While Research In Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM) and Apple, Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) are locked in their battle for smartphone supremacy, a new entry into the market has grabbed headlines.

Palm's (NASDAQ: PALM) brand new touch-screen smartphone -- the Pre -- was the surprise event at this year's Consumer Electronics Show (CES). Among other things, the Pre uses the Palm's Web OS, which supposedly can consolidate data from multiple Web sources.

The canary in the coal mine for the economy is business capital spending.

IT spending? What IT spending?

According to ChangeWave Research surveys, spending is flat or falling.

There are no gee-whiz products to buy and install, the number of employees is shrinking, meaning there are lots of extra computers and spare server capacity lying about. The number of licensees for a software license is shrinking and so on.

What's worse, IT spending is contracting even faster overseas, and these markets account for more than 50% of the revenue for most big U.S. tech outfits.

Be sure to read all 7 reasons the stock market isn't going up any time soon.

Michael Shulman is a contributor to OptionsZone.com.

Dropped calls have been a nuisance since the dawn of cell phones. But which cellular service provider has the best record in terms of the fewest dropped calls?

In a recent survey, ChangeWave asked 3,800 cell phone owners to estimate the percentage of their calls that were dropped during the past 90 days.

The survey, which was conducted Dec. 9-15, 2008, produced a clear winner: Verizon (NYSE: VZ) has the fewest dropped calls of all.

After the stock market meltdown of 2008, Wall Street brokerages aren't anyone's favorites in 2009.

But some customers said they're still happy with their online broker.

A December ChangeWave survey of 3,051 consumers found that despite the extremely difficult financial market, two online brokerages still capture high customer satisfaction ratings -- Charles Schwab (NASDAQ: SCHW) and archrival, Scottrade.

Java junkies are shunning Starbucks (NASDAQ: SBUX) in favor of McDonald's (NYSE: MCD) coffee, according to a new ChangeWave survey of more than 1,300 consumers.

The survey results show a massive shift away from specialty retailers toward less expensive alternatives like McDonald's and home brewing.

Just 4% of respondents said they'll be purchasing coffee more often at Starbucks during the next 90 days, while a huge 26% said less often (net score = -22).

Though 11% of respondents said they'll buy more coffee at McDonald's, only 4% said less (net score = +7).

MOST NOTEWORTHY: AutoNation (AN), Darden Restaurants (DRI), Rare Hospitality (RARE) and ChoicePoint (CPS) were today's noteworthy downgrades:

• Goldman cut AutoNation (NYSE: AN) to Sell from Neutral based on potential for additional earnings shortfalls. The firm does not expect a sharp rebound in shares.

• Bear Stearns downgraded Darden Restaurants (NYSE: DRI) to Peer Perform from Outperform following its acquisition of Rare Hospitality.

• Rare Hospitality (NASDAQ: RARE) was cut to Hold from Buy at Keybanc following the acquisition offer from Darden.

• ChoicePoint (NYSE: CPS) was cut to Reduce from Neutral at Suntrust, citing the difficult macro environment, which will impact revenue growth in its low-barrier commoditized non-insurance operations...

OTHER DOWNGRADES:

• Alliance Holdings (NASDAQ: AHGP) was cut to Hold from Buy at AG Edwards.

• UBS downgraded SL Green Realty (NYSE: SLG) and Boston Properties (NYSE: BXP) to Neutral from Buy.

• Morgan Stanley downgraded Countrywide Financial (NYSE: CFC) to Equal Weight from Overweight.

Analyst summaries provided by TheFlyOnTheWall.com (subscription required).

In what may be the coolest bit of news to hit the wires all week, Taser International Inc (NASDAQ: TASR) and iRobot Corporation (NASDAQ: IRBT) have announced their intentions to form an alliance to create an army of T-1000 robots. Okay, not exactly. The actual announcement read:

"Under the terms of this alliance the two companies will work collaboratively to develop a new robotic capability utilizing TASER technologies. This combination of capabilities will allow law enforcement, federal, and military users to employ TASER technology from an iRobot platform at a safe distance to engage, incapacitate, and control dangerous suspects without exposing those personnel, the suspect, or bystanders to unnecessary risks, the companies said.

