"IT managers have taken their foot off the brakes, but they are hesitant to put their foot on the gas ..." That's what we wrote in our Eye on IT newsletter in January 2004, and that is what we still think. Despite very good signs of a recovery in the US, possibly manipulated because elections are coming, there are very few signs that IT investments are back to normal.
This week, several software companies issued warnings about a weak quarter, but this did not surprise us. Sun managed to disguise its bad news about a miserable quarter and subsequent layoffs of 3300 staff with the news about a capitulation to Microsoft, but Sybase, E.Piphany, SeeBeyond and Kana Software were not so lucky. On the other hand, Siebel Systems suprised with some good news about its earnings, although Tom Siebel said "he doesn't see any indicators of dramatically increasing growth in the information technology market this year". Just wait and see...
Update: Nokia issued a warning that it will miss its sales guidance for the first quarter, due to a weaker-than-expected performance from its mobile-phone business in Europe and Asia. Its networks business and its enterprise solutions unit are doing well, but its shares were down over 16% in early trading.
Who's next ??