in 2002. The site proclaimed that the company had created a "highly unusual" site that "offers a news service compiled solely by computer algorithms without human intervention. Google employs no editors, managing editors, or executive editors."[162] The site hosted less licensed news content than Yahoo! News, and instead presented topically selected links to news and opinion pieces along with reproductions of their headlines, story leads, and photographs.[163] The photographs are typically reduced to thumbnail size and placed next to headlines from other news sources on the same topic in order to minimize copyright infringement claims. Nevertheless, Agence France Presse sued Google for copyright infringement in federal court in the District of Columbia, a case which Google settled for an undisclosed amount in a pact that included a license of the full text of AFP articles for use on Google News.[164]
In 2006, Google made a bid to offer free wireless broadband access throughout the city of San Francisco along with Internet service provider EarthLink. Large telecommunications companies such as Comcast and Verizon opposed such efforts, claiming it was "unfair competition" and that cities would be violating their commitments to offer local monopolies to these companies. In his testimony before Congress on network neutrality in 2006, Google's Chief Internet Evangelist Vint Cerfblamed such tactics on the fact that nearly half of all consumers lack meaningful choice in broadband providers.[165] Google currently offers free wi-fi access in its hometown of Mountain View, California.[166]
One year later, reports surfaced that Google was planning the release of its own mobile phone, possibly a competitor to Apple's iPhone.[167][168][169] The project, calledAndroid, turned out not to be a phone but an operating system for mobile devices, which Google acquired and then released as an open source project under the Apache 2.0 license.[170] Google provides a software development kit for developers so applications can be created to be run on Android-based phone. In September 2008, T-Mobilereleased the G1, the first Android-based phone.[171] More than a year later on January 5, 2010, Google released an Android phone under its own company name called theNexus One.[172]
Other projects Google has worked on include a new collaborative communication service, a web browser, and even a mobile operating system. The first of these was first announced on May 27, 2009. Google Wave was described as a product that helps users communicate and collaborate on the web. The service is Google's "email redesigned", with realtime editing, the ability to embed audio, video, and other media, and extensions that further enhance the communication experience. Google Wave was previously in a developer's preview, where interested users had to be invited to test the service, but was released to the general public on May 19, 2010, at Google's I/O keynote. On September 1, 2008, Google pre-announced the upcoming availability of Google Chrome, an open source web browser,[173] which was then released on September 2, 2008. The next year, on July 7, 2009, Google announced Google Chrome OS, an open source Linux-based operating system that includes only a web browser and is designed to log users into their Google account.[174][175]
In 2011, Google announced that it will unveil Google Wallet, a mobile application for wireless payments.[176]
In late June 2011, Google soft launched a social networking service called Google+.[177] On 14 July 2011, Google announced that Google+ had reached 10 million users just two weeks after it was launched in this "limited" trial phase.[178] After four weeks in operation, it had reached 25 million users.[179]
Corporate affairs and culture
Then-CEO, now Chairman of Google Eric Schmidt with Sergey Brin and Larry Page(left to right) in 2008.
New employees are called "Nooglers," and are given a propeller beanie hat to wear at their first TGIF.[180]
Google is known for having an informal corporate culture. On Fortune magazine's list of best companies to work for, Google ranked first in 2007 and 2008[181][182] and fourth in 2009 and 2010.[183][184] Google was also nominated in 2010 to be the world’s most attractive employer to graduating students in the Universum Communications talent attraction index.[185] Google's corporate philosophy embodies such casual principles as "you can make money without doing evil," "you can be serious without a suit," and "work should be challenging and the challenge should be fun."[186]
Employees
Google's stock performance following its initial public offering has enabled many early employees to be competitively compensated.[187] After the company's IPO, founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page and CEO Eric Schmidt requested that their base salary be cut to $1. Subsequent offers by the company to increase their salaries have been turned down, primarily because their main compensation continues to come from owning stock in Google. Before 2004, Schmidt was making $250,000 per year, and Page and Brin each earned a salary of $150,000.[188]
In 2007 and through early 2008, several top executives left Google. In October 2007, former chief financial officer of YouTube Gideon Yu joined Facebook[189] along with Benjamin Ling, a high-ranking engineer.[190] In March 2008, Sheryl Sandberg, then vice-president of global online sales and operations, began her position as chief operating officer of Facebook[191] while Ash ElDifrawi, formerly head of brand advertising, left to become chief marketing officer of Netshops, an online retail company that was renamed Hayneedle in 2009.[192] On April 4, 2011 Larry Page became CEO and Eric Schmidt became Executive Chairman of Google.[193]
As a motivation technique, Google uses a policy often called Innovation Time Off, where Google engineers are encouraged to spend 20% of their work time on projects that interest them. Some of Google's newer services, such as Gmail, Google News, Orkut, and AdSense originated from these independent endeavors.[194] In a talk at Stanford University,Marissa Mayer, Google's Vice President of Search Products and User Experience, showed that half of all new product launches at the time had originated from the Innovation Time Off.[195]
On March 2011, consulting firm Universum released data that Google ranks the first on list of ideal employers by nearly 25 percent chosen from more than 10,000 young professionals asked.[196]
Googleplex
Main article: Googleplex
Google's headquarters in Mountain View, California is referred to as "the Googleplex", a play on words on the number googolplex and the headquarters itself being a complex of buildings. The lobby is decorated with a piano, lava lamps, old server clusters, and a projection of search queries on the wall. The hallways are full of exercise balls and bicycles. Each employee has access to the corporate recreation center. Recreational amenities are scattered throughout the campus and include a workout room with weights and rowing machines, locker rooms, washers and dryers, a massage room, assorted video games, table football, a baby grand piano, a billiard table, and ping pong. In addition to the rec room, there are snack rooms stocked with various foods and drinks, with special emphasis placed on nutrition.[197] Free food is available to employees 24/7, with paid vending machines prorated favoring nutritional value.[198]
In 2006, Google moved into 311,000 square feet (28,900 m2) of office space in New York City, at 111 Eighth Avenue in Manhattan.[199] The office was specially designed and built for Google, and it now houses its largest advertising sales team, which has been instrumental in securing large partnerships.[199] In 2003, they added an engineering staff in New York City, which has been responsible for more than 100 engineering projects, including Google Maps, Google Spreadsheets, and others. It is estimated that the building costs Google $10 million per year to rent and is similar in design and functionality to its Mountain View headquarters, including table football, air hockey, and ping-pong tables, as well as a video game area. In November 2006, Google opened offices on Carnegie Mellon's campus in Pittsburgh, focusing on shopping related advertisement coding and smartphone applications and programs.[200][201] By late 2006, Google also established a new headquarters for its AdWords division in Ann Arbor, Michigan.[202] Furthermore, Google has offices all around the world, and in the United States, including Atlanta, Austin, Boulder, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington DC.
Google is taking steps to ensure that its operations are environmentally sound. In October 2006, the company announced plans to install thousands of solar panels to provide up to 1.6 megawatts of electricity, enough to satisfy approximately 30% of the campus' energy needs.[203] The system will be the largest solar power system constructed on a U.S. corporate campus and one of the largest on any corporate site in the world.[203] In addition, Google announced in 2009 that it was deploying herds of goats to keep grassland around the Googleplex short, helping to prevent the threat from seasonal bush fires while also reducing the carbon footprint of mowing the extensive grounds.[204][205] The idea of trimming lawns using goats originated from R. J. Widlar, an engineer who worked for National Semiconductor.[206] Despite this, Google has faced accusations in Harper's Magazine of being an "energy glutton", and was accused of employing its "Don't be evil" motto as well as its very public energy-saving campaigns as an attempt to cover up or make up for the massive amounts of energy its servers actually require.[207]
Easter eggs and April Fools' Day jokes
Main article: Google's hoaxes
Google has a tradition of creating April Fools' Day jokes. For example, Google MentalPlex allegedly featured the use of mental power to search the web.[208] In 2007, Google announced a free Internet service called TiSP, or Toilet Internet Service Provider, where one obtained a connection by flushing one end of a fiber-optic cable down their toilet.[209] Also in 2007, Google's Gmail page displayed an announcement for Gmail Paper, allowing users to have email messages printed and shipped to them.[210]In 2008 Google announced Gmail Custom time where users could change the time that the email was sent.[211] In 2010, Google jokingly changed its company name to Topeka in honor of Topeka, Kansas, whose mayor actually changed the city's name to Google for a short amount of time in an attempt to sway Google's decision in its new Google Fiber Project.[212][213] In 2011, Google announced Gmail Motion, an interactive way of controlling Gmail and the computer with body movements via the user's webcam.[214]
In addition to April Fools' Day jokes, Google's services contain a number of Easter eggs. For instance, Google included the Swedish Chef's "Bork bork bork," Pig Latin, "Hacker" or leetspeak, Elmer Fudd, andKlingon as language selections for its search engine.[215] In addition, the search engine calculator provides the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything from Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.[216] Furthermore, when searching the word "recursion", the spell-checker's result for the properly spelled word is exactly the same word, creating a recursive link.[217] Likewise, when searching for the word "anagram," meaning a rearrangement of letters from one word to form other valid words, Google's suggestion feature displays "Did you mean: nag a ram?"[218] In Google Maps, searching for directions between places separated by large bodies of water, such as Los Angeles and Tokyo, results in instructions to "kayak across the Pacific Ocean." During FIFA World Cup 2010, search queries like "World Cup", "FIFA", etc. caused the "Goooo...gle" page indicator at the bottom of every result page to read "Goooo...al!" instead.[219]
Philanthropy
Main article: Google.org
In 2004, Google formed the not-for-profit philanthropic Google.org, with a start-up fund of $1 billion.[220] The mission of the organization is to create awareness about climate change, global public health, and global poverty. One of its first projects was to develop a viable plug-in hybrid electric vehicle that can attain 100 miles per gallon. Google hired Dr. Larry Brilliant as the program's executive director in 2004[221] and the current director is Megan Smith.[222]
In 2008 Google announced its "project 10100" which accepted ideas for how to help the community and then allowed Google users to vote on their favorites.[223] After two years of silence, during which many wondered what had happened to the program,[224] Google revealed the winners of the project, giving a total of ten million dollars to various ideas ranging from non-profit organizations that promote education to a website that intends to make all legal documents public and online.[225]
In 2011, Google donated 1 million euros to International Mathematical Olympiad to support the next five annual International Mathematical Olympiads (2011–2015).[226]
Network neutrality
Google is a noted supporter of network neutrality. According to Google's Guide to Net Neutrality:
Network neutrality is the principle that Internet users should be in control of what content they view and what applications they use on the Internet. The Internet has operated according to this neutrality principle since its earliest days... Fundamentally, net neutrality is about equal access to the Internet. In our view, the broadband carriers should not be permitted to use their market power to discriminate against competing applications or content. Just as telephone companies are not permitted to tell consumers who they can call or what they can say, broadband carriers should not be allowed to use their market power to control activity online.[227]
On February 7, 2006, Vint Cerf, a co-inventor of the Internet Protocol (IP), and current Vice President and "Chief Internet Evangelist" at Google, in testimony before Congress, said, "allowing broadband carriers to control what people see and do online would fundamentally undermine the principles that have made the Internet such a success."[228]
Privacy
Eric Schmidt, Google’s chief executive, said 2007 in an interview with the Financial Times: "The goal is to enable Google users to be able to ask the question such as ‘What shall I do tomorrow?’ and ‘What job shall I take?'".[229] Schmidt reaffirmed this 2010 in an interview with the Wall Street Journal: "I actually think most people don't want Google to answer their questions, they want Google to tell them what they should be doing next."[230]
On December 2009, Google's CEO, Eric Schmidt, declared after privacy concerns: "If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place. If you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines – including Google – do retain this information for some time and it's important, for example, that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act and it is possible that all that information could be made available to the authorities."[231] Privacy International ranked Google as "Hostile to Privacy", its lowest rating on its report, making Google the only company in the list to receive that ranking.[232][233][234]
At the Techonomy conference in 2010 Eric Schmidt predicted that "true transparency and no anonymity" is the way forward for the internet: "In a world of asynchronous threats it is too dangerous for there not to be some way to identify you. We need a [verified] name service for people. Governments will demand it." He also said that "If I look at enough of your messaging and your location, and use artificial intelligence, we can predict where you are going to go. Show us 14 photos of yourself and we can identify who you are. You think you don't have 14 photos of yourself on the internet? You've got Facebook photos!"[235]
The non-profit group Public Information Research launched Google Watch, a website advertised as "a look at Google's monopoly, algorithms, and privacy issues."[236][237] The site raised questions relating to Google's storage of cookies, which in 2007 had a life span of more than 32 years and incorporated a unique ID that enabled creation of a user data log.[238] Google has also faced criticism with its release of Google Buzz, Google's version of social networking, where Gmail users had their contact lists automatically made public unless they opted out.[239] Google has been criticized for its censorship of certain sites in specific countries and regions. Until March 2010, Google adhered to the Internet censorship policies of China, enforced by means of filters known colloquially as "The Great Firewall of China".[240] There were reports in 2010 from leaked diplomatic cables that the Chinese Politburo had hacked into Google's computers as part of a worldwide coordinated campaign of computer sabotage carried out by "government operatives, private security experts and Internet outlaws recruited by the Chinese government."[241]
Despite being highly influential in local and national public policy, Google does not disclose its political spending online. In August 2010, New York City Public Advocate Bill de Blasio launched a national campaign urging the corporation to disclose all of its political spending.[242]
During 2006–2010 Google Streetview camera cars collected about 600 gigabytes of data from users of unencrypted public and private Wi-Fi networks in more than 30 countries. No disclosures nor privacy policy was given to those affected, nor to the owners of the Wi-Fi stations. A Google representative claimed that the company was not aware of its own data collection activities until an inquiry from German regulators was received, and that none of this data was used in Google's search engine or other services. A representative of Consumer Watchdog replied, "Once again, Google has demonstrated a lack of concern for privacy. Its computer engineers run amok, push the envelope and gather whatever data they can until their fingers are caught in the cookie jar." In a sign that legal penalties may result, Google said it will not destroy the data until permitted by regulators.[243][244]
See also
- Outline of Google
- Criticism of Google
- Gayglers – LGBT employee group
- Google China
- Google logo
- Google platform
- Google Ventures – venture capital fund
- Googlebot – web crawler
- List of Google domains
- Google Doodle
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HTC Corporation
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"HTC" redirects here. For other uses, see HTC (disambiguation).
 | |
| Type | Public |
|---|---|
| Traded as | TWSE: 2498 |
| Industry | Telecommunications |
| Founded | 1997 |
| Headquarters | Taoyuan City, Taoyuan County, Taiwan |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Key people | Cher Wang, Chairwoman Peter Chou, CEO and President Fred Liu, COO |
| Products | Smartphones, Tablets |
| Revenue | $11.95 billion USD (2011Q3)[1] |
| Operating income | $1.833 billion USD (2011Q3)[1] |
| Net income | $1.673 billion USD (2011Q3)[1] |
| Total assets | $8.575 billion USD (2011Q3)[1] |
| Total equity | $3.438 billion USD (2011Q3)[1] |
| Employees | 12,943 (2011-3-31)[2] |
| Subsidiaries | Beats Electronics S3 Graphics Dashwire |
| Website | HTC.com |
The HTC headquarters in Taoyuan.
