LinkedIn didn’t just delight investors today with a bullish earnings report
that sent its stock up 12% by the end of after-hours trading. Company CEO Jeff
Weiner and his sidekick, chief financial officer Steve Sordello, also mastered
the art of making LinkedIn’s future sound bright, without committing themselves
to any specific targets beyond the company’s traditional earnings and revenue
guidance for the rest of the year.
Bringing good news to Wall Street can be just as tricky — even treacherous
— as communicating during troubled times. Get too ebullient about products that
haven’t yet been launched, or potential customers that haven’t yet been signed
on, and today’s upbeat remarks can lead to a subsequent stock-price cave-in and
investor outrage if promised breakthroughs don’t happen. LinkedIn’s challenges
are especially intense because the company now sports a remarkable $23.5 billion
market capitalization. That’s more than 14 times its annualized revenue run
rate, and a vastly bigger multiple of its earnings.
But Weiner and Sordello played their cards carefully. Here are some of the
key points from the call, followed by some deconstruction of what they didn’t
say:
LinkedIn’s membership has expanded to a record 238 million people, up 37%
from a year earlier. That’s the first acceleration in membership growth since
late 2011.
- Audience engagement is high, too. Citing comScore data, Weiner said
LinkedIn averaged 189 million unique visitors a month in the quarter, counting
both the flagship LinkedIn site and the separate SlideShare site. LinkedIn’s new
Contacts service, which helps members keep track of their dealings with other
people on th site, piloted in a small way in April, with early users viewing 2.5
times more pages.
- Financial performance measures are surging across the board. Second
quarter revenue climbed 59%, to $363.7 million, from a year earlier. Net income
rose 32%. Profit margins — as measured by adjusted earnings before interest,
taxes, depreciation and amortization — expanded to 24% of revenue, up from 22%
the year earlier.
- LinkedIn’s Talent Solutions division, which delivers tools for corporate
recruiters, remains the company’s biggest and fastest-growing operation. Its
revenue jumped 69% in the quarter and now accounts for 56% of LinkedIn’s total
revenue, up from 53% a year earlier. LinkedIn’s marketing solutions business
(mostly advertising and job listings), grew 36%, while premium subscriptions
expanded revenue 68%.
- Looking ahead, LinkedIn slightly raised its estimates for full-year 2013
performance, predicting revenue of between $1.445 and $1.475 billion, along with
EBITDA of $340 million to $355 million.
How much room is there for LinkedIn to keep expanding at this rate? Weiner
was asked if there’s an upper limit to how many people might ever join LinkedIn,
which caters to managers, executives and skilled white-collar workers. Overall,
he said, there are 600 million people in the world who fit that bill. But he
said his long-term dream is to expand LinkedIn in ways that would make it
relevant to all 3.1 billion people on earth with a job.
Similarly, Scardello talked about the ways that Talent Solutions’ products
could connect with many more businesses outside the U.S. “There’s still a lot of
headroom there,” he said.
Such answers let LinkedIn reassure Wall Street without promising too much.
Analysts can feel a bit more confident that LinkedIn can keep growing in ways
that will justify the stock’s current value and perhaps even provide room for
more price appreciation down the road. (LinkedIn stock has already surged more
than 85% this year.) But Weiner and Scardello didn’t promise any specific amount
of growth.
If the company hits a slow spell, LinkedIn’s leaders can just position
those big goals on the horizon as a little more distant than analysts might have
realized.
Thursday, August 1, 2013
Speaking of which two games from Microsoft Studios-Skull
Greater than nine months into the excellent revamping known as Windows 8, a
clear vision of its core is finally starting to emerge. The baked-in apps have
already been streamlined and Windows eight.1 looms, able to polish the several
rough edges found inside the original release on the operating method. But
Microsoft alone cannot improve what exactly is definitely the beating heart of
Windows 8: The Windows Store.
Windows eight revolves about the Windows Retailer. Each and every Reside Tile that glimmers around the modern-style Commence screen may be the iconic representation of a Windows eight app-and it is possible to only snag Windows eight apps in Microsoft’s own Windows Store. Because the Windows Shop goes, so goes the Windows 8 expertise.
How, precisely, could be the Windows Store performing? The obvious indicators are mixed. Windows RT devices can run only modern-style apps, not desktop apps, and they’re tanking difficult. But app submissions picked up steam around the time of Microsoft’s Build conference, culminating inside the shattering on the one hundred,000-app barrier in early July, and they’re nevertheless going (fairly) sturdy.
That is an excellent milestone for Microsoft, but it is nevertheless paltry in comparison to the around 1 million apps in Google Play and 900,000 apps in Apple’s App Store. So it’s a great time for you to take the pulse on the Windows Retailer again: Is one hundred,000 apps adequate to maintain a physique pleased? As I did final February, I spent days scouring the Windows Shop and taking notes in 5 important categories: games, music apps, video apps, social apps, and a catch-all “other” category-to see how well Microsoft covered each. Here’s how they all measured up.
In my original Windows Shop evaluation, I noted that the game choice was an early highlight-and it has only gotten stronger considering the fact that February. The number of accessible apps has tripled in that time. Though the roughly 13,500 available games do not hold a candle for the vast Android and iOS libraries, there is greater than sufficient to keep you distracted for months to come. A lot of them are ports from other platforms, but, hey, they play just as nicely on Windows.
In fact, they play so nicely that we’ve had two separate roundups of killer Windows 8 games, with extremely small overlap. If you open the Games tab inside the Windows Store and sort by "noteworthy," you’ll come across dozens and dozens of high-quality titles. (I’ve been playing Royal Revolt nonstop lately.) Microsoft Studios in specific has released a bevy of bodacious games like Pinball FX2, Hydro Thunder Hurricane, and the Gunstringer.
Speaking of which, two games from Microsoft Studios-Skulls in the Shogun and Halo: Spartan Assault-aren’t just a blast-they’re also far-reaching, letting you play with gamers on Windows Telephone and Xbox Reside at the same time as with fellow Windows Store shoppers. That sort of cross-platform knowledge is an thrilling tease on the prospective of Windows eight gaming within a One Microsoft form of planet. Here’s hoping it continues.
That is not to say that all is nicely in Winny’s planet, even so. As described, even though the Windows Retailer game selection is impressive, it can not examine towards the selections for iOS or Android-you won’t obtain any mobile Walking Dead games or Grand Theft Auto ports right here.
Windows eight revolves about the Windows Retailer. Each and every Reside Tile that glimmers around the modern-style Commence screen may be the iconic representation of a Windows eight app-and it is possible to only snag Windows eight apps in Microsoft’s own Windows Store. Because the Windows Shop goes, so goes the Windows 8 expertise.
How, precisely, could be the Windows Store performing? The obvious indicators are mixed. Windows RT devices can run only modern-style apps, not desktop apps, and they’re tanking difficult. But app submissions picked up steam around the time of Microsoft’s Build conference, culminating inside the shattering on the one hundred,000-app barrier in early July, and they’re nevertheless going (fairly) sturdy.
That is an excellent milestone for Microsoft, but it is nevertheless paltry in comparison to the around 1 million apps in Google Play and 900,000 apps in Apple’s App Store. So it’s a great time for you to take the pulse on the Windows Retailer again: Is one hundred,000 apps adequate to maintain a physique pleased? As I did final February, I spent days scouring the Windows Shop and taking notes in 5 important categories: games, music apps, video apps, social apps, and a catch-all “other” category-to see how well Microsoft covered each. Here’s how they all measured up.
In my original Windows Shop evaluation, I noted that the game choice was an early highlight-and it has only gotten stronger considering the fact that February. The number of accessible apps has tripled in that time. Though the roughly 13,500 available games do not hold a candle for the vast Android and iOS libraries, there is greater than sufficient to keep you distracted for months to come. A lot of them are ports from other platforms, but, hey, they play just as nicely on Windows.
In fact, they play so nicely that we’ve had two separate roundups of killer Windows 8 games, with extremely small overlap. If you open the Games tab inside the Windows Store and sort by "noteworthy," you’ll come across dozens and dozens of high-quality titles. (I’ve been playing Royal Revolt nonstop lately.) Microsoft Studios in specific has released a bevy of bodacious games like Pinball FX2, Hydro Thunder Hurricane, and the Gunstringer.
Speaking of which, two games from Microsoft Studios-Skulls in the Shogun and Halo: Spartan Assault-aren’t just a blast-they’re also far-reaching, letting you play with gamers on Windows Telephone and Xbox Reside at the same time as with fellow Windows Store shoppers. That sort of cross-platform knowledge is an thrilling tease on the prospective of Windows eight gaming within a One Microsoft form of planet. Here’s hoping it continues.
That is not to say that all is nicely in Winny’s planet, even so. As described, even though the Windows Retailer game selection is impressive, it can not examine towards the selections for iOS or Android-you won’t obtain any mobile Walking Dead games or Grand Theft Auto ports right here.
Monday, July 15, 2013
Microsoft Surface gets $180 price cut
Microsoft has slashed the price of its Surface RT tablet by up to $180 as
it fights to increase its tiny share of the booming tablet market.
The cut brings the price of the Surface RT with 32 gigabytes (GB) of memory from $559 to $389 without a cover, which also acts as a keyboard, a difference of $170. Including a cover with a touch-sensitive keyboard, the device goes from $679 to $499.
The price of the Surface RT with 64 GB of memory without a cover goes from $679 to $499, a discount of $180; while the price of the 64 GB model with a cover goes from $789 to $609.
The Surface has a 10.1-inch screen measured diagonally.
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According to market research firm IDC, Microsoft shipped about one million tablets in the first quarter of 2013. That includes about 260,000 of the slimmed-down RT version and 750,000 of the Pro version of Surface, which is compatible with older Windows programs.
That gave Microsoft a slim 2 per cent share of the 49.9 million tablets shipped worldwide. Apple remained the leader with 39.1 per cent and was followed by Samsung, AsusTek, Amazon.com, Acer and Microsoft in sixth place. Second-quarter figures are not out yet.
The cut, implemented on Sunday, comes just days after Microsoft reorganised its corporate structure to become more of a "devices and services" company.
Microsoft has manufactured devices before, such as its Xbox gaming console, but when it began selling Surface tablets in October, the company became a competitor to its many manufacturing partners, who rely on its Windows operating system to power their machines.
Microsoft is trying hard to succeed in tablets because PC sales are falling. Research firm Gartner said worldwide shipments of personal computers fell 11 per cent to 76 million in the April-June period, the fifth consecutive quarter of decline and the longest PC slump ever.
The cut brings the price of the Surface RT with 32 gigabytes (GB) of memory from $559 to $389 without a cover, which also acts as a keyboard, a difference of $170. Including a cover with a touch-sensitive keyboard, the device goes from $679 to $499.
The price of the Surface RT with 64 GB of memory without a cover goes from $679 to $499, a discount of $180; while the price of the 64 GB model with a cover goes from $789 to $609.
The Surface has a 10.1-inch screen measured diagonally.
Advertisement
According to market research firm IDC, Microsoft shipped about one million tablets in the first quarter of 2013. That includes about 260,000 of the slimmed-down RT version and 750,000 of the Pro version of Surface, which is compatible with older Windows programs.
That gave Microsoft a slim 2 per cent share of the 49.9 million tablets shipped worldwide. Apple remained the leader with 39.1 per cent and was followed by Samsung, AsusTek, Amazon.com, Acer and Microsoft in sixth place. Second-quarter figures are not out yet.
The cut, implemented on Sunday, comes just days after Microsoft reorganised its corporate structure to become more of a "devices and services" company.
Microsoft has manufactured devices before, such as its Xbox gaming console, but when it began selling Surface tablets in October, the company became a competitor to its many manufacturing partners, who rely on its Windows operating system to power their machines.
Microsoft is trying hard to succeed in tablets because PC sales are falling. Research firm Gartner said worldwide shipments of personal computers fell 11 per cent to 76 million in the April-June period, the fifth consecutive quarter of decline and the longest PC slump ever.
Microsoft has abruptly found itself in
v
Microsoft right now released an update to OneNote for Windows RT and Windows 8, adding Workplace 365 help and making the on-screen keyboard dismissible. You'll be able to download the new version now directly in the Windows Shop.
The most significant addition with this release is undoubtedly the ability to sign in with your Workplace 365 account. This indicates you could now effortlessly open your perform notes.
To do so, tap on the More Notebooks drop-down menu within the left pane, tap the plus button that says “Add a operate or college account to view extra notebooks,” and sign in along with your function or college account. You ought to see a list of recently utilized notebooks appear within the left pane; tapping any of them ought to open it.
Subsequent up around the list can be a modest but important tweak for the way OneNote’s touch keyboard functions. Even though the feature has usually let you form anyplace, Microsoft has finally admitted that “you do not want to kind.”
As a result, it is possible to now dismiss the on-screen keyboard so you may see the entire screen for reading. In Windows eight and Windows RT, the on-screen keyboard shows up whenever you tap into a text box and goes away if you tap outdoors. Tapping “outside” in OneNote signifies tapping into any empty space.
Some might see this as a minor detail, but it’s really rather important in the touchscreen planet that Microsoft has abruptly found itself in. Tweaks like this one make the distinction among a superb app as well as a good a single.
Though these are the only two improvements Microsoft chose to highlight, the app has received a little far more within this release. The full changelog is as follows.
In building Windows 8, Microsoft created a massive bet that adding touch capabilities to private computers would assistance revive an business that was getting eaten away by smartphones and tablets. But Inventive Techniques president Tim Bajarin, writing over at Time, says his study has found that generating touch such a crucial a part of individual computers was a serious strategic error on Microsoft’s element. The cause, he says, is that Computer customers are so utilized to working with mice and keyboards that they see no advantage to touching their screens to obtain function accomplished. So though touch interfaces make ideal sense for smaller sized, portable devices such as smartphones and tablets, they make little sense for personal computer systems that have larger displays and that already come with trackpads or mice.
“While adding touch input to screens is not a undesirable thing, men and women getting able to adapt promptly to touch as a key type of user interface input on larger PCs will not occur overnight,” Bajarin writes. “Early on, Apple’s scientists studied the kinesiology of arm movements in relationship to keyboards and mice, and concluded that implementing any gestures into the user interface worked ideal by means of a trackpad. The business also determined that selecting the hand up in the keyboard area and moving it to touch the screen was unnatural, and factored that in to the final choice to add gestures towards the Magic Trackpad instead.”
Microsoft right now released an update to OneNote for Windows RT and Windows 8, adding Workplace 365 help and making the on-screen keyboard dismissible. You'll be able to download the new version now directly in the Windows Shop.
The most significant addition with this release is undoubtedly the ability to sign in with your Workplace 365 account. This indicates you could now effortlessly open your perform notes.
To do so, tap on the More Notebooks drop-down menu within the left pane, tap the plus button that says “Add a operate or college account to view extra notebooks,” and sign in along with your function or college account. You ought to see a list of recently utilized notebooks appear within the left pane; tapping any of them ought to open it.
Subsequent up around the list can be a modest but important tweak for the way OneNote’s touch keyboard functions. Even though the feature has usually let you form anyplace, Microsoft has finally admitted that “you do not want to kind.”
As a result, it is possible to now dismiss the on-screen keyboard so you may see the entire screen for reading. In Windows eight and Windows RT, the on-screen keyboard shows up whenever you tap into a text box and goes away if you tap outdoors. Tapping “outside” in OneNote signifies tapping into any empty space.
Some might see this as a minor detail, but it’s really rather important in the touchscreen planet that Microsoft has abruptly found itself in. Tweaks like this one make the distinction among a superb app as well as a good a single.
Though these are the only two improvements Microsoft chose to highlight, the app has received a little far more within this release. The full changelog is as follows.
In building Windows 8, Microsoft created a massive bet that adding touch capabilities to private computers would assistance revive an business that was getting eaten away by smartphones and tablets. But Inventive Techniques president Tim Bajarin, writing over at Time, says his study has found that generating touch such a crucial a part of individual computers was a serious strategic error on Microsoft’s element. The cause, he says, is that Computer customers are so utilized to working with mice and keyboards that they see no advantage to touching their screens to obtain function accomplished. So though touch interfaces make ideal sense for smaller sized, portable devices such as smartphones and tablets, they make little sense for personal computer systems that have larger displays and that already come with trackpads or mice.
“While adding touch input to screens is not a undesirable thing, men and women getting able to adapt promptly to touch as a key type of user interface input on larger PCs will not occur overnight,” Bajarin writes. “Early on, Apple’s scientists studied the kinesiology of arm movements in relationship to keyboards and mice, and concluded that implementing any gestures into the user interface worked ideal by means of a trackpad. The business also determined that selecting the hand up in the keyboard area and moving it to touch the screen was unnatural, and factored that in to the final choice to add gestures towards the Magic Trackpad instead.”
Tuesday, July 9, 2013
Once up on a time, there was a popular search engine called AltaVista. It
lives no more.
On Monday, its owner Yahoo Inc. sent AltaVista.com to the Internet graveyard to rest alongside order-almost-anything venture Kozmo.com and the butler from Ask Jeeves.
Palo Alto, Calif.-based AltaVista was introduced in 1995, three years before Google Inc. was founded. Eclipsed by Google in the early 2000s, AltaVista's star had already faded by the time Yahoo acquired it as part of its $1.7 billion purchase of Overture Services Inc. in July 2003. Overture had bought AltaVista earlier that year from Massachusetts-based CMGI Inc.
Yahoo announced AltaVista's fate on its Tumblr page late last month. Search industry expert Danny Sullivan likened AltaVista to a bright child neglected by its parents.
"You were loved. You really were," Sullivan wrote in a blog post eulogizing the site. "People did not want to leave you. But despite adding new features, some of which Google copied, you couldn't keep up with the pace and innovation of that company, which decided against becoming a portal like your corporate masters ordered for you."
Indeed, AltaVista's decline began after it expanded to become more like Yahoo, offering a bevy of online services instead of sticking solely with search. By the time the site reversed course, it was too late. Its finances were sinking and Google was on the rise.
Yahoo's June 28 announcement of AltaVista's end is brief. It's buried as the eighth item on a list of other services the company is shutting down. Along with the mention of AltaVista's July 8 expiration date, the post says only: "Please visit Yahoo Search for all of your searching needs."
According to data from online research firm comScore, most people in the U.S. use Google for their search needs, followed by Microsoft's Bing. Yahoo is in third place.
On Monday, its owner Yahoo Inc. sent AltaVista.com to the Internet graveyard to rest alongside order-almost-anything venture Kozmo.com and the butler from Ask Jeeves.
Palo Alto, Calif.-based AltaVista was introduced in 1995, three years before Google Inc. was founded. Eclipsed by Google in the early 2000s, AltaVista's star had already faded by the time Yahoo acquired it as part of its $1.7 billion purchase of Overture Services Inc. in July 2003. Overture had bought AltaVista earlier that year from Massachusetts-based CMGI Inc.
Yahoo announced AltaVista's fate on its Tumblr page late last month. Search industry expert Danny Sullivan likened AltaVista to a bright child neglected by its parents.
"You were loved. You really were," Sullivan wrote in a blog post eulogizing the site. "People did not want to leave you. But despite adding new features, some of which Google copied, you couldn't keep up with the pace and innovation of that company, which decided against becoming a portal like your corporate masters ordered for you."
Indeed, AltaVista's decline began after it expanded to become more like Yahoo, offering a bevy of online services instead of sticking solely with search. By the time the site reversed course, it was too late. Its finances were sinking and Google was on the rise.
Yahoo's June 28 announcement of AltaVista's end is brief. It's buried as the eighth item on a list of other services the company is shutting down. Along with the mention of AltaVista's July 8 expiration date, the post says only: "Please visit Yahoo Search for all of your searching needs."
According to data from online research firm comScore, most people in the U.S. use Google for their search needs, followed by Microsoft's Bing. Yahoo is in third place.
Windows 8.1 to OEMs by late August. Microsoft did not say when Home windows 8
Microsoft will hand about its most recent variation with the running
program, Home windows eight.1, to OEMs in late August, Microsoft’s Home windows
marketing and advertising main told its companions on Monday early morning.
Talking at its All over the world Partner Conference (WPC), Tami Reller, corporate vice chairman and main advertising and marketing officer for Windows, explained that Microsoft would make the RTM (launch to production) variation of Windows 8.1 to OEMs by late August. Microsoft did not say when Home windows 8.one can be released to buyers in its closing kind, but background suggests that Microsoft ought to at the least be on target to ship by Oct.
Microsoft’s WPC, as its title implies, is Microsoft’s opportunity to communicate its roadmaps to its associates; Microsoft started its companion method about 20 years back. In accordance to chief executive Steve Ballmer, ninety p.c of your income Microsoft realizes “in a way, condition or form” is created with the partners Ballmer dealt with these days as portion of a 3.5-hour keynote tackle.
In mixture, these associates had “quite a fantastic yr,” Ballmer stated, with all of its partners growing six.five % more than very last yr, on foundation income of $650 billion.
Ballmer’s message, mainly because it continues to be, was that Microsoft has reinvented itself to be a equipment and companies enterprise, rather then simply a software package agency. “Windows has usually been a lot more a tool than a piece of software package; it outlined a class of system known as the Personal computer,” he reported, no matter if they be, tablets, all-in-ones, convertibles, and a lot more.
Ballmer reported that Microsoft’s partners could well be shown how Microsoft has enhanced while in the cloud, particularly how Microsoft straddles the general public and personal cloud; “big information,” like how Microsoft options to share Bing lookup facts with developers and provide community facts to non-public clouds with all the Azure Facts Market; how Microsoft’s social initiatives straddle several different products; and cellular, particularly how Microsoft supports its very own solutions from by itself and many others.
http://www.windows7retailbox.com/microsoft-windows-8-professional-3264-bit-full-retail-pack-p-3597.html
Talking at its All over the world Partner Conference (WPC), Tami Reller, corporate vice chairman and main advertising and marketing officer for Windows, explained that Microsoft would make the RTM (launch to production) variation of Windows 8.1 to OEMs by late August. Microsoft did not say when Home windows 8.one can be released to buyers in its closing kind, but background suggests that Microsoft ought to at the least be on target to ship by Oct.
Microsoft’s WPC, as its title implies, is Microsoft’s opportunity to communicate its roadmaps to its associates; Microsoft started its companion method about 20 years back. In accordance to chief executive Steve Ballmer, ninety p.c of your income Microsoft realizes “in a way, condition or form” is created with the partners Ballmer dealt with these days as portion of a 3.5-hour keynote tackle.
In mixture, these associates had “quite a fantastic yr,” Ballmer stated, with all of its partners growing six.five % more than very last yr, on foundation income of $650 billion.
Ballmer’s message, mainly because it continues to be, was that Microsoft has reinvented itself to be a equipment and companies enterprise, rather then simply a software package agency. “Windows has usually been a lot more a tool than a piece of software package; it outlined a class of system known as the Personal computer,” he reported, no matter if they be, tablets, all-in-ones, convertibles, and a lot more.
Ballmer reported that Microsoft’s partners could well be shown how Microsoft has enhanced while in the cloud, particularly how Microsoft straddles the general public and personal cloud; “big information,” like how Microsoft options to share Bing lookup facts with developers and provide community facts to non-public clouds with all the Azure Facts Market; how Microsoft’s social initiatives straddle several different products; and cellular, particularly how Microsoft supports its very own solutions from by itself and many others.
http://www.windows7retailbox.com/microsoft-windows-8-professional-3264-bit-full-retail-pack-p-3597.html
Saturday, July 6, 2013
Satoru Iwata Refuses to Layoff Nintendo Employees
Nintendo's top dog says that layoffs may solve short-term financial woes,
but are destructive to employee morale.
Nintendo isn't doing so well this generation. Despite this, president Satoru Iwata refuses to layoff staff members, stating that while it may solve short-term financial woes, the destructive effect on employee morale isn't worth it. "If we reduce the number of employees for better short-term financial results, employee morale will decrease," he told investors in a Q and A session.
Further justifying his reasoning, Iwata says "I sincerely doubt employees who fear that they may be laid off will be able to develop software titles that could impress people around the world." Sounds like a pretty solid boss who actually has his employee's bests interests at heart, if he refuses to give them the ax despite the company's struggling financials.
"I also know that some employers publicize their restructuring plan to improve their financial performance by letting a number of their employees go," Iwata explained, "but at Nintendo, employees make valuable contributions in their respective fields, so I believe that laying off a group of employees will not help to strengthen Nintendo's business in the long run."
Iwata points to the rapidly strengthening yen versus the US dollar as another reason for the company's financial situation. He adds that that today's games require more manpower to produce than those in the past, mirroring statements made earlier this week by Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto
Nintendo isn't doing so well this generation. Despite this, president Satoru Iwata refuses to layoff staff members, stating that while it may solve short-term financial woes, the destructive effect on employee morale isn't worth it. "If we reduce the number of employees for better short-term financial results, employee morale will decrease," he told investors in a Q and A session.
Further justifying his reasoning, Iwata says "I sincerely doubt employees who fear that they may be laid off will be able to develop software titles that could impress people around the world." Sounds like a pretty solid boss who actually has his employee's bests interests at heart, if he refuses to give them the ax despite the company's struggling financials.
"I also know that some employers publicize their restructuring plan to improve their financial performance by letting a number of their employees go," Iwata explained, "but at Nintendo, employees make valuable contributions in their respective fields, so I believe that laying off a group of employees will not help to strengthen Nintendo's business in the long run."
Iwata points to the rapidly strengthening yen versus the US dollar as another reason for the company's financial situation. He adds that that today's games require more manpower to produce than those in the past, mirroring statements made earlier this week by Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto
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