Scotiabank Q1 profit rises 17 per cent to $988 million

TORONTO The Bank of Nova Scotia wrapped up the Canadian banking industry's first-quarter earnings season with a $988-million profit that was up 17 per cent from a year earlier and ahead of analyst estimates.

Scotiabank said yesterday its profit for the three-month period was the equivalent of 91 cents per diluted share or 93 cents on a cash basis, with $3.9 billion in revenue for the quarter ended Jan. 31.

Scotiabank's provisions for credit losses was increased to $371 million, up from $281 million a year ago but that was down from $420 million in the prior quarter ended Oct. 31.

Scotiabank's Canadian banking operations performed especially well, with record net income of $560 million -- up 28 per cent from a year earlier -- continuing a trend of robust domestic operations at all of Scotiabank's peers.

The Canadian Press

Lower fuel revenues pinch Couche-Tard earnings

MONTREAL Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc., Canada's largest convenience store operator, reports its third-quarter profits fell to $54.8 million US from $71.1 million US as the company was hit with lower fuel revenues in the United States.

Overall revenues from its 5,900 outlets across North America -- which include Couche-Tard, Mac's and Beckers in Canada and Circle K in the United States -- rose to $4.9 billion from $3.9 billion.

The Montreal-based company reports in U.S. dollars.

The Canadian Press

Researcher wins Turing prize for helping develop first PC

SAN JOSE, Calif. A Microsoft researcher has won the $250,000 Turing Award, one of technology's most coveted prizes, for his work helping design and build what is widely considered the first modern personal computer.

While at Xerox Corp.'s famed Palo Alto Research Center, or PARC, in the 1970s, Charles Thacker led the hardware development for the Alto, which featured innovative display and other technologies that helped inspire future generations of computers. Thacker, 67, was also co-inventor of the Ethernet networking technology for connecting computers.

The Turing Award is funded by Google Inc. and Intel Corp. It is named for the mathematician Alan Turing.

The Associated Press

Judge certifies class-action suit against Microsoft

VANCOUVER A British Columbia judge has certified a class-action lawsuit against Microsoft that alleges the software giant engaged in anti-competitive behaviour that enabled it to charge higher prices for its products.

Justice E.M. Meyers concluded in a ruling released Monday that Vancouver-based Pro-Sys Consultants, which is leading the plaintiffs in the case, has met requirements for certification for the lawsuit to proceed as a class action.

The legal action against Microsoft was launched in 2006 on behalf of a number of indirect purchasers who acquired Microsoft software from resellers and from those who had Microsoft software pre-installed on their computers.

They argue they were forced to pay more for the software component of their purchase as a result of Microsoft's anti-competitive actions.

None of the claims has been proven in court.

Meyers narrowed the scope of the suit to cover British Columbians who indirectly acquired a licence for Microsoft operating systems or application software for their own use and those who bought computers with pre-installed Microsoft software since January 1994.

The Canadian Press

Cisco unveils new heavy-duty Internet router

SAN JOSE, Calif. Cisco Systems Inc. announced yesterday that it is upgrading one of its biggest pieces of networking hardware, a router that's used to power the most trafficked parts of the Internet backbone.

Routers play an important role as the Internet's traffic cops, shunting packets of data to their destinations. Those placed at the Internet's backbone -- the main arteries for traffic -- need the most capacity given the amount of data passing through. These machines are known as core routers, and Cisco competes in this market with Juniper Network Inc., which has updated its products more recently than Cisco.

Cisco, the world's largest maker of computer networking gear, said it is replacing its aging CRS-1 core router, which was introduced in 2004, with a model that is three times faster, the CRS-3. It can handle 322 terabits of traffic per second -- the capacity to deliver in four minutes every film ever made, or to allow every person in China to make a video call simultaneously.

The Associated Press