I'll admit it. When Intel announced that its XMM 7260 LTE-Advanced category 6 modem would make it to market during the first half of 2014, it seemed that Intel had a chance of edging out Qualcomm's MDM9x35 -- Qualcomm's first LTE-Advanced category 6 device -- to market. However, as the current quarter winds to a close, Intel's XMM 7260 has yet to show up in a formally announced device while Qualcomm's new chip finds a home in Samsung's premium edition of the Galaxy S5. In short, it's a bit late.

Intel had claimed that devices on shelves by Q2 2014
During Intel's press conference at the Mobile World Congress, Intel informed participants that the XMM 7260 would be in devices and on shelves by the second quarter of 2014. Further, the company was pretty clear in setting expectations for multiple design wins to be announced this spring. That didn't happen, and it's looking like we won't see designs until Q3.

Now, this is a far cry from the end of the world, and there's very little doubt that Intel will still be the second to market with a category 6 LTE-Advanced solution that's viable on many networks. However, it's a disappointment relative to the expectations set.

Hey, now, Intel's still No. 2!
Intel appears likely to be the No. 2 player in the discrete LTE baseband market next to Qualcomm, and it looks as though for the time being it will compete mostly on price rather than on performance and feature sets.

There's no shame in that, especially considering that Intel is still transitioning its modem efforts from "fast follower" (which is how it was run before Intel acquired it) to leadership, but this does give us a bit more perspective on where Intel is today vis-a-vis cellular.

Not a near-term problem for the share price
The reason, though, that this slip isn't all that material to shareholders is that the company's stock is still basking in the glory of the seemingly rejuvenated PC market. It's too early to tell whether this is just a one-time bump driven by the Windows XP end-of-life, or if the secular trends are now in Intel's favor, but at the very least this PC-driven bump is buying Intel a bit more time to get its mobile efforts in order.

Foolish closing thoughts
Intel is making steady progress, but for now, there's no question that Qualcomm's the king of this market. Intel's next shot at leadership will be with its XMM 7460 LTE-Advanced baseband, built on Intel's 14-nanometer process and -- from leaked roadmaps -- scheduled for launch in early 2016.

Some GM recalls seem like easy fixes. Owners of the 511,528 Chevrolet Camaros recalled last week will have their key fobs modified, likely a very quick job. But getting all the parts needed for all of these recalls to all of GM's dealers could take months. Source: General Motors Co.

It seems like every week brings another big new recall from General Motors Company .

So far this year, GM has issued 44 (and counting) separate recalls covering over 20 million (and counting) vehicles in North America. But a new report from investigators working for the U.S. House of Representatives made a troubling point: Very few of those vehicles have been fixed so far.

As Motley Fool senior auto specialist John Rosevear explains in this video, only about 155,000 of the 2.6 million vehicles in the recalls that started this whole mess -- those for defective ignition switches in the Chevy Cobalt and other cars made last decade -- have been fixed.

As John notes, there are good reasons why GM hasn't been able to move faster. But at this pace, GM's dealers may be digging through the recall backlog for years. 

A transcript of the video is below:

John Rosevear: Hey Fools, it's John Rosevear, senior auto specialist for Fool.com.So we've been hearing for months and months about these General Motors recalls. As I record this for you on Thursday, GM is up to 44 separate recalls in North America so far this year covering over 20 million vehicles, and that number could increase by the time you watch this. Of course it's not really 20 million vehicles as several models have been recalled more than once, but it's still an awful lot.

We know why GM is doing this, the big scandal over their long-delayed, ignition-switch recall for the old Chevy Cobalt and other compact models from the last decade has made GM's new CEO, Mary Barra, want to err on the side of extreme caution for a while when it comes to recalls. She wants everything that might ever need to be recalled for any problem whatsoever taken care of now, so that GM can get through this mess and recover its momentum.

But now there's a new challenge for GM emerging, and that's getting all the vehicles that have been recalled for all of these defects actually fixed. Before Mary Barra's big appearance before Congress on Wednesday, congressional investigators reported that of the 2.6 million vehicles recalled for that serious ignition-switch defect that is being blamed for at least 13 deaths and 42 crashes, of those 2.6 million vehicles only about 155,000 have been repaired.

The supplier of the kits to repair them is Delphi Automotive , and Delphi has so far shipped just under 400,000 of the kits. The problem is apparently that the switches have been out of production for some time, so GM and Delphi had to resetup the assembly lines from scratch, and that has taken some time.

GM said this week that it is in the process of adding a third assembly line, and those lines are working around the clock, three shifts, and they expect to have the last of the kits needed for this recall shipped by the end of October.

So GM has a long long way to go here before it actually gets all those old cars fixed, and this is going to take months, and it's going to take months for GM's dealers and parts suppliers to work through all of these other recalls as well. So this story, this scandal, isn't going away any time soon.

But of course it's an opportunity for GM's dealers, too, when they have all these people coming in who maybe they haven't seen before, or haven't seen in years, and they can show them GM's new models, which are much improved over a lot of these cars that have been recalled, and maybe this whole mess has a little bit of a silver lining for GM aside from giving Mary Barra the ammo she needs to fix a lot of lingering problems inside GM.

It's going to be interesting to see what the long-term effect is here, but one thing's for sure and that's that we're going to be talking about this for quite a while longer. Thanks for watching.

PayPal's president, David Marcus, is leaving to join Facebook's Messenger team, but he will not have control of the company's recent messaging acquisition, WhatsApp.

Considering PayPal is essentially eBay's core business now, to leave it to run a single unit of Facebook is intriguing. Also, given Marcus' background, it hints that Facebook is making things like money transfers a key way of monetizing communication platforms. That's especially important, because at some point Facebook will need to justify its $19 billion WhatsApp price tag.

