Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

Here are some of the topics covered in the latest issue:

*Q4 tech earnings surprises

*Acme Packet gets conservative

*A small-cap video infrastructure play

*Informatica bounces back

*Qualcomm going strong

*Google bets big on mobile

*EMC grabs market share

*A cloud-software name with Facebook exposure

*An activist investor sees value in PMC-Sierra

*Updated Apple valuation analysis

*One hardware company benefiting from new software offerings

*How to play a promising product refresh cycle in networking

*An IT-security leader keeps gaining market share

*MicroStrategy shines in mobile business intelligence

*LSI Corp is a new force in flash storage processors

*TSP Deal Report: Boosting shareholder value at CA

Salesforce.com (CRM, $143.38) CEO Marc Benioff was a lot calmer at the Morgan Stanley tech conference this afternoon than he was on the recent earnings call. He focused his presentation on the topic of the social enterprise, saying the most successful companies going forward will focus on the interactions between customers, partners and employees.

Someone asked Benioff if a Microsoft (MSFT, $31.74) purchase of Jive Software (JIVE, $21.74) would hurt Salesforce.com. He said he was surprised that Jive was not acquired during its IPO process as it is a relatively small company that would be better as part of a larger organization. He also said the more companies competing in the social enterprise software space the better because this raises overall awareness.

Benioff’s comments sent Jive shares soaring in the final two minutes of trading. The stock closed up 5.6% for the session.

At the Morgan Stanley tech conference, Juniper Networks (JNPR, $23.04) CFO Robyn Denholm said the T4000 core router is on track to ship in the current quarter. But Juniper will not see a meaningful revenue ramp  for this product or other new offerings (including PTX and MobileNext) for six to nine months.

Sterne Agee lifts its Apple (AAPL, $546.99) price target to $620 from $550 based on positive expectations for the new iPad, which will be rolled out next week.

The firm thinks this product refresh (a significant one because of the move to 4G, better screen quality, faster processor and longer battery life) will help Apple sell 55 million iPads this year, up from the previous forecast of 51 million units.

Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

NetApp (NTAP, $43.95) shares are showing signs of life. After building a base in the low-$30s over the past several months, the stock is approaching its November pivot high of $44.89. NetApp has rebounded 33% from the 52-week low of $33, which was set on October 4.

In Q4, Dodge & Cox was the biggest NetApp buyer, opening a new position of 7.58 million shares. Tech-focused Coatue Management ($3.2 billion in long equity assets/74% tech weighting) started a position of 4.3 million shares. NetApp is now among Coatue’s 10 largest holdings.

VMware (VMW, $100.96) shares are back above the $100 level for the first time since the middle of November. The stock has rebounded 35% from the December low of $74.69.

OpCo made a nice call at the end of December when it upgraded VMware to ‘Outperform’ when the shares were trading around $83.70.  Wunderlich Securities made an even better call during the same period, going to ‘Buy’ when the stock was just under $77. See TechStock Radar—December 22, 2011.

Morgan Stanley names networking chipmaker Cavium (CAVM, $38.46) to its long Research Tactical Idea list ahead of the company’s presentation this afternoon at the investment firm’s tech conference.

Cavium shares got an immediate boost from this news and are now up more than 7% for the session. So far this year, the stock is up 35%.

For more on Cavium, Tech-Stock Prospector subscribers should see TSP #116 (October 2011, page 7).

Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

Next Century Growth Investors sure likes its SaaS names. The money manager, with 41% of its $2.6 billion in long equity assets in the tech sector, counts NetSuite (N, $50), Ultimate Software (ULTI, $71.63) and Concur Technologies (CNQR, $59.66) among its five largest holdings.

In Q4, Next Century was also a big buyer of Cornerstone OnDemand (CSOD, $20.61), boosting its position by 206% by purchasing 1.01 million shares. It now owns 1.5 million shares and is among Cornerstone’s five largest holders.

BMO Capital ups its Apple (AAPL, $520.23) price target to $590 from $545 based on continued strong demand in the overall smartphone market and the positive impact from new carrier partners. China Telecom begins offering the iPhone on March 9. For the March quarter, BMO lifts its iPhone sales estimate by 1 million units to 29 million.

