Local open source association, Open Source Victoria (OSV), has called on Australian state government agencies to join the Federal Government in adopting the OpenDocument XML file format, saying its the only way to preserve electronic documents.

Satellite communications provider NewSat, a division of Multiemedia (ASX:MUL), has completed a trial with the Australian Trade Commission (Austrade) of a portable satellite broadband system for Austrade's offices around the world.

Redflex Traffic Systems, a US subsidiary of the Redflex Group (ASX:RDF), has been awarded a new US build-own-operate-maintain contract for a photo enforcement program with the City of San Leandro in California.

The Australian Electrical and Electronic Manufacturers' Association (AEEMA) has forged links with the Communications and Information Network Association of Japan (CIAJ) to develop business relations between Japan and Australia in electronics and ICT.

Three Australians have been recognised in the latest awards and elections of IFIP (International Federation for Information Processing), a UN-sponsored peak professional body for ICT workers.

Linux vendor Red Hat has partnered with the Australian Computer Society (ACS) to offer ACS members discounted Red Hat Certified Engineer (RHCE) training.

Bill Gates shows next Windows

Bill Gates, Microsoft's chairman and chief software architect, gave software developers a preview of the next version of the Windows operating system yesterday in an effort to build support and enthusiasm for the new program.

The New York Times reports (14 September) that the commercial release of the program, known as Windows Vista, is not expected for another year, but Mr. Gates and legions of Microsoft employees are already working with developers to create software applications that will work with the new Windows.

Mr Gates promised attendees that Vista would usher in a "big wave" of sales when it was introduced, the newspaper reports.

Microsoft executives said Vista would have better connectivity with corporate servers, improved graphics and more advanced search capability to allow users to find files more easily on their hard drives.

The new version will be the first major upgrade to Microsoft's core product since the release of Windows XP in 2001.

The newspaper said that, today, Windows runs on nearly 90 percent of the world's computers and accounts for about a third of Microsoft's revenues.

In June, Microsoft said it would release Vista in the second half of 2006, and yesterday the company reaffirmed its intent to meet that schedule.

Nokia plans rival to BlackBerry

Nokia, the leading maker of mobile phones, announced Tuesday that sales were improving and that it was introducing a mobile e-mail product to compete with BlackBerry and others.

The New York Times reports (14 September) that Nokia's revenue and earnings faltered a year ago when it mismatched its products to the market, but it said sales for the three months that will end 30 Sept. should be 8.4 billion euros (US$10.3 billion) to 8.5 billion euros, compared with its previous expectations of 7.9 billion euros to 8.2 billion euros. Nokia predicted earnings of 18 to 19 cents a share, up from an earlier estimate of 14 to 17 cents.

The newspaper reports that, while the sales forecasts were not greatly different, analysts and traders reacted more to Nokia's statement that prices for its phones had been "relatively firm" since July.

For corporate customers, Nokia announced it was getting into the potentially lucrative market for business e-mail messages via cellphone. Bob Brace, Nokia's vice president for mobile enterprise solutions, said the company intended to "bring mobile e-mail to the masses."

The NYT reports that Nokia said its e-mail product, called Nokia Business Centre, is meant for workers without access to company e-mail when they are away from their office computers, a market that comprises most of the 650 million company in-boxes Nokia estimates exist around the world.

The newspaper says that mobile access to e-mail has been the successful stock in trade of the BlackBerry device made by Research in Motion. Nokia, which has been working with the mobile e-mail specialist Good Technology, also faces competition from Microsoft, Visto, Seven Networks and others in wireless corporate messaging.

Bang & Olufsen and Samsung to sell top-end phones

Danish up-market electronics firm Bang & Olufsen and Samsung Electronics will launch a jointly made mobile phone this year, with typical B&O design and high-quality sound, the firms said on Wednesday.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (14 September) that the phones will have basic communications features and little in the way of high-tech extras, Bang & Olufsen's chief executive told Reuters, adding they would target the high end of the market in terms of price and quality.

Bang & Olufsen are known for their expensive, sleekly designed art-house type televisions and home stereos.

The Reuters/NYT report says that the handsets will be launched in 17 European countries in the fourth quarter, the companies said in a joint statement.

The report adds that while most mobile phone makers are focusing on launching third-generation (3G) phones with features like video calls and downloading music, B&O said the joint venture would stick to tried-and-tested technology.

South Korea's Samsung is the world's third largest mobile phone maker after Nokia of Finland and US Motorola, and its announcement follows comments earlier this month that it aimed to become an elite brand name.

Yahoo launches test of e-mail upgrade

Yahoo on Wednesday will begin testing a sleeker version of its free e-mail service, shifting to a more dynamic design that mimics the look and feel of a computer desktop application like Microsoft's Outlook.

The Associated Press reports in The New York Times (14 September) that the company plans to invite a ''sizable'' portion of its current e-mail accountholders to experiment with the retooled service, said Yahoo spokeswoman Karen Mahon, who declined to be more specific.

The AP report says that if the test goes well, all of Yahoo's e-mail users -- an audience that spans tens of millions -- eventually will be converted to the new system.

Yahoo imported most of the changes from Oddpost, an e-mail startup the company bought for an undisclosed amount last year.

According to the AP/NYT report, the overhaul, described as the most extensive since Yahoo began offering free e-mail accounts eight years ago, represents the latest salvo in a technological tug-of-war for online traffic.

AP says that for the past two years, Yahoo and its main internet rivals -- Google, AOL and Microsoft's MSN.com -- have been unveiling a series of upgrades aimed at attracting and retaining their web audiences so they remain appealing outlets for advertisers.

