Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!news.media.mit.edu!americast.com!usa-post Newsgroups: usa-today.tech From: usa-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: usa-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: tech Fri, Mar 6 1992 Date: Fri, 6 Mar 92 05:54:04 EST Message-ID: 03-06 0000 DECISIONLINE: Technology USA TODAY Update March 6-8, 1992 Source: USA TODAY:Gannett National Information Network MICHELANGELO STRIKES EARLY: The Michelangelo computer virus, due to strike Friday, arrived early in some places, destroying information. Personal computers whose internal clocks were off a day reportedly were struck Thursday, a day before the virus was set to strike IBM-compatible PCs. The Computer Virus Industry Association says the virus showed up Thursday at more than a dozen companies worldwide. FUJITSU TO ENTER U.S. MARKET: Fujitsu, Japan's largest computer manufacturer, said Thursday it plans to sell its highest performance supercomputers in the USA, a move the company expects to create a political backlash. "We have seen some Japan bashing, and we will possibly now see some Fujitsu bashing," said Thomas Miller, vice president of sales and marketing for Fujitsu America's supercomputer group. ASIA SEEN AS AEROSPACE SAVIOR: Congresswoman Barbara Boxer, D-Calif. - Senate candidate and would-be savior of the McDonnell Douglas Corp. - puts the fear surrounding a proposed 40% Taiwan partnership with the aerospace icon into words: "It starts with a little tip, and suddenly you don't have an American company anymore." That fear is driving legislation to find an "American solution" to the firm's woes. (For more, see special Aerospace package below.) MOTOROLA LINKS WITH ALPS: Motorola and Alps Electric of Japan have reached an agreement seen as a possible forerunner to other collaborative deals between Japanese and western companies. Under the arrangement, products based on the two companies' joint semiconductor research in Europe can be brought to world markets this year. COVIA AND GALILEO MERGING: As expected, United Airlines said Thursday it is merging its computer reservation system Covia with the Galileo system owned by a group of European airlines. The linkup will create the world's biggest computerized airline reservation systems and the first global network, to be called Galileo International. In the USA, about 90% of all flights are booked this way. SUFFERING SYSTEMS: Two new computer viruses are discovered every day, according to the National Computer Security Association. It notes 504 new viruses were discovered between January and August 1991 - the latest year figures are available. That compares to 220 viruses in all of 1990, and just 63 in 1989. HIGH TECH WOULD RAISE RATES: The Justice Department has a proposal that could raise telephone rates so law officers can more easily wiretap suspected criminals. The plan: Require phone companies to have new high-tech equipment for wiretaps, and raise telephone rates to pay it. Justice officials weren't commenting on the proposal, circulating in Congress and obtained by The Associated Press. ROCKET MAY STILL TAKE OFF: NASA's solid rocket motor project - slated for the scrap heap under the agency's budget plans for next year - may yet lift off with more funding, lawmakers said Wednesday. A major plant for the project is at Iuka, Miss., in the district of Rep. Jamie Whitten, D-Miss., chairman of the House Appropriations Committee. He is "very much in favor of this program," said Rep. Ralph Hall, D-Texas. ELECTRIC BICYCLE LAUNCHED: Britsh inventor Sir Clive Sinclair Thursday launched an electric bicycle which travels at a top speed of about 12 miles an hour. The Zike was unveiled seven years after the failure of Sir Clive's electric tricycle, the C5. The Zike uses a nickel-cadmium battery and a motor based on a new form of "rare-earth" magnet which are concealed in the frame. SPECIAL PACKAGE ON AEROSPACE: INDUSTRY MOVING TO PACIFIC RIM: Thirty-two senators have questioned the pending $2 billion deal between McDonnell Douglas and Taiwan. Workers in California's aerospace industry are also worried. "It's not just Taiwan and McDonnell Douglas," said Joel Kotkin, a Los Angeles business consultant and author of several books about the United States and Asia. "The aerospace game is now a Pacific Rim game." ASIA HAS ALL THE TOOLS: Asia has the capital and the engineers and technology to make and maintain new jets. Most importantly, it has the expanding economies, the airports under construction and the airlines that create customers for aircraft. If U.S. plane makers are to survive intense, government-subsidized competition from Europe, many economists say, they must do it through strategic marriages. MD DOESN'T WANT GOV'T HELP: A growing number of lawmakers worry that the immediate Taiwan-McDonnell Douglas deal could lead to a disappearance of U.S. jobs and technology overseas. As an alternative, they are proposing $5 billion in loan guarantees that could help the company solve its problems at home. MD has said it's not interested in a government bailout, and some analysts say that's smart for the long term. ASIA IS WHERE MARKET IS HEADED: "Asia is where the market is headed," said Ted James, an economist at the University of Hawaii's East-West Center in Honolulu. McDonnell Douglas may be so deeply in trouble that Taiwan's assistance won't save it, but for the long term Asian partnerships are the logical course for U.S. aerospace companies, said University of California at Berkeley economist Laura Tyson. (End of package.) Technology Editor: William Snoddy. (1-919-855-3491) Making copies of USA TODAY Update (Copyright, 1992) for further distribution purposes violates federal law. This article is copyright 1992 Gannett News Service. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM