Large corporations are exercising caution about large-scale information technology spending amid concerns about global economic growth and fiscal uncertainty, Hewlett-Packard Co (HP) CEO Leo Apotheker said.
While technology upgrades are under way at many companies, “everybody’s a bit cautious in an environment like this,” Apotheker said on Saturday on the sidelines of the Rencontres Economiques conference in Aix-en-Provence, France. “People are still a bit wary.”
Providers of computer hardware and services are benefiting unevenly from a rebound in technology spending. HP’s rival Oracle Corp reported a surprise decline in hardware sales last month. Still, IT spending by companies and governments in the US is expected to grow 5.6 percent this year, about double the estimated rate of growth in GDP, according to market researcher IDC.
Apotheker, who took over HP in November last year after leaving SAP AG, is looking to slice costs and spur sales after cutting US$1 billion from the company’s annual revenue projection in May.
Under its new CEO, HP is shifting toward cloud-based services and new devices like tablet computers to reduce reliance on traditional personal computers. In May, he warned employees to expect “another tough quarter” and urged managers to cut expenses.
HP is continuing discussions with other hardware manufacturers on licensing its WebOS mobile operating system for their devices, Apotheker said on Saturday, and isn’t concerned that such agreements could cannibalize sales of its own TouchPad tablet. That device went on sale on July 1.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day