In Q4, William Blair & Co. ($22.2 billion in long equity assets/22% tech weighting) was a big buyer of SolarWinds (SWI, $38.87), a provider of IT infrastructure management solutions.

SolarWinds represented the money manager’s largest tech position increase for the December quarter: William Blair boosted its stake by 600%, adding 2.84 million shares; it now owns 3.3 million shares and is the #2 investor behind Fidelity, which owns 6.05 million shares.

After some recent acquisitions, SolarWinds now sells datacenter software that manages shared computer servers using virtualization technology, along with solutions to manage applications and data storage systems. The company’s core business has been network performance management solutions.

In Q4, revenue rose 34% to $55.6 million. New license revenue rose 28%, driven by 32% growth in North America. After coming in with 2011 revenue growth of 30%, SolarWinds predicts 2012 top-line growth of between 24% and 29%.

SolarWinds shares are up 39% YTD. The stock trades at 34 times the 2012 consensus EPS estimate of $1.15. The high estimate is $1.21.

Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

Salesforce.com (CRM, $143.64) shares finished the day up 9%, but off the high of $146.26. With a market cap of $19.5 billion, the stock now trades at 6.6X the high end of the fiscal 2013 revenue guidance range of $2.92 billion to $2.95 billion.

While many analysts cheered the 35% billings growth in the latest quarter, others expressed concerns about a slowdown in Salesforce.com’s revenue growth for the current fiscal year. While revenue in fiscal 2012 rose 37%, the high end of the guidance range for fiscal 2013 indicates growth of 30%.

The bears say CEO Marc Benioff can hype the company all he wants (he put on quite a show during last night's conference call) and talk about all of the big deals that are being signed, but the top line is still showing a deceleration in growth.

FBR Capital lifted its LSI Corp (LSI, $8.49) price target to $10.50 from $9.50 based on channel checks that indicate the chipmaker could begin shipping production HDD controllers to Western Digital later this year.

The firm also expects a ramp in enterprise HDD shipments at Seagate thanks to an improvement in the flood situation in Thailand and a seasonal rebound in the PC sector.

For more on LSI, Tech-Stock Prospector subscribers should see the February 2012 issue (TSP #120, page 8).

UBS boosts its AMD (AMD, $7.49) price target to $11 from $9, saying a ramp in the company’s Trinity processor for ultrathin notebooks will help drive margin improvement. The firm also sees AMD gaining share in server processors. For 2012, UBS raises its EPS estimate to 89 cents from 65 cents.

For more on AMD, see TechStock Radar—February 7, 2012.

Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

UBS increases its Salesforce.com (CRM, $143) price target to $180 from $169, saying the company’s fiscal Q4 bookings and billings upside momentum was impressive. Deutsche Bank is even more bullish, boosting its target to $215 from $205. Salesforce.com shares are up more than 8% this morning.

Shares of Salesforce.com (CRM, $145 after hours) are up 10% in after-hours trading following a fiscal Q4 (Jan.) beat on both the top and bottom lines.

Per-share earnings of 43 cents topped the consensus estimate by three cents and revenue of $632 million (+38.3% year over year) came in well above the consensus of $624 million.

For fiscal 2013, Salesforce.com sees revenue of $2.92 billion to $2.95 billion (representing growth of 29% to 30%), vs. the consensus of $2.91 billion.

Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

Shares of Ultimate Software (ULTI, $69.87), a cloud-based provider of human capital management solutions, have traded back to the top of their recent range after dipping to $64.26 earlier this month. The stock faces tough resistance in the $70 to $71 range.

Ultimate has a market cap of $1.8 billion against a 2012 consensus revenue estimate of $330.4 million.

FBR Capital downgrades Juniper Networks (JNPR, $23.78) to ‘Market Perform’ and lowers its price target to $21 from $25 because the firm thinks delays and performance issues with various new and existing products will have a negative impact on revenue growth this year.

Sourcefire (FIRE, $45.20) is surging more than 26% today on heavy volume of 4.6 million shares.

