In Search of the Perfect Investment

We had a mini-reunion yesterday in Boston — ten graduates of the Harvard Business School class of 1969. We talked about our lives, with focus on charity, and with heavy focus on family, children and grandchildren — which we all agreed is what it’s all about.

We graduated 43 1/2 years ago. We were at war in Vietnam. We were all being drafted. There were 35mm cameras with film. Kodachrome and Tri-X were king. Now Kodak is bust. And we have digital cameras. There were no handheld calculators. We did our work on slide rules. There was no Kindle. We read books (the paper ones).  There was no GPS. We used paper maps. There were no cell phones. BlackBerries and Apples were things you ate. There were no cordless phones.  There were no laptops. What little computing we did was on noisy teletypewriters. There was no WiFi. There was no Internet. and there was no Google. You wore glasses. There were no contact lenses or laser surgery. You had your original knees or a wheelchair. There were no replacement knees — which many of my classmates now proudly sport.

Some classmates are poor. Some are rich. But all are happy, and reinventing themselves for the next thirty years. We hope.

• Strong sales for Qualcomm’s leading high-ASP 28nm LTE solutions, much improved QCT margins, and strong global 3G/4G device sales led to strong December quarter results.
• Consistent with our thesis, Qualcomm’s raised F2013 guidance suggests strong 3G/4G device sales growth, stable QTL ASPs, and strong growth of higher-ASP integrated Snapdragon and LTE solutions.
• We believe Qualcomm is well positioned to post strong earnings growth due to stable royalty rates, strong market share for integrated chipsets, and continued strong growth of 3G device sales in emerging markets. We reiterate our BUY rating and increase our price target to $83.

• Management also announced plans to change the company name from RIM to BlackBerry.
• While we were impressed with the features of the new OS, we believe RIM has only closed the gap with more mature smartphone OS platforms and offered limited differentiating services or features to win back customers from more mature ecosystems.
• Further, we believe the carrier pricing of the new Z10 smartphone versus competing high-end smartphones creates a tough environment for strong BB10 sales to turn around BlackBerry’s long term business trends. We reiterate our SELL rating and $9 price target.

“BlackBerry 10 debut disappoints shareholders” — from the Washington Post, Says the Post,

“At least three analysts reiterated their sell recommendations for BlackBerry yesterday, with at least two — James Moorman at S&P Capital IQ and Mark McKechnie at Evercore Partners — cutting their ratings to the equivalent of sell from hold. In all, six analysts recommend buying the stock, 20 have a hold rating, and 20 advise selling, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.”

For the full piece, click here.

From the Wall Street Journal,

“In the roughly 18 months since it last released a new BlackBerry, RIM installed a new management team, laid off 5,000 employees, and built an entirely new operating system on which to run its new phones. Its share of the global smartphone market fell to 4.7% last year from 10.3% in 2011, according to research firm IDC.”

For the full Journal piece, click here.

Weekend reading (i.e. pieces I found fascinating):

+ “North Dakota Went Boom. It’s hard to think of what oil hasn’t done to life in the small communities of western North Dakota, good and bad.” New York Times Magazine. Click here.

+  Timbuktu Endured Terror Under Harsh Shariah Law. Click here.

+ The Spy Novelist Who Knows Too Much..

Last June, a pulp-fiction thriller was published in Paris under the title “Le Chemin de Damas.” Its lurid green-and-black cover featured a busty woman clutching a pistol, and its plot included the requisite car chases, explosions and sexual conquests. Unlike most paperbacks, though, this one attracted the attention of intelligence officers and diplomats on three continents. Set in the midst of Syria’s civil war, the book offered vivid character sketches of that country’s embattled ruler, Bashar al-Assad, and his brother Maher, along with several little-known lieutenants and allies. It detailed a botched coup attempt secretly supported by the American and Israeli intelligence agencies. And most striking of all, it described an attack on one of the Syrian regime’s command centers, near the presidential palace in Damascus, a month before an attack in the same place killed several of the regime’s top figures. “It was prophetic,” I was told by one veteran Middle East analyst who knows Syria well and preferred to remain nameless. “It really gave you a sense of the atmosphere inside the regime, of the way these people operate, in a way I hadn’t seen before.”

For the full article, click here. Sadly, I can’t find an English translation of the book.

The Daily Show’s Al Gore interview with Jon Stewart. He explains why he sold out to Al Jazeera. Click here.

Decoding Microsoft Office: From PC World.  I think the words are funny) “Which Office version does what? Microsoft doesn’t make it easy on mere mortals who want to understand which edition of Office software fits their needs. Here’s help.” Click here.

More tastelessness.

+ I came out of the shop with a whopper, fries and a 20 ounce Coke.

A poor homeless man sat there and said “I’ve not eaten for two days.”

I told him “I wish I had your will power”!

+ A fat girl served me in McDonald’s at lunch time. She said “sorry about the wait.”

I said ‘don’t worry dear, you’re bound to lose it eventually. ‘

+ The TV weather girl said she was expecting 8 inches tonight.

I thought to myself, fat chance with a face like that!

+ I failed a Health and Safety course at the Senior Center today.

One of the questions was: “In the event of a fire, what steps would you take?”

“Freeking’ big ones” was apparently the wrong answer.

Harry Newton, who is rushing out to have breakfast with his favorite (and only) daughter Claire. It’s the only time she can spare for her aging Daddy.