Google, which runs the Internet's most popular search engine, shook things up in the e-mail market last year by introducing a free service that included 250 times more storage than some of its rivals. Yahoo and MSN subsequently matched Google, which responded by more than doubling its e-mail storage limit to 2.5 gigabytes, reports AP.

Microsoft Xbox 360 aims at Sony's hold on Japan

Microsoft is making an unprecedented effort to woo Japanese gamers with its new Xbox 360 game console, but analysts say it will be lucky if it can put a dent in Sony Corp's PlayStation following.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (14 September) that even before the release of the Xbox 360, Sony has created more market buzz in Japan for its next-generation PlayStation 3 console, due in the spring.

Microsoft Chief Xbox Officer Robbie Bach dismisses surveys showing interest in his new console is still low.

Reuters says that Microosoft commented in the NYT report that the lack of success in Japan with the first Xbox was due to lack of compelling games for Japanese, not relations with retailers or even the bulky design of the first Xbox.

Analysts expect the Xbox 360 to sell better than its previous version, but they don't expect it to seriously challenge Sony's dominance of the gaming market in Japan.

US-based research firm IDC estimates that Microsoft will sell 3.5 million Xbox 360 units in Japan by 2009, compared with 8 million PlayStation 3 units.

Microsoft and Sony dominate the US$25 billion video game hardware and software market.

Google gains researcher, Microsoft wins limits

Google and Microsoft each claimed victory on Tuesday in the latest round of their bitter court dispute over a top researcher's defection to Google.

The New York Times reports (14 September) that for Google, though, the victory claim was backed by one clear-cut result: the researcher, Kai-Fu Lee, will be at work there on Wednesday.

The newspaper says that, ruling on Microsoft's request to extend a restraining order, a Seattle judge said Dr. Lee could proceed with helping to create a Google research centre in China. But the judge, Steven C. Gonzalez of King County Superior Court, restricted him from working on some of his specialties - search and language technologies - or using information acquired while a Microsoft vice president.

According to the NYT, the dispute is an extension of the companies' increasing rivalry on each other's software turf, with Google offering a growing array of software programs and utilities that impinge on Microsoft's monopolies and Microsoft trying to gain ground in the search engine market.

Their animosity has grown more acute, or at least more evident, since Google announced in July that it was hiring Dr. Lee, a Chinese computer scientist who established a Microsoft research center in China and more recently worked at Microsoft headquarters on speech recognition technology, says the newspaper.

The NYT report says that the judge's ruling does not end the legal battle. A trial is scheduled to begin in Seattle in January in a Microsoft lawsuit seeking broad application of a noncompete clause in its contract with Dr. Lee.

Results of a new study reveals why some end users in enterprise environments are more likely to engage in riskier online behavior at work than at home.

The Senate has passed the legislation authorising the full sale and operational separation of Telstra after Nationals senator Barnaby Joyce voted with the Government.

The directors of the board IT solutions company Alphawest (ASX:ALW) have unanimously accepted a bid by Singtel Optus to buy the company for more than $24 million.

Philips Polymer Vision revealed its Concept Readius last week in Germany, a prototype of a functional electronic-document reader that can unroll its display to a scale larger than the device itself.

Business imaging vendor, Konica Minolta Australia, has appointed Frank Mellish to the newly created position of general manager, sales and marketing, Australia, based in Sydney. Mellish joined Konica Minolta in 2003. Prior to being promoted to the new position he was marketing director. Previously, Mellish spent more than a decade with IBM where he launched the Thinkpad Brand in Europe and was responsible for marketing PC products to the small-to-medium business sectors on a global basis. He also worked for CSC as the global vice president, marketing, based in Los Angeles.

Software developer's association, Software Queensland, has announced its new chair and committee as it heads into association’s second year of representing software developers in Queensland. Founding committee member and former treasurer, Kon Kakanis, takes on the role of chair. Kakanis is director, sales and marketing for Sundata and  is also a member of the ICT Industry Workgroup representing a number of key associations in lobbying to Government on procurement and industry development issues.

Enterprise infrastructure provider, Aruba Networks, has appointed David Humphries as the country manager, responsible for the sales of Aruba for Australia and New Zealand. Humphries comes to Aruba with 20 years experience in the Australian Networking Industry. Most recently Humphries was at Avnet, where he was managing the networking arm of its distribution business. Before that, he held various sales roles at Memorex Telex, Xylan (acquired by Alcatel), Arrowpoint Communications (acquired by Cisco) and network management company, Concord Communications (recently acquired by CA).

Intelligent Business Research Services (IBRS) has appointed high profile industry analyst Dr Kevin McIsaac to a senior research role. Dr McIsaac was formerly research director Asia Pacific with META Group, prior to its take-over by Gartner. Dr McIsaac is an expert in infrastructure, operations and vendor management and works with CIOs and IT management teams on strategy development and the key issues associated with running IT as a business. His first report, entitled:” Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) – Who Dares Wins” examines the impact of the SAS communication protocol on the storage market.

IBM bulks up integration line

IBM is expected to expand its server software line with a handful of integration and workflow-related products.

The New York Times reports (13 September) that the company plans to introduce two integration servers, called WebSphere Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) and WebSphere Process Server. The software pulls data from various sources and tracks different steps in a business process, according to a company representative. ESB is a loosely defined term to describe integration servers that rely on industry standard messaging formats.

