BIZ BITS: THE WORD FEBRUARY 2005
Musical Hubs
A coffee with your favorite tunes
Departure lounges will soon get a musical boost with the introduction of new Media Bars in Starbucks coffee houses. Responding to the huge increase in downloading, the coffee chain is to install kiosks that connect to a vast library of music, helped up by the chain’s $8 million acquisition of the Hear Music retailer five years ago. Customers will be able to listen to, download and even burn their own CD compilations full of the 99¢ tracks while their latte steams. It’s a heavy punch into the download market, backed by over 3000 Starbuck stores promoting wireless Internet access. The company isn’t looking at music profits overtaking it’s traditional beverage sales however. With downloaded music accounting for only an estimated 1% of revenue it doesn’t need to. At the end of last year, the chain’s earnings had soared 44% to well over $288million. Now that is something to sing about.
CEO Soundbite
Google founders, Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page
Brin and Page retain considerable voting and senior managerial influence in the multi-billion dollar company that floated last year. They founded it back in 1998 while still at college and worked out of their dormitories until they secured their initial investment. Aptly they chose a variant of the word googol, the mathematical term for a 1 followed by 100 zeros, for their company name. Since then, they’ve overseen its meteoric rise to become the world’s leading search engine. "We believed that searching and organizing the world’s information was an unusually important task that should be carried out by a company that is trustworthy and interested in the public good. We believe a well-functioning society should have abundant, free and unbiased access to high quality information. Google therefore has a responsibility to the world,” says Brin.
A Dead Cert
Stars who earn cash long after they’re gone
A recent survey by Forbes found that 50% of people are banking on Ray Charles being the highest money maker in the future out of those celebrities who died in 2004. Future earnings are estimated on merchandise sales, assets, royalties and various licensing agreements. The public’s choice seems to be backed up by the analysts who point out that Ray’s assets are rocketing. His estate will have to bring in high rewards, however, to knock Elvis Presley, current king of the Dead Earners list, to second place. Elvis Presley Enterprises estate, which his daughter Lisa Marie recently agreed to sell, brought in $54 million dollars last year.
Forbes’ top ten dead celebrities:
1 Elvis Presley $54 million
2 Charles Schulz $47 million
3 JRR Tolkien $31 million
4 John Lennon $28 million
5 Theodore ‘Dr Seuss’ Geisel $24 million
6 Marilyn Monroe $10.6 million
7= George Harrison, Irving Berlin, Bob Marley $9.4 million
10 Richard Rodgers $8.7 million
Word up
DocuPen R700
The latest hand-held scanning device, the DocuPen R700 ($199) has an upgraded memory allowing 100 pages of text to be scanned and stored in its 2MB of flash memory. Its inbuilt battery charges automatically when connected to a PC’s USB port, and it comes with the facility of either 100 or 200 DPI resolution. Weighing just 1.75 ounces, it won’t make a dent in your pocket. www.planon.com
Time for lunch
Top venue for a business meeting
Dallas boasts a world-famous lunch experience, perfect for clinching any deal. Set in the hotel of the same name, The Mansion on Turtle Creek was once the palatial home of Texan oil magnate Sheppard W King in the 1920s. Since then, it has retained its sumptuous 19th-century, Spanish-influenced architecture and corkscrew columns. The interior boasts lavish surroundings, offering intimate dining areas and an unrivalled menu. Head chef, Dean Fearing, has a long list of awards with the Michelin and Zagat guides bestowing high praises on its American Southwest inspired dishes. His signature dishes, including warm lobster tacos with yellow tomato salsa, are grand enough to frame any business meeting. The restaurant is located less than five minutes from the Central Business District and under 30 minutes from the international airport. The Mansion on Turtle Creek, 2821 Turtle Creek Blvd., 214-559-2100.
One to Watch
Mobile TV streams into 2005
The first quarter of this year will see some radical developments in the mobile TV market. Sling Media, founded by Blake Krikorian, plans to roll out video content to handheld devices. Blake was inspired to start pursuing this development when he missed out on seeing his favorite baseball team, the San Fransisco Giants, win their World Series place two years ago because he was traveling on business. So in June last year Sling was born and secured the financial backing of Mobius Venture Capital, to the tune of $10.5 million, and the support of Microsoft and Texas Instruments. The first product, the Slingbox Personal Broadcaster, $199, connects to your home entertainment system and broadcasts whatever you want to watch to your wireless devices. The quality of the final video streams and the amount of people who have the devices able to receive the images, pose a question mark. Analysts predict though, that the market for such inevitable services and products will grow from $32.8 million last year to $47.5 million by the end of 2005 and reach $1.9 billion by 2008. Sling Media hope to have captured a large slice of that market by then. www.slingmedia.com