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Super Bowl XLII tech companies commercials

American Football is not a big game in this region, we’re more to football or soccer as what American calls our football. Just giving a quick fact of what the Superbowl is, it is NFL’s championship game, a match between the champions of the two league’s conferences: the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). It’s kinda long story of how this league is formed, but this is not like English Premier League, where EPL have multiple tier divisions according to the performances, but this is 2 different leagues (I can say it is on the same level) whereby the champions compete against each other in Superbowl.

I have known about Superbowl before, but I’ve heard more about it lately, the excitement and fun of this game from my teammates who are based in the US. They’re trying to get me in their conversation even though I know nothing about it. While the game itself is full of excitement, the second most exciting part is the Superbowl advertisement which is aired during the television broadcast. Last year ad costs USD2.2 million for 30 sec ads due to the number of viewers with almost 90 millions. This ads however are available on US and Canada television broadcastings only, but luckily, with Youtube around, most of the ads are available there.

For full advertisement list, direct your browser to NFL official websites. Enjoy!!

Apple Macbook Air

Dell (PRODUCT) RED


Dell XPS

T-Mobile

GoDaddy.com

Verizon Voyager

Sprint



Toyota Sequoia SUV

Admin 6 February 2008 Corp 6 Comments

Google missed earning target, Microsoft offered to buy Yahoo

For the last few hours, there are 2 interesting development of top 3 internet search engines company

Google miss earning forecast
Even though Google continue to be in black (profit) and its profit continue to rise to 1.21 billion from 1.03 billion on the same period a year before, but the fact that it miss the forecasted earning set by market analyst is kinda worrying the investor. OK on the simplest word, investors expect more but Google provides less. What does it mean? This is how I understand. Google’s revenue comes mostly from advertising, and big chunks of it came from the US.

At the moment, US economy is not that stable after the subprime crisis that happened from last year. Financial institution such as Citibank and JP Morgan has loss billion of dollar in their mortgage loan. Due to this also, consumers becomes more careful in spending their penny.

What is the connection between this and Google’s earning? With economic slowdown, the spending on advertising will slightly affected . So the rest is like a Domino effect, the slowdown on the other end will affect the other end along the road and so on

The most significant effect to us is the weakening of US dollar which causing you Adsence earning in USD converted to local currency lesser than usual.

Microsoft offer to buy Yahoo for 44.6 billion
Another not really shocking news, after MS announced their batter than expected profit last quarter, and the gloomy outlook of Yahoo. Ok, this is not rumors anymore. Microsoft has attempted to buy Yahoo before but it was rejected. But now, Microsoft is trying it luck again. Ironically, MS tabled the offer after Terry Semel, Yahoo chairman who’d rejects their offer earlier step down.

What is the problem with Yahoo? Why Yahoo has never recovered from their downfall? Well, the problem is within themselves. Yahoo has the most traffic in the world, but they have problem converting them into earning. Its project such Panama Project is not successful. Same fate goes to YPM which is still in beta stage after a year. Sigh

MS smell the opportunity and definitely trying to take an advantage of Yahoo current situation with hopes to catch up Google who lead the online business market. And with piles of cash it has, buying Yahoo is just another investment to grow bigger

What do you think of the whole story. Can Microsoft buy Yahoo and overtake Google???

Admin 2 February 2008 Yahoo, google, microsoft 7 Comments

Microsoft second quarter profit rise to $4.7 billion

Microsoft is making the front page news again. Not with super thin notebook, fancy MP3 player, gaming console, corporate take over, porn or political issue. Microsoft just doesn’t care about all these things. Not even with their patchy Windows, bugs, their over price operating system or even their under performing MS Live. They let the $$ talk on behalf of them.

Microsoft (or known as MS) announced that they made a net profit of USD4.7 bil for their second quarter (1 quarter = 3 months). It is translated to RM15.5 bil from revenue of USD16.37 bil (RM 54 Bil). Enough to cover Malaysian Budget partially.

USD4.7 bil is a lot. By looking at how much Vista was sold, it is easily understood on how MS earning is climbing and perhaps can push MS profit even higher in the next quarter. Price below shows how much Vista is priced in a single license, but the price would be different on OEM bundled together with PC or bulk licenses.

The company said it has sold 100 million copies of Vista since its January 2007 launch.

Microsoft Recommended Retail Price Table*:
Windows Vista Business RM550
Windows Vista Home Premium RM440
Windows Vista Home Basic RM330


Other important points in Microsoft revenue

  • The business division, which includes Office, brought in $4.81 billion in sales.
  • Xbox 360 game console and the Zune brought in $3.06 billion. The division make a profit of $357 million from a loss of $302 million last year.
  • Online services business (Live and advertising) rose up to 30%, but widen the loss to $245 million, from $118 million a year ago.

By looking at this figure (and table below as well), Microsoft’s main contributor came from its office suite, operating system (workstation and server), server and other software licensing. The only place where Microsoft is losing its ground is on its Online business. We know who’re the KING on online right… While Microsoft has found its arch rival in online business, Microsoft is still the undisputed champion in offline business. And even though Apple’s Leopard who also gained its market share last quarter, it’s still a long way to go before Leopard can treat MS Vista seriously. The simplest situation that I can see is how Windows is widely used by government sector and big corp due to its easiness and broad support provided by them (even though sometimes it’s not that good).


So while MS profit keeps on increasing which shows their sales in their product such as office suite and home computing growth are tremendous, it also got me to question if open source application such OS in uBuntu, office suite in Lotus Notes and Star Office does really impact MS revenue and profit. If we let the numbers speak, the answer is definitely NO. There is a lot of buzz about Ubuntu, and some computer manufacturers such as Dell and HP who had even started shipping system with this OS,  but the fact that most users are still relying on MS to do their daily task especially in office is showing how MS has deeper influence than most of us had thought. Using Ubuntu for experiment is not really parallel on goal in a way the open source community would want.


The recent subprime issue which is overshadowing the US economy also, seems like does have any impact on MS revenue due to the nature of its business which is located around the world. If you’re to venture into any business, you’re highly advised to practice what MS did.


  • Build (or copy but make it better) product that everybody use, regardless of the geographical or economical situation
  • Kill your competitors (give it away, allow piracy (on initial stage only))
  • Show image that MS product is better supported (compared to open source)


Just some further info if you’re interested to know how much MS operating profit for the same period system of his fiscal year ad last fiscal year


Microsoft operating income brake down and comparison table. (see detail )


                                                                   3 Months Ended     Months Ended
                                                                           Dec 31                Dec 31
                                                                     2007        2006        2007     2006

Client $3,358 $1,838

$6,727 $4,485

Server and Tools 1,172 981

2,132 1,751

Online Services Business (245) (118)

(510) (236)

Microsoft Business Division 3,185 2,152

5,879 4,391

Entertainment and Devices Division 357 (302)

524 (423)

Corporate-Level Activity (1,346) (1,079)

(2,353) (2,022)

  Total operating income

$6,481 $3,472

$12,399 $7,946


source : Yahoo News, CNNMoney Microsoft

Admin 25 January 2008 microsoft 11 Comments

Google and DoubleClick

merge small Google and DoubleClick
DoubleClick? Have you heard of it? Few months back, I wrote about Google spending spree, where Doubleclick is one of many companies that bought by Google . Well, DoubleClick, Inc. is a leading online ad-serving and tracking firm which provides technology, and data products and services for advertising agencies, marketers, and Web publishers to plan, execute, and analyze marketing programs. Connection with Google? Though Google earns a whole lot more than Double Click by over 20 times of the profit, they are willing to pay $3.1 billion for DoubleClick, when the company could go for $2 billion.

What Google sees in DoubleClick is an opportunity, Google is focusing on search engines and DoubleClick has vibrant advertising business for banners, videos, and other so-called display ads often intended more to promote brands than to generate immediate sales. This would then help Google in the display advertising market.

Nope, not yet, Google has not yet closed the deal here, it has to get the clearance from both U.S. antitrust and European Union’s antitrust commissions. They’ve got a go from the U.S. regulators, but not yet from European Commission. The review deadline is on Apr 2, we’ll need to wait by then.

Any impact on us? I’m not sure on that.. but both companies seems to compliment each other, and the merging could create 1 huge entity that could dominate the internet advertisement. Google looks unstoppable, especially after getting the clearance from the US, but could this impact EU decision towards them?

As an Adsense publisher, I’m always looking for a better opportunity to earn more and more. So if this benefit most of us, why not let the deal roll on? But I believe, there are more important things behind this deal, which delay the merge process such as monopoly or data privacy issue, more than the money!!

maiardz 21 December 2007 google 3 Comments

Pictures of Dell Direct Store

dell1 Pictures of Dell Direct Storedell2 Pictures of Dell Direct Store

Finally, I manage to get the Dell so called Direct Store’s pictures from my friend. On my post earlier, I have mentioned about the opening of Dell’s Direct Store in Mid Valley Megamall shopping complex.

I’m not sure if this is part of Dell’s channel strategy, since the store itself bear the Dell logo as well as Intel. It could be the collaboration between Dell and Intel to showcase their product to the public. I doubt there are AMD’s powered notebooks/desktops displayed there.

Judging on the size of the store, it seems that the store is not that huge and does not showcasing full array of Dell’s product. I’m actually expecting something similar (or almost) to Mac Store nearby

If Dell is looking somewhere to build similar store, I believe Low Yat Plaza located at Kuala Lumpur’s so called Golden Triangle is the best. It is the largest IT center in Malaysia. I do visit there quite often, and I can see that there are large crowd looking for computer related items.

Good luck Dell!!

Admin 14 December 2007 Dell 13 Comments
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