Banks, telcos to decide on wallet-phones

By Tarmo Virki, Thu Oct 30, 2008 4:36am EDT  

HELSINKI (Reuters) - The potentially lucrative business of mobile phone wallets is waiting for banks and telecom operators to agree on each one's role and possible revenue flow in the future. 

Technology for paying with mobile phones by just flashing them near reading equipment in stores or in public transport is ready, and consumers have appreciated the ease of its use in trials around the world. 

The world's biggest payment card company, Mastercard, will unveil on Thursday a service for banks, enabling them to install payment cards into clients mobile phones much easier than earlier, possibly breaking the deadlock over the market takeoff. 

"We are talking to serious banks ... and not about trials, but about commercial launches," said James Anderson, a Vice President at Mastercard's mobile business. 

Anderson said that during the next two years he expects to see substantial activity from retail-focused banks, whose plans to develop mobile payment services have been little affected by the financial crisis. 

"We have not seen a lot of impact," Anderson said. 

It would still take at least until 2010 before any wider availability of phones equipped with such technology and the financial industry and telecom operators would need to agree on some kind of revenue and role split. 

"Traditional financial industry met telcos by going mobile. Now telecom operators want to play a part in that chain. These talks are well under way," Gerhard Romen, Director for Strategic Alliances & Partnering at Nokia, told Reuters. 

"Now it's like the Olympics, everyone is on their starting blocks, and just waiting," he said. 

PHONES NEEDED 

Consumers will be able to use a phone as a wallet or as an access card simply by waving it over a wireless reader, and in some cases punching a PIN number into the phone -- similar to how travelers in Tokyo and London access public transport. 

"It's not the payments driving it, it's the convenience and simplicity for the user," said Nokia's Romen. 

Mastercard's new service could help deal with some of the problems facing the industry, but analysts said there was more to be done. 

"A lot of pieces are yet to be fit in and some of them are out of control of the financial community," said Ed Kountz, analyst at Jupiter Research, adding that lack of availability of wallet-phones was also holding back the market.

Read more ....

Sony, HP, Dell Recall Laptop Batteries

by Jeff Gamet, The Mac Observer.com, 8:40 AM EDT, October 31st, 2008 

Sony's recurring problems with laptop batteries has started up again, so it is recalling some 100,000 batteries from around the world. The recall impacts HP, Dell and Toshiba and includes batteries that were produced between October 2004 and June 2005. 

Apparently the batteries pose a potential fire hazard due to overheating. None of the batteries in this recall are being used in Apple laptops. 

Sony suffered a black eye in 2006 when it was forced to recall thousands of batteries from a long list of laptop manufacturers, including Apple. This time, however, the recall appears to impact a substantially smaller number of computers and companies. 

Additional information about the voluntary recall is available at the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission Web site.

Chief Information Officers increasingly important in Southeast Asia

Pacific Bridge, Inc. - Asian HR Newsletter, Volume 8, Number 10 (October 2, 2008)

Throughout the world, chief information officers (CIOs) are no longer limited to leading the information technology divisions of companies. They are becoming increasingly important as a result of globalization and the fact that companies now rely heavily on IT processes and systems to be competitive. With more companies spread out over multiple locations throughout the world, it is necessary for CIOs to be able to manage all the technological, organizational, and cultural aspects of a company with a global mindset. 

Recent surveys of CIOs from multinational companies in the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam suggest that this trend is particularly evident in Asia. In fact, one study indicated that well over half of Asian CIOs described responsibilities beyond IT. International IT budgets were expected to increase by a little over three percent this year, while Asia prepared for an increase of over eight percent. With so many companies expanding into Asia, IT professionals need to combine their knowledge of technology and business to assist employees in different regions to produce positive results. 

While using their IT expertise to ensure reliability and improve business functions, CIOs in Asia can also advance their companies’ corporate social responsibility plans through the development and use of environmentally-conscious practices that can save energy and cut costs in the long run. While many Asian countries still have relatively lax laws protecting the environment, many multinational companies are going “green.” The new generation of CIOs will need to be more versatile so that they can merge their traditional cost-effective roles with the new business responsibilities of today’s companies.

Unilever credits SAP for boosting growth

Ian Grant, Computerweekly.com,  Oct 2008

Unilever chairman Patrick Cescau has credited last year's shift to a global SAP enterprise management system with helping to boost sales for the first nine months by a total of 7.4% to £23.7bn. 

"Growth in the third quarter was 8.2%, boosted by the effect of the IT systems change last year which had reduced growth last quarter," he said this morning, as the grocery manufacturer reported its third quarter results. 

"The implementation of a harmonised IT system continues (in Europe) with 80% of all locations already live." he said. 

Unilever has rolled out its SAP-based strategy through the Asia division. The company is also centralising the supply chain in Singapore as part of its "One Unilever" programme, Cescau revealed. The change would be completed by January 2009, he said. 

The One Unilever Programme aims to help Unilever simplify its organisation and management structure and to improve capabilities in marketing, customer management, and research and development. It has led to better allocation of resources, faster decision-making and a lower cost level, the company said. 

Unilever is rolling out One Unilever in every major country. The company is using the project to share services including IT, HR and Finance across countries. The changes were part of an accelerated programme of restructuring announced in 2006.

 

Indonesia, India cooperation in IT wide open

Yogyakarta (ANTARA News) - The chance of cooperation between Indonesia and India in information technology is wide open. 

India is now well known as the country improving rapidly its information technology. 

"There are many potential of cooperation between Indonesia and India in information technology sector. Many companies in India are willing to expand their business in Asian countries like Indonesia," Indian ambassador to Indonesia Biren Nanda said on Thursday in an international seminar in Yogyakarta`s State University (UNY). 

At this moment, Nanda said, countries using India`s information technology service are the United States and Europe. 

"The information technology can cut down the cost of companies and government. It is very suitable to be implemented in Indonesia," Nanda said. 

Indonesia, like India, has many factors such as a number of qualified human resources that can support the development of information technology. 

Nanda also said the information technology has many advantages to be developed because it does not need much physical means, no pollution resulted and it can absorb many work forces. 

Meanwhile, UNY head Rochmat Wahab said the information technology cannot be separated in people`s life in this globalization era. 

"The information technology will be implemented in the daily life so people have to use it in their daily life to improve it," Wahab said. 

"In the future, to form the world class university, I hope there will be an exchange program, like students exchange, lecturer as well as university`s staffs," Wahab said. 

India in the recent years rapidly develops information technology and has gained profit of 47.8 million USD for the national income in 2008. 

Some policies to improve the information technology in India like the making of legal protection, fiscal intensive, the simplified procedure, the building of infrastructure and investment in education was made by the government.

U.S. to use new media technology to help promote tourism in Bali

Ni Komang Erviani, The Jakarta Post, Denpasar   

U.S. Ambassador Cameron Hume said Monday the U.S. government was ready to help promote Bali to American citizens, acknowledging the Indonesian government's seriousness in maintaining the island's security. 

"I want to bring together tourism professionals from both countries so there will be a more serious and large-scale tourism campaign to bring more Americans to this island," Hume told reporters after a closed meeting with officials from the Bali Tourism Board (BTB) in Denpasar. 

The U.S. government was among those which recommended against its citizens visiting Bali over security concerns following the Bali bombing attacks in 2002 and 2005. 

The lifting of the travel restriction made earlier this year signified a major improvement in U.S. government foreign policy toward Bali. 

Hume said apart from conducting regular information campaigns about Bali, they could promote the island through the latest media formats, including GPS (Global Positioning System) technology available on the Google Earth application on the Internet. 

By August this year, Bali's tourism agency recorded that almost 47,000 Americans visited the island. 

BTB chairman Ngurah Wijaya said he was enthusiastic about the U.S. plans and expected they could arrange further technical meetings to discuss ideas in the immediate future. 

"I hope the plan will materialize soon enough," he said. 

Separately, a group of Indonesian honorary consuls from countries across Latin America, Europe and Africa have traveled to Bali to learn about the culture firsthand under an initiative by the Indonesian government, an official said. 

The group's leader, Handriyo Kusumo Prio, also an official from the Foreign Ministry, said the group earlier visited Yogyakarta for the same reason. 

"It is the government's token of appreciation for years of their voluntary work promoting Indonesia," Prio said. 

Throughout the 10-day visit, he added, the government expected the honorary consuls would update their knowledge about Indonesia. 

"So they can further promote Indonesia in their countries," he added. 

The Indonesian government has appointed 64 honorary consuls around the world. These consuls, mostly local tourism business people and professionals were chosen to assist the government promote Indonesia's tourism to their international counterparts. 

The consuls, all volunteers, come from countries such as Australia, Brazil, India, Ireland, Nepal, Paraguay, Portugal, Russia, Spain, and Turkey. 

On their first day in Bali on Monday, the honorary consuls met Governor Made Mangku Pastika for an initial briefing. 

"Hopefully your stay in Bali will enable you to explore the beauty of our island, so you can pass on what you have learned to others overseas," Pastika told the consuls. 

He said the visit was significant considering the government's current efforts maintaining the island's security situation. 

"Let the consuls see that we mean business here," he said. 

The consuls will visit the Taman Ayun Grand Temple in Mengwi, Tanah Lot Temple in Tabanan and the Tampak Siring Presidential Palace in Gianyar. 

Nalan Rimer of Turkey said she was excited by her firsthand experiences of Bali. 

"Now I have completed my knowledge, as I have had the chance to experience Bali for myself."

Google Earth Comes To The iPhone, And It's Awesome

Washingtonpost.com, Robin Wauters, TechCrunch.com

Color me impressed: Google has released a custom Google Earth application for the iPhone/iPod Touch, and it's stunning. 

The Google Earth geographical software has been altered to make maximum use of the iPhone's screen and functionality. You're able to tilt the device to adjust your view when browsing mountainous terrain, use the 'My Location' feature to jump right to where you are in the blink of an eye, and use Google's local search engine to look for information on cities, places and businesses. Google has also added additional layers to the application, namely Panoramio and Wikipedia, for geo-located high-quality photos and informative articles respectively. 

This marks the main differentiator between the official Google Earth app and the one Earthscape released last May. More recently, the Earthscape application dropped its price from $10 to free, but will most likely be trumped by the official app now. 

As CNET points out, Google Earth for iPhone has a small Webkit-based browser to show the specific information users click on, and includes a link to the Safari browser Apple builds into the iPhone. When you click the address of a business using the local search engine, the iPhone will intercept the command and show it on the Google Maps application, enabling you to get directions instantly. 

The app is free and available today in all languages the iPhone currently supports (18) and will gradually be released for 22 countries in total. Check the iTunes App Store to see if you're among the lucky ones. 

Product Manager Google Earth Peter Birch, who is the one demonstrating the app in the video below, has also announced that a similar application running on Android is high on the priority list for the future, but that there's nothing to announce at this point. More features, like integration of 3D buildings and advanced mapping functionalities, are in the pipeline. It's likely Google is also looking at ways to monetize the mobile traffic. 

"Why can't I do this at work?"

Putting Facebook and Twitter to work 

By Steven Mollman, CNN, Bangkok Thailand 

Bringing Skype to the workplace is just one way companies are harnessing tech that has previously been used just for fun. 

Employees in the office used to ponder this question about corporate technology not easily available to consumers. 

Today the question, usually asked from home or a cafe, is: "Why can't I do this at work?" 

Innovative, user-friendly offerings -- Skype, Facebook, Twitter, mash-ups, YouTube, wikis, and the like -- take root and thrive as consumer offerings. 

Corporate IT departments meanwhile often seem oblivious to their potential usefulness, even as workers wonder at their absence. But increasingly such technologies are being used for business. 

Partly this is because enterprise versions have emerged with fancier security features. And partly it's because as the consumer-side versions keep growing, new users continue to come from within small companies -- or even large enterprises, often to the horror of security-conscious IT departments. 

Twitter, the popular micro-blogging service, has seen the emergence of small copycat services focused on businesses. 