HTC Corporation (Chinese: 宏達國際電子股份有限公司; pinyin: Hóngdá Guójì Diànzǐ Gǔfèn Yǒuxiàn Gōngsī) (TWSE: 2498), formerly High Tech Computer Corporation,[3] is a Taiwanese manufacturer of smartphones. The company initially made smartphones based mostly on Microsoft's Windows Mobile operating system(OS) software, but in 2009 it began to shift its core focus away from Windows Mobile devices to devices based on Android OS, and in 2010 to Windows Phone OS as well.
HTC is also a member of the Open Handset Alliance, a group of handset manufacturers and mobile network operators dedicated to the advancement of the Androidmobile device platform.[4] The HTC Dream, marketed by T-Mobile in many countries as the T-Mobile G1 or Era G1 in Poland, was the first phone on the market to use the Android mobile device platform.[5]
Contents
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History
HTC was founded in 1997 by Cher Wang, HT Cho, and Peter Chou.[6] Initially a manufacturer of notebook computers, HTC began designing some of the world's first touch and wireless hand-held devices in 1998.[7] The company has a rich heritage of many "firsts", including creating the first Microsoft-powered smartphone (2002) and the first Microsoft 3G phone (2005).[6] Their first major product was made in 2000 and was one of the world's first touch screen smartphones. The Palm Treo 650 and theiPAQ were created by HTC.[8] They started producing 3G-capable phones in early 2005 and made the world's first Android phone in 2008, the HTC Dream (also marketed as the T-Mobile G1). It was first released in the United States for pre-order through T-Mobile USA on September 23, 2008, and became available in U.S. T-Mobile stores on October 22, 2008.[9] The G1 was available in the UK several days after its USA launch, and has since been introduced in many countries including Australia andSingapore. In 2009, the company launched the HTC Sense interface for the platform with the HTC Hero.[10]
In March 2010, Apple Inc. filed a complaint with the US International Trade Commission claiming infringement of 20 of its patents covering aspects of the iPhone user interface and hardware.[11] HTC disagreed with Apple's actions and reiterated its commitment to creating innovative smartphones.[12] HTC also filed a complaint against Apple for infringing on 5 of its patents and sought to ban Apple products imported into the US from manufacturing facilities in Asia.[13][14] Apple expanded its original complaint by adding two more patents.[15]
In June 2010, the company launched the HTC Evo 4G, the first 4G-capable phone in the United States.[16] In July 2010, HTC announced it would begin selling smartphones in China under its own brand name in a partnership with China Mobile.[17] In 2010, HTC sold over 24.6 million handsets, up 111% over 2009.[18]
HTC was named the "Device Manufacturer of the Year" for 2011 by the GSMA at the Mobile World Congress on 16 February 2011.[19] In April 2011, the company's market value surpassed that of Nokia to become the third largest smartphone maker in the world, behind only Apple and Samsung.[20]
On July 6, 2011 it was announced that HTC would buy VIA Technologies' stake in S3 Graphics, thus becoming the majority owner of S3.[21][22] On August 6 2011, HTC acquired Dashwire for $18.5M. In August 2011, HTC confirmed that HTC will be entering a strategic partnership with Beats Electronics by acquiring 51 percent of Beat's shares.[23][24]
In the 2011 Best Global Brands rankings released by Interbrand, HTC was listed at #98 and valued at $3.6 billion.[25][26]
Based on researcher Canalys, in Q3 2011 HTC Corporation became the largest smartphone vendor in the U.S. by 24 percent, ahead of Samsung's 21 percent, Apple by 20 percent and Blackberry just 9 percent. HTC Corporation made different models for each operator.[27]
Corporate information
HTC's chairwoman is Cher Wang who is the daughter of the late Wang Yung-ching, Taiwan's petrochemical industrial giant and one of Taiwan's wealthiest men.[7] Peter Chou serves as President and CEO,[28] and HT Cho as Director of the Board and Chairman of HTC Foundation.[29] HTC's CFO is Hui-Ming Cheng.[30] In addition to being chair of HTC, Cher Wang is also acting chair of VIA Technologies.[7] HTC's main divisions, including the IA (Information Appliance) engineering division and the WM (Wireless Mobile) engineering division, are ISO 9001/ISO 14001-qualified facilities.[31]
The company's growth has accelerated dramatically since being chosen by Microsoft as a hardware platform development partner for the Windows Mobile operating system (based on Windows CE). HTC also works with Google to build mobile phones running Google's Android mobile OS such as the Nexus One.[32] HTC's sales revenue totalled $2.2 billion for 2005, a 102% increase from the prior year. It was listed as the fastest-growing tech company in BusinessWeek's Info Tech 100.[33]
HTC has invested strongly in research and development, which accounts for a quarter of its employees.[6] The company's North American headquarters are located in Bellevue, Washington.[34] HTC runs a software design office in Seattle (near its North American headquarters) where it designs its own interface for its phones.[35] In 2011, HTC also opened a research and development office in Durham, North Carolina, a location the company chose over Seattle and Atlanta,[36] to focus on multiple areas of wireless technology.[37]
Product range
Main article: List of HTC phones
When HTC was founded it was strictly an original design manufacturer,[30] selling devices such as the HTC Wizard as the T-Mobile MDA and the Cingular 8125. The company focused on telecom operators who were willing to pay a contract manufacturer for customized products.[38] Today, many HTC devices (e.g., Incredible, Evo 4G) are marketed and sold under the HTC brand, though its main focus still remains with smartphones.[28][38]
Innovations
On February 17, 2010, Fast Company ranked HTC as the 31st most innovative company in the world.[39] Bloomberg reports that HTC is assessing creating its own mobile operating system to compete with Apple'siOS, Google's Android, and Microsoft's Windows Phone.[40] On May 27th 2011, in response to customer feedback, HTC announced that they will no longer lock the bootloaders on their Android based phones.[41]
Sports Sponsorship
HTC sponsored the HTC-Highroad cycling team, currently the most successful team in professional cycling from 2009 to 2011.[citation needed] The Team will disband in 2012 due to lack of sponsorship and investment.[citation needed]
See also
 | Wikimedia Commons has media related to: HTC Corporation |
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Motorola
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about the original company which split in 2011. For the mobile phone manufacturer, see Motorola Mobility. For the equipment provider, see Motorola Solutions.
 | |
| Type | Public company |
|---|---|
| Industry | Telecommunications |
| Fate | Divided into Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions |
| Successor | Motorola Mobility Motorola Solutions |
| Founded | September 25, 1928 |
| Headquarters | 1303 East Algonquin Road,[1]Schaumburg, Illinois, United States |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Key people | • Greg Brown (President & Co-CEO)[2] • Sanjay Jha (CEO and Chairman)[3] |
| Products | Tablet computers Mobile phones Smartphones Two-way radios Networking systems Cable television systems Wireless Broadband Networks RFID Systems Mobile Telephone Infrastructure |
| Employees | 60,000 (2010)[4] |
| Website | www.motorola.com |
Motorola, Inc. (
/moʊtɵˈroʊlə/) was an American multinational[5] telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, which was eventually divided into two independent public companies, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011, after losing $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009.[6] Motorola Solutions is generally considered to be the direct successor to Motorola, Inc., as the reorganization was structured with Motorola Mobility being spun off.[7]Motorola designed and sold wireless network infrastructure equipment such as cellular transmission base stations and signal amplifiers. Motorola's home and broadcast network products included set-top boxes, digital video recorders, and network equipment used to enable video broadcasting, computer telephony, andhigh-definition television. Its business and government customers consisted mainly of wireless voice and broadband systems (used to build private networks), and, public safety communications systems like Astro and Dimetra. These businesses (except for set-top boxes and cable modems) are now part of Motorola Solutions.
Motorola's wireless telephone handset division was a pioneer in cellular telephones. Known as the Personal Communication Sector (PCS) prior to 2004, it pioneered the "flip phone" with the MicroTAC -- and, the "clam phone" with the StarTAC -- in the mid-1990s. It had staged an enormously successful resurgence by the mid-2001s with the RAZR; but, lost significant market share in the second half of that decade. Lately, it has focused on smartphones using Google's open-source Androidmobile operating system. The first phone to use the newest version of Google's open source OS, Android 2.0, was released on November 2, 2009 as the Motorola Droid (the GSM version launched a month later, in Europe, as the Motorola Milestone). The handset division, (along with cable set-top boxes and cable modems) has since then been spun off into the independent Motorola Mobility.
Contents
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History
Motorola started in Chicago, Illinois as Galvin Manufacturing Corporation (at 847 West Harrison Street)[8] in 1928, with its first product being a battery eliminator. In 1930 Galvin Manufacturing Corporation introduced the Motorola radio, one of the first commercially successful car radios. Company founder Paul V. Galvin created the brand name Motorola for the car radio -- linking "motor" (for motorcar) with "ola" (which implied sound). Thus the Motorola brand meant sound in motion.[9] The name Motorola was adopted in 1930, and the word has been used as a trademark since the 1930s.[10]
Many of Motorola's products have been radio-related, starting with a battery eliminator for radios, through the first walkie-talkie in the world in 1940, defense electronics, cellularinfrastructure equipment, and mobile phone manufacturing. In the same year, the company built its research and development program with Dan Noble, a pioneer in FM radio and semiconductor technologies joined the company as director of research.
In 1943, Motorola went public and in 1947, the name changed to its present name. At this time, Motorola's main business was producing and selling televisions and radios. Motorola produced the hand-held AM SCR-536 radio during World War II which was vital to allied communication.
In 1946 (October) - first "car phone" - Motorola communications equipment carried the first calls on Illinois Bell Telephone Company's new car radiotelephone service in Chicago, Illinois, USA.
In 1952, Motorola opened its first international subsidiary in Toronto, Canada to produce radios and televisions. In 1953, Motorola established the Motorola Foundation to support leading universities in the United States.
In 1955, years after Motorola started its research and development laboratory in Phoenix, Arizona to research new solid-state technology, Motorola introduced the world's first commercial high-power germanium-based transistor. The present "batwing" logo was also introduced in 1955 (having been created by award-winning Chicago graphic designer Morton Goldsholl in late 1954).
Beginning in 1958 with Explorer 1, Motorola provided radio equipment for most NASA space-flights for decades including during the 1969 moon landing. A year later, it established a subsidiary to conduct licensing and manufacturing for international markets.
In 1960, Motorola introduced the world's first "large-screen" (19-inch), transistorized, cordless portable television.
In 1963, Motorola, which had very successfully begun making televisions in 1947 introduced the world's first truly rectangular color TV. The tube, developed in a joint venture with National Video Corporation picture tube quickly became the industry standard.
In 1964, Motorola opened its first company Research and Development branch out side of the United States, in Israel under the management of Moses Basin.
In 1969, Neil Armstrong spoke the famous words "one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind" from the Moon on a Motorola transceiver.[11]
In 1973, Motorola Demonstrates Portable Telephone to be available for public use by 1976.[12]
In 1974, Motorola sold its television business to the Japan-based parent company of Panasonic.
In 1976, Motorola moved to its present headquarters in Schaumburg, Illinois.
In September 1983, the firm made history when the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approved the DynaTAC 8000X telephone, the world's first commercial cellular device. By 1998, cellphones accounted for two thirds of Motorola's gross revenue.[13] The company was also strong in semiconductor technology, including integrated circuits used in computers. In particular, it is well known for the 6800 familyand 68000 family of microprocessors used in Atari ST, Commodore Amiga, Color Computer, and Apple Macintosh personal computers. The PowerPC family was developed with IBM and in a partnership with Apple (known as the AIM alliance). Motorola also has a diverse line of communication products, including satellite systems, digital cable boxes and modems.
In 1986, Motorola invented the Six Sigma quality improvement process. This became a global standard. In 1990, General Instrument Corporation, which was later acquired by Motorola, proposed the first all-digitalHDTV standard. In the same year, the company introduced the Bravo numeric pager which became the world's best-selling pager.
In 1991, Motorola demonstrated the world's first working-prototype digital cellular system and phones using GSM standard in Hanover, Germany. In 1994, Motorola introduced the world's first commercial digital radio system that combined paging, data and cellular communications and voice dispatch in a single radio network and handset. In 1995 Motorola introduced the world's first two-way pager which allowed users to receive text messages and e-mail and reply with a standard response.
In 1998, Motorola was overtaken by Nokia as the world's biggest seller of mobile phone handsets.[11]
On September 15, 1999, Motorola announced it would buy General Instrument in an $11 billion stock swap. General Instrument had long been the No. 1 cable TV equipment provider, supplying cable operators with end-to-end hybrid fiber coax cable solutions. This meant that GI offers all cable TV transmission network components from the head-end to the fiber optic transmission nodes to the cable set-top boxes, now at the availability of Motorola.
In June 2000, Motorola and Cisco supplied the world's first commercial GPRS cellular network to BT Cellnet in the United Kingdom. The world's first GPRS cell phone was also developed by Motorola.
In 2002, Motorola introduced the world's first wireless cable modem gateway which combined a high-speed cable modem router with an ethernet switch and wireless home gateway.
In 2003, Motorola introduced the world's first handset to combine a Linux operating system and Java technology with "full PDA functionality".
In June 2006, Motorola acquired the world-class software platform (AJAR) developed by the British company TTP Communications plc.[14]
In 2006, the firm announced a music subscription service named iRadio. The technology came after a break in a partnership with Apple Computer (which in 2005 had produced an iTunes compatible cell phoneROKR E1, and most recently, mid 2007, its own iPhone). iRadio has many similarities with existing satellite radio services (such as Sirius and XM Radio) by offering live streams of commercial-free music content. Unlike satellite services, however, iRadio content will be downloaded via a broadband internet connection. As of 2008, iRadio has not been commercially released and no further information is available.[15]
In 2007, Motorola acquired Symbol Technologies, Inc. to provide products and systems for enterprise mobility solutions, including rugged mobile computing, advanced data capture and radio frequency identification (RFID).
January 2011 Motorola Splits into two different companies. Motorola Solutions in blue based in Schaumburg Illinois and would concentrate on police technologies, radios, and commercial needs. Motorola Mobility in red based in Libertyville would be the mobile handset producer.
In August 2011, Google announced that it will purchase Motorola Mobility for about $12.5 billion.[16] On November 17, 2011, Motorola Mobility stockholders “voted overwhelmingly to approve the proposed merger with Google Inc”.[17]
Motorola creates numerous products for use by the government, public safety officials, business installments, and the general public. These products include cell phones, laptops, computer processors, and radio communication devices. The Motorola RAZR line has sold over 120 million units bringing the company to the number two mobile phone slot in 2005.
Since the 1950s, used Motorola radio equipment has been popular with amateur radio ("ham") operators. Known as "Ma Batwings," Motorola has provided little to no support to hobbyists, who keep using these radios for years or even decades after they were taken out of production.
Divisional Products:[18]
- Enterprise Mobility Solutions: Headquarters located in Schaumburg, Illinois; comprises communications offered to government and public safety sectors and enterprise mobility business. Motorola develops analog and digital two-way radio, voice and data communications products and systems, mobile computing, advanced data capture, wireless infrastructure and RFID solutions to customers worldwide.
- Home & Networks Mobility: Headquarters located in Arlington Heights, Illinois; produces end-to-end systems that facilitate uninterrupted access to digital entertainment, information and communications services via wired and wireless mediums. Motorola develops digital video system solutions, interactive set-top devices, voice and data modems for digital subscriber line and cable networks, broadband access systems for cable and satellite television operators, and also wireline carriers and wireless service providers.
- Mobile Devices: Headquarters located in Libertyville, Illinois; currently the least prosperous arm of the firm; designs wireless handsets, but also licenses much of its intellectual properties. This includes cellular and wireless systems and as well as integrated applications and Bluetooth accessories.
