The European Commission is seeking information on current and future prices practised by the nine European phone companies involved in the high-speed fibre optic data transmission Global European Network, which brings together British Telecomunications Plc, Deutsche Telekom AG, France Telecom, Telecom Italia SpA, Telefonica de Espana SA, Belgacom NV, Koniklijke PTT Nederland NV, Portugal Telecom SA and the Swiss PTT: the Commission wants further information on the price users will have to pay to access the network, and also whether current differences between the low prices charged beteen operators and the prices charged to the public are justified; phone companies charge each other rates five to 10 times below prices charged to outsiders a Commission spokesman said.
Mercury Communications Ltd is trying to be friends with the UK cable television industry after having initially wooed cable companies as partners for local telephony and then irking them with high interconnect charges, leaving room for British Telecommunications Plc to come in as an alternative long distance carrier: it says it has set aside a budget for cable alliances that might involve further direct investments; they would otherwise involve joint service development, Mercury chief executive Duncan Lewis told Reuters in an interview: we’re saying to them, ‘We are not in info-tainment but if we can use you for local delivery of our services that will allow us to marginalise BT then that suits us fine.’
XMR Inc, Santa Clara manufacturer of excimer lasers for use in the liquid crystal display and semiconductor industries, has announced a 10-year partnership agreement with Sumitomo Heavy Industries Ltd, which will invest $3.5m in XMR and has signed a $500,000 licensing agreement; the capital will enable XMR to meet the growing demand in Japan, the firm’s largest market; Sumitomo will use existing facilities to manufacture the laser annealing systems for the liquid crystal display market and have exclusive rights for Japanese distribution of XMR systems; the stake it gets in XMR has not been disclosed.
Kokusai Denshin Denwa Co Ltd and 24 other Japanese firms have formed a Japanese cellular phone service company, Satellite Phone Japan Ltd, as part of the Inmarsat P global satellite cellular telephone project: the company is capitalised at $15m and owned 53.2% by Kokusai Denshin; Satellite Phone Japan owns a 6.7% stake in the company overseeing the project, I-CO Global Communications, which was formed here in London back in January.
Electronic Data Systems Corp and Hewlett-Packard Co have been chosen as the information technology suppliers for the 1998 World Cup in France – as it is in Europe there should be no need to add the prefix ‘soccer’ to the name: last year Sun Microsystems Inc was the exclusive supplier in its largest-ever sponsorship, but decided not to bother bidding this time, preferring instead to concentrate on the America’s Cup, Formula One and Indy Car racing; the General Motors Corp unit was brought in for systems integration by Sun last time, and newcomer Hewlett, which runs its personal computer business from France will supply hardware from its numerous locations in and around the World Cup sites throughout France.
Nexus Telecommunication Systems Ltd of Israel has signed Rockwell International Corp to develop and manufacture a chip set that can be incorporated into Nexus’s Two-Way Messaging and Location System applications: Nexus says the deal enables it to distribute the frequency-hopping digital-spread-spectrum transmitter chip set exclusively to its licensees and to buy up to 3m chip sets exclusively from Rockwell; Samsung Electronics Co Ltd is already making similar chip sets.
Indonesia’s PT Satelit Palapa Indonesia, Satelindo and Malaysia’s Cellular Communications Network Sdn Bhd, Celcom, have signed a memorandum of understanding to explore operational co-operation in telecommunication services: the memo, signed in Jakarta, covers cellular communications, international teleph
one services and very small aperture satellite terminals.
Wang Laboratories Inc reports that Nippon Wang KK has signed partnership deals with two systems integrators and four application software firms to market the OPEN/image software in Japan: its newest partners in Japan include systems integrators CTC-LS, a unit of the trading company Itochu Corp and Hitachi Information Systems; application software partners include Axis Software Co, which specializes in Oracle Corp-related applications, Bemac Corp, which focuses on relational database management applications; and Otto Corp, which serves companies affiliated with Yokogawa Electric Corp and NED, which focuses on the transport industry and news media in Japan; it also has co-marketing relations with vendors, such as Yokogawa Hewlett-Packard Co and Nippon Sun Microsystems.
Tandem Computers Inc’s alliance partner SCC Communications Corp is to supply the technological infrastructure, database management and application portfolio expertise to help Ameritech Corp increase reliability and management efficiency in its enhanced emergency 911 service throughout its five-state region.
Turns out that if you ask Intel Corp to replace your Pentium with the flawed maths co-processor, you may get a lot of noise you did not bargain for, and we’re not talking static here: according to PC Week, after two to three weeks you receive the replacement processor – which has one of those dinky little fans glued on, and it’s a cheap and truly noisy fan; if you don’t like your noisy new chip with the hot air blower, Intel promises to send you yet another replacement – within another three weeks’ time.
