By Robert Cyran The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.

NEW YORK — Groupon’s gaffes have given fair warning to investors. The run-up to the Internet coupon company’s initial public offering has been characterized by a series of rosy promises from executives that went unfulfilled. This bodes poorly for the company’s governance, and perhaps its financial prospects, as a full-fledged public company.

The Chicago-based web outfit lost $420 million last year and $220 million in the first half of this year despite earlier claims it was in the black. Since it’s relatively easy for rivals to set up competing services, buying stock in Groupon is placing a bet upon management. The firm’s latest foot-in-mouth episode — which came directly from chief executive and founder Andrew Mason — makes this a risky wager.

By Robert Cyran The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.

NEW YORK — Investors who think stock buybacks are bad have a new benchmark against which to channel their dislike. Demand Media, a content farm whose public offering in January briefly heralded a new boom in Internet stocks, has seen its shares plunge by half as its business model has been challenged by Google. But rather than dedicate the proceeds of the IPO to fixing the company, its board has decided to use a third of it to repurchase stock.

This is shameful for a few reasons. For starters, it contravenes the promises Demand made to prospective investors when it sold shares at $17 a pop seven months ago. Demand Media said the $71 million it was raising in its IPO — alongside existing stockholders who sold $69 million worth — was pegged for “investments in content, international expansion, working capital, product development, sales and marketing activities, general and administrative matters and capital expenditures.”

By Robert Cyran The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.

Few companies are as indelibly linked to an individual as Apple is to Steve Jobs. Not only one of the founders, he led the company from near bankruptcy to become one of the most valuable companies in the world. News on Wednesday of his retirement from running day-to-day operations is a blow — even if it was both inevitable and expected. But investors haven’t yet wrapped their minds around the powerhouse Jobs built.

For the time being, Apple will still be able to call on Jobs’ uncanny sense of consumer tastes and shrewd marketing skills. He was elected chairman of the board and will presumably guide and advise the company as long as he is physically able. It’s nevertheless reasonable to surmise his illnesses, first disclosed seven years ago, are taking a harder toll. Meanwhile, his replacement, Tim Cook, is not just capable but has had several stints in the CEO’s seat, during which there were no noticeable hiccups.

By Robert Cyran The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.

The selloff in Hewlett-Packard shares looks like overkill. The tech giant has seen about a quarter of its market value — or almost $16 billion — vaporized in two days. Shareholders have fled following another profit warning, a pricey deal to buy data search group Autonomy for around $10 billion, and a strategic U-turn. That makes for plenty of warts — but HP now looks too cheap.

Spinning off the PC division, as the company said it may do, would rid it of a headache. The growth of tablets and mobile devices are hurting traditional computer sales. But separating the two could take up to 18 months, and some antsy customers could flee. Rival Dell is valued at about 0.3 times last years’ sales. Attach a 25 percent discount to be conservative, and HP’s PC operations would be worth about $10 billion.

By Robert Cyran The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.

Google is spending $12.5 billion on insurance for itself — but its partners may not feel at ease. The search giant’s deal to buy smartphone maker Motorola Mobility locks in patents to help protect its rapidly growing Android mobile operating system. But Google’s plans for the hardware business that comes along with the patents will be the key concern for regulators and other current Android handset makers alike.

Intellectual property suddenly mattered to Google following the recent $4.5 billion purchase of 6,000 patents from the bankrupt Nortel by a consortium of Apple, Microsoft and several others. Google’s much smaller hoard of patents left Android vulnerable. The risk was that rivals could extract increased royalties from the manufacture of Android devices — or, worse, prevent companies selling them altogether.

By Robert Cyran The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.

Smartphones powered by Apple and Google operate using hundreds of thousands of highly specialized Web programs. That’s what has allowed the two firms to lock up most of the premium cellphone market. Yet a new Web standard, called HTML5, is gaining traction and buzz, not least because its biggest supporters say it will allow a bit of an end-run around these walled gardens.

In general, Web browsers on phones haven’t been ideal for accessing content. Only programs installed directly on gadgets have taken full advantage of handsets’ address books or knowledge of a users’ location. So these applications, or apps, caught on and set off virtuous cycles, attracting both users and developers to the iPhone and Android operating systems.

By Robert Cyran The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.

Could Apple be worth $1 trillion? It’s conceivable. The $342 billion iPhone and iPad maker became – if only briefly – the most valuable company in the United States when it surpassed Exxon Mobil on Aug. 9. Yet its sales have been surging 80 percent a year, and profit faster. And Apple trades roughly in line with the growing U.S. market — and at less than half the price-to-earnings multiple it fetched in 2006, when revenue growth was much slower.

Apple now trades at about 11 times estimated earnings for the fiscal year ending September 2012. The S&P 500 index is valued at about 10 times next year’s earnings. But Apple’s sales growth is not far off 10 times faster than that of the average company. The gadget producer also sits on $76 billion of cash and investments.