According to the newspaper, in addition, IBM plans to introduce a development tool geared specifically for writing programs that move data between systems, called WebSphere Integration Developer. IBM's Global Services division has also developed professional services for building software that conforms to a service-oriented architecture, or SOA, an increasingly popular software design approach that relies heavily on standards-based integration tools, the report says.

The NYT report says that analysts expect corporate customers to spend tens of millions of dollars on infrastructure software for building and running SOAs.

In the battle to win over customers, IBM is competing against other large providers, including Oracle, BEA Systems, SAP and Microsoft, which is detailing its SOA strategy at its Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles this week, said the NYT report.

Nokia taking mobile e-mail to corporate masses

Nokia, the world's largest maker of mobile phones, said it was launching a corporate e-mail system to allow workers at almost any level to send and receive mail from their mobiles.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (13 September) that Nokia Business Centre, as the new e-mail system is to be known, seeks to bridge the gap between the world's 650 million corporate e-mail accounts and the elite of about 10 million who have mobile access to their business e-mail inboxes.

The Finnish group, long expected to push into a market which brought success to Research in Motion's (RIM) Blackberry devices, said it wanted to make e-mail more cost-effective and available on a wider range of phones.

Reuters says in the NYT report that firms from software giant Microsoft to e-mail management groups Visto, Seven, Good Technology, and Intellisync are jumping in to the market pioneered by RIM.

According to the Reuters/NYT report, Nokia's e-mail system comes in two modes. A standard version gives office staff basic read/write access to e-mail.

A professional version integrates directly into a company's corporate network directory, giving people direct access to their e-mail on their mobile device in the same way they would expect to use it on their office computer. It also allows the mobile worker to handle hefty e-mail attachments.

Reuters says that the standard version comes free when a company purchases a server license, according to the company. Each server license covers 400 people and is priced at 1,800 euros.

The professional version requires a company to pay an additional one-time fee, per user, of 55 euros, giving them a perpetual license for each office worker. The cost per user for Blackberry licenses ranges from two to four times as much.

Nintendo's new Game Boy Micro's solid debut

Nintendo's new mobile phone-sized game console, Game Boy Micro, attracted better-than-expected orders on its debut on Tuesday, though less than Game Boy Advance SP had done, retailers said.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (13 September) that Nintendo, known for software titles featuring characters such as Mario, Donkey Kong and Pokemon, launched what it said was the world's smallest console in Japan a week before the US launch with a price tag of 12,000 yen.

Nintendo dominates the portable game industry with a market share of about 94 percent, and aims to strengthen its grip with the Micro as it goes up against Sony's PlayStation Portable.

The Reuters/NYT report says that Sony will introduce new white consoles in Japan on Thursday in an effort to boost sales. Previously the consoles were only available in black.

Nintendo, based in the western Japan city of Kyoto, hopes to draw women, casual gamers -- those unwilling or unable to spend hours playing games -- and older players with the new compact and stylish device.

Local retailers, including Japan's biggest discount home electronics retailer, Yamada Denki Co., said the Micro was enjoying solid orders. An electronics store clerk in Tokyo said it received advance orders for 70 percent of its Micro stock, mostly for the limited edition.

Orders were brisk but less than when the Game Boy Advance SP made its debut in 2003, the clerk said. The store sold all of the SP consoles through advance orders at the launch.

According to Reuters, Japan's video game hardware and software market has shrunk 30 percent to US$4 billion since 2000, according to the Computer Entertainment Supplier's Association.

Nintendo aims to sell 4 million units of the Micro worldwide by the end of its business year to next March.

Nintendo plans to release the Micro in Europe on 4 November in silver, pink, green and blue, at a recommended price of 99 euros, while US versions, due on 19 September for US$99, will be available in black and silver with three removable faceplates.

Reuters reports that Nintendo said in May it expected to sell a total of 10.2 million Game Boy Advance devices worldwide this business year, including Game Boy Micro.

Wallet phones for Asia

Japanese and South Korean mobile operators are betting future revenue growth on wallet phones -- handsets with embedded chips that allow electronic payments -- but the technology may be slow to take off in the rest of Asia.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (12 September) that whether the service enjoys the same demand as in Japan and South Korea will depend on the level of security and degree of participation by retailers, banks, content providers and the public transport system, according to one analyst.

DoCoMo, Japan's largest cellular operator, was the first to launch a wallet phone in June last year.

The handset contains Sony's FeliCa radio frequency identification (RFID) chip that enables electronic money transactions, identification and ticketing.

DoCoMo, whose name is a play on the Japanese word for ''everywhere,'' has sold over 5 million wallet phones, and over a quarter of users have used the service at least once.

The Reuters/NYT report says that about 20,000 stores have installed the equipment to allow customers to make payments using their phones, and DoCoMo hopes to increase this figure to 1-2 million eventually.

Smaller rivals KDDI and Vodafone K.K. are also expected to offer wallet phones later this year.

According to Reuters, East Japan Railway plans to launch a service on 1 January that would allow users to enter fare gates by passing their handsets embedded with smart chips over a scanner.

SK Telecom, South Korea's top mobile operator, offers a range of so-called MONETA services, where chip-mounted cell phones are used for credit card transactions, transport fee payments, cash withdrawals and stock trading. As of August, SK Telecom had sold 4.9 million MONETA-enabled handsets and its subscriber base stood at more than 19 million.

Reuters says that South Korea's second-largest mobile operator, KTF Co., which offers similar financial transactions for its subscribers, expects monthly revenues of US$2 million from its mobile commerce services in 3 years.

