WEEK IN REVIEW

Friday, March 30: Canadian governments must embrace and invest in electronic government or risk extending the "generational" digital divide, Finance Minister Paul Martin tells an e-government conference in Ottawa.

• The biggest sunspot cluster seen in at least 10 years develops on the upper right face of the sun's disc, according to satellite readings. Researchers expect the sunspot to persist for several days, disrupting telecommunications.
• Some model D8903A 17-inch Hewlett-Packard Co. monitors shipped in Canada could electrically shock users, the company says, offering to replace problem monitors.

Thursday, March 29: Nortel Networks Corp. says it will delay the spinoff of its lucrative fibre-optic component business, the latest fallout from the weakened star's restructuring plans.

• Japanese electronics giant Sony Corp. says it will upgrade its cellular phone handset operations into a full division and put more focus on mobile computing products.
• The Ontario Securities Commission sets up a fake Internet scam to demonstrate to investors the kind of advice they should avoid when using the Web.
• Animation and effects specialist Softimage Co. cuts its spending and staff, bracing itself to ride out rough market conditions.

Wednesday, March 28: A computer virus that can infect PCs running either the Windows or Linux operating system has emerged in what its discoverers say is a world first. The virus, dubbed "W32.Winux" by the company that first reported it, anti-virus firm Central Command, is not destructive and does not appear to have infected any computers yet.

• Shares of Nortel Networks Corp. tumble in Toronto and New York, bringing Canada's benchmark TSE-300 index down for the ride, after it issued another surprise profit warning and layoff announcement at the end of trading Tuesday. Nortel says is axing thousands more jobs and again cutting growth forecasts, only six weeks after sending Canadian stock markets into a tailspin with another earnings warning and round of job cuts, and amid mounting pressure from analysts to lower its expectations.
• On-line song-swapping service Napster Inc. - now under court order to block trading of copyrighted material - says it is working "aggressively" to that end and accused the recording industry of not co-operating.

Tuesday, March 27: U.S. Nasdaq , the world's second largest stock exchange, said on Tuesday it had agreed to buy 58 per cent of Easdaq, the ailing pan-European electronic stock exchange based in Brussels.

• A U.S. privacy watchdog Monday raised questions about the practices of TiVo Inc. , the personalized television service that lets people order up their favourite shows whenever they wish, but also collects a lot of consumer data in the process.
• Shares of Toronto-based Geac Computer Corp. tumble after the company says it was unable to find a buyer and is looking to seriously cut costs. The software company says it is is focusing on improving operations, and that means "substantial" layoffs and office closures.

Monday, March 26: Cyber crime is making Canadians anxious, with slightly more than half the population feeling threatened by or concerned about illicit on-line activities such as hacking and computer viruses, a new poll by Ipsos-Reid Corp. for information technology services company EDS Canada suggests. The survey also finds that 49 per cent of respondents said Internet crime makes them less likely to conduct business over the Internet.

• Burnaby, B.C.-based chip-maker PMC-Sierra Inc. cuts its first-quarter earnings forecast and says it will layoff 230 workers - or about 13 per cent of its work force - because of weak demand and order cancellations.
• IBM Canada signs a $900-million deal to manage certain information technology-related issues for Bank of Nova Scotia.
• Business software maker Novell Inc. chairman Eric Schmidt is named chairman of the increasingly popular Internet search-engine company Google. Mr. Schmidt succeeds Sergey Brin, 27, Google's founding chairman and current president, who will continue as president.

Sunday, March 25: Germany's top power supplier RWE and Swiss partner Ascom said on Friday they would begin offering customers the first commercial powerline technology for high-speed Internet access via electricity cables this summer.

• Venture capital investing in Canada easily shattered records last year, reaching $6.3-billion - more than double the $2.7-billion total for 1999 - thanks largely to a flurry of activity in the fourth quarter.

Saturday, March 24: Computer Sciences Corp. says it will provide an additional $339-million (U.S.) in information-technology services to Nortel Networks Corp., the world's largest telecom equipment supplier, under a seven-year outsourcing agreement originally valued at $3-billion.

• Motorola Inc. , the world's No. 2 mobile phone maker, says it will cut about 4,000 more jobs because of the slowing economy, bringing to 22,000 the total job cuts this year at the struggling technology giant.

Friday, March 23: Red Hat Inc. , the leading distributor of the Linux operating system that competes with Microsoft's Windows, says it effectively broke even in its fiscal fourth-quarter, a quarter ahead of expectations, beating Wall Street's estimates.

Thursday, March 22: British billionaire Sir Richard Branson is poised to launch his Virgin Mobile wireless telephone business in North America and the betting is that, in Canada, he will unleash it through Fido owner Microcell Telecommunications Inc.

• Corel Corp. says it has returned to profitability two quarters earlier than it had forecast but warns that it will again post disappointing quarterly revenue.

Wednesday, March 21: Europe's top technology trade fair CeBIT is as big and chaotic as ever, but last year's excitement has faded as groups struggle to restore shaken investor confidence in the face of an economic slowdown.

• Mitel Semiconductor hires technology industry veteran Patrick Brockett as its new president and chief executive officer.
• Millions of children - and children at heart - get a new gadget to dream for when Nintendo's hotly hyped Game Boy Advance console hits the shops in Japan to rave reviews.
• ATI Technologies of Markham, Ont., signs a letter of agreement to purchase FGL Graphics, a division of SONICblue of Santa Clara, Calif., marking its first foray into the workstation graphics market.

Tuesday, March 20: Microsoft Corp. unveils a plan to blend traditional economics and New Economy services to form the first initiative of its .NET strategy.

• Xerox Corp. releases a line of colour printers, heating up the printer market war.

Monday, March 19: Palm Inc. unveils its newest handheld computer devices, the Palm m500 and Palm m505, in a bid to stay atop the fast-growing market for personal digital assistants.

• Nortel Networks Corp., the world's No. 1 supplier of fibre-optic network equipment, Monday launched plans for a new line of high-speed products in a bid to make optical networks run cheaper by cramming in more information and moving it faster.

Sunday, March 18: Mexico's President Vicente Fox says the creation of a nationwide fibre-optic network with Internet links would allow Mexico to revolutionize provision of education, health and government services.

Saturday, March 17: Analysts say the year ahead will be rocky for major makers of personal computers as they struggle to wring profit from increasingly saturated markets and adjust to a playing field where high double-digit growth rates are a thing of the past.

Friday, March 16: Publishing software developer Adobe Systems Inc. announces that it met its first-quarter profit target and that sales had picked up in February, but cuts its sales forecast, cautioning U.S. economic weakness could spread abroad. It also announces that Adobe co-founder John Warnock will retire but remain chairman of the board, along with co-founder Charles Geschke. Mr. Warnock had stepped down as chief executive in December to become Adobe's chief technology officer.

• Sony Corp. says its Memory Stick, a tiny data storehouse for portable devices such as digital cameras and the centre of a key product strategy, will miss sales targets for this business year as the economy slows.