Last night’s strong Q4 earnings report from the IT-security vendor has sent Wall Street analysts scrambling to raise their price targets on the stock:

*Needham goes to $48 from $32

*Miller Tabak goes to $46 from $42

*ThinkEquity goes to $46 from $39

*Stifel Nicolaus goes to $46 from $39

*UBS goes to $46 from $34

Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon.com Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

Needham raises its Salesforce.com (CRM, $128.70) price target to $139 from $125 ahead of the fiscal Q4 (Jan.) earnings report on Thursday.

The firm expects a positive tone on the conference call, with a focus on increased large deal activity and strength across all products and geographies.

Credit Suisse raises its Apple (AAPL, $510.33) price target to $600 from $550 based on valuation and the company’s large cash position.

The fiscal 2012 (Sept.) consensus EPS estimate is up to $42.76 from $42.60 last week.

Shares of IT-security vendor Sourcefire (FIRE, $38.55 after hours) are up more than 7% after hours following a strong Q4 report. Per-share earnings of 25 cents topped the consensus estimate by six cents. Revenue rose 40% to $53.2 million, well above the consensus of $46.9 million.

For Q1, the company sees revenue of $40 million to $42 million, above the consensus is $38.2 million, and EPS of six to eight cents, in line with the consensus of seven cents.

Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon.com Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

Informatica (INFA, $49.17) shares ran up to a high of $50.25 this morning before sellers stepped in. The stock continues its advance off the January low of $34.15. The November high stands at $50.75.

For more on Informatica, see TechStock Radar—February 16, 2012.

JMP Securities downgrades Oracle (ORCL, $28.69) to ‘Market Perform’ on concerns that the company’s cloud offerings will take time to mature just as competition is heating up in the cloud sector.

More customers are deciding to adopt cloud computing, but Oracle has a big legacy business to protect during this transition. JMP thinks Oracle is feeling the pressure in the form of reduced sales of its perpetual applications and reduced pull-through of database and middleware solutions to support these applications.

Lazard Capital is upbeat on Salesforce.com (CRM, $129.99) going into the fiscal Q4 earnings report on Wednesday, saying the results should alleviate any concerns about billings growth. For the January quarter, the consensus estimates: EPS of 40 cents on revenue of $622.8 million. The high EPS estimate is 42 cents.

Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

There might be some life in Juniper Networks (JNPR, $24.29) shares after all as value players come in, hoping that capital spending from U.S. carriers will bounce back this year more quickly than expected.

The stock, which is up 34.5% from its December low of $18.05, is approaching the 200-day moving average at $24.83.

The 2012 consensus EPS estimate of 98 cents indicates an expected decline of 17% from 2011 EPS of $1.19.

Intel (INTC, $27.35) shares today hit a new 52-week high at $27.35.  So far this year, the stock is up 12.7%. The RSI is rising from 69.5.

OpCo raises its Apple (AAPL, $505.66) price target to $570 from $510 and boosts its fiscal Q2 iPhone sales estimate to 31 million units from 29 million units. The firm says its check indicate only a modest post-holiday slowdown in iPhone 4S demand.

Read the latest issue of Tech-Stock Prospector on your Amazon Kindle. 

Order the February 2012 issue here.

In Q4, Fidelity increased its Hewlett-Packard (HPQ, $29.55) position by 24%, purchasing 10.17 million shares. The money manager now owns 52.2 million shares and is the #5 H-P investor. Dodge & Cox remains #1 with 116.9 million shares.

Owl Creek Asset Management ($2.9 billion in long equity assets) was the biggest new H-P buyer in the December quarter, opening a position of 5.2 million shares. It was the firm’s largest new position for the quarter.

So far this year, H-P shares are up 14.7%.

Informatica (INFA, $48.09) shares have crossed above the 200-day moving average at $46.74 and are approaching the November high of $50.75. The RSI is at 72.7. The stock is now up 40% from the January low of $34.15.

For more on Informatica, see TechStock Radar--January 27, 2012.

Traders are sending shares of enterprise storage vendor NetApp (NTAP, $43.74 after hours) up more than 9% after hours because the fiscal Q3 (January) earnings report did not disappoint.

While the numbers were only in line with expectations, there had been some concern that the company would fall short. We’re definitely seeing a relief rally after the close.

