2007 has been less than easy for many. It started promisingly enough with Nancy Pelosi becoming the first female Speaker of the House and ended on a sad note with the assassination of another female politician, former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. Between those two bookends, we saw a credit crunch; Paris paralyzed not once but twice by major strikes and Malibu caught on fire proving that not even the privileged and their beach front homes were safe from the spate of bad luck. But least I sound like a pessimist let me point out that not everyone had a bad time. Fortune favored the brave and made last year a profitable one for a select few. So in the interest of lifting everyone’s spirits and proving that cliché about clouds with silver linings I will offer up my list of the five who made good in 07. It is not exhaustive, merely a glimpse of who or what had reason to be grateful for 2007.The Cell Phone Industry
Cell phones rose from the gutter of commoditization to become status symbols again. The industry had reached a stagnation point with units being almost indistinguishable and the service providers calling all the shots. Through a combination of deep discounts on phones, iron clad contracts and confusing calling plans the service providers sought to entice and retain as many customers as they could. Then, out of Cupertino, came a messiah: iPhone and the market was changed for good. As melodramatic as that sounds one would be remiss to underestimate the effect that the release and surrounding media attention had on the mobile industry. Here was a phone that everyone was talking about and wanted and few could get before the official rollout. Even tech darlings like New York Times columnist David Pogue was only given one close to the release date. Steve Jobs is a master of promotion and primed the hype engine to the max so the anticipation had become a crescendo by the June 29 release. Never had a product caused such hysteria, people lined up for hours to be among the first to own the iPhone. Apple sold 270, 000 in the first 30 hours and 1 million by September 10th. Though the numbers are impressive they probably will not reach the projected 10 million units by the end of 2008 fiscal year.
For the most part iPhone delivered. It featured a slick design, revolutionary touch interface, full web browser and the best iPod yet. The 'visual voice mail' feature meant you no longer ate up minutes slogging through your messages. In fact the phone itself was the weakest feature of iPhone. It lacked picture messaging (MMS), had no video recording capabilities or flash support, no removable battery and it relied on EDGE rather than the faster 3G network. Also there was that unfortunate marriage to AT&T. But nothing seemed to slow down the juggernaut that was iPhone, not even the iBrick incident or the sudden price drop from $499 to $399. Not only did Apples coffers overflow but the industry as a whole was revitalized. Cell phone manufacturers fell over themselves to bring out iPhone inspired smart models some even more impressive than Apple’s. They stopped producing phones and started making mobile communication devices for a public that was hungry for entertainment and information on the go. Despite tightened wallets no one thought twice about spending hundreds of dollars on a smart phone when a basic one could be had for less than $40. Bolstered by the promise of hyper fast WiMax and 4G networks it seemed the days of the computer in your pocket were finally here. Suddenly the phone is sexy again.
Carlos Slim Helú
Slim is a misnomer when it comes to both his appearance and his wallet. He emerged from left field taking even the recorder of astronomical wealth, Forbes magazine and their rich list by surprise. The Mexican business man moved from obscurity to household name by toppling Bill Gates from his perch as richest man in the world, a position he held since 1995. Though Forbes does not plan to recalculate their list until later this year and maintains Gates as #1, Fortune magazine reported that in July 2007 Slims stock holdings caused him to surpass Gates. Slim, the son of Lebanese immigrants made his fortune in telecommunications and wields considerable influence over the industry in Mexico and Latin America through his ownership of Teléfonos de México (Telmex), Telcel and América Móvil. His Grupo Carso holding company also owns Sanborns one of the largest retail, pharmacy and department chains in Mexico. In addition it operates 50 Sears Mexico stores as well as major construction and industrial holdings.
His strategy is consistent and deceptively simple: Buy companies cheap, whip them into shape and drive out competitors. Slim shrewdly bought 3% of Apple before its renaissance following the release of the iMac line of computers. This investment has shot up in value with the meteoric rise of Apple stock. But Slim’s Midas touch is not infallible. He owns bankrupt computer retail outlet CompUSA. Grupo Carso announced that it would close or sell off all the remaining stores after last years holiday season. But that is chump change to Slim who through Telmex operates 92% of the land lines in Mexico and his mobile arm Telcel has 73% of the nations cell phones. His América Móvil has been buying up mobile carriers throughout Latin America and now with over 100 million subscribers is the regions biggest player. To understand the influence Carlos Slim wields one would have to go back to the days of the great robber barons of the gilded age when men like John D. Rockefeller, J.P Morgan and Andrew Carnegie controlled oil, finance and railroads. The antitrust laws that broke up those great monopolies are not a part of the business lexicon in Mexico and this allows Slim to be the only big fish in the pond. However he does have his detractors and has been called a monopolist who discourages competition. His vast fortune is roughly 7 % of the country's annual economic output and his companies make up one-third of the Mexican stock exchange. This is in stark contrast to the rest of the population. Slim is polishing his image by increasing his philanthropic efforts. His charitable foundations have roughly $4 billion to date and have been pledged at least another $6 billion going towards causes like health and education. Carlos Slim showed that the American dream is not confined to those living north of the Rio Grande.