Users, rather than answering the Twitter question of "What are you doing?" for anyone to read, answer "What are you working on?" for colleagues only to read. 

Wikis, online pages that any user can edit, surged in popularity among consumers thanks partly to the online encyclopedia Wikipedia. Not long after businesses hopped aboard with tools geared for them. 

One of those, PBwiki, has seen the number of individual business wikis created with it jump to well over 40,000, up from less than 20,000 a year ago and only about 5,000 two years ago. 

A Los Angeles design firm called The Groop, which uses PBwiki for creative collaboration among teams and clients, claims to have realized $1 million in annual productivity gains with it. 

On the social networking side, Facebook and MySpace became household names seemingly overnight. 

This year businesses are expected to spend more than $250 million on social networking tools geared towards them, from vendors like Awareness, Communispace, and Jive Software, according to research firm Forrester. 

And increasingly vendors offer companies suites of Web 2.0 technologies that have emerged on the consumer side. 

For instance HiveLive lets employees create and control blogs, wikis, mash-ups and so on within business social networks. 

Skype, the online phone service bought by eBay, noticed that many of its customers were small businesses. To entice more of them, it created a business version of its software with improved security and a "control panel" application for central management of Skype credit and numbers. 

Last month Google launched a YouTube-like video sharing service for businesses. The idea is that employees can share videos amongst themselves in a secure setting. A CEO could broadcast a message, for instance, or a technician could post a how-to video. 

The iPhone, inevitably, is also forcing its way into the work force. "The best phone for business. Ever" claims the typically bomb-throwing ad copy from Apple. 

Research firm Gartner foresees consumer adoption driving more technologies into enterprises over the coming years. 

Among them are desktop video-conferencing, virtual worlds, 3-D controllers, and augmented reality. 

Gartner analyst Jackie Fenn suggest IT departments should make it their ongoing strategy to take advantage of such consumer technologies, rather than bump into them on a case-by-case basis. 

Besides, there's a nice upside to this approach for IT workers, as long as security and other challenges can be overcome. 

As anyone who's played around on Facebook, YouTube or an iPhone can attest to, the consumer side is where all the fun stuff is.

Related Article:

Social networking sites "good for businesses"

Web 2.0 has crept into the everyday work place, FaceTime reports

Microsoft to Seed Vista SP2 to Developers Next Week

By Chloe Albanesius , PC Magazine

A small group of Microsoft Technology Adoption program customers will get their hands on Vista SP2 next week, but a release date for the general public has not yet been set. 

Tech Adoption customers will get the second service pack for Windows Vista on October 29, Mike Nash, corporate vice president for Windows product management, wrote in a Friday blog post. 

"The final release date for Windows Vista SP2 will be based on quality," Nash wrote. "So we'll track customer and partner feedback from the beta program before setting a final date for the release." 

Vista SP2 will contain "previously released fixes focused on addressing specific reliability, performance, and compatibility issues," according to Nash. 

Microsoft has adopted a "single serviceability model" so SP2 will come packaged as a single release covering Windows Vista client and Windows Server 2008. 

"This should also minimize deployment and testing complexity for our customers," Nash wrote. 

In addition, SP2 also adds: Windows Search 4.0; the Bluetooth 2.1 Feature Pack; the ability to record data on to Blu-Ray media natively in Windows; Windows Connect Now for Wi-Fi configurations; and the ability of the exFAT file system to support UTC timestamps, which allows correct file synchronization across time zones. 

Despite these improvements, Nash urges most Vista users to hang tight for the formal SP2 release. "While we will recommend SP2 when it ships, your best bet today is Windows Vista SP1," he said. 

Microsoft released SP1 in March. It included compatibility, security, and performance enhancements, but little in the way of features or interface changes that the end user will notice.

Mobile Phones and Vanishing Bees

The Institute of Science in Society

The recent boom in third generation mobile phones may be the main culprit for colony collapse disorder in honeybees. Dr. Mae-Wan Ho

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Colony collapse a new phenomenon

Bees worldwide have been involved in a disappearing act called “colony collapse disorder” over the past two years [1] (Mystery of Disappearing Honeybees, this series), with little sign of the disease or infestations that have resulted in massive loss of colonies in the past. The bees simply leave the hives and fail to return. Beekeepers and scientists alike are stymied as to the cause of this strange phenomenon.