In this episode of The Next, Motley Fool tech analyst Eric Bleeker and Rule Breakers analyst Simon Erickson discuss what Marcus' move might mean for a future Facebook payments system.

SolarCity Corp's acquisition of solar module manufacturer Silevo earlier this week hit the industry by surprise and it comes with huge risks as well as great opportunity. Yesterday, I highlighted the risks for SolarCity and investors, but today, I want to look at the positive side of the acquisition. There are always two sides of the story, and here's the good one if you're a SolarCity investor.

Can Silevo's modules make SolarCity's installers even more efficient than they are today? Source: SolarCity.

Integration and efficiency will lower costs
SolarCity's acquisitions over the past year have been all about lowering the balance of system costs for solar. Zep Solar makes racking that can standardize installation and integrate with panels, and now modules can be built to integrate with racking and inverters, which Musk alluded to developing in-house. All of this is in an effort to lower the time it takes to install each project.

On the efficiency side, SolarCity is trying to pack more power onto each rooftop, or at least a smaller space on each roof. This will either reduce installation time by requiring fewer panels, or increase power output and increase the number of watts (and potential profit) on each roof.

Source: SolarCity.

The goal is to put more MW of solar up with the same number of installers, and each piece of the supply chain SolarCity brings in-house will lower those costs.

SolarCity doesn't have to be the best
If there's one silver lining in SolarCity's move into module manufacturing, it's that the company doesn't have to be best in breed, it just has to be better than what it could buy for a similar cost on the open market.

The headlines surrounding the Silevo acquisition make it sound like the company will allow SolarCity to suddenly make the best module in the industry for lower costs than the competition. Let's clear that up right now. First, SolarCity will not have the lowest costs in the industry, especially not early on. It's using industry-standard polysilicon and wafers (so those costs are the same as the rest of the industry) and a non-standard manufacturing process that will likely lead to slightly higher costs than commodity competitors, at least initially.

Community solar is a big opportunity for SolarCity, especially with energy storage. Source: SolarCity.

Second, even SolarCity's lofty efficiency targets won't put it at the top of the industry. SunPower has already commercialized a 21.5% efficient panel, and even if Silevo hits the 24% cell efficiency target it has two years from now, it would only match SunPower's current product. By the time SolarCity ramps production, it will likely be 2%-3% behind SunPower.

With those two factors understood, we need to understand that Silevo isn't exactly reinventing the wheel, either. Musk said it can use some standard equipment to manufacture cells and modules and will be buying standard raw materials. So, there's technology risk, but it isn't nearly as high as Solyndra, Evergreen Solar, or any number of companies who have failed trying to make a differentiated product.

If SolarCity can simply ramp up its production capacity with a product that's slightly better than commodity modules and has a similar cost per watt, it will have a huge winner. The cost savings come on the balance of system side and from knowing it has a certain amount of supply at a set cost. That piece of mind alone is enough to make this acquisition a success.

Don't bet against Elon Musk
The one intangible factor in this acquisition is Elon Musk. He has a history of surprising us with revolutionary technology improvements and has the vision to take an idea from the drawing board to reality. So, if anyone can jump into an ultra-competitive business like solar module manufacturing and succeed, it's him.

It will be fascinating to watch what Musk and team do when they begin putting R&D dollars into solar modules and inverters. The 24% cell efficiency target that's been stated is already in sight, but a decade from now, that should be ancient history. I wouldn't be surprised if Musk already has his sights set on cell efficiency of 30% or more, which has been demonstrated in the lab.

If SolarCity can innovate faster than the industry, it will build a huge competitive advantage. That's how SunPower stayed afloat as Chinese competitors cut prices, and it's how they've returned to profitability, and even generated more retained value per watt than SolarCity on each installation. With the right innovation, SolarCity could leapfrog even the industry's best.

If it does, this acquisition will be a home run. Musk is one man who can make that happen.

Foolish bottom line
The upside for SolarCity buying Silevo comes from controlling more of the process, integrating its modules into the rest of the system, and continued innovation. It's not a guaranteed success, but for a $350 million acquisition mostly paid for with stock, it's worth the risk.

At the very least, Musk and team aren't people I would bet against, especially considering the powerhouse they've already built in residential solar.

The retail landscape is quickly evolving today, as brick-and-mortar retailers including lululemon athletica and Kate Spade reinvent themselves to better compete with e-commerce giant Amazon.com. There's a lot at stake for these retailers, as more consumers than ever are opting for the convenience of online shopping over trekking to physical store locations.

Amazon pulled in quarterly sales of $19.74 billion during the first quarter, a double-digit increase over the same period a year ago. That's more than Michael Kors, Kate Spade, and Lululemon combined. However, new technologies such as Apple's iBeacons are helping reinvigorate the in-store shopping experience. Check out the following presentation to discover three retail trends that promise to transform the industry in 2014.

What is Berkshire Hathaway ? Most people with an interest in investing know that Berkshire Hathaway is the big conglomerate run by Warren Buffett.

However, it wasn't always that way. 50 years ago, when Warren Buffett first became involved with Berkshire Hathaway, the company was a major textile firm. This incarnation of Berkshire Hathaway may have been the worst acquisition of Buffett's career.

Berkshire Hathaway was probably Warren Buffett's biggest investment blunder

The problem with Berkshire Hathaway was not bad management -- it was just a tough business. There are many similarities between Berkshire then and the airlines today. Investors have bid up the stock prices of big airlines like American Airlines and United Continental based on rosy assumptions about their long-term profitability. They may soon learn the tough lesson Buffett learned at Berkshire Hathaway.

The hard thing about the textile business
Buffett's comment on the pitfalls of capital-intensive businesses reflected 15 years of experience trying to wring adequate profits out of Berkshire Hathaway. The root of the problem was that Berkshire Hathaway's product was a commodity -- it was no different than the products being produced by competitors.

