BoomTown » Lenovo

Qualcomm's CEO Paul Jacobs Talks About Smartbooks and More!

Kara Swisher — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:36:52 +0000

When in San Diego recently, BoomTown paid a visit to Qualcomm and its Chairman and CEO, Paul Jacobs, to talk about a new “smartbook” device the wireless-technology company unveiled last week.

Well, sort of–while I got a gander at a prototype, the real one is not actually set to debut until the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show in January, where Jacobs will deliver his first keynote address.

There, he will show off what is essentially a combination of a smartphone and a netbook using wireless technology and an always-on capability, an attempt to push yet another innovative device type onto the market.

It will use Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chip, and the first ones will be made by Lenovo and offered by AT&T (T)–to try to get the device widely used by consumers.

Smartbooks will be videocentric and have a Linux-based user interface, a keyboard and a range of popular widget applications, such as email and Facebook.

Obviously, this will be a competitive market and, really, Apple (AAPL), with its upcoming tablet computer, is also pushing into this mobile-phone-that-ate-computers space.

Moving into new markets has been important for Jacobs and Qualcomm (QCOM), which recently gave fiscal-year forecasts under Wall Street expectations and has had a rocky time in recent quarters.

Along with the econalypse, the company has attributed this to the decline in handsets with CDMA wireless technology, which Qualcomm pioneered.

Here’s my interview with Jacobs about smartbooks, as well as augmented reality and the company’s new FLO TV device, coming out soon. Plus, a wireless bandaid!:

[ See post to watch video ]

In the Year 2025–Who Knows What Tomorrow Brings in Tech?

Kara Swisher — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 13:43:29 +0000

When attending the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last week, BoomTown moderated what turned out to be a fascinating panel discourse of what was to come in the tech sector.

No, it was not a gathering of Trekkies.

The CES SuperSession panel, titled “What Will They Think of Next? Consumer Technology in 2025,” was less Jules Verne than a logical analysis of where gadgetry is headed by looking at both the past and the present.

Overall consensus: Touch screens everywhere, 3-D imaging in wide use, no device wires, ubiquitous high-speed wireless networks and more.

Of course, there were some edgier ideas, like being able to tell exactly when it is going to rain to the minute, via massive computing of weather patterns.

In addition, one of the panelists, Greg Harper, brought back what was popular in 1994, the same number of years back that 2025 is forward. Yep, he dragged out for display the Apple (AAPL) Newton and brick-sized cellphones.

The panelists were: Stephen DiFranco, VP and GM, Americas Consumer Group, Lenovo; Gregory Harper, co-founder, Gadgetoff and president, Cerberus; Len J. Lauer, EVP and COO, Qualcomm (QCOM); Sean Maloney, EVP and GM, Sales and Marketing, Intel (INTC); and Phil McKinney, VP and CTO, Personal Systems Group, Hewlett-Packward (HPQ).

Here’s the video with interviews about 2025 with all of them–and don’t miss the very funny poster at the end from Microsoft (MSFT) about its vision of the future:

[ See post to watch video ]

The Entire Internal Microsoft Memo on New Dell and Verizon Deal

Kara Swisher — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 21:29:14 +0000

BoomTown loves a good memo and here’s one that two of Microsoft’s top online execs, Yusuf Mehdi and Satya Nadella sent out about the deal the tech giant signed with Dell (DELL) and Verizon (VZ) to distribute its search and other products.

Microsoft (MSFT) is opening its fat wallet to do such a deal and try to best archrival Google (GOOG). It was announced last night at Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s keynote kickoff for the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Here’s the memo:

From: Yusuf Mehdi
Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 6:29 PM
To: OSD R&D FTE World Wide; Online Audience Business Group FTE; APSP FTE–Adv & Pub Solutions Platform
Cc: Yusuf Mehdi; Satya Nadella; Qi Lu
Subject: Announcing Dell and Verizon Strategic Partnerships!

Team,

This evening, in his keynote address at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Steve Ballmer announced two major new distribution partnerships that will significantly increase the reach of our Online businesses to end users.

Starting in February, Dell–the number one PC manufacturer in the US and number two worldwide – will begin to distribute Live Search and Windows Live Essentials on a majority of consumer and small business PCs shipped globally. Under the terms of the agreement, Live Search will be the default search engine in the Web browser, as well as including a Live Search-powered toolbar on all new PCs over the next several years.

Steve also announced a five-year partnership with Verizon–the number one wireless carrier in the US–that covers mobile search and display advertising. The deal will provide more than 70 million subscribers in the U.S the ability to use Live Search to find local business and shopping information, access maps and directions, find ringtones and other online mobile products and services.

Partnering with the #1 PC manufacturer and the #1 wireless carrier in the US is a huge win for our Online Services business. More importantly, the partnerships will benefit our mutual customers as we make it easier to access their email, IM, homepage, and Search services from their PC and Phone.

As you know, these are just two–albeit big ones!–examples of our partnering to grow our audience through distribution and bring our services to new users. Our momentum is building from previous and existing partnerships with Sun Microsystems, Facebook, Lenovo, and most recently HP for all their PCs in North America.

A big thanks to the many individuals across the company that helped secure these partnerships. Now onward to executing very well on our product offerings and marketing to make the most of our investment!

Satya and Yusuf

Afternoon Siesta With WSJ Online Videos: Morse Code, Lenovo, Legos and the Geeky French!

Kara Swisher — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 22:10:53 +0000

How much do we love this Morse Code guy in the Arizona desert–Chuck Adams, who is the eighth fastest in the world–in this video of what is a dying breed: the tappy-tapping ur-geek:

And Lenovo tries to grow a global business against competitors like Acer, IBM and Dell, although there is also a rural PC for farmers. So says Bill Amelio, CEO of the Chinese computer maker:

Making Lego movies–stop-motion films called “brickfilm”–which are a lot more gripping than a lot out there (but not much!):

Get your iPods and music and fashion and design at France’s Colette. It’s like an Apple store with tasty food!: