Data General Corp. (DGN), maker of multi-user computer systems and servers, said Monday it would reduce its 5,100-employee worldwide workforce by about 400 people to strengthen its focus on providing storage and high-end, enterprise computing solutions. The company said it will take a third-quarter charge of US$125 million, and said it expects savings in the range of $50 to $55 million annually from the reorganization.
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King o' email: Free email provider Hotmail said Monday that it has been signing up new users at a clip of 100,000 per day. Hotmail, which is now a Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) subsidiary, said it first hit the 100,000-a-day mark on 19 May and has since repeated the feat several times. The service, which now claims 15 million users, said it passed America Online (AOL) last month as the world's largest email provider.
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Japan venture: Softbank Corp. has been talking with US online brokerage E*Trade Group about establishing an online securities company in Japan this summer, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported over the weekend. The joint venture would charge low commissions to broker stock transactions over the Internet.
Besides stocks, the joint venture will handle other financial products, such as bonds and investment trusts, and also offer a wide range of information, including corporate financial data and market analysis, the paper said. Softbank said on Monday it would announce an Internet-related joint venture on Wednesday.
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Surprise, surprise: Internet addiction may not be caused solely by the evils of the Net. The University of Cincinnati College of Medicine studied a rather modest pool of 14 Net addicts and found that most of them had no less than five other psychiatric disorders in their lives, the Associated Press reported. Qualifications of the study's subjects included spending enough time surfing to disrupt their love lives, jobs, or schooling, and the psychiatric disorders involved manic depression, anxiety disorders, bulemia or binge eating, uncontrollable anger, and substance abuse. The lead researcher on the job suggested that the term "Internetomania" or "Netomania" be used rather than the misleading "Net addiction."
Reuters contributed to this report.