As a result, Berkshire Hathaway had to match the prices of its competitors to sell its products. The capital-intensive nature of the textile industry compounded this problem. Once major capital investments have occurred (e.g. building or retooling a factory), the depreciation of those assets represents a fixed cost.

When the textile industry had too much capacity, Berkshire and its competitors were faced with a Hobson's choice: they could either keep their factories running or not. Either way, they were in a bad situation. If they kept the plants running, the oversupply would continue, forcing them to cut prices to clear excess inventory. If they idled the plants, they would lose money due to their high fixed costs.

Buffett's insight was that it is virtually impossible to avoid this issue in a capital-intensive commodity business. When times are good, companies will invest in fixed assets to meet the growing demand. However, that will leave them with overcapacity as soon as demand starts to drop off. Only during fleeting moments of "shortage" can such businesses earn high returns on invested capital.

Airlines are like textile mills
Despite identifying the problem with capital-intensive commodity businesses in the late 1970s, Warren Buffett made a big bet on USAir 10 years later. Shortly after Buffett invested in USAir, the airline industry ran into trouble due to overcapacity and irrational pricing by some carriers.

Warren Buffett's big airline bet in the late 1980s was a bust

Buffett soon recognized that the airline industry displayed the same key characteristics as the textile industry: it was capital-intensive due to the high cost of airplanes, and it was a commodity-type business, as most travelers buy primarily based on price. He therefore described his investment in USAir as an "unforced error" -- even though it eventually turned a profit.

Beware airline rocket stocks
Investors don't necessarily need to avoid all airline stocks, despite Buffett's warnings. (I personally own several airline stocks.) However, Buffett's insights about this type of business show that investors should be particularly cautious about airlines.

Recently, investors have abandoned this caution. For example, United Continental and American Airlines have both posted big stock price gains in the past year -- even though in United's case, earnings estimates have been falling.

United Continental vs. American Airlines stock performance, data by YCharts

However, United and American are investing heavily in new capital -- particularly new planes. As a result, free cash flow is essentially nil at both companies today. This means that investors are really betting on these airlines' ability to maintain or even improve earnings over the next 10-20 years.

In other words, airline investors appear to be ignoring Warren Buffett's wisdom. Buffett would argue that airlines are just benefiting from a temporary period of shortage right now. Capital is starting to pile into the industry, fueling growth among smaller U.S. airlines. There will be a lot more competition in the airline industry 5-10 years down the road than there is today -- leading to lower industry profit margins.

Foolish conclusion
Warren Buffett learned the hard way that capital-intensive commodity businesses are poor long-term investments. Good management could produce good returns in Berkshire Hathaway's textile business occasionally, but not consistently. That's why Berkshire Hathaway was (arguably) the worst investment of Buffett's career.

Today, airline bulls think that "capacity discipline" has helped major airlines like American and United Continental become good long-term investments, despite being in a capital-intensive commodity business. In reality, capacity discipline has just created a temporary shortage of capacity. In the long run, new competitors will make up the difference, leading to lower margins for everybody.

The 2015 Chevrolet Corvette Z06 will generate 650 horsepower from its supercharged 6.2-liter V8 engine, General Motors recently confirmed. Source: General Motors Co.

How much horsepower is too much?

High-performance car fans might be quick to answer that there's no such thing as "too much" power. And lately, automakers are rushing to cater to those fans: Just in the last month, GM has announced that the 2015 Chevrolet Corvette Z06 will have a whopping 650 horsepower -- a number that could be eclipsed when Fiat Chrysler  reveals the final horsepower numbers for the ferocious new "Hellcat" Hemi V8 that will power the top-of-the-line 2015 Dodge Challenger.

So far, Chrysler has only said that the 2015 Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat will have "over 600" horsepower -- but some reports suggest that the final number could be considerably higher. Source: Fiat Chrysler

Those are numbers that put the top-tier exotic cars of just a few years ago to shame. And there's more on the way: Higher-powered versions of the new Ford  Mustang could eventually top the Hellcat, while the German luxury-car makers are rushing to add turbos to their already-high-powered premium sedans. Even Nissan's  Infiniti could soon be getting in on the game.

Motley Fool senior auto specialist John Rosevear loves fast cars as much as anybody, and he's owned a bunch -- but as an investor, he's starting to wonder if things are on the verge of getting out of hand. Products like the Corvette Z06 and the Challenger SRT Hellcat are very profitable for their makers, and great marketing tools for their brands. But in an era when fuel-economy regulations are rapidly tightening and safety concerns are higher than ever, is a full-blown horsepower war inviting trouble -- or is it just good old-fashioned tire-smoking fun?

A transcript of the video is below.

John Rosevear: Hey Fools, it's John Rosevear, senior auto specialist for Fool.com. General Motors dropped some product news a couple of weeks ago that got a lot of attention among high performance enthusiasts, and I think it's worth a look from us as well.

Back in January, GM revealed the 2015 Chevrolet Corvette Z06, a super high performance version of the new Corvette that GM launched a year ago. I was there with my Foolish colleague Rex Moore and we brought you some coverage of that at the time.

Now, the Corvette Stingray that they introduced last year has been a big sales success, at least by Corvette standards, and now GM is going to build on that with the Z06. We knew it was going to be a monster but we didn't know how much of a monster, GM didn't release horsepower ratings for it when they showed it in January.

Well, now they have, and now we know that the supercharged 6.2 liter engine in the new Z06 will make 650 horsepower at 6,400 rpm and 650 foot pounds of torque at 3,600 rpm.

Folks, that's a whole lot of power.

GM said it's the most powerful engine ever from Chevrolet. GM's press release points out that it blows away the Porsche 911 Turbo S by 90 horsepower and 134 pound feet of torque, and it's almost certain to blow away the Porsche in price too, but in the other direction, the 911 Turbo S starts at $182,700. GM hasn't announced pricing for the new Z06 but it's likely to be half of the Porsche's price tag, probably less, the best guesses are that it will come in around $80,000 give or take.

It's a cool product, but step back a minute.

There's one heck of a horsepower war going on in the global auto business right now that has been facilitated by the technology that has come into play over the last several years. Cleaner-burning engines can generate more power while still complying with tough emissions regulations, and more sophisticated computer controlled handling aids, like anti skid systems and so forth, have made these new super-powered cars safe for ordinary people to drive, or at least a lot safer.

But this is just the latest in a lot of high horsepower announcements, we've been talking about the new Hellcat engine that Fiat Chrysler is introducing to the Dodge brand, it's a supercharged 6.2-liter version of the Hemi V8, that'll have over 600 horsepower, again they haven't said how much, and Ford just ended production of the top of the line Shelby GT500 version of the outgoing Mustang, which had 662 horsepower, and it's a safe bet that they'll do something even wilder for the all-new Mustang in a year or two.

Meanwhile, cars like the BMW M5 which has 560 horsepower have upped the game in luxury, and a version of this new Corvette engine might end up in the next Cadillac CTS-V, the old one had a mere 556 horsepower and GM has hinted that the new one will have more.

Now, I personally like high horsepower cars, I own a CTS-V, and I know that these are very profitable products as well as great marketing tools for these brands, but as an investor I have to wonder where this ends. How much horsepower is too much? If you're watching this on Fool.com, scroll down to leave a comment and let me know your thoughts. Thanks for watching.

This story originally written by Ryan Faas at CITEworld. Sign up for our free newsletter here.

Samsung and Apple have doubled down on health and fitness tracking solutions that aggregate and analyze information from multiple sources and potentially share that data with physicians or other health care professionals. Google is expected to announce a similar platform at Google I/O next week.

It was inevitable once Samsung scheduled its Voice of the Body event days ahead of Apple's developer conference that the moves would be seen as the latest battle front of the so-called mobile platform wars or as a new turf war -- a mobile health platform war -- in its own right.

The natural tendency when any new category develops is to cast it in these terms of battle, and for proponents (and skeptics) of each company operating in the new space to use a range of data -- costs, feature set, market share, sales numbers, user base, or number of partner companies -- to predict or declare winners and losers. Think of Mac vs. PC, iOS vs. Android, Samsung vs. Apple, Office vs. iWork, Nintendo vs. Playstation, and Kindle vs. Nook as just a handful of examples. In almost any market that you look at, be it consumer, education, or enterprise, you can immediately see evidence of some type of platform war. So it's inevitable that we'll see end-to-end mobile digital health offerings discussed and disputed in these terms. What's different in this case, however, is that platform choices in mobile health are not entirely consumer-driven.

Health IT's role as kingmaker
In the industry of health care technology -- think of the vendors that create things like electronic health record systems and medical devices used in hospitals or clinics -- the customer isn't the individual receiving care. The customers are the doctors, hospital administrators, and health IT professionals. In large organizations particularly, the IT department and administration often makes the big buying decisions, with varying levels of input from the clinicians who will use these tools on a daily basis.

This presents an interesting dynamic. The emerging mobile health platforms will be marketed toward consumers. In the end, consumers will either buy into a particular platform or not. So how will health care IT influence the market?

The answer comes down to the ability for consumers to share data with their doctors, hospital, or other providers. That's where a lot of the value will be generated, particularly for users tracking and managing chronic conditions. Whether it is a custom app designed for a specific practice or hospital or an app that is part of a larger health IT solution like an electronic health record, the integration functionality will be built or purchased by the provider's health IT team.

So to some extent, the growth of these platforms is going to be dictated by health IT professionals and health IT vendors.

You probably missed it if you're not familiar with health care IT, but as I noted following Apple's HealthKit announcement two weeks ago, Epic's involvement as a HealthKit partner is a big, big deal.

A core part of Epic's business is building electronic health record systems and it owns a large chunk of that market -- the company claims that its systems cover 100 million individuals. As part of its EHR package, Epic offers a patient-facing website and mobile app called MyChart that lets patients access their records and related information.

When iOS 8 launches anyone who uses the MyChart app could be able to relay data from their iPhone to their health care provider(s).

How the U.S. government might tip the scales
While consumer choice is likely to be constrained by the existing health care IT industry, it won't be eclipsed completely. The federal government electronic health records (EHR) incentive program will also impact this emerging market.

That program requires providers to engage patients using online solutions and has usage targets that providers must meet. Any medical practice is going to want the widest net possible for facilitating those interactions, and that means they'll want the biggest selection of integrated mobile health platforms possible.

As a result, major health IT vendors like Epic will support multiple mobile health platforms. That should ensure some measure of patient choice.

The market will need time to evolve
It's unlikely that every platform will be supported by a wide swath of vendors on day one. Some vendors may actively sit out the next year or two to see which platforms gain traction. Others may start out supporting just one platform and build out support for others depending on how the platforms are evolving or which platforms their competitors are choosing to support.

There's also a big question about exactly which individual features of these platforms the vendors will support. This touches on an ongoing debate in the health IT about how to handle data generated by patients and their devices and apps. Some vendors might support a range of notifications to providers from patient devices or cloud services, while others may support just electronic submission basic set of data like daily blood glucose readings, effectively offering little more than a patient might record in a notebook and bring with them to an office visit.

Even if a wide range of capabilities is supported by a medical group's vendor of choice, there's no guarantee that individual doctors or practices will want to use them.

While the health platforms rolled out over the next six months could truly revolutionize health care, but it's likely to be a few years before we can judge any of these platforms as successful or not. Likewise, it will take as long to see exactly how health care will change -- probably in ways we can't even predict today.

The new Fire Phone has a fatal flaw that could prevent it from driving revenue and boosting Amazon stock. Credit: Amazon.com.

