Technology titans Google, Microsoft, and Sun Microsystems will provide $7.5 million, collectively, to fund research at a University of California, Berkeley, laboratory that will use the money to focus on next-generation Internet technology.
 
The Reliable, Adaptive, and Distributed (RAD) systems lab is designed to create technology for use by inventors

The Web search arena just became a little more crowded as Amazon.com has announced that it is opening programmer access to its Web crawler, Alexa, for a small fee.

Heretofore, Alexa has been known more for traffic rankings than searches, but the newly unveiled Alexa Web Search Platform will give developers access

Hong Kong-based SwitchEasy, Ltd., a young company currently focused on Apple iPod add-ons, announced this week the availability of its second product, the Capsule Accessory System, which is designed to protect the tiny and delicate iPod Nano.
 
SwitchEasy launched its first Capsule accessory on Tuesday: a fashion-forward, duo-toned polycarbonate carrying

SAN JOSE, Calif. — For years, Intel Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. have battled each other in the x86-based microprocessor business.
But in 2005, Intel verses AMD reached epic proportions: Call it a new and memorable chapter in the ongoing battle between the semiconductor industry’s version of David and Goliath. Read More...   Category: Hardware

Ipevo Inc., a Taiwanese startup based in California, has launched the beta version of a software driver that allows its Skype phones to be used on computers running Apple’s Mac OS X, the company said Thursday.
 
It’s the company’s first attempt to get its Free-1 Skype phones, handsets that plug

VoIP over Pre-WiMAX has been successfully tested in a trial in South Africa utilizing solutions supplied by Verso Technologies and Saab Grintek Technologies, the companies said Thursday.

The trials involved Wi-Fi-compatible PDAs obtaining access to the public switched telephone network (PSTN) via customer premise gateways. Backhauling of WiMAX technology to an existing

Microsoft said Friday it plans to acquire software and intellectual property from UMT, a software and consulting firm based in New York that specializes in portfolio management software. 
 
Microsoft will combine UMT's technology, including its Portfolio Manager software, with Microsoft Office Enterprise Project Management, which is based on Office Project

Companies that want constant employee E-mail access but can't afford the cost of PDAs, such as Research In Motion's BlackBerry or the Palm Treo, have a new alternative in MailCall, a service from startup Great American Technologies Inc. The hosted service translates a text E-mail into a computerized voice mail and sends it to

Digital media processor supplier Sigma Designs has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Blue7 Communications, a developer of advanced wireless technologies and ultrawideband (UWB) semiconductors.

Sigma Designs (Milpitas, Calif.) will pay $14 million in stock considerations for Blue7 (San Jose), a private start-up company focused on developing UWB semiconductor products for consumer electronics.

As the U.S. Senate threatens a filibuster, dozens of groups and newspaper editorials around the nation are questioning the government's ability to electronically monitor citizens and enter personal information into databases.

At a press conference this week the Electronic Privacy Information Center joined dozens joined an FBI spokesperson, conservative groups, Veterans for