Articles by Jennifer LeClaire

Imation on Thursday agreed to acquire Memorex International in an all cash transaction for US$330 million Contigent on financial performance of the purchased business, Imation could pay an additional sum ranging between $5 million and $45 million over a period of up to three years after close. The Boards of both companies have approved the transact...

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers on Thursday confirmed the draft specification for the next-generation 802.11n WiFi standard. The decision could help push 600-Mbps products into the home as early as the first quarter of this year The confirmation ends months of debate over the standard as 40 of the 42 voting companies (with two...

Sales of music through the Internet and via mobile phones skyrocketed to US$1.1 billion in 2005, up from $380 million the previous year with the figure expected to grow in 2006, according to the International Federation of Phonographic Industry (IFPI) The IFPI's Digital Music Report 2006 revealed that music fans legally downloaded 420 million singl...

Philips Electronics on Thursday announced plans to acquire Lifeline Systems, a personal emergency medical services company Philips has offered approximiately US$750 million, or $47.75 per share to buy the firm. That's 21 percent higher than Lifeline's closing stock price of $39.49 on Wednesday. Lifeline's board of directors unanimously approved the...

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) released what many expected to be a controversial first draft of the GNU General Public License version 3.0 on Monday at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge Now it looks as though the draft may not actually be as controversial as some had speculated. In fact, it appears that the debate may...

Motorola on Tuesday announced it has entered into an agreement to acquire a Swedish developer of Internet protocol-based digital set-top boxes Motorola will purchase open-source technology vendor Kreatel Communications, which provides a combination of set-top boxes, software and professional services aimed at offering stable and future-proof soluti...

HP on Tuesday announced it has extended its agreement with JBoss to offer an expanded portfolio of open-source solutions and services customers can deploy within their existing data centers HP will now provide worldwide support services for the entire JBoss Enterprise Middleware Suite (JEMS) of products on Linux, Windows and HP-UX 11i. HP also will...

Google has agreed to acquire Newport Beach, Calif.-based dMarc, which develops digital applications for the radio broadcast industry, for US$102 million in cash DMarc connects advertisers directly to radio stations through its automated advertising platform. Its technology is designed to simplify the sales process, scheduling, delivery and reportin...

The Free Software Foundation is releasing the long-awaited first draft of GNU General Public License Version 3 today at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass Legal experts are already wrangling over the possible revisions to the most popular open-source license in the world. About two-thirds of all open-source licenses fall ...

One twentieth of a second. That's about how long it takes for a Web site to make a first impression on an Internet user, according to researchers at a Canadian university, whose findings could have competitive impacts for businesses on the Web Dr. Gitte Lindgaard and colleagues from Carleton University's Human-Oriented Technology Lab in Ottawa appr...

Mainsoft last week announced it is working with IBM to extend the Linux ecosystem. Specifically, the companies want to help Microsoft customers migrate to the open-source operating system The program is designed to allow Windows Web and server applications to run on Linux across IBM's line of eServer platforms supporting IBM WebSphere Application S...

Nikon on Wednesday said it would stop making most of its film camera products in favor of its digital line Nikon's digital lineup has become an increasingly successful part of its business over the past seven years. In fact, digital cameras make up more than 95 percent of Nikon's UK business....

Microsoft Research India announced plans this week to expand its operations over the next 18 months The company intends to bolster teams in existing research areas and to create a new research group for cryptography and security....

Symantec this week released an update to Norton SystemWorks to fix a security issue that could leave a back door open for hackers: a rootkit A rootkit is a hacker security tool that captures passwords and message traffic to and from a computer.The tool may allow a hacker access to a so-called "back door" into a system, where he or she can collect i...

The much-anticipated first draft of GNU General Public License Version 3 will be released on Jan. 16 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass. However, the draft may raise more questions than answers In fact, the debate over the content and exact wording of the license has already begun. It's a strategic debate, with GPL clai...

Microsoft is downplaying newly reported bugs in its Windows' graphic rendering engine. The software giant late Monday said security vendor reports about additional Windows Metafile (WMF) flaws are actually nothing more than "performance issues." Specifically, Symantec warned users on Monday that three new WMF vulnerabilities could allow attackers t...

Mercury Interactive Corporation on Monday signed a definitive agreement to acquire privately held Systinet Corporation for US$105 million in cash Mercury is in the business technology optimization (BTO) software business. Systinet is a provider of service-oriented architecture (SOA) governance and lifecycle management software and services....

In a move to reform the U.S. patent system, IBM is partnering with Open Source Development Labs (OSDL) and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) on an initiative to improve patent quality and accelerate innovation The initiative has three elements: the Open Patent Review, Open-Source Software as Prior Art, and a Patent Quality Index....

Forty-nine mouse clicks and 81 minutes. That's how long it takes to properly set up and secure that new PC you got for Christmas, according to security vendor Symantec. Why should the recipient of a brand new, shiny, fast PC care? Because the "bad guys" find new PC users on the Internet in 20 minutes or less, Symantec research indicates What's more...

Atari and Saber Interactive on Friday announced a closed public beta test for the upcoming first-person shooter "TimeShift." Gamers are invited to submit an application to participate in the testing The beta test will run in multiplayer game mode. Atari's aim with the test is to get player feedback on game tuning and balance. The classic video game...