George Kurtz, co-founder and CEO of CrowdStrike, discusses the cybersecurity company's IPO on the Nasdaq with CNBC's "Squawk Alley" team, June 12, 2019.
CrowdStrike, Inc. is a U.S.-based cybersecurity technology company, with headquarters in Sunnyvale, California, and a wholly owned subsidiary of CrowdStrike Holdings, Inc. The company provides endpoint security, threat intelligence, and incident response services to customers in more than 170 countries. Leveraging artificial intelligence (AI), the CrowdStrike Falcon® platform protects customers against cyberattacks on endpoints on or off the network by offering visibility and protection across the enterprise.
Founders: George Kurtz, Dmitri Alperovitch, Gregg Marston
CrowdStrike Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: CRWD), announced June 11, 2019, the pricing of its initial public offering of 18,000,000 shares of its Class A common stock at a price to the public of $34.00 per share. CrowdStrike granted the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to 2,700,000 additional shares of Class A common stock at the initial public offering price less underwriting discounts and commissions. The shares began trading on the Nasdaq Global Select Market, June 12, 2019, under the symbol "CRWD." The offering is expected to close on June 14, 2019, subject to customary closing conditions.
Tech Review (TR 2019-05-25)--Domain Mondo's weekly review of tech investing news: Features • 1)The Future of Facial Recognition AI Software, 2) How Amazon Is Fighting Rakuten For E-Commerce In Japan,3)Investing: The Week & Investor Notes: Chinarunning out of runway,4)ICYMI Tech News: Twitter, Amazon, Google, IBM, Red Hat, Huawei, Facebook, T-Mobile, Spacelink, and more.
1)The Future of Facial Recognition AI Software
San Francisco is the first American city to ban facial recognition software used by police and other agencies. Bloomberg QuickTake explains why the technology's advance is so alarming to regulators, the public, and even the people developing it. Bloomberg.com video above published May 16, 2019.
2) How Amazon Is Fighting Rakuten For E-Commerce In Japan
Amazon is involved in around half of all e-commerce transactions in the United States, but in Japan it faces competition from Rakuten(rakuten.com). The Japanese e-commerce giant has a loyalty program and a suite of products including its own credit card, online bank and streaming services. In recent years, Amazon’s superior logistics capabilities and focus on price have allowed the company to capture greater market share. This video shows how the two e-commerce giants are borrowing the most successful parts of each other’s models as they look to the future. CNBC.com video above published Apr 30, 2019.
Investor Notes: China running out of runway in U.S. Trade War. China is running out of options to hit back at the United States without hurting its own interests, as Washington intensifies pressure on Beijing to correct trade imbalances in a challenge to China’s state-led economic model. Even Lloyd Blankfein is now a Trade Warrior.
Trade war can seriously derail China economic development, according to Mohamed El-Erian--China could slip into a middle income trap if trade war persists, but by ending the trade war, El-Erian believes China could regain its economic momentum--scmp.com. Why an economic war with the US blows China up--zerohedge.com.
"The US is willing to take a short-term hit in the form of higher consumer prices, and welcome inflation, from Chinese imports until global supply chains re-adjust and new domestic and international lines open, knowing the long-term damage is limited. Meanwhile, the hit to China is long-term and directly on production, thus right across the economy right at the most difficult phase of economic transition. Chinese economists are talking about a 1-2% hit to GDP. I suspect much more plus increased domestic social and political tension. Xi is in more trouble than we think."--Bill Blain
Eurozone banking at risk of dangerous fragmentation, ECB warns. Euro hits 20, but will it make 30?--dw.com. French Incomes Are Below America's Poorest States... And The Protesters in France Know It.
Brexit: Watch the European election results, particularly from the UK, to be released late Sunday May 26. See also: Why Freedom From Brussels' Tyranny Is Worth A Small Loss Of British GDP, and UK Prime Minister Theresa May resigns after having failed to deliver Brexit. Conservative Party successor in place by late July, without need for a general election, is likely to be Boris Johnson who has indicated that leaving the EU without a deal ("no deal Brexit") is a possibility.
Beware M&A:
Occidental's Big Mistake: Overpaying For Resources In An Age Of Energy Abundance--seekingalpha.com.
Bayer's Acquisition Of Monsanto May Have Sown The Seeds Of Bayer's Own Destruction--seekingalpha.com.
4)ICYMI Tech News:
How Twitter Became Ubiquitous in Japan--a look at Twitter in Japan, its second-largest market, raking in $136M in Q1 revenue, where the service has mass appeal and many users have multiple accounts--bloomberg.com.
E-commerce sales in the U.S., over the past five years have doubled. On a seasonally adjusted basis, e-commerce sales in Q1 2019 hit an all-time high of $137.7 billion. "E-commerce sales" include sales by the online operations of brick-and-mortar retailers Walmart, Home Depot, BestBuy, and Macy’s, which operate the fourth through seventh largest e-commerce websites in the U.S., behind Amazon, eBay, and Apple.--wolfstreet.com.
Out of 50 of the largest companies in the U.S., the highest median employee pay in 2018 was at Texas-based oil giants not Silicon Valley tech giants.--bizjournals.com.
Google has had a huge run, and with financial and potential political challenges looming, now looks like a good time to sell $GOOG, $GOOGL--SeekingAlpha.com.
IBM and Red Hat after IBM's acquisition of Red Hat is complete later this year--zdnet.com.
By 2023, Uber Eats may own 25% of the global food delivery industry worth $191B, but both DoorDash and GrubHub make more sales, and DoorDash is growing fastest--fortune.com.
Huawei: Wi-Fi Alliance, semiconductor standards body JEDEC, and SD Association suspend Huawei's membership, which will limit Huawei's future ability to shape these standards. U.S. Tech Companies Begin to Cut Off Huawei. Experts are skeptical of Huawei's claims that it can ensure a steady components supply without U.S. tech, saying Huawei will struggle to replace chips, lasers, other parts. For example, Huawei relies on chip design software from the American global "gold standard" market leaders Cadence Design Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CDNS), and Synopsys Inc. (NASDAQ: SNPS), used by manufacturers worldwide. Note also: Google reportedly suspended business with Huawei that requires the transfer of hardware and software products except those covered by open source licenses.
China's tech transfer problem is growing, says EU business group. European firms are reportedly increasingly required to transfer technology in China in order to gain access to the Chinese market.
Facebook has apparently formed a new financial tech firm, Libra Networks LLC, according to a filing on the Geneva Commercial Register.
Google Chrome browser pushes "SameSite" cookie security overhaul--an IETF standard called SameSite (RFC6265bis)--which Google and Mozilla have promoted since 2016 and Google has announced it will start pushing more aggressively in Chrome from version 76 this July--nakedsecurity.sophos.com.
SpaceX launches first satellites for Musk's Starlink internet service (domain: starlink.com). Competitors include Airbus SE-backed OneWeb which launched satellites in February, LeoSat Enterprises (domain: leosat.com), and Canada’s Telesat (domain: telesat.com).
"... we will have eliminated about 7,000 salaried positions or about 10% of our global salaried
workforce. This includes both voluntary and involuntary separations over the past year. Within that
total, and consistent with our goal to reduce bureaucracy, we will have reduced management structure
by close to 20%. This will result in annual savings of about $600 million ..."
Personal tech:
10 best cheap phones: for summer travel, leave your $1,000 iPhone or Galaxy at home. Editor's note: my 'short list'--LG K30 – 16 GB – Unlocked (AT&T/T-Mobile/Verizon) ($139.99) orUnihertz Jelly Pro The Smallest 4G Smartphone in The World, Android 7.0 Nougat Unlocked Smart Phone with 2GB RAM and 16GB ROM ($124.99). Almost everyone could use a second "backup phone" / "emergency phone" / "vacation phone" anyway.
Personal security: hacker steals $1 million using just a phone number--bitcoinist.com.
“You’re at the table because people want your voice. It’s easy to forget that. Don’t keep second guessing. If you have a point of view, the reason you were hired is because people want to hear it.”
Ruth Porat, CFO at Alphabet and Google, was interviewed for the final View from the Top for this academic year at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Failing to invest for the long term could be one of tech’s greatest vulnerabilities, she said, and advised students to keep thinking about investing for the long haul.
”What I’ve seen is that if you don’t invest in the long term, you’re sowing the seeds of your own destruction.” In the video, Porat discusses her experiences while at Morgan Stanley$MS (morganstanley.com) and later, Google$GOOGL, $GOOG (google.com). Stanford Graduate School of Business video above published May 21, 2019.
Tesla’s Gigafactory in Nevada is expected to be the largest building in the world by footprint once completed. CNBC.com’s Uptin Saiidi gets a rare look inside what Tesla founder Elon Musk calls, ‘the machine that builds the machine.’ CNBC International video above published May 2, 2019.
Marc Benioff: Business is the Greatest Platform for Change
Salesforce.com, Inc.$CRM Chairman and Co-CEO Marc Benioff discusses how artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming the tech industry and beyond, the importance of leading with trust, and why business is the greatest platform for change. Goldman Sachs video above published Feb 22, 2019.
