Technology notebook
Published 12:01 am Sunday, December 13, 2009
EU still leery of Oracle’s takeover of Sun
The European Union’s top antitrust official said Wednesday she was “still optimistic” that regulators could resolve a bitter dispute over an EU investigation into Oracle Corp.’s planned takeover of Sun Microsystems Inc.
The two companies had hoped to close the $7.4 billion deal this summer but EU objections have held up the deal for months while Sun hemorrhages money and sheds jobs.
EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said she hoped regulators and Oracle “could reach a satisfactory outcome to ensure that there is no adverse impact on effective competition on the European market.”
The EU regulators have been concerned that Oracle would gain too much control over the database software market if it buys Sun’s open source-based MySQL, which regulators claim will increasingly pose a threat to Sun’s proprietary database programs.
Oracle says it does not want to sell MySQL — a solution for many companies running into similar problems with the EU commission. Sun paid $1 billion for MySQL last year.
It is unclear whether Oracle could make other commitments to resolve the EU’s worries. Regulators say they fear Oracle could refuse to license MySQL to some companies or for some uses in order to favor its own software — which could limit customer choice and ultimately raise prices.
AT&T rolling out speedier service
AT&T Inc. is boosting its top available broadband speeds in Austin, Texas, San Antonio and St. Louis in preparation for a wider rollout.
The new U-verse High Speed Internet Max Turbo tier will provide downloads at up to 24 megabits per second and uploads at up to 3 megabits per second, the company said Wednesday.
The new tier will be available where AT&T has upgraded its phone lines to carry its U-Verse TV and data service. Max Turbo will cost residential customers $65 per month when bundled with TV.
Previously, the top download speed available on U-Verse was 18 megabits per second. Among the major phone companies, Qwest Communications International Inc. has the highest download speeds over phone lines, at 40 megabits per second in a few markets.
Phone companies are ramping their speeds to compete with cable companies, which are upgrading their modems to support download speeds of around 50 megabits per second.
Associated Press
