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 General Motors has developed a concept car lacking such things as an engine, steering wheel or foot pedals. The GM Hy-wire combines a hydrogen fuel cell and electronic drive-by-wire technology. The concept is set to go on display at next month's Paris Motor Show and is the first driveable car to combine the two technologies. Everything that makes the car go, stop, and steer, is contained in an 11-inch thick box and all the controls are contained in a simple-to-use unit called an X-drive. Drivers have the choice of sitting in either the right-hand or left-hand seat and can brake and accelerate with either hand.
IONA has named Steve Fisch as chief operating officer. Fisch has previously been chief executive officer of Virtual Access Networks, president of Attunity and ISG, and held senior executive positions at Computervision, Prime and McDonnell Douglas Information Systems.
Xpert Technology has renewed its oldest customer contract with Eason & Son Ltd. For the past 20 years, Xpert Technology has provided the hardware, network infrastructure and support for Eason's wholesale news distribution business.
Version [1] Software, the IT Services company, has won a deal with Bord Iascaigh Mhara (BIM)/Irish Sea Fisheries Board to install an IT system to manage, control and track the distribution of all national and EU aquaculture grants. BIM controls expenditure in the region of EUR5 million each year, with responsibility for developing the Irish sea fishing and aquaculture industry. The system will modernise BIM's Head Office improving the processing of grant applications and better reporting and feedback to Government Departments.
Despite claims earlier in the week that Internet Explorer has a security flaw related to the Secure Sockets Layer implementation, Microsoft claims the flaw is in fact a Windows O/S issue. The company is developing patches for Windows 98, Millennium Edition, NT 4.0, 2000, and XP to resolve the issue.
In a quarterly report filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Flextronics said it had terminated 856 employees as of June 30 and notified 4,405 employees they would be let go after facility closures and consolidations. The company had about 80,000 employees at the end of June. The company said it recorded USD76.9 million in employee termination costs in the June-ended quarter. Flextronics said last month, and also in June, that it would continue to close plants and reduce headcount as it deals with a prolonged downturn for the contract manufacturing industry.
Yahoo has released a new version of its enterprise portal platform, which provides corporate content. The new release, My Yahoo Enterprise Edition 5.0, is the first time that it has delivered corporate portal information substantially different from that of its public My Yahoo service. The new release offers other enterprise-oriented features, including new APIs for integrating Yahoo portal content with corporate applications.
Ericsson has announced a partnership with Esat BT's business services and solutions division, to deploy Ireland's first DSL solution specifically designed for the business market. The contract award is in the value of EUR25 million. The first area to gain access was Limerick in April this year. Ballina, Thurles and Churchfield will all come onstream at the end of August.
A robot 'evolved' the principles of flying in three hours, according to research by Swedish scientists. Krister Wolff and Peter Nordin of Chalmers University of Technology built a robot with wings and then gave it random instructions via a computer at three per minute. Each instruction produced a small movement -- the robot's wings could move up and down, forwards and backwards, and twist in either direction, the research published in the New Scientist magazine said on Wednesday. The robot was attached to two vertical poles to enable it to move up and down, and the metre-long wings were made from balsa-wood covered with a light plastic film.
Subscribers of mobile operator O2 were able to bet on the outcome of World Cup matches up until the last few seconds of each contest during the World Cup, according to the software developer Scaraboo. Now Siemens and Scaraboo are marketing the technology to other wireless carriers. Scaraboo's system is meant for sporting events, but not all kinds are suitable. Because it can take a minute to enter a bet, a shorter event, like a 50 metre freestyle swim, would be over before another bet could be made.
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