In the papers 12 March

12-03-2007

by Jonathan Farrelly

Havok may take on Motorola staff | Realex Payments wins CD Wow deal

The Irish Times reports that games software firm Havok has said it may take on some of the workers who have been laid off from Motorola. The mobile phone maker's Cork plant is due to close at the end of May with the loss of 330 jobs. Havok plans to interview a number of engineers from the Mahon plant over the next two weeks. Havok hopes to employ around 30 former Motorola staff, and executives promised to open an office in Cork if they can attract over 10 staff.

The Irish Independent says that Gardai have been accessing personal e-mail messages with the help of internet service provider Eircom. A spokeswoman for Eircom declined to say how often the telecoms company had surrendered e-mail records to Gardai but noted that the firm was obeying the law in doing so. "We are fulfilling our legal obligation," she said. The Department of Justice refused to reveal how many times it had asked ISPs to hand over e-mail records.

The paper also reports on the latest incidents of 'skimming', or ATM fraud. Eight such incidents were reported to Gardai in Pearse Street station in one night recently. One of the victims believes that fraudsters attached a false ATM frame to a bank machine in the Baggot Street area and recorded his PIN code on a hidden camera.

According to the Financial Times, Swisscom is putting the finishing touches to a takeover offer worth more than EUR3 billion for Fastweb, Italy's second largest broadband operator. Fastweb has called a board meeting for Monday morning. Over the weekend, people close to the talks said they expected a preliminary offer to arrive late on Sunday or on Monday.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Intel's chairman and its chief executive may be among employees who failed to comply with a company directive to preserve e-mails relevant to antitrust litigation against the company, according to a hearing transcript released by rival AMD. Lawyers at AMD said initial information supplied by Intel shows that executives who hadn't complied with instructions to preserve e-mail include Paul Otellini, Intel's chief executive; Craig Barrett, Intel's chairman; and Sean Maloney, an executive vice president in charge of Intel's sales and marketing.

The paper also says that Siemens faces fresh scrutiny of its business conduct this week, when two former managers of the engineering giant's power-generation-equipment unit will go on trial in Germany for alleged bribery. The criminal case -- involving about EUR6 million in bribes the men allegedly paid to secure gas-turbine contracts for Siemens -- could shed light on a larger investigation into alleged bribes at Siemens' telecommunications-equipment unit.

The Sunday Times reports that Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Micheal Martin has said that the Government has set aside more resources to help re-train workers who have lost their jobs following the recent redundancies in multinationals like Motorola, Vodafone and Pfizer. "Last year the IDA had one of its best years, there are plenty more jobs coming down the track. There were 25,000 job losses last year, but we created many more than that," he said.

The same paper also reveals that an Irish O2 subsidiary set up to sell top-ups to UK mobile customers will meet British tax authorities at a tribunal hearing in October to fight claims that the manoeuvre allowed it to avoid paying about STG37 million in VAT returns to the British government. O2 Communications sold top-ups to O2's UK prepaid customers from Ireland from October 2002, exploiting a loophole in British law allowing it to avoid VAT.

The same paper also reports that Dublin's Docklands are on their way to becoming Europe's biggest Wi-Fi hotspot. The Dublin Docklands Development Authority (DDDA) plans to put a Wi-Fi network covering 500 acres in place this year and later roll it out to 1,300 acres. The authority wants Grand Canal Dock, the IFSC and the North Lotts to have Wi-Fi coverage by the middle of this year, offering full-capacity broadband services.

The Sunday Independent reports that special effects group The Mill has been bought by a combination of management and private equity giant Carlyle in a near EUR100 million deal. The London-based outfit now specialises in special effects for advertising, recently creating the award-winning Impossible Dream ad series for Honda. The group was co-founded and chaired by businessman James Morris.

The same paper also says that IDA sources are insisting that the loss of Motorola would not cripple the region as suggested. Already 22 companies have visited the Motorola factory seeking to recruit workers who are to become redundant.

The same paper also reveals that Paddy Power now makes half of its profits from web gambling, despite taking 33 percent of its bets online. Operating profits were up 51 percent to EUR45.5 million, while online profits were up 38 percent to EUR23.4 million, and telephone profits jumped 65 percent to EUR6 million.

