Fusion-io In A Booming Market

According to researcher IDC, the enterprise flash market will grow to $4.5 billion by the year 2015 from an estimated $1.5 billion in 2011. But IDC’s estimates are among the more conservative. In a survey of CIOs conducted by Morgan Stanley, the financial services firm found that the enterprise flash market will triple in 2012 and soon reach $20 billion. Another report claims that the performance disk market is projected to grow 10%-20% annually over the next ten years to reach $20 billion by 2021. Within storage, the race then continues to develop higher efficiency products as are being developed by SSD leader Fusion-io.

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Dell Moving To The Cloud

The PC industry is facing difficult times. After the floods in Thailand last year, which hurt production of major manufacturers, the market is now faced with increasing costs because of wage hikes in China’s manufacturing sector. According to recent reports, Chinese manufacturer Foxconn Technology Group increased employee wages by 16%-25%. Foxconn is a supplier to Apple, HP, Dell, Nokia, and Motorola Mobility. Foxconn has been embroiled in several labor disputes about poor working conditions that have led to labor suicides. Apple and Microsoft themselves have been involved in scrutinizing market conditions in the company. Meanwhile, the increased wage bill will translate to increased prices of computer equipment – an unwelcome move in an already depressed market.

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Salesforce.com May Acquire Concur

Last quarter, Salesforce.com’s stock tumbled to a 52-week low due to disappointing billings growth. But this quarter, its stock is climbing after the company reported strong growth in sales and deferred revenue. The company says its success in closing deals this quarter was powered by the momentum of its social enterprise strategy.

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Concur, NetSuite As Acquisition Targets

Both SAP and Oracle have over the past few months stepped up their cloud strategy with acquisitions. Oracle recently announced its plans to acquire Taleo for $1.9 billion. Coming on the heels of SAP’s December acquisition of SuccessFactors for $3.4 billion, it creates huge expectations of further consolidation of the SaaS industry. Let’s take a closer look at two likely candidates: Concur and NetSuite.

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Electronic Arts Giving Zynga A Run For Their Money

Not only did overall U.S. retail toy sales fall last year, video games fared no better. According to an NPD Group study, video game sales for the year fell 8% to $17 billion. In December 2011 alone, sales of U.S. retail video game fell 21% over the year to $3.99 billion. The decline was attributed to hardware sales falling by 28% and software sales by 14% over the month.

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Leapfrog’s Toy Tablet Scores Successful Turnaround

According to a recently released toy industry report by NPD Research, U.S. retail sales of toys fell 2% over the year to $21.18. During the holiday season, the 5% increase in prices of toys helped compensate for the 7% decline in the volume of toy sales. Overall, for the quarter, dollar value of toy sales fell 3% over the year. But, while toy sales may have declined, digital educational toy maker, Leapfrog (NYSE:LF) saw significant growth in the holiday quarter.

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Zynga Diversifying Revenue Streams

Market research firm eMarketer projects that 62 million people, nearly a quarter of the U.S. Internet-using population, will become social gamers by the end of this year. The social gaming population is expected to grow to 73 million by 2013. Virtual goods transactions are expected to remain the leading source of revenue for social game developers. In another report by In-Stat, the worldwide market for virtual goods is projected to grow to $15 billion in 2014 from $9 billion in 2011. The recently listed social games developer, Zynga (Nasdaq:ZNGA), will benefit from this growth.

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Athenahealth Growing On All Fronts

According to researcher Millenium Research Group, EHR software market will grow 12% annually over the years through 2016 to $8.3 billion. An IDC report titled IDC MarketScape: U.S. Ambulatory EMR/EHR for Midsize and Large Practices 2011 Vendor Assessment claims that the ambulatory EHR market will see significant growth over the next few years, with adoption rates rising from 25% in 2009 to more than 80% by 2016. A survey commissioned by the Optum Institute for Sustainable Health on 10 hospitals found that 70% of the hospitals claimed to have their systems attested to meaningful use stage 1 criteria already, and 75% of them expected to reach stage 2 by 2014. The continued growth in investment and adoption of EHR systems is helping drive performance for leading provider, Athenahealth.

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Online Real Estate Sector Improving

Analysts believe that the housing market may have finally bottomed out last year. According to real estate research firms, 2011 home prices fell 2.1% over the year. Researchers believe that during the current year, the housing market will see growth of 0.2% across all markets. Another report estimates growth to continue into 2013, when home prices will grow 3% through 2016. With unemployment finally dropping and the economy picking up, home shopping may soon be on the rise again.

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Robust Results From Genpact, Cognizant

According to a recent report by Gartner on global IT spending, worldwide IT spending is projected to grow 3.7% in 2012 to $3.8 trillion. Earlier estimates had pegged the year’s growth at 4.6%. Revenues from IT services are expected to grow at a comparatively slower pace of 3.1% to $874 billion. Gartner expects the Eurozone crisis to impact technology spend. Despite these worrisome predictions, IT services outsourcers are continuing to surpass market expectations.

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