corporate

When it comes to grading companies on their sustainability, some leading organizations fall short as far as transparency and methodology. That's according to a white paper released this week by SustainAbility.com, an organization that is both a think tank and a consulting firm for corporations looking to improve green standings and sustainability practices.

SustainAbility.com issued a video Tuesday along with its report discussing how 21 of the leading eco-ratings organizations it investigated based on 13 criteria (see chart) appeared to be insufficiently evaluating the companies they target. Its partners include the United Nations Environment Programme and the … Read more

Ken Olsen, co-founder of the defining technology company of a bygone era, Digital Equipment Corporation, has died. He was 84.

A spokeswoman for Gordon College in Massachusetts, where Olsen was a trustee and prominent donor, confirmed Monday evening Twitter reports of his death on Sunday. Olsen's company dominated the minicomputer era of the tech industry from the 1960s through the 1980s with the PDP and VAX series computers, and was a key part of the famed Route 128 technology corridor just outside Boston, along with companies like Data General and Wang.

"Ken Olsen is in the elite club … Read more

News Corp. has chosen Groundhog Day for its launch of The Daily, a digital publication designed for tablet devices--and it's chosen New York, not the previously rumored San Francisco, for the February 2 event.

News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch will be making the announcement at the event at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, and Apple Vice President of Internet Services Eddy Cue will join him. This is in contrast to News Corp.'s initial plans to hold the event at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in late January.

A source close to the matter had informed CNET … Read more

Samsung Electronics America's leadership was shuffled a bit today.

The company's outgoing president and CEO, C.S. Choi, will be heading to Samsung's global headquarters in Korea to become a special advisor to CEO G.S. Choi (no relation). In his place, Samsung is sending Yangkyu Kim to its America division to become the new president and CEO. He will oversee operations in the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

Kim is a long-time veteran of Samsung, serving the company for 24 years. He was most recently the senior vice president and head of global sales and marketing … Read more

We didn't always want to admit it, but in 2010 the world accepted that Facebook--the company that introduced us all to such mundane pursuits as photo tagging, virtual farmsteads, and the voyeuristic tracking of the lives of people we only half-knew in high school--has changed the world.

Yet Facebook has also begun to pioneer something different: a corporate structure and philosophy intimately tied to the mind of its young CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, and the company's roots as a tiny cadre of coders in a college dorm. We'll call this "the Facebook Way." And in 2011 … Read more

Switzerland prides itself on its neutral sense of justice.

Its definition of neutrality, of course, might not mesh with yours, especially should you have strong feelings about Nazi gold or women not being allowed to vote before 1971. Still, it's a neutrality that sometimes rears its beautiful head to quite bizarre effect.

So might I offer you an ad for the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation's iPad app? For reasons the corporation has tried to explain--reasons you might be tempted to doubt--at the 39-second mark of the ad, up pops a little green android standing among the throngs.

Now, you might be wondering whether this android is portrayed as a bad guy, a club-wielding, club-footed neanderthal trailing in the iPad's wake.

Yet, no. This very strange--one might almost call it very Swiss--iPad app ad suggests that the android is one in the army of good guys.

I thank AndroidGuys.com for quoting SBC and its artistic motives for this motif: "The android is here as part of the details we wanted to include, in this case a hint to the fact that we cover both platforms (Android fans might want to have a look at the swissinfoandroid channel)."… Read more

There's a scene in the film "The Social Network" in which a fictionalized version of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg holds a developer challenge that involves programming at breakneck pace and pounding frequent shots of alcohol. The real Facebook "Hacker Cup" developer challenge, which the company announced last night, will probably be a little different. We hope.

The Hacker Cup, an "annual algorithmic programming contest open to hackers from around the world," is open to entries starting Dec. 20 and will consist of three online elimination rounds followed by finals at Facebook's headquarters … Read more

Microsoft this morning unveiled the latest version of its Office Communicator product, which now goes by the name Lync.

The rebranding actually happened earlier this year, but the product was not finalized and released to manufacturers until late October. This morning's event centered around the news that Lync will be available for sale in 150 countries beginning December 1.

Lync is made up of three different products: an instant messaging system with presence; an audio and video conferencing tool; and a voice call service. The product has been in development for the past five to six years, according to … Read more

More than a year since Google CEO Eric Schmidt's departure from Apple's board, the company has elected a replacement.

Going in a completely different direction than Schmidt's expertise in online search and advertising, Apple today announced the appointment of Ronald Sugar, former chairman and CEO of aerospace and defense giant Northrop Grumman. Sugar will head the board's Audit and Finance Committee.

CEO Steve Jobs emphasized Sugar's engineering background in a statement announcing the appointment.

"Ron is an engineer at heart, who then became a very successful business leader. We are very excited to welcome … Read more