Where's the debt crisis in Silicon Valley? The knock-on effects are all too real, but frozen credit markets have had little direct effect on business operations, aside from possibly scotching the debt-fueled sales of Alltel and Nextel. That's because technology companies are run by paranoid sorts who like to keep large cash reserves, in case some upstart renders their market obsolete....
...So who's got cash on hand? Here are the 10 richest tech companies, from a Yahoo Finance screening. (I left out companies, like IBM, whose cash was matched by equally outsized debts.)
- China Mobile, $31.0 billion
China's oil, steel, and finance giants are investing overseas. Why not its leading wireless company? Yes, China censors its citizens. That was a trendy thing to worry about in August 2008.- Cisco Systems, $26.2 billion
Cisco's so proud of its cash pile, its investor-relations chief has blogged about it. If only investors had any confidence in Cisco's bizarre social-network acquisition strategy, which has nothing to do with its fine telecom-equipment assets. Memo to Cisco's M&A team: Just because it has the word "network" in it doesn't mean you have to buy it....MORE
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Cash is King: The 10 richest tech companies (Off-topic)
We try to keep some focus at Climateer Investing but as firm believers in the interconnectedness of everything, it takes diligence. Sometimes though, we come across something totally off-topic but potentially useful to our readers. Here's an example, from Valleywag:
