BusinessWeek reveals that, according to the latest Money Tree report from PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association (based on Thomson-Reuters data), “[v]enture capital investments dropped to the lowest level since 1997 in the first quarter, with just $3 billion invested. […] That’s down 61% in venture dollars invested from the first quarter of 2008, and a 47% decline from the amount invested in the fourth quarter of 2008, which itself was much lower than the rest of 2008. This reinforces what most entrepreneurs already understand: bootstrapping is more important than ever.”
Yahoo!Tech writes that “European Union states headed for a collision course with the bloc's parliament on Tuesday as a spat over how to tackle illegal downloads threatened a wider telecom reform. There is broad agreement over the reform package, authored by EU Telecoms Commissioner Viviane Reding, but a last-minute standoff between member countries and parliament has put back final adoption to May at the earliest. The battle over copyright abuse has emerged as a final sticking point between EU states and the European Parliament, which have joint say. The issue was not part of Reding's reform, which covers infrastructure rather than content.”
The San Francisco Chronicle has a good article on how Sun’s inability to come up with a solid business model is partly responsible for the company’s demise as an independent entity.
According to Internetnews.com, “Sony Ericsson is putting plans for any Android-based smartphones on the low-priority list after announcing layoffs, a $382 million loss for the first quarter and a 35 percent drop in shipments year-over-year. The company announced in its earnings report that it will cut 2,000 jobs, after trimming 2,000 last year, and that phone shipments fell 35 percent, to 14.5 million between January and March. […] Sony Ericsson's grim financial news comes at a time when handset makers gun for position in the smartphone market, with signature releases slated for this summer. They include the do-or-die Pre from Palm, the rumored new iPhones from Apple and BlackBerry models from RIM, plus Android devices from Samsung, HTC and Acer.”
eWeek.com has an interesting piece on how Oracle’s acquisition of Sun might affect SMEs.