The Register reports that “[t]he European Commission’s reform of VAT on internet-delivered services such as software, ringtones and music has been adopted and will take effect from 2015. Europe’s finance ministers yesterday agreed the proposed measures, which means that they become EU legislation, shortly to be published in the Official Journal of the European Union. The proposal was hammered out in a political agreement on the issue last December. VAT on ‘telecommunications, broadcasting and electronic services supplied to consumers’ will now be charged at the rate in the country of the customer, not of the supplier, as is now the case. The fact that the VAT rate of the supplier applied to online transactions led to firms such as Amazon, Skype and Paypal, relocating to Luxembourg, which has Europe’s lowest VAT rate.”
According to Reuters, “Nokia and Qualcomm agreed to look for ways in which a U.S. court in Delaware could solve some wider, international issues in the major legal battle between the two technology heavyweights. ‘The parties are now working on the precise details, including the timeline, so that the proceedings can move forward,’ said Nokia spokeswoman Anne Eckert. Eckert said the common issues could include interpretation of their 2001 technology licensing agreement, and certain parts of standardization rules. ‘The intention is that the same interpretation applies to Qualcomm products using Nokia patents and to Nokia products if they are deemed to use Qualcomm patents,’ Eckert said.”
The CNet News Blog reveals that “[a] former Chinese university professor who was dismissed after he founded a democratic opposition party, plans to sue Yahoo and Google in the United States for blocking his name from search results in China. Guo Quan, an expert on classical Chinese literature and the 1937 Nanjing massacre of Chinese civilians by Japanese troops, last week issued an open letter pledging to bring a lawsuit against Google after he discovered that his name had been excised in searches of its Google.cn portal in China. He told The Times that he had now found that the Chinese Yahoo site had also blocked his name and that he planned to bring actions against both companies.”
The Mercury News writes that “Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress today that the country’s economic outlook has deteriorated and signaled that the central bank is ready to keep on lowering a key interest rate – as needed – to shore things up. In prepared remarks to the Senate Banking Committee, Bernanke said the one-two punch of the housing and credit crises has greatly strained the economy. Hiring has slowed and people are likely to tighten their belts further, as they are pinched by high energy prices and watch the value of their single biggest asset – their homes – weaken, he warned.”
The International Herald Tribune today has an interesting article on Google’s role at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week. According to the IHT, “Google did not even have a booth at the Mobile World Congress, and its executives met quietly in modest, off-the-beaten-track hospitality suites. But the shadow of the powerful software company was cast over the conference, with one phone executive accusing Google of ‘a land grab’ for customers and advertising dollars, and a rival saying that Android would never be secure enough for mobile phone carriers. Access cast its vote this week by joining the LiMo Foundation, what could be considered a rival consortium of companies to Android, although both efforts are using the free Linux computer system as a foundation.”