Finances
![[icon]](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wiki_letter_w_cropped.svg){kind=small} | This section requires expansion. |
Motorola's handset division recorded a loss of US$1.2 billion in the fourth quarter of 2007, while the company as a whole earned $100 million during that quarter.[19] It lost several key executives to rivals,[20] and the web site TrustedReviews called the company's products repetitive and uninnovative.[21] Motorola laid off 3,500 workers in January 2008,[22] followed by a further 4,000 job cuts in June[23] and another 20% cut of its research division a few days later.[24] In July 2008 a large number of executives left Motorola to work on Apple Inc.'s iPhone.[25] The company's handset division was also put on offer for sale.[26] Also that month, analyst Mark McKechnie from American Technology Research said that Motorola "would be lucky to fetch $500 million" for selling its handset business. Analyst Richard Windsor said that Motorola might have to pay someone to take the division off the company's hands, and that Motorola may even exit the handset market altogether.[27] Its global market share has been on the decline; from 18.4% of the market in 2007 the company had a share of just 6.0% by Q1 2009, but at last Motorola scored a profit of $26 million in Q2 and showed an increase of 12% in stocks for the first time after losses in many quarters. During the second quarter of 2010, the company reported a profit of $162 million, which compared very favorably to the $26 million earned for the same period last year. Its Mobile Devices division reported, for the first time in years, earnings of $87 million.[28]
Spin-offs
Television and radio manufacturing
In 1974, Motorola divested itself of its television and radio-manufacturing division, which included the popular Quasar brand of electronics. This division was acquired by Matsushita, already well-known under itsPanasonic brand in North America, where it was looking to expand.
Iridium
Main article: Iridium (satellite)
Motorola developed the first truly global communication network using a set of 66 satellites. The business ambitions behind this project and the need for raising venture capital to fund the project led to the creation of the Iridium company in the late 1990s. While the technology was proven to work, Iridium failed to attract sufficient customers and it filed for bankruptcy in 1999. Obligations to Motorola and loss of expected revenue caused Motorola to spin off the ON Semiconductor (ONNN) business August 4, 1999, raising for Motorola about $1.1 billion.
Motorola manufactured two satellite phone handsets for this network – the 9500 and 9505 as well as transceiver units. Some of these are still in production by an OEM but sold under the Iridium brand.
Government and defense
Further declines in business during 2000 and 2001 caused Motorola to spin off its government and defense business to General Dynamics. The business deal closed September 2001. Thus GD Decision Systems was formed (and later merged with General Dynamics C4 Systems) from Motorola's Integrated Information Systems Group.
Semiconductor
On August 4, 1999 Motorola, Inc.'s Semiconductor Components Group, manufacturing Motorola's discrete, standard analog and standard logic devices was spun-off, recapitalized and established as an independent company named ON Semiconductor.
On October 16, 2003, Motorola announced that it would spin off its Semiconductor Products Sector into a separate company called Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.. The new company began trading on the New York Stock Exchange on July 16 of the following year.
Automotive
In July, 2006 Motorola completed the sale of its automotive business to Continental AG. Motorola’s automotive unit had annual sales of $1.6 billion (€1.33 billion) and employed 4,500. The divisions products included telematics systems used for vehicle navigation and safety services, engine and transmission control electronics, vehicle control, electronics and sensors used in steering, braking, and power doors andpower windows.
Biometrics
In 2000, Motorola acquired Printrak International Inc.[29] for $160 million.[30] In doing so, Motorola not only acquired computer aided dispatch and related software, but also acquired Automated fingerprint identification system software.[31]
In October, 2008, Motorola agreed to sell its Biometrics business to Safran, a French defense firm. Motorola's biometric business unit was headquartered in Anaheim, Calif. The deal closed in April, 2009.[32] The unit became part of Sagem Morpho, which was renamed MorphoTrak.
Split
On March 26, 2008, Motorola's board of directors approved a split into two different publicly traded companies. This came after talk of selling the handset division to another corporation. These new companies would comprise the business units of the current Motorola Mobile Devices and Motorola Broadband & Mobility Solutions. Originally it was expected that this action would be approved by regulatory bodies and complete by mid-2009, but the split was delayed due to company restructuring problems and the 2008–2009 extreme economic downturn.[33]
On February 11, 2010, Motorola announced its separation into two independent, publicly traded companies,[34] effective Q1 2011. The official split occurred at around 12:00 pm EST on January 4, 2011. The two new companies are called Motorola Mobility (NYSE: MMI
; cell phone and cable television equipment company) and Motorola Solutions (NYSE: MSI
; Government and Enterprise Business). Motorola Solutions is generally considered to be the direct successor to Motorola, Inc., as the reorganization was structured with Motorola Mobility being spunoff.[7]
Motorola Mobility deal by Google
In fact, according to the filing, Google senior vice president Andy Rubin first reached out to Motorola Mobility in early July 2011 to discuss the purchase by some of Google’s competitors of the patent portfolio of Nortel Networks Corp., and to assess its potential impact on the Android ecosystem
Google boosted its offer for Motorola Mobility by 33% in a single day in early August, even though Motorola wasn’t soliciting competing bids. The aggressive bidding by Google showed that the search giant was under considerable pressure to beef up its patent portfolio to protect its promising Android franchise from a growing number of legal challenges.
According to the filing, Google and Motorola began discussions about Motorola’s patent portfolio in early July, as well as the “intellectual property litigation and the potential impact of such litigation on the Android ecosystem.”
Although the two companies discussed the possibility of an acquisition after the initial contact by Mr. Rubin, it was only after Motorola pushed back on the idea of patent sale that the acquisition talks picked up steam.
The turning point came during a meeting on July 6. At the meeting, Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha discussed the protection of the Android ecosystem with Google senior vice president Nikesh Arora, and during that talk Jha told Arora that “it could be problematic for Motorola Mobility to continue to as a stand-alone entity if it sold a large portion of its patent portfolio.”
In connection with these discussions, the two companies signed a confidentiality and non-disclosure agreement that allowed Google to do due diligence on the company’s patent portfolio.
On July 21 and July 23, Jha met with Arora and Rubin to discuss strategic options between the two companies, agreeing to continue to discuss a potential sale.
On July 27, Motorola pushed the sale idea even harder when it requested that Google expand its confidentiality agreement to cover due diligence relating to a possible acquisition of Motorola.
Google got the message. The next day, Mr. Jha, Mr. Arora and Google chief legal officer David Drummond met to discuss the terms of an acquisition of the whole company. Arora and Drummond talked price for the first time, telling Jha that Google was considering an offer “in the range in the high $20s or low $30s.”
On August 1, Google sent Motorola a letter offering the company $30 a share, and requested a response by August 4. The same day Motorola hired Qatalyst Partners and Centerview as its advisors.
On August 5, Motorola, advised by Qatalyst Partners, rejected the offer and suggested $43.50. Qatalyst Partners suggested to Drummond that Google increase its price to $43.50 a share.
On Aug. 9, Arora came back with an offer of $37 a share over the phone to Jha. Jha told Arora that he would be prepared to recommend that its board consider accepting an offer of $40.50 or higher.
Later that day, Google responded with a new offer of $40 a share.
On August 14, Motorola director Daniel Ninivaggi told the board that Carl Icahn, a large shareholder of the company who had urged Motorola to explore alternatives to its patent portfolio, would support the proposed merger without a voting agreement.
On the morning of August 15, the two companies entered into a merger agreement at the offered price of $40.
On November 17, Motorola Mobility stockholders approved the proposed merger with Google Inc.
Quality systems
The Six Sigma quality system was developed at Motorola even though it became best known through its use by General Electric. It was created by engineer Bill Smith, under the direction of Bob Galvin (son of founder Paul Galvin) when he was running the company. Motorola University is one of many places that provide Six Sigma training.
Environmental record
Motorola, Inc., along with the Arizona Water Co. has been identified as the sources of trichloroethylene (TCE) contamination that took place in Scottsdale, Arizona. The malfunction led to a ban on the use of water that lasted three days and affected almost 5000 people in the area. Motorola was found to be the main source of the TCE, an industrial solvent that is thought to cause cancer. The TCE contamination was caused by a faulty blower on an air stripping tower that was used to take TCE from the water, and Motorola has attributed the situation to operator error.[35]
Motorola ranks 6th out of 18 leading electronics manufacturers in Greenpeace’s Guide to Greener Electronics of October 2010 (the company shares 6th place with its competitors Panasonic and Sony). [36]
Motorola scores relatively well on the chemicals criteria and has a goal to eliminate PVC vinyl plastic and brominated flame retardants (BFRs), though only in mobile devices and not in all its products introduced after 2010, despite the fact that Sony Ericsson and Nokia are already there. All of its mobile phones are now PVC-free and it has two PVC and BFR-free mobile phones, the A45 ECO and the GRASP; all chargers are also free from PVC and BFRs.[36]
The company is also increasing the proportion of recycled materials that is used in its products. For example the housing for the MOTO™ W233 Renew and MOTOCUBO A45 Eco mobile phones contains plastic from post-consumer recycled water cooler bottles.[37] According to the company’s information all of Motorola’s newly designed chargers meet the current Energy Star requirements and exceed the requirements for standby/ no-load modes by at least 67%.[38]
Sponsorships
Motorola sponsored Scottish Premier League club Motherwell F.C. for 11 years. This long term deal ended after the company started to reduce its manufacturing operations in Scotland. The club also sponsoredLivingston F.C. between 1998–2002. The company also had a plant on the edge of the town. However, this closed down at the same time as their sponsorship with the club ended. The South Stand at Livingston'sAlmondvale Stadium, was named after the company, during their time of sponsorship. The company also sponsored a cycling team that counted Lance Armstrong amongst its members. Motorola is also a large sponsor of Danica Patrick, David Beckham, and Fergie. It also Sponsored The Richmond Football Club in the Australian Football League from 2004–2007. Motorola sponsored São Paulo FC from 2000–2001. Motorola also sponsored Club Bolívar since 2008.
Robby Gordon was sponsored by Motorola in 2007 and 2008. Motorola is on Gordon's car in NASCAR 07 and NASCAR 08.
See also
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nokia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about the telecommunications corporation. For the Finnish town, see Nokia, Finland. For other uses, see Nokia (disambiguation).
 | |
| Type | Public company |
|---|---|
| Traded as | OMX: NOK1V ,NYSE: NOK ,FWB: NOA3 |
| Industry | Telecommunications Internet Computer software |
| Founded | Tampere, Finland, Russian Empire (1865) incorporated in Nokia (1871) |
| Founder(s) | Fredrik Idestam Leo Mechelin |
| Headquarters | Espoo, Finland |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Key people | Jorma Ollila (Chairman) Stephen Elop (President & CEO) Timo Ihamuotila (CFO) Kai Öistämö (CDO) Henry Tirri (CTO) |
| Products | Mobile phones Smartphones Mobile computers Networks (See products listing) |
| Services | Maps and navigation, music,messaging and media Software solutions (See services listing) |
| Revenue | €42.45 billion (2010)[1] |
| Operating income | €2.070 billion (2010)[1] |
| Net income | €1.850 billion (2010)[1] |
| Total assets | €39.12 billion (end 2010)[1] |
| Total equity | €16.23 billion (end 2010)[1] |
| Employees | 132,430 (end 2010)[1] |
| Divisions | Mobile Solutions Mobile Phones Markets |
| Subsidiaries | Nokia Siemens Networks Navteq Symbian Vertu Qt Development Frameworks |
| Website | Nokia.com |
Nokia Corporation (Finnish pronunciation: [ˈnɔkiɑ]) (OMX: NOK1V, NYSE: NOK, FWB: NOA3) is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki.[2] Nokia is engaged in the manufacturing of mobile devices and in converging Internet and communications industries, with over 132,000 employees in 120 countries, sales in more than 150 countries and global annual revenue of over €42 billion and operating profit of €2 billion as of 2010.[1] It is the world's largest manufacturer of mobile phones: its global device market share was 23% in the second quarter 2011.[3] Nokia's estimated share of the converged mobile device market was 31% in the fourth quarter, compared with 38% in the third quarter 2010.[1] Nokia produces mobile devices for every major market segment and protocol, including GSM, CDMA, and W-CDMA (UMTS). Nokia offers Internet services such as applications, games, music, maps, media and messaging through its Ovi platform. Nokia's joint venture with Siemens, Nokia Siemens Networks produces telecommunications networkequipment, solutions and services.[4] Nokia is also engaged in providing free digital map information and navigation services through its wholly owned subsidiaryNavteq.[5]
Nokia has sites for research and development, manufacture and sales in several countries; as of December 2010, Nokia had R&D presence in 16 countries and employed 35,870 people in research and development, representing approximately 27% of the group's total workforce.[1] The Nokia Research Center, founded in 1986, is Nokia's industrial research unit consisting of about 500 researchers, engineers and scientists;[6][7] it has sites in seven countries: Finland, China, India, Kenya,Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States.[8] Besides its research centers, in 2001 Nokia founded (and owns) INdT – Nokia Institute of Technology, a R&D institute located in Brazil.[9] Nokia operates a total of 9 manufacturing facilities[10] located at Salo, Finland; Manaus, Brazil; Cluj, Romania; Beijing and Dongguan, China;Komárom, Hungary; Chennai, India; Reynosa, Mexico; and Masan, South Korea.[11][12] Nokia's factory in Cluj was seized by the Romanian government in November 2011 to prevent a sale of the assets, after Nokia had accumulated a tax liability of US$ 10 million.[13] Nokia's industrial design department is headquartered in Soho in London, UK with significant satellite offices in Helsinki, Finland and Calabasas, California in the US.
