Tuesday, March 25. 2008

SiRF Cuts, Stock Falls

Expect upturns after the holidays in GPS sales never came and thus Tuesday GPS chip maker SiRF announced that it would lay off 7 percent of its 753 member workforce and close offices in South San Francisco and Stockholm, Sweden .

The company expects to report revenues of between $60 million to $62 million, compared to the prior expected range of $71 million to $77 million. A planned move into mobile TV will dropped. The market responded to the bad news: stock fell by about 27 percent to $5.00 by noon

- PC Magazine

DigitalGlobe Spinoff EarthMap Acquired by Monsanto

I just caught wind of this acquisition which occurred in January but was announced March 14. EarthMap owns the IP from Resource21 and serves the ag market with remote sensing technology. Several ex-DigitalGlobe employees launched EarthMap as a spinoff in 2004. Monsanto's been a customer of the 7 person shop and now owns the people and tech. Recall that another ag-focussed geo-biz, GeoVantage, went to John Deere in recent years.

- Boulder County Business

Quote of the Week

"Who's your customer? Who else is out there that you're competing with? What kind of budget do you have for marketing? What does your business plan say? You've got to do the homework and do the math."

- Devon Wolfe, managing director at MapInfo on questions to ask to use geotools to locate a businesses (I can attest that Devon did his homework in college; he was easily the top student in our geography department.)

- BusinessWeek

Study: Cell Phones can be used to Study Teen's Locations

The study was really about the feasibility of using cell phones to track teen girls to look at the impact of environment on health behaviors. I feel sure the researchers knew that cell phones could do tracking, with known limitations.

The results of a study by researchers from Indiana University School of Medicine, published in the April issue of the Journal of Adolescent Health, show that indeed girls 14- to 16-year-old girls will carry the phones. The pilot also showed one interested and unexpected thing: they were spending more time away from home, school and surrounding areas than anticipated.

- Science Daily

Getting Kids of the Couch with LBS

Interesting marketing for LocoMatrix: sell phone-based games to Mom and Dad that get junior off the couch and running around. Will it do for outdoor exercise what the Wii did for indoor activity?

- Springwise

Garmin Rumors

Rumors are floating that Garmin may be entertaining a deal with Nokia for a nav device. The stock folks wonder if this is a sort of back up plan should the Nokia/NAVTEQ deal fail. Chin strokers suggest that if that and the TomTom/Tele Atlas deal fail, Garmin would be in a safe place.

- Seeking Alpha