Articles by Rob Enderle

Another year is about to bite the dust and this is my opportunity to look back and ahead broadly and cover the things I haven't already touched on in this column during the last few weeks. The month began with my discussion of five companies -- Sony, Google, IBM, Oracle and Apple -- and how four of them would probably drop into decline in 2006. Then I brought up the major technology trends and companies to watch in 2006, and last week's column focused on the major software and hardware battles of 2005 and 2006...

Over the last few weeks I wrote about the companies I expect will be in trouble in 2006 and several of the major trends we can expect to see develop next year as well. This time let's look at a few of the knock down, drag out battles I foresee for the coming year, ending with my final gift recommendation for this holiday season 2005: Some Weird ...

We got the bad news out of the way last week when I highlighted four companies I see as likely to go into decline next year. This time let's focus on the major technology trends coming in 2006 and point to some companies you may not have heard of that should benefit from these trends, both corporate and consumer Mass Customization...

As the new year approaches, a look ahead tells me there are companies doing well now who undoubtedly will be doing less well and companies that you may never have heard of that nevertheless have the potential to be stars in '06. Let's talk about the companies at risk first, and next week, I'll review some of the firms I believe to be potential emerging stars. At the end of this column, and for every one from now until Christmas, I'll also include an unusual technology gift recommendation...

In the month of November, three things happened nearly back-to-back that have had significant effects on the technology landscape. The first was the Sony rootkit fiasco, which may have changed the software arena forever. The second was the acquisition by Cisco of Scientific-Atlanta, in what was likely the WMD targeted at the digital home. And finally, TiVo announced its plans to deliver video content to video iPods, potentially breaking the hard lock Apple has on those devices...

I'm either fortunate or unfortunate enough to have gone through a couple of significant corporate cycles in the world of business in recent decades. In the 1980s IBM started as the most respected company in the industry and ended as that decade's "Evil Empire." In the '90s, and over what seemed to be a much shorter period of time, Microsoft went down a similar path. And now all eyes are on Google, who is everyone's darling today, but is clearly showing a disturbing dark side...

Continuing with a theme, this week I'd like to focus on companies that misact with respect to consumer rights. Last week we went into some detail on Sony's despicable recent actions which compromised consumers' rights and safety. This is all related to the idea that power corrupts. As the time comes to make your holiday purchases, it would be a good idea to look beyond the rhetoric this year and find out which companies really are acting against your best interests -- and choose accordingly...

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about how Google was on track to become the next "Evil Empire" because they were increasingly behaving as if they were the center of the universe. The central theme of the piece was how companies, particularly those that grow very quickly, can lose track of their ethics and, by placing their needs in front of all others, move from being widely admired to widely despised...

Last week Microsoft announced its new online extensions to Windows and Office called, coincidently, Windows Live and Office Live. These say a great deal about both Microsoft's direction and the future of desktop software in general. In addition, HP announced an intent to eliminate the concept of the "IBM" PC and take Dell out in the process Micros...

I'm either fortunate or unfortunate enough to have gone through a couple of significant corporate cycles in the world of business in recent decades. In the 1980s IBM started as the most respected company in the industry and ended as that decade's "Evil Empire." In the '90s, and over what seemed to be a much shorter period of time, Microsoft went down a similar path. And now all eyes are on Google, who is everyone's darling today, but is clearly showing a disturbing dark side...

Last week was another interesting week. So far, this month the biggest announcements have largely been about Apple. As expected, Apple refreshed some of its product offerings. This should be the last significant release of many of these products before the Intel-based replacements start to arrive in about six to nine months While PowerBooks are be...

The video solution on the new iPod sucks and, strangely enough, this showcases how much better Apple understands the current market and why others are either failing in it or have had to exit, like, respectively, Creative Labs and D&M Holdings (RIO) The 2005 Portable Entertainment Market...

This week's column is inspired by my experience last week in Miami where I moderated at AMD's Global Vision Conference. A number of distinguished speakers participated and we spoke at length on the digital home On my panel I had Dave Alles, Microsoft's eHome division chief; Ameer Karim, Director of Worldwide Product Marketing with HP's consumer PC...

Two historic events occurred last week that have the potential to change the future of personal computing. The first, and probably the most dramatic, was Palm adopting the Windows Mobile platform for its market-leading Treo communicator. The second, while less dramatic, is nearly as powerful: that was AMD rolling out stable platforms with both Nvidia and ATI...

Last week's column covered much of the breadth of software inside Windows Vista. The piece addressed some of the features that probably were not widely known and covered likely competitive threats to Apple and Linux. To refresh, Apple is going into the Vista launch weaker and much less differentiated than when they fought the losing battle with the Windows 95 system, and Vista remains too different from Linux to offer the same kind of threat there...

Windows Vista is the biggest release for Microsoft since Windows 95. With that release, Apple was tested -- and they failed miserably. I was at Dataquest at the time and not only did I warn Apple to take 95 more seriously, I also accurately forecast the massive decline that would happen to them if they didn't do just that This was in 1994, after ...

As we watch the disaster relief effort play out in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina we seem to be falling into the same old pattern of focusing on finding the right scapegoat rather than trying to make sure we can deal with similar future problems. Even after 9-11, the tsunami, and a variety of other disasters, we seem no more capable of effectively dealing with the critical aspects of such scenarios than we were a decade ago. In fact, we were probably in better shape to deal with such problems in the 1940s...

Except for those of us who build our own desktop computers, laptops have become the product that increasingly defines our personalities and which one we choose says more and more about who we are. Until recently our choices were defined by vendors: Apple if you favored high design, IBM if you liked reliability and unique features like secret keyboard light, Dell if you were driven by price and Sony if small was your thing...

In a series of columns this month, we started out by talking about the future of desktop computers, moved to laptops, and we'll conclude by talking about the future of convergence, or the melding of the PC and consumer electronics (CE) industries into what is hoped will be a compelling set of products for the home Let's start with a refresher on wh...

This month we are looking at the future -- and last week we spoke of the changes that are going on in desktop computers. I pointed out that one of the big problems with every single one of the available desktop concepts is the lack of a mobile solution With the Zotob virus allegedly being spread by improperly patched notebook computers and bringing...