Nearly everything that we expected out of Apple's (Nasdaq: AAPL) Apple TV came to fruition. Chatter about the low, $99 price point, TV show rentals for just $0.99, and a shift to the proven iOS platform all proved accurate.
The gadget is also considerably smaller than the original, ready to be pocketed from one living room to another.
Apple finally appears to have a winner here, and one has to feel sorry for Logitech (Nasdaq: LOGI) and Google (Nasdaq: GOOG), as the two are teaming up to roll out a Google TV-powered set-top box later this year that is rumored to have a substantially higher price point.
You have some homework to do, couch potatoes. Digital convergence is here.
Briefly in the news
And now let's take a quick look at some of the other stories that shaped our week.
- Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) will begin selling its Kindle e-reader in the Staples (Nasdaq: SPLS) chain of office supply superstores. It's a good fit, especially given the Kindle's cheaper price points and the corporate crowd that strolls the aisles at Staples.
- When Big Pharma pipelines need a little priming, acquisitions are a popular remedy. Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) is acquiring protein misfolding specialist FoldRx.
- Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) won the 3Par sweepstakes. Then again, it may not exactly feel like a victory, when a bidding war forced HP to wind up paying more than 200 times this year's projected profitability for the cloud-based storage company.
Until next week, I remain,
Rick Munarriz
