Amazon.com said Friday it was launching a customer credit program, which it billed as a virtual credit card, in a move to lure more customers into its site just weeks ahead of the height of Christmas shopping.
The credit account can be used to purchase goods at Amazon's Internet stores. Customers who sign up with the Amazon Credit Account will be granted three months of no payments with no interest charged on orders over $200 placed through January 21, 2002, the company said.
Amazon (AMZN) said it is working with a division of Citibank through its Amazon.com Financial Services subsidiary to offer the credit accounts.
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Qwest CEO to stay: Qwest Communications chairman and CEO Joseph Nacchio has signed a contract that keeps him in the fold until 2005.
Under a deal announced Wednesday, the same day Qwest (Q) reported third-quarter earnings far worse than expected, Nacchio will get 7.25 million additional stock options as an incentive, but he won't be able to cash them until late 2004 and 2005.
As part of Qwest's efforts to cut costs, the company has told contractors and vendors working on the company's worldwide network to stop work immediately.
The decision to assess work being done by contractors comes in the wake of Qwest reporting an unexpected loss of $142 million and flat revenues for its third quarter.
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Nokia overtakes Palm: Nokia, buoyed by its 9210 Communicator smart phone, has overtaken Palm (PALM) and Compaq (CPQ) to become Western Europe's leading mobile data device vendor, a study released on Friday said.
According to Canalys, a British technology research firm, Nokia (NOK) shipped 152,355 handheld units in the third quarter, amounting to 28.3 percent share of the regional market.
The recent launch of the Nokia device puts the company -- the market leader in mobile telephone handsets -- in direct competition with the producers of personal digital assistants.
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Layoffs at Legend: Legend Holdings, a Chinese PC maker, will lay off 10 percent of its office staff -- about 500 workers -- by March in the face of a weakening market, a company spokeswoman said.
Legend (LGHLY), which claims a 30 percent share of China's PC market, will cut 5 percent of its 5,000 non-factory workers -- or 250 employees -- and then lay off the same number before March, spokeswoman Jenny Lee said.
A surprising slowdown in China's personal computer sales growth in July to September is expected to take a bite from profits when Legend reports quarterly results on Wednesday.
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Nitel for sale: Nigeria will sell its troubled state phones company to local investors but foreign management will be brought in to stave off fears of continued neglect, a top privatization agency official said on Friday.
Hassan Usman, the deputy director of the privatization agency the Bureau for Public Enterprises who is in charge of Nitel's sale, said that although Nigerians may prefer a foreign owner, telecoms companies are extremely reluctant to invest in Nitel after global players hit financial straits.
"Obviously we'd hoped for the major telcos -- AT&T, BT and so forth -- but that won't happen because of the depressed state of the telco market," Usman said. "What we have is Nigerian investors ... working with lots of foreign institutional investors and quite a few emerging market funds."
The investors have partnered with larger telcos who will help to steer Nitel for at least five years, Usman said. "They will be given complete operational autonomy to run Nitel."
AP and Reuters contributed to this report.
