Research firm bets its search-engine technology can upstage Google
An ambitious start-up named Powerset is licensing "natural language" technology developed by Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center with the goal of developing a search engine that could someday rival Google.

Premiere shares surge after it wins soccer rights
Shares of Premiere, the largest German pay-TV company, surged more than 16 percent on Thursday after it secured the broadcast rights to the country's top soccer matches by giving 16.7 percent of its stock to a competitor, Arena.

Kodak plans to cut up to 5,000 more jobs
Eastman Kodak, the world's biggest photography company, said Thursday that it would eliminate as many as 5,000 more jobs than originally planned as it accelerates its withdrawal from the consumer film business.

Taking the blush out of personal-care products
Marketers of products whose functions used to be only whispered about are injecting a new frankness, and humor, into their advertising.

Vodafone and Orange will share 3G networks in Britain
The cooperation between the British and French companies is designed to cut costs and improve customer service.

Briefing: New Windows version set for mobile devices
Also: Nokia to offer free maps; Research In Motion settles Samsung suit; Russian ad sales surge; Vodafone to offer eBay

A new wave of envy over the YouTube deal
The biggest windfalls went, not surprisingly, to YouTube's three founders and its main financial backer, Sequoia.

Internet security issues prompt $100 million overhaul
VeriSign, a Silicon Valley company that handles networking infrastructure, is undertaking a $100 million expansion of a crucial part of the Internet.

More Net clients lifts BT profit
BT Group said Thursday that profit in its first three quarters rose 13 percent after the former British telecommunications monopoly signed up more Internet customers.

U.S. retains lead in global patents
The United States retained its lead as the world's most inventive country in 2006, with a 6.1 percent increase in international patent applications from the previous year bringing its share to 34.1 percent of the world total, according to the World Intellectual Property Organization.

The Web drives an advertising boom without the need for agencies
Advertisers may be free to make their own television commercials. Several companies are offering automated ad creation.

No bravos in EU for Apple overture
Is digital music another issue on which Europeans and Americans can't sing from the same hymn sheet?

Egyptian billionaire buys TIM Hellas
The Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawiris agreed Wednesday to buy TIM Hellas Telecommunications from two buyout firms in a deal that valued the Greek cellphone company at about €3.4 billion and extended his reach in Europe.

Hollywood converges on Congress
Hollywood actors and producers lobby Congress on fighting piracy, obtaining new tax advantages, and keeping movie and TV production from going abroad.

A new generation of flying toys
New technologies have spawned a new generation of flying toys that soar, float, walk and roll in ways unimaginable just a few years ago.

Microsoft on Thursday introduced a new version of its Windows operating system for mobile devices, adding features previously available only on personal computers.

Windows Mobile 6, to be available in the second quarter of 2007, introduces the ability to view e-mails in their original HTML Internet format with live Web links. Windows Mobile 6 also includes Windows Live, a consumer service for sending e- mails and instant messages.

It includes new security features and allows users to view, navigate and edit documents in the original Word, Outlook, Excel and Powerpoint format, without affecting tables, images or text. Microsoft last week introduced Vista, the new version of its personal computer operating system. (Reuters)

Nokia to offer free maps

HELSINKI: Nokia is introducing a service offering free maps and routing in more than 150 countries, aiming to shake up the navigation service business.

The service, which Nokia is calling smart2go, will let users put maps and route-finding services into mobile phones for free. It will charge for more advanced services such as voice commands and turn-by-turn car navigation. Nokia expects to install the service on millions of mobile phones this year.

Nokia said the service, with map data from Tele Atlas, would be available beginning Saturday for a number of its phones and for mobiles from other manufacturers that use Microsoft's Windows Mobile 5.0 operating system. (Reuters)

RESEARCH IN MOTION and Samsung Electronics settled a lawsuit in which RIM alleged that the South Korean company had infringed on its BlackBerry trademark with the BlackJack smartphone. RIM said that the companies had agreed to keep terms confidential but that the deal included limitations on use of the BlackJack trademark. (Reuters)

RUSSIAN advertising sales surged 29 percent to a record $6.5 billion last year as an eighth straight year of economic growth pushed up incomes and spending on consumer goods and services. Spending on Internet ads climbed 67 percent to $100 million, the Association of Communication Agencies said. (Bloomberg)

VODAFONE plans to offer the auction site eBay on its mobile phones. It will be offered to Italian customers first and other European countries later in the year. The announcement was made a day after Vodafone became the first to do a deal with the News Corp.-owned networking site MySpace. (Reuters)

LYCOS EUROPE, the Internet company partly owned by Bertelsmann and Telefónica, will stop funding its German Internet-access division and is "starting discussions" with unidentified third parties that may acquire it. (Bloomberg)

CBS, the most-watched U.S. television network, opened an online store to sell TV clips to mobile- phone users.$@ (Bloomberg)