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Despite the ongoing financial crisis that is weighing down some tech companies, Intel earnings were up in the third quarter, narrowly beating analyst expectations. The third quarter was the first full period in which Intel sold its Atom microprocessors and chipsets for low-cost PCs, and sales of the chips brought down the average selling price of microprocessors for Intel. Overall, the average selling price was lower sequentially, but excluding Atom shipments, the average stayed flat.
A U.S. appeals court overturned a ruling that prevented Qualcomm’s handset-making customers from importing products to the U.S. because they allegedly contain patented technology developed by Broadcom. The appeals court said the U.S. International Trade Commission had overstepped its bounds when it issued the ban against handset makers who were not named in Broadcom’s complaint to the ITC. The appeals court also said the ITC misapplied the legal standard for “induced infringement.” At the same time, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit agreed with the ITC’s finding that the Broadcom patent in question is valid, something Qualcomm had disputed.
Google will appeal two German court decisions that found it violated copyright law by showing thumbnails of works by two artists in search results. Google has fought this battle before in other countries, sparring in court over the fine line between limited, legal use of copyrighted material and violating intellectual property laws. The case, which involved Google’s Image Search feature in its search engine, concerned a photograph and artwork from two artists. Google will file a single appeal covering both cases to Germany’s Supreme Court, according to a company spokesman.
Microsoft is sticking with the name Windows 7 when it releases the next version of its client operating system, according to Mike Nash, corporate vice president of product management. The Windows client operating system will eventually lose its beta tag, but not its code-name as Microsoft opts for “simplicity” with its naming conventions, Nash said on the Vista team blog. The release is the seventh version of Windows since its inception.
…And those are the top stories from the IDG Global IT News Update, brought to you by the IDG News Service. I’m Sumner Lemon in Singapore. Join us again later for more news from the world of technology.