David Needle

Google’s release today of an update to its Service Level Agreement (SLA) is the latest in a series of moves by the search giantdesigned to assure IT that Google Apps are enterprise-ready. Claiming a first among major cloud computing providers, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) said it has eliminated scheduled maintenance from the SLA. Typically an SLA […]

Deploy more mobile applications. Check. Figure out how to manage them. Check. Those are two key takeaways from a just-released survey of IT managers by Kelton Research, sponsored by Sybase, an SAP (NYSE: SAP) company. An overwhelming majority of the 250 IT managers polled (90 percent), said they will implement new mobile applications this year, […]

Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) reported its third consecutive quarter of record revenue today, exceeding $40 billion ($43.6 billion) for the full year for the first time. The chip giant also had record profits for 2010 of $11.7 billion. “2010 was the best year in Intel’s history. We believe that 2011 will be even better,” Paul Otellini, […]

If you build it, others will too? Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) and several big name partners showed off some new, tech-driven concepts for retailing as part of a two-story, 2,400 square-foot futuristic storefront it created for the National Retail Federation Convention this week in New York. The mock Connected Store features fast food, grocery and big […]

In a surprise announcement, AMD said today that CEO Dirk Meyer has resigned as president, CEO and director of the company effective immediately. Bruce Claflin, Chairman of AMD’s Board of Directors, is leading a search committee to find a replacement for Meyer. Industry veteran Claflin was also named Executive Chairman of the Board and will […]

Personal computers down; smartphones, tablet computers and 3DTV sales up, way up. That’s the forecast from a just-released report by Accenture (NYSE: ACN). The research giant predicts consumer purchase rates of PCs and mobile phones (excluding smartphones) will decline by 39 and 56 percent respectively this year. On the flip side, Accentureexpects buying rates of […]

A USA Today/Gallup poll released this week finds strong consumer sentiment in favor of keeping advertisers from tracking their movements on the Web. The news comes at a time when U.S. lawmakers are considering so-called “Do Not Track” legislation that would set limits on how much personal information Web companies can collect on consumers as […]

Comedian Groucho Marx once quipped that he didn’t care to “belong to any club that would have me as a member.” The latest announcement from LinkedIn opens up the professional social network site a bit so that non-LinkedIn members can view Groups on the Web. “In the new Open Groups, all discussions can be viewed […]

Just when you thought the “HP CEO Resigns Amid Controversy” story had run its course, it looks like another chapter is being written. Today the Wall Street Journal reported that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is investigatingclaims that Hurd may have shared information about HP’s (NYSE: HPQ) pending $13.9 billion acquisition of Electronic Data […]

So much for coopetition. After reporting strong earnings that trumped analyst’s expectation, Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) CEO Larry Ellison gave former close ally Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) fair warning that he’s gunning for their business. “Our goal is to be number one in high end systems for high end transaction processing and data warehousing,” Ellison said in […]