Matsushita to sell more displays to rivals

Matsushita Electric Industrial plans to sell more of its plasma displays to other TV makers next year, a senior executive said on Tuesday, as it aims to boost display output and take market share from rivals.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (13 September) that Matsushita is the world's largest seller of plasma TVs through its Panasonic brand, but it trails Samsung SDI in panel shipments because its South Korean competitor sells more panels to other TV manufacturers.

The company said it currently supplies a little more than 10 percent of its panels to other companies, but would like to see that percentage above 20 percent when a new plant at Amagasaki is up and running at full capacity next year.

Reuters reports that Fujita said the new factory in Hyogo prefecture, western Japan, would start production by the end of September. Matsushita had previously said the start could be in September or October.

Fujitsu's robot on wheels going on sale

Japanese electronics maker Fujitsu is bringing a robot to market which is equipped with voice recognition capabilities, cameras and sensors. The 4-foot tall robot on wheels will go on sale for 6 million yen (US$54,000) each in Japan in November.

The Associated Press reports in The New York Times (13 September) that Tokyo-based Fujitsu plans to sell about 20 or 30 of the robots, called ''enon'' (pronounced EH-nohn), which stands for ''exciting nova on network,'' and already has received 10 orders. The price tag covers just the machine, and software programs cost extra. Fujitsu refused to estimate software costs.

The AP report says that Enon can find itself around in an office or store, based on a map programmed inside its computer brain, move at a slow pace of up 1.86 miles an hour, and picks up things as heavy as 1.1 pounds. Its mechanical arms have paws at the end that can grip objects.

According to the AP/NYT report, Japan boasts one of the most advanced robot industries in the world. Industrial robots are widely used in plants, including those of automakers Toyota and Nissan. Toyota and Honda are also developing robots for entertainment and robotics research.

Fujitsu is among a burgeoning number of Japanese makers counting on a market for service robots like enon, where software solutions will drive the business rather than sophisticated machinery, AP adds.

The report says that Fujitsu foresees the worldwide service robot market as growing to 100 billion yen (US$907 million) by 2010. It wants enon to become a mass-produced product in a year or so, and hopes to lower its price to 2 million yen (US$18,000).

CNN and Time magazines combine web sites

CNN and Time, both units of the Time Warner media conglomerate, said Monday they would combine their business and financial web sites and relaunch them next January under a single banner.

The Associated Press reports (12 September) the new site will keep the name www.cnnmoney.com, which currently features business news from CNN and from Money magazine, one of Time's magazines.

Beginning in January, the combined site will also carry material from Time's other business-focused magazines -- Fortune, Fortune Small Business and Business 2.0. The freestanding web sites of those magazines -- Fortune.com, FSB.com and Business2.com -- will also be rolled into the new site.

AP reports that the site will carry daily business news as well as market coverage and analytical stories by staff. It will also carry material produced by the CNN and Time business-related magazines.

14,000 Telstra jobs at risk

The Regiaster in the UK reports (13 September) that there are fears that as many as 14,000 telecoms jobs could be axed in Australia following the privatisation of incumbent telco Telstra.

According to The Register report, The Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) has called on Telstra management and the Government to release a confidential 104-page document which it says details the job cuts and other cost cutting measures.

The union is concerned that in a bid to cut overheads and maximise profits for shareholders, the quality of Telstra's service will dip especially in rural areas. It has also raised concerns about whether other jobs will be offshored to countries such as India and China.

The Register says that the matter is deemed so serious the Australian Stock Exchange is now investigating following the intervention of opposition politician Senator Stephen Conroy.

The publication also reports that, in a statement the telco said: "Telstra has not taken any decision to cut 10,000 jobs as stated by Senator Conroy or 14,000 as reported in the media."

Intel cans US$700m Indian plant-report

Intel will not be building a US$700 million wafer-testing plant in India, a local newspaper has claimed.

The Register reports (13 September) that, according to Indian business-oriented daily, the Business Standard, Intel put the plans for the plant on hold after it failed to gain tax concessions from the Indian government.

The paper attributed the claim to an unnamed Intel official, who said:

"The company conveyed to the government last week that it would not be able to make the investment as the project would not be viable without the tax concessions. The company, however, said it would explore opportunities in the future."

The Register reports that negotiations between Intel and the Indian government emerged in March, when Dayanidhi Maran, India's minister for information technology and communications, claimed Intel was close to a decision on siting the facility in India. The country has been on Intel's list of possible plant sites for some time, as former CEO Craig Barrett admitted in November 2004. The chip giant already has a number of software development and R&D facilities in the sub-continent.

According to The Register, in July the Business Standard claimed, however, that the talks were faltering. Citing government sources, the paper claimed Intel had asked India to fork out US$100m up front - a payment the nation appears unwilling to make. Intel is also negotiating for tax-beaks and other incentives, all of which are part and parcel of major plant plans.

Database and ERP vendor Oracle Corporation will acquire CRM vendor Siebel Systems for approximately US$5.85 billion, in an amicable merger designed to narrow the gap between Oracle and number one ERP player SAP.

Telstra-owned IT services company, KAZ, has acquired the intellectual property and customer contracts of business intelligence company, Intology Ltd.

Tasmanian power utility Aurora Energy has announced plans for what is believed to be the first large scale commercial trial of Mitsubishi Electric's 200Mpbs broadband over powerline technology.

Businesss process software vendor, Pegasystems, has been selected to provide insurer QBE's Australia Pacific Asia Central Europe Division (APACE) with rules-driven technology to enhance the company's business process management (BPM) capabilities.

Business intelligence vendor, Business Objects has been deployed by Australian ticketing agent Ticketek as its business intelligence and reporting standard.

