The Risk of Junk Upends Leverage (Breakingviews.com via New York Times)
Focuses on SunGard.

Google finally sued by makers of Finally Fast (CNET News)

What should SAP do with its $5bn war chest? (ZDNet Blogs)

Verizon, Comcast To Compete For Pittsburgh Cable Customers
Pittsburgh, Verizon Reach Tentative Cable Agreement (The PittsburghChannel.com)

CardioNet’s strong pulse
Stock price drop a blip on screen? (Philadelphia Business Journal)

People News 7/06/09

Kramer leaving Finch for MEDecision (Philadelphia Business Journal)

Lori Sofianek to Join WorldGate as Senior Vice President of Customer Operations
(Business Wire)

IMS Names Kimberly Gray Chief Privacy Officer, Americas (Business Wire)

Canoe Hires Schaffer As Head Of Finance
Former CEO of Consulting Firm Reports to David Verklin (Mutichannel News)

Emerio Names Vice President for USA (Company Press Release)

UniRisX, a provider of SaaS-based solutions for the insurance industry with offices in Conshohocken, announced three appointments. David Hollander, formerly a managing director at Accenture, was named CEO. Jonathan Kalman, managing partner of Jaguar Capital Investments, was named chairman of the board. David Plate, also from Accenture, was named vice president sales and business development, North America.

Two Join Regulatory DataCorp Board (Business Wire)

Dynasil Announces Dr. Gerald Entine as New Director (Business WIre)

William Ashton Named Founding Dean of the Mayes College of Healthcare Business and Policy (University of the Sciences)



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Updating Recent Philly VC Investments

Below is a table showing IT-related venture capital investments in the Philadelphia area in the second quarter, at least those that I am aware of. It should not be considered a complete record of deals in Q2; the PricewaterhouseCooper/MoneyTree report that should be out soon always includes some deals that have not been previously announced. But as you can see activity in Q2 looks much better already than what happened in Q1.
One company I have removed from the list that was on the PwC/MoneyTree Q1 report is a stealth company called "OSS 1701", listed as being Wilmington-based. It turns out that the company has nothing to do with Delaware, as far as I can tell, other than possibly being incorporated there. It is based in Redwood City, CA. The company actually turns out to be a pretty big deal; it is a cloud platform startup called webappVM, backed by Marc Andreessen among others. Possibly the founders or investors had it shown as being in Delaware in order to protect its stealth status by keeping it out of the Silicon Valley rumor mill.

QVC Debt Concerns

The Wall Street Journal reports on mounting concerns over QVC's debt load (subscription required). Its not that QVC is going to go bust anytime soon, its just that John Malone's Liberty Media empire (which owns QVC) is so difficult to keep track of with all of its asset juggling and tax advantage oriented transactions.The article suggests that Malone may not have treated some debt holders too well relative to other classes of investors.
Another thing I don't like about Liberty Media is its tracking stocks (for instance, QVC is assigned to the Liberty Interactive tracking stock). I would never buy a tracking stock; even though I have an MBA I've never quite understood what I'm getting with them (just my opinion).
Another thought about Liberty Media-if it does need more liquidity would it consider unloading its 90% or so position in TruePosition of Berwyn? I think it might, if the tax implications are favorable. I don't see a strong fit with most of the other activities Liberty Media is engaged in, though I might be missing something strategically.
Other Liberty Media holdings in the area include a stake in GSI Commerce, and ZoomBak, which sells GPS locators.

Editorial: Philadelphia story
Transparency in education is a rare thing -- which is why Microsoft and AIE are to be commended (eSchoolNews-Free Registation)
A report card on Philadelphia's School of the Future.