Nvidia Q4 FY19 EarningsLIVE WebcastFeb 14, 5:30 pm EST
Analysts expect Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) (nvidia.com) to report revenue of $2.29B for the quarter, down from the early forecast for $3.42B. Gaming revenue is anticipated to fall by 41% Y/Y to $1.02B.
NVIDIA today reported revenue for the fourth quarter ended Jan. 27, 2019, of $2.21 billion, down 24 percent from $2.91 billion a year earlier, and down 31 percent from $3.18 billion in the previous quarter. GAAP earnings per diluted share for the quarter were $0.92, down 48 percent from $1.78 a year ago and down 53 percent from $1.97 in the previous quarter. Non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were $0.80, down 53 percent from $1.72 a year earlier and down 57 percent from $1.84 in the previous quarter. For fiscal 2019, revenue was $11.72 billion, up 21 percent from $9.71 billion a year earlier. GAAP earnings per diluted share were $6.63, up 38 percent from $4.82 a year earlier. Non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were $6.64, up 35 percent from $4.92 a year earlier.
NVIDIA Updates Financial Guidance for Fourth Quarter of Fiscal Year 2019
Fourth quarter revenue expected to be $2.20 billion versus previous guidance of $2.70 billion
Gaming and Datacenter revenue below company’s expectations
Management to discuss reported financial results on Feb. 14 earnings call
In Gaming, NVIDIA’s previous fourth-quarter guidance had embedded a sequential decline due to excess mid-range channel inventory following the crypto-currency boom. The reduction in that inventory and its impact on the business have proceeded largely inline with management’s expectations. However, deteriorating macroeconomic conditions, particularly in China, impacted consumer demand for NVIDIA gaming GPUs. In addition, sales of certain high-end GPUs using NVIDIA’s new Turing™ architecture were lower than expected. These products deliver a revolutionary leap in performance and innovation with real-time ray tracing and AI, but some customers may have delayed their purchase while waiting for lower price points and further demonstrations of RTX technology in actual games.
In Datacenter, revenue also came in short of expectations. A number of deals in the company’s forecast did not close in the last month of the quarter as customers shifted to a more cautious approach. Despite these near-term headwinds, NVIDIA has a large and expanding addressable market opportunity in AI and high performance computing, and the company believes its competitive position is intact.
Corporate profile: "NVIDIA is the pioneer of GPU-accelerated computing. We specialize in products and platforms for the large, growing markets of gaming, professional visualization, data center, and automotive. Our creations are loved by the most demanding computer users in the world – gamers, designers, and scientists. And our work is at the center of the most consequential mega-trends in technology."
Learn how to put smart to work, witness the evolution of mankind and machine come to life. Immerse yourself in AI, cloud, and other groundbreaking technologies, and see firsthand how IBM clients are using them across all industries.
Black Swan Data CEO: We use AI to predict how movies will do
Steve King discusses how his firm uses data to map out trends in multiple industries. CNBC Life video first published Jun 20, 2018.
Black Swan Data is a London-based technology and data science company with an online data analytics platform that uses predictive data science to analyze a wide variety of data to help businesses identify potential trends and customer behaviors.
Two internets will form to cater to Chinese and US apps, strategist says | World Economic Forum
Kai-Fu Lee, chairman and CEO of Sinovation Ventures (sinovationventures.com) (and former President of Google China), discusses the possibility of the internet splitting between the U.S. and China and discusses the AI race between the two superpowers. CNBC International TV video Feb 2, 2019.
Tweets by kaifulee
The event will be webcast live, and the audio and associated slides will be available for at least three months thereafter at amazon.com/ir (Amazon Investor Relations).
Fourth Quarter 2018: Net sales increased 20% to $72.4 billion in the fourth quarter, compared with $60.5 billion in fourth quarter 2017. Excluding the $801 million unfavorable impact from year-over-year changes in foreign exchange rates throughout the quarter, net sales increased 21% compared with fourth quarter 2017. Operating income increased to $3.8 billion in the fourth quarter, compared with operating income of $2.1 billion in fourth quarter 2017. Net income increased to $3.0 billion in the fourth quarter, or $6.04 per diluted share, compared with net income of $1.9 billion, or $3.75 per diluted share, in fourth quarter 2017. The fourth quarter 2017 included a provisional tax benefit for the impact of the U.S. Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 of approximately $789 million.