Secure electronic transaction solutions provider Keycorp Limited (ASX: KYC) has announced big increases in revenues and before tax earnings but took a tax hit that pushed its net profit into the red.

Enterprise content management provider, Objective Corporation (ASX:OCL), has won a deal to provide an electronic document and records management system to be used enterprise-wide by the newly formed public sector agency, The Corruption and Crime Commission of Western Australia.

Online training and recruitment company TodayCorp Pty Ltd, has acquired privately held Impart.

US-based IP telephony software developer, BroadSoft, has acquired Sydney based Carbon Twelve, a software and multimedia applications developer which exclusively produces software designed to work with BroadSoft's BroadWorks hosted IP telephony platform.

IBM Australia has taken a minority stake in network performance management tools developer NetPriva in order to access applications to supplement its IP integration business.

Research group, Gartner, has issued a warning that the current shortage of skilled labour is negatively affecting the Indian call centre industry.

Geographic information systems provider, MapInfo Corporation, has won a deal with the Sustainable Energy Authority Victoria to chart the State's renewable energy resources and generators.

According to a new Australian study, the ‘at home’ broadband market is set to reach $1.3 billion in access revenues by the end of 2005, growing by 36% over 2004. Industry revenues are forecast to reach $2.5 billion by 2010.

Owner of the Ansearch search engine business, Optum Health Ltd  ASX:OPM), has shed most of its legacy water treatment holdings for $800,000 cash and a share of future royalties.

Business intelligence vendor, Business Objects, has named John Schwarz chief executive officer. Company founder, Bernard Liautaud, continues as chairman of the board and assumes the new role of chief strategy officer. Schwarz joins the company from Symantec Corporation, where he held the position of president and was responsible for leading the company's six lines of business. At Symantec, Schwarz played a key role in the recent combination of Symantec and VERITAS. Previously, he spent 25 years at IBM Corporation working in development, manufacturing, sales, and marketing. He was general manager of IBM's Industry Solutions unit, a worldwide organization focused on building business applications and related services for IBM's large industry customers.

Business performance software vendor, Hyperion, has appointed Thomas Palmer as director of sales for the company’s Australia and New Zealand operations.  Palmer, who the company considers one of its top 5 sales executives worldwide, joined Hyperion Solutions in 1999 as strategic account manager in Atlanta. Prior to joining Hyperion, Palmer held senior business development, sales and marketing positions at Cap Gemini Insurance. His experience also includes stints as director of sales & marketing at Business Intelligence and e-business consulting firm Blackstone and Cullen Inc., account manager at National Education Training Group, and business systems consultant with the Atlanta office of Arthur Andersen S.C.

Business solutions consulting firm, Votar Partners, has appointed Laurie Ward as NSW/ACT strategic business development Manager. Ward joins Votar Partners after a career of more than 20 years in the IT industry, working for companies such as ICL Australia, NCR, Seagate, Aspect and most recently Advanced Data Integration.

News Corporation on web buying spree

The News Corporation has been giving new meaning to the term e-commerce: the company has been on an online buying spree, spending nearly US$1.5 billion on three internet companies in just the last seven weeks.

The New York Times reports (9 September) that its swiftness in agreeing to pay US$650 million to buy IGN Entertainment, an internet game and entertainment site, in a deal announced yesterday, underscored just how serious - one of his executives says "obsessed" - the chairman, Rupert Murdoch, is about replicating in cyberspace the kind of power he has in media arenas like British newspapers, Hollywood and cable television news.

According to the newspaper, executives involved in the deal said that as of Tuesday, Mr. Murdoch and Peter Chernin, the News Corporation's president, were informed by the head of their newly created interactive media division that IGN, with whom they had held intermittent talks since March, was on the verge of being sold to Viacom. (A Viacom spokesman declined to comment.)

The newspaper says that Mr. Murdoch was told that he would have only a short time to come up with a counterbid, but if he agreed to pay US$650 million the company would be his. Within 36 hours, he and Mr. Chernin had met with Mark Jung, IGN's chief executive, in New York, brought in bankers and lawyers, and agreed to the terms. "They got wind that we had been in other conversations, and moved heaven and earth to get a deal done," said Michael A. Kumin of Great Hill Partners, IGN's largest shareholder, who handled the negotiations.

According to the NYT report. Mr. Murdoch has said he is willing to spend up to US$2 billion on internet acquisitions, and in addition to IGN has recently acquired Intermix Media, the parent of the popular social networking site MySpace.com, for US$580 million and Scout Media, a sports site, for US$60 million. This weekend, Mr. Murdoch is holding an internet meeting for his top managers from around the world near his ranch in Carmel, California, where he is expected to discuss the progress the company has made since a similar gathering in February.

The newspaper says that what they will hear is that the purchases of MySpace and IGN in particular represented the best opportunities the company identified for quickly bolstering its presence online, when measured in terms of internet traffic. Mr. Murdoch has been particularly concerned about younger audiences spending less time reading newspapers and watching television, while spending more time online and embracing such features as interactivity and virtual communities.

The NYT says that when the deals close, traffic across all of News Corporation's internet properties - which include the web sites of dozens of newspapers and scores of TV stations it owns - will have increased to nearly 70 million unique monthly users from fewer than 25 million. According to Merrill Lynch, the estimated 12 billion monthly page views News Corporation will generate with IGN will rank it fourth among all companies online, behind Yahoo, Time Warner and MSN, but ahead of eBay and Google.

The company's challenge now, Mr. Chernin said, is figuring out how to integrate its new online businesses with one another as well as the huge amount of content the company owns and produces.

