IBM Corp is suing Bruce Claflin, who jumped ship from the Personal Computer Co to join Digital Equipment Corp, because he exercised his lucrative package of share options a month before he resigned: the suit claims that he breached his contract by exercising the options, which were part of an plan designed to keep valued employees on board, and stipulates that if an employee leaves within six months of exercising the options to go work for a competitor, IBM can ask for its money back – Claflin should have made a paper profit of over $1m – and IBM says that it did ask and was told by DEC that Mr Claflin would not return it, the suit says.
SoftKey International Inc looks as if it is going to land Learning Co Inc: the Cambridge predator says it met Learning brass on Tuesday night and began discussions relating to the recently-revised terms of SoftKey’s tender offer for Learning Co.
Omnitel Pronto Italia SpA, the free market cellular operator licensed for Italy in competition with the state-controlled Telecom Italia Mobile SpA annpunced that it has now reached key national coverage targets, and will start marketing its commercial Groupe Speciale Mobile cellular phone service in Italy from today: Omnitel says it has hit the 40% national coverage target, reaching 70% of the population.
Apple Computer Inc’s $500 or so Pippin has a PowerPC 603 processor, quad-speed CD-ROM drive, 8Mb memory and video and audio input-output support: extras include keyboard, printer, modem and display, although it will use a television screen and Apple has created an antialiasing algorithm that makes text appear very clearly on a low-resolution television screen according to US PC Weekers that saw it.
No-one is actually using the F – for failure – word about the Microsoft Network yet, but everyone used it about Apple Computer Inc when it decided to turn its eWorld service into a World Wide Web site, and now Microsoft Corp chairman Bill Gates says that the Microsoft Network will ultimately operate as an Internet site that computer users will be able to access for a modest fee.
Cisco Systems Inc reports that it has now completed its previously announced acquisition of Network Translation Inc, the privately-held developer of address translation products for use in accessing the Internet; no terms were given.
Netscape Communications Corp ain’t stupid, and, echoing what we were saying a few weeks ago about the urgent need for it to exploit its incredibly expensive paper by using it for suitable acquisitions, the company says that it must continue to foster alliances with the right partners and will consider acqusitions to fuel the growth expected of a company with its spiralling market capitalisation – $170 a share, $6,800m last time we looked!
Raising a new scare, the US Semiconductor Equipment & Materials International trade body warned that world semiconductor manufacturers may find it hard to raise output as much as they’d like because of a possible shortage of chip manufacturing equipment and materials: About 200 semiconductor plants are planned to be formed worldwide by the end of the year 2000, but this target may be difficult to achieve, William Reed, chairman of the trade body told a news conference at the start of the annual SEMI exhibition in Chiba, near Tokyo; there are concerns about supply shortage in polysilicon and semiconductor manufacturing equipment, he said; the conference will include a meeting on large diameter chip wafers, where participants will attempt to reach a global consensus on when and how equipment, materials and device makers will work together to do a 12 wafer.
The president of Samsung Electronics Co was also chilling the blood at the meeting, saying world demand for memory chips will continue to exceed supply until the year 2000.
US West Inc is ready to raise its stake in Belgian telecommunications venture Telenet Vlaanderen to 50% from 25%, according to L’Echo: the US Bell says it would prefer the thing to remain predominantly Flemish, but stands ready to buy the stakes of any local investors that decide that they want to back out.
Versant Object Technology Corp has seen off rival Object Design Inc at London based-Mobile Systems International Ltd, winning the cellular network planning and design company over with its object-oriented database system, which will be used to develop a Network Planning Tool.
Fort Lauderdale, Florida-based Interim Services Inc has now completed acquisition of the Computer Power Group unit of Computer Power Group Pty Ltd of Sydney for $71m in cash.
They love their touchtone telephones in the US of A, and filing your tax return could be just a touch tone away: the Internal Revenue Service in Washington announced that its TeleFile service will enable the 23m or so US taxpayers that use the form, 1040EZ, the least complicated one, to use a touch-tone telephone for 1995 returns, due on April 15; the form is for single taxpayers with no dependents who have taxable income of less than $50,000, have filed a tax return previously, and who live at the same address as last year.
According to a survey of 5,000 of its US users, H&R Block Inc’s CompuServe Inc unit says that its average user is a married college graduate, aged between 35 and 54, with a household income of $70,000; it finds an estimated 25% of its 3.7m worldwide members are women.
Commenting on the first half consolidated figures announced last week (CI No 2,805), on mainframes, Hitachi Ltd says only that sales of large computer systems were adversely affected, both by a changeover to a new line of mainframe systems, and by the strong yen.
Gandalf Technologies Inc, Nepean, Ontario has signed a formal market development deal with Pacific Telesis Group Inc under which its Pacific Bell unit will join Gandalf in providing value-added resellers and systems integrators with ISDN using Gandalf’s remote access products and Pacific Bell’s data services.
US West Inc and Time Warner Inc do not look much like partners any more: the Englewood, Colorado Bell is now suing in an effort to block the entertainment giant’s latest reorganisation and claiming it violates terms of their 1993 partnership, saying that the move would in effect dismantle the partnership.
DreamWorks SKG has decided to build its studio and office complex near the Marina del Rey area of Los Angeles, the Los Angeles Times says: the project will be the first major new studio complex in Southern California in more than 50 years.
The Internet stocks, those incredible shooting stars of the tech group, writes Barrons, the US business weekly, encountered some celestial headwinds last week and made a brief re-entry from outer space into the stratosphere: UUnet Technologies, PSINet, Netcom, Netscape and Spyglass and the rest of the anointed all demonstrated that their stocks can go down, if only a tad and for an instant; this fleeting pause in their interstellar journey was merely, we’re sure, for purposes of refuelling and to give those who missed the great blast-off a chance to clamber on board.
