$100 Million Lifeline: Palm receives investment from Elevation Partners
January 29, 2009
After recently posting a $506 million loss and watching their revenues and smartphone sales drop, you might not consider Palm a smart investment. Private equity firm Elevation Partners hotly disagrees and backs that opinion confidently with a $100 million deal, according to a recent post on FierceWireless.
In the deal Elevation trades the equity investment for newly issued Series C preferred stock, which it can convert into common stock at a price of $3.25 per share along with warrants to acquire 7 million shares of Palm common stock at the same price.
Palm sees life on the horizon. “The additional capital from Elevation Partners will enable us to put added momentum behind the new product introductions scheduled for 2009 and will provide us with enhanced stability in unsettled economic times,” said Ed Colligan, president and chief executive officer of Palm, Inc.
What exactly is Palm looking towards? If you attended the Consumer Electronics Show at Las Vegas in early January you would witness proud-papa Colligan beaming at the Palm Pre smartphone and new operating system, Nova, Palm’s answer to top competitors, Apple and Research In Motion. Also unveiled, Touchstone, a wireless, inductive charger for the phone resembling a paperweight. If you missed it you can watch Colligan’s “Mobile is in our DNA” speech and phone unveiling here.
Early reports call the Pre, “smaller, rounder and slightly oblong version of Apple’s iPhone 3G.” The phone features include 3.1″ multi-touch display, slideout QWERTY keyboard, removable battery, 3 megapixel camera with led flash, 8 GB storage, EvDO RevA., Bluetooth stereo, GPS, and Wi-Fi.
200% Online Traffic Increase!
January 29, 2009
Considering the erratic economic weather, it’s rare to read stories not featuring a sad multitude of layoffs and drastic revenue drops, and we surely haven’t seen the end. We here at Wireless Association are ecstatic to report a 200% increase in online traffic in the past 6 months! More traffic for us means an important thing for you: A greater audience to market your products and services!
Wireless Association’s Trading Floor is an ideal platform to buy and sell cellular products, components and accessories on the simplest trading floor in the industry. Companies, worldwide and locally, market products to a global audience.
Instantly visible are clear and readable listings, links to each company’s personal profile and entire inventory listing, Wireless Association membership and verified status, and feedback ratings from customers and clients. These features help to secure future sales and make the cellular wholesale marketplace a safer and easier place to do business.
Search for top industry products or post your inventory to the Wireless Association Trading Floor, your gateway to the global market. Visit us at wassociation.com.
Refurbished & Used Phones: Winners of the Economic Downturn
January 20, 2009
Nails chewed to the nub? Hands wringing? The fiscal downturn have many people furrowing their brows trying to analyze and predict how to hold up and trade smarter in the wireless industry. Some companies will fare better than others, but it seems refurbished and used phones are one of the winners of the crisis.
According to a post on GSM Exchange, Increased demand from credit-pinched, lower-end users is pumping up demand. Even AT&T is getting in on the game releasing refurbished 8 GB iPhones with their standard two-year contract for $99, sold exclusively in AT&T stores, but rumored to be offered at all Best Buys by the end of January.
Earth911.com reports refurbished smart phones offer the biggest “bang” for your buck in today’s economy and estimates possible 6 million unit sales jump worldwide in 2009. Refurbished is the easy way to get all the technology you want for up to 60 percent less than new phones. They also carry the environmentally friendly perk of reducing the need for virgin product and reducing landfill waste.
Refurbished phones now sold generally are units that have been returned during the standard 30-day trial period, but as most people tend to upgrade their phones every 18 months, it’s expected that today’s iPhone or BlackBerry will be the top recycled and reused models in 2009 or 2010.
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Now, where will you look for or market your refurbished phones? Look no further than Wireless Association’s Trading Floor, providing a global platform to buy and sell cellular products, components and accessories on the simplest trading floor in the industry. Join us at wassociation.com.
Spotlight Your Products and Services: Wireless Association Inventory Wizard
January 20, 2009
Are your products and services getting the attention and promotion they deserve? The Wireless Association Inventory Wizard can make advertising and managing your inventory magic.
You’ll get greater exposure and flexibility with your personal Inventory system that is fully accessible 24/7 from any computer. You can upload, edit, add or delete inventory from any location.
Wireless Association will drive traffic to you as your full inventory is instantly listed both on the our online tradefloor, promoting your stock to a worldwide audience, and on your branded inventory page where Wassociation.com members and your customers can view it seperate from the competition.
Your inventory is searchable and downloadable. You can email your inventory to customers by simply inputting their email address and clicking send.
Watch our short video demonstration.
8,000 Verified Wireless Wholesale Company Contacts
January 13, 2009
Compiled from CTIA/CES tradeshow and other legitimate channels, the Wireless Association Verified Email Contact List is an important tool to instantly increase profits, your customer base, and your access to wireless wholesale distributors, carriers, and manufacturers around the world.
Now providing access to nearly 8,000 verified, effective wireless contacts sure to expand your distribution market, the Wireless Association list is spam and bounce free, and updated every six months. Each email has been verified to be up-to-date, real and working.
