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Google has purchased more than 1,000 patents from IBM, as part of its strategy to strengthen its patent portfolio to counter litigation, according to records of the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Jim Prosser, a Google spokesman, confirmed the transfer, reported by a blog SEO by the Sea, but did not provide details such as the the purchase price Google paid for the patents. Google also acquired another over 1,000 patents from IBM in July. It transferred recently some patents to smartphone... 

Hewlett-Packard Co (HP) should re-think its decision to dump its TouchPad tablet since the device could double the value of the PC division HP plans to spin off, technology research firm Canalys said in a statement to clients. HP stunned markets in August by saying it may shed its PC business — the world’s largest after the $25 billion acquisition of Compaq in 2002 — while at the same time killing webOS-based phones and the TouchPad tablet which was launched only six weeks earlier. HP... 

Cisco has slashed its forecast revenue increase by more than half, while rumours circulate about the possible departure of its long-serving CEO. Cisco previously expected to increase revenues by 12 to 17 per cent over the next three years, but it has revised this figure downwards to a much smaller five to seven per cent, according to the BBC. It expects profits, however, to be seven to nine per cent for this three year period, which is a healthy profit forecast for a company that has been struggling... 

For the first time on Tuesday, Intel unveiled working prototypes of tablets computers with Google’s Android OS and the chip maker’s upcoming Atom low-power chip, code-named Medfield. The tablet was about 8.9 millimeters (0.3 inches) thick and had a 10.1-inch screen, and was on display during a briefing at the Intel Developer Forum being held in San Francisco. The tablets ran on Android 3.0, code-named Honeycomb, and alpha software developed jointly by Google and Intel. Earlier on Tuesday,... 

Microsoft will debut next month a major overhaul of its Hotmail webmail service, with upgrades across the board, including in areas like spam, security and performance. “We listened. We learned. We reinvented Hotmail from the ground up,” reads an invitation sent on Friday to journalists for press events to be held on Oct. 3 simultaneously in New York and San Francisco. “Forget everything you thought you knew about Hotmail. Just don’t forget this date,” reads the invitation. Hotmail’s... 

Many CIOs predict that real-time communication technologies, such as instant messaging, SharePoint, Chatter and Yammer will outpace traditional email in the workplace in the next five years. That’s the conclusion of a Robert Half Technology survey of more than 1,400 CIOs at U.S. companies with more than 100 employees. The survey was published last month. More than half (54%) of the CIOs polled said real-time workplace communication tools will surpass traditional email in popularity within... 

Google has purchased the prestigious restaurant ratings publisher, Zagat to boost its online maps and local business listings with trustworthy reviews and recommendations, which Web surfers increasingly seek and value. “Zagat will be a cornerstone of our local offering — delighting people with their impressive array of reviews, ratings and insights, while enabling people everywhere to find extraordinary (and ordinary) experiences around the corner and around the world,” wrote Marissa Mayer,... 

Several of Microsoft’s business productivity applications will be available free of charge on Nokia’s latest Symbian Belle smartphones later this year, Nokia stated Thursday. The move comes at the same time Nokia is developing its first smartphone on the Windows “Mango” Phone platform. That phone is rumored to be scheduled for a November debut. The free apps will run on Symbian Belle smartphones announced in August; they’re designed to keep customers buying Nokia products while Nokia... 

Sprint on Tuesday announced it has initiated a lawsuit against AT&T and Deutsche Telekom to block the two companies from merging “as a violation of Section 7 of the Clayton Act.” Section 7 of the Clayton Antitrust Act bars any person from acquiring “the whole or any part of the stock or other share capital” that would “substantially … lessen competition, or to tend to create a monopoly.” In its suit, Sprint argues that the proposed merger would violate this act because it would... 

Taiwanese handset maker HTC has been on a shopping spree to reshape its business, though it remains to be seen if the strategy will help it gain ground on rivals such as Apple, Samsung and Research In Motion. HTC has bought or invested in at least six companies this year, many of which provide technologies to improve how users consume and share content on its devices. It’s a big change for the Taiwanese manufacturer, which focused for much of its existence on hardware, leaving software and...