Stacy Cowley

With less than a month to go before shareholders vote on Hewlett-Packard Co.'s (HP) planned acquisition of Compaq Computer Corp., HP chief executive officer Carly Fiorina and a roster of HP's top executives met with analysts in New York Wednesday to offer impassioned speeches and a blizzard of statistics supporting the deal.

Dutch ERP (enterprise resource planning) software maker Baan Co. NV plans to radically expand its services business within the next 12 months, according to Baan president Laurens van der Tang.

IBM Corp. is extending its alliance with longtime partner Avaya Inc. The two companies said they will work together to integrate Avaya's CRM (customer relationship management) technology with IBM's middleware and server products.

Merger opponent and Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP) board member Walter Hewlett has a three-part plan for HP's future without Compaq Computer Corp: Expand HP's lucrative printer business, scale back its PC business and fill in gaps in its line of enterprise products, software and services.

The exclusive World Economic Forum (WEF) had planned to share highlights and live session broadcasts of this week's annual meeting with the public through its Web site, but that site has been down since the meeting opened Thursday.

Many of the IT world's most visible leaders will be in New York for the next several days, participating in the World Economic Forum's annual gathering of several thousand executives, politicians, academics and gadflies.

Linux developer Red Hat Inc. is looking to increase its presence in the high-end market for enterprise software.

IBM Corp.'s board of directors Tuesday officially tapped Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Louis Gerstner's longtime heir apparent, Samuel Palmisano, as the company's next CEO.