Per-share earnings of 58 cents matched the consensus estimate and revenue rose 21.4% to $1.57 billion, just above the consensus of $1.56 billion.

For Q4, NetApp sees EPS of 60 cents to 65 cents (the consensus is 63 cents) on revenue of $1.645 billion to $1.725 billion, vs. the consensus of $1.68 billion.

In Q4, Jennison Associates opened the largest new position in LinkedIn (LNKD, $86.87) of 3.63 million shares. Winslow Capital Management opened the second-largest position of 2.2 million shares.

Jennison is now the third largest LinkedIn shareholder, while Winslow is #4.

Among existing shareholders, T. Rowe Price was the largest buyer, adding 5.85 million shares, and is now the #1 holder.

Wellington Management increased its position by 420%, purchasing 1.64 million shares, and now owns 2.03 million shares. Fidelity boosted its stake by 180% with the purchase of 841,110 shares.

The Apple (AAPL, $519.43) price chart shows an overbought stock in the short term. A new high at $519.73 was reached this morning. The RSI is at 89.5. I think the shares need to consolidate some of the recent gains.

Zynga (ZNGA, $13.06) shares are off 9% this morning on some Wall Street downgrades following the Q4 earnings report.

Robert W. Baird takes its price target up to $13 from $12, but downgrades Zynga to ‘Neutral’ following the recent rebound in the stock. The firm also points out that the company’s new release schedule is weighted toward the second half of this year.

BofA/Merrill and Evercore also downgraded the shares. However, Piper Jaffray is more bullish, boosting its price target to $16.50 from $11.

In Q4, Zynga reported EPS of five cents, one cent above the consensus estimate, on revenue of $311 million, above the consensus of $303.8 million.

For 2012, Zynga sees EPS of 24 cents to 28 cents, vs. the consensus estimate of 26 cents.

Activist hedge fund Third Point, which has a 5.5% stake in Yahoo (YHOO, $15.36), plans to nominate four people to the board:

*Dan Loeb—CEO of Third Point

*Harry Wilson—CEO of turnaround & restructuring boutique MAEVA

*Michael Wolf—CEO of Activate, a strategy consulting firm for media and entertainment companies. Wolf is past president of MTV Networks.

*Jeff Zucker—Former CEO of NBC Universal

Zynga (ZNGA, $14.16) reports Q4 results today after the bell. The stock rallied 81% to a high of $14.44 on February 3 from the January 9 low of $7.97.

Suffice to say, expectations (and risk levels) are elevated going into tonight’s earnings report after this big rebound in the stock price.

In the January 2012 issue of Tech-Stock Prospector, we pointed out that Zynga shares, trading at $8.10 at the time, still had plenty of supporters (even though the stock was down from its December IPO price of $10) because of the company’s growth prospects in social games, particularly with respect to the mobile segment.

Piper Jaffray thinks Fusion-IO (FIO, $23.25) shares could come under selling pressure tomorrow with the end of the IPO lock-up period for more than 43 million shares. The stock is already down sharply from its November high of $41.74.

But the firm believes Wall Street is underestimating Fusion-IO’s upside potential in the enterprise flash storage segment, especially with respect to its largest customers, Facebook and Apple, which could drive strong revenue growth over the longer term.

Piper Jaffray maintains its price target of $38 and recommends buying any weakness caused by the lock-up expiration.

The new issue of Tech-Stock Prospector (February 2012/TSP #120) has been posted to the website.

Here are some of the topics covered in the latest issue:

*Q4 tech earnings surprises

*Acme Packet gets conservative

*A small-cap video infrastructure play

*Informatica bounces back

*Qualcomm going strong

*Google bets big on mobile

*EMC grabs market share

*A cloud-software name with Facebook exposure

*An activist investor sees value in PMC-Sierra

*Updated Apple valuation analysis

*One hardware company benefiting from new software offerings

*How to play a promising product refresh cycle in networking

*An IT-security leader keeps gaining market share

*MicroStrategy shines in mobile business intelligence

*LSI Corp is a new force in flash storage processors

*TSP Deal Report: Boosting shareholder value at CA

Sign up for a subscription online or call 800-392-0998.

