With the IBM - International Business Machines Corp. - stock having done better than the company's large-capital technology contemporaries,

Chairman and CEO Samuel J. Palmisano, in a letter to the stockholders, expressed optimism that IBM is "positioned to lead in the era that lies on the other side of the present crisis."

Saying that IBM is confident of thriving despite the economic downturn, as the company plans to develop money-saving computer services, and spread out further, by the way of the so-called 'cloud computing' concept of delivering software, data and computing power over the Internet.

Sodexho, multinational food service major, has bought a majority stake in Radhakrishna Hospitality Services for Rs 4 billion.

The company is likely to make an official declaration about the contract later in the day.

Radhakrishna Hospitality is the only organized player in Indian food service space.

In 2008, the company bought the equity stake possessed by Compass, a US-based food service firm, in a joint venture and is involved in launching its international catering services.

The company had earlier tried to incorporate financial investors but couldn't do so because of problems with prospective investors over pricing.

Tata Motors, India’s biggest automobile company, has signed up a contract with Union Bank of India with the aim to finance its range of passenger vehicles.

The company’s aim is to offer an additional facility of car finance to its clientele.

The banking institution provides car loans up to 85% of invoice, for term ranging up to 5 years, at a very competitive rate of 11% to 11.25%.

The facility will be available at UBI divisions and 329 sales touch points of Tata Motors.

The newly launched Laser Sweat Ablation service guarantees to finish the embarrassing problem, called axillary hyperhidrosis, that affects over 300-million people in UK.

Surgeon Mark Whiteley, who pioneered keyhole surgery to remove varicose veins ten years back, launched the treatment.

His newest procedure consists of a local anaesthetic under the arms, accompanied by a laser that kills the sweat glands permanently before the treated tissue get removed using a suction method.

Samsung Electronics has launched its new EcoGreen F2EG hard disk, which comes with a huge capacity of 1.5 TB with 500 GB per disk.

Apt for both external hard disks and desktop PC, the new hard disk drive is a highly energy-efficient and delivers superb performance with various power saving technologies implanted into it.

Andy Higginbotham, director of HDD sales and marketing for the Samsung Semiconductor Storage Division, said, “Lower platter count means less power to start the motor, less power to continuously spin the motor and a lighter head-stack which takes less power to seek.”

After the record breaking success of Oscar winning ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, the lucky duo of Danny Boyle and A R Rahman has been flooded with great offers.

It is learnt that film producer Barbara Broccoli has approached Danny Boyle to direct James Bond's forthcoming film.

And also Rahman, who composed grand music for ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, has also been chosen to score music for the James Bond’s 23rd project in line.