Summer Movie Season
Surprised? The industry is in the midst of a writer's strike that is affecting not only the studios but also ancillary businesses like limo services and restaurants that depend on the movie machine for a big part of their existence. But despite all the uncertainty that came with the walkout on November 5th, the past summer season was the biggest in box office history totaling $4.15 billion domestically. The record was previously held by summer 04 with $3.95 billion. 04 was the season of 'Spiderman 2', 'Shrek 2', 'Oceans 12' and 'The Bourne Supremacy', four franchises that all showed up again this summer and made it the year of the 'threequels'. Studios had a loyal built in audience for these films and it helped them draw crowds to theaters producing monster opening weekends. The web slinging 'Spiderman 3' had the biggest opening day on record in the US with $59.8 million but was third overall in worldwide total earnings behind 'Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End' which banked $961,002,663, and 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix'. DreamWorks Animation's 'Shrek the Third' was the fourth biggest earner worldwide, continuing its successful send-up of the fairytale genre. Though the top four were all sequels the fifth was not. Despite spastic editing and the fact that it did not really make sense, audiences flocked to see 'Transformers' making it the biggest earning non-sequel of the year with a worldwide total of $702,927,087. Why? Because no one does loud, effects driven, testosterone fueled bombast quite like Michael Bay. He took a thin script based on a tired 80's toy franchise, injected a generous amount of CG robots, explosions and car chases then gave birth to a video game on steroids that devoured the summer.
Not all the big money makers were empty soul suckers. The 'Bourne Ultimatum' received positive reviews and '300' was visually arresting though historically flawed. But the best blockbuster was undoubtedly 'Ratatouille'. Pixar can do no wrong and justified its $7.4 billion purchase by Disney. Now with Steve Jobs as Disney's biggest individual shareholder and on the board of directors things are somewhat different from the time when the Disney Pixar collaboration produced 'Toy Story' and 'Monsters, Inc.'. However one thing hasn't changed and that is their batting average because 'Ratatouille' was 3 star Michelin good. It told the charming tale of a rat with a taste for haute cuisine and director Brad Bird went to great lengths to give the movie authenticity, tapping the talents of renowned chef Thomas Keller and immersing the animators in Paris. And it paid off. Pixar, known for setting a high technical bar, outdid itself animating fur, wet clothes, wild chase scenes and such lushly rendered food that you could almost smell it. Combining a great story, slapstick physical comedy and lovable characters they produced a film that appealed to both children and adults without pandering to either. It also resonated across languages by avoiding the pop culture references that bogged down “Shrek 2”. Although the movie was computer generated it packed more pathos into 111 minutes than all the other blockbusters combined, proving you can still be brilliant and profitable in Hollywood.
The Media
Journalism 101, the more eventful the year the better it is for the fourth estate. While more respectable papers were trying vainly to raise a blasé public's awareness about the significance of the upcoming year's presidential election, publications that catered to the lowest common denominator were having a field day reporting on high profile pop culture disasters. It was a year that saw the divorce and subsequent fall from grace of an American pop princess, the arrest, incarceration and re-arrest of several overexposed stars, the firing of a veteran radio personality following a racial slur and it seemed that everyone from underage starlet to forty-something actress was having a baby. In a word it was tabloid gold and US Weekly, People magazine and the other peddlers of celeb culture could not dish the dirt fast enough to satisfy the nations hunger for scandal. Even TV news got in on the act; witness the live coverage of Paris Hilton’s release from jail an event given more attention than any 08 presidential candidate. The hyper connectedness of the citizen journalist made it almost impossible for something to occur, significant or otherwise to someone famous without it being recorded on a cell phone cam and sold to the highest paying bidder.
Even the old establishment had its dramatic moment this year when media tycoon Rupert Murdoch put in an unsolicited takeover bid for the venerable Wall Street Journal and his battle plan was genius. Offer more money ($60 a share for stock that was trading at $33 a share) than anyone else and brow beat them into saying yes. His $5 billion bid for the WSJ was first rebuffed by the Bancroft family which had held a controlling 60% of the paper since 1903. Bancroft family members did not even deign to meet with him and the back and forth was played out in breathless tones online and in print. There were concerns that Murdoch, unabashed conservative owner of New York Post and the right leaning Fox News Channel, would try to bend the country's most important business daily to his way of thinking. Fact is the journal needed a shakeup; an infusion of fresh blood and Murdoch had both the pockets and the experience to handle such a publication. And the cachet that owning the respected WSJ would impart on him would be worth much more than the paper’s ticket price. He threatened to revoke the offer and the Bancroft's finally caved in. Rupert got what he wanted and despite all the dire predictions, the Journal is not yet ruined
The Environment
Green was the new black this year as environmental awareness got a makeover. It became less tree hugging hippie and more, trendy hipster. The patron saint of the green movement was former vice president and one time candidate Al Gore who reinvented himself as caretaker of Earth. He narrated the 2006 Oscar winning movie 'An Inconvenient Truth' and authored its companion book that reached #1 on the New York Times best selling non fiction paperback list. Then he capped it off by winning the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. With Gore spearheading the new efforts to increase awareness of global warming more people started paying attention to their habits as conspicuous overconsumption fell out of favor.
Front and center of the new green wave were celebrities who placed their famous faces and fan appeal behind the movement. Names like Leonardo DiCaprio, Julia Roberts and Brad Pitt were everywhere, supporting environmental foundations, building green mansions, purchasing carbon offsets or lining up to reserve a ride that would forever change the image of the little electric car that just putters along. The Tesla Roadster is the world's fastest fully electric car and goes from 0 to 60 in under 4 seconds. It is slated for release in very limited numbers (only 650 for 2008) during the first quarter of this year but being this green will set you back $100,000. Even the annual New Year celebration in Times Square jumped into the fray with its first environmentally conscious ball drop. The crystal ball was the brightest ever with over 16.7 million colors and special effects but featured state of the art lighting from Philips, 9,567 energy-efficient LED bulbs that in total used the same amount of energy needed to power ten toasters.