Articles by Erika

Groupon's push into mobile is firing on all cylinders, to hear the company describe its progress at the World Mobile Congress now under way in Barcelona. The daily deal giant posted record mobile performance in North America in Dec. 2011, with one quarter of all Groupon vouchers purchased via a mobile device. Also, both consumer and merchant app u...

Attorneys General from 36 states have written to Google CEO Larry Page expressing deep concerns over the company's privacy terms Google's new privacy policy, which permits greater information sharing among its products, should allow consumers to opt in, the attorneys general maintain. Besides lacking an opt-in mechanism, the policy also fails to pr...

Salesforce.com hit it out of the park with quarterly earnings for its fiscal fourth quarter and full fiscal year, which ended Jan. 31, 2012. Total Q4 revenue was US$632 million, an increase of 38 percent on a year-over-year basis, topping the $624 million expected by analysts. For the full fiscal year 2012, the company reported revenue of $2.27 billion, an increase of 37 percent from the prior year.

Speculation that Google is going to disrupt yet another industry -- this time cable television -- is circulating, prompted by an application the search engine giant filed with the Missouri Public Service Commission, seeking a franchise to provide video service in Kansas City, Mo. A similar application was filed in Kansas City, Kan This is not the f...

When Microsoft's next service update to Microsoft Dynamics CRM is released in Q2 2012, users who rely on its business intelligence functionality will be in for a pleasant surprise. ...

Microsoft has filed a formal complaint with European Union antitrust authorities alleging that Motorola Mobility -- and hence, Google -- is improperly restricting the use of certain patented technologies The complaint comes a week after the European Commission approved Google's US$12.5 billion acquisition of the handset manufacturer -- with the war...

Research In Motion has released its first update for the BlackBerry PlayBook's operating system. The debut of BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 adds -- finally -- some essential features to the tablet, such as a native email client, calendar and contact functionality.

Avaya has provided a sneak preview of several healthcare IT-based mobile applications it will be rolling out later this year at the 2012 HIMSS Conference and Exhibition now under way in Las Vegas. These include Avaya Mobile Activity Assistant, Avaya Flare Communicator for iPad, and other collaborative service offerings in telehealth and social media...

The hacker group Anonymous has struck again -- this time taking down the U.S. Federal Trade Commission's consumer protection business center website as well as one touting National Consumer Protection Week. In their place was a German language video mocking ACTA, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement....

Stefani Germanotta might be one of the most popular music performers today but many people still have to think a moment before they realize she's Lady Gaga. Recognizing this, and the plight of other people who prefer to use nicknames -- or perhaps a blog name -- Facebook is putting in place an account verification mechanism for subscribers with a ...

Three years ago, the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia was at a crossroads with its constituent relationship management system. The system it was using at the time, based on Unidata, was decades old, said Necie Steward, director of advancement services for USciences. ...

A Morgan Stanley analyst has cut his rating on Amazon to equal weight from overweight. The reason? Mounting near-term challenges that mean 2012 will be a year of transition for the stock. Generally, the company is a long-term supporter of Amazon, Scott Devitt wrote, and it remains a long-term supporter.

Google has cleared a significant hurdle in what will perhaps be its greatest prize yet: its US$12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility. The deal has gotten the green light from both U.S. and European regulators. Their approval did not come without some words of caution about making sure that critical patents are licensed at fair prices. EU C...

On Monday, Myspace announced startling news: 1 million new members have joined in the past month, and the rate of signups has risen to 40,000 per day. Myspace was considered all but dead when Specific Media and singer and actor Justin Timberlake took it off News Corp.'s hands last year. News Corp. took a minority equity stake in Specific Media as ...

Doug Whitman, a hedge fund manager with Whitman Capital, has been charged with insider trading of tech stocks by federal prosecutors. The Securities and Exchange Commission is also pursuing Whitman in a parallel civil case. Whitman surrendered to the Federal Bureau of Investigation on Friday, pled not guilty at a hearing in federal court, and was ...

If you are a Boston Red Sox fan who splurges on luxury seats, don't be surprised if the organization suddenly seems much more familiar with your tastes and preferences. Last year, toward the end of the season, the team deployed parts of Green Beacon Solutions' Sports CRM app, which is based on Microsoft Dynamics CRM. ...

Reports are coming out of Iran that the country is increasingly squeezing Internet access to certain sites, including websites that use the HTTPS protocol. Many tech-savvy users who were able to circumvent restrictions to gain access to an unfettered Internet have found their usual methods are no longer effective. One prominent blogger in the coun...

Another government venue, another condemnation of LightSquared's planned 4G LTE (Long Term Evolution) network. U.S. Department of Transportation Deputy Secretary John Porcari told a congressional hearing on Wednesday that if LightSquared were to be deployed, the Federal Aviation Administration would have to constantly monitor some 40,000 broadcast...

Oracle has announced it is acquiring the cloud-based talent management provider Taleo. It is paying US$46 per share, or approximately $1.9 billion, net of Taleo's cash and debt. Taleo's board of directors has unanimously approved the transaction, which is expected to close mid-year 2012, subject to Taleo stockholder approval, certain regulatory ap...

The California State Teachers' Retirement System has a gripe about the makeup of Facebook's board of directors: It is too small and too male. In fact, there are no women on the board. "We believe that investors and the company would benefit from a larger, more diverse board," CalSTRS corporate governance director Anne Sheehan wrote to Facebook fou...