The new Fire Phone has the makings of a top-notch handset, but is it capable of taking sales from the iPhone and Galaxy S5? Will it will drive long-term gains in Amazon.com stock? Guest host Alison Southwick puts this question to Fool analysts Nathan Alderman and Tim Beyers in this week's episode of 1-Up on Wall Street, The Motley Fool's Web show in which we talk about the big-money names behind your favorite movies, toys, video games, comics, and more.

Tim says the phone boasts a number of cool features powered by four front-facing cameras, but in most other respects it's like any other smartphone. It even looks like every other smartphone. If you're buying, it's probably because you like the idea of having immediate access to Amazon wherever you are. Or maybe you just like having a phone with a purported 3-D display.

Either way, Tim says, Amazon isn't pitching features so much as convenience via an image-based catalog called Firefly. The idea is simple: Point the Fire Phone at something, and it tells you what it is and how to buy it Amazon. All that's missing is a mobile payments option, for those moments when you're shopping and what you find isn't available online. Amazon would still get a cut of the transaction.

Nathan agrees, arguing that everything Amazon does is designed to get you to spend more money at Amazon. That includes a free, one-year trial of Prime for Fire Phone users who choose to take advantage. A smart move when you consider that Prime members tend to spend more than twice as much as non-members, making them a huge source of profits. If the Fire Phone helps bring in a rush of new Prime members, it'll be a win.

Yet that's anything but guaranteed at this point. Nathan says it's always better to bet on the companies that help customers do great things. The Fire Phone isn't that sort of product. Rather, it's a marketing tool for persuading users to do what's best for Amazon. Tim agrees.

Now it's your turn to weigh in using the comments box below. Do you believe the Fore Phone will drive profits and boost Amazon stock? Click the video to watch as Alison puts Nathan and Tim on the spot, and then be sure to follow us on Twitter for more segments and regular geek news updates!

Shares of Advanced Micro Devices are typically extremely volatile and are quite sensitive to news flow. This volatility stems, at least in part, from its being a very "polarizing" stock with a pretty sizable short interest. On one hand, bulls cheer the large new opportunities afforded to the company in the form of ARM Holdings servers, semi-custom, and embedded. On the other, bears expect continued market-share loss in its core PC market to more than offset any potential growth in the "new" areas.

While the intra-quarter volatility is interesting to traders, long-term investors are more interested in the trajectory of the business. With that in mind, let's look at what investors should be on the lookout this quarter, and what areas could potentially be sources of upside surprise.

Rewinding back to guidance
At AMD's most recent earnings report, management guided for revenue to increase 3% from Q1 levels, give or take 3%, which actually beat sell-side consensus at the time. Additionally, the company guided to gross margins of 35%. For the full year, AMD set the following expectations:

• Revenue growth year over year from 2013 levels.
• Free cash flow positive for the year.
• Cash balance to be maintained near the company's "optimal balance" of $1 billion, and above the target minimum of $600 million.

From that, the sell side went ahead and set the "benchmark" for the year, with consensus for the year coming in as follows:

• Full year revenue estimate of $5.97 billion, up 12.6% from the previous year.
• Full year non-GAAP earnings per share of $0.19.

However, more importantly, the sell side is expecting $1.43 billion in sales ($0.02 per share in earnings) for the June quarter and $1.56 billion in sales ($0.07 per share in earnings) for the September quarter. In particular, the guide for the September quarter will be the one to watch, as the market doesn't seem to be expecting anything too off from consensus for the current quarter.

Does AMD do better than expected in PCs?
Following PC chip rival Intel's positive pre-announcement, some investors believe that AMD may beat for the current quarter and/or guide up. Given that AMD's shares didn't really react positively to Intel's announcement, the market may not think Intel's performance will reflect AMD's.

There's good reason to think that, particularly as Intel's beat was driven by strength in business PCs, a segment where Intel has the lion's share of the market. Keep in mind, though, that AMD's exposure here is non-zero, and if AMD was able to keep market segment share here flat, then secular growth would imply a bump for AMD as well. The double-edged sword, of course, is that if Intel's surprise was driven in part by share gains, then the picture looks unfavorable to AMD. 

Is the alleged graphics-card weakness set to take a toll on the company's results?
According to Digitimes, shipments of graphics add-in boards for PCs is set to drop 30%-40% this quarter as a result of unhealthy inventory levels. Further, according to the report, both AMD and graphics-rival NVIDIA would rather reduce shipments and keep average selling prices up than cut prices to catalyze sales.

Note that according to the Digitimes report, the graphics card vendors have been aware of this inventory problem since April. Since AMD issued its guidance in April, and since AMD is known to negatively pre-announce when management expects a material miss, it's unlikely that AMD will see such a miss this quarter as a result of this alleged graphics inventory glut.

However, if this issue is real, then it may not affect GPU shipments for the current quarter but could adversely affect shipments in the coming quarter for both AMD and NVIDIA.

Foolish bottom line
If AMD is able to beat this quarter's estimate and issue a better-than-expected guide for the September quarter, then you can probably expect the shares to head toward $5 a share. However, since this stock is highly volatile (and shorted), any miss in the current quarter and/or guide could drive the shares dramatically lower.

With all of that in mind, the long-term picture is dependent on AMD's ability to stabilize and grow PC processor share, grow graphics share, and expand into new markets. It's not inconceivable that AMD's shares could trade meaningfully higher from here on strong execution, but at the same time the competitive dynamics and secular trends aren't particularly favorable.

But it's that uncertainty that makes AMD, at the very least, an interesting company to follow. 

Microsoft is taking direct aim at the laptop market with the Surface Pro 3. Credit: Microsoft.

With Surface Pro 3 tablet, Microsoft  isn't aiming for the iPad or Android tablets so much as the entire laptop market. I think the new docking station (pictured above) is key to the strategy.

