Stacy Cowley

Siebel Systems Inc. has adopted a set of employee benefits plans guaranteeing its workers severance payments and continued health-care coverage if the company is acquired, a move Siebel said is necessary to retain employees amid widespread speculation about the company's future.

More than a year after they buried the hatchet and announced a collaboration agreement, Microsoft Corp. and Sun Microsystems Inc. spoke at an event Friday about their work together, including steps toward addressing what Sun called customers' top request: single sign-on between Microsoft's Windows Server and Sun's Solaris operating system and Java Enterprise System.

Google Inc. continued extending its reach beyond the PC this week by acquiring social networking service Dodgeball.com, according to a note posted Wednesday on Dodgeball.com's Web site. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, and representatives of Dodgeball.com and Google did not immediately return messages seeking comment.

IBM Corp. said Tuesday it has acquired Gluecode Software Inc., a startup developer of open-source infrastructure software. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. El Segundo, California-based Gluecode built a Java application development platform called Joe out of open-source components from the Apache Software Foundation's portfolio.The components include Apache's portal technology, its Geronimo application server, its Derby database and its Agila BPM (business process management) engine. Some of those technologies originated at IBM.

Siebel Systems Inc. will pay new chief executive officer George Shaheen an annual salary of US$1 million, under an employment agreement substantially the same as the one it signed a year ago with deposed CEO Mike Lawrie.

In his first meeting with Wall Street analysts as Hewlett-Packard Co.'s (HP's) new leader, incoming Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Mark Hurd steadfastly refused to map out his plans for the company's direction.

Oracle Corp. said Monday it has acquired Oblix Inc., a privately held identity management technology developer, for an undisclosed sum. Oracle said it will move quickly to integrate Oblix's security products with its own infrastructure software.

First Ebbers, now Nacchio. The former CEO of Qwest is the latest in a series of senior executives of technology companies who have been raked over the coals for alleged financial fraud. After a series of legal actions against former Qwest Communications executives for alleged financial fraud, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) finally worked its way to the top of the executive ladder. It charged former Qwest Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Co-Chairman Joseph Nacchio on Tuesday with fraud and other securities-law violations.