Amazon, Microsoft Shine in the Cloud, Others Don’t
Posted on December 9, 2011 |
By Ari Levy
As we fasten our seatbelts and take off for the cloud, we must be mindful of who's flying the plane. That's the message from a study to be released today by Nasuni Corp., which concludes that only six of the leading 16 cloud storage providers are ready for primetime.
Since April 2009, Nasuni has been evaluating the market, testing storage vendors for performance, stability and scalability. The top performers were Amazon S3 and Microsoft Azure, the study found. The other services to pass the test were from AT&T, Nirvanix, Peer 1 Hosting and Rackspace.
Which 10 failed? Nasuni spared those names, and for good reason. It wants them to get better, not go away. The Natick, Massachusetts-based startup provides storage technology and services built on top of existing cloud infrastructure. So the more providers in the market the better the competition and the more prices likely fall for Nasuni, which buys cloud storage and bundles in its proprietary technology to then sell to customers.
"Our hope is that everyone who is not at the top of their game looks at where there are holes and improves upon those," says Andres Rodriguez, Nasuni's chief executive officer. "We want to have as many low-cost high volume providers of cloud storage out there as there can possibly be."
The test was aimed at showing how providers perform in mid-size organizations. Those would be companies that need more storage, security and recovery capacity than startups and mom-and-pop shops but might not get the customer support of a Fortune 500 company because they don't deliver enough business.
Price Check! Amazon App Takes Aim at Brick-and-Mortars
Posted on December 6, 2011 |
By Danielle Kucera
Amazon.com Inc. wants shoppers to do a price check the next time they're at the store.
The world's largest online retailer is offering a 5 percent discount to entice users to try its new mobile app that compares their prices with brick-and-mortar retailers.
How does it work? The app, called Price Check, allows shoppers to look up Amazon's prices by scanning physical products at a store using their phones. Customers will get the discount, as much as $5 off, on three qualifying products on Dec. 10, the Seattle-based company said today in a statement.
Amazon is joining the ranks of companies such as EBay Inc., which lets users search prices and compare results with its RedLaser barcode scanning mobile app. Internet sellers are aiming to spur more online purchases this holiday season among the more than 95 percent of U.S. consumers who still shop in stores.
"The ability to check prices on your mobile phone when you're in a physical retail store is changing the way people shop," said Sam Hall, director of Amazon Mobile. "Price
transparency means that you can save money."
In addition to scanning a bar code, users search for a product by taking a photo, saying its name or typing it into the application's search engine. Customers who download the app and enable the location feature will see an additional 5 percent discount of up to $5 on Amazon's products, including electronics, toys, music, sporting goods and DVDs, the company said.
The app is available for iPhone and Android and is free on the Amazon Appstore, Android Market and App Store for iPhone.
E-Reader Alex to Put More Pressure on Amazon
Posted on April 13, 2010 |
On April 14, Spring Design will start shipping Alex, yet another new e-reader to compete with current market leader, Amazon’s Kindle line. Alex offers access to more than 1 million books and allows for Web browsing and even using e-mail. Unlike the Kindle, it can also access and run apps. Unlike the Kindle, it has a full-color touch screen. Unlike the Kindle, it allows users to store content on a removable SD card.
Cupertino, Calif.-based Spring Design may be a start-up, but it has some formidable backers. Co-founder Albert Teng was a general manager at chipmaker Intel. Co-founder Jack Yuan previously co-founded storage maker SanDisk. Its partners include search giant Google and software maker Adobe. Because Alex can read digital books published in so-called ePub format, users will be able to download books from Google Books, which offers free public-domain older books and magazines.
Alex is entering a market crowded with offerings from giants, such as Amazon, Sony and Barnes & Noble. Apple’s iPad tablet, and other upcoming tablets and netbook computers could compete head-to-head with e-readers as well.
Alex is yet another device adding to the pressure for Amazon to innovate, and to add more features to the Kindle, which is increasingly beginning to look less capable than rival offerings.
E-Reader Alex to Put More Pressure on Amazon
Posted on April 13, 2010 |
On April 14, Spring Design will start shipping Alex, yet another new e-reader to compete with current market leader, Amazon’s Kindle line. Alex offers access to more than 1 million books and allows for Web browsing and even using e-mail. Unlike the Kindle, it can also access and run apps. Unlike the Kindle, it has a full-color touch screen. Unlike the Kindle, it allows users to store content on a removable SD card.
Cupertino, Calif.-based Spring Design may be a start-up, but it has some formidable backers. Co-founder Albert Teng was a general manager at chipmaker Intel. Co-founder Jack Yuan previously co-founded storage maker SanDisk. Its partners include search giant Google and software maker Adobe. Because Alex can read digital books published in so-called ePub format, users will be able to download books from Google Books, which offers free public-domain older books and magazines.
Alex is entering a market crowded with offerings from giants, such as Amazon, Sony and Barnes & Noble. Apple’s iPad tablet, and other upcoming tablets and netbook computers could compete head-to-head with e-readers as well.
Alex is yet another device adding to the pressure for Amazon to innovate, and to add more features to the Kindle, which is increasingly beginning to look less capable than rival offerings.
Amazon CEO: “Millions” of Kindles Sold
Posted on January 29, 2010 |
Amazon.com keeps secret the number of Kindles it sells, saying the devices generate too small a portion of overall revenues to warrant disclosure. But on Thursday, the company gave its first big hint at the e-book reader’s financial success.
In a press release detailing the e-commerce giant’s solid all-around performance in the fourth quarter of 2009, CEO Jeff Bezos says, “Millions of people now own Kindles.” So, assuming that at least two million people have bought the device, and that each paid at least $259 – the cost of the least-expensive Kindle – Amazon now has a business worth more than $500 million in sales. Not bad for a product that’s a little more than two years old.
Amazon spokeswoman Mary Osako declines to specify whether the word “millions” was deliberately pluralized in the release. “We’re letting the quote stand for itself,” she says.
The size of the Kindle market has been the subject of much guesswork, since e-books are such a new and promising business. In 2008, Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney came up with a method of estimating sales based on a filing from Sprint, the former wireless carrier for all Kindles, and estimated 500,000 that year. Forrester Research recently estimated that 2.5 million Kindles have been sold, based on consumer surveys.
