Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : Intel Corporation (INTC) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: kapkan4u who wrote (171125)	9/18/2002 5:28:11 PM
From: L. Adam Latham	Respond to of 186894

All: Intel/Intergraph news: online.wsj.com Judge in Intel-Intergraph Suit Asks CEOs to Appear in Court By GARY MCWILLIAMS Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL HOUSTON -- The federal judge overseeing a patent suit involving a key Intel Corp. microprocessor has asked the chief executives of Intel and Intergraph Corp. to personally appear in Texas in a last-ditch effort to settle the case. The unusual request came after U.S. District Court Judge T. John Ward indicated he would be prepared to rule on the patent infringement suit next month if the two companies cannot come to an agreement. The executives were requested to appear at a court ordered mediation session Sept. 26. Intergraph, of Huntsville, Ala., sued Intel in U.S. District Court, Marshall, Texas, alleging its Itanium chip violates two patents covering parallel-processor computing. Under terms of a prior settlement reached after court-ordered mediation, Intel paid $300 million to Intergraph to end a 1997 suit alleging Intel's Pentium chips infringed Intergraph so-called Clipper patents. As part of that agreement, Intel, Santa Clara, Calif., also agreed to pay as much as $250 million more if the Texas court were to subsequently rule that the design of Itanium chips violated the parallel-processor patents. An Intel spokesman said the company plans to send "someone in authority." He couldn't confirm whether CEO Craig R. Barrett would attend. Eugene Wrobel, Intergraph's treasurer, said its CEO James F. Taylor Jr. would attend. "We're not sure exactly what it means. [But] we'll appear on the 26th and comply with the judge's order," he said. The new attempt at a settlement comes after both companies made their presentations before the court in July and submitted summary arguments last month. "We had expected the judge to make a decision" in August, Mr. Wrobel said.

To: kapkan4u who wrote (171125)	9/18/2002 5:37:39 PM
From: Jim McMannis	Respond to of 186894

RE:"The company said it expects to earn 12 cents to 15 cents a share in the period. It had forecast earnings of 74 cents." The beat goes on... More trim the fat coming.

To: kapkan4u who wrote (171125)	9/18/2002 5:46:20 PM
From: The Duke of URL©	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 186894

no wonder eds is down: :) Gates to speak at Siebel gathering By Alorie Gilbert Staff Writer, CNET News.com September 18, 2002, 1:53 PM PT Siebel Systems' choice of Bill Gates as keynote speaker at its customer conference next month is raising some eyebrows. Most software companies would no sooner welcome Microsoft into their market than court an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission. But Gates, Microsoft's chairman and chief software architect, will address a throng of Siebel customers at its User Week 2002 in Los Angeles on Oct. 21. Siebel is the leader in the $11.3 billion market for customer relationship management (CRM) software, which helps companies track sales, marketing and customer service activities. Even as Gates delivers his address, his product developers will be putting the finishing touches on Microsoft's own CRM software, set to debut later this year. The companies downplay talk of any rivalry, and insist that their respective products appeal to different spectrums of the market. Siebel sells to the very largest companies in the world, including Ford, Boeing and AT&T. Microsoft plans to market CRM applications to companies with 500 employees or fewer. Siebel's choice of Gates as a keynote speaker boils down to his star power, said a Siebel executive. "Bill Gates is an industry icon with a huge draw," said George Ahn, general manager of Siebel sales. "I'm delighted we got Bill." Despite the feel-good comments, analysts say the companies are on a collision course. Siebel is reaching out to smaller companies. It has a division, led by Ahn, dedicated to selling Siebel applications to companies with fewer than 1,000 employees. And Microsoft isn't known for being content with a narrow section of any market in which it competes. "It's a curious mix," said Josh Greenbaum, an analyst at Enterprise Applications Consulting. "These two guys are largely competitors and have less and less reason to be in a co-opetition mode. Siebel doesn't make a compelling case for .Net (Microsoft's software architecture), and .Net doesn't make a great case for Siebel. Makes you wonder what Gates is doing there." In a further sign of a budding rivalry between the companies, Siebel and Microsoft said last month that they will not renew a 4-year-old reseller deal that expires at the end of the year. The agreement gives Microsoft the right to resell Siebel applications. Siebel signed the reseller deal with Great Plains, a maker of accounting software, before Microsoft acquired that company last year. Gates' appearance may also speak volumes about where enterprise business applications--a new market for Microsoft--stand on his priority list. While Gates is speaking at Siebel's conference, he's not speaking at Microsoft's own business applications conference, called Stampede, being held this week. More than 2,000 consultants, Microsoft resellers and development partners are attending the event in Minneapolis, where Microsoft will discuss its CRM plans. "That's a great juxtaposition," said Erin Kinikin, an analyst at Giga Information Group. "Where is Bill Gates when his own CRM product is being announced?" A Microsoft representative said he didn't know why Gates was not speaking at Stampede, but that his keynote at the Siebel conference attests to the fact that Microsoft considers Siebel an important business partner. Some see Gates' appearance at the conference as a political gesture intended to ease tensions. "It's an effort to reassure Siebel that Siebel is important to Microsoft and that Microsoft doesn't intend to compete with Siebel," said Matt Rosoff, an analyst at Directions on Microsoft, a Microsoft watchdog. Microsoft is eager to recruit software makers, including Siebel, to support its forthcoming set of .Net products, the makings of a software infrastructure on which business applications like Siebel's could run. Siebel wants to remain in the good graces of Microsoft to ensure that its applications work with the latest versions of Microsoft databases and development tools. In a sense, Microsoft is the lesser of two evils: It offers SQL Server, an alternative to databases from market leader Oracle, which is a more direct competitor to Siebel in the CRM market. "Even without the resale relationship for CRM, Microsoft is an important Siebel supplier and Siebel is an important proof-point for Microsoft's 'enterprise' aspirations," said Kinikin.

To: kapkan4u who wrote (171125)	9/18/2002 9:50:58 PM
From: L. Adam Latham	Respond to of 186894

kap: Re: Oops, a huge warning by EDS. The details of the EPS drop are interesting. They went from $0.74 in July to ~$0.13 today, or ~$0.61. The WSJ is saying that (1) ~$0.26 of that is from slowed IT spending and increased spending to pursue new business; (2) $0.14 is a write-off from US Airways; (3) $0.14 is from contract problems in Europe; and (4) $0.08 from exiting a business. So it's hard to see how much of the EPS decrease is due to IT spending decreases alone. The main point, one I hope investors realize tomorrow, is that the BIG headline of a $0.60 decrease in EDS earnings estimates is not all IT related - a lot of the drop is specific to EDS. Adam