Pols attack IBM-Lenovo (China) deal

The Deal ^ | January 27, 2005 | Ron Orol

[Golden Eagle]

Pols attack IBM-Lenovo deal

Three key lawmakers are pressing federal regulators to expand their probe into Lenovo Group Ltd.'s $1.7 billion acquisition of IBM Corp.'s PC division.

In a letter Tuesday, Jan. 25, to Treasury Secretary John Snow, House International Relations Committee Chairman Henry J. Hyde, R-Ill., House Small Business Committee Chairman Donald Manzullo, R-Ill., and House Armed Services Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., requested an agency briefing on the merger and urged him to withhold approval until they can confer.

Hyde's panel poses a particular threat to the deal because it oversees export control issues.

"Given the relationship between so-called 'private companies' in Communist states and their government, we believe that it is manifestly in the public interest to extend the time for review by those agencies in the federal government responsible for defense, foreign policy and intelligence in order to ensure that there are no adverse national security ramifications of the sale," they wrote.

The Treasury Department (news - web sites) leads the Committee on Foreign Investments in the U.S., a multiagency panel that reviews acquisitions of U.S. businesses by foreign companies.

A source close to the situation said CFIUS is leaning toward opening a formal 45-day investigation into whether the IBM-Lenovo merger threatens U.S. national security and economic interests.

[Golden Eagle]

Previous comments, surprisingly pro and con of the deal:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1327158/posts

[mgist]

I'm not sure what to think of this. Considering it is China, you assume there is something dubious. Yet, very little has been said about it. How exactly does something like this happen. Payoffs, bribes? If I'm not mistaken IBM in Argentina was accused of actively engaging in offerring and accepting bribes.

[Golden Eagle]

Blockage of IBM/China deal gaining momentum...

[Golden Eagle]

Background reading here...

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1327158/posts

But if you're not sure, wouldn't you rather error on the side of caution?

[Golden Eagle]

China still clamoring for the transfer.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20050127/tc_afp/hongkongchinaus_050127131726

[b4its2late]

What ever happened with some Chinese firm and Global Crossing? If anything should've been looked into, it should've been that one....

[Golden Eagle]

It was blocked by this same commission...

[b4its2late]

Wow. That's good news, for me anyway.

[maui_hawaii]

it was blocked but still sold. Not to China...but to a different Asian buyer whom we can trust more.

[Golden Eagle]

GOP Lawmakers Urge IBM-China Sale Review

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050127/ap_on_go_co/ibm_computers_china_5

The panel, which meets in secret, includes representatives from the departments of Treasury, Defense, Justice, Commerce, State and Homeland Security. The committee is run by Treasury Secretary John Snow and makes recommendations directly to the president, who can block sales for national security reasons.

George H.W. Bush is the only president ever to block such a deal, stopping the sale of a Seattle aircraft parts manufacturer to China in February 1990.

The three lawmakers urged the administration to investigate the proposed sale by International Business Machines Corp. to Lenovo Group Ltd., which they said "may result in certain U.S. government contracts with or involving personal computers being fulfilled or participated in by the Chinese government."

Hunter heads the House Armed Services Committee. Hyde is chairman over the International Relations Committee, and Manzullo runs the House Small Business Committee.

Full-scale investigations are unusual. Last year, the committee conducted only one such probe out of nearly 50 cases, according to John B. Reynolds III, a lawyer for Wiley, Rein & Fielding who specializes in these deals. In more than 1,500 deals submitted to the committee for approval since its inception, it has conducted formal investigations only 22 times, Reynolds said.

The committee was expected to decide whether to approve IBM's sale as early as Friday.

[HAL9000]

Blockage of IBM/China deal gaining momentum...

Glad to hear it. IBM needs to go to Plan B and spin off their PC division somewhere else besides China.

[Golden Eagle]

Thanks. IBM won't do back down, they've made it abundantly clear their future is to partner with China, or at least their CEO has. I may take some time off work today to contact a few of these GOP lawmakers and voice my support for blocking the deal. Hopefully other concerned citizens will as well. But if this deal goes through, it could be a watershed event. IBM's support of the free Linux software sure has been.

[af_vet_rr]

I'm not sure what to think of this. Considering it is China, you assume there is something dubious. Yet, very little has been said about it. How exactly does something like this happen. Payoffs, bribes?

There's all kinds of ways these companies pull this - Microsoft, for instance, "donates" millions of dollars to schools in China, to get in good with various state-owned companies (or "global partners" as Microsoft likes to call them). All companies do this - look at when they build various facilities in China and just so happen to invest in what they call "infrastructure". Look at various American companies and their investments in the facilities/infrastructure - you will probably find investments that are "interesting" for lack of a better word.

It's too bad nobody was paying attention to this stuff years/decades ago. It'll come back to haunt us.

[af_vet_rr]

But if this deal goes through, it could be a watershed event. IBM's support of the free Linux software sure has been.