The Sunday Tribune also reports that telecoms tycoon Denis O'Brien narrowly missed out on a place on the Forbes billionaire rich list by less than a fortnight. His USD800 million cash takeaway from a USD1.4 billion sale of Digicel junk bonds came 13 days after the 9 February deadline for the magazine's wealth snapshot. The sale of Digicel saw him increase his estimated wealth by two-thirds to about USD2 billion.

The same paper also states that Dell is under pressure to cut its global workforce by 15 percent, or some 13,500 jobs. Bernstein Research released a report calling for redundancies. Analyst Toni Sacconaghi wrote in the report "We believe a 10 percent reduction would be a reasonable goal." Irish government sources concede it is likely that Dell's Irish operation will be affected.

The same paper also reveals that Adobe Systems is developing photo-authentication plug-ins for its Photoshop software in association with Reuters in response to an image-manipulation scandal at the news agency during last summer's Lebanon war, according to a report in Wired. Adnan Hajj, a freelance photographer based in London, was found by bloggers to have used Photoshop to alter photographs he then filed with Reuters. Reuters distributed the photographs on its news wire before being alerted to the scam. The agency later fired Hajj and removed the photographs.

The Sunday Business Post reveals that Denis O'Brien turned down a USD3 billion windfall from private equity firms which offered to buy Digicel. Two equity firms made offers of USD3.8 billion, but O'Brien chose to raise USD1.4 billion in funding to take 100 percent control of the firm.

The same paper also says that the Department of Justice is to launch a revolutionary new IT system aimed at cracking down on fraudulent applications for asylum. The integrated system will allow the departments Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service (INIS) to monitor individual cases and will be linked in to the new Garda IT electronic fingerprinting software. IBM leads the successful consortium that that has obtained the contract. Irish IT companies System Dynamics, BlueWave Technologies and Intertech are also part of the consortium.

The same paper also reports that Intel has applied to expand its USD2 billion Fab 24 plant, which is currently under construction in Leixlip, County Kildare. The company published a planning notice last week stating that it was looking to develop two single story extensions measuring a total of 490 square metres at the plant.

The same paper also says that Dublin firm Realex Payments has won a deal to handle payments for CD Wow, one of the biggest online retailers in the world. Realex will handle all the payments for millions of CDs and DVDs sold worldwide by CD Wow. It is believed that the deal is to be worth more than EUR1 million.

The same paper also reveals that Bank of Ireland and Enterprise Ireland are nursing losses following the collapse of H2Hcare, a Dublin software firm that had raised more than EUR2 million in funding. H2Hcare was founded in 2000, and developed technology to manage medical applications and patient records online. The firm was wound up at a creditors meeting last Tuesday with debts of between EUR2 million and EUR2.5 million.

The same paper says that more than one-third of technology journalists say their PR contacts do not know their clients services well enough. That is according to a poll by the newly founded Technology Journalists Association of Ireland (TJAI). Of the 22 journalists questioned, only 4 percent of those polled said PR executives knew their clients services "very well".

The same paper also notes that Babcock & Brown, the Australian company that owns Eircom, has taken the step of writing to its shareholders to assure them that it remains "committed to a disciplined private equity investment approach". The letter seems to follow some disquiet among B&B investors about the investment fund's share price performance, particularly since it took over Eircom.

The same paper also reveals that US computer game publisher Activision plans to expand in Dublin after buying Irish gaming software firm Demonware in a multimillion euro deal. Demonware's 15 staff will be transferring to Activision as a result of the deal that was completed last week.

The same paper reveals that Interactive Services, a Dublin technology firm, is on track to more than double its profits this year after a turnaround in its business, according to its chief executive, Garrett Byrne. He said the firm expected to make a profit of about EUR500,000 in the financial year to the end of this month after winning 11 six-figure deals in the past year.

Finally, the Sunday Business Post reveals that British software firm C24, which was bought last week by Iona Technologies, has turnover of about EUR1.25 million a year and is loss-making. The firm had sales of STG855,478 in the financial year to the end of June 2005, and a pre-tax loss of STG68,418.