Business

AOL went on a buying binge this week. It made headlines with the purchase of the TechCrunch blog network, but on the same day it also bought two promising startups -- Thing Labs and 5min Media. Thing Labs makes Brizzly, a Web-based program that allows people to manage their social networking on Twit...

With the announcement of its PlayBook device, Research In Motion this week joined the ever-growing list of companies rushing to bring out tablets of their very own. The company seems to be focusing on the enterprise, with the hope that corporate users will love their PlayBooks so much that it will s...

Facebook and Skype reportedly will soon announce a partnership, integrating a number of functions to enhance the user experience: Users will be able to call and SMS Facebook friends from Skype; Skype will integrate Facebook Connect into its system; and users will be able to video chat with Facebook ...

AOL on Tuesday confirmed it has agreed to acquire technology TechCrunch, following a crescendo of rumors surrounding the possible deal. News of the deal was released on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt, a gathering being held in San Francisco through Wednesday. "TechCrunch and its team will be an outstan...

Six major high-tech firms have agreed to toss out the no-solicitation agreements they had reached concerning competitors' employees. The secret anti-trolling agreements came to a voluntary end on Friday as the Department of Justice announced a settlement with Adobe, Apple, Google, Intel, Intuit and ...

The private settlement of HP's lawsuit against Oracle over its hiring of Mark Hurd as co-president after weeks of public wrangling is welcome news to everyone but the corporate attorneys. Still, don't expect the two vendors to just pick up and resume their former close partnership. Their quarrel got...

The dream of streaming video and audio on the go, without boundaries, is one step closer to reality. The FCC has ruled in favor of releasing "white spaces" -- broadcast frequencies between television channels -- for wireless broadband use. The result could be the emergence of "super WiFi" networks.

Blockbuster, the company that once reigned atop the video rental business, announced Thursday that it has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. This may be its last chance at surviving in an industry in which consumers increasingly are gravitating toward services that enable instant access to ...

The Texas Comptroller's Office recently made revisions to its sales tax rules that could ensnare many companies that merely use computer servers located in Texas, requiring them to collect the state's sales tax on sales to customers there. In 1992, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a state can only ...

Monday's announcement that Oracle and HP have settled the lawsuit triggered by Oracle's hiring of former HP CEO Mark Hurd may seem surprising, given that the suit was filed just two weeks ago. However, there are many reasons both companies would want to end this battle now. HP filed the suit the day...

IBM has made a $1.7 billion offer to acquire Netezza, a data warehouse specialist that allows users to analyze huge amounts of data very quickly by integrating hardware with analytics applications. Since IBM announced its offer, Netezza's stock price has risen past the $27 per share price it reflec...

Two tech stalwarts -- Oracle and Research In Motion -- posted solid quarterly earnings, not only goosing their own shares, but delivering a boost to the stock market in general. The bigger surprise was RIM, which posted higher-than-expected second quarter earnings and gave a forecast for the third q...

ComScore's latest tally of smartphone operating system market shares in the U.S. showed RIM's BlackBerry OS continues to hold a dominating lead in the smartphone arena. Apple's iOS owns the No. 2 spot, but it saw a slight decline. The big story in the ComScore report is the third-place OS -- Google'...

Consumers will spend $237 billion on online purchases in the United States alone in 2010, Javelin Strategy & Research predicts. That's almost 15 percent more than in 2009. Online retail is also growing globally. MasterCard announced a global agreement with cross-border e-commerce shopping firm B...

Consumers will spend $237 billion on online purchases in the United States alone in 2010, Javelin Strategy & Research predicts. That's almost 15 percent more than in 2009. Online retail is also growing globally. MasterCard announced a global agreement with cross-border e-commerce shopping firm B...