Juan Carlos Perez

Microsoft Corp., facing proposed legislation in Peru that would seriously hamper its sales to the government, on Monday signed a wide-ranging agreement with that country

Electronic Data Systems Corp. (EDS) will cut 2,000 jobs, or about 1.4 pe rcent of its workforce, a move due to a spending slowdown and unrelated to the IT services provider's relationship with WorldCom Inc., EDS executives said Tuesday during a conference call.

KPMG Consulting Inc. has decided to hire en masse the staff of Arthur Andersen LLP's business and IT consulting unit, instead of acquiring the unit itself, apparently in order to shield itself from legal liabilities.

To cut costs and improve customer service, Finnish airline Finnair Oyj has granted IBM Corp. a 10- year, US$400 million services contract that calls for IBM to manage the airline's IT infrastructure and for the creation of a jointly operated technology-development center.

KPMG Consulting Inc. declined to comment on Monday about what effects, if any, the conviction of Arthur Andersen LLP this weekend will have on KPMG Consulting's ongoing efforts to acquire IT services units from the accounting firm's parent company, Andersen Worldwide SC.

IBM Corp. launched this month a new service designed to manage Web servers that are located at customers' premises. As part of the new offering, called Services Anywhere, IBM will deliver remotely a variety of managed security, monitoring and storage services.

Companies are increasing their spending on outside help to better deal with their enterprise software, according to a new study from market research firm IDC. Enterprise software, used by companies to automate their business operations, has always been complicated to implement and maintain, which in turn has fueled a demand for related IT services.

Companies are increasing their spending on outside help to better deal with their enterprise software, according to a new study from market research firm IDC.