In the papers 23 May

23-05-2008

by Sylvia Leatham

Yahoo postpones Icahn showdown | Profits up at Lenovo

The Irish Times reports that Eircom's future investment plans for broadband and other new services may have to be redrawn following a decision by the ComReg limiting the return it can make on investments. ComReg has imposed a 'cost of capital' on Eircom of 10.21 percent, as noted by ENN on Thursday. In a statement, Eircom said the decision by the regulator was a "concern" as it "does not address the high risk premium for future investment in new telecommunications infrastructure in a market of Ireland's scale".

The paper also says that recruitment website Jobs.ie did not meet the requirements of the Data Protection Act when its site was hacked recently and CVs downloaded, the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner has found. On 27 March, Jobs.ie discovered and fixed a security breach which had resulted in the illegal downloading of jobseekers' personal details. The ODPC noted that the website responded to the breach "in an exemplary fashion".

The same paper says that World Refugee Day on 21 June will see the launch of Irish web start-up Ammado. The company, which has been in development for the past two years, is a social networking site for non-profit organisations and their supporters. It has already signed up more than 1,700 non-profits from 60 countries including the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Amnesty International, Friends of the Earth, Oxfam and the Worldwide Fund for Nature.

According to the Financial Times, internet giant Yahoo has postponed its showdown with Carl Icahn, the billionaire investor seeking to oust its board and sell the company to Microsoft. Yahoo said it was putting off its annual meeting until around the end of July, for regulatory reasons. Yahoo had originally said its annual meeting would be held on 3 July, but it said on Thursday that Icahn's move to nominate an alternative slate of directors in a proxy fight would mean a US Securities and Exchange Commission review. The meeting would therefore be postponed until SEC review and clearance, Yahoo said.

The paper also notes that the board of Atos Origin on Thursday narrowly escaped a rout by foreign activist investors after the annual meeting of the French IT services group's governance was suspended in uproar. Philippe Germond, chief executive, declared the meeting null and void after the spokesman for an employee shareholder trust with a 3 percent stake announced that he planned to vote against the management and in favour of funds Centaurus and Pardus. The two funds have opposed the recovery strategy put in place by the board last year and are seeking to nominate five new directors in a bid to force disposals.

The Wall Street Journal says that Chinese PC maker Lenovo more than doubled net income in its fiscal fourth quarter, helped by a strong performance in its home market and sales growth in Europe and the Middle East. The world's fourth-largest PC company by shipments said profit jumped to USD140 million in the fiscal fourth quarter ended 31 March, from USD60.3 million a year earlier. Revenue from continuing operations rose 14 percent to USD3.73 billion. However, the company warned that the weak US economy poses challenges for the global PC industry, and vowed to rein in costs by taking additional steps to streamline its supply chain in the coming year.

The paper also reports that Samsung Electronics is reorganising its businesses as part of efforts to change the way it operates. The company's home-appliance division will be combined with its digital-media section, which mainly produces television sets and monitors. Within the digital-media division, the home-theatre, DVD and Blu-ray player businesses will be merged with the TV section. Also, the company's MP3, notebook PC and set-top-box businesses will be transferred to its telecommunications network division. The moves are "in line with the latest technology trend," the company said.