Cisco Systems agreed on 29 July to settle its lawsuit claiming that Huawei Technologies had copied code and documentation for its routers and switches. Huawei has agreed to revise its command-line interface, user manuals, help screens, and some source code. Financial terms were not disclosed.
Monti Unhorsed . Mario Monti, the European Union's hugely influential antitrust regulator, has been given what amounts to a pink slip. As head of the EU's competition directorate, the once obscure Italian economist made himself the world's most feared and respected antitrust official. He blocked Worldcom from buying Sprint, and General Electric from acquiring Honeywell, and he imposed stiff penalties on Microsoft. In mid-July, however, the government of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi made it known that it will not support Monti's reappointment as a member of the EU Commission, meaning in effect that some other commissioner will have to take over the competition portfolio.
MA Bell Deserts Homes. AT&T announced in late July that it will stop trying to acquire residential customers for its long-distance services. From now on, said AT&T, it will concentrate on provision of much more profitable business services. The immediate reason for AT&T's dramatic decision was its difficulty breaking into local telephone markets, but the larger reasons have to do with the company's steady decline through a series of failed acquisitions, reorganizations, and spinoffs since its breakup 20 years ago.