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Internet infrastructure and security services provider VeriSign has reported a net loss of $68.04m for the second quarter 2008, against a net loss of $4.71m a year ago, on revenue up 17% to $303.24m.

US-based management and technology consulting company BearingPoint has been awarded a five-year $104m contract by the US Coast Guard, USCG, to provide financial management support services.

Business intelligence software provider Sybase has released the latest version of its 4GL rapid application development, RAD, tool to simplify data access, manipulation and presentation for developers planning to deploy PowerBuilder applications to the .NET framework.

AT&T has introduced a next-generation utility computing service to provide managed networking, security and storage services for business customers. The announcement is part of its $1bn global network investment planned for 2008.

TELSTRA has lifted the commercial barricade around its ADSL2+ network and hooked-up its first wholesale customer to the service.

update COMMANDER Communications is in deeper trouble than expected with receivers being appointed to address the telco's woes.

IBM announced new software and services for mobile devices today, noting that sometime later this year there will be more mobile phones in use worldwide than landline phones.IBM's internal Institute for Business Value also projects that the number of mobile Internet users worldwide should reach 1 billion this year, nearly 200 percent above the number in 2006. Two-thirds of all workers are estimated to use mobile and wireless computing, IBM said.That kind of market growth makes the provision of software for mobile devices more important than ever, said Shawne Robinson, product manager for mobile and wireless at IBM's software group.Among its new offerings, IBM unveiled IBM Rational Host Access Transformation Services (HATS), which allows developers to transform green-screen applications that usually run on mainframe systems so they can be securely accessed by mobile users from wireless devices, Robinson said. An insurance adjuster could, for instance, access details of a claim on the ro

A tech vendor-backed company that buys up patents in an effort to protect the Linux community from intellectual property (IP) litigation will soon launch a Web site to help inventors file defensive publications -- documents that make details of an invention public, preventing others from later making patent claims on it."The more we can mobilize this community, the fewer patents that will actually be granted," said Keith Bergelt, who recently became CEO of the Open Invention network. "Whatever happens in the patent reform world in the next [U.S.] administration is great, but we have to act now to stop the granting of patents that threaten Linux and open-source in general."In coming weeks, OIN will reveal more details of the site, which Bergelt described as "a production environment where we educate and train people to do this. We'll work with them to make sure it's put in a form that is acceptable."The effort will serve as a counterpart to OIN's existing s

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