Some 4.1 billion people, more than half the global population, will have access to 5G technology by 2025, said Bankr Tuesday. About 15% now have 5G coverage, rising to 25%, or 1.95 billion people, next year, it said. 5G’s peak download speeds of 20 Gbps can handle a wide range of IoT applications in healthcare, energy, education and transportation, Bankr noted. Coverage is being driven by select regions in Asia, the U.S. and Europe, while other regions are still building out 5G infrastructure. Asia leads in 5G after undergoing a "rapid migration" in mobile broadband networks and smartphones, Bankr said.
Paychex hasn’t experienced any business “deterioration” due to the recent resurgence in COVID-19 cases across the U.S., said CEO Martin Mucci on a fiscal Q2 investor call Wednesday. The quarter ended Nov. 30. The payroll and human resources outsourcing company continues “to monitor trends closely, especially as new restrictions are being implemented in many states,” he said. Some Paychex clients “have been holding on, waiting for a second stimulus,” said Mucci. When Paychex canvassed clients, it found that of those who took a Paycheck Protection Program loan in the first stimulus package, “virtually 100% of them were still in business,” he said. The first stimulus “made a big difference for holding clients over until things picked back up,” he said. “The second one will do the same thing.” It’s “very targeted” to small businesses, he said.
The rapid rise in pandemic-driven telework could make first-time homeownership more accessible to Black renters compared with other groups, based on factors such as income, the makeup of local industries and geography, reported Zillow. Research showed that of the nearly 2 million U.S. renters who are able to take advantage of heightened telework options and could afford monthly payments on homes in less-expensive areas outside their current metropolitan areas, “Black renters benefit far more than other renters,” said the real estate website. “In large metro areas where typical starter home values are higher than they are nationally, Black renters are 29% more likely than other renters to be able to buy their first home in a less expensive area because of the opportunity to work from home permanently.” Zillow emphasized, though, that the Black and white homeownership gap “remains as wide today as it was at the dawn of the 20th century.” Nearly 75% of white households own their homes, compared with 44% of Black families, it said. “While remote work can open up opportunities to buy a home in more affordable locations, it doesn't address the root of the various affordability issues for people of color.”
IBM agreed to buy Nordcloud, the Finland-based cloud services provider, in a transaction IBM said would boost its hybrid cloud consulting capability. Analysts estimate the global market for cloud professional services will exceed $200 billion by 2024, said IBM Monday. The deal is expected to close in Q1, it said. Financial terms weren’t disclosed.
Steelcase saw “increased interest” a quarter ago among U.S.-based companies about returning their employees to the physical office by early January, said CEO Jim Keane on a fiscal Q3 investor call. With the worsening spikes in COVID-19 that began in October, “our customers put off their plans to return to the office, with many now talking about sometime next summer,” he said. Steelcase, the world’s largest manufacturer of office furniture, is a bellwether of coronavirus work-from-home trends. “Orders and shipments weakened” in Q3, ended Nov. 27, as the pandemic worsened, and revenue declined 35% from a year earlier, he said. Fiscal Q4, ending late February, “is going to be challenging, as we get to the bottom of this crisis,” he said. The company reduced U.S. production hours “to better match capacity with demand,” he said. “Work-from-home is surging this year for obvious reasons,” said Keane, deviating from remarks in recent quarters that remote work would disappear completely with the passing of the pandemic (see 2007020009). “More people will choose to work from home from time to time” and will need higher-quality “ergonomic furniture” for their home work spaces, he said, identifying unconventional avenues for Steelcase addressable growth. As more employees telework at least part time, the physical commercial office also “will need additional updates to support more remote meeting participants and more individual video meetings,” he said.
Stay-at-home mandates spurred the average HomePass Wi-Fi subscriber home to surpass 1.87 TB in 2020 data use, “the equivalent of downloading Home Alone 467 times,” emailed smart home company Plume Wednesday. May “was the busiest month on average for HomePass members,” at 261 GB per home, it said, as that month “saw the beginning of people adjusting to the stay-at-home order.” Plume “blocked 676 security threats for the average HomePass household this year,” it said. “The number of threats blocked in each home varies based on factors such as number and types of devices, amount of online activity, and global cyberthreat trends.” The average speed in a HomePass home was 287.77 Mbps for the year, it said.
Amazon third-party seller Stratton AV is giving the Epson brand a bad name by advertising and offering for sale various Epson products through its Hatchfields Co. online store, which lacks Epson inventory and authorization to sell the goods to consumers, alleged Epson America in a false advertising and unfair competition complaint (in Pacer) Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Fort Lauderdale. Many of the Epson products marketed are “restricted SKUs,” mainly projectors, sold only through Epson authorized resellers, “which Stratton AV is not,” it said. Consumers who order Epson products through the merchant “are confused and disappointed” when the order never arrives or is canceled or when they receive a product they didn’t order, said Epson. Consumers who are charged need to go after Stratton AV or Amazon to get a refund, it said. Epson is “injured by Stratton AV’s misconduct due to the significant lost sales it suffers as a direct and proximate result thereof,” it said. Epson has contacted Stratton AV more than 20 times since June 2018, trying to curb its “improper” behavior, it said. Epson seeks an injunction, plus compensatory and punitive damages. Stratton AV operates out of Doral, Florida, said the complaint, but attempts to reach the merchant for comment Wednesday were unsuccessful. Amazon, not a defendant in the action, didn’t respond to questions.
Dish Network completed the sale to Morgan Stanley of $2 billion in 0% convertible notes due 2025 through a “private unregistered offering” Monday, said an 8-K Tuesday at the SEC. The agreement grants Morgan Stanley a 30-day option to buy $300 million more, it said. The filing didn’t say how Dish plans to use the proceeds, and the company didn’t comment. Chairman Charlie Ergen faced repeated questioning on recent earnings calls from analysts skeptical about the company’s ability to raise the $10 billion it says it needs to fund its open radio access network 5G buildout (see 2011060043).
When a new retail normal emerges post-COVID-19 pandemic, brands need to be ready to reach shoppers directly in their homes and through the use of new touch points, reported Walmart Media Group. It’s important to integrate communication, technology and data across platforms; Walmart measures the impact of sales across e-commerce, brick-and-mortar and hybrid shopping trips that are a mix of both, it said. Central to its ad-technology platform is the ability to measure the effect of digital advertising on total sales, both on the retailer’s site and app and in physical stores. This includes recently added touch points in Walmart stores, it said, such as an improved 4K TV wall, ads on self-checkout screens, short-form videos on shoppers’ devices during curbside pickup, and geo-aware ads that appear in the Walmart app’s store mode. “Every time a shopper buys something either online or in a physical store -- or searches or views a product on one of our digital properties -- we take these billions of shopping signals and use them to determine how best to influence these shopping journeys,” said Vice President-Strategy and Transformation Stephen Howard-Sarin. Walmart uses the first-party data to “tell brands which shoppers buy cat food or dog food, how many times the relevant households saw their ad, and whether those households bought their brand online or walked into our store and made a purchase.” It can also tell whether households targeted with ads “behaved differently than those who were not.”
Startup Hearo debuted Tuesday, described as the world's first desktop and mobile “co-watching party app.” It’s the brainchild of CEO Edward Lerner, who described himself as a former Sony PlayStation executive. Hearo is the only service on the market “that lets consumers watch TV and premium streaming services while talking together on phones, tablets, and PCs,” said Lerner. Available on iOS, Android, macOS and Windows, Hearo lets Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video subscribers “watch synchronized streaming movies and shows while talking to their friends,” he said.