Full Year 2018: Net sales increased 31% to $232.9 billion, compared with $177.9 billion in 2017. Excluding the $1.3 billion favorable impact from year-over-year changes in foreign exchange rates throughout the year, net sales increased 30% compared with 2017. Operating income increased to $12.4 billion, compared with operating income of $4.1 billion in 2017. Net income increased to $10.1 billion, or $20.14 per diluted share, compared with net income of $3.0 billion, or $6.15 per diluted share, in 2017. “Alexa was very busy during her holiday season. Echo Dot was the best-selling item across all products on Amazon globally, and customers purchased millions more devices from the Echo family compared to last year,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO. “The number of research scientists working on Alexa has more than doubled in the past year, and the results of the team’s hard work are clear. In 2018, we improved Alexa’s ability to understand requests and answer questions by more than 20% through advances in machine learning, we added billions of facts making Alexa more knowledgeable than ever, developers doubled the number of Alexa skills to over 80,000, and customers spoke to Alexa tens of billions more times in 2018 compared to 2017. We’re energized by and grateful for the response, and you can count on us to keep working hard to bring even more invention to customers.”
Amazon.com, Inc., (amazon.com) is a multinational technology company in e-commerce (Amazon), cloud computing (AWS - Amazon Web Services - aws.amazon.com), and artificial intelligence (Alexa - alexa.amazon.com, developer.amazon.com/alexa). Headquarters are in Seattle, Washington.
Amazon Is Doing 'Everything Right,' Wedbush's Pachter Says--Bloomberg.com video published Jan 25, 2019: Michael Pachter, Wedbush Securities managing director, discusses the reasons behind his bullish call on Amazon.com Inc. with Bloomberg's Lisa Abramowicz.
L2inc.com video above published Jan 10, 2019: There are almost 25 million US households with an Amazon Alexa device. Here's how your brand can take advantage of Amazon's voice platform.
Amazon's Alexa is the voice-activated, interactive AI bot, or personal assistant, that lets people speak with their Amazon Echo, Echo Dot and other Amazon smart home devices. ... But Alexa Skills are apps that give Alexa even more abilities, letting her speak to more devices even websites--gearbrain.com.
Amazon.com, Inc., (NASDAQ: AMZN) (domain: amazon.com) video above published Apr 19, 2017: "At a recent Amazon all hands meeting, Jeff was asked 'Jeff, what does Day 2 look like?'"
“'Jeff, what does Day 2 look like?' That’s a question I just got at our most recent all-hands meeting. I’ve been reminding people that it’s Day 1 for a couple of decades. I work in an Amazon building named Day 1, and when I moved buildings, I took the name with me. I spend time thinking about this topic. 'Day 2 is stasis. Followed by irrelevance. Followed by excruciating, painful decline. Followed by death. And that is why it is always Day 1.' To be sure, this kind of decline would happen in extreme slow motion. An established company might harvest Day 2 for decades, but the final result would still come. I’m interested in the question, how do you fend off Day 2? What are the techniques and tactics? How do you keep the vitality of Day 1, even inside a large organization?"--Jeff Bezos' 2016 Letter to Amazon Shareholders
Don't look now Jeff, but Day 2 may have just arrived, at your invitation:
BILLION DOLLAR DIVORCE: Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced that he and his wife of 25 years are divorcing, which could make her the world's wealthiest woman https://t.co/r0AkXg54rCpic.twitter.com/2bb3qHXGnB
Bezos owns approximately 16 percent of Amazon’s market cap of over $800 billion. Prominent short-seller Doug Kass, who runs hedge fund Seabreeze Partners, said he sold his stake in Amazon on news of the Bezos divorce, after initially buying a stake in late December and naming Amazon among his “best ideas list.” Jeff, You May Be Needing This Soon:
Kohler unveiled a $7000 “intelligent toilet” called the Numi 2.0 at the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas last week. It comes with built-in surround sound speakers, ambient mood lighting and Amazon Alexa, Amazon's AI voice assistant. You can talk to and ask Alexa questions while you're "doing your business." You can even ask Alexa to raise the lid as you walk into the bathroom, warm up the seat on a chilly day, change the glowing lights on the bottom of the seat, play music, and lastly, even ask Alexa to flush the toilet when you're finished.
Amazon and Google battle for smart speaker dominance at CES 2019
CNBC’s Elizabeth Schulze runs through the battle of Amazon Alexa vs Google Assistant "smart speakers" between Amazon$AMZN (amazon.com) and Google$GOOG$GOOGL (google.com) at CES, the biggest gadget show of the year. CNBC International TV video above published Jan 9, 2019 Tweets by alexadevs
IBM (domain: ibm.com) has created the world’s first fully integrated universal quantum computing system designed for scientific and commercial use that could help solve problems beyond the reach of classical computers. Financial Times (ft.com) video above first published Jan 7, 2019.