Nokia is a public limited-liability company listed on the Helsinki, Frankfurt, and New York stock exchanges.[10] Nokia plays a very large role in the economy of Finland; it is by far the largest Finnish company, accounting for about a third of the market capitalization of the Helsinki Stock Exchange (OMX Helsinki) as of 2007, a unique situation for an industrialized country.[14] It is an important employer in Finland and several small companies have grown into large ones as its partners andsubcontractors.[15] In 2009, Nokia contributed 1.6% to Finland's GDP, and accounted for about 16% of Finland's exports in 2006.[16]
The Nokia brand, valued at $25 billion, is listed as the 14th most valuable global brand in the Interbrand/BusinessWeek Best Global Brands list of 2011.[17] It is the 14th ranked brand corporation in Europe (as of 2011),[18] the 8th most admirable Network and Other Communications Equipment company worldwide in Fortune's World's Most Admired Companies list of 2011 ,[19] and the world's 143th largest company as measured by revenue in Fortune Global 500 list of 2011.[20] In July 2010, Nokia reported a drop in profits by 40%,[21] which turned into an operating loss of EUR 487 million in Q2 2011.[22] In the global smartphone rivalry,[23] Nokia held the 3rd place in 2Q2011, trailing behind Samsung and Apple.[24][25]
On 11 February 2011, Nokia announced a partnership with Microsoft where all future Nokia smartphones will be powered by the Windows Phone (WP7) operating system. On 26 October 2011, Nokia unveiled its first WP7.5 powered handsets Lumia 710 and 800.[26]
The Nokia House, Nokia's head office located by the Gulf of Finland in Keilaniemi,Espoo, was constructed between 1995 and 1997. It is the workplace of more than 1,000 Nokia employees.[27]
History
Pre-telecommunications era
The predecessors of the modern Nokia were the Nokia Company (Nokia Aktiebolag), Finnish Rubber Works Ltd (Suomen Gummitehdas Oy) and Finnish Cable Works Ltd (Suomen Kaapelitehdas Oy).[28]
Nokia's history starts in 1865 when mining engineer Fredrik Idestam established a groundwood pulp mill on the banks of the Tammerkoski rapids in the town ofTampere, in southwestern Finland in Russian Empire and started manufacturing paper.[29] In 1868, Idestam built a second mill near the town of Nokia, fifteen kilometres (nine miles) west of Tampere by the Nokianvirta river, which had better resources for hydropower production.[30] In 1871, Idestam, with the help of his close friend statesman Leo Mechelin, renamed and transformed his firm into a share company, thereby founding the Nokia Company, the name it is still known by today.[30]
Toward the end of the 19th century, Mechelin's wishes to expand into the electricity business were at first thwarted by Idestam's opposition. However, Idestam's retirement from the management of the company in 1896 allowed Mechelin to become the company's chairman (from 1898 until 1914) and sell most shareholders on his plans, thus realizing his vision.[30] In 1902, Nokia added electricity generation to its business activities.[29]
Industrial conglomerate
In 1898, Eduard Polón founded Finnish Rubber Works, manufacturer of galoshes and other rubber products, which later became Nokia's rubber business.[28] At the beginning of the 20th century, Finnish Rubber Works established its factories near the town of Nokia and they began using Nokia as its product brand.[31] In 1912, Arvid Wickström founded Finnish Cable Works, producer of telephone, telegraph and electrical cables and the foundation of Nokia's cable and electronics businesses.[28] At the end of the 1910s, shortly after World War I, the Nokia Company was nearing bankruptcy.[32] To ensure the continuation of electricity supply from Nokia's generators, Finnish Rubber Works acquired the business of the insolvent company.[32] In 1922, Finnish Rubber Works acquired Finnish Cable Works.[33] In 1937, Verner Weckman, a sport wrestler and Finland's first Olympic Gold medalist, became President of Finnish Cable Works, after 16 years as its Technical Director.[34] After World War II, Finnish Cable Works supplied cables to the Soviet Union as part of Finland's war reparations. This gave the company a good foothold for later trade.[34]
The three companies, which had been jointly owned since 1922, were merged to form a new industrial conglomerate, Nokia Corporation in 1967 and paved the way for Nokia's future as a global corporation.[35] The new company was involved in many industries, producing at one time or another paper products, car and bicycle tires, footwear (including rubber boots), communications cables, televisions and other consumer electronics, personal computers, electricity generation machinery, robotics, capacitors, military communications and equipment (such as the SANLA M/90 device and the M61 gas mask for the Finnish Army), plastics, aluminium and chemicals.[27] Each business unit had its own director who reported to the first Nokia Corporation President, Björn Westerlund. As the president of the Finnish Cable Works, he had been responsible for setting up the company’s first electronics department in 1960, sowing the seeds of Nokia’s future in telecommunications.[36]
Eventually, the company decided to leave consumer electronics behind in the 1990s and focused solely on the fastest growing segments in telecommunications.[37] Nokian Tyres, manufacturer of tires, split from Nokia Corporation to form its own company in 1988[38] and two years later Nokian Footwear, manufacturer of rubber boots, was founded.[31] During the rest of the 1990s, Nokia divested itself of all of its non-telecommunications businesses.[37]
Telecommunications era
The seeds of the current incarnation of Nokia were planted with the founding of the electronics section of the cable division in 1960 and the production of its first electronic device in 1962: a pulse analyzer designed for use in nuclear power plants.[36] In the 1967 fusion, that section was separated into its own division, and began manufacturing telecommunications equipment. A key CEO and subsequent Chairman of the Board was vuorineuvos Björn "Nalle" Westerlund (1912–2009), who founded the electronics department and let it run at a loss for 15 years.
Networking equipment
In the 1970s, Nokia became more involved in the telecommunications industry by developing the Nokia DX 200, a digital switch for telephone exchanges. The DX 200 became the workhorse of the network equipment division. Its modular and flexible architecture enabled it to be developed into various switching products.[39] In 1984, development of a version of the exchange for the Nordic Mobile Telephony network was started.[40]
For a while in the 1970s, Nokia's network equipment production was separated into Telefenno, a company jointly owned by the parent corporation and by a company owned by the Finnish state. In 1987, the state sold its shares to Nokia and in 1992 the name was changed to Nokia Telecommunications.
In the 1970s and 1980s, Nokia developed the Sanomalaitejärjestelmä ("Message device system"), a digital, portable and encrypted text-based communications device for the Finnish Defence Forces.[41] The current main unit used by the Defence Forces is the Sanomalaite M/90 (SANLA M/90).[42]
First mobile phones
The Mobira Cityman 150, Nokia's NMT-900 mobile phone from 1989 (left), compared to theNokia 1100 from 2003.[43] The Mobira Cityman line was launched in 1987.[44]
The technologies that preceded modern cellular mobile telephony systems were the various "0G" pre-cellular mobile radio telephony standards. Nokia had been producing commercial and some military mobile radio communications technology since the 1960s, although this part of the company was sold some time before the later company rationalization. Since 1964, Nokia had developed VHF radio simultaneously with Salora Oy. In 1966, Nokia and Salora started developing the ARP standard (which stands for Autoradiopuhelin, or car radio phone in English), a car-based mobile radio telephony system and the first commercially operated public mobile phone network in Finland. It went online in 1971 and offered 100% coverage in 1978.[45]
In 1979, the merger of Nokia and Salora resulted in the establishment of Mobira Oy. Mobira began developing mobile phones for the NMT (Nordic Mobile Telephony) network standard, the first-generation, first fully automatic cellular phone system that went online in 1981.[46] In 1982, Mobira introduced its first car phone, the Mobira Senator for NMT-450 networks.[46]
Nokia bought Salora Oy in 1984 and now owning 100% of the company, changed the company's telecommunications branch name to Nokia-Mobira Oy. The Mobira Talkman, launched in 1984, was one of the world's first transportable phones. In 1987, Nokia introduced one of the world's first handheld phones, the Mobira Cityman 900 for NMT-900 networks (which, compared to NMT-450, offered a better signal, yet a shorter roam). While the Mobira Senator of 1982 had weighed 9.8 kg (22 lb) and the Talkman just under 5 kg (11 lb), the Mobira Cityman weighed only 800 g (28 oz) with the battery and had a price tag of 24,000 Finnish marks (approximately €4,560).[44] Despite the high price, the first phones were almost snatched from the sales assistants’ hands. Initially, the mobile phone was a "yuppie" product and a status symbol.[27]
Nokia's mobile phones got a big publicity boost in 1987, when Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev was pictured using a Mobira Cityman to make a call from Helsinki to his communications minister in Moscow. This led to the phone's nickname of the "Gorba".[44]
In 1988, Jorma Nieminen, resigning from the post of CEO of the mobile phone unit, along with two other employees from the unit, started a notable mobile phone company of their own, Benefon Oy (since renamed to GeoSentric).[47] One year later, Nokia-Mobira Oy became Nokia Mobile Phones.
Involvement in GSM
Nokia was one of the key developers of GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications),[48] the second-generation mobile technology which could carry data as well as voice traffic. NMT (Nordic Mobile Telephony), the world's first mobile telephony standard that enabled international roaming, provided valuable experience for Nokia for its close participation in developing GSM, which was adopted in 1987 as the new European standard for digital mobile technology.[49][50]
Nokia delivered its first GSM network to the Finnish operator Radiolinja in 1989.[51] The world's first commercial GSM call was made on July 1, 1991 in Helsinki, Finland over a Nokia-supplied network, by then Prime Minister of Finland Harri Holkeri, using a prototype Nokia GSM phone.[51] In 1992, the first GSM phone, the Nokia 1011, was launched.[51][52] The model number refers to its launch date, 10 November.[52] The Nokia 1011 did not yet employ Nokia's characteristic ringtone, the Nokia tune. It was introduced as a ringtone in 1994 with the Nokia 2100 series.[53]
GSM's high-quality voice calls, easy international roaming and support for new services like text messaging (SMS) laid the foundations for a worldwide boom in mobile phone use.[51] GSM came to dominate the world of mobile telephony in the 1990s, in mid-2008 accounting for about three billion mobile telephone subscribers in the world, with more than 700 mobile operators across 218 countries and territories. New connections are added at the rate of 15 per second, or 1.3 million per day.[54]
Personal computers and IT equipment
In the 1980s, Nokia's computer division Nokia Data produced a series of personal computers called MikroMikko.[55] MikroMikko was Nokia Data's attempt to enter the business computer market. The first model in the line, MikroMikko 1, was released on September 29, 1981,[56] around the same time as the first IBM PC. However, the personal computer division was sold to the British ICL (International Computers Limited) in 1991, which later became part of Fujitsu.[57] MikroMikko remained a trademark of ICL and later Fujitsu. Internationally the MikroMikko line was marketed by Fujitsu as the ErgoPro.
Fujitsu later transferred its personal computer operations to Fujitsu Siemens Computers, which shut down its only factory in Espoo, Finland (in the Kilo district, where computers had been produced since the 1960s) at the end of March 2000,[58][59] thus ending large-scale PC manufacturing in the country. Nokia was also known for producing very high quality CRT and early TFT LCD displays for PC and larger systems application. The Nokia Display Products' branded business was sold to ViewSonicin 2000.[60] In addition to personal computers and displays, Nokia used to manufacture DSL modems and digital set-top boxes.
Nokia re-entered the PC market in August 2009 with the introduction of the Nokia Booklet 3G mini laptop.[61]
Challenges of growth
In the 1980s, during the era of its CEO Kari Kairamo, Nokia expanded into new fields, mostly by acquisitions. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the corporation ran into serious financial problems, a major reason being its heavy losses by the television manufacturing division and businesses that were just too diverse.[62] These problems, and a suspected total burnout, probably contributed to Kairamo taking his own life in 1988. After Kairamo's death, Simo Vuorilehto became Nokia's Chairman and CEO. In 1990–1993, Finland underwent severe economic depression,[63] which also struck Nokia. Under Vuorilehto's management, Nokia was severely overhauled. The company responded by streamlining its telecommunications divisions, and by divesting itself of the television and PC divisions.[64]
Probably the most important strategic change in Nokia's history was made in 1992, however, when the new CEO Jorma Ollila made a crucial strategic decision to concentrate solely on telecommunications.[37]Thus, during the rest of the 1990s, the rubber, cable and consumer electronics divisions were gradually sold as Nokia continued to divest itself of all of its non-telecommunications businesses.[37]
As late as 1991, more than a quarter of Nokia's turnover still came from sales in Finland. However, after the strategic change of 1992, Nokia saw a huge increase in sales to North America, South America and Asia.[65] The exploding worldwide popularity of mobile telephones, beyond even Nokia's most optimistic predictions, caused a logistics crisis in the mid-1990s.[66] This prompted Nokia to overhaul its entire logistics operation.[67] By 1998, Nokia’s focus on telecommunications and its early investment in GSM technologies had made the company the world's largest mobile phone manufacturer.[65] Between 1996 and 2001, Nokia’s turnover increased almost fivefold from 6.5 billion euros to 31 billion euros.[65] Logistics continues to be one of Nokia's major advantages over its rivals, along with greater economies of scale.[68][69]
Recent history
Product releases
Reduction in size of Nokia mobile phones
Nokia released its first touch screen phone, the Nokia 7710, which was a huge success. In May 2007, Nokia announced that its Nokia 1100 handset, launched in 2003,[43]with over 200 million units shipped, was the best-selling mobile phone of all time and the world's top-selling consumer electronics product.[70] In November 2007, Nokia announced and released the Nokia N82, its first Nseries phone with Xenon flash. At the Nokia World conference in December 2007, Nokia announced their "Comes With Music" program: Nokia device buyers are to receive a year of complimentary access to music downloads.[71] The service became commercially available in the second half of 2008.
Nokia Productions was the first ever mobile filmmaking project directed by Spike Lee. Work began in April 2008, and the film premiered in October 2008.[72]
In 2008, Nokia released the Nokia E71 which was marketed to directly compete with the other BlackBerry-type devices offering a full "qwerty" keyboard and cheaper prices. Nokia announced in August 2009 that they will be selling a high-end Windows-based mini laptop called the Nokia Booklet 3G.[61] On September 2, 2009, Nokia launched two new music and social networking phones, the X6 and X3.[73] The Nokia X6 features 32GB of on-board memory with a 3.2" finger touch interface and comes with a music playback time of 35 hours. The Nokia X3 is a first series 40 Ovi Store-enabled device. The X3 is a music device that comes with stereo speakers, built-in FM radio, and a 3.2 megapixel camera. On September 10, 2009, Nokia unveiled a new handset, the 7705 Twist, a phone with a sports square shape that swivels open to reveal a full QWERTY keypad.[74] The new mobile, which will be available exclusively through Verizon Wireless, features a 3 megapixel camera, web browsing, voice commands and weighs around 3.44 ounces (98 g).
Plant movements
Nokia opened its Komárom, Hungary mobile phone factory on May 5, 2000.[75]
In March 2007, Nokia signed a memorandum with Cluj County Council, Romania to open a new plant near the city in Jucu commune.[12][76][77] Moving the production from the Bochum, Germany factory to a low wage country created an uproar in Germany.[78][79] Nokia recently moved its North American Headquarters to Sunnyvale.
Reorganizations
In April 2003, the troubles of the networks equipment division caused the corporation to resort to similar streamlining practices on that side, including layoffs and organizational restructuring.[80] This diminished Nokia's public image in Finland,[81][82] and produced a number of court cases and an episode of a documentary television show critical of Nokia.[83]
On February 2006, Nokia and Sanyo announced a memorandum of understanding to create a joint venture addressing the CDMA handset business. But in June, they announced ending negotiations without agreement. Nokia also stated its decision to pull out of CDMA research and development, to continue CDMA business in selected markets.[84][85][86]
In June 2006, Jorma Ollila left his position as CEO to become the chairman of Royal Dutch Shell[87] and to give way for Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo.[88][89]
In May 2008, Nokia announced on their annual stockholder meeting that they want to shift to the Internet business as a whole. Nokia no longer wants to be seen as the telephone company. Google, Apple andMicrosoft are not seen as natural competition for their new image but they are considered as major important players to deal with.[90]
In November 2008, Nokia announced it was ceasing mobile phone distribution in Japan.[91] Following early December, distribution of Nokia E71 is cancelled, both from NTT docomo and SoftBank Mobile. Nokia Japan retains global research & development programs, sourcing business, and an MVNO venture of Vertu luxury phones, using docomo's telecommunications network.
Acquisitions
For a more comprehensive list, see List of acquisitions by Nokia.
On September 22, 2003, Nokia acquired Sega.com, a branch of Sega which became the major basis to develop the Nokia N-Gage device.[92]
On November 16, 2005, Nokia and Intellisync Corporation, a provider of data and PIM synchronization software, signed a definitive agreement for Nokia to acquire Intellisync.[93] Nokia completed the acquisition on February 10, 2006.[94]
On June 19, 2006, Nokia and Siemens AG announced the companies would merge their mobile and fixed-line phone network equipment businesses to create one of the world's largest network firms, Nokia Siemens Networks.[95] Each company has a 50% stake in the infrastructure company, and it is headquartered in Espoo, Finland. The companies predicted annual sales of €16 bn and cost savings of €1.5 bn a year by 2010. About 20,000 Nokia employees were transferred to this new company.