The newspaper reports that both Mr. Chernin and Mr. Murdoch are now spending much of their time on internet strategy, though the internet represented a small fraction of the company's US$23.8 billion in annual revenues last year.
News Corporation's online strategy this time around differs from its previous efforts. Rather than taking small stakes in promising start-ups, it is focusing on buying companies outright that are somewhat proven and generating operating earnings.

The Internet strategy is being handled by a new division called Fox Interactive Media, based in Los Angeles and led by Ross Levinsohn, a former executive at Foxsports.com. Mr. Levinsohn said Mr. Murdoch tapped him several months ago to come up with an online strategy and advised him to "think about where we should be in 10 years and work your way backwards."

Mr. Levinsohn came up with a list of eight internet companies that he believed could be potential acquisition targets or partners; with IGN, the company has acquired three of them, reports the NYT.

EBay in talks to buy Skype

EBay is in negotiations to acquire Skype Technologies, the internet phone company that has been the object of much merger speculation, for US$2 billion to US$3 billion, two people involved in the negotiations said yesterday.

The New York Times reports (9 September) that the talks are highly tentative and could fall apart, these people said, speaking on the condition that they not be identified because the talks are continuing. These people also noted that Skype has wavered about selling or pursuing an initial public offering and has held merger discussions with the News Corporation and Microsoft only to abandon those talks.

According to the newspaper, an acquisition of Skype would enable eBay to enter the rapidly growing market for internet-based phone service. Cable providers and Bell companies are expanding quickly into that field, as are eBay rivals like Microsoft and Google.

Skype allows users who download its software and register for its service to talk to one another free over the internet through their PC's. About two million Skype customers have signed up for a premium pay service that allows them to use their PC's to make calls to regular phone numbers as well as receive calls from regular phones.

The NYT reports that last month, Google announced a service similar to Skype's free service called Google Talk, and Microsoft said it was acquiring Teleo, a San Francisco company that allows users to call conventional phones from their PC's. The discussions between eBay and Skype were first reported in The New York Post and The Wall Street Journal yesterday.

According to the NYT, an acquisition of Skype would be eBay's biggest purchase since it bought the Internet Auction Company of South Korea in 2004 for US$4.3 billion. EBay has been aggressively acquiring companies, many of them overseas, as it reaches beyond its core online auction business.

China Telecom seeks to block VoIP

China Telecom, the nation's largest fixed-line operator, is looking at ways to block phone calls made over the internet such as the popular service offered by Skype, according to media reports.

The Associated Press reports (9 September) that Skype Technologies SA's free software lets people talk for free over the internet using computers and microphones. It can also be used to call land lines for a fee. Such services threaten the business of fixed-line phone operators.

According to the AP/NYT report, China Telecom wants to prevent users in China from logging on to Skype's server, the newspaper Beijing Business Today reported on its web site.

It is also trying to monitor and control online data volume, so if someone is making a phone call over a China Telecom broadband connection it will be disconnected, the report said.

The report says that China Telecom expects these controls will be ready in 2006 or 2007, it added.

An operator at Shenzhen Telecom -- a branch of China Telecom in the southern city of Shenzhen -- said Saturday that downloading software for voice over internet calls is not allowed by Shenzhen Telecom.

Operators at Beijing Telecom and Shanghai Telecom -- other China Telecom branches -- said they had heard of no such restrictions., reports AP

Sony takes on iPod with new Walkman

Sony said Thursday that it would sell advanced Walkman portable music players this year, aiming to move out of Apple Computer's shadow in a market that Sony created a quarter of a century ago.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (9 September) that the announcement came hours after Apple introduced the pencil-thin iPod nano digital player and a long-anticipated mobile phone that plays music in a bid to extend its domination of the market.

Sony, which created the portable music market with its cassette-playing Walkmans, has lost out to Apple in the portable digital era as it focused on its mainstay CD and Mini Disc players.

The Reuters/NYT report says that Sony will offer two music players based on hard disks - one with a storage capacity of 20 gigabytes and the other with 6 gigabytes - and three flash- memory-based players that will keep the existing models' perfume bottle appearance.

The 6-gigabyte model is Sony's first hard-disk player with a small capacity. Apple's iPod nano comes in 2- and 4-gigabyte capacities.

According to the Reuters report, Sony's new models will add the ability to select and play the songs a user listens to most, and also to pick songs released in a certain year - a function Sony calls the "time machine shuffle."

The models will go on sale in Japan on 19 November and overseas by the end of the year.

Reuters says that Sony aims to sell 4.5 million hard-disk and flash-memory portable music players in the year to next March, up from 850,000 a year earlier.

Apple has sold about 22 million iPods worldwide in four years.

13 nations urge open technology standards

In a report to be presented today at the World Bank, a group that includes senior government officials from 13 countries will urge nations to adopt open-information technology standards as a vital step to accelerate economic growth, efficiency and innovation.

The New York Times report (9 September) that the 33-page report is a road map for creating national policies on open technology standards, and comes at a time when several countries - and some state governments - are pursuing plans to reduce their dependence on proprietary software makers, notably Microsoft, by using more free, open-source software.

The newspaper reports that the project, begun by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at the Harvard Law School, gathered government officials from China, India, Thailand, Denmark, Jordan, Brazil and elsewhere at a three-day meeting in Silicon Valley in February to discuss technology standards and economic development. The meeting was followed by e-mail exchanges, conference calls and postings on a shared web site.

The group defines an open standard as technology that is not owned by a single company and is openly published. Still, there is a huge debate in industry and among policy makers about how far openness should go.

According to the NYT, the report makes clear that government policy should "mandate technology choice, not software development models."

It also points out that open technology standards - the digital equivalent of a common gauge for railroad tracks - are not the same thing as open-source software. Open source is a development model for software in which code is freely shared and improved by a cooperative network of programmers.

But, says the NYT, even so, the spread of open-source software in recent years has probably been the most striking example of the benefits of openly sharing information technology to reduce costs and make it easier for users themselves to innovate.

The newspaper says that even though the report did not name any companies, Microsoft, the world's largest software maker, has been the prime target of open-source advocates. And the Berkman Center sought support from IBM and Oracle, two Microsoft rivals, to help pay for the three-day conference. Both are champions of Linux, the popular open-source operating system that is an alternative to Windows from Microsoft. (Microsoft is a corporate sponsor of the Berkman Center.)

The report adds that in the last few years, Microsoft has been an active participant in internet and web groups that have developed standards so that data can be shared by different software programs. That allows the information - about a person or bank account, say - to be exchanged, but the digital equivalent of the envelope carrying the information can be proprietary.

The newspaper says that at the World Bank, the interest in open standards mostly involves using them as a tool to help stimulate economic growth in developing countries.

Intel: strong chip demand causing tight supplies

Intel, the world's largest semiconductor maker, reported yesterday that demand for its chips remained strong and that last year's problem of excess inventory had now become one of short supply.

The New York Times reports (9 September) that the company said it continued to see double-digit growth, driven primarily by demand for notebook computers based on its Centrino chips. It also said it expected to fall short of meeting chip demand through the fourth quarter.

According to the newspaper, in its midquarter update, the company said revenue for the quarter ending 1 October would be US$9.8 billion to US$10 billion. The forecast was squarely in line with that of analysts, who projected sales of US$9.92 billion and earnings of 36 cents a share, according to Thomson First Call. Intel does not provide earnings guidance.

The NYT reported that Intel also narrowed its forecast for gross margin slightly, to about 60 percent for the third quarter, plus or minus one percentage point.

The newspaper says that the report was in stark contrast to Intel's situation last year, when it was swollen with inventory and faced a host of technical problems. These days, Mr. Bryant said, the company was constrained by its manufacturing capacity, and was selling as many chips as it makes.

Intel's report came just as Texas Instruments, the largest supplier of chips used in mobile phones, also reported strong demand for its products. The company raised estimates for the third quarter, saying it expected third-quarter profit to be 36 cents to 38 cents a share, compared with its previous estimate of 31 cents to 35 cents a share.

The company predicted revenue would be US$3.48 billion to US$3.62 billion, up from its previous forecast of US$3.29 billion to US$3.56 billion.

HP to cut 6,000 jobs in Europe

US computer giant Hewlett-Packard will shed 6,000 jobs in Europe with more than half the cuts in France, Germany and Britain, a union official said on Friday.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (9 September) that an HP spokesman said some 1,250 to 1,300 jobs would go in France and 145 in Belgium.

A spokesman for HP in California said the company had no comment. The group has a total of around 151,000 employees.

The Reuters/NYT report says that the news emerged as European finance ministers were meeting in Manchester, England, where Britain's Gordon Brown urged action to make Europe a ``high growth, low unemployment'' area instead of a continent plagued by low growth and high unemployment.

The report says that Hewlett-Packard has plants or offices in Grenoble, Isle d'Ableau and Sophia-Antipolis in France, Boebingen, Herrenberg and Ratingen in Germany and Bracknell, Bristol, Erskine, Glasgow, Reading and Swindon in the UK.

It also has sites in Brussels, Amstelveen in the Netherlands, Milan, Barcelona and Dublin and Galway in Ireland.

Reuters reports that Hewlett-Packard said in July it would slash about 10 percent of its work force in a sweeping move by new Chief Executive Mark Hurd to cut costs by US$1.9 billion a year and compete better in cutthroat computer and printer markets.

PalmSource stock price skyrockets

Shares of PalmSource, maker of the Palm operating system for handheld computers, surged 78 percent on Friday on news that the Japanese software company Access Co. had agreed to pay US$324 million for it.

The Associated Press reports in The New York Times (9 September) that the news had some analysts wondering how PalmSource, which has failed to excite investors since Palm spun it off two years ago, could draw such an offer.

The AP/NYT report says that Access was offering US$18.50 for each share of PalmSource common stock, an 83 percent premium to the stock's Thursday closing price of US$10.09 on the Nasdaq Stock Market.

According to the report, PalmSource has seen its market share erode since its separation from Palm Inc., a darling of the tech investors in the high-flying 1990s. Microsoft and Symbian have in recent months gained in handheld operating systems.

Nevertheless, more than 45 companies worldwide have licensed PalmSource software. More than 39 million mobile devices run on the Palm OS.

New Google 'evangelist' to spread applications

The New York Times reports (9 September) that with a billion users and counting, the internet hardly seems to need an evangelist.

Yet "chief internet evangelist" is precisely the title chosen by Vinton G. Cerf for his new job at Google.

The newspaper says that Google announced on Thursday that Dr. Cerf would be leaving MCI, where he is senior vice president for technology strategy, to be one of a dozen or so vice presidents working closely with Eric E. Schmidt, Google's chief executive, as the company continues to move beyond its roots as an internet search engine.

According to the NYT, Dr. Cerf, 62, is best known for the early work he did on the internet, and its precursor, the Arpanet. Together with Robert Kahn, a fellow computer scientist, Dr. Cerf in 1973 sketched out a set method, or protocol, for allowing different, isolated computer networks to talk to one another. The protocol, which paved the way for today's internet, is called Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol, or TCP/IP.

Dr. Cerf spent 11 years at MCI, with an eight-year break to work with Dr. Kahn on internet infrastructure issues at the Corporation for National Research Initiatives. While at MCI in the early 1980's, Dr. Cerf devised MCI Mail, an early e-mail program.

The newspaper says that his hiring is the latest in a string a successful high-profile recruiting efforts on Google's part. Rob Pike, a high-level software engineer, was recruited from Bell Labs in November 2002. Louis Monier, who oversaw research and development at eBay, went to Google this summer. And Kai-Fu Lee, a former Microsoft vice president, joined Google in July, prompting Microsoft to file a lawsuit that is now in court.

Yahoo founder explains China e-mail move

Yahoo had to comply with a demand by Chinese authorities to provide information about a personal e-mail of a journalist who was later convicted under state secrecy laws and sentenced to 10 years in prison, the company's co-founder Jerry Yang said Saturday.

The Associated Press reports in The New York Times (10 September) that Yang, responding to questions during an internet forum, said he could not discuss the details of the case involving Shi Tao, a former writer for the financial publication Contemporary Business News.

Overseas-based human rights groups disclosed days earlier that Yahoo Holdings (Hong Kong) Ltd., part of Yahoo's global network, provided e-mail account information that helped lead to Shi's conviction.

Yahoo earlier defended its move, saying it was obliged to comply with Chinese laws and regulations.

AP reports that the demand for the information was a ''legal order'' and Yahoo gets such requests from law enforcement agencies all the time, and not just in China, Yang told the forum.

According to the AP/NYT report, despite government information sharing requirements and other restrictions, Yahoo and its major rivals have been expanding their presence in mainland China in hopes of reaching more of the country's fast-growing population of Internet users, which now number more than 100 million.

Yahoo paid US$1 billion for a 40 percent stake in Alibaba.com, host of the Hangzhou conference, last month.

The Reuters report says that the case is the latest instance in which a prominent high-tech company has faced accusations of cooperating with Chinese authorities to gain favor in a country that's expected to become an Internet gold mine.

Yahoo and two of its biggest rivals, Google and Microsoft's MSN, previously have come under attack for censoring online news sites and web logs, or blogs, featuring content that China's communist government wants to suppress.

US rejects Cisco plan on options

The Securities and Exchange Commission threw cold water yesterday on a plan being pushed by Cisco Systems to value employee stock options by selling similar securities to institutional investors. But the agency said other market-based approaches might work.

The New York Times reports (10 September) that Christopher Cox, the new chairman of the commission, announced the conclusions of the staff but sought to encourage further private- sector efforts to value options. The effort has taken on new urgency since an accounting rule on the issue went into effect this year requiring companies to report the value of options granted to employees as an expense, the newspaper adds.

According to the newspaper, the commission's economists suggested two ways of using markets to value the options, but Donald Nicolaisen, the commission's chief accountant, said he doubted that those methods would be embraced quickly by any companies. Cisco said it would keep looking for such a plan, but a spokeswoman said the company would not comment on the plans suggested by the SEC.

One such plan would involve finding buyers who would, in effect, agree to accept the same returns that options holders as a group receive. Such investors would not have the ability to time when the options were exercised, and would suffer by having options forfeited, as some of the employees with options quit before they could exercise the options, reports the NYT.

The NYT report says that the other plan backed by the economists would essentially involve a company paying a third party to take on its risk of having to issue shares to employees who exercise options. That is unlikely to be embraced because it could be highly costly.

The commission's Bureau of Economic Analysis rejected the idea of selling restricted options to institutional investors, as Cisco had proposed, and using their value to estimate the value of the options issued by the company.

Former HP chief dies

Lewis E. Platt, who rose from an entry-level engineer to become the chief executive of Hewlett-Packard, died on Thursday at his home in California. He was 64.

His death was announced by the company, which did not give a cause.

The New York Times reports (10 September) that during his tenure as chief of Hewlett-Packard from 1992-99, Mr. Platt was known for his low-key management style, straightforward manner and an engineering attitude applied to the executive suite.

The newspaper says that under Mr. Platt, Hewlett-Packard, the computer and printer company, prospered in the 1990's, but it seemed slow to recognise the rise of the internet and did not benefit as much as most of its competitors from the resulting investment boom. To try to make Hewlett-Packard a more nimble company, Mr. Platt spun off the medical instruments business, which is where he began his career.

Court rules barcode scanner patents invalid

A federal appeals court on Friday upheld a lower court ruling that struck down barcode scanning patents claimed by the estate of late inventor Jerome Lemelson.

Reuters reports in The New York Times (9 September) that the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit sided with a federal judge in Nevada, who concluded in January 2004 that the patents held by Lemelson Medical, Education & Research Foundation LP were invalid and unenforceable.

The report says that the appeals court ruling is a victory for a consortium of companies, led by barcode technology companies like Symbol Technologies (SBL.N), who mounted a legal challenge to the Lemelson patents.

Traffic camera systems provider, Redflex Group (ASX:RDF), has been awarded a contract by the Victorian Government for the provision of fixed speed safety cameras on the Princes Freeway between the cities of Melbourne and Geelong.

Automated fare collection systems and smartcards provider, ERG Limited (ASX:ERG), has reported a solid turnaround in 2005, with increased revenues and a dramatic narrowing of its previous year's net loss.

Portfolio management software company, Tomato Technologies (ASX:TMO), had a less than inspiring 2005, with its net profit down nearly $1 million.