The World’s First Integrated Quantum Computing System
IBM Research video above first published Jan 8, 2019: IBM Q System One enables universal approximate superconducting quantum computers to operate outside the research lab for the first time. It's a major step forward in the commercialization of quantum computing, which could one day enable breakthroughs in such areas as materials and drug discovery, financial services, and artificial intelligence. Learn more: https://ibm.biz/systemone
NVIDIA Press Event at CES 2019 with NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang
NVIDIA (nvidia.com) video above published Jan 7, 2019: Watch the live replay of NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang's press event at CES 2019 in Las Vegas, where he unveiled the GeForce RTX 2060 GPU, more than 40 NVIDIA RTX-powered laptops from every major manufacturer, an expanded ecosystem of G-SYNC displays, and a slew of amazing real-time ray tracing demos.
Nvidia Corporation is a U.S.-based technology company that designs and manufactures graphics processing units for the gaming and professional markets, as well as system on a chip units for the mobile computing and automotive market. Besides gaming, professional visualization, data centers and auto, Nvidia is now also focused on artificial intelligence.
CEO: Jensen Huang (Apr 1993–)
Headquarters: Santa Clara, CA
Revenue: 9.714 billion USD (2017)
Founded: April 1993
Founders: Jensen Huang, Curtis Priem, Chris Malachowsky
Tech Review (TR 2018-11-24)--Domain Mondo's weekly review of tech investing news with commentary, analysis and opinion: Features • 1) Apple's Core Problems, 2)High Tech Wars of the Future,3)Investing: The Week, Investing Notes, 4) ICYMI Tech News.
1) Tech Share Rout: Apple's Core Problems
The iPhone maker, Apple (apple.com) $AAPL, has been hit as investors worry over sales and US-China tensions. Financial Times (ft.com) video above published Nov 21, 2018.
U.S. scientists prepare for high-tech wars of the future: the U.S. is investing in robotics and artificial intelligence as it races against China to develop the weapons of the future. The FT.com’s US foreign policy and defense correspondent Katrina Manson visits the US Army Research Lab to meet the scientists working on the latest tech developments. Financial Times (ft.com) video above published Nov 16, 2018.
EU troubles: Eurozone, Italy, Immigration, and Brexit--Editor's note: why invest in someone else's mess?
China: more nations voice concerns over Chinese investment--'here, borrow some money from us'--chinaeconomicreview.com. Editor's note: a/k/a the Chinese "Extortionate Debt Trap."
Bitcoin hit its lowest level in more than a year on Monday, falling under $5,000, while the entire cryptocurrency market cap lost about $40 Billion in the prior week--cnbc.com. Editor's note: until such time as Bitcoin, or some other crypto, becomes "legal tender" in a respected jurisdiction (sorry Venezuela doesn't qualify), the entire market is pure speculation subject to multiple scams. The U.S. government (CFTC) treats cryptocurrencies as commodities and the IRS taxes them as "property" Have you reported your crypto holdings and transactions, paid applicable property taxes on your holdings, and applicable income taxes?Oh, and by the way, the U.S. government does not accept any crypto as payment for taxes.
4) ICYMI Tech News:
Not All Clouds Are Equal: Key findings of the 2018 ThousandEyes Public Cloud Performance Benchmark Report: "Architectural differences between providers impacts service delivery: AWS (Amazon) sends traffic over the Internet for the majority of the service delivery path, whereas GCP (Google) and Azure (Microsoft) do not, instead using their own backbone networks. Increased exposure to the Internet means there is greater operational risk and impact on performance predictability ..." Learn more: Download the 2018 ThousandEyes Public Cloud Performance Benchmark Report; also Register for the webinar, "Cloud Wars: Performance Benchmarking AWS, GCP and Azure," taking place December 6, 2018 at 10:00 AM PST.
Apple CEO Tim Cook: new regulations on the tech industry ‘inevitable’--"Generally speaking, I am not a big fan of regulation," Cook told Axios on HBO. "I'm a big believer in the free market, but we have to admit when the free market is not working. And it hasn't worked here." See also Washington pummels Facebook: ‘Big tech can no longer be trusted’--recode.net.
US-based Krogerand UK-based Ocado to build first robotic warehouse in Cincinnati in a joint effort to dominate the U.S. grocery delivery business--reuters.com.
US tops world in internet development, with China in second place, said China's Academy of Cyberspace Studies, an institute affiliated with the Cyberspace Administration of China, in its second annual World Internet Development Report. According to the report, the US leads in innovation, industry development and security. Also four U.S. companies, Tesla, Amazon, Microsoft and Qualcomm, were the only non-Chinese companies receiving special mentions at China's recent World Internet Conference 2018 in Wuzhen, along with eleven Chinese companies--scmp.com.