On August 8, 2006, Nokia and Loudeye Corp. announced that they had signed an agreement for Nokia to acquire online music distributor Loudeye Corporation for approximately US $60 million.[96] The company has been developing this into an online music service in the hope of using it to generate handset sales. The service, launched on August 29, 2007, is aimed to rival iTunes. Nokia completed the acquisition on October 16, 2006.[97]
In July 2007, Nokia acquired all assets of Twango, the comprehensive media sharing solution for organizing and sharing photos, videos and other personal media.[98][99]
In September 2007, Nokia announced its intention to acquire Enpocket, a supplier of mobile advertising technology and services.[100]
In October 2007, pending shareholder and regulatory approval, Nokia bought Navteq, a U.S.-based supplier of digital mapping data, for a price of $8.1 billion.[5][101] Nokia finalized the acquisition on July 10, 2008.[102]
In September, 2008, Nokia acquired OZ Communications, a privately held company with approximately 220 employees headquartered in Montreal, Canada.[103]
On July 24, 2009, Nokia announced that it will acquire certain assets of cellity, a privately owned mobile software company which employs 14 people in Hamburg, Germany.[104] The acquisition of cellity was completed on August 5, 2009.[105]
On September 11, 2009, Nokia announced the acquisition of "certain assets of Plum Ventures, Inc, a privately held company which employed approximately 10 people with main offices in Boston, Massachusetts. Plum will complement Nokia’s Social Location services".[106]
On March 28, 2010, Nokia announced the acquisition of Novarra, the mobile web browser firm from Chicago. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.Novarra is a privately held company based in Chicago, IL and provider of a mobile browser and service platform and has more than 100 employees.[107]
On April 10, 2010, Nokia announced its acquisition of MetaCarta, whose technology was planned to be used in the area of local search, particularly involving location and other services. Financial details of acquisition were not disclosed.[108]
Curtailments
Amid falling sales, Nokia posted a loss of 368 million euros for Q2 2011, while in Q2 2010 had still a profit of 227 million euros. On September 2011, Nokia has announced it will lose another 3,500 jobs worldwide, including the closure of its Cluj factory in Romania.[109]
Operating systems
Photograph taken using Nokia N82 TheNokia N8 smartphone is the world's firstSymbian^3 device, and the first camera phone to ever feature a 12 megapixelautofocus lens.
The first Nseries device, the N90, utilised the older Symbian OS 8.1 mobile operating system, as did the N70. Subsequently Nokia switched to using SymbianOS 9 for all later Nseries devices (except the N72, which was based on the N70). Newer Nseries devices incorporate newer revisions of SymbianOS 9 that include Feature Packs. TheN800, N810 and N900 are as of July 2010 the only Nseries devices to not use Symbian OS. They use the Linux-based Maemo.[110]
Nokia stated that Maemo would be developed alongside Symbian.
Maemo has since (Maemo "6" and beyond) merged with Intel's Moblin, and become MeeGo, which will continue to be developed for mobile devices.
The Nokia N8 is the first device to function on the Symbian^3 mobile operating system.
Nokia revealed that the N8 will be the last device in its flagship N-series devices to ship with Symbian OS.[111][112]
Instead, Nokia will use Microsoft Windows Phone for its high-end flagship devices, and revealed the Nokia N9 will function on the MeeGo mobile operating system.
"Alliance" with Microsoft
On 11 February 2011, Nokia's CEO Stephen Elop, a former Microsoft employee, unveiled a new strategic alliance with Microsoft, and announced it would replace Symbianand MeeGo with Windows Phone.[113][114] Nokia will, however, retain Symbian for use in mid-to-low-end devices. It will also invest into the Series 40 platform and release a single MeeGo product in 2011.[115]
This news has not been well-received by consumers, and has contributed to the decline in the stock price by 11%.[1]
As part of the restructuring plan, Nokia plan to reduce spending on research and development, instead refocusing on customising and enhancing the software line for Windows Phone 7.[116] Nokia's "applications and content store" (Ovi) will be integrated into the Windows Phone Marketplace, while Nokia Maps will be at the heart of Microsoft's Bing and AdCenter. Microsoft will provide developer tools to Nokia, to replace the Qt framework which will not be supported by Windows Phone 7 devices.[117]
Symbian is now described as a "franchise platform" with Nokia planning to sell 150 million Symbian devices into the future. MeeGo emphasis will be on longer-term exploration with plans to ship "a MeeGo-related product" later this year. Microsoft's search engine, Bing, will be the search engine for all Nokia phones. Nokia also will get some level of customisation on WP7.[118] After this announcement, Nokia's share price fell about 14%, its biggest drop since July 2009.[119]
As Nokia is the largest mobile phone manufacturer worldwide[3] it is suggested the alliance will make Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 a stronger contender against Androidand iOS.[117] In June 2011, Nokia was overtaken by Apple as the world's biggest smartphone maker by volume.[120] In August 2011, Chris Weber, head of Nokia's subsidiary in the U.S., stated "The reality is if we are not successful with Windows Phone, it doesn’t matter what we do (elsewhere)." He further added "North America is a priority for Nokia (...) because it is a key market for Microsoft."[121]
Corporate affairs
Corporate structure
Divisions
Since July 1, 2010, Nokia comprises three business groups: Mobile Solutions, Mobile Phones and Markets.[122] The three units receive operational support from the Corporate Development Office, led by Kai Öistämö, which is also responsible for exploring corporate strategic and future growth opportunities.[122]
On April 1, 2007, Nokia’s Networks business group was combined with Siemens’ carrier-related operations for fixed and mobile networks to form Nokia Siemens Networks, jointly owned by Nokia and Siemens and consolidated by Nokia.[123]
Mobile Solutions
The Nokia N900, a Maemo 5 Linux based mobile Internet device and touchscreensmartphone from Nokia's Nseries portfolio.
Mobile Solutions is responsible for Nokia's portfolio of smartphones and mobile computers, including the more expensive multimedia and enterprise-class devices. The team is also responsible for a suite of internet services under the Ovi brand, with a strong focus on maps and navigation, music, messaging and media.[122] This unit is led by Anssi Vanjoki, along with Tero Ojanperä (for Services) and Alberto Torres (for MeeGo Computers).[122]
Alberto Torres has stepped down.
Mobile Phones
Mobile Phones is responsible for Nokia's portfolio of affordable mobile phones, as well as a range of services that people can access with them, headed by Mary T. McDowell.[122] This unit provides the general public with mobile voice and data products across a range of devices, including high-volume, consumer oriented mobile phones. The devices are based on GSM/EDGE, 3G/W-CDMA and CDMA cellular technologies.
In the first quarter of 2006 Nokia sold over 15 million MP3 capable mobile phones, which means that Nokia is not only the world's leading supplier of mobile phones anddigital cameras (as most of Nokia's mobile telephones feature digital cameras, it is also believed that Nokia has recently overtaken Kodak in camera production making it the largest in the world)[citation needed], Nokia is now also the leading supplier of digital audio players (MP3 players), outpacing sales of devices such as the iPod fromApple.[citation needed] At the end of the year 2007, Nokia managed to sell almost 440 million mobile phones which accounted for 40% of all global mobile phones sales.[124]By 2010, Nokia's market share in the mobile phone market had dropped to 32.6% (453 million phones).[125]
Anssi Vanjoki resigned a few days before Nokia World 2010 and under new leadership team Jo Harlow will look into the affairs of Smartphones portfolio.
On 27 April 2011, The Register reported that Nokia is secretly developing a new operating system called Meltemi aiming at the low-end market. It is believed it will be replacing the S30 and S40 operating systems. Due to low-end market customers' demand of having smartphone features in their feature phone, the OS will include some features exclusive to high-end smartphones.
Markets
Markets is responsible for Nokia's supply chains, sales channels, brand and marketing functions of the company, and is responsible for delivering mobile solutions and mobile phones to the market. The unit is headed by Niklas Savander.[122]
Subsidiaries
The Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, a touchscreen smartphone and portable entertainment device which emphasizes music and multimedia playback.
Nokia has several subsidiaries, of which the two most significant as of 2009 are Nokia Siemens Networks and Navteq.[122] Other notable subsidiaries include, but are not limited toVertu, a British-based manufacturer and retailer of luxury mobile phones; Qt Software, a Norwegian-based software company, and OZ Communications, a consumer e-mail and instant messaging provider.
Until 2008 Nokia was the major shareholder in Symbian Limited, a software development and licensing company that produced Symbian OS, a smartphone operating system used by Nokia and other manufacturers. In 2008 Nokia acquired Symbian Ltd and, along with a number of other companies, created the Symbian Foundation to distribute the Symbian platform royalty free and as open source.
Nokia Siemens Networks
Main article: Nokia Siemens Networks
Nokia Siemens Networks (previously Nokia Networks) provides wireless and fixed network infrastructure, communications and networks service platforms, as well as professional services to operators and service providers.[122] Nokia Siemens Networks focuses in GSM, EDGE, 3G/W-CDMA and WiMAX radio access networks; core networks with increasing IP and multiaccess capabilities; and services.
On June 19, 2006 Nokia and Siemens AG announced the companies are to merge their mobile and fixed-line phone network equipment businesses to create one of the world's largest network firms, called Nokia Siemens Networks.[95] The Nokia Siemens Networks brand identity was subsequently launched at the 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona in February 2007.[126][127]
On Aug 22, 2011 Nokia Siemens became embroiled in a scandal related to the use and abuse of surveillance systems delivered to the Bahrain government by one of its former business units, Nokia Siemens Intelligence Solutions (NSIS). The spy gear in Bahrain was sold by Siemens AG (SIE), and maintained by Nokia Siemens Networks and NSN’s divested unit, Trovicor GmbH. The sale and maintenance contracts were also confirmed by Ben Roome, a Nokia Siemens spokesman based in Farnborough, England. The system was reportedly used as the investigative tool of choice to gather information about political dissidents—and silence them. Companies such as Nokia and Nokia Siemens are free to sell such equipment almost anywhere. For the most part, the U.S. and European countries lack export controls to deter the use of such systems for repression, as was the case in Bahrain were at least 30 people were killed during the 2011 uprising. Many Western nations actively support the export of these systems of repression, e.g. to countries that are home to some of the U.S. Navy’s Fleet. Monitoring centers, as the systems are called, are sold around the globe by Nokia Siemens and its competitors, such as Israel-based Nice Systems Ltd. (NICE), and Verint Systems Inc. (VRNT), headquartered in Melville, New York. They form the heart of so-called lawful interception surveillance systems. By the end of 2007, the Nokia Siemens Intelligence Solutions unit had more than 90 systems installed in 60 countries.[128] Besides Bahrain, several other Middle Eastern nations that cracked down on uprisings this year—including Egypt, Syria and Yemen—also purchased monitoring centers from the chain of businesses now known as Trovicor. Trovicor equipment plays a surveillance role in at least 12 Middle Eastern and North African nations. Trovicor’s precursor, which started in 1993 as the voice- and data-recording unit of Siemens, in 2007 became part of Nokia Siemens Networks, the world’s second biggest maker of wireless communications equipment. NSN, a 50-50 joint venture with Espoo, Finland-based Nokia Oyj (NOK1V), sold the unit, known as Intelligence Solutions, in March 2009. The new owners, Guernsey-based Perusa Partners Fund 1 LP, renamed the business Trovicor, coined from the Latin and Esperanto words for find and heart, according to the company’s website. According to NSN the elevated risk of human rights abuses was a major reason for NSN’s exiting the monitoring-center business. In Bahrain, officials routinely used the NSIS surveillance systems as a basis for the arrest and torture of political opponents; legally the monitoring technology is to be only used by order of legal authorities such as judges and prosecutors. According to local regulations, every Bahraini phone and Internet operator must provide the state with the ability to monitor communications. Phone companies also must track the location of phones within a 164-foot (50-meter) radius, the rules say. NSN and Trovicor’s status as exclusive provider in Bahrain continued at least through 2009. That period of more than two years coincides with the dates of text messages used to interrogate scores of political detainees. Authorities used messages that dated as far back as the mid-2000s, even in recent interrogations.[129]
As of March 2009, Nokia Siemens Networks serves more than 600 operator customers in more than 150 countries, with over 1.5 billion people connected through its networks.[130]
Navteq
Main article: Navteq
Navteq is a Chicago, Illinois-based provider of digital map data and location-based content and services for automotive navigation systems, mobile navigation devices, Internet-based mapping applications, and government and business solutions.[122] Navteq was acquired by Nokia on October 1, 2007.[5] Navteq’s map data is part of the Nokia Maps online service where users can download maps, use voice-guided navigation and other context-aware web services.[122] Nokia Maps is part of the Ovi brand of Nokia's Internet based online services.
Corporate governance
The control and management of Nokia is divided among the shareholders at a general meeting and the Group Executive Board (left),[131] under the direction of the Board of Directors (right).[132] The Chairman and the rest of the Group Executive Board members are appointed by the Board of Directors. Only the Chairman of the Group Executive Board can belong to both, the Board of Directors and the Group Executive Board. The Board of Directors' committees consist of the Audit Committee,[133] the Personnel Committee[134] and the Corporate Governance and Nomination Committee.[135][136]
The operations of the company are managed within the framework set by the Finnish Companies Act,[137] Nokia's Articles of Association[138] and Corporate Governance Guidelines,[139] and related Board of Directors adopted charters.
|
|
Former corporate officers
| Chief Executive Officers | Chairmen of the Board of Directors [140] | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Björn Westerlund | 1967–1977 | Lauri J. Kivekäs | 1967–1977 | Simo Vuorilehto | 1988–1990 | |
| Kari Kairamo | 1977–1988 | Björn Westerlund | 1977–1979 | Mika Tiivola | 1990–1992 | |
| Simo Vuorilehto | 1988–1992 | Mika Tiivola | 1979–1986 | Casimir Ehrnrooth | 1992–1999 | |
| Jorma Ollila | 1992–2006 | Kari Kairamo | 1986–1988 | |||
| Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo | 2006–2010 | |||||
Logos
- Past
The Nokia Corporation "arrows" logo, used before the "Connecting People" logo.
Nokia introduced its"Connecting People"advertising slogan, coined by Ove Strandberg[141] and used since 1992.[142]
This earlier version of the slogan used Times Roman SC (Small Caps) font.[143]
- Present
Nokia's current logo used since 2006,[144] with the redesigned"Connecting People" slogan.
This slogan uses Nokia's proprietary 'Nokia Sans' font, designed by Erik Spiekermann.[145]
Stock
Nokia, a public limited liability company, is the oldest company listed under the same name on the Helsinki Stock Exchange (since 1915).[27] Nokia’s shares are also listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (since 1988) and New York Stock Exchange (since 1994).[10][27]
In June 1, 2011 Nokia shares dropped to their lowest in more than 13 years. Nokia shares fell as much as 10 percent, extending their previous day's by 18 percent fall.[146]
For fiscal Q2 2011 ending in June 2011, Nokia reported a net loss of 492 million EUR, despite a 430 million EUR payment from Apple. Nokia cited decline in its mobile phone business as the primary cause of the loss.[147]
Corporate culture
Nokia's official corporate culture manifesto, The Nokia Way, emphasises the speed and flexibility of decision-making in a flat, networked organization, although the corporation's size necessarily imposes a certain amount of bureaucracy.[148]
The official business language of Nokia is English. All documentation is written in English, and is used in official intra-company spoken communication and e-mail.
