John Ribeiro

Motorola Inc. has expanded its research and development (R&D) resources in Asia, with new centers opened this week in India and Taiwan, and more in preparation in China, according to an executive of the company.

Work on the repair of the Sea-Me-We 3 (South East Asia Middle East Western Europe 3) cable off the southern coast of Pakistan is under way and is expected to be completed by the second week of this month, according to an executive of Emirates Telecommunications and Marine Services FZE (e-marine), the United Arab Emirates (UAE) company assigned to do the repair. The fault in the cable, the only cable link to Pakistan, has affected the country's Internet connectivity and international telephony service since June 27.

Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. (TCS) is setting up an IT outsourcing services joint venture in China with Microsoft Corp., along with two software parks in the country and a Chinese software company, Uniware Co. Ltd. in Beijing., TCS announced.

BEA Systems Inc. announced Wednesday that it plans to double the number of employees at its research and development (R&D) center in Bangalore, India.

Microsoft Corp. has opened an IT academy in the southern Indian state of Karnataka where it will provide IT training for school teachers from across the state, the company announced Friday. The endeavour may help to give the software maker a head start over Linux and other open-source software in these areas.

India's minister for IT and communications said Tuesday that Intel Corp has decided to invest about US$400 million in an assembly and testing facility in the country. Intel denied the move, however, prompting speculation that the minister may be pushing the chip maker's hand.

Amazon.com Inc. is planning to open a customer service center in Hyderabad, India, that will offer e-mail support to customers, it said Wednesday.

Microsoft Corp. rolled out Windows XP Starter Edition, its low-cost, stripped-down version of Windows XP for emerging economies, in India on Thursday.