Walmart on Tuesday outlined plans to grow its critically important e-commerce business in the U.S. by 40 percent over the next fiscal year. The company intends to leverage a series of key acquisitions and its more than 4,600 brick-and-mortar locations to mount a direct challenge to Amazon for millennial customers. Walmart is the largest retail operation in the world and the leading U.S. challenger to Amazon.

What would it take to cause Apple to fail? While Steve Jobs was alive, the prevalent belief was that it would take his removal from the company. That has happened, but Apple's valuation and reserves are higher. Although the foundational element was removed, no one really went after Apple hard until last week, when Google launched a comprehensive strategy that clearly targeted the company.

Oracle will announce its Q1 revenue and profit numbers after market close on Wednesday. There's more than a little excitement about what might be revealed, specifically if the company can continue its rise, thanks to its cloud products. The anticipated answer is yes, but there's potential for a surprise. The company so far has been posting great numbers for its cloud products.

Salesforce announced the partial attainment of one of its long-range goals in its Q2 earnings announcement last week: It eclipsed its goal of a $10 billion run rate. This will be followed by similar announcements over the next year -- first $10 billion year, etc. -- and why not? The company should celebrate. Second quarter revenue hit $2.56 billion, a 26 percent increase year over year.

HP just took over the PC market lead worldwide. You probably don't get how incredible this is, so here's an analogy: It's as if a crooked referee put a bunch of lead on a racer who already was overweight and shuffled him to the back of the pack, but in the end, the guy finished first. You'd seriously want to look under his T-Shirt to see if you'd find Superman's costume.

There's been a lot written recently about how artificial intelligence, machine learning and automation are going to displace millions of workers. However, these powerful new technologies already have spawned a surge in demand for a new wave of highly skilled consultants to help organizations capitalize on the added business opportunities resulting from the latest innovations.

Alphabet shares reached a new record high on Monday, surpassing the $1,000 benchmark just a week after Amazon accomplished the feat. Investors placed bets that Google's core search and emerging AI technology will help maintain the company's dominance over rivals. The stock price surged after securities analyst Andy Hargreaves advised investors to get out of Apple and invest in Alphabet.

Amazon stock surged to more than $1,000 for the first time in early trading on Tuesday, marking a milestone for the dominant e-commerce retailer and leaving its closest competitors still trying to figure out a path to closing the gap. Amazon's shares hovered near $997 in late mid-afternoon trading after reaching $1001.20 earlier in the day, an all-time-high for the stock.

Snap shares appear to have rebounded from the plunge they took earlier this month, after the newly public company released a massive $2.2 billion loss in the first quarter, but investors still are scratching their heads over the company's prospects. Trading just over $20 at mid-day Tuesday, Snap looks to some like it has regained its early bloom. Others suspect that darker days are yet to come.

The Softbank Vision Fund has closed its first major funding round raising more than $93 billion in capital from the Gulf states, as well as tech stalwarts Apple, Qualcomm and others. Softbank, which last fall launched the fund with backing from the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, said it has received new commitments from the Mubadala Investment Fund from the United Arab Emirates.

One of the interesting things at Dell EMC World came from Karen Quintos, the most powerful woman at Dell. Karen is responsible for its Entrepreneur in Residence program, which focuses on equipping and helping woman entrepreneurs. Dell Technologies apparently has created "Alice," a female-focused artificial intelligence focused on helping support and drive innovative firms backed by women.

Nintendo last week introduced a new contender in the increasingly hot portable gaming competition. The New Nintendo 2DS XL will make its debut on July 28 at a mid-range price of $149.99. It will slot in right between the entry-level 2DS and more robust 3DS XL. The 2DS XL has the same large screen as the 3DS XL and can play all the games made for the Nintendo 3DS, New Nintendo 3DS and Nintendo DS.

Cloud marketing automation firm Zeta Global on Thursday announced that it has raised $140 million in its largest ever round of financing. Former Apple CEO John Sculley and David Steinberg cofounded the company in 2007. GPI Capital led the Series F financing, which includes $115 million in equity and $25 million in debt. Zeta will use the funds to advance its growth plan through strategic acquisitions.

Instagram has reached a milestone of 700 million members while enjoying the fastest-ever growth rate in its history. The network has grown by more than 100 million members in the last four months. Its burgeoning growth can be credited to new features like Stories, live video and disappearing messages, the company said. User engagement with Stories has grown to more than 200 million people per day.