Until May 2007, the Nokia Values were Customer Satisfaction, Respect, Achievement, and Renewal. In May 2007, Nokia redefined its values after initiating a series of discussions worldwide as to what the new values of the company should be. Based on the employee suggestions, the new values were defined as: Engaging You, Achieving Together, Passion for Innovation and Very Human.[148]
Online services
mobi and the Mobile Web
Nokia was the first proponent of a Top Level Domain (TLD) specifically for the Mobile Web and, as a result, was instrumental in the launch of the .mobi domain name extension in September 2006 as an official backer.[149][150] Since then, Nokia has launched the largest mobile portal, Nokia.mobi
, which receives over 100 million visits a month.[151] It followed that with the launch of a mobile Ad Service
to cater to the growing demand for mobile advertisement.[152]
Ovi
Main article: Ovi (Nokia)
Ovi, announced on August 29, 2007, is the name for Nokia's "umbrella concept" Internet services.[153] Centered on Ovi.com, it is marketed as a "personal dashboard" where users can share photos with friends, download music, maps and games directly to their phones and access third-party services like Yahoo's Flickr photo site. It has some significance in that Nokia is moving deeper into the world of Internet services, where head-on competition with Microsoft, Google and Apple is inevitable.[154]
The services offered through Ovi include the Ovi Store (Nokia's application store), the Nokia Music Store, Nokia Maps, Ovi Mail, the N-Gage mobile gaming platform available for several S60 smartphones, Ovi Share, Ovi Files, and Contacts and Calendar.[155] The Ovi Store, the Ovi application store was launched in May 2009.[156] Prior to opening the Ovi Store, Nokia integrated its software Download! store, the stripped-down MOSH repository and the widget service WidSets into it.[157]
On March 23, 2010, Nokia announced launch of its online magazine called the Nokia Ovi. The 44-page magazine contains articles on products by Nokia, what Ovi stands for , tips and tricks on the usage of Nokia mini laptop Booklet 3G, latest reviews of mobile applications, news about the mobile maker's services and apps such as Ovi maps, files and mail. Users can download the magazine as a PDF or view it online from the Nokia website.[158]
My Nokia
Nokia offers a free personalised service to its subscribers called My Nokia (located at my.nokia.com).[159] Registered My Nokia users can get free services as follows:
- Tips & tricks alerts through web, e-mail and also mobile text message.
- My Nokia Backup: A free online backup service for mobile contacts, calendar logs and also various other files. This service needs GPRS connection.
- Numerous ringtones, wallpapers, screensavers, games and other things can be downloaded free of cost.
Comes With Music
On December 4, 2007, Nokia unveiled their plans for the "Nokia Comes With Music" initiative, a program that would partner with Universal Music Group International, Sony BMG, Warner Music Group, and EMI as well as hundreds of Independent labels and music aggregators to bundle 12, 18, or 24 months worth of unlimited free music downloads with the purchase of a Nokia Comes With Music edition phone. Following the termination of the year of free downloads, tracks can be kept without having to renew the subscription. Downloads are both PC and mobile-based.[71]
On January 18, 2011, Nokia decided to withdraw its "Comes With Music" program in 27 countries, due to its failure to gain traction with customers or mobile network operators. The service will still be offered in China, India, Indonesia, Brazil, Turkey and South Africa where take-up has been better.[160]
Nokia Messaging
On August 13, 2008, Nokia launched a beta release of "Nokia Email service", a new push e-mail service, since graduated as part of Nokia Messaging.[161]
Nokia Messaging operates as a centralised, hosted service that acts as a proxy between the Nokia Messaging client and the user's e-mail server. It does not allow for a direct connection between the phone and the e-mail server, and is therefore required to send e-mail credentials to Nokia's servers.[162] IMAP is used as the protocol to transfer emails between the client and the server.
Controversy
NSN's provision of intercept capability to Iran
In 2008, Nokia Siemens Networks, a joint venture between Nokia and Siemens AG, reportedly provided Iran's monopoly telecom company with technology that allowed it to intercept the Internet communications of its citizens to an unprecedented degree.[163] The technology reportedly allowed it to use deep packet inspection to read and even change the content of everything from "e-mails and Internet phone calls to images and messages on social-networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter". The technology "enables authorities to not only block communication but to monitor it to gather information about individuals, as well as alter it for disinformation purposes," expert insiders told The Wall Street Journal. During the post-election protests in Iran in June 2009, Iran's Internet access was reported to have slowed to less than a tenth of its normal speeds, and experts suspected this was due to the use of the interception technology.[164]
The joint venture company, Nokia Siemens Networks, asserted in a press release that it provided Iran only with a 'lawful intercept capability' "solely for monitoring of local voice calls". "Nokia Siemens Networks has not provided any deep packet inspection, web censorship or Internet filtering capability to Iran," it said.[165]
In July 2009, Nokia began to experience a boycott of their products and services in Iran. The boycott was led by consumers sympathetic to the post-election protest movement and targeted at those companies deemed to be collaborating with the Islamic regime. Demand for handsets fell and users began shunning SMS messaging.[166]
Lex Nokia
In 2009, Nokia heavily supported the passing of a law in Finland that allows companies to monitor their employees’ electronic communications in cases of suspected information leaking.[167] Contrary to rumors, Nokia denied that the company would have considered moving its head office out of Finland if laws on electronic surveillance were not changed.[168] The law was enacted, but with strict requirements for implementation of its provisions. As of 2010, the law has become a dead letter; no corporation has implemented it. The Finnish media dubbed the name Lex Nokia for this law, named after the Finnish copyright law (the so-called Lex Karpela) a few years back.
Nokia–Apple patent dispute
In October 2009, Nokia filed a lawsuit against Apple Inc. in the U.S. District Court of Delaware citing Apple infringed on 10 of its patents related to wireless communication including data transfer.[169] Apple was quick to respond with a countersuit filed in December 2009 accusing Nokia of 11 patent infringements. Apple’s General Counsel, Bruce Sewell went a step further by stating, "Other companies must compete with us by inventing their own technologies, not just by stealing ours." This resulted in an ugly spat between the two telecom majors with Nokia filing another suit, this time with the U.S. International Trade Commission(ITC), alleging Apple of infringing its patents in "virtually all of its mobile phones, portable music players, and computers."[170] Nokia went on to ask the court to bar all U.S. imports of the Apple products including the iPhone, Mac and the iPod. Apple countersued by filing a complaint with the ITC in January 2010, the details of which are yet to be confirmed.[169]
In June 2011, Apple settled with Nokia and agreed to an estimated one time payment of $600 million and royalties to Nokia.[171] The two companies also agreed on a cross-licensing patents for some of their patented technologies.[172][173]
Environmental record
Electronic products such as cell phones impact the environment both during production and after their useful life when they are discarded and turned into electronic waste. Nokia is listed in Greenpeace’s Guide to Greener Electronics that scores leading electronics manufacturers according to their policies on sustainability, climate and energy and how green their products are. In November 2011 Nokia ranked 3rd out of 15 listed electronics companies, falling two places due to its weaker performance on the Energy criteria and scoring 4.9/10. [174]
All of Nokia’s mobile phones are free of toxic polyvinyl chloride (PVC) since the end of 2005 and all new models of mobile phones and accessories launched in 2010 are on track to be free of brominated compounds, chlorinated flame retardants and antimony trioxide.[174]
Nokia’s voluntary take-back programme to recycle old mobile phones spans 84 countries with almost 5,000 collection points.[175] However, the recycling rate of Nokia phones was only 3–5% in 2008, according to a global consumer survey released by Nokia.[176] The majority of old mobile phones are simply lying in drawers at home and very few old devices, about 4%, are being thrown into landfill and not recycled.[176]
All of Nokia’s new models of chargers meet or exceed the Energy Star requirements.[177] Nokia aims to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by at least 18 percent in 2010 from a baseline year of 2006 and cover 50 percent of its energy needs through renewable energy sources.[178] Greenpeace is challenging the company to use its influence at the political level as number 85 on the Fortune 500 to advocate for climate legislation and call for global greenhouse gas emissions to peak by 2015.[179]
Nokia is researching the use of recycled plastics in its products, which are currently used only in packaging but not yet in mobile phones.[180]
Since 2001, Nokia has provided eco declarations of all its products and since May 2010 provides Eco profiles for all its new products.[181] In an effort to further reduce their environmental impact in the future, Nokia released a new phone concept, Remade, in February 2008.[182] The phone has been constructed of solely recyclable materials.[182] The outer part of the phone is made from recycled materials such as aluminium cans, plastic bottles, and used car tires.[183] The screen is constructed of recycled glass, and the hinges have been created from rubber tires. The interior of the phone is entirely constructed with refurbished phone parts, and there is a feature that encourages energy saving habits by reducing the backlight to the ideal level, which then allows the battery to last longer without frequent charges.
Research cooperation with universities
Nokia is actively exploring and engaging in open innovation through selective research collaborations with major universities and institutions by sharing resources and leveraging ideas. Major research collaboration is with Tampere University of Technology based in Finland. Current collaborations include:[184]
- Aalto University School of Science and Technology, Finland
- École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland
- ETH Zurich, Switzerland
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology, United States
- Stanford University, United States
- Tampere University of Technology, Finland
- Tsinghua University, China
- University of California, Berkeley, United States
- University of Cambridge, United Kingdom
- University of Southern California, United States
Awards and recognition
The Brand Trust Report [185] published by Trust Research Advisory has ranked Nokia in the 1st position among the brands in India.
See also
- Lists
- General
- Nokia Ovi Suite – Nokia's next generation phone suite software.
- Nokia PC Suite − A software package, slated to be replaced by Nokia Ovi Suite.
- Nokia Beta Labs − Nokia beta applications.
- Nokia Software Updater − Mobile device firmware updater.
- Symbian – An open source operating system for mobile devices.
- Maemo − Software and development platform and an operating system.
- MeeGo − Merger of Nokia's Maemo and Intel's Moblin projects.
- Qt − A cross-platform application development framework.
- Gnokii − A suite of programs for communicating with mobile phones.
- Nokia Pure - Nokia's current corporate font
- Other
- Nokia head office − Nokia's headquarters.
- Nokia, Finland − A Finnish town.
- Nokian Tyres − A Finnish manufacturer of tires split from Nokia Corporation in 1988.
- Nokian Footwear − A Finnish manufacturer of boots split from Nokia Corporation in 1990.
- Nokia Arena, Tel Aviv
- Mobile phone
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Palm, Inc.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 | |
| Former type | Subsidiary of HP |
|---|---|
| Industry | Computer hardware andsoftware |
| Fate | Acquired by HP, retired use of Palm brand |
| Founded | United States (1992) |
| Defunct | 2010-2011 |
| Headquarters | Sunnyvale, California, United States |
| Key people | Jon Rubinstein, Former Senior Vice President and General Manager Jeff Hawkins, founder Donna Dubinsky Ed Colligan |
| Products | PalmPilot, Z22, Tungsten E2,TX, Treo 650, Treo 700p, Treo 755p, Treo 680, Treo 700w,Treo 700wx, Treo 750,Centro, Treo Pro, Palm Pixi,Palm Pre, webOS, Palm App Catalog |
| Parent | Hewlett-Packard |
| Website | http://hpwebos.com |
Palm, Inc., was a smartphone manufacturer headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, that was responsible for products such as the Pre and Pixi as well as the Treo andCentro smartphones. Previous product lines include the PalmPilot, Palm III, Palm V, Palm VII, Zire and Tungsten. While their older devices run Palm OS Garnet, four editions of the Treo run Windows Mobile. In early 2009 Palm announced a new operating system, webOS, replacing the original Palm OS Garnet in their newest devices.[1]
On April 28, 2010, HP announced that it had agreed to acquire Palm for $1.2 billion.[2] The deal was completed on July 1, 2010.[3] The Palm global business unit was to be responsible for webOS software development and webOS based hardware products, from a robust smartphone roadmap to future slate PCs and netbooks. However, on August 18, 2011, HP announced that it would discontinue production of all webOS devices, including smartphones and tablets.[4][5]
Contents |
History
Founding and acquisition
Palm Computing, Inc., was founded in 1992 by Jeff Hawkins, who sought out the help of Donna Dubinsky and Ed Colligan, all of whom guided Palm to the invention of the Palm Pilot. The company started to create a PDA for consumers, called the Zoomer (1993). The devices were manufactured by Tandy and distributed by Casio, while Palm provided the PIM software. The operating system was provided by Geoworks. The Zoomer failed commercially, but Palm managed to survive through selling synchronization software for HP devices, and the Graffiti handwriting recognition software for the Apple Newton MessagePad.[6]
The company was acquired by U.S. Robotics Corp. in 1995. In June 1997, Palm became a subsidiary of 3Com when U.S. Robotics was acquired by 3Com. In June 1998, the founders became unhappy at the direction in which 3Com was taking the company, and they left and founded Handspring.
Stock offering and split into PalmSource and PalmOne
3Com made the Palm subsidiary an independent, publicly traded company on March 1, 2000, and it traded on the NASDAQ under the ticker symbol PALM. Palm Inc had its IPO during the dot com bubble and in its first day of trading the shares of the new company hit an all time high of US$95.06.[7] But competition and the end of the tech bubble caused Palm's shares to lose 90% of its value in just over a year. By June 2001 the company's shares were trading at US$6.50, making it the worst performing PDA manufacturer on the NASDAQ index at the time.[7]
In January 2002, Palm set up a wholly owned subsidiary to develop and license Palm OS,[8] which was named PalmSource in February.[9] PalmSource was then spun off from Palm as an independent company. In August 2003, the hardware division of the company merged with Handspring, was renamed to palmOne, Inc. and traded under the ticker symbol PLMO. The Palm trademark was held by a jointly owned holding company.
United as a single company
 | This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2010) |
In April 2005, palmOne purchased PalmSource's share in the 'Palm' trademark for US$30 million.[10] In July 2005, palmOne launched its new name and brand reverting back to Palm, Inc. and trading under the ticker symbol PALM once again. In late 2005, ACCESS, which specializes in mobile and embedded web browser technologies, acquired PalmSource for US$324 million. On January 4, 2006, Palm released the PalmTreo 700w, the first Windows Mobile-powered Treo in a partnership with Verizon Wireless and Microsoft. In December 2006, Palm, Inc. paid US$44 million to ACCESS for the rights to the source code for Palm OS Garnet. With this arrangement, a single company was once again developing Palm hardware and software. Palm could modify the licensed software as needed and did not need to pay royalties to ACCESS.
In June 2007, Palm formed a strategic relationship with the private-equity firm Elevation Partners who purchased a 25% equity stake of the company for US$325 million – an investment that came after months of rumours about a possible Palm sale. Palm CEO Ed Colligan acknowledged that "We were approached by larger parties over the last six months," and "the reality is that we thought this was the best outcome for our business and our investors."[11] On December 18, 2008, Palm CEO Ed Colligan announced that the company would no longer develop any new handheld PDAs.[12] Palm announced the webOS operating system and Palm Pre smartphone at the Consumer Electronics Show on January 8, 2009, and released on June 6, 2009 with Sprint.[13] The design team was led by Matias Duarte, Mike Bell, Peter Skillman andMichael Abbott.[14]
Acquisition by HP
On April 28, 2010, Hewlett-Packard announced it would purchase Palm at $5.70 a share for $1.2 billion in an all-cash deal.[15] The next day Palm stock rose 26%.[citation needed] The acquisition was completed on July 1, 2010.[16] On February 9, 2011, HP introduced a series of webOS devices under the name HP, indicating the discontinuation of the "Palm" brand.[17] On June 2, 2011, Palm.com officially began redirecting to HPwebOS.com marking the end of the last use of the Palm brand after nearly 20 years of being recognized as a genericized trademark for "mobile computer".[18] However, on August 18, 2011, HP announced that it would discontinue production of all webOS devices, including smartphones and tablets.[4][5]
Logo evolution gallery
Palm Computing logo (1992–2003)
Palm, Inc. logo (2000–2004)
PalmOne, Inc. logo (2004–2005)
Palm, Inc. logo (2005–2010)
See also
- Graffiti (Palm OS)
- Handspring
- List of Palm OS devices
- Palm (PDA)
- Palm Centro
- Palm Desktop
- Palm OS
- Palm Foleo
- PalmSource, Inc.