I disagree (and it has nothing to do with our discussions the other day). I thought initially that IBM's support of Linux would really push it out into mainstream America, but it hasn't - yes, Linux has made many inroads in server-type areas, but that was always its strength and it would have done so regardless of IBM's involvement - Microsoft's security problems insured that. Unless Linux can make it on the desktop of the average user, it's hard to say if it'll be around 10 years from now in any significant numbers. It looks especially bad for Linux when you compare it Microsoft giving Internet Explorer away for free - look at how fast IE tore through Netscape's market share, and compare that to Linux's track record. Look at how fast Firefox, another piece of free software, is gaining on Internet Explorer - much faster than Linux is gaining on Windows.

Before any Linux fans jump on me - let's face it, the interface, whether it's KDE or GNOME, it needs work. It also needs commercial software, games, etc. It's no mistake that Apple's Mac OS X has been eating into Linux's desktop market share here and there - you get the stability of a Unix-based/related OS, with Apple's GUI and the most popular applications.

Linux's window (pun intended) of opportunity is fading fast. Microsoft has had problems and delays with Longhorn, and that opened the door to other OSes for a very limited time (until Longhorn's release), and so far only Apple has had the wherewithal to take advantage of it - and the Mac mini is just one step in that direction.

The only way Linux has a shot long-term, is if Longhorn fails. I find that hard to believe, considering that MS seems to be acting like the company is riding on Longhorn - they could have went ahead and released it when they originally said, but they've kept changing the release date and plugging ahead.

[Golden Eagle]

I very much has been a watershed event. Look at this, which NEVER would have happened with out Linux:

Sun introduces OpenSolaris, releases 1,670 patents

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1328952/posts

It's obvious you're bitter about givaways that took place over the last few decades. But that's no excuse to throw in the towel now.

[af_vet_rr]

I'm not necessarily bitter about giveaways (if your talking free software). If I ran a small company that was impacted by giveaways, such as the anti-spyware (and eventually anti-virus) industry, where Microsoft goes and buys an anti-spyware company and then gives away the tool for free, then I would be upset (I should be upset since those are fairly underhanded tactics).

Like I said, Linux is going to do well in its chosen field - servers. Linux is definitely not free in that aspect - it can be almost as expensive to support/maintain as any other Unix-based or Windows-based setup.Whether it's free doesn't impact the desktop market as well - for better or for worse, Microsoft did one heckuva job locking that market up.

I'm not giving up the towel either, I'm just saying that battles should be chosen a little wiser. I see outrage over IBM trying to spin off its PC Company (or at least the name/image).

I don't see outrage over Bill Gates' comments yesterday (saturday the 29th) where he praised China over and over again. He heaped so much praise on the Chinese leadership, it just makes me sick. I keep thinking "he's praising China's Communist leadership and their way of doing things, and nobody cares". If this had happened 30 years ago, people would have been selling their shares in Microsoft as fast as possible, Microsoft would be investigated, and people would be looking for alternatives.

After Gates' comments, I would rather see a free OS like Linux take hold in the desktop arena, than Microsoft Windows. I don't see the various programmers/companies/etc. that work on the Linux kernel running praising China's leadership.

[Golden Eagle]

Gates has commented against communism multiple times before, including quite prominently early this month, you can find the article right here on FR. So these quotes from the French Press deserve further scrutiny. But if you want to see a real sicko, take a look at the father of the "free software" movement himself, Richard Stallman. This is the personal website of the "inventor" of the GPL:

http://www.stallman.org/archives/2004-nov-feb.html

Little doubt where the father of free software stands. However Gate's comments should remove any doubt that China is growing in strength. Can anything stop them? Not at this rate. The way things are going, the chicoms aren't going to pay for any of America's intellectual property, ever. All thanks to those that flat out don't give a damn. And they're all over the place.

Let's hope not Gates now too, it would be a shocker, but once again it would be the end result of promoting free software in the first place. Just as I have been predicting, the end of any significant profits from software code, forever lost to this country. Pure genius, it will have been. /sarcasm

[af_vet_rr]

Thread about Bill Gates' comments

[Doohickey]

You were doing okay until this:
I don't see the various programmers/companies/etc. that work on the Linux kernel running praising China's leadership.
Which is just a ridiculous statement. Nobody knows who the multitude of developers of the Linux kernel are, nor does anyone care what they have to say. I'm willing to bet they run the gamut of the political spectrum...much like the developers of Microsoft Windows, because I doubt Bill Gates is writing much code these days.

[Doohickey]

Well, GPL isn't going anywhere and there are benefits. For home users, SOHO and small business it provides capabilities that would otherwise be beyond their means.

I, for example, run a web server from my home. My OS (Slackware) was free, the web server (Apache) was free and so was the database (MySQL), blog sofware (WordPress) and web extensions (PHP). My personal investment consisted of the physical hardware (PC and firewall) and the time it took to install, configure, debug and weed through decidedly subpar documentation.