Imagination on Monday announced that Apple would no longer use its intellectual property, and the company's stock sank faster than a bottomless boat on the news. Apple planned to discontinue its use of the company's IP in new products in 15 months to two years, ending the companies' license and royalty agreement, Imagination said. Those royalties account for about half the company's revenue.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has entered more rarefied air, having leapfrogged billionaires Amancio Ortega and Warren Buffett to become the second wealthiest person in the world. Bezos -- CEO of the e-commerce retailer and cloud services provider -- last week enjoyed a jump of $1.5 billion to $75.6 billion net worth, after his company announced a deal to acquire Souq.com.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise has inked a deal to acquire flash storage firm Nimble Storage, once viewed as a darling of Wall Street, for $12.50 a share in cash, or $1 billion. HPE also agreed to assume or pay out Nimble Storage's unvested equity awards, which are valued at $200 million. Upon completion of the deal, Nimble Storage will merge with a unit of HPE and become a subsidiary of the company.

Shares of Snapchat owner Snap Inc. soared higher on Friday, following Thursday's successful initial public offering. After debuting at $17.00 on the New York Stock Exchange, Snap shares rose 44 percent to $24.48 on Thursday, well above analyst expectations, placing the company's value at $28 billion. The stock continued to trend upward on Friday, trading at $27.16 by mid-day.

As it approaches its IPO, Snap, maker of the popular Snapchat messaging app, is positioning itself as a camera company. "We feel like we're really at the beginning of what cameras can do," said Snap CEO Evan Spiegel. "Before, cameras were the best way to perfectly save or record something that you saw. They sort of helped augment memory -- but now, you know, cameras augment the way that we talk."

Toshiba shares fell 8 percent on Tuesday as the company took a $6.3 billion writedown related to its struggling nuclear power business and delayed the release of its fiscal Q3 earnings. Shigenori Shiga, Toshiba's chairman and representative executive officer, resigned effective Wednesday. His resignation in part reflects management taking responsibility for the Westinghouse fiasco.

Twitter's share price plunged 12.3 percent, closing Thursday at $16.41 after the company released its Q4 2016 financial report. It fell further on Friday, trading at $15.54 mid-day. On the bright side, daily active usage grew for the third consecutive quarter and strong growth is expected to continue, the company said. Active monthly users in Q4 totaled 319 million, up 4 percent year over year.

SnapRoute, a developer of open source networking software, announced that it has raised $25 million in Series A financing led by Norwest Venture Partners with new support from AT&T and Microsoft Ventures. SnapRoute, founded by CEO Jason Forrester and other former Apple engineers, plans to use the funding to speed up the development of open source networking software for Fortune 500 firms.

Is Avaya on the road to financial recovery? What will happen to business partners and customers if it is not? The company last month filed for Chapter 11 protection for itself and some of its United States subsidiaries -- a move that makes it "the first major established technology company that's dying as a direct result of the cloud," according to Ian Campbell, CEO of Nucleus Research.

Snap last week filed for a $3 billion IPO. The company's private market valuation is $17.8 billion, but investors reportedly have valued it at between $20 billion and $25 billion. "Twenty-five billion dollars is just nuts, but that's the market we're in," remarked Rob Enderle, principal analyst at the Enderle Group. "This could provide an opportunity for the big gambler investors," he suggested.

Apple had a good quarter, but if you look under the numbers there is a ton of trouble. It just dropped behind Google in brand value, and valuation may crater in a few months. The iPhone 7 did well, but that shouldn't be a surprise, given that its biggest competitor, Samsung, saw its phone literally go up in flames last quarter. The Galaxy 8 is coming, though, and it looks really impressive.

Apple stunned Wall Street with Q1 earnings that set new quarterly unit and revenue records in key product segments, and its highest-ever earnings per share. CEO Tim Cook said the company set all-time revenue and unit records for its iPhone and Apple Watch brands, all-time revenue records for its Mac and Services businesses, and all-time revenue records for four of its five geographic sectors.

Samsung is set to release the results of its Galaxy Note7 investigation on Monday, explaining the underlying causes of the problems that led to the phone's demise. The three independent quality control and supply chain analysis firms Samsung engaged to conduct the investigation concluded that the Note7 was affected by two separate issues. One was a battery issue; the other was the rush to market.

Netflix generated $8.3 billion in global streaming revenue in 2016, with 35 percent year-over-year growth, it reported Wednesday. The company ended last year with 93.8 million members, including 19 million net additions -- up from 17.4 million new subscribers in 2015. Netflix's global revenue for the fourth quarter of 2016 grew by 41 percent year-over-year to $2.4 billion, and 7.05 million net new members joined during that time period.

Pipedrive, a CRM manager that targets the end-user salesperson, has raised $17 million in a round of Series B funding from an investor group led by Atomico. Two of the company's original investors, Bessemer Venture Partners and Rembrandt Ventures, participated in the new round as well. Atomico partner Teddie Wardi will join Pipedrive's board to offer advice and support to the firm.

Amazon on Thursday announced it will create more than 100,000 new jobs across the United States over the next 18 months, ranging from entry-level opportunities to positions for engineers and software developers. All will be full-time jobs with full benefits. Many of the jobs will be in new fulfillment centers currently under construction in Texas, California, Florida, New Jersey and other states.