This bidding war between HP and Dell for 3Par says something to me about big technology companies: They are stuck. They can't grow internally, so they have to look outside the company.

If you think about the evolution of all big industries, they trend toward consolidation and giant companies eating up new companies in the search for growth and innovation. This certainly appears to be the case with players like HP, Dell, Microsoft, and Cisco. The new innovation is not coming from within, it's coming from outside.

Oh, this is fantastic, Oracle is suing Google. Larry Ellison vs. Eric Schmidt -- the Alpha Male vs. the Science Geek. This is going to be very interesting!

Oracle says in a press release that Google "knowingly, directly and repeatedly infringed Oracle's Java-related intellectual property." What's interesting is that it involves Java technology, which Oracle acquired when it bought Sun Microsystems earlier in the year. Hmmm, did Oracle lawyers know something that Sun lawyers didnt?

I'm sure you'll be reading more about that in the days ahead. On to some more news:

• IBM is buying software company Unica for $480 million (ZDNet). Unica helps retail sellers target marketing efforts and predict consumer behavior. I bet they can't predict my behavior.
• Sequoia is backing Airstrip, a software company that makes mobile patient monitoring applications (VentureBeat).
• WePay raises $7.5 million for group payment systems (TechCrunch).
• Retail sales rise less than estimated (Bloomberg). Hmm, just a theory here, but does that mean everybody spent their tax refunds?
• China mudslides kill more than 1,000 (CNN).
• Russian fire spreads near nuclear facility (Bloomberg). No, they don't mean it's come close to Boris Yeltsin.
• Google defends net neutrality plan (PCWorld).
• New Google apps extend the cloud (InformationWeek).
• Citizen scientists, using their computers in the Einstein@Home project, have discovered a rare star (BBC).
• Belgium is looking to get greener -- by liquifying corpses (Greenbiz.com). Ewwww.
• Liberals start "F*ck Tea" party compaign (CBSNews). Now, that's kind of funny.

 

 

RightNow Technologies, a scrappy CRM company that is starting to become a more serious competitor with CRM giants such as SAP, Oracle's Siebel, and Salesforce, just announced a solid quarter in which they continue to make customer and revenue gains.

The company reported GAAP earnings of $1.4 million, or 4 cents per share, for the quarter. The non-GAAP earnings, which analysts use in their estimates, were 9 cents per share, matching the street view. Revenue grew 20 percent from the year-ago period to $43.5 million. But company executives were careful to stress on the call that recurring revenue stream is growing at a 27% clip.

Greetings, it's Tablet Wednesday! It would be so much better if it were a Tuesday so that we could call it Tablet Tuesday. I find it funny that people are still trying to print sketchy "scoops" in the hours up to the Apple tablet computer launch. Like this grainy puzzle-pieced photo from Engaget. Holy cow, is that some kind of map... on an LCD screen! Well, that's the news business in 2010. Any piece of incremental information, no matter how shady or inconclusive, needs to be published. With that, we travel onto the world of shady Internet journos, toiling overtime to bring you the n0t-so-much-news: McGraw-Hill CEO Terry McGraw, who I once worked for, tells you all about the tablet. No word on whether the tablet will have an  feature to buy your own S&P ratings.

• The Business Insider rounds up all the rumors. No word on whether Henry Blodget thinks the stock is going to $800.
• Can we link to ourselves? Here's what I think about the notion that the tablet will save the content industry (Rayno Report).
• Apple gets a slew of new patents related to the tablet (Patently Apple).
• Apple Tablet Portends Rewrite for Publishers (Wall Street Journal).

Oh, and in case you thought anything else was going on in the world:

• Treasury Secretary Geithner is getting grilled on AIG (BusinessWeek). He's crispy. Fried. Done.
• Geithner denies role in AIG payment disclosures (Reuters).
• Bernanke says he didn't negotiate with the AIG lenders. (Reuters) Also, rumor has it he's not really sure what "money" is.
• Superbowl ad stokes abortion controversy (Reuters). Not going to touch this one!
• Toyota halts sales on millions of vehicles, stock slammed (Associated Press).
• Roku wants to create a 100-channel Internet TV box (Bloomberg). Memo to Roku: The Internet has infinite channels.
• AT&T to launch Yelp competitor (Forbes). Isn't this kind of like your grandma launching an Internet startup?
• Oracle plans to hire people (InfoWorld). Yes, you too can wash Larry Ellison's car.
• Send inmates to Mexico, says Shcwarzenegger (Agence France Press).
• Five things Obama could learn from Reagan (Time). Somehow, I just don't see Obama reading this article. Or behaving like the Gipper. Or looking like him. Or moving to Santa Barbara. Yep, it's completely confirmed: They're totally different people.
• My vote for the best headline of the day, even though I'm not sure what it means: "Facebook and Twitter? Why not just put a gun to your head?" (Network World).
• The FCC is probing mobile phone termination fees (Digital Trends).
• The Mars rover is dead (National Geographic). Long live the Mars rover!
• Leading space scientist claims Earth becoming invisible to aliens (Telegraph).