Microsoft Rocking the Cloud

Earning are coming out and while Yahoo! looks to be taking its final lap Microsoft is doing quite well with its focus on the cloud.

Microsoft on Tuesday reported earnings that easily topped expectations as the company continues to shift from a traditional software seller to a provider of cloud-based services.

Excluding certain items, the Redmond, Wash.-based company said it earned $5.5 billion, or 69 cents per share, on adjusted revenue of $22.6 billion. On that basis, the company had been expected to report per-share earnings of around 58 cents, according to Zacks, with analysts expecting revenue of around $22.1 billion, roughly flat from the prior year.

Including all items, per-share earnings would have come in at 39 cents per share, on revenue of $20.6 billion.

Read the whole story here:

http://www.recode.net/2016/7/19/12226280/microsoft-july-2016-earnings-report

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Mobile Commerce Jumping More and More

Mobile commerce, or mCommerce, all of the buying you do on your phone, is exploding and set to grow more and more.

Here is a snippet from the piece:

As ecommerce sales continue their meteoric growth, mobile is grabbing a larger market share, with smartphone-enabled purchases set to grow from $122 billion in 2015 to nearly $319 billion by 2020, according to a new report from Javelin.

A greater number of overall ecommerce purchases will come from smartphones, per Javelin’s estimate that mcommerce purchases will make up 49 percent of total online retail commerce in 2020, a significant increase from 29 percent in 2015. The enlarging spotlight placed on mobile is partly due to retailers’ ongoing efforts to provide smartphone-friendly offerings and checkout solutions to customers, according to Javelin’s 2016 Online Retail Payments Forecast.

Read on:

http://www.mobilecommercedaily.com/mcommerce-purchases-set-to-jump-160pc-by-2020-report

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

A Letter to the Daughters Out There

Great little read:

My daughter is almost eight. She likes princesses and Harry Potter and doll houses and making videos to Taylor Swift songs and she has a few very clear influences and/or heroes. Mal from the Descendents. Hermione. My wife. Me. Her great grandmother Sadie.

And now I want her to be influenced by the Ghostbusters. The new Ghostbusters, not the version with Murray and Ackroyd. I want her to love the version with women.

As an aside when I started this post I was unaware of this horrible attack on Leslie Jones, the smart African-American Ghostbuster who knows New York history. On behalf of – I don’t know, the Internet everywhere? – I apologize. We suck. I wish that after 20 years of regular Internet use we’d all be better people. We’re not. We are literally the worst.

Read the full story here:

https://techcrunch.com/2016/07/19/for-my-daughter/

My daughter is 4 and curious about everything in the world.

Oh, and, the clips I've seen from this new Ghostbusters movie look absolutely hilarious.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Grocery Stores in Decline

If you aren't growing, or increasing market share, you are probably going the other way.

Bad news for the well-established Supermarket concept.

Here is a snippet from the story:

Sure, Americans head to Costco some days, drop by the dollar store another, and sometimes swing by their neighborhood grocer, too. But that doesn’t mean they’re happy about all that running around, andProgressive Grocer’s new annual report finds that many feel forced to make multiple trips to find everything they want.

And whether shoppers are looking for deals, quality or variety, supermarkets continue to be on the losing end, with their share of total grocery spending—about $2 trillion each year—falling to 54.5%. That means its slice of the grocery pie has fallen more than six percentage points since 2007. Warehouse clubs and supercenters continue to be the big winners, with their combined share rising from 25.1% in 2007 to 31.3%.

Read on:

http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/280591/report-finds-grocery-stores-continue-to-lose-share.html?edition=94758

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Walmart as Customer Experience Experts?

This little article really caught my eye.

If all you do is compete on price that leaves you open for competitors to narrow or eliminate the gap.  All of these retailers are selling most of the same products right?  Corn Flakes.  Shorts and shirts.  Etc.

How can a retailer differentiate in today's world?  Digital.

Read on:

http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/279914/walmart-vaults-into-customer-experience-derby.html?edition=94545

Here is a snippet from the piece:

Walmart says Walmart Pay, which it began rolling out in back in December, is now available in all 4,600 of its stores. And experts say the mobile app puts the retailer one step closer to level footing with Amazon.

“What wins the Amazon shopper over is the customer experience,” says Gene Alvarez, managing VP at Gartner. “Walmart has always competed on price. But if the prices are equal, which consumers can now quickly figure out, it becomes about customer experience. Who is it easier to do business with?”

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant