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☆ SAP slightly lowers outlook after Qualtrics divestment
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-21 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

April 21 (Reuters) - Business software maker SAP (SAPG.DE) on Friday slightly lowered its outlook due to the divestment of its Qualtrics unit while reporting first-quarter revenue growth that beat expectations. SAP reported revenue growth of 10% in the first three months of 2023, to 7.44 billion euros ($8.15 billion), beating expectations of 7% in company-provided consensus. The tech giant now expects non-IFRS operating profit in the range of 8.6-8.9 billion euros, 200 million euros less than before. For cloud revenue, it now targets between 14 and 14.4 billion euros, down 1.3 billion euros from previous guidance. Additionally, the IFRS operating result was affected by restructuring costs associated with SAP's recent cost-cutting program.

The logo of German software group SAP is pictured at the headquarters of SAP (Schweiz) AG in Regensdorf, Switzerland January 22, 2021. Revenue from SAP's lucrative cloud business grew 24% year-on-year, broadly in line with consensus. For the year, SAP expects non-IFRS operating profit in the range of 8.6-8.9 billion euros, 200 million euros less than before. Cloud revenue forecast is seen down by 1.3 billion euros to between 14 and 14.4 billion euros. "Underlying guidance is essentially unchanged, although updated to reflect the disposal of Qualtrics," Jefferies analysts wrote in a client note.

☆ Silver Lake to buy Germany's Software AG in $2.42 bln deal
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-21 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: 1 min

April 22 (Reuters) - Private-equity firm Silver Lake has offered to buy Software AG (SOWGn.DE) in a deal that values the German business software developer at 2.2 billion euros ($2.42 billion). The offer price of 30 euros per share in cash by Silver Lake-controlled Blitz 22-449 SE represents a premium of 53% to Software AG's closing price of 19.59 euros on Thursday. In February 2022, Silver Lake had invested 344 million euros in the software developer's convertible bond, which upon conversion would represent nearly 9% of issued Software AG shares, the company said in a statement. Software AG's board and takeover committee are "highly supportive" of the offer and intend to recommend it to its shareholders, the company said. ($1 = 0.9102 euros)Reporting by Juby Babu in Bengaluru; Editing by Anil D'SilvaOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Generative AI, which the tech industry has embraced, has the ability to synthesize large amounts of data and answer complex questions. Atlassian co-founder Scott Farquhar said because companies use its software to track and document projects, Atlassian is in a unique position to use AI to help knowledge workers dramatically increase their productivity. Starting Wednesday, customers can join a waitlist to access the new features, the company said. Atlassian said the new AI features include the ability to extract action items and decisions from a meeting transcript, and draft Tweets and software testing plans based on product documentation. Reporting by Anna Tong in San Francisco; Editing by Sonali PaulOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ The dollar's dominance on the world stage isn't going away. Here's why.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-06 | by ( Phil Rosen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

The move makes sense, given Russia's growing status as a pariah state, but it also highlights a push to unseat the dollar as a dominant force in global trade. But to strategists at the Carson Group, a scenario where the dollar isn't the world's primary reserve currency simply isn't in the cards in the near future. Are you convinced that the dollar won't lose its status as a dominant global reserve currency? Some companies in this batch of oil stocks have upsides of up to 180%, according to strategists at Bank of America. An expert from the World Gold Council pointed out that history says gold performs well in a recession.

☆ Generative AI Tools Use Custom Data to Power More Business Functions
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-29 | by ( Angus Loten | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Adobe’s Amit Ahuja, left, Anjul Bhambhri, center, and Ely Greenfield discuss generative AI at the Adobe Summit last week. Business software makers in financial management, design and other areas are rolling out generative artificial intelligence tools that pack troves of industry-specific data into customized applications, aiming for an edge in an already crowded market. By leveraging data gathered from specific business functions—in some cases stockpiled from decades of commercial use—software firms can offer AI tools fine-tuned for distinct applications, industry analysts said. They can also keep underlying algorithms free of extraneous data scraped online from unknown sources, which can produce unreliable results, they said.

☆ A.I. could drive $7 trillion in global growth in 10 years, Goldman estimates. Here's how to play it.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-28 | by ( Pia Singh | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Within that, generative AI has a total addressable market of $150 billion, Goldman said. We believe Generative AI can streamline business workflows, automate routine tasks and give rise to a new generation of business applications," Goldman analysts wrote in a recent research report. But generative AI is able to produce new content such as text, video, images or computer code — putting it a step ahead. "Generative AI tools have far-reaching implications across industries, from enterprise software to healthcare, financial services and more," Goldman said. With the tech giants already incorporating it into their products, Goldman sees generative AI boosting sales, productivity and product innovation.

☆ Microsoft Adds the Tech Behind ChatGPT to Its Business Software
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-16 | by ( Tom Dotan | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Microsoft Corp. is infusing its popular workplace software with the technology behind the viral chatbot ChatGPT, upgrading PowerPoint, Word, Excel and Outlook with new abilities in its latest move to try to stay ahead in the artificial-intelligence race. The software giant has gone all-in on generative AI, following its multibillion-dollar investment in ChatGPT’s creator OpenAI. In February, Microsoft rolled out a new version of its search engine Bing that used generative AI to give direct answers to questions and had a sophisticated chat tool. Now it is bringing the technology to its Microsoft 365 suite of software to enable users to create presentations, write documents and summarize emails—all from natural-language prompts.

☆ Microsoft adds OpenAI technology to Word and Excel
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-16 | by ( Jonathan Vanian | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Photographer: Charles Pertwee/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesMicrosoft is bringing generative artificial intelligence technologies like the popular ChatGPT chatting app to its Microsoft 365 suite of business software. features, dubbed Copilot, will be available in some of the company's most popular business apps like Word, PowerPoint and Excel. The Copilot technology is built upon a type of artificial intelligence software known as a large language model, or LLM. Microsoft executives demonstrated some of the capabilities of its Copilot tool on Thursday during an online presentation. In February, Microsoft debuted a new version of its Bing search engine that included a chatbot powered by OpenAI's GPT-4 language technology.

☆ SVB Collapse Puts Pressure on Enterprise-Tech Pipeline
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-15 | by ( Angus Loten | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince spoke at The Wall Street Journal CIO Network Summit on Tuesday in Palo Alto, Calif. The abrupt collapse of Silicon Valley Bank is expected to put a damper on innovation in the enterprise-technology market—at least in the short term—with emerging software startups facing new fundraising challenges and higher-priced loans, corporate technology chiefs, investors and industry analysts say. Beyond added financial pressures, they say, enterprise-tech developers—which make business software tools for companies—will also have to adjust to the sudden loss of the bank as a networking hub at the center of the startup ecosystem, which has helped foster the growth of countless go-to enterprise software products and services.

☆ Salesforce to add ChatGPT to Slack as part of OpenAI partnership
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-07 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

March 7 (Reuters) - Salesforce Inc (CRM.N) said on Tuesday it was working with ChatGPT creator OpenAI to add the chatbot sensation to its collaboration software Slack, as well as bring generative artificial intelligence to its business software generally. ChatGPT also would integrate with Slack to help users summarize conversation threads and handle other queries. Clara Shih, a general manager at Salesforce, said in a press briefing that the announcement responded to demand by businesses for the nascent technology. Salesforce's generative AI tools would help companies “completely reimagine how they engage with their customers,” she said. Salesforce also announced a fund to invest in generative AI startups.

☆ Salesforce shares climb as growth forecast, buyback plan appease investors
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-02 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

March 2 (Reuters) - Shares of Salesforce Inc (CRM.N) jumped 15% in premarket trade on Thursday after the cloud-based software provider's revenue forecast eased concerns about slowing growth and its move to double its share repurchase to $20 billion appeased investors. Still, Salesforce's first-quarter revenue forecast implied growth of 10%, higher than analysts' estimates of 9%. Other activist investors with a stake in Salesforce include Starboard Value, Inclusive Capital Partners and ValueAct Capital. They have pushed for higher growth and margins, more share buybacks and raised concerns about recent acquisitions. Shares of Salesforce have advanced 26% this year through Wednesday's close, compared with a near 3% gain in the benchmark S&P 500 index (.SPX).

☆ Salesforce sufficiently acquiesces to angry mob
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-02 | by ( Robert Cyran | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

The software developer revealed financial progress in its quarterly results, indicated it would throttle pricey deals and installed new board members, including a representative from ValueAct Capital. Co-Founder and Chief Executive Marc Benioff said on Wednesday that improving profitability is the company’s top priority. As evidence of the commitment, Salesforce said in January that it would lay off 10% of its workers. They are Mason Morfit, chief executive of ValueAct Capital; Sachin Mehra, Mastercard’s finance chief; and Arnold Donald, the former CEO of Carnival. Assertive investors Starboard Value, ValueAct Capital, and Inclusive Capital, have held talks with Salesforce, according to Reuters.

The nominating window closes March 14, and it is unclear if it is two or three nominees, Faber said on " Squawk on the Street ." The slate will likely include Jesse Cohn who runs the activist practice at Elliott, according to people familiar with the situation, but Faber said his position hasn't been confirmed. Activist investor Elliott Management has nominated a slate of directors for Salesforce 's board, sources told CNBC's David Faber on Wednesday. Elliott Management unveiled its multibillion-dollar investment in Salesforce in January, and the company said ValueAct Capital CEO Mason Morfit will join its board this month. Dan Loeb's hedge fund, Third Point, has also built a position in the company, CNBC confirmed in February.

☆ China tech companies are closely watching ChatGPT's A.I. skills. Here's what they're doing
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( Evelyn Cheng | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Big tech companies in the U.S. and China rushed this month to announce they are working on similar AI tools. PingCap launched "Chat2Query" for customers outside China in January that uses a publicly available application programming interface from OpenAI. "We think the revolution may not be in AI search but in every business," he said in Mandarin, translated by CNBC. Transformative potentialFang said he was directly inspired by OpenAI's early version of ChatGPT tech in 2020. In contrast, he said generative AI tech can immediately provide value since it operates where users are already producing and consuming content.

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Marc Benioff, cofounder and CEO of Salesforce, attends a session at the Congress centre during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on January 17, 2023. Dan Loeb's hedge fund Third Point has built a position in Salesforce , expanding the group of activists circling the business software maker, CNBC has confirmed. The news comes two weeks after Salesforce said ValueAct Capital CEO Mason Morfit will join its board in March. Since, which joined the Dow Jones Industrial Average in 2020, has faced high-profile departures and slowing revenue growth of late and dealt with criticism for buying companies such as Slack and Tableau at high multiples. On Jan. 4, Salesforce shares rose more than 3% after the company announced a plan to cut 10% of employees.

☆ TripActions Rebrands as Navan, Adds ChatGPT to Expense Reports
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( Angus Loten | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +6 min

TripActions, a business-travel software startup, plans to integrate OpenAI’s ChatGPT capabilities across its online platform, an effort aimed at seizing market share by making expense reports easier to use. That way, the expense report is generated during the trip as expenses are incurred, Mr. Cohen said. “Generally, software in the business-to-business space is designed to serve the company,” rather than the employees, Mr. Cohen said. “Using AI helps you create the kind of software that I’m talking about,” Mr. Cohen said. PREVIEWSAP Concur has also begun using AI in its travel and expense software, which can “tap decades of expense data and experience tracking to identify hard-to-detect spend issues and anomalies,” said Charlie Sultan, president of Concur Travel.

☆ Here’s our February rapid-fire update on all 34 stocks in Jim Cramer’s Investing Club portfolio
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-05 | by ( Matthew J. Belvedere | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +12 min

Here's a rapid-fire update on all 34 stocks in Jim Cramer's Charitable Trust, the holdings we manage in the CNBC Investing Club. J & J is a good stock to get into ahead of the impending split into two companies: consumer brands and pharma/medical technology. The company reported a good quarter and guidance, while fundamentals are solid ahead of the split. As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust's portfolio.

Advertising meme account @digital_chadvertising had decidedly humble beginnings on its way to becoming a popular outlet for industry workers to voice their frustrations, connect with each other and share marketing news. @digital_chadvertising has since gained nearly 80,000 followers on Instagram while mocking everything from industry acronyms to Twitter’s recent advertiser exodus. That does not match the Instagram followings of the leading ad trade publications, but it tops those of large ad-agency networks and other industry accounts. Some prefer formats and platforms that don’t fit the strict definition of a meme but still use the meme world’s sardonic tone to target an industry niche. “The line is so thin between meme and work with my specific niche,” said @digital_chadvertising.

Feb 1 (Reuters) - QAD, a business software maker was taken private by buyout firm Thoma Bravo in 2021 for $2 billion, told Reuters on Wednesday it has agreed to acquire employee productivity platform Redzone for about $1 billion. Redzone, which was founded in 2013, offers enterprise software solutions primarily for the manufacturing industry. Founded in 1979, QAD provides cloud-based planning and resources solutions software to manufacturing companies. The deal will help QAD expand its footprint across different sectors within the manufacturing industry. Reporting Milana Vinn in San Francisco and Krystal Hu in New York Editing by Greg RoumeliotisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Global IT Spending Decreased in 2022
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-18 | by ( Angus Loten | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +4 min

Companies worldwide made deep cuts in enterprise technology spending last year, with tighter information-technology budgets likely to stretch well into the year ahead. Global IT spending contracted 0.2% in 2022, dropping to $4.38 trillion—a rare instance of corporations spending less on digital business tools than in the previous year, according to IT consulting and research firm Gartner Inc.Gartner had initially estimated that IT spending had increased 0.8% last year. Newsletter Sign-up WSJ | CIO Journal The Morning Download delivers daily insights and news on business technology from the CIO Journal team. Spending on business software and IT services is expected to remain steady year-over-year, together accounting for more than $2.16 trillion in projected spending in 2023, Gartner said. Within IT services, spending on consulting services alone is projected to reach $264 billion, up 6.7% from 2022, Gartner said.

☆ The most-popular big tech default email programs are old and vulnerable
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-15 | by ( Elizabeth Macbride | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +13 min

All over the world, organizations of all sizes, including small businesses, scrambled to upload patches and to figure out if they'd been infiltrated. Each time big software companies have changed default settings or made blanket changes with cybersecurity in mind, he points out, cybercrime fell measurably. Some of its donors are big technology companies. "Microsoft takes email security very seriously," said Girish Chander, head of Microsoft Defender for Office, in a statement to CNBC. Updating email software default settings.

☆ 5 writers break down how they launched careers from their copywriting side hustles and now make up to 6 figures
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-12 | by ( Ella Hopkins | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Alexa Nizam started freelance copywriting on weekends and in the evenings alongside her job in 2020 using the freelancer-platform Fiverr. She left her day job one year after she started copywriting when she realized she'd made $8,000 in a month from freelancing. Read more: I make up to $13,000 a month on Fiverr doing freelance copywriting. Courtesy of Elna CainElna Cain started freelance writing in 2014 when her maternity leave was coming to an end. Emilina LomasEmilina Lomas started freelance copywriting while earning her master's degree in 2018.

☆ Save, don't spend, warns Intuit's CEO, as he notices 'good behavior' around money habits eroding
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-10 | by ( Jason Lalljee | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

That's partially due to inflation woes, but spending on travel and recreation still remains high. That's largely due to an unprecedented boon in cash from stimulus checks and other pandemic aid along with reduced spending amid the pandemic. Inflation has been eating into Americans' wallets for the last two years, but it's not the only reason savings are falling. Spending has remained strong overall, especially for in-person services that were especially constrained during the worst of the pandemic, said Goodarzi. Credit bureau Experian defines a score of 580 to 669 as "fair," and most Americans fall somewhere between 600 and 750.

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