If you're at all like me, you work on a laptop that converts into a desktop equivalent once you've plugged in all the necessary peripherals: keyboard, mouse, external monitor, printer, and so on. Microsoft's Surface Pro 3 docking station is meant to offer all that, plus audio and Ethernet support.

The decline of the laptop
Laptops are already under assault from tablets. According to a March estimate from IDC, worldwide portable PC shipments are expected to decline 6.5% this year and grow modestly through 2018 -- but still not enough to reach 2013's total.

Yet, for Microsoft, it's actually worse than that. Gartner predicts that only 15% of Internet-connected devices shipped this year will run Windows. Surface Pro 3 is attempting to cauterize a bleeding wound, and slowing growth in the tablet market may be just the opportunity Mr. Softy needs.

According to IDC, tablet sales inched up just 3.9% in the first quarter as businesses held back on purchases amid declining demand among consumers. Apple, in particular, saw iPad shipments slip more than 16% year over year. Novel 2-in-1s such as the Surface Pro 3 may finally push corporate buyers to give tablets a try.

"Although its share of the market remains small, Windows devices continue to gain traction thanks to sleeper hits like the ASUS T100, whose low cost and 2-in-1 form factor appeal to those looking for something that's 'good enough'," said IDC analyst Jitesh Ubrani in a press release.

Cashing in on a megatrend
To be fair, Microsoft might not be the only one to cash in on this trend. Last year, backers funded a  Kickstarter project for a product called DOCKr for turning an iPad into a laptop lookalike, while ASUS built an add-on keyboard for its Android-powered Transformer line that includes extra USB ports and HML support for connecting to an external HDMI monitor.

Any number of similar alternatives could challenge the Surface Pro 3. Or not. Either way, between lagging laptop sales and growing tablet fatigue, Microsoft may be launching its most sophisticated 2-in-1 at precisely the right time.

Allergan (NYSE: AGN) continues to fight off the advances of serial acquirer Valeant (NYSE: VRX) and its partner, hedge fund manager Bill Ackman. Ackman's Pershing Square is Allergan's largest shareholder, and is hoping to convert enough other investors to his side as this deal has gone hostile. Given Allergan's tenous position, rumors continue to swirl that it will make a play for Irish drugmaker Shire (Nasdaq: SHPG).  But given the lure of Ireland's low tax rate, Allergan may have to get into a bidding war with AbbVie to pull off its own deal for the ADHD drugmaker.

In this episode of Market Check-Up, the otley Fool's health care focused investing show, analysts David WIlliamson and Michael Douglass, discuss the agressive new posture of Ackman and Valeant, how Allergan is responding, and why its only defense may be to go on the offensive.

The FDA just announced new regulations for pharma and biotech companies that wish to promote their drugs via Twitter (Nasdaq: TWTR). Companies cannot brag about a drugs benefits without also tweeting about the associated risks of taking it. There aren't a lot of companies currently promoting in 140 characters, but given clear guidlines we could see an increase in sponsored tweets.

In this episode of Market Check-Up, the Motley Fool's health care focused investing show, analysts David Williamson and Michael Douglass, discuss the new FDA regs, why stocks like Ariad (Nasdaq: ARIA) and VIVUS (Nasdaq: VVUS) will have trouble in this new medium, and the most likely to use this new marketing avenue. Watch and find out.

All sorts of big video-game announcements came out of this month's E3 conference. A company making one of the biggest splashes was Bungie, the studio that created the Halo series that became the Xbox's marquee franchise. The studio separated from Microsoft  in 2007 and produced its last game in the series -- Halo: Reach -- back in 2010. 

Since breaking from Microsoft, the studio signed a 10-year publishing deal with Activision Blizzard . The first game under this agreement, Destiny, is slated for a September release. Destiny is a hugely important game for a simple reason: It's the most expensive game ever made. Activision's CEO let slip at an investing conference that he believe Destiny will cost $500 million in development costs and marketing. That's more than $200 million more in costs than the next most expensive game, Grand Theft Auto 5. 

Aside from the massive costs sunk into the project, Destiny is a risk because it's creating an ambitious melding of a first-person shooter and role-playing game. Luckily for Activision Blizzard, most reviews of Destiny were largely positive. With Call of Duty appearing to be a franchise that's slipping in popularity, it's important that Destiny could become another marquee bankable franchise for the company. 

In this episode of The Next, Motley Fool tech analyst Eric Bleeker and Rule Breakers analyst Simon Erickson talk about this year's E3, and also some of the disappointment around Microsoft. As expected, there won't be a new Halo game in 2014, which only compounds the Xbox One's early struggles. 

To see their full thoughts, watch the following video. 

Source:  Starbucks

The long lines at your local Starbucks may be about to get really short. No, I'm not talking about increased competition, falling demand, or accelerated order processing. I'm not referring to more registers, simpler menus, or even faster pay options at checkout. What I'm referring to is the coolest thing in Starbucks technology that will make waiting itself a thing of the past.

Immobile mobile
Isn't it a bit ironic that our mobile devices are allowing us to be more immobile? Our devices allow us to do more while doing less. On that note, and you may not be aware, but Starbucks' app happens to be the No. 1 payment app of anybody out there.

Scott Maw, CFO of Starbucks, stated at a recent conference about its digital initiatives:

I think the first thing we can say with confidence is we have a position in this space that is unequaled by others, particularly in mobile payments.

Maw said that the management teams knows with confidence that it is No. 1 though it is unaware of even who No. 2 is, suggesting whoever it happens to be is nowhere even close. Starbucks has a significant portion of the mobile-pay market share.

Three is a charm
For Starbucks, its domination secret is working in a threefold manner of things working together: digital, mobile, and rewards. The "My Starbucks Rewards" now has more than 8 million members and is "growing rapidly." The result is more frequent visits from these people. Starbucks is able to market directly to them, digitally, and help get them into the stores.

