Business Quick Take

■ Software
Legislature tackles Microsoft
The legislature on Friday passed a resolution asking the government to cut purchases of Microsoft Corp products by a quarter. The resolution is an attempt to discourage state agencies from purchasing Microsoft products because the US maker has a virtual monopoly in supplying software to the government. The resolution may not be binding because it is against the nation's fair-trade regulations, the Chinese-language Commercial Times newspaper said.

■ Telecoms
Nokia to cut local middlemen
Nokia Oyj will start distributing handsets directly to mobile-phone retail stores in Taiwan, the Chinese-language Commercial Times reported, citing unidentified cellphone industry officials. Nokia will cut handset shipments through its two main wholesaling distribution agents in Taiwan, Synnex Technology International Corp (聯強) and Senao International Co (神腦), the Taipