McAfee’s Unified Management Threat (UTM) firewall will enable multifunctional network security appliances especially for SMEs.

“McAfee UTM firewall is a complete office network-in-a-box Internet security appliance that can be deployed as a firewall, VPN gateway, or UTM security appliance,” said Darrell Rodenbaugh, SVP of McAfee’s midmarket segment.

The new solution offers SMBs a range of security solutions in an integrated package with a platform for subscription-based security services to respond to cost-cutting initiatives, managing their risk, and meeting their compliance regulations programs.

UTM management firewall has web-based central control that allows active monitoring of intrusion detection, network events to alert network personnel, and supports 3G wireless support for a primary connection or backup/failover.

APC By Schneider Electric, an energy management company is offering online comprehensive assessment tools targeted at data centers. The tools help evaluate and determine the health status of the existing infrastructure and also help enable up to 30% energy savings.

The APC online tools are new Web-based applications with easy-to-use interfaces designed for use in the early stages of data center concept and help CIOs or IT managers design the right physical layer of the data center.

Reports indicate that data center consumes the maximum amount of energy and out of 100% energy that goes into a data center, only 2% gets effectively utilized by the IT architecture.

vice-president & sales of APC By Schneider Electric (APAC) said, We provide the physical infrastructure design for the data centres that gives better cooling and power management through our intelligent software. Our software was now available online free for any CIOs to determine the energy efficiencies of their existing data centres and redesign them accordingly.

The company offers tools from desktops to data centres for the home segment, SMBs to large enterprises.

The website tools.apc.com is a comprehensive site with links to various tools like Data Center Power Sizing Calculator, Visualization Energy Cost Calculator, Energy Efficient Calculator etc.

All our software are designed in-house by the APC development centers. In fact, APC has two development centers in India at Bangalore that have contributed significantly in the developments of the software, said Sharma.

The InfraStrucXure (ISX) is a energy efficient, modular and scalable architecture comprising of - UPS, power distribution, cooling, racks, and management tools technologies like InRow cooling, high efficiency UPS systems etc help save data center operational costs in a big way, enabling up to 30% energy savings.

The tool set ISX Central and with ISX Capacity Manager allows APC customers to not only manage their energy, but for the first time have the eyes to see what is actually using the energy and allow customers to see where free energy can be utilized without compromising the facility. ISX Central also allows customers to commence projects to remove energy hungry / lowly performing technologies with new efficient product and ISX Change Manager is the tool to manage change.

XFX, a technology manufacturer of high resolutions computer graphics and computer accessories will provide products based on AMD ATI Radeon series this year.

We are excited with this technology partnership as it allows us to incorporate current and future ATI graphics technology into our graphics card designs. This partnership will enable our R&D teams to develop a wider range of XFX graphics products, said Sunny Narain, VP, regional sales, XFX Speaking on the new technology partnership, Patrick Wong, director graphic sales, APAC, AMD, said that India graphic card market is growing exponentially, and AMD sees a lot of potential for our graphics and high resolution work portfolio.

A study by Nasscom estimates games industry to reach 300 million by 2009 and animation industry to reach $950 million by 2009, which requires graphics cards and other computer peripherals.

NEW YORK: Investors are back to worrying about banks.

Long-present unease about soured loans bubbled over on Monday after Bank of America Corp. said it set aside $13.4 billion to cover lending losses, even as it posted a profit for the first quarter, and as anxiety grew about the results of the government’s “stress tests” to determine if banks will need more government bailout money.

While Bank of America and other big banks like Citigroup Inc. have fared better so far this year than many believed they would, nervousness is growing now over the massive losses from defaulting loans that are yet to come. On Sunday, White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel said some banks will need help.

Financial stocks suffered some of the day’s worst declines: Bank of America plunged 24.3 percent and Citigroup fell 19 percent. Those two components of the Dow Jones industrial average contributed to a daily loss in the index of 290 points, or 3.6 percent. That was the biggest Dow drop since early March, before the market’s big rally from nearly 12-year lows.

Joe Saluzzi, co-head of equity trading at Themis Trading LLC, said traders are skeptical about bank earnings and believe the better-than-expected profit reports may be disguising problems.

“They’re looking at bank numbers and are saying they are not that great,” Saluzzi said.

Traders have been looking for some pullback ever since the Dow jumped 24 percent from its early March lows. But that pullback could end up being more significant than a mere correction if the market cannot shake its concerns about banks. With the stress test results expected in early May, the market is likely to see more volatility.

Worries about banks’ debt problems were aggravated by news reports that their lending remains tight and that the government may swap its debt in banks for ownership stakes as its $700 billion bailout fund runs down.

Because of the central role lending plays in keeping businesses of all kinds going, investors have been hunting for signs of a recovery in banks before they get more optimistic about the broader economy.

The market has been encouraged by early indications that a government drive for lower interest rates has been helping banks step up lending, but investors are still sensitive to any signs of trouble — including the comments from Emanuel and senior White House adviser David Axelrod, who said some banks “are going to have very serious problems.”

Energy and materials companies also fell along with the prices of key commodities they rely on, such as crude oil.

The market declines were broad and deep, outweighing what would otherwise be positive news about a step-up in deal activity. After a deal with IBM Corp. didn’t work out, troubled technology company Sun Microsystems found a buyer in Oracle, a leading maker of business software, while PepsiCo Inc. said it would bid $6 billion to buy its two biggest bottlers.

The Dow fell 289.60, or 3.6 percent, to 7,841.73.

Broader stock indicators also lost ground. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index fell 37.21, or 4.3 percent, to 832.39, and the Nasdaq composite index fell 64.86, or 3.9 percent, to 1,608.21.

About 10 stocks fell for every one that rose on the New York Stock Exchange, where consolidated volume came to 6.79 billion shares, down from 7.1 billion shares on Friday.

Concerns about the sustainability of bank earnings weighed on financial stocks. Citigroup Inc. lost 71 cents to $2.94; JPMorgan Chase & Co. fell $3.57 or 10.7 percent to $29.69 and American Express Co. fell $2.83 or 13 percent to $18.98.

Jeffrey Frankel, president of Stuart Frankel & Co. in New York, said the retreat in financial stocks is welcome after their massive gains from early March - he said too sharp a rise could endanger a long-term advance. Many bank stocks have doubled in only weeks.

“These banks have had a tremendous run,” Frankel said. “Now you’re hearing the bearish camp speak up a little bit.”

Investors are also cautious about financial after The New York Times reported that the government might be forced to find ways to stretch the $700 billion allocated for the government’s bank rescue fund by converting the government’s loans into common stock. Such a move would give the government a controlling stake in banks and hurt existing shareholders by reducing the value of their shares.

Separately, The Wall Street Journal reported that banks receiving government bailout money are having a hard time making loans.

Wall Street was more upbeat about the Oracle deal, which carries a 42 percent premium to Sun’s Friday closing stock price of $6.69. Sun jumped $2.46 or 36.8 percent to $9.15, Oracle slipped 24 cents or 1.3 percent to $18.82.

Beverage and snack maker PepsiCo offered to acquire Pepsi Bottling Group and PepsiAmericas in a move to cut costs. Pepsi lost $2.27 or 4.4 percent to $49.86 while Pepsi Bottling jumped $5.53 or 22 percent to $30.73 and PepsiAmericas surged $5.16 or 26 percent $25.04.

In earnings news, drug maker Eli Lilly & Co.’s first-quarter earnings rose 24 percent on higher sales of the antidepressant Cymbalta and as costs for Humalog, a form of insulin Lilly makes, remained flat. Shares slipped 76 cents or 2.3 percent to $32.99.

Light, sweet crude fell $4.45 to $45.88 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. That helped send Occidental Petroleum Corp. down $3.76 or 6.3 percent to $55.88, while Dow Chemical Co. fell $1.12 or 8.9 percent to $11.48.

In other market moves, the Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell 26.88, or 5.6 percent, to 452.49.

Bond prices rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 2.84 percent from 2.95 percent late Friday. The yield on the three-month T-bill fell to 0.12 percent from 0.13 percent.

The dollar was mostly higher against other major currencies. Gold prices rose.

Overseas, Japan’s Nikkei stock average rose 0.19 percent. Britain’s FTSE 100 fell 2.5 percent, Germany’s DAX index fell 4.1 percent, and France’s CAC-40 fell 4 percent.

SHANGHAI: Chinese stocks slipped 1.24 per cent in heavy trade on Tuesday, knocked by a drop in financial, energy and metals shares as renewed concerns about the financial crisis weighed on stock and commodities prices overseas.

The Shanghai Composite Index ended the morning at 2,525.638 points after rising to an eight-month closing high on Monday.

Losing Shanghai A shares outnumbered gainers by 573 to 319, while turnover in Shanghai A shares rose to 85.8 billion yuan ($12.6 billion) from Monday morning’s 68.2 billion yuan.

A jump in bad loans at Bank of America, the largest US bank, rekindled fears about the state of the banking sector globally and pushed prices of industrial commodities such as oil and copper sharply lower.

US stocks slid more than 3 per cent on Monday while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell 3.5 per cent.

Washington: The Obama administration will make about $500 million available to Chrysler LLC through the end of this month as it seeks to reach an alliance with Fiat, and up to $5 billion through May to help General Motors Corp restructure outside of bankruptcy, an independent oversight report on the Treasury Department’s corporate rescue fund said on Tuesday.

Separately, the United Auto Workers (UAW) union urged its members to lobby the White House by phone or email to ensure that workers and retirees are treated fairly in negotiations at both companies on new concessions, which are considered vital for the automakers’ to survive.

“We need President (Barack) Obama and his auto task force to stand up for the interests of workers and retirees in these restructuring negotiations,” the union said in an appeal on its Web site to members.

The UAW represents about 26,000 workers at Chrysler and 62,000 at GM.

The union is under pressure along with bondholders and banks to help Chrysler and GM slash debt so they can restructure. The central issue for the UAW and the car companies is reaching an accord on restructuring the finances of a multi-billion-dollar retiree health care trust.

The administration’s task force does not believe Chrysler can stand alone and is brokering meetings this week in Washington and Detroit to see if a deal with Fiat is possible.

The administration has offered up to $6 billion to help finance the alliance that would give Chrysler access to Fiat’s small car technology and the Italian automaker a platform for building light trucks and a robust network for selling its vehicles in the United States.

Analysts and consultants have questioned whether the companies can close the deal and avert what most believe would be a certain Chrysler bankruptcy.

At the White House on Monday, Obama’s chief spokesman, Robert Gibbs, would not forecast where the talks were headed but said the administration was working “with all of the stakeholders involved” and was hopeful a solution would be found to “continue the Chrysler brand” and strengthen the industry overall.

“The President continues to be involved in this issue and understanding the tremendous economic importance both for the overall industry and for the dozens of communities throughout the country that are dependent upon Chrysler and auto parts suppliers that supply Chrysler for good-paying jobs,” Gibbs said.

The administration in March set aside up to $500 million to help Chrysler get through April, according to a report on…

oversight of corporate bailout funds prepared by the Treasury Department inspector general. GM was slated to receive up to $5 billion through May.

GM said on Monday it would cut another 1,600 salaried jobs by May 1. The reductions are part of GM’s plan to slash its global salaried work force this year by about 10,000, or 14 per cent. GM also aims to cut 37,000 hourly jobs worldwide by the end of the year.

GM and Chrysler, controlled by Cerberus Capital Management, received a $17.4 billion government bailout in December. Ford Motor Co is also struggling but opted against seeking rescue funds

Manufacturing sector to be hit by slowdown for some more time, it says. A survey conducted by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has estimated that the Indian economy would grow at less than 6 per cent during the current financial year, the slowest expansion since 2002-03.

The median forecast of professional forecasters’ survey estimated that the economy would grow by 5.7 per cent during the current financial year and also revised the growth projections for 2008-09.

According to the Central Statistical Organization’s advance estimates, GDP is projected to grow by 7.1 per cent in 2008-09. This would be the slowest growth since 2002-03, when the economy grew by 4 per cent. For three successive years up to 2007-08, GDP rose at a rate of over 9 per cent.

Agriculture, which is projected to grow at 3 per cent during the current financial year, provides a silver lining of sorts with services and industrial growth expected to moderate.

During the current financial year, imports and exports are projected to contract by 4 per cent and 8.4 per cent respectively. This indicates that the manufacturing sector would continue to feel the impact of the global slowdown for some more time.

The only good news is that there are signs of the economy bottoming out. During April-June, the GDP is expected to rise by 5.3 per cent, before improving to 5.6 per cent in the second quarter. The Indian economy is expected to grow at 6.2 per cent in the third and 6.5 per cent in the fourth quarters. During the third quarter of 2008-09, the Indian economy grew by 5.3 per cent as against 7.7 per cent in the first half.

While RBI expects inflationary pressure to remain low during the current financial year due to low commodity prices globally, it also points out that high food prices have kept consumer price inflation at elevated levels. During January-February, inflation based on consumer price indices has hovered around 9.6-10.8 per cent as against 7.3-8.8 per cent in June 2008.

Pointing to more pain for companies, the forecasters’ survey estimated the growth in corporate profit to fall to single-digit rates.

In addition, the quarter-ahead expectations survey on industrial performance conducted by RBI projected all-round deterioration during April-June 2009. Only 11.2 per cent of the respondents said that the overall business situation would be better and 8.4 per cent said the financial situation would be better.

“In sum, the Indian economy has experienced some loss of growth momentum with major drivers of growth witnessing moderation,” RBI said in its pre-monetary policy assessment today.

While savings and investment rates are expected to decline during 2008-09, RBI said the fiscal stimulus packages announced by it and the government would help arrest the moderation and revive consumption and investment with some lag. Besides, it said that the balance of payment position remained sustainable in the context of the present level of foreign exchange reserves and external debt.

Among the positives, the central bank, which is due to announce the annual policy statement for 2009-10 tomorrow, said that foreign exchange reserves continued to remain at comfortable levels, and would ensure stability, despite falling by $59 billion over the last 12 months.

The Reserve Bank of India cut its key short-term rates by 25 basis points each on Tuesday to shore up faltering growth in the face of the global economic slowdown.

The repo rate, at which the Reserve Bank of India infuses cash into the banking system, will be cut to 4.75 per cent, and the reverse repo rate, at which it absorbs excess cash from banks, will be reduced to 3.25 per cent, effective immediately.

The central bank cut is growth estimate for 2008/09, which ended on March 31, to 6.5 to 6.7 per cent, and forecast growth of around 6 per cent for 2009/10.

It said that managing large government borrowing in 2009/10 in a non-disruptive manner would be a major challenge, and said it would used a mix of monetary and debt management tools to ensure this was done smoothly.

“Large borrowings also militate against the low interest rate environment that the Reserve Bank is trying to maintain to spur investment demand in keeping with the stance of monetary policy,” the central bank said in its policy statement.

The bank rate, used by banks to price long-term loans, remained at 6.0 per cent. Banks’ cash reserve requirements were also left unchanged at 5.0 per cent.

Analysts polled by Reuters were almost evenly split over whether the central bank would cut rates or not. Six out of the 11 analysts polled expected the bank to bring down its lending rate by 25 to 50 basis points. The other five forecast the rate to be held steady.

The RBI has now cut its short-term lending rate by 425 basis points in six steps since Oct. 20 as the global economic crisis has hit Asia’s third-largest economy harder than expected. The central bank said wholesale-priced based inflation was expected to turn negative early in the current fiscal year, but this should not be interpreted as deflation for policy purposes.

It projected WPI inflation would be around 4 per cent at the end of 2009/10.

The central bank said a planned April 2009 review of the policy on foreign banks in India would now not go ahead until there was greater clarity regarding stability, recovery of the global financial system and better global coordination on regulation and supervision.

Oracle Corporation and Sun Microsystems have entered into a definitive agreement under which Oracle will acquire Sun common stock for $9.50 per share in cash.

According to a press release on the Oracle website, the transaction is valued at approximately $7.4 billion, or $5.6 billion net of Sun’s cash and debt.

“We expect this acquisition to be accretive to Oracle’s earnings by at least 15 cents on a non-GAAP basis in the first full year after closing. We estimate that the acquired business will contribute over $1.5 billion to Oracle’s non-GAAP operating profit in the first year, increasing to over $2 billion in the second year. This would make the Sun acquisition more profitable in per share contribution in the first year than we had planned for the acquisitions of BEA, PeopleSoft and Siebel combined,” said Safra Catx, president, Oracle.

Santa Clara, CA headquartered Sun, is a leading provider of standards-based computing infrastructure, including enterprise computing systems, software and storage. With 30,000 employees worldwide, 47,000 enterprise customers worldwide, the acquisition is being seen as an industry transforming acquisition that combines best-in-class enterprise software and mission-critical computing systems.

The acquisition is expected to deliver an integrated system, from applications to disk, optimized for higher performance, improved reliability and enhanced security. It will also benefit customers in terms of decreased systems integration costs, improved performance, reliability, and security.

