The Rib Room is okay… but that’s it January 30, 2012 The Carlton’s eatery turned 50 last year, celebrating with a refurb and new chef. But has it worked? Jumeirah Carlton Tower, SW1X 9PY FOOD ** SERVICE **** ATMOSPHERE *** Cost per person without wine: £65 Elderly restaurants can be a bit like grandparents – demanding of respect without doing very much to deserve it. They [...]
Record profits at Samsung on handset sales January 26, 2012 SAMSUNG, the world’s top technology firm by revenue, reported a record quarterly profit this morning, aided by its best-ever sales of smartphones, and hiked 2012 capital investment nine per cent to 25 trillion won (£8.9bn) to boost chips and flat-screen production. The South Korean firm reported a 5.3 trillion won operating profit for the last [...]
Nokia reports a loss January 26, 2012 DESPITE selling over one million Lumia handsets since mid-November, Nokia has struggled to scratch the surface of the Apple dominated smartphone market. Fourth quarter operating earnings at the Finnish telecoms group swung to a loss of €954m as Nokia’s $250m partnership with Microsoft failed to make waves. The Christmas quarter brought in €10bn from net [...]
2011: THE YEAR OF THE TABLET January 26, 2012 GLOBAL tablet shipments in 2011 soared to 66.9m units – over triple the previous year’s number – with Android increasingly encroaching on Apple’s market domination. Last year Android, used in Amazon and Samsung tablets among others, upped its share of the market by a third to 39 per cent, while Apple’s supremacy declined over ten percentage [...]
No consoling Nintendo on poor results January 26, 2012 A SET of bleak third quarter results from Nintendo, flanked by a drastic increase in expected losses for the year, could drive the final nail into the coffin of its game consoles. The Japanese company reported a nine-month net loss of 48.4bn yen (£400m) – compared to the 49.6bn yen profit collected by this point [...]
AT&T survives the loss of T-Mobile bid with growth to contest Verizon January 26, 2012 COSTS from AT&T’s failed multi-billion dollar bid for T-Mobile dragged down fourth quarter profit at the American telecoms giant, which reported a loss of $6.68bn (£4.25bn) despite an overall annual growth. Fourth quarter operating loss was $9bn, down from a $2.1bn gain a year earlier. However, revenues in the final months of the year rose [...]
RAPID RESPONSES January 26, 2012 Data deluge Craig Drake rightly emphasises the importance of institutions making big data “work for their business” [Big industry responses are needed to big data explosion, yesterday]. Data must be seen as an asset for businesses and managed properly. If it’s not, then it just becomes a liability. The financial services industry is only now [...]
Nokia profits dive January 26, 2012 Nokia Oyj reported a 73 per cent fall in fourth-quarter earnings as sales of its new Windows Phones failed to dent the dominance of Apple’s iPhone or compensate for diving sales of its own old smartphones. The world’s largest cellphone maker by volume last February unveiled a major strategy shift to Microsoft Corp software for [...]
AT&T posts huge loss January 26, 2012 AT&T Inc posted a massive quarterly loss due to a break-up fee for its failed T-Mobile USA merger and a pension-related charge on top of costly subsidies for smartphones such as Apple’s popular iPhone. As a result, the telephone company posted a loss of $6.68 billion (£4.25bn) or $1.12 per share, compared with a profit [...]
NEC to axe 10,000 jobs January 26, 2012 NEC Corp said it will slash 10,000 jobs, almost one in 10 of its workers, in a bid to cut costs as competition from foreign rivals including Apple Inc pushes it deep into the red. NEC blamed its poor performance on weak demand for its smartphones amid the popularity of Apple’s iPhone in Japan, as [...]