Paul Ausick

Recent Articles

Hewlett-Packard To Spend $1B on Job Cuts (HPQ, IBM, ORCL, SAP, SY)

By Paul Ausick

Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ) has announced that it will "invest" $1 billion in its Enterprise Services business by taking a charge of $1 billion over several years to cut 9,000 jobs. That's one way of looking at layoffs. HP spent $13.9 billion in 2008 to acquire EDS, putting the company in a position to challenge IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM) in the IT services business. Since then, IBM has widened its offerings in services, Oracle Corp. (NASDAQ: ORCL) has swallowed up Sun Microsystems, and SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) recently announced that it would pay $5.8 billion for Sybase Inc. (NYSE: SY). The common thread in all this is that scale and diversity are required to compete successfully.

Icahn Missed Yahoo! But Takes Aim at Lawson (YHOO, MSFT, LWSN, ORCL, IBM, HPQ, SAP)

By Paul Ausick

Carl Icahn, the gunslinger of private investors, once made an investment in more than 75 million shares of Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO). Now Icahn is doubling his investment position in Lawson Software Inc. (NASDAQ: LWSN) to about 8.54% of Lawson's stock outstanding.

WMT Stock – Walmart Buys UK Discount Retailer

By Paul Ausick

Asda, the British retail chain owned by Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT), has agreed to purchase the 193 UK stores of Denmark's Netto for $1.2 billion. The move is a first for both Asda and Walmart into the small footprint space that UK shoppers appear to prefer. An average Asda store has around 46,000 square feet of space, while the Netto stores have an average of just 8,000 square feet.

Is Apple iTunes Bad for the Music Business But Good for Music? (AAPL, AMZN)

By Paul Ausick

The US Department of Justice has started looking into complaints that Apple, Inc.'s (NASDAQ: AAPL) iTunes and related business practices in the music industry may be anti-competitive. The Apple inquiries are not yet a formal investigation of AAPL stock, but a move to find out whether or not a formal investigation by the Justice Department should be initiated into Steve Jobs and company.

Yahoo! Keeps Widening Global Footprint (YHOO, NOK)

By Paul Ausick

In its first quarter earnings report, Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) ticked off all the deals and buyouts it had made in the first quarter of the year. In the five weeks since then, the company has kept itself busy with even more deals.

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