Worldwide mobile data traffic will increase 18-fold over the next five years, according to the latest forecast from Cisco Systems. This represents a CAGR of 78%.

Cisco points out that the incremental amount of traffic being added to the mobile Internet between 2015 and 2016 alone is approximately three times the estimated size of the entire mobile Internet in 2012.

Here’s what is driving the big increase:

1-More streamed content—Cisco sees mobile cloud traffic putting up a 95% CAGR from 2011-2016.

2-More mobile connections—There will be more than 10 billion mobile Internet-connected devices in 2016.

3-Enhanced computing devices—Tablets are generating traffic levels that will grow 62-fold from 2011-2016, the highest growth rate of any device category tracked by the forecast.

4-Faster mobile speeds—Cisco sees mobile speeds increasing nine-fold over the five-year period.

5-More mobile video—Mobile video will comprise 71% of all mobile data traffic by 2016.

Apple (AAPL, $502.60) shares closed up more than 9 points today and settled above the $500 level for the first time.

So far this year, Apple shares have risen 24% from the 2011 close of $405.

The fiscal 2012 (Sept.) consensus EPS estimate is up to $42.34 from $42.14 at the end of January. The forward P/E is 11.8.

Given that Taleo (TLEO, $45.65) will be taken over by Oracle at $46 a share, I am removing the stock from the TSP Small-Cap Portfolio. The total return since June 2007 is +104.2%.

For Tech-Stock Prospector subscribers, I am in the process of researching a few new names that could be additions to the TSP Small-Cap Portfolio.

The new issue of Tech-Stock Prospector (February 2012/TSP #120) has been posted to the website.

Here are some of the topics covered in the latest issue:

*Q4 tech earnings surprises

*Acme Packet gets conservative

*A small-cap video infrastructure play

*Informatica bounces back

*Qualcomm going strong

*Google bets big on mobile

*EMC grabs market share

*A cloud-software name with Facebook exposure

*An activist investor sees value in PMC-Sierra

*Updated Apple valuation analysis

*One hardware company benefiting from new software offerings

*How to play a promising product refresh cycle in networking

*An IT-security leader keeps gaining market share

*MicroStrategy shines in mobile business intelligence

*LSI Corp is a new force in flash storage processors

*TSP Deal Report: Boosting shareholder value at CA

Sign up for a subscription online or call 800-392-0998.

ThinkEquity downgrades NetApp (NTAP, $39.10) to ‘Hold’ and reduces its price target to $42 from $54 based on checks that show a weaker-than-expected reaction to the new scale-out product cycle ONTAP 8.1 and continued competitive pressure from EMC that is hurting business in a few large enterprise accounts.

NetApp reports fiscal Q3 (January) results on Wednesday. The consensus estimates: EPS of 58 cents on revenue of $1.56 billion.

Apple (AAPL, $500.27) shares crossed the $500 mark for the first time just after the open, hitting an early high of $503.83.

Telsey Advisory Group raised its LinkedIn (LNKD,$89.96) price target range to $96 to $98 from $74 to $76 based on the company’s ability to expand its membership base and then monetize it.

The firm notes LinkedIn is in the early stages of monetizing and that demand for its services should expand over the coming years following an extended period of unemployment and underemployment.

LinkedIn jumped 17% today on heavy volume of 13.2 million shares. For more on LinkedIn, see my TechStock Radar post from yesterday covering the Q4 earnings report.

In Q4, RCM Capital Mangement ($21.4 billion in long equity assets) opened a new position of 2.25 million shares in Juniper Networks (JNPR, $22.78) and boosted its Cisco Systems (CSCO, $19.93) position by 88%, purchasing 3.76 million shares. The firm now owns 8.03 million shares of Cisco. Juniper was RCM Capital’s largest new position in Q4.

RCM Capital’s top tech holdings: Apple, Qualcomm, Google, EMC, Intel, Oracle and Microsoft.

The new issue of Tech-Stock Prospector (February 2012/TSP #120) has been posted to the website.