Fourteen percent of payments at Starbucks are now from using the mobile app. People are quickly becoming as addicted to using the app as they are to caffeine. The comfort of using digital applications in the companies' locations is increasing to the point where one-third of customers will use some form of a digital means to pay their tab, such as the reloaded gift cards.

Source:  Starbucks

The really cool line-killer
It may be a tad premature for me to get excited since it's technically not even in pilot mode yet, but Starbucks will be testing an option on the app to order in advance. Then you can walk right in the store and pick it up.

Line wait becomes irrelevant. If I can do a couple of clicks, walk in, and my order is literally waiting for me, I'm so in. I imagine millions of Starbucks fans are on the same page. How many times have you and millions of others been running late to work and didn't have time to take a chance waiting on line? Step aside, drive-thru. Starbucks has an even quicker idea.

Assuming the pilot tests work well, and it's hard to imagine, at least to me, that they won't, Starbucks expects a national rollout during the back half of next year, perhaps just in time for the holiday shopping season. How cool is that to save sometimes 10 to 15 precious shopping minutes when you're able to make a rolling pit stop at Starbucks?

Source: Starbucks

Foolish takeaway
This could be a game-changer for Starbucks. Not only is there the direct obvious benefit of likely higher sales from those using the app, but the reduction in the line should please the traditional crowd that is ordering and paying the old-fashioned way. As an additional bonus, digital-app ordering should reduce labor costs and mistakes even if just slightly. As with any business, especially in the food business, all things being equal each penny you can trim in costs is an extra penny to the bottom line.  

Its a big pharma showdown as health care analyst David Williamson discusses whether Merck (NYSE: MRK) or Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) is the better buy. Both stocks have a lot going for them, Merck an exciting pipeline featuring a likely first to market immuno-oncology drug, a hepatitus-c cure, and even a potential treatment for Alzheimer's. Pfizer has a sizable cash horde and an aggressive management team. While losing out on the lower taxes an AstraZeneca deal would have brought, shareholders can look forward to buybacks dividends and a possible huge expansion of its pneumonia vaccine.

Watch and find out in this episode of Market Check-Up, the Motley Fool's health care focused investing show which of these two stocks is the winner.

This week, we look at the feature-rich Fire Phone. Will the new handset help Amazon.com steal business from its smartphone competitors? Or is it just a ploy to get more consumers visiting the retailer's online store?

Then, we examine the prospects for GoPro's upcoming IPO. Should long-term investors look to get in now, or is it too early to buy? We also consider whether Facebook has a winner in Slingshot, a so-called Snapchat killer that leans on an interesting gimmick to boost engagement.

We also talk about a new Google initiative called "Made With Code," aimed at getting girls more interested in writing the next generation of great digital apps. Is Google being generous, savvy, or both?

Next, we return to entertainment and a report that Time Warner plans to make and release seven movies based on DC Comics characters between now and 2018. Is the studio smart to adopt such an accelerated schedule? Does it need a show-runner like Marvel's Kevin Feige to run point?

Finally, we talk about Denver Comic Con and how a beloved independent comics property is getting new life on screen -- and why that may be bad news for one of the major pay TV networks.

Guest host Alison Southwick, Nathan Alderman, and Tim Beyers have these stories and more in this week's episode of 1-Up on Wall Street. Click the video to watch now, and then be sure to follow us on Twitter for more segments and regular geek news updates!

Source: Wikimedia Commons

One of the hottest turnaround stories in recent years has been Rite Aid . Although the drugstore chain is the third largest in the United States, it has been struggling for years against CVS Caremark and Walgreen , its two larger competitors. In spite of its challenges, the retailer's revenue has stayed virtually flat and its bottom line has improved tremendously, which resulted in Mr. Market boosting its shares up 175% from their 52-week low. But is it too soon for shareholders to rejoice? Even though the company's financial situation is improving, there are some big downsides to holding its stock.

Rite Aid's stores vastly underperform those of the competition
A big indicator of a retailer's performance is its revenue per square foot. By figuring out the average nominal worth of products sold for each square foot of selling space, it's possible to gauge the retailer's performance relative to its peers. For Rite Aid, the situation looks downright awful.

As of the end of its 2013 fiscal year, Rite Aid reported approximately $556 in revenue for each selling square foot across its 4,587 retail locations. In all fairness, this exceeds the $537 in sales per square foot that the business reported five years earlier, as management has moved to close underperforming stores while improving comparable-store sales, but it falls far short of its peers.

Sources: Rite Aid, Walgreen, and CVS

At the end of its most recent fiscal year, rival Walgreen saw its revenue per square foot of selling space come in at $811, 46% more than that of Rite Aid. This marks a reasonable uptick from the $802 per square foot of selling space reported by Walgreen five years earlier, but shareholders should keep in mind that the company's revenue (as measured by this metric) has been on the decline since 2011.

The biggest winner over this period, however, has been CVS. Between 2009 and 2013, the retailer saw its revenue per square foot of selling space climb 17% from $1,449 to $1,690.

Rite Aid's international presence is minuscule at best
Currently, Rite Aid has no operations outside of the U.S. While this may not seem like a big deal, the fact of the matter is that remaining U.S.-centric may put Rite Aid even further behind its rivals, given that GDP growth in developing countries is expected to outpace GDP growth in developed ones.

In contrast, both Walgreen and CVS have footprints abroad. For CVS, this takes the form of 45 stores in Brazil, while Walgreen is in talks to acquire the rest of Alliance Boots.