Bill banning forced identity-chip implants clears House (Philadelphia Inquirer)

BI Number Games

It was a little surprising when Information Week reported last month on Gartner's Business Intelligence market share estimates for 2008. It cited that report as implying that SAS Institute (which historically has a large Philadelphia area user base) grew its BI revenue from $752 million in 2007 to $1.29 billion in 2008, a growth rate of 72%. I thought this couldn't be correct; in fact it was a virtual mathematical impossibility since SAS revenue grew only about 5% overall and BI revenue (as estimated by Gartner) represented almost 60% of overall SAS revenue.
Gartner confirmed to me that the Information Week figures were, in fact, incorrect. The reporter apparently compared the 2008 numbers to a previous Gartner release about the 2007 numbers, but it was not apples to apples since Gartner had added another category to the 2008 figures: Analytical and Performance Management applications, areas in which SAS is strong. (These numbers were also reflected in the revised 2007 figures.) SAS BI revenue actually grew about 5% in 2008, according to Gartner.
On the other hand, Gartner showed SAP's BI revenue rising by 46% in 2008, apples to apples including all Business Objects revenue in 2007, as it upsold its enterprise application customer base as well as its own legacy BI customers to Business Objects solutions. (SAP closed the Business Objects acquisition in January 2008.) This is a vastly different than IDC's recently released numbers, which shows SAP's growth rate at 17%, and that would appear to account for most of the difference between Gartner's overall market growth rate of 22% and IDC's rate of 11%.
A summary of the IDC report, including a breakout of the major vendors' revenue and market share, is here. Two other Philadelphia area companies are also included; rapidly growing QlikTech of Radnor, which appears to have continuing momentum in 2009, and Arcplan of Berwyn.
Also, see Cindi Howson's take on the IDC numbers in Intelligent Enterprise.

Daily Links 7/02/09: More Gannett Layoffs; City Water Billing Still a Problem?

Gannett Says It Will Lay Off 1,400; Digital Properies Largely Spared (paidContent)
Gannet owns daily papers in Cherry Hill and Wilmington, as well as PointRoll in Conshohocken.

NetSuite vs. SAP – How Newton would see this contest (ZDNet
Blogs)

Oracle plans to lay off up to 1,000 in Europe: AFP (Reuters)

City controller criticizes water-billing system (Philadelphia Inquirer)
Gee, I thought that problem was all fixed.

Qlik Tech enters into strategic deal with Path Infotech (Silicon India)

You Are About to Lose a Fortune (Motley Fool)
Mentions GSI Commerce.

The Human Capitalist Nails the SaaS Test (The Boomi Blog)

TelVue Launches New National Data Center
(Globe Newswire)

Environmental Tectonics turns 1Q profit (Philadelphia Business Journal)

Dish Wins Stay From Appeals Court On DVR Order
Court Schedules Case in TiVo Litigation For as Soon as November (Multichannel News)

CableLabs Issues Ad Specs For Canoe
Four Interfaces Define Attributes of Advanced-Advertising Campaigns (Multichannel News)

Pirate Bay 2.0 to Resell Users' Bandwidth to Comcast, AT&T (Silicon Alley Insider)

Smart Zone, an introduction
(Comcast Voices)

Peco Building's Fancy New LED Display Debuts July 4th (KYW NewsRadio)



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Daily Links 7/01/09: CardioNet Shares Down 41% on Reduced Guidance

Vishay Announces Settlement with International Rectifier (Business Wire)

CardioNet, Inc. Updates Full Year 2009 Guidance, Industry Dynamics and Future Strategies (Business Wire)
Reimbursement rates drop; shares down about 40% today.

J&J (Centocor) Wins Record $1.67 Billion Verdict From Abbott (Bloomberg)

ERP SaaS: Three Moves Worth Noting (MSPmentor)

As Oracle advances Fusion middleware, what’s SAP’s next move? (IT Knowledge Exchange: SAP Watch)

More than $1.7B tendered in Comcast debt offer (Associated Press via Business Week)

FlyCast radio player comes to a desktop near you (Geeks.com)

Analysts Doubt Future of Comcast's WiMAX Offering (Mobile Tech Today)

July 1st Tru2way Deadline (Zatz Not Funny!)

Ascensus Acquires CUNA Mutual Group’s IRA Services (Business Wire)

Universal Display Awarded $750,000 SBIR Phase II Contract from U.S. Air Force for Flexible OLED Displays (Business Wire)

Electronic chemicals see slow signs of recovery (ICIS.com)
Discusses Dow Advanced Materials (Rohm & Haas).