- Personal digital assistant
- webOS
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Samsung
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 | This article or section needs copy editing resulting in readable prose, proper spacing, and/or standard section length. You can assist by editing it now. A how-to guide is available.(August 2011) |
 | |
| Type | Public (Korean: 삼성그룹) |
|---|---|
| Industry | Conglomerate |
| Founded | 1938 |
| Founder(s) | Lee Byung-chull |
| Headquarters | Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Key people | Lee Kun-hee (Chairman andCEO) Lee Soo-bin (President, CEO ofSamsung Life Insurance)[1] |
| Products | Consumer electronics,shipbuilding, telecom, engineering and construction,financial services, chemicals,retail, heavy industries, entertainment, apparel, medical services |
| Revenue | US$ 220.1 billion (2010)[2] |
| Net income | US$ 21.2 billion (2010)[2] |
| Total assets | US$ 343.7 billion (2010)[2] |
| Total equity | US$ 141.1 billion (2010)[2] |
| Employees | 344,000 (2010)[2] |
| Subsidiaries | Samsung Electronics Samsung Life Insurance Samsung Heavy Industries Samsung C&T etc. |
| Website | Samsung.com |
 | This article contains Koreantext. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbolsinstead of Hangul or Hanja. |
Samsung Group (Korean: 삼성그룹 / Samseong Geurup / sam'sʌŋ gɯ'ɾup) is a South Korean multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Samsung Town,Seoul, South Korea. It comprises numerous international affiliated businesses, most of them united under the Samsung brand.
Notable Samsung Group industrial subsidiaries include Samsung Electronics (the world's largest information technology company measured by 2010 revenues),[3][4]Samsung Heavy Industries (the world's second-largest shipbuilder measured by 2010 revenues),[5] and Samsung Engineering and Samsung C&T (respectively the world's 35th- and 72nd-largest construction companies).[6] Other notable subsidiaries include Samsung Life Insurance (the world's 14th-largest insurance company),[7]Samsung Securities, Samsung SDS, Samsung Everland (the oldest theme park in South Korea),[8] Cheil Worldwide (the world's 19th-largest advertising agency measured by 2010 revenues)[9][10] and Shilla Hotel.
Samsung Group produces around a fifth of South Korea's total exports[11] and its revenues are larger than many countries' GDP; in 2006, it would have been the world's 35th-largest economy.[12] In many South Korean industries Samsung Group enjoys a monopoly position.[citation needed] The company has a powerful influence on South Korea's economic development, politics, media and culture, and has been a major driving force behind the "Miracle on the Han River". Many businesses today use Samsung's international success as a role model.[citation needed]
Contents
|
Etymology
According to the founder of Samsung Group, the meaning of the Korean hanja word Samsung (三星) is "tristar" or "three stars". The word "three" represents something "big, numerous and powerful"; the "stars" mean eternity.[13]
History
The building of Samsung Sanghoe in Daegu in the 1930s
In 1938,[14] Lee Byung-chull (1910–1987) of a large landowning family in the Uiryeong county came to the nearby Daegu city and founded Samsung Sanghoe (삼성상회), a small trading company with forty employees located in Su-dong (now Ingyo-dong). It dealt in groceries produced in and around the city and produced noodles itself. The company prospered and Lee moved its head office to Seoul in 1947. When the Korean War broke out, however, he was forced to leave Seoul and started a sugar refinery in Busan as a name of Cheil Jedang. After the war, in 1954, Lee founded Cheil Mojik and built the plant in Chimsan-dong, Daegu. It was the largest woolen mill ever in the country and the company took on an aspect of a major company.
Samsung diversified into many areas and Lee sought to establish Samsung as an industry leader in a wide range of enterprises, moving into businesses such as insurance, securities, and retail. Lee placed great importance on industrialization, and focused his economic development strategy on a handful of large domestic conglomerates, protecting them from competition and assisting them financially. He later banned several foreign companies from selling consumer electronics in South Korea in order to protect Samsung from foreign competition.[citation needed]
In the late 1960s, Samsung Group entered into the electronics industry. It formed several electronics-related divisions, such as Samsung Electronics Devices Co., Samsung Electro-Mechanics Co., Samsung Corning Co., and Samsung Semiconductor & Telecommunications Co., and made the facility in Suwon. Its first product was a black-and-white television set. In 1980, the company acquired Hanguk Jeonja Tongsin in Gumi, and started to build telecommunication devices. Its early products were switchboards. The facility were developed into the telephone and fax manufacturing systems and became the centre of Samsung's mobile phone manufacturing. They have produced over 800 million mobile phones to date.[15] The company grouped them together under Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. in the 1980s.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Samsung Electronics invested heavily in research and development, investments that were pivotal in pushing the company to the forefront of the global electronics industry. In 1982, it built a television assembly plant in Portugal; in 1984, a plant in New York; in 1985, a plant in Tokyo; in 1987, a facility in England; and another facility in Austin in 1996. In total, Samsung has invested about $5.6 billion in the Austin location – by far the largest foreign investment in Texasand one of the largest single foreign investments in the United States. The new investment will bring the total Samsung investment in Austin to more than $9 billion.[16]
Samsung started to rise as an international corporation in the 1990s. Samsung's construction branch was awarded a contract to build one of the two Petronas Towers inMalaysia, Taipei 101 in Taiwan and the Burj Khalifa in United Arab Emirates.[17] In 1993, Lee Kun-hee sold off ten of Samsung Group's subsidiaries, downsized the company, and merged other operations to concentrate on three industries: electronics, engineering, and chemicals. In 1996, the Samsung Group reacquired theSungkyunkwan University foundation.
Compared to other major Korean companies, Samsung survived the 1997 Asian financial crisis relatively unharmed. However, Samsung Motor was sold to Renault at a significant loss. As of 2010, Renault Samsung is 80.1 percent owned by Renault and 19.9 percent owned by Samsung. Additionally, Samsung manufactured a range ofaircraft from the 1980s to 1990s. The company was founded in 1999 as Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI), the result of merger between then three domestic majoraerospace divisions of Samsung Aerospace, Daewoo Heavy Industries, and Hyundai Space and Aircraft Company. However, Samsung still manufactures aircraft enginesand gas turbines. [18] Samsung Techwin has been the sole supplier of a combustor module of the Trent 900 engine of the Rolls-Royce Airbus A380-The largest passenger airliner in the world- since 2001.[19]Samsung Techwin of Korea is a revenue-sharing participant in the Boeing's 787 Dreamliner GEnx engine program.[20]
Samsung became the largest producer of memory chips in the world in 1992, and is the world's second-largest chipmaker after Intel (see Worldwide Top 20 Semiconductor Market Share Ranking Year by Year).[21] In 1995, it built its first liquid-crystal display screen. Ten years later, Samsung grew to be the world's largest manufacturer of liquid-crystal display panels. Sony, which had not invested in large-size TFT-LCDs, contacted Samsung to cooperate, and, in 2006, S-LCD was established as a joint venture between Samsung and Sony in order to provide a stable supply of LCD panels for both manufacturers. S-LCD is owned by Samsung (50% plus 1 share) and Sony (50% minus 1 share) and operates its factories and facilities in Tangjung, South Korea.
Samsung Electronics overtook Sony as one of the world's most popular consumer electronics brands in 2004 and 2005, and is now ranked #19 in the world overall.[22] In Q3 of 2011, Samsung has overtaken Apple to become the World's Largest Smartphone maker.[23] SCTV and Indosiar are subsidiary of Surya Citra Media that owned by Samsung. In 2011, SCTV and Indosiar will merger and given stake by Samsung.[citation needed]
According to the FTC(Fair Trade Commission) data as of April 1, 2011, the number of Samsung Group’s affiliates increased 32.1 percent to 78 from 59 in 2008.[24]
Samsung has also been listed among the top 10 most trusted brands in India by The Brand Trust Report[25] India Study.
- Number of unlisted companies within the group : 59
- Number of listed companies within the group : 19(KOSPI-listed firms)
‹ The template below (Standard table) is being considered for deletion. See templates for discussion to help reach a consensus.›
| Company | Symbol | Company | Symbol |
|---|---|---|---|
| SAMSUNG Corporation | 000830 | Shilla Hotels and Resorts | 008770 |
| SAMSUNG Securities | 016360 | SAMSUNG Fine Chemicals | 004000 |
| SAMSUNG SDI | 006400 | SI Corporation | 012750 |
| SAMSUNG Electro-Mechanics | 009150 | SAMSUNG Fire & Marine Insurance | 000810 |
| SAMSUNG Engineering | 028050 | SAMSUNG Electronics | 005930 |
| SAMSUNG Techwin | 012450 | Samsung Life Insurance | 032830 |
| Cheil Industries | 001300 | SAMSUNG Card | 029780 |
| SAMSUNG Heavy Industries | 010140 | Cheil Worldwide | 030000 |
| Imarket Korea | 122900 | Credu | 067280 |
| Ace Digitech | 036550 |
Veiled revenue
Consolidated revenue is the sum of the revenues perceived by the company and the revenues from its subsidiaries all together. In FY 2009, Samsung Group had a revenue of 220 trillion KRW ($172.5 billion), financial results are based on parent companies. In FY 2010, Samsung reported 280 trillion KRW($258 billion) worth of revenue, and 30 trillion KRW($27.6 billion) profit.(* Based upon a KRW=USD exchange rate of 1,084.5KRW per USD, the spot rate as of 19 August 2011)[26] However, they also do not contain the revenues of overseas subsidiaries, and no one knows about real revenues.[27]
Partitions of Samsung Group
- First partition (1966)
- Second partition (1990s)
Acquisitions
Samsung has been notoriously wary of such expansion since its unsuccessful purchase of companies in the late 1990s. Samsung, which has mainly focused on organic growth, has made no major acquisitions in past 10 years.
- Rollei – Swiss watch battle
- Samsung Techwin acquired a German camera-maker Rollei on 1995. Samsung (Rollei) used its optic expertise on the crystals of a new line of 100% Swiss-made watches, designed by a team of watchmakers at Nouvelle Piquerez S.A. in Bassequort, Switzerland. Rolex's decision to fight Rollei on every front stemmed from the close resemblance between the two names and fears that its sales would suffer as a consequence. In the face of such a threat, the Geneva firm decided to confront. Rolex, this was also a demonstration of the Swiss watch industry's determination to defend itself when an established brand is threatened. Rolex sees this front-line battle as vital for the entire Swiss watch industry. Rolex has succeeded in keeping Rollei out of the German market. On 11 March 1995 the Cologne District court prohibited the advertising and sale of Rollei watches on German territory.[33][34]
- Fokker, a Dutch aircraft maker
- Samsung lost a chance to revive its failed bid to take over Dutch aircraft maker Fokker when other airplane makers rejected its offer to form a consortium. The three proposed partners – Hyundai, Hanjin and Daewoo – have notified the South Korean government that they will not join Samsung Aerospace Industries Ltd.[35]
- AST Research
- Samsung bought AST (1994) and tried to break into North America，but the effort foundered.
- FUBU clothing and apparel – a rare case of success
- In 1992, Daymond John had started the company with a hat collection that was made in his house in the Queens area of New York City. To fund the company, John had to mortgage his house for $100,000. With his friends, namely J. Alexander Martin, Carl Brown, and Keith Perrin, half of his house was turned into the first factory of FUBU, while the other half remained as the living quarters. Along with the expansion of FUBU, Samsung, a Korean company, invested in FUBU in 1995.[37]
- Lehman Brothers Holdings’ Asian operations
- Samsung Securities was one of a handful of brokerages looking into Lehman Brothers Holdings. But Nomura Holdings has reportedly waved the biggest check to win its bid for Lehman Brothers Holdings’ Asian operations, beating out Samsung Securities, Standard Chartered, and Barclays.[38] Ironically, after few months Samsung Securities Co., Ltd. and City of London-based N M Rothschild & Sons (more commonly known simply as Rothschild) have agreed to form a strategic alliance in investment banking business. Two parties will jointly work on cross border mergers and acquisition deals.[39]
- Grandis Inc. - memory developer
- In July 2011, Samsung announced that it had acquired spin-transfer torque random access memory (MRAM) vendor Grandis Inc.[40] Grandis will become a part of Samsung's R&D operations and will focus on development of next generation random-access memory.[41]
Products, customers and organizational structure
| This section is in a list format that may be better presented using prose. You can help by converting this section to prose, if appropriate. Editing helpis available. (October 2010) |
Group divisions
The world's largest oil and gas project, Sakhalin II- Lunskoye platform under construction. The topside facilities of the LUN-A (Lunskoye) and PA-B (Piltun Astokhskoye) platforms are being built at the Samsung Heavy Industry shipyard in South Korea.[42]
SHI hosted the ambassadors of these three countries that had invested in the development of the sea oil field of Sakhalin. (British-Amec, Netherlands-Royal Dutch Shell, Russia-Gasprom)Warwick Morris, the British ambassador to Korea, Hans Heinsbroek, the Netherlands ambassador to Korea, and Charge dAffaires Alexander Timonin of Russia in Korea visited Samsung Heavy Industry’s (SHI) Geoje shipyard to see Piltun-B, the worlds largest crude oil and gas production platform, which the Korean shipbuilder had just completed.[43]
| GROUP DIVISIONS |
|---|
| Electronics industries |
| Financial services |
| Chemical industries |
| Machinery and heavy industries |
| Engineering and construction |
| Retail and entertainment |
| Apparel and advertisement |
| Education and medical services |
| Trading and resource development |
| Food supplier and security services |
Notable customers
- Royal Dutch Shell
- Samsung Heavy Industries will be the sole provider of liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage facilities worth up to US$50 billion to Royal Dutch Shell for the next 15 years.[44]
- United Arab Emirates government
- A consortium of South Korean firms - including Samsung, Korea Electric Power Corp and Hyundai - has won a deal worth 40 billion dollars to build nuclear power plants in the United Arab Emirates.[46]
- Ontario government
- The government of the Canadian province of Ontario signed off one of the world's largest renewable energy projects, signing a $6.6bn deal that will result in2,500 MW of new wind and solar energy capacity being built. Under the agreement a consortium – led by Samsung and the Korea Electric Power Corporation – will manage the development of 2,000 MW-worth of new wind farms and 500 MW of solar capacity, while also building a manufacturing supply chain in the province.[47]
| Samsung's key clients (Q1 2010)[48] | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rank/company | Part description | Buying (trillion KRW) | Percent of total sales | |||
| 1 Sony | DRAM, NAND flash, LCD panels, etc... | 1.28 | 3.7 | |||
| 2 Apple Inc | AP (mobile processor), DRAM, NAND flash, etc... | 0.9 | 2.6 | |||
| 3 Dell | DRAM, flat-panels, lithium-ion batteries, etc... | 0.87 | 2.5 | |||
| 4 HP | DRAM, flat-panels, lithium-ion batteries, etc... | 0.76 | 2.2 | |||
| 5 Verizon Communications | Handsets, etc... | 0.5 | 1.3 | |||
| 6 AT&T | Handsets, etc... | 0.5 | 1.3 | |||
Logo
|
Sonic logo
Audio branding was produced by Musikvergnuegen and written by Walter Werzowa using the notes E♭, A♭, D♭, E♭ .[50][51]
Samsung Medical Center
The Samsung Group annually donates around $100 million to the Samsung Medical Center, their nonprofit medical organization.[52] The Samsung Medical Center (Korean: 삼성의료원) is composed of Samsung Seoul Hospital (Korean: 삼성서울병원), Kangbook Samsung Hospital (Korean: 강북삼성병원), Samsung Changwon Hospital (Korean: 삼성창원병원), Samsung Cancer Center (Korean:삼성암센터) and Samsung Life Sciences Research Center (Korean: 삼성생명과학연구소). Samsung Cancer Center located in Seoul, is the largest cancer center in Asia.[53] Samsung Medical Center and Pfizer to Conduct Joint Research to Identify Genomic Mechanisms Responsible for Clinical Outcomes in Hepatocellular Carcinoma.[54]
Olympics
Samsung is hoping their role in the London 2012 Olympic Games will provide a "golden moment" for the company's UK reputation, according to Olympic news outlet Around the Rings
. Vice President Gyehyun Kwon told ATR that "double digit gains in U.K. consumer awareness are possible" through Samsung's partnership with London 2012.Samsung was instrumental in bringing the 2018 Winter Olympics to Pyeongchang. In December 2009, the former chairman of Samsung, Lee Kun-hee, was pardoned in order that he could return to the International Olympics Committee and help South Korea bid for the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang. He had previously been convicted of tax evasion in 2008 and had been part of two failed bids to bring the Olympics to South Korea. [55]
During this bid, Lee Kun-hee and figure skating gold medalist Kim Yuna lobbied heavily for support; it was thought that Lee's influence would help to secure the bid. On July 6 2011, it was announced that Pyeongchang would be the location of the 2018 Winter Games. [56] Samsung C&T Corporation will be among the top tier of firms competing for construction projects for the games. [57]
See also
 |
| History |
| Miracle on the Han River 1997 financial crisis |
| Companies |
| List of companies · Chaebol Samsung (Chaebol) Hyundai (Chaebol) LG (Chaebol) · SK (Chaebol) |
| Industry |
| Currency · Communications Tourism · Transportation Real estate · Financial services Nuclear power |
| Rankings |
| Regions by GDP per capita International rankings |
| Related topics |
| Science and technology · Cities |
- Economy of South Korea
- Ho-Am Prize
- List of Korean companies
- List of Korea-related topics
- Seocho Samsung Town
- Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation
- Korean Broadcasting System
- Seoul Broadcasting System
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Sony Ericsson
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For an arrangement of Sony Ericsson products, see list of Sony Ericsson products.