While Sun has world-class, standards-based mission-critical computing systems, Oracle is a leading standards-based database, middleware and applications software. Together, the duo will deliver complete, open and integrated products from applications to disk have complementary assets, and common vision for complete, open and standards based
enterprise systems have best-in-class products that have been deployed globally to thousands of customers, accelerate innovation across the combined companies’ customer bases and protect and extend customers’ investment in Sun technologies.

“The acquisition of Sun transforms the IT industry, combining best-in-class enterprise software and mission-critical computing systems,” said Larry Ellison, CEO, Oracle.

The company is also promising to leverage on Sun’s Java and Solaris. Java is one of the computer industry’s best-known brands and most widely deployed technologies, and it is the most important software Oracle has ever acquired. Oracle Fusion Middleware, Oracle’s fastest growing business, is built on top of Sun’s Java language and software. Oracle can now ensure continued innovation and investment in Java technology for the benefit of customers and the Java community, the company said.

The Sun Solaris operating system is the leading platform for the Oracle database, Oracle’s largest business, and has been for a long time. With the acquisition of Sun, Oracle can optimize the Oracle database for some of the unique, high-end features of Solaris. Oracle is as committed as ever to Linux and other open platforms and will continue to support and enhance our strong industry partnerships, it said in the statement.

“Oracle and Sun have been industry pioneers and close partners for more than 20 years,” said Scott McNealy, chairman, Sun Microsystems. “This combination is a natural evolution of our relationship and will be an industry-defining event.”

“This is a fantastic day for Sun’s customers, developers, partners and employees across the globe, joining forces with the global leader in enterprise software to drive innovation and value across every aspect of the technology marketplace,” said Jonathan Schwartz, Sun’s CEO, “From the Java platform touching nearly every business system on earth, powering billions of consumers on mobile handsets and consumer electronics, to the convergence of storage, networking and computing driven by the Solaris operating system and Sun’s SPARC and x64 systems. Together with Oracle, we’ll drive the innovation pipeline to create compelling value to our customer base and the marketplace.”

“Sun is a pioneer in enterprise computing, and this combination recognizes the innovation and customer success the company has achieved. Our largest customers have been asking us to step up to a broader role to reduce complexity, risk and cost by delivering a highly optimized stack based on standards,” said Charles Phillips, president Oracle. “This transaction will preserve and enhance investments made by our customers, while we continue to work with our partners to provide customers with choice.”

“Our customers have been asking us to step up to a broader role to reduce complexity, risk, and cost by delivering a highly-optimized standards-based product stack. Oracle plans to deliver these benefits by offering a broad range of products, including servers and storage, with all the integrated pieces: hardware operating system, database, middleware and applications. We plan to preserve and enhance investments made by our customers, while we continue to work with our partners to provide customers with choice. We are dedicated to maintaining and increasing the quality of innovation, support, and service that you have come to expect from Oracle and Sun,” he wrote in a letter to stake holders.

In what can be termed as a confidence building measure toward Sun customers, Oracle said it plans to protect, extend and enhance customers’ investments after closing the deal. It will increase R&D investment and innovation, extend value from a more complete set of products, give access to Oracle’s global support and services organizations and customers, provides a more complete and integrated line of standards-based products, enable customers to take advantage of Sun’s significant innovations, reduces integration costs while improving performance, reliability and security of the system and the choice of a one-stop shop for enterprise computing and support.

The official Indian Premier League (IPL) website has incorporated Microsoft’s Silverlight platform to improve viewer experience and increase site interactivity.

Silverlight will allow IPL to deliver content, including real time ball-by-ball commentary, scoreboard updates, match schedules, team standings, detailed player profiles, and behind the scenes snippets, to cricket audience across the globe. The website will also provide a customized Internet Explorer 8 for IPL fans to stay connected with all the action.

The website’s image gallery has been built using Microsoft’s Deep Zoom technology, which will enable publishing of high-resolution images.

Video gallery is an on-demand interactive gallery using Silverlight to air video highlights. It will provide the end-user with features to filter videos based on match, team, player, etc. The videos can also be shared with friends (after community features are built) or commented upon. The ‘Highlights’ gallery will also provide a collection of videos from the tournament. The user can navigate through the collection of videos and filter them by various criteria like ‘Player’, ‘Team’, and ‘Match’ etc.

The website will also provide multiple video streams, which can be selected based on user preferences and bandwidth.