Business & Tech

Google Faces Antitrust Lawsuit, Symantec Acquires Nukona

A look at how Mountain View companies have made the news over the past week.

Every week, Mountain View makes news with technology developments, discoveries and sometimes controversies.

In the weekly “Bits and Bytes” column we’ll relay the past week’s news highlights from our backyard giants, start-ups and small businesses alike.

In addition to facing a , Google has also been among the group of big corporations named in an anti-trust lawsuit that claims the companies illegally agreed "not to poach each other’s employees." News reports explain that the class action lawsuit was brought on by five software engineers, who accuse the companies of "conspiring to depress employee pay by eliminating competition for skilled labor." The companies named in the lawsuit include Google, Apple, Intel, Adobe Systems, Intuit, Walt Disney’s Pixar unit and Lucasfilm Ltd. In a decision announced Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose rejected the companies’ bid to dismiss claims brought under the Sherman Act and California state law. Looks like Google may have a lot more courtroom time to add to its already-busy calendar.

It was quite a coup for online learning platform Coursera this week when the major universities of Stanford, Princeton, University of Michigan and University of Pennsylvania announced they will begin offering online courses through the company. Faculty from these top-ranked universities will provide courses in multiple disciplines, including business, medicine, social studies, history, literature, mathematics and computer science, among others. Seven courses from Stanford, University of California, Berkeley and University of Michigan have already been running through Coursera for several weeks, and around 30 more courses will reportedly launch this week and through late summer. Coursera's offerings include video lectures with interactive quizzes, mastery-building interactive assignments and collaborative online forums.

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Symantec announced this week that it has completed its acquisition of privately-held Nukona Inc., a provider of mobile application management. Symantec is a provider of security, storage and systems management solutions to help consumers and organizations secure and manage their information-driven world, particularly in today’s global “bring-your-own-device” workplace. Symantec’s acquisition of Nukona reportedly complements the company’s recent acquisition of Odyssey Software, a provider of mobile device management.

Egnyte recently announced a major promotion for new customers. The provider of cloud-based and “hybrid-cloud-based” file sharing solutions for businesses is advertising that any company that is currently using another file sharing platform can switch to Egnyte with “no hassles, and no fees until 2013.” Egnyte’s website boasts “over 1 billion files are shared daily by businesses using Egnyte HybridCloud file server. Egnyte's unique technology provides the speed and security of local storage with the accessibility of the cloud. Users can easily store, share, access and backup files, while IT has the centralized administration and control to enforce business policies.” Egnyte is a privately-held company founded in 2007 and is backed by venture capital firms.

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