Here are some of the topics covered in the latest issue:

*Q4 tech earnings surprises

*Acme Packet gets conservative

*A small-cap video infrastructure play

*Informatica bounces back

*Qualcomm going strong

*Google bets big on mobile

*EMC grabs market share

*A cloud-software name with Facebook exposure

*An activist investor sees value in PMC-Sierra

*Updated Apple valuation analysis

*One hardware company benefiting from new software offerings

*How to play a promising product refresh cycle in networking

*An IT-security leader keeps gaining market share

*MicroStrategy shines in mobile business intelligence

*LSI Corp is a new force in flash storage processors

*TSP Deal Report: Boosting shareholder value at CA

Sign up for a subscription online or call 800-392-0998.

Collins Stewart raises its LinkedIn (LNKD, $85.62) price target to $95 from $86, saying the company has a long-term opportunity to increase its penetration of the recruiting market. Other growth drivers include international and adjacent markets. Collins Stewart also points out that user growth has accelerated recently.

LinkedIn shares are up more than 12% this morning following last night’s strong Q4 earnings report.

LinkedIn (LNKD, $82.70 after hours) turned in another big quarter, sending the shares up more than 8% after hours. Per-share earnings for Q4 of 12 cents topped the consensus estimate by five cents and revenue rose 105.3% to $167.7 million, vs. the consensus of $159.4 million.

Member page views rose 77%, indicating increased engagements across the installed base of 145 million members (14 million members were added in Q4). Mobile page views jumped 350% and now account for 16% of member page views. Management said it’s seeing a marked increase in mobile engagements from tablets, particularly the iPad.

Revenue in the Hiring Solutions unit (50% of total revenue) saw growth of 136%. In Q4, LinkedIn added 1,900 new corporate customers and now has a total of 9,200 enterprise customers, up from 3,900 at the end of 2010.

For Q1, the company sees revenue of $170 million to $175 million, vs. the consensus of $170.8 million. For 2012, the revenue guidance range of $840 million to $860 million is above the consensus of $828.2 million.

The new issue of Tech-Stock Prospector (February 2012/TSP #120) has been posted to the website.

Here are some of the topics covered in the latest issue:

*Q4 tech earnings surprises

*Acme Packet gets conservative

*A small-cap video infrastructure play

*Informatica bounces back

*Qualcomm going strong

*Google bets big on mobile

*EMC grabs market share

*A cloud-software name with Facebook exposure

*An activist investor sees value in PMC-Sierra

*Updated Apple valuation analysis

*One hardware company benefiting from new software offerings

*How to play a promising product refresh cycle in networking

*An IT-security leader keeps gaining market share

*MicroStrategy shines in mobile business intelligence

*LSI Corp is a new force in flash storage processors

*TSP Deal Report: Boosting shareholder value at CA

Sign up for a subscription online or call 800-392-0998.

Needham boosts its Apple (AAPL, $492.85) price target to $620 from $540 based on increased sales estimates for the iPad and Mac.

Canaccord Genuity boosts its iPhone sales estimate for the March quarter to 32.6 million units from 30.1 million units because of strong demand in international markets. The firm raises its Apple price target to $665 from $650.

Apple shares are up more than 3% this morning.

Oracle will acquire Taleo (TLEO, $45.54) at $46 a share in a $1.9-billion deal. This comes after SAP’s announced acquisition of SuccessFactors in the same human capital management software sector.

Taleo has been in the Tech-Stock Prospector Small-Cap Portfolio since June 2007. I had estimated Taleo’s fair value buyout price at $44.70, so I was not far off.

Oracle CEO Larry Ellison simply could not sit back and let SAP get all the attention. This is a good acquisition for Oracle as it strengthens the company’s cloud-software position against rivals SAP and Salesforce.com. It’s a fair price for Taleo.

On the Cisco Systems (CSCO, $20.40) fiscal Q2 earnings conference call, CEO John Chambers said the company expects to be more active in tech acquisitions in the coming quarters. Cisco has $46.7 billion in cash & investments on the balance sheet.

The new issue of Tech-Stock Prospector (February 2012/TSP #120) has been posted to the website.