One likely culprit is a new class of systemic pesticides, which are not only sprayed on crops, but also used universally to dress seeds in conventional agriculture, and can confuse and disorientate bees at very low concentrations [2] (Requiem for the Honeybee, this series). Another candidate is radiation from mobile phone base stations that has become nearly ubiquitous in Europe and North America where the bees are vanishing; this possibility is considerably strengthened by preliminary findings that bees fail to return to the hives if cordless phone base stations are placed in them.

Simple experiment with dramatic results

Researchers at Landau University in Germany designed a simple experiment for students on the Environmental Science course [3]. Eight mini-hives, each with approximately 8 000 bees were set up for the experiment. Four of them were equipped with a DECT (Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunication)-station at the bottom of the hive, and the other four without the DECT-station served as controls.

At the entrance of each hive, a transparent plastic tube enabled the experimenters to watch the marked bees entering and leaving the hive, so they can be counted and their time of return after release recorded for a period of 45 minutes.

The experimenters also studied building behaviour by measuring the area of the honeycomb and its weight.

In the course of the experiment, three colonies exposed to mobile phone radiation and one non-exposed control colony broke down. The total weights of the honeycombs in all colonies, including those at the time of breakdown were compared. The controls weighed 1 326g, while those exposed to the DECT-stations weighed only 1 045g, a difference of 21 percent. The total area of the honeycomb in the controls was 2 500, compared to just 2050 in the exposed hives.

But it was the number of returning bees and their returning times that were vastly different. For two control hives, 16 out of 25 bees returned in 45 minutes. For the two microwave-exposed hives, however, no bees at all returned to one hive, and only six returned to the other.

Cordless phone base station widely used in homes and offices

These dramatic results are of a preliminary nature, but one should bear in mind that the DECT-station is a simple cordless phone base, widely used in homes and offices.

It emits microwave radiation of about 1 900 MHz continuously, which is frequency modulated at 100 Hz. The average power is 10 mW, with a peak of 250 mW. It represents the exposure levels of perhaps tens of millions worldwide living near mobile phone base stations, or have cordless phones in their homes or offices.

The same scientists had carried out an earlier experiment with the cordless phone base on a standby mode, in which the average power is 2.5 mW, and that appeared to have had no effect on the bees [4, 5].

Clearly the present findings need to be taken much further, but their significance should not be downplayed for a number of reasons. The findings are compatible with evidence accumulating from investigations on many other species including humans, showing that mobile phone radiation is associated with a range of health hazards including cancers [6] (Drowning in a Sea of Microwaves, SiS 34). Furthermore, bees are known to be extremely sensitive to magnetic and electromagnetic fields, and there have been many suggestions that they could be used as an indicator species for electromagnetic pollution.

Bees as indicator species for electromagnetic pollution

Experiments dating well back to the last century have documented the phenomenal sensitivity of honeybees to electromagnetic fields. Bees use the earth’s magnetic field to navigate. Free-flying honeybees are able to detect static intensity fluctuations as weak as 26 nT against the background earth-strength magnetic field (average 500 mT) [7]. This has been demonstrated in experiments where individual honeybees have been trained to discriminate between the presence and the absence of a small static magnetic anomaly in the lab. Honeybees can also learn to distinguish between two 360o panoramic patterns that are identical except for the compass orientation. In this case, the difference was a 90o rotation about the vertical axis [8]. The most powerful cue to direction for the honeybee comes from the sky, but discrimination between patterns is possible in the absence of celestial information, as when the sky is overcast. Under those conditions, bees can use a magnetic direction to discriminate between patterns.

The bees’ waggle dance on the honeycomb, which tells hive mates where to find food, can also be misdirected by anomalies in the earth’s magnetic field or very weak pulsed magnetic fields at about 250 MHz applied in the correct direction [9]. Bees can even learn to detect very low levels of extremely low frequency alternating electromagnetic fields [10].

But mobile phones have been around for close to 20 years, so why now? There has been a recent change in cell phone technology that coincides with the current crisis. At the beginning of the present century, 3G (third generation) mobile phone systems became publicly available, leading to a surge in popularity of mobile phones, and many more phone towers [11]. Bees are disappearing in North America, Europe and also Australia, wherever mobile phones are greatly in use. Stay tuned.

NATURE | Silence of the Bees | The Importance of Bees

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Dell: Asia PC shipments rise faster than average

Dell says its Asia PC shipments are growing much faster than the industry average

Wednesday October 22, 10:34 am ET 

NEW YORK (AP) -- Computer company Dell Inc. said Wednesday its PC shipments in the Asia-Pacific region continue to grow faster than the industry average, according to preliminary data from research firm IDC.

Dell said IDC estimates that its shipments grew 35 percent in the third quarter, three times faster than the industry average. 

The Round Rock, Texas-based company, which is the world's No. 2 PC maker after Hewlett-Packard Co., plans to post third-quarter results on Nov. 20. 

Shares fell 34 cents, or 2.7 percent, to $12.26 in morning trading.

Chinese surfers see red over Microsoft black-outs

By Kitty Bu 

BEIJING, Oct 22 (Reuters) - Chinese Internet users have expressed fury at Microsoft's launch of an anti-piracy tool targeting Chinese computer users to ensure they buy genuine software. 

The "Windows Genuine Advantage" programme, which turns the user's screen black if the installed software fails a validation test, is Microsoft's latest weapon in its war on piracy in China, where the vast majority of 200 million computer users are believed to be using counterfeit software, unwittingly or not. 

"Why is Microsoft automatically connected with my computer? The computer is mine!" one angry blogger wrote on popular Chinese web portal Sina.com. "Microsoft has no right to control my hardware without my agreement." 

Another blogger railed over the cost of authorised versions. 

"If the price of genuine software was lower than the fake one, who would buy the fake one?" he wrote. 

A visitor to a Beijing internet cafe said Microsoft was violating people's rights. 

"If, when I'm programming, the computer screen goes black, that will probably cause some important information to be lost," he said. "Who will pay me for my loss then?" 

Dong Zhengwei, 35, a Beijing lawyer, described Microsoft as the "biggest hacker in China with its intrusion into users' computer systems without their agreement or any judicial authority", the China Daily said. 

"Microsoft's measure will cause serious functional damage to users' computers and, according to China's criminal law, the company can stand accused of breaching and hacking into computer systems," he was quoted as saying. 

"I respect the right of Microsoft to protect its intellectual property, but it is taking on the wrong target with wrong measures. They should target producers and sellers of fake software, not users." 

The software giant defended the programme on its website as part of its "commitment to help protect its intellectual property and to help you avoid problems before they happen". 

"The purpose ... is to help our customers to determine (if) genuine software is installed on their computers," Microsoft told Reuters. 

(Reporting by Beijing Newsroom; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Jakarta to host "Pesta Blogger" on Saturday

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta 

Information and Communication Minister Mohammad Nuh said on Wednesday that Jakarta would host this year's national blogger gathering on Saturday, heralding the theme "Blogging for Society". 

Nuh said the event was to be titled Pesta Blogger 2008 and would be held in the BPPT II building on Jl M.H. Thamrin, Central Jakarta. Nuh added that the gathering would be attended by the U.S. ambassador to Indonesia Cameron R. Hume. 

"To establish an information-based society, we need creativity. Events like this undoubtedly give people room to express themselves," Nuh said, as quoted by kompas.com. 

The event's administrative chairman, Wicaksono, said bloggers from across Indonesia would participate, and that his team expected to double the attendance levels seen at last year's gathering. 

"We hope this event will make a positive contribution to society," Wicaksono said. (and)

Reports: Google CEO to stump for Obama

Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal 

The Wall Street Journal reported Monday that Schmidt has also been providing unofficial advice to the Democratic hopeful on energy and technology issues, and speculation swirls around whether he could be in line for a Chief Technical Officer post Obama has said he would create in his administration.

