If history is any guide, investors who are interested in buying shares of Microsoft might want to do that before it actually releases its new Windows 7 operating system upgrade.
That’s the conclusion of a Bloomberg story published today by reporter Dina Bass, who looked at Read the rest of this entry »
Nielsen Online released its U.S. search share rankings for August this morning. Depending on your point of view, the failure of the Microsoft bid for Yahoo may have been a blessing, at least in the short term. Yahoo Search handled 1.3 billion queries in August, down 16.5 percent year over year, and representing 18.1 percent of all search requests in August.
And Microsoft? Even worse, Read the rest of this entry »
Immersion will pay a $20.75 million one-time payment to Microsoft to settle breach-of-contract charges the software giant brought against the San Jose developer and licensor of touch feedback technology in June 2007.
Microsoft alleged that Immersion breached a sub-license agreement executed in connection with the settlement in 2003 of Immersion’s claims of patent infringement against Microsoft in Immersion v. Microsoft, Sony. Microsoft maintained it was entitled to Read the rest of this entry »
Here’s another dispatch from Mercury News reporter Elise Ackerman, who has been covering the Yahoo saga for us. She’s been examining some materials related to the shareholder litigation brought about regarding Microsoft’s proposed takeover:
Now that the Yahoo shareholder meeting is over and Carl Icahn has been appointed to Yahoo’s board of directors he will be working to rescind severance plans adopted by the board’s compensation committee on February 12 , 2008.
According to a declaration filed in Delaware Court by John Fox, a veteran Silicon Valley employment attorney, the plans were highly unusual. Read the rest of this entry »
Why is it so difficult for Microsoft to compete with Google? Steve Ballmer tried to explain at the software giant’s annual analyst day up in Redmond on Thursday. (Thanks to our colleague Elise Ackerman, who covers Google and Yahoo for the Mercury News, for providing this to Docu-Drama.) Read the rest of this entry »
Google shares had their biggest one-day decline ever Friday, dropping $52.12, or 9.8 percent, to $481.32 as they were punished by investors digesting the Internet search giant’s second-quarter earnings that were released after the markets closed Thursday. Read the rest of this entry »
The Yahoo drama just heated up yet again. Shortly after midnight EDT, Yahoo released “confirmation” that it had rejected a joint proposal from Microsoft and Carl Icahn proposing a “complex restructuring” of the company that would leave Microsoft owning Yahoo’s search business and immediately replace the current Yahoo board with Icahn’s proposed slate of directors.
The plan was evidently given Friday evening to Yahoo’s board, which “was given less than 24 hours Read the rest of this entry »
Jon Shirley, a member of the board of directors at Microsoft since 1983, won’t seek
re-election at the company’s next shareholder meeting in November, according to an SEC filing Tuesday. He was the company’s president and chief operating officer from 1983 to 1990.
“Having turned 70-years-old this year, I’m at a point in my life where I want to reduce my professional commitments and allow more time pursuing some of my personal interests,” said Shirley in a statement. “”I could only make this decision knowing that Microsoft is well-positioned for success in the years ahead. I have the utmost confidence in the leadership of Microsoft and believe we have established the strongest board in the history of the company.”
And who would that board include, you ask? Read the rest of this entry »
Avistar heard from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office that, as of Friday, it had rejected nearly half of the patent re-examination requests made by Microsoft regarding Avistar’s patent portfolio. Its shares jumped 21 cents, or 21.7 percent, Monday to close at $1.18. Read the rest of this entry »
Avistar Communications will cut its U.S. and European workforces by 25 percent, blaming the move largely on Microsoft’s legal challenge of patents held by the San Mateo videoconferencing company, according to a press release it issued Wednesday. It had 88 employees as of the end of 2006, the most recent figure available.
Microsoft moved to challenge all of Avistar’s 29 U.S. patents through the U.S. Patent
Office’s re-examination process after “in-depth licensing discussions” failed to produce a result the software giant was satisfied with, according to Avistar’s release.
“This single action against Avistar’s complete US patent portfolio represents over 5% of the entire 2007 third-party re-examination challenges at the USPTO,” stated Simon Moss, Avistar’s CEO, in the release. “”This leads to only one logical conclusion … Microsoft must be taking our patent portfolio very seriously in regard to it’s relevance to their present or future products. Why else would it take such a dramatic action?”
Avistar, which was notified in November that its stock was subject to de-listing by the
Nasdaq market because its market value fell below $25 million, said March 20 it regained that compliance. Avistar shares have more than doubled so far this year. They fell three cents Wednesday to close at 88 cents.
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