Business

The U.S. Supreme Court is hearing oral arguments Wednesday for a patent case that could impact how manufacturers configure and sell computers overseas, and to what extent U.S. patent laws can be enforced in foreign countries. Called Microsoft v. AT&T, the software industry is aligning behind Mic...

The U.S. Supreme Court is hearing oral arguments Wednesday for a patent case that could impact how manufacturers configure and sell computers overseas, and to what extent U.S. patent laws can be enforced in foreign countries. Called Microsoft v. AT&T, the software industry is aligning behind Mic...

Google's efforts to convince video content owners to license their TV shows and movies to its YouTube video-sharing site may have hit another snag, with reports suggesting that a tentative deal with CBS may be unraveling. A sweeping agreement that would have given YouTube access to video clips -- su...

Hewlett-Packard posted first-quarter results Tuesday that featured a 26 percent jump in earnings amid strong sales of PCs, enterprise computer gear and printers. Earnings were $1.5 billion for the quarter compared to $1.2 billion in the year-ago period, with sales up 11 percent year-over-year to $25...

Sirius and XM -- the two providers of satellite radio service in the United States -- on Monday announced a plan to combine operations in a $4.6 billion merger, but by Tuesday the deal looked to face significant regulatory hurdles. The two companies agreed to a "merger of equals," which would create...

Warner Music Group acknowledged Tuesday it is still interested in purchasing EMI Group, its slumping rival in the troubled music industry, but such a deal is unlikely to solve the long-term problems facing both companies. New York-based Warner Music confirmed it approached EMI on Jan. 24 to discuss ...

The United States is considering taking legal action against China for continued violations of intellectual property rights, as well as the use of subsidies in a broad array of manufactured goods. The U.S. may pursue its case to the World Trade Organization -- an action it has previously threatened ...

As massive snowstorms battered much of the Midwest and Northeast this week, it was 70 degrees and sunny in Palm Desert, Calif., during eTail 2007 Palm Desert, the 16th annual multichannel retail conference. Nevertheless, weather was merely an added bonus for the hundreds of attendees -- top executiv...

CEO Steve Ballmer has cautioned Wall Street that analysts' fiscal year 2008 expectations for Windows Vista sales may be too "optimistic" and "overly aggressive." Vista is more of an opportunity to sustain Windows revenue -- not necessarily grow it, Ballmer reportedly said Thursday during a meeting f...

Most of us are quite aware of a new, brewing scandal -- the stock option scandal. It has been revealed that some companies have "cooked the books" when it came to reporting dates of stock option grants. The purpose of misdating the stock option was to accommodate executives by giving them the possi...

It was a David versus Goliath case that made international headlines. Russian authorities, determined to fight pirated software, came down hard on a school found to have 12 computers with phony versions of Windows and Microsoft Office. A court on Thursday dismissed the charges, calling the case "tri...

Dell has hired the CEO of electronics manufacturer Solectron to head up a new division overseeing worldwide operations, the company announced Wednesday, as it bolsters efforts to regain its supply chain efficiency and low-cost edge. Michael Cannon will become the president of global operations later...

Last year, the average click fraud rate of pay-per-click advertisements appearing on search engine content networks rose to 19.2 percent for the last quarter of 2006, the highest yet, according to Tom Cuthbert, CEO of Click Forensics. Click fraud occurs when online advertisers pay search engine comp...

Time Warner was finally able to complete the spin-off of its cable division Tuesday, a move that investors have long banked on as a way for the media giant to focus on growing its TV, print, movie and online businesses. Time Warner Cable became a standalone public company after a judge put a Chapter...

Google suffered a legal setback Tuesday as a Belgian court ruled that the search giant violated copyright law by publishing portions of a newspaper's stories on Google News without prior authorization. A higher court upheld an earlier ruling requiring Google to remove snippets of copyrighted news st...