Professor Voices » N. Venkat Venkatraman

Kindle Fire vs. iPad

Jo Breiner — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 21:06:57 +0000

Amazon.com introduced their new Kindle Fire tablet to compete with the Apple iPad, but at a price point of $199. N. Venkat Venkatraman, chairman of the Information Systems Department at the School of Management, offers his insight from a business perspective on how the Kindle Fire stands up to other tablets in the marketplace:

“With Kindle Fire, Amazon is firmly positioned to compete in the digital sector. Priced at $199, Fire is positioned at a different price point from Apple iPad and Android tablets from Samsung, HTC and others. Now, Barnes & Noble’s Nook, Sony eReader and others have to follow suit.

“From the point of view of tablet manufacturers, it will be interesting to see how they compete against Fire in terms of the aggressive price point — albeit without communication and collaboration functionality.

“Eighteen months after Apple announced the iPad with an aggressive $499 price point, Amazon has introduced a compelling alternative at an aggressive price point supported by an extensive library of digital content and powerful cloud functionality.”

Contact Venkatraman at 617-353-7117; venkat@bu.edu; Twitter: @nvenkatatraman

CEO change at HP?

Jo Breiner — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 19:01:45 +0000

Hewlett-Packard is expected to name former eBay chief executive Meg Whitman their new CEO, replacing Leo Apotheker. N. Venkat Venkatraman, chairman of the Information Systems Department at BU’s School of Management, offers the following comment:

“The real question is what can Meg Whitman do to undo some of the strategic blunders of the previous CEO?

“It is clear that they cannot back out of the Autonomy purchase at $10B without incurring huge penalties.

“Will she go back on the spin-out of PC business or make minor adjustments? Or will she go the B2B route with software and services that Leo Apotheker has laid out. If she does that, then she is admitting that the strategy was right and that the company simply blundered through in its announcement.

“The market is expecting her to deliver clarity of where HP is going. She needs to do that sooner rather than later.”

Contact Venkatraman at 617-353-7117; venkat@bu.edu; Twitter: @nvenkatraman

LinkedIn IPO

Jo Breiner — Thu, 19 May 2011 15:27:41 +0000

Professor N. Venkat Venkatraman, chairman of the Information Systems Department at Boston University’s School of Management offers the following comment on the recent LinkedIn IPO:

“I think it is the beginning of the new tech bubble focused on social (professional) networks. We are in the early stages of social commerce and the monetization logics are still fuzzy.

“The only logical explanation is short-term speculation, but these valuations are likely to go down very, very soon. I can only imagine the frenzy when Twitter and Groupon go public, not to mention Facebook or Zynga.”

Contact Venkatraman at 617-353-7117, venkat@bu.edu, Twitter @nvenkatraman

Yahoo may quit Japan

Jo Breiner — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 16:35:17 +0000

Boston University School of Management professor N. Venkat Venkatraman is available to offer expert analysis on a report that Yahoo is in talks to exit its Japanese joint venture. The move would make an estimated $8 billion available to Yahoo to fight Google and Facebook.

Contact N. Venkat Venkatraman, 617-353-7117, venkat@bu.edu, Twitter: @nvenkatraman