Five Companies That Came To Win This Week

Love him or hate him, you have to give credit to Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, who this week brought embattled former HP CEO Mark Hurd into the fold as co-president and member of Oracle's board of directors. In one fell swoop, Ellison added to his roster a former arch-foe with a channel friendly pedigree and experience in hardware-software integration.

"Mark did a brilliant job at HP and I expect he'll do even better at Oracle," Ellison said in a statement this week.

Hurd going to Oracle also fulfilled what had to be the worst-case scenario for HP, which responded with a lawsuit aimed at blocking Hurd's move. HP's position is that Hurd will inevitably disclose HP's trade secrets and other confidential information, but some legal experts don't expect the suit to succeed.

ARM Takes The Fight To Intel In Server Chips

Chip designer ARM this week unveiled "Eagle" Cortex-A15, its future mobile processor core architecture that features five times the performance of current smartphone processors with no additional power consumption.

But Eagle isn't just for smartphones: Industry analysts say that when products arrive in 2013, ARM could give Intel and AMD a run for their money in the server and laptop markets, where low power consumption could be a game-changer.

Intel has been gunning for ARM in the smartphone processor space, as evidenced by its $1.4 billion acquisition of Infineon's wireless chipset unit last month. But if ARM delivers on its promises with Eagle, Intel's road to catching up just got a lot steeper.

Nokia Taps Microsoft Executive As New CEO

Nokia has lost a third of its market capitalization since April, and it's struggling to remain relevant in a smartphone market dominated by the likes of Apple and Google. In an effort to halt its slide, Nokia this week brought in Stephen Elop, president of the Microsoft Business Division, as its new CEO.

Elop, who has also spent time at Juniper, doesn't bring much mobile experience, but he was the first Microsoft executive to articulate the company's Software Plus Services vision and the significance of its Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) of cloud based Office apps. Doing so was no mean feat, and while Elop will face a different set of challenges at Nokia, his appointment is a bold, yet calculated gamble on Nokia's part.

Apple Loosens Restrictions For iPhone, iPad Developers

Apple this week removed some of the restrictions in its Application Developer Program license agreement and opened the door for Flash developers to build apps for the iPhone and iPad. The cynical view holds that Apple's move was prompted by SEC scrutiny, but no matter what the cause, it's helping to melt some of the iciness that has built up in the historically strong Apple-Adobe partnership.

The move will make it easier for developers to build apps and get them onto the App Store, and down the road that will give Apple the ability to cite ever more eye-popping figures to illustrate its growth. More apps equates to more interest, too, which means developers could start pushing into new realms of heretofore undreamt-about functionality.

Skype Makes Its Channel Program Official

Skype isn't on the radar of most telephony solution providers, but the VoIP company took a big step into the business space this week with the unveiling of a formal channel program. Skype's ambitions in courting businesses are well known, but the company's goal isn't to resell the Skype platform through the channel. Rather, Skype is recruiting a network of VARs with the skills to incorporate Skype into networking and infrastructure solutions.

Skype has already brought onboard 20 VARs and systems integrators as part of the Skype Channel Partner Program, and it is seeking new applications to be certified on Skype through a sign-up page: partner.skype.com.

Check out our roundup of vendors that dropped the ball for a look at the companies that were asleep at the wheel this week.