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HWF Current Market Background

The TMT sector is now globally very large, and technology is mission critical for businesses and governments alike. Penetration of mobile telephones and networked personal computers has risen dramatically. Does the sector still have attractions?

1) The sector generally has little debt, and many substantial companies have significant cash balances. This proved a drag on the sector in relative terms, when there was a credit boom, but has provided resilience in the downturn, and offers the potential for earnings enhancing acquisitions, at prices reasonable for the sellers, while cash yields so little. Furthermore, products and services are not generally acquired with debt as in sectors such as property and cars.

2) There is a significant amount of non discretionary recurring expenditure - maintenance, data centres, security such as unified threat management, rental and hosted software models, domain names, etc. Companies with recurring models may not offer the highest growth rates, but should command a premium for certainty.

3) The major market of PCs is forecast by Gartner to grow in unit terms by 24.5% in 2010 reflecting a strong upgrade cycle and successful penetration of WIndows 7. This in turn will stimulate an upgrade cycle for Windows 7 compatibility and these more powerful products will drive further adoption of multimedia applications over the networks within organisations and over the wide area network. Just as we look back on the quaint DOS based PCs of the early years, no doubt we will look back at the current age of PCs as quaint too. 

4) While the major market of mobile phones appears to have flattened in volume terms, there is a seismic shift to the use of smart phones utilising  the mobile internet. Apple and its i-Phone has demonstrated that there is a big market for mobile access thanks to the success of their applications, and their user friendly nature.

5) TVs now account for c50% of consumer electronics expenditure reflecting the adoption of flat panels, high definition pictures and widespread adoption of digital transmission. This market is still evolving and a further replacment cycle looks probable with the emergence of 3D TV, which is not at a mass market price point yet, further developments in screen technology and the expectation that TVs will increasingly be used to view internet content.

6) Energy efficiency is a major driver both for mobile battery life, and to reduce fuel costs and the associated emissions. Data centres consume c2% of US electricity! This is also opening up new markets such as LED lighting, which will shortly become economically attractive for domestic and business use, as well as solar power generation. The compound semiconductors used in these technologies are a natural extension for the markets historically addressed.

All these markets have only opened up because of enabling technologies behind the scenes. If Microsoft has been a primary driver of PCs, a number of major companies have spun from this market- Intel, Foxconn, Dell, HP, EMC, Seagate, Western Digital to name but a few. A later generation of companies have benefited from the growth in networking- Cisco, Huawei, F5 and more. The widespread adoption of the internet has spawned Google and Amazon. 

We continue to be excited about our sector.

Portfolio Companies

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