Here are some of the topics covered in the latest issue:

*Q4 tech earnings surprises

*Acme Packet gets conservative

*A small-cap video infrastructure play

*Informatica bounces back

*Qualcomm going strong

*Google bets big on mobile

*EMC grabs market share

*A cloud-software name with Facebook exposure

*An activist investor sees value in PMC-Sierra

*Updated Apple valuation analysis

*One hardware company benefiting from new software offerings

*How to play a promising product refresh cycle in networking

*An IT-security leader keeps gaining market share

*MicroStrategy shines in mobile business intelligence

*LSI Corp is a new force in flash storage processors

*TSP Deal Report: Boosting shareholder value at CA

Sign up for a subscription online or call 800-392-0998.

Pacific Crest increases its Amazon.com (AMZN, $185.94) 2012 Kindle Fire sales estimate to 14.9 million units from 12.7 million units. The firm expects Amazon.com to continue to gain share as the Fire adoption rates go up.

Yahoo (YHOO, $15.83) board chairman Roy Bostock will not stand for re-election at the next shareholders’ meeting. He is joined going out the door by fellow board members Joshi, Kern and Wilson.

Yahoo today elected two new independent directors: Alfred Amoroso, previously CEO of Rovi, and Maynard Webb, Jr., chairman of LiveOps and former COO at eBay.

The new issue of Tech-Stock Prospector (February 2012/TSP #120) has been posted to the website.

Here are some of the topics covered in the latest issue:

*Q4 tech earnings surprises

*Acme Packet gets conservative

*A small-cap video infrastructure play

*Informatica bounces back

*Qualcomm going strong

*Google bets big on mobile

*EMC grabs market share

*A cloud-software name with Facebook growth exposure

*An activist investor sees value in PMC-Sierra

*Updated Apple valuation analysis

*One hardware company benefiting from new software offerings

*How to play a promising product refresh cycle in networking

*An IT-security leader keeps gaining market share

*MicroStrategy shines in mobile business intelligence

*LSI Corp is a new force in flash storage processors

*TSP Deal Report: Boosting shareholder value at CA

Sign up for a subscription online or call 800-392-0998.

VMware (VMW, $96.19) shares are trying to push off the 200-day moving average at $92.62. The stock is approaching resistance from early December at $99. A close above $97.09 would be a positive sign. The RSI is rising from 65.2.

For more on VMware, see TechStock Radar—January 24, 2012.

Longbow Research upgrades chipmaker AMD (AMD, $6.98) to ‘Buy’ with a price target of $10 based on improving fundamentals, potential design wins and a strengthening balance sheet.

For 2012, the consensus EPS estimate is 64 cents, representing expected growth of 28%.

Netflix (NLFX, $129.25) shares are up 86.5% so far this year. Not a bad start. The market cap is back above $7 billion. Of course, the stock is just clawing its way back as it tanked last year after hitting a high of $304.79 in July.

Even today’s announcement regarding Coinstar (Redbox) partnering with Verizon could not knock down Netflix shares.

Apple (AAPL, $464.33) shares today hit a new high at $464.67. Traders are starting to think about when the stock will hit the $500 level.

The next big positive catalyst is the upcoming launch of the iPad 3, which is expected sometime in March.

Jefferies, which has an Apple price target of $599, thinks iTV could launch as early as late this year. The firm estimates fiscal 2013 sales of 5 million iTVs.

BMO Capital’s checks indicate that Salesforce.com (CRM, $123.17) saw a strong close to its January quarter. The firm’s sources were upbeat about fiscal Q4 and BMO Capital does not think the company’s momentum has slowed. The firm has a price target of $150.

Shares of Aruba Networks (ARUN, $24.32), a provider of enterprise wireless LAN solutions, are up 31% so far this year. The stock has crossed above its 200-day moving average at $23.82. Next up, traders are watching the October high of $25.55.

Zynga (ZNGA, $14.21) is surging more than 14% this morning on extremely heavy volume of 23.5 million shares. This comes after yesterday’s 16.8% gain for shares of the social-gaming company. The market cap is up to $9.9 billion.

Google (GOOG, $590.76) shares moved into the gap on the price chart from January 20, which reaches from $591 up to $631.46. The 50-day moving average stands at $614.23. A 50% retracement of the recent plunge from the January 19 high of $640.99 would bring Google shares back to $602.77.