Paired with The Wireless Association Bulk Email Service, we let business do business.
The Wireless Associaion Bulk Email Service breaks down barriers with limitless access to your audience. Whether you send 100 or 50,000 bulk emails, we won’t limit you. Wireless Association allows business to do business, without being hassled. (Lists may not contain spam emails.) Your cost depends on the size of your email list.
Features include: Unlimited Email Blasts, Top Industry Security, Easy Message Scheduling, Deliverability Statistics, Spam Filter Analysis, a Built-in HTML Content Builder, Media Rich Content Capability, and much more.
The service is open to all business industries. Wireless Association members will recieve a 10% discount
Let’s do business! Wireless Association Verified Email Contact List
Wal-Mart + Apple: Bringing flash to the masses
January 13, 2009
An jaw-dropping post on Fierce Wireless made us do a double take. Is the big box store to beat all box stores, Wal-Mart, really selling the smart phone that is redefining smart phones, Apple’s iPhone 3G?
The answer appears to be a resounding yes. Sold in-store only, according to Wal-Mart’s website, the iPhone is above the pre-holiday rumored $99 price, ranging from $197-$297, in 8 and 16 gigs, with the standard 2-year AT&T contract. Now, how are consumers to find the wanton treasure? With a 51-page, downloadable pdf treasure map, a list of Wal-Mart store locations where the iPhone is sold.
Three days after Christmas, another instance of Steve Jobs’ mysterious retail strategies, the iPhone went on sale at select Wal-mart and Sam’s Club locations, representing the fourth major expansion of the iPhone outside Apple’s 200 retail stores. Yes AT&T’s 2,000 stores and Best Buy’s 1,000 stores got it first. But with Wal-Mart as the world’s largest retail chain at more than 7,000 mega-stores strong, 2.1 million employees, finishing its last fiscal year with $380 billion in sales and ranking No. 1 in the Fortune 500, this could prove a watershed movement for the iPhone.
Search for top industry products or post your inventory to the Wireless Association Trading Floor, your gateway to the global market. Visit us at wassociation.com.
Stormy Weather: Can Motorola Ride Out the Economic Storm?
January 8, 2009
“Someone will eventually have to fall, and it won’t be pretty.” That is the prediction Phil Goldstein cautions in a recent post on Fierce Wireless. After a series of industry warnings from wireless companies; Nokia, Samsung, Palm, Research In Motion, and LG, of lower revenues and slower growth, Motorola stays mum. Pressed by the recession and weakening consumer demand in a highly competitive, fast-paced industry trending toward smart, thinner, more data-centric phones, perhaps Motorola’s silence is the loudest harbinger announcing its demise.
“Who will suffer? The most obvious answer is Motorola,” Goldstein furthers his supposition. Seen as “clinging to the RAZR as its beacon of hope”, Goldstein states plainly, in such a fast-moving market “it’s difficult to play catch-up.” Carriers will keep handing out subsidies to handset makers to keep prices down, but only the strongest will survive this teeth-knashing environment. The companies well positioned to ride the wave appear to be solid Nokia, Samsung and LG with their diverse portfolios, and RIM and Apple offering hot products consumers are craving.
Yes, consumers are dreamy-eyed with higher end products since the iPhone 3G, but those smartphones require data plans and with them a large monthly investment for already-stretched consumer budgets. $150 or more for that shiny upgrade then $80 or more per month for voice and data plans, more frugal customers wallets cautiously shut while handset producers keep pumping out smartphones. Those gleaming gadgets may sit on inventory shelves turning to dust collectors.
Motorola brought Sanjay Jha, from Qualcomm, onboard who has promised a refocus towards Windows Mobile and Android-based phones to turn around the handset division. With Motorola’s debt recently downgraded by Standard & Poor’s to little more than junk, expectation are dismal for the division’s survival, especially as Samsung and LG turn up the heat.
What is your company’s hottest seller?
January 8, 2009
Wireless Association asked last August when the world seemed a different place, as was the wireless outlook. But with company news changing almost daily we want to ask again…
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| Palm | 0.00 | ||
| Apple Inc. | 262.92 | ||
| Brightpoint, Inc. | 6.39 | ||
| Lm Ericsson Telep | 10.74 | ||
| Motorola, Inc. Co | 7.98 | ||
| Nokia Corporation | 9.70 | ||
| Research In Motio | 44.67 | ||
| Utstarcom, Inc. | 2.02 | ||
| __________________ | 0.00 | ||
| America Movil, S. | 48.79 | ||
| At&t Inc. | 27.39 | ||
| China Unicom (hon | 14.42 | ||
| Leap Wireless Int | 10.66 | ||
| Metropcs Communic | 9.57 | ||
| Ntt Docomo, Inc A | 17.27 | ||
| Sprint Nextel Co | 4.39 | ||
| Telefonica Sa Com | 68.16 | ||
| Verizon Communica | 30.46 | ||
| Vodafone Group Pl | 24.76 |