Schmidt has said Google is neutral in the campaign. The Mountain View-based company's employees have donated a total of $487,355 to Obama's campaign, according to reports. They've given $20,600 to Sen. John McCain's.

Both Obama and Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) have said they are in favor of limiting the rate changes Internet providers can make for different levels of service. 

Schmidt follows on the heels of other tech executives who also became involved in the presidential race: former Palo Alto-based Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE:HPQ) CEO Carly Fiorina, San Jose-baed eBay Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY) CEO Meg Whitman and San Jose-based Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) CEO John Chambes have been advising and stumping for McCain.

H-P Plans to Unveil Smart Phone

Justin Scheck, The Wall Street Journal

Hewlett-Packard Co., aiming to grow its device business beyond corporate users, is preparing to release a new smart phone that will also be marketed to consumers, according to people briefed on the plan. The device will debut in Europe, these people say, and will be sold by a mobile carrier in retail stores.

The new device will have a touchscreen and keypad and will use Microsoft Corp.'s Windows Mobile 6.1 operating system, say people briefed on the plan. It will be able to send and receive emails, and access the Internet.

The phone is the latest version of H-P's iPaq devices. H-P, which has been 

selling iPaq-branded devices since it acquired personal-computer maker Compaq Computer Corp. in 2002, primarily focused earlier iPaqs on businesses and typically didn't sell them through retail stores.

The new phone will likely be released in Europe within the next two months, say people familiar with the matter. It will later be released world-wide.

H-P spokesman Mike Hockey said the most recent iPaq device, a business-oriented smart phone, was launched in June. H-P trails behind manufacturers like Nokia Corp. and Research in Motion Ltd. in world-wide smart-phone sales, according to market researcher IDC, with less than a 3.3% global market share. Mr. Hockey said, "the iPaq brand is extremely strong around the world, especially in the European market."

Globalization and IT: Exclusive CIO Survey

It's official: Today's CIOs are global. Explore the details of Smart Enterprise's international survey of IT leaders. 

By Bob Violino, Smart Enterprise

Today's CIOs need to think globally—and act globally. Exclusive new research by Smart Enterprise shows just how globalized business has become, and the huge impact it has had on CIOs and their IT operations. In fact, globalization affects nearly every facet of IT and the CIO's role in the organization. What's more, at a time when the sluggish U.S. economy is straining many IT projects, globalization provides CIOs with a new opportunity to invest in technology that can help their organizations expand into new markets. 

While most enterprises already do business internationally, what's new is the central role IT now plays. CIOs support international expansion efforts, and they are expected to help their organizations succeed in today's global marketplace. 

Indeed, more than 60 percent of IT executives in the U.S. work for organizations that serve customers outside the country, according to the Smart Enterprise "2008 Globalization & IT" survey. Nearly the same percentage of U.S. respondents have business operations or offices outside the U.S. Half have non-U.S. product suppliers, and more than 40 percent work with international third-party technology service providers or shared services. In fact, just one-quarter of the 350 executives worldwide surveyed by Smart Enterprise work for organizations that operate only in the U.S. (For more on the survey methodology, see "How the Globalization & IT Survey Was Conducted") 

Other key findings of the Smart Enterprise "2008 Globalization & IT" survey: 

• Globalization has led CIOs to increase spending in areas that include security, IT infrastructure, network infrastructure and compliance. For example, more than 40 percent of the survey respondents say globalization has driven them to spend more on IT infrastructure this year.
  
• Globalization affects the way IT executives address several key issues, including planning, collaboration, leadership and compliance. For example, when it comes to leadership, globalization affects the way over 65 percent of IT executives manage up, and how 75 percent handle relationships with partners and suppliers.
  
• The leading driver of accelerated IT projects is globalization. In fact, among respondents who are accelerating major projects, nearly 70 percent attribute the acceleration to globalization.
  
• To support global efforts, organizations rely on a variety of technology solutions. These include network and end-point security, online collaboration, teleconferencing, and network and storage consolidation and virtualization.
  
• To help support global issues, technology leaders believe they must enhance a number of their own professional skills, including their understanding of business issues, leadership skills and technical skills.
  
  

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