Lenovo Sets Web-Linked TV
Chinese personal-computer maker Lenovo Group Ltd. on Tuesday said it would soon unveil a "smart TV" product called LeTV as well as a new cloud-computing strategy, as it competes with others to diversify and address growing demand for Internet-connected devices. The company, which surpassed Dell Inc. in the third quarter to become the world's second-largest PC vendor by unit shipments after Hewlett-Packard Co., is the latest to enter the competition to offer Internet content on television. Lenovo didn't provide details on the capabilities of LeTV, but it comes as others have released smart TVs, which are expected to have computer-style features and could allow companies to directly sell movies, TV shows and other content. Search giant Google Inc. is gearing up to challenge the likes of Apple Inc. in the area with its Google TV operating system. Lenovo said the new LeTV will be an Internet-connected product and is expected to launch in the first quarter. In recent weeks, Samsung Electronics Co. and LG Electronics Inc. have also announced plans for smart TVs.
Cyber Monday sales hit record $1.25 billion
Cyber Monday online sales set a record, led by department stores and home goods retailers, according to U.S. data released on Tuesday.
Online sales reached $1.251 billion on Monday, up 22 percent from the same day last year, said comScore Inc, a closely watched Web tracking firm. IBM Benchmark, a unit of International Business Machines Corp, put the increase at 33 percent compared with Cyber Monday in 2010. Department stores saw online sales surge 60 percent this Cyber Monday, compared with last year, while sales of home goods rose 68 percent, IBM Benchmark added.
New Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface Is Available to Pre-order
Retail outlets looking for new, innovative ways to get hands-on with their customers will soon have a new tool – the Samsung SUR40. Companies are already using Microsoft Surface to give potential customers virtual tours of plane interiors, help them plan flights, provide them with the ability to create immersive photo books, and entice bank customers into brick and mortar branches. Those experiences only hint at how the new Surface device will be able to help businesses engage with customers, said Somanna Palacanda, director of Microsoft Surface. Samsung and Microsoft announced today that a new, more versatile Microsoft Surface device is now available for pre-order, the near final stop on its journey from lab to marketplace. Now, businesses in 23 countries can visit the Samsung website to find a local reseller and place an order for the Samsung SUR40. Shipments are expected to start early next year.
CE Spurs Record Black Friday Sales
Earlier store openings, a bargain-hungry consumer and the lure of deeply discounted TVs and laptops contributed to the largest Black Friday sales haul in history this past weekend. Americans spent a record $52 billion from Thanksgiving through Sunday, or $398.62 per shopper, a 9.1 percent increase from last year, the National Retail Federation (NRF) reported, while traffic to stores and websites rose 6.6 percent to hit an historic high of 226 million visits.
Broken out by channel, 62.2 percent of the total weekend spend took place in brick-and-mortar stores and 37.8 percent was transacted online, the trade group said. Black Friday proper was also one for the record books. According to market research firm ShopperTrak, sales at brick-and-mortar stores rose 6.6 percent the day after Thanksgiving to $11.4 billion, while foot traffic increased a 5.1 percent from last year.
After four years of declines, TiVo adds new customers
TiVo has spent the last several years losing subscribers, dropping to mid-2000s customer levels in the second quarter of this year. But the DVR maker might finally be showing some positive momentum, reporting 117,000 net new customers in its third-quarter earnings report. Those new customers are the result of growth in TiVo's partnerships with pay-TV operators, spurred by the addition of partners like Virgin Media and RCN. And that strategy - based around getting cable companies to offer TiVo DVRs to their customers rather than the set-top boxes they've been using - could help the company grow even more over the next few quarters. In addition to its existing partnerships, TiVo will see some promotion from DirecTV soon, and Comcast is integrating its video-on-demand service to work with TiVo DVRs consumers can buy themselves. The company says its partnerships give it a potential footprint of 10 million homes between them, compared to the 2 million subscribers it currently has.
Has Netflix overextended itself?
Netflix agreed to sell $400 million in stock and convertible bonds on Monday in an effort to stockpile some cash. The filings were seen as the latest in a series of bad news for the company by investors, with shares down about five percent. But the raising of short-term funds brings up the question of how well Netflix has been managing its cash, particularly as the company has seen customer additions stall at home while investing heavily to expand internationally.
Netflix has already committed billions of dollars to new streaming deals over the next few years, which would be fine if the company had ample cash in the bank or was still on an outstanding growth trajectory. Netflix finished the third quarter with just $366 million in cash and short-term investments, however, and with $200 million in long-term debt.
Cyber Monday Shoppers At The Ready
Discount-seeking cyber shoppers will hit the web early on Nov. 28, looking to take advantage of free shipping, said shopping site PriceGrabber. The PriceGrabber survey of 2,322 people found 39 percent intended to do their shopping on Cyber Monday over any of the other four days of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. This is up 2 percent from last year. Ninety-two percent said this decision was based on the fact that this is the day most one-day sales and free-shipping offers took place. Other reasons cited for hitting the web on Monday instead of fighting the crowds Black Friday morning were to spend time with friends and family on Black Friday to discover what they wanted, 20 percent; family tradition to shop online that day, 6 percent; 5 percent consider it a chance to take a break from work, and 5 percent said their office Internet connection was faster than the one at home.
Roku Aims To Launch In UK And Canada In 2012
Roku is following Boxee in trying to go global, as internet TV operators of varying stripes compete for place in the living room.
Roku says it will start retailing the UK and Canada from early 2012.
That will go alongside what will have to be Roku's effort to find local content channel partners for the new markets. Candidates are likely to include Spotify, Netflix (NSDQ: NFLX), BBC iPlayer, ITV (LSE: ITV) Player, 4oD, Channel Five, Blinkbox and PlayJam. "Content can be free, ad supported or paid," Roky says. Roku's boxes now range from a $49.99 SD device to its $99.99 model.
Survey: More Americans to shop on Black Friday
Americans plan this year to go shopping in greater numbers on Black Friday, the biggest shopping day of the year and unofficial kick-off the holiday spending season. Some 152 million shoppers say they will hit stores on November 25, the day after U.S. Thanksgiving, up 10.1 percent from 138 million people last year, according to a survey by the National Retail Federation, an industry group. For the November-December period, the NRF previously forecast retail sales would rise 2.8 percent to $465.6 billion, in what executives and analysts have said will be a more competitive season than last year. Major retailers are leaving little to chance. For instance, discount retailer Target Corp and department stores Macy's Inc and Kohl's Corp are opening their doors earlier than ever, at midnight on Thanksgiving.
Boxee Box Live TV dongle shipping for $49 in January 2012, pre-orders open today
Boxee has just affirmed that the leaked Live TV dongle is legit, and it'll be splashing down on North American shores in January. The Boxee Box Live TV dongle will allow North American users to connect an antenna to their Box to watch channels like ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC in HD with no monthly fee -- assuming you're close enough to an OTA tower to receive said signals, of course. Once equipped, a Box will be able to fetch content from the major networks, Vudu, Netflix and Hulu, though you may want to spring for that bolstered internet connection.
Boxee Live TV works with signals from HDTV antennas (using ATSC) or an unencrypted cable connection (using ClearQAM), and a portable antenna is included. Users who live out in the 'burbs may want to consider something a bit beefier.
Sony Considers Internet Rival to Cable TV
Sony Corp. is considering launching an Internet-based alternative to cable-TV service, people familiar with the situation said, posing the latest threat to the cable and satellite operators that dominate pay TV. The Japanese electronics and entertainment company has approached several big media companies to negotiate the rights to offer their TV channels over the Web in the U.S., the people said. Sony is proposing to beam the channels over Internet connections to Sony-made devices, including PlayStation gaming consoles, TV sets and Blu-ray players, the people said. Sony has sold about 18.1 million PlayStation 3 consoles in the U.S. alone, according to NPD Group Inc., and many homes have other Internet-connected Sony devices. The biggest U.S. cable operator, Comcast Corp., has about 22.4 million video subscribers and serves a geographic area with over 52 million homes.
CEO Says Sony Developing New Kind of TV
Sony Corp.'s chief executive said Thursday that the Japanese electronics giant is well-positioned to turn out the innovative products needed to re-energize the television market, even as it faces design-savvy competitors like Apple Inc. Howard Stringer, speaking at a breakfast hosted by The Wall Street Journal, said TV manufacturers, driven by their desire to rack up market share, have bred an intensely competitive market. As a result, they are scrambling to come up with a new generation of TV sets that will separate them from the pack and command premium prices. Mr. Stringer declined to discuss details of what Sony has on the drawing board, but said, "There's a tremendous amount of R&D going into a different kind of TV set." He added that he has "no doubt" Apple's late leader Steve Jobs also was working on changing the traditional TV set. "That's what we're all looking for," said Mr. Stringer. "We can't continue selling TV sets [the way we have been]. Every TV set we all make loses money."
Kindle Fire ships today, a day early
A release from the company this morning says that Amazon's much anticipated 7-inch, $199 slate will beginning showing up on customers' doorsteps a little sooner than anticipated. "We're thrilled to be able to ship Kindle Fire to our customers earlier than we expected." said Amazon's Kindle VP, Dave Limp in the statement. "Kindle Fire quickly became the bestselling item across all of Amazon.com, and based on customer response we're building millions more than we'd planned." Amazon's promotional effort of the Kindle Fire, which many believe could be the first substantial challenger to Apple's iPad in the tablet market, has been closely controlled. For months, Amazon refused to even acknowledge it was developing a tablet. Then, earlier this fall it unveiled a whole new line of Kindles at greatly reduced prices while also introducing the Fire.
GORDON J. GOW TECHNOLOGIES, INC. INTRODUCES CLARUS
Calling them THE WORLD’S MOST ADVANCED AUDIOPHILE-QUALITY CABLES. Developed by celebrated cable designer Jay Victor, the Clarus Collection features:
• Pure Copper Ohno Continuous Casting (PCOCC) the purest copper in the world
• Individually insulated cable strands
• Precision impedances
• CNC-machined gold-plate connectors
• Extraordinary fit and finish
“The new Clarus brand of products present a 2-channel dealer with the opportunity to demonstrate and sell cables that no other high-end brand on the market can match,” said Joe Perfito, President of Tributaries. “Their revolutionary design and superior sound quality reproduction make them the ideal choice for the audiophile who demands nothing less than the ultimate listening experience.”
The Boxee Box is getting a live TV tuner
Boxee Box owners will soon be able to watch live television through the device, with the help of a special USB dongle that functions as a tuner for free over-the-air HD TV signals. The live TV feature is part of a major update to the Boxee platform that is likely going to be rolled out over the coming weeks. Read the article and view the video here.
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