Business

Eastman Kodak shoved its way into the tough world of desktop printing Tuesday by tipping a sacred cow of the segment: the overpriced inkjet cartridge. For a decade, other printer makers relied on the model pioneered by Gillette, which gave away its razors but charged customers a premium to buy repla...

The Federal Trade Commission on Monday ordered DRAM chipmaker Rambus to license its technology to third parties and capped the amount the company can charge others for using the technology -- penalties stemming from a long-running antitrust probe. The FTC's remedy is designed to correct "effects of ...

In a wide-ranging, sometimes forceful and frequently upbeat e-mail to employees, Dell founder Michael Dell said he doesn't forget what was involved in creating a company and making it succeed. The e-mail, made public Saturday by a Texas newspaper, was sent on Friday, the same day Dell returned as CE...

Apple Inc. has reached a settlement with the company that manages the Beatles' intellectual property holdings, ending a trademark lawsuit and possibly paving the way for Beatles songs to be sold through the iTunes Music Store. On Monday, Apple announced the pact with The Beatles' music publisher App...

On the same day that founder Michael Dell returned as CEO of his namesake firm, a class-action lawsuit was filed claiming Dell had used rebates from its main business supplier Intel of about $1 billion to inflate its profits. The suit was filed in the U.S. District Court in Austin, Texas. Dell has s...

Media conglomerate Viacom demanded on Friday that Google's video service YouTube remove from its Web pages as many as 100,000 video clips containing copyrighted material. The two sides had been negotiating a licensing agreement that would allow Viacom-owned content on the YouTube site when talks bro...

A record holiday season pushed Amazon to nearly $4 billion in sales in the fourth quarter, but a heavier reliance on electronics sales, continued promotions and shipping discounts ate into profits, forcing executives to defend some of its recent moves into new markets. Profit plummeted 50 percent fr...

As the Enron story gradually begins to fade from the news, one has to wonder if such an economic debacle could happen again. As a result of Enron, WorldCom and other corporate scandals, there are now former top executives from several major corporations who, since they probably won't live long enoug...

For the past three years, a Chicago consulting firm has assumed a Grinch-like role with its annual estimate of worker productivity losses attributable to the Super Bowl. Those losses, though, may actually be gains for many businesses, according to the firm's top executive. Money lost due to producti...

Following several quarters of disappointing earnings reports and a fall to the No. 2 spot in global PC sales, Dell on Wednesday reinstated Michael Dell as CEO of the computer company he created in his dorm room at the University of Texas more than 20 years ago. The move comes with the immediate resi...

The Microsoft executive who led the company's Zune product launch, among other things, is retiring from the company, officials announced Wednesday. Bryan Lee, corporate vice president of Microsoft's entertainment business, plans to leave the company in the next several weeks to pursue personal inter...

Google further solidified its paid search lead in the fourth quarter, nearly tripling its profit amid a 38 percent jump in revenue as the search giant continued to burnish its reputation as the can't-miss Internet company. Google secured net income for the quarter of $1.03 billion, or $3.29 per shar...

Media conglomerate Time Warner posted strong fourth quarter results Wednesday, despite a decline in revenue from online unit America Online. Revenue at AOL, which is continuing to undergo a massive transformation from dial-up Internet access provider to free-to-all Web portal supported by search and...

As more phones and other small-form handheld devices get "smarter," so does the potential for people to use them more often, and for many varied and different purposes. The number of mobile cell phone subscribers worldwide surpassed 1 billion in 2006, and technological innovation continues apace as...

Music label Sony BMG has reached a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission over charges that it violated federal law by installing spyware and digital rights management software onto music CDs without telling consumers. The deal calls for Sony BMG to allow consumers to exchange CDs purchased be...