 | |
| Type | Aktiebolag |
|---|---|
| Industry | Telecommunications |
| Founded | October 1, 2001[1] |
| Headquarters | London, United Kingdom |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Key people | Howard Stringer (Chairman) Bert Nordberg (President) Rikko Sakaguchi (EVP) Kristian Tear (EVP) William A Glaser Jr (CFO)[2] |
| Products | Mobile phones Mobile music devices Wireless systems Wireless voice devices Hi-Tech accessories Wireless data devices |
| Revenue |  €6.294 billion (2010)[3] |
| Operating income | €147 million (2010) |
| Profit | €200 million (2010) |
| Employees | 7,500 (as of December 2010)[4] |
| Parent | Sony Corporation (50%) Ericsson AB (50%) |
| Website | www.sonyericsson.com |
Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB is a joint venture established on October 1, 2001[1] by the Japanese consumer electronics company Sony Corporationand the Swedish telecommunications company Ericsson to manufacture mobile phones.
The company's global management is based in Hammersmith, London, and it has research and development teams in Lund, Tokyo, Mexico City, Beijing, and Redwood Shores in the US. By 2009, it was the fourth-largest mobile phone manufacturer in the world after Nokia, Samsung and LG.[5] The sales of products largely increased due to the launch of the adaptation of Sony's popular Walkman and Cyber-shot series.
In 2010, its market share had fallen to sixth place.[6]
Contents
|
History
Origins
In the United States, Ericsson partnered with General Electric in the early nineties, primarily to establish a US presence and brand recognition.
Ericsson had decided to obtain chips for its phones from a single source—a Philips facility in New Mexico. In March 2000, a fire at the Philips factory contaminated the sterile facility. Philips assured Ericsson and Nokia (their other major customer) that production would be delayed for no more than a week. When it became clear that production would actually be compromised for months, Ericsson was faced with a serious shortage.[7] Nokia had already begun to obtain parts from alternative sources, but Ericsson's position was much worse as production of current models and the launch of new ones was held up.[8]
Ericsson, which had been in the mobile phone market for decades, and was the world's third largest cellular telephone handset maker, was struggling with huge losses. This was mainly due to this fire and its inability to produce cheaper phones like Nokia. To curtail the losses, it considered outsourcing production to Asian companies that could produce the handsets for lower costs.[according to whom?]
Speculation began about a possible sale by Ericsson of its mobile phone division, but the company's president said it had no plans to do so. "Mobile phones are really a core business for Ericsson. We wouldn't be as successful (in networks) if we didn't have phones", he said.[citation needed]
Sony was a marginal player in the worldwide mobile phone market with a share of less than 1 percent in 2000.
By August 2001, the two companies had finalised the terms of the merger announced in April. The company was to have an initial workforce of 3,500 employees.
2001 to 2010
Following the creation of the joint venture Ericsson's market share actually fell and in August 2002, Ericsson announced that it would cease making mobile phones and end its partnership with Sony if the business continued to disappoint.[citation needed] However, in January 2003, both companies said they would inject more money into the joint venture in a bid to stem the losses.
Sony Ericsson's strategy was to release new models capable of digital photography as well as other multimedia capabilities such as downloading and viewing video clips and personal information management capabilities. To this end, it released several new models which had built-in digital camera and colour screen which were novelties at that time. The joint venture, however, continued to make bigger losses in spite of booming sales. The target date for making a profit from its first year to 2002 was postponed to 2003 to second half of 2003. It failed in its mission of becoming the top seller of multimedia handsets and was in fifth-place and struggling in 2005.
Annual net income or loss 2003 to 2009
On March 1, 2005, Sony Ericsson introduced the K750i with a 2 megapixel camera, as well as its platform mate, the W800i, the first of the Walkman phones capable of 30 hours of music playback, and two low-end phones.
In 2007 the company's first 5-Megapixel camera phone, the Sony Ericsson K850i, was announced followed in 2008 by the Sony Ericsson C905, the world's first 8-Megapixel phone.[citation needed] At Mobile World Congress 2009, Sony Ericsson unveiled the first 12-Megapixel phone, named Satio, on May 28, 2009.
On May 1, 2005, Sony Ericsson agreed to become the global title sponsor for the WTA Tour in a deal worth $88 million US dollars over 6 years. The women's pro tennis circuit was renamed the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour. Just over a month later on June 7, it announced sponsorship of West Indian batsmen Chris Gayle andRamnaresh Sarwan. In October 2005, Sony Ericsson presented the first mobile phone based on UIQ 3, the P990.
On January 2, 2007, Sony Ericsson announced in Stockholm that it would have some of its mobile phones made in India, and that its two outsourcing partners,Flextronics and Foxconn would manufacture ten million mobile phones per year by 2009. CEO Miles Flint announced at a press conference held with India's communications minister Dayanidhi Maran in Chennai that India was one of the fastest growing markets in the world and a priority market for Sony Ericsson with 105 million users of GSM mobile telephones.
Sony Ericsson struggled following the launch of Apple's iPhone in the third quarter of 2007. Its handset shipments fell from a high of 30.8m in Q4 2007 to only 8.1m in Q1 2011.[9] The company had made net losses in six of the 15 quarters and seen its cash reserves shrink from €2.2bn to €599m, after taking a €375m cash injection from its joint owners. The eclipse of the Symbian operating system, initially by Apple's iPhone, and then by Google's Android, has affected Sony Ericsson's position in the market.
Sony Ericsson was overtaken by its South Korean rival LG Electronics in Q1 2008. Sony Ericsson's company's profits fell significantly by 43% to €133 million (approx. US$180 million), sales falling by 8% and market share falling from 9.4% to 7.9%, despite favourable conditions that the handset market was expected to grow by 10% in 2008. Sony Ericsson announced another profit warning in June 2008[10] and saw net profit crash by 97% in Q2 2008, announcing that it would cut 2,000 jobs, leading to wide fear that Sony Ericsson is on the verge of decline along with its struggling rival, Motorola.[11] In Q3 the profits were much on the same level, however November and December saw increased profits along with new models being released such as the C905 being one of the top sellers across the United Kingdom.
In June 2008, Sony Ericsson had about 8,200 employees, it then launched a cost-cutting program and by the end of 2009 it had slashed its global workforce by around 5,000 people. It planned to cut another 1,500 jobs in 2010. It has also closed R&D centres inChadwick House
, Birchwood (Warrington) in the UK; Miami, Seattle, San Diego and RTP (Raleigh, NC) in the USA; The Chennai Unit (Tamil Nadu) in India; Hässleholm and Kista in Sweden and operations in the Netherlands. The UIQ centres in London and Budapest were also closed, UIQ was a joint venture with Motorola which began life in the 1990s.[12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22]
2010 to present
On October 27, 2011, Sony announced that it would acquire Ericsson's stake in Sony Ericsson for €1.05 billion ($1.47 billion), making the mobile handset business a wholly owned subsidiary of Sony. The transaction's completion is expected to occur in January 2012.[23][24][25]
Operations
In 2009 Sony Ericsson announced that it was moving its North American headquarters from Research Triangle Park, North Carolina to Atlanta. The headquarters move was part of a plan to reduce its workforce, then 10,000 employees, by 20%. As of that year Sony Ericsson had 425 employees in Research Triangle Park; the staff had been reduced by hundreds due to layoffs.[26] Stacy Doster, a spokesperson of Sony Ericsson, said that the proximity to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport's flights to Latin America and the operations of AT&T Mobility influenced the decision to move the USA headquarters. Sony Ericsson will close the Research Triangle site.[26][27]
Products
| This article may contain an excessive amount of intricate detail that may only interest a specific audience. Please relocate any relevant information, and remove excessive detail that may be against Wikipedia inclusion policy. (January 2010) |
Sony Ericsson currently concentrates on the categories of: music, camera, business (web and email), design, all-rounder, eco-friendly, and budget focused phones. Its six largest categories are:
- The Walkman-branded W series music phones, launched in 2005.
The Sony Ericsson W-series music phones are notable for being the first music-centric series mobile phones, prompting a new market segment for portable music that was developing at the time. The main feature that can be seen in all of these Walkman phones is they all have a 'W' button, which when pressed opens the media centre. Sony Ericsson's Walkman phones have formerly been commercially endorsed by pop stars Christina Aguilera and Jason Kay across Europe. Walkman branded phones are also produced for the Japanese market. - The Cyber-shot-branded line of phones, launched in 2006 in newer models of the K series phones.
This range of phones are focused on the quality of the camera included with the phone. Cyber-shot phones always include a flash, some with a xenon flash, and also include auto-focus cameras. Sony Ericsson kicked off its global marketing campaign for Cyber-shot phone with the launch of 'Never Miss a Shot'. The campaign featured top female tennis players Ana Ivanović and Daniela Hantuchová. On February 10, 2008, the series has been expanded with the announcement of C702, C902 and C905 phones. Cyber-shot branded phones are also produced for the Japanese market. - The BRAVIA-branded line of phones, launched 2007 in the Japanese market only.
Until now, five BRAVIA branded phones have been produced. Sony Ericsson (FOMA SO903iTV, FOMA SO906i, U1, S004, and S005[28]) uses the BRAVIA brand. BRAVIA branded phone are able to show 1segterrestrial television. - The UIQ smartphone range of mobiles, introduced with the P series in 2003 with the introduction of P800.
They are notable for their touchscreens, QWERTY keypads (on most models), and use of the UIQ interface platform for Symbian OS. This range has since expanded into the M series and G series phones. - The XPERIA range of mobile phones, heralded by the Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 in February 2008 at the Mobile World Congress (formerly 3GSM) held in Barcelona Spain, was the first trademark promoted by Sony Ericsson as its own and is designated to provide technological convergence among its target user base. The first model, X1, carried the Windows Mobile operating system with a Sony Ericsson's panel interface. The Xperia X10 model features the Android operating system. Additionally, Yahoo! News reported that Sony would align with Google to run Android on its upcoming smartphone.[29][30]
- The GreenHeart range of mobile phones, first introduced in 2009, heralded by the Sony Ericsson J105i Naite and C901 GreenHeart.
It is focused on an environmentally friendly theme, but still featured with recent mobile technology and multimedia capability. It mainly uses eco-friendly materials and features eco-apps.
Sales
Sony Ericsson posted its first profit in the second half of 2003. Since then, the sales figures from phones have been:
Annual shipments of units 2003 to 2009
| Year | Unit sales, millions |
| 2004 | 42[31] |
| 2005 | 50[32] |
| 2006 | 74.8[33] |
| 2007 | 103.4[34] |
| 2008 | 96.6[35] |
| 2009 | 57.1[36] |
| 2010 | 43.1 |
In the third quarter of 2009, Sony Ericsson became the world's fourth largest mobile phone maker with 4.9% of market share after Nokia (37.8%), Samsung (21%) and LG (11%).
According to the Swedish Magazine M3s issue 7/2006 Sony Ericsson is the best-selling phone brand in the Nordic countries, followed by Nokia.
Compatibility
During E3 2007 Media and Business Summit, Phil Harrison, Sony CEO showcased a Sony Ericsson phone using the PlayStation's XMB. A select group of phones are also said to integrate into PlayStation Home(final product)
During the announcement of Sony Ericsson K850, W960 and W910 some review sites have shown that those mentioned phones and future mid-range or better phones will have Media to replace the standard File Manager which will be moved to the Organiser of the phone. The Media manager possesses a UI that resembles the XMB interface found on Sony TV, PS3, and PSP products. The mobile developer site confirmed from their spec sheets and white papers that the XMB media manager is standard to the phones running Java Platform 8 also known as A200 Platform and Symbian devices like Sony Ericsson Satio and Sony Ericsson Vivaz.
Marketing campaigns
- Social media
- Sports sponsorship
Environmental record
Sony Ericsson ranks 6th out of 15 leading electronics makers in Greenpeace’s Guide to Greener Electronics that assesses companies' policies on climate and energy, sustainability and how green their products are. The company scores 4.2/10 and is one of the top scorers in the Products category, gaining maximum points for the energy efficiency of its phones and doing well for its avoidance of hazardous substances in its products. [39] Sony Ericsson is ahead of many of its competitors in eliminating chemical substances in its products and is currently finalising the phase out of antimony, beryllium, phthalates and the very small remaining use of BFR.[40]
However, Greenpeace criticises Sony Ericsson for not having a plan to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions through energy efficiency or more use of renewable energy. The guide also states that the company still needs to report the amount of recycled plastic sourced as a percentage of all plastics used. [39]
In June 2009, Sony Ericsson launched its first GreenHeart series device, the C901, which indirectly emits a 15% less of CO2 during its fabrication and usage, compared to other SE phones. It is also packed in a small box without paper manual, includes an eco-charger, and its cover is made of recycled plastic.[41]
See also
- Sony
- Ericsson
- MyPhoneExplorer – full featured Sony Ericsson manager software for Microsoft Windows, able to backup, synch and editing almost all data on the phone via Bluetooth, infrared or USB
- Media Go – music, photo, video, and game management software made for Sony Ericsson phones
- Disc2Phone – music management software made for Sony Ericsson phones
- SonicStage – music management software made for Japan market phones
- PlayNow – global content distribution portal
- List of Sony Ericsson products
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