Source: Alliance Boots

In 2012, the drugstore chain purchased a 45% stake in Alliance Boots for $6.5 billion and gained an option to buy the remaining 55% of the company for $9.5 billion between Feb. 2 and Aug. 2 of 2015. Using 2013's revenue, this would increase the company's sales from $72.2 billion to $110 billion and would allow the business (if shareholders can persuade management) to move its tax base to Switzerland, effectively decreasing its corporate tax rate by nearly half.

Rite Aid's debt could be a pressing concern
In addition to the issues previously discussed, there's also the matter of Rite Aid's high debt. Although the business has moved from annual losses to annual gains and its debt levels have been improving over the past five years, the fact that its $5.7 billion in debt equals 22% of the company's trailing-12 month revenue isn't something to brush aside.

To put this into perspective, both Walgreen and CVS have less debt than Rite Aid as a percentage of sales, based on their most recent revenue and balance sheet data. Currently, CVS' ratio stands at 10% of trailing-12 month sales while Walgreen's is even lower at 6%.

This disparity does not mean that Rite Aid will suffer because as long as management can keep the earnings and cash flow of the business positive, its debt burden shouldn't be too much of an issue. However, in the event that the drugstore chain sees bad times come again, this is something the Foolish investor should watch very closely.

Foolish takeaway
None of what I wrote implies that Rite Aid is a terrible investment. In fact, given the company's improvement in recent years it's entirely possible that the retailer can continue its winning streak. But these weaknesses do point to a picture in which the company may not be such a no-brainer but may, instead, be riskier than what some investors have been led to believe.

Just like the protagonist in "Fortunately, Unfortunately" Gilead Sciences is experiencing a disproportionate amount of highs and lows.

Fortunately, the big biotech released great phase 3 data out of Japan for an experimental hepatitis-c combo treatment of the approved Sovaldi and ledipasvir which saw 100% cure rates.

Unfortunately, the cost of the hep-C cure has created a intense backlash which has spread to the UK. Their health agency, NICE, said Sovaldi's $59,000 price tag, $25,000 less than we pay in the U.S., was likely still too high for the government to pay for in all but the most severe cases. 

In this episode of market checkup, the Motley Fool's health care focused investing show, analysts David Williamson and Michael Douglass discuss the highs and lows of Gilead's week and the important takeaways for investors.

Source: Wikimedia Commons. 

Heading into earnings on June 25, investors of Bed Bath & Beyond are probably trying to figure out what to do with the stock. Currently, the company's shares are trading around 52-week lows, which could indicate some upside, but given the business's performance lately, is it possible that companies like Target or Macy's make for more attractive plays?

Mr. Market has relatively high expectations for Bed Bath & Beyond!
For the quarter, analysts expect Bed Bath & Beyond to report revenue of $2.69 billion. If this forecast turns out to be accurate, it will represent a 3% gain in revenue from the $2.61 billion management reported for the first quarter of its 2013 fiscal year.

On an earnings basis, Mr. Market is slightly less optimistic. For the quarter, Bed Bath & Beyond is expected to report earnings per share of $0.95, which should equate to a net profit of around $195 million. On a per-share basis, this will represent a 2% increase over the $0.93 management reported last year.

How does the company stack up against the competition?
The past few years have been pretty good for Bed Bath & Beyond. Between 2009 and 2013, the retailer saw its revenue jump 47% from $7.8 billion to $11.5 billion. According to the company's most recent annual report, the biggest contributor to its sales growth during this period appears to be its store count, which rose 36% from 1,100 locations to 1,496. This was, however, complimented by the 25% increase in aggregate comparable-store-sales management reported during the period.

Source: Bed Bath & Beyond revenue data by YCharts.

During a similar five-year timeframe, Target couldn't keep pace with Bed Bath & Beyond. Between 2009 and 2013, Target's revenue rose just 11% from $65.4 billion to $72.6 billion. Looking at the company's financial statements, this mediocre growth seems to stem from a comparable-store-sales increase of just 5%, at a time when the retailer's store count rose 10% from 1,740 locations to 1,917.

Source: Bed Bath & Beyond.

Although not as impressive as Bed Bath & Beyond's metrics, Macy's has done alright for itself. Over the past five years, Macy's saw its revenue climb a respectable 19% from $23.5 billion to $27.9 billion. The main driver behind this jump in sales has been its comparable store sales, which was partially offset by a 0.7% reduction in store count from 847 locations to 841.

Looking at profits, Macy's has continued to do well. In fact, the company's growth over this period put both of its rivals to shame. Between 2009 and 2013, Macy's saw its net income soar 306% from $329 million to $1.3 billion. This jump in profits was due, in part, to the company's rising sales. But an even bigger component to its profitability was its selling, general and administrative expenses, which fell from 34.3% of sales to 30.2%.

Source: Bed Bath & Beyond net income data by YCharts.

The runner-up in profitability for this time horizon was Bed Bath & Beyond. During this five-year period, the retailer's net income leapt 70% from $600 million to $1 billion. Like Macy's some of this can be attributed to higher sales, but it would be reckless to ignore that the retailer's selling, general and administrative expenses dropped from 28.5% of sales to 25.7%.

Of the three retailers profiled here, the only poor performer over this period was Target, which saw its bottom line contract by 21% from $2.5 billion to nearly $2 billion. Even though revenue increased, it was plagued by higher costs. A 41% rise in interest expense during the period, its cost of goods rose from 69.7% of sales to 70.5%, and its selling, general and administrative expenses increased from 20% of sales to 21.2%. The business also booked a $17 million charge (net of insurance proceeds) stemming from a data breach that occurred last year and affected as many as 110 million customers.

Foolish takeaway
Right now, Mr. Market seems to be somewhat pessimistic about Bed Bath & Beyond's prospects. While it is possible that the company could begin sliding, management has grown its top and bottom lines by a significant amount. This suggests that investors might not want to discard this retailer before looking into it further. Based on past performance, only Macy's (because of its net income growth) might make for a more appealing prospect for a Foolish investor.