As the first step in this alliance, the two companies have integrated TASER X26 electronic control device technology into the iRobot PackBot Explorer."

This is still exciting news for both Taser and iRobot. It signals that both companies are aware of the limited markets for their niche products -- the Taser stun gun and the Roomba -- and are actively seeking to broaden their scope. How successful will this alliance be? Only after we see a prototype of the iRobot PackBot Explorer with Taser x26 electronic control device technology will we know for sure. But hopefully not as successful as the T-1000.

China Tech News has reported that IBM and Lehman Brothers are working in financial and technical alliance to help bring Chinese software provider Kingdee into fully global status. IBM (NYSE: IBM) has been associated with Kingdee for approximately ten years already, and an offshore business alliance between IBM and Lehman Brothers (NYSE: LEH) is focusing on helping mid-stage and maturing Chinese businesses expand their business and management capabilities. IBM helps with the operational and technical aspects while Lehman Brothers will be assisting with investment strategies and private equity direction. This cooperative financial support is being provided through what has been labeled the "China Investment Fund." What makes this particular scenario a bit more interesting is that Lehman Brothers and IBM are each purchasing just under 4% of the issued share capital interest in Kingdee.

For now the declared intent of this joint project is primarily to facilitate the growth of Kingdee, but the long-term language suggests that IBM is helping to nurture the Chinese software industry as a whole. I can't help but wonder what the implications might be for Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) as the Chinese software industry continues to push into global markets with background support from IBM. At this point in time I can only draw one undeniable conclusion: This is definitely not something to be taken lightly.

Since August, the stock price of Countrywide (NYSE: CFC) has had a decent rally. And, it looks like part of it has been from rumors of a takeover.

Well, according to a report from the Financial Times, there may actually be some credence to this scenario. The suitor? Bank of America (NYSE: BAC).

However, the first step may be an alliance. But, why not just ultimately make it a merger?

Actually, investors are taking things seriously. On the news, Countrywide's stock price increased 4.24% to $42.

Already, Bank of America is #1 in deposits and #1 in credit cards. Hey, why not #1 in mortgages?

Besides, after last year's deal for MBNA, Bank of America is probably ready for another mega deal.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including the Complete M&A Handbook and the EDGAR-Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements.

Following on last week's Wall Street Journal article (see my previous commentary), exploring a potential alliance between eBay and either Microsoft or Yahoo, Microsoft's CEO Steve Ballmer in an interview with German newspaper Die Welt dismissed explicit plans for an eBay and Microsoft alliance to combat Google.

He notes that he and eBay CEO Meg Whitman have known each other for 22 years and do communicate often regarding their respective businesses and what synergies the two companies could attain together. 

Of course, Ballmer makes no explicit reference on how Microsoft plans to deal with increasing competition from Google, but the field will no doubt become more interesting as the battle over search-advertising rages on.

Today's Wall Street Journal reports that eBay is in talks with Microsoft and Yahoo! to potentially form a strategic alliance against Google.

The net industry is really showing how truly volatile and liquid it is.  Where Yahoo! used to reign supreme in search and eBay in auctions, just this week both companies are reporting numbers that are lackluster, to say the least. 

Once upon a time, two years ago, Yahoo! and eBay were heralded in academic classrooms and Wall Street boardrooms as the new leaders in their respective sectors. Their competitors (Alta Vista, Excite, MSN, Amazon, Pricewatch, Yahoo! Auctions, etc.) were all in distant second and third places; Yahoo! and eBay seemed destined to be de facto internet titans. 

Out of left field though, Google has come blazing onto the scene and the buzz won't seem to stop.  In less than two years, Google has surpassed any analyst's wildest dreams and reached a market cap of $130 billion. Compare that to Yahoo!'s market cap of $46 billion and eBay's market cap of $49.37 billion.