Zynga (ZNGA, $12.12) bulls like the fact that the social gaming company accounts for 12% of Facebook’s revenue. The shares have surged more than 14% today, even trading up to a high of $12.91 at one point. Zynga now sports a market cap of $8.4 billion.

It’s funny because Zynga bulls were using the argument that the company is expanding beyond the Facebook platform as a reason to like the stock. Now they see Zynga’s dominant position on Facebook as a positive.

For more on Zynga, Tech-Stock Prospector subscribers should see TSP #119 (January 2012, page 3).

Goldman raises its Qualcomm (QCOM, $61.42) price target to $72 from $65 based on the company’s accelerating earnings growth, which is being driven by strong handset demand and chipset share gains.

Cowen says Qualcomm remains a top pick for 2012 based on acceleration in the migration to 3G/4G and solid pricing trends. China represents a key growth driver.

ThinkEquity is quite bullish, boosting its price target to $85 from $75.

Canaccord Genuity starts coverage of Broadcom (BRCM, $36.95) at ‘Buy’ with a price target of $45 based on strength at key mobile & wireless customers and a resumption in growth in the infrastructure & networking unit as service-provider spending picks up again. For 2012, the firm sees EPS of $2.77, vs. the consensus estimate of $2.80.

Facebook (FB) filed its S-1 today. Here are some key stats:

*845 million monthly active users (as of 12/31/2011), +39% from the end of 2010

*483 million daily active users (as of 12/31/2011), +48% from the year-ago level

*425 million monthly active users on Facebook Mobile

*2011 revenue: $3.71 billion, +88% from 2010

*2011 net income: $1.0 billion

*2011 diluted pro forma EPS: 43 cents

*2011 advertising revenue = 85% of total revenue

*Estimated offering amount: $5 billion

*In 2011, Zynga (ZNGA) accounted for about 12% of Facebook’s revenue

*User growth will decline as the company achieves higher penetration rates

Qualcomm (QCOM, $63.17 after hours) shares are up 6% after hours on a beat-and-raise earnings report. For fiscal Q1 (December), EPS of 97 cents tops the consensus estimate by seven cents and revenue of $4.68 billion beat the consensus of $4.58 billion.

For fiscal Q2, the company sees EPS of 91 cents to 97 cents (the consensus is 89 cents) on revenue of $4.6 billion to $5.0 billion (the consensus is $4.51 billion).

For more on Qualcomm, Tech-Stock Prospector subscribers should see TSP #112 (June 2011, page 3) and TSP #116 (October 2011, page 2).

A strong quarterly report has boosted shares of Broadcom (BRCM, $37.16) today by more than 8%.

The communications chipmaker came in with Q4 EPS of 68 cents, three cents above the consensus estimate, on revenue of $1.82 billion, vs. the consensus of $1.81 billion.

For Q1, the company sees revenue of $1.7 billion to $1.8 billion, vs. the consensus of $1.73 billion. Broadcom is benefiting from positive secular trends in the broadband networking and mobile (handsets & tablets) segments.

For more on Broadcom, see TechStock Radar—December 14, 2011.

In early December, FBR Capital made a good call on Broadcom; see TechStock Radar—December 1, 2011.

Google (GOOG, $582.75) shares held the 200-day moving average of $562.63 on the first test of this support level. The stock also held the November low of $561.33.

A 50% retracement of the recent pullback from the January 19 high of $640.99 to the low of $564.55 on January 26 would mean a potential rebound to $602.77.

Piper Jaffray continues to expect Apple (AAPL, $456.48) will introduce its own TV set. The firm’s research indicates that Apple has invested in manufacturing facilities for LCD displays ranging from 3.5” mobile displays to 50” television displays.

There are prototypes in the works and Piper Jaffray thinks a launch late this calendar year is possible.

Piper Jaffray singles out Rovi (ROVI, $32.09), which makes interactive program guides, as a potential beneficiary because an Apple TV could result in higher royalty payments from Apple. Also, other TV manufacturers would turn to Rovi to help them improve the user interface to better compete with Apple TV. Rovi counts Sony, Samsung, Sharp, Panasonic, Vizio and Toshiba as customers.