USA Technologies, Inc. Announces Record Date for Rights Offering (Business Wire)

Urban flight slowing down (Philadelphia Daily News)
The rate of Philadelphia's population shrinkage declines.

The Insider-Film in Philly (Innovation Philadelphia Blog)



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Daily Links 6/30/09: Septa Finally Gets Together With Google Maps

Helping corporations leverage the Web, using open source and the cloud (ZDNet Blogs)
On Philadelphia and San Francisco- based interactive agency Freshout.

Philly Transit Agency Partners With Google Maps (Associated Press via CBS3)

Voxware Announces $2.5 Million Financing
Investment Led by Cross Atlantic Capital Partners with Participation by Edison Venture Fund (Business Wire)

Really Strategies Acquires SaaS XML Content Management Provider DocZone.com (WebWire)

Unisys Offers Enterprises a Security Blanket in the Cloud (GigaOM)

Book names Philadelphia’s ‘Richest Man in Town’ (Philadelphia Inquirer)

The Top 100 Networked Venture Capitalists (TechCrunch)

Supreme Court shrugs at NH data ban (Medical Marketing & Media)

New SAP process control and risk management apps ease GRC integration (SearchSAP.com)

Joost Says It Has No Future As Portal, Enters White-Label Market; Volpi Out As CEO (paidContent)

Verizon explains Monday’s Phila. phone problems (Philadelphia Business Journal)
Sure, that explains it.

Another Big Round of Layoffs is Imminent at Gannett (New York Times: Media Decoder)

Accenture Creates Health & Public Service Operating Group to Focus and Expand Services to Healthcare, Government and Public-Service Clients (Business Wire)

New iPhone Application from Beyond.com Helps HR Professionals and Recruiters Gain Maximum Exposure for their Job Postings (Business Wire)

Devon IT Spoof Ad Videos (evrik.as)

PostgreSQL Community Leader and EnterpriseDB Senior Architect Bruce Momjian to Teach Database Theory Course at Drexel University (Marketwire)



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Razorfish Philly and Digitas Health Combo Interesting Possibility

As Microsoft reportedly looks to unload Razorfish, and Publicis is prominently mentioned as a possible bidder, that raises an interesting possibility for the Philly Interactive Marteting Scene. The combination of Publicis's Philly-based Digitas Health and Razorfish's Philadelphia office could create a vitual juggernaut in Intereractive Health Marketing. Razorfish Philadelphia is much more Health Marketing oriented than most of its
sister offices.
See my earlier post on Razorfish Philadelphia.

Daily Links 6/29/09: Comcast Begins Rollout of High-Speed Wireless Data Service

SAP Certifies SunGard Availability Services Hosting Services; SunGard Now an SAP Hosting Partner in U.S. (PR Newswire)

SAP aims to hit key margin target by 2014-document (Reuters)

Comcast Begins National Rollout of High-Speed Wireless Data Service (Business Wire)

Michael Reitermann to Head Siemens Healthcare U.S. Organization (PR Newswire)

Dish, GroupM, Invidi Prep Ad System (ADWEEK)
Invidi is based in Princeton.

Supreme Court: Cablevision Remote DVR is OK (Business Week: The Tech Beat)

Verizon cagey on phones, open about global ambitions (Reuters Blogs)

Industry Moves: DailyCandy GM Levene Departs, Hearst’s Ellard To Take Her Place (paidContent)


ERT Relocates Customer Care Team to Provide Stronger Client Support (PR Newswire)

Wharton's Kevin Werbach on "All I Really Needed to Know I Learned in World of Warcraft" (Technology at Wharton)

Warming to the business incubator (Philly.com: Philly Inc)

NAVTEQ Traffic.com Upgrades Mobile Website for Real-Time Traffic Delays (LBSZone.com)

Bensalem company today weighs future of Billy Mays commercials (Philadelphia Daily News: Philly Gossip)
Perhaps a digitized version of Billy Mays could live on for ever.




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