Keeping Current

Home Depot Targeting Sears, hhgregg’s Appliance Share

Home Depot knows an opportunity when it sees it. As hhgregg closes the last of its doors and Sears cuts back on its appliance...

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SiriusXM In Talks To Acquire Pandora

Despite Pandora founder Tim Westergren’s efforts, the streaming service hasn’t been able to compete with the on-demand likes of Spotify or even Napster. “Liberty...

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Rick Sharp Golf Classic Raises Funds For Alzheimer’s Cure

Circuit City and Carmax chief exec Rick Sharp was felled by Alzheimer’s in 2014 but his legacy lives on in an annual golf tournament...

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The MP3 Is Officially Dead

The Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits, inventor of the digital format, announced it was terminating the licensing program for MP3s. While the group was...

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Sprint, SoftBank Said In Informal Deal Talks With T-Mobile

Sprint’s last attempt to acquire to the crimson carrier fell apart in 2014 because of the difficulty of obtaining federal regulatory approval. “Sprint Corp....

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Sears’ Lampert: We Have All The Customers We Need, Thanks

Sears Holdings chairman, CEO and chief investor Eddie Lampert told shareholders at yesterday’s annual company meeting that the retailer’s Shop Your Way loyalty program...

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It’s Official: T-Mobile’s In Play

The CEO of T-Mobile parent Deutche Telekom confirmed that it will weigh all merger options for the crimson carrier, but will take its time...

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iPhone 8 Facing Production Delays

A new report by Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo confirms earlier indications that supply shortages will hamper production of Apple’s forthcoming mobile flagship iPhone 8....

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It’s Now Or Never, Google

Amazon has already established a commanding lead in the connected-home space with it’s Alexa AI platform and Echo family of voice-activated products. So Alphabet...

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Bloomberg Writes Sears’ Obit

Although Bloomberg’s pre-preemptive obituary may be a tad premature, the business news outlet incisively compares the impact of Sears’ early catalog days on a...

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Samsung Working On Next-Gen Washer

Samsung has applied for a patent that would allow owners to store quantities of detergent and fabric softener within a compartment inside their washer,...

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Walmart May Be Readying An Amazon Dash Competitor

Walmart has made it no secret that it won’t go gentle into Amazon’s good night, revealing last year that it would slow brick-and-mortar openings...

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Apple Promises To Give U.S. Manufacturing A $1 Billion Boost

Apple CEO Tim Cook appeared on CNBC’s “Mad Money” Wednesday to declare that Apple will invest $1 billion to fund manufacturing initiatives in the...

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Retail Restructuring Forcing Merchants, Malls To Rethink Biz Models

With nine national chains filing for bankruptcy and nearly 90,000 retail jobs gone since October, merchants are scrambling to adapt to the margin pressures...

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Merger Talk From T-Mobile Chief John Legere Centers On Dish, Sprint And Comcast

Following a strong first-quarter earnings report and the netting of some $8 billion in low-frequency bandwidth in the FCC’s recent airwave auction, T-Mobile CEO...

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T-Mobile’s John Legere Taking ‘Pot’ Shots At Verizon’s 4/20 Earnings Report

T-Mobile’s troll-in-chief John Legere is at it again. In response to Verizon’s first-quarter earnings report, which was released on unofficial Cannabis Day (April 20)...

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Best Buy Shares Near All-Time High

Shares of Best Buy are rapidly approaching their all-time high of $56.66 (reached on April 1, 2006). Fueling the momentum is a recent analyst...

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Landlords Seeking Alternative Tenants Amid Retail Consolidation

In the wake of what USA Today describes as a “retail apocalypse” (we prefer the term retrenchment), commercial real estate brokers are looking to...

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Is There Any Hope For Brick-And-Mortar?

No question that the Amazon-ization of retail and an over-stored landscape has led to chain-store bankruptcies and zombie malls. But rather than spelling the...

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Will Amazon Buy BJ’s?

BJ’s Wholesale Club, which was taken private six years ago by a pair of equity investment partners, is up for grabs once again. This...

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Apple Considers Bidding For Big Stake In Toshiba Chip Business

Apple and manufacturing partner Foxconn are considering a plan to help bail out struggling Toshiba by investing “several billion dollars” to take a stake...

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FCC Reverses Proposal For Cellphone Use On Planes

Federal regulators are withdrawing a proposal that would have allowed air travelers to use their cellphones at high altitude. “Taking it off the table...

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Staples For Sale?

Staples may be back in play following it’s failed merger with Office Depot. The No. 1 office supply chain is reportedly in talks with...

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Streaming Drives U.S. Music Sales Up 11% In 2016

Although things improved for 2016, the RIAA noted in its report that revenue was still about half of what was achieved in 1999. It...

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LeEco’s On Again, Off Again Vizio Acquisition May Be Off For Good

After being sidelined by cash flow problems and a privacy invasion lawsuit, LeEco’s $2 billion acquisition of Vizio may be permanently scuttled, this time...

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AVAD Adds BenQ To Product Lineup

The addition gives the distributors’ dealers “access to solutions for every installation and application they encounter,” said AVAD’s senior vendor business manager Timo Hildebrandt....

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Headquarters Closure A Possibility, RadioShack Warns

RadioShack may have to lay off upward of 150 corporate employees and possibly shut its Forth Worth, Texas, headquarters if it is unable to...

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Amazon May Open Consumer Electronics Stores

After taking a sledgehammer to CE brick-and-mortar, a report from The New York Times indicates the e-tailer is weighing its entry into the format....

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Amazon Will Collect Sales Taxes Nationwide On April 1

A study in 2016 supported what brick-and-mortar retailers had long complained about: Not collecting sales tax gave Amazon an unfair advantage. “Amazon, the online...

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Wedding Bells Likely For T-Mobile And Sprint

UBS analyst John Hodulik sees the writing on the wall: A laissez faire administration; an eager Sprint owner in SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son; T-Mobile’s thirst for high-band spectrum; and...

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hhgregg Cash Squeeze Causes Fulfillment Snags For Customers

According to this report by an ABC-TV affiliate in Cleveland, hhgregg customers have waited as long as three months for big-ticket deliveries before being...

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Huawei Wooing AT&T In Pursuit Of U.S. Smartphone Foothold

Any foreign manufacturer’s dream is to crack the U.S. market and No. 3 smartphone maker Huawei is no different. After sampling domestic success with...

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Vendors Get Defensive Following Sears’ Distress Call

Manufacturers are taking added precautions to assure payment from Sears in the wake of the retailer’s insolvency warning this week. “Sears Holdings Corp’s (SHLD.O)...

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Walmart Gets Its Digital Groove On

Enthused by its $3.3 billion investment in Jet, the world’s largest discount chain has created an e-commerce incubator, called Store No. 8, to develop digital start-ups...

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It’s A Bird, It’s A Plane … It’s Amazon!

Underscoring its commitment to aerial delivery, Amazon has applied for a pair of sky-high patents describing a “super-drone collective” and a floating warehouse to...

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Sears Pretty Much Admits It’s Toast

They finally came right out and said it: In its annual 10-K filing, released yesterday, Sears Holdings acknowledged that “substantial doubt exists” as to...

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Kellyanne Conway Isn’t As Crazy As You Think With That Microwave Comment

Security concerns for smart-home devices — both real and imagined — are taking a toll on the category’s advancement potential. “In case you’re wondering,...

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Replacing Wi-Fi With Sci-Fi At T-Mobile’s Test Labs

Deep inside T-Mobile’s test labs near its Washington state headquarters, secreted away behind three layers of secure-entry doors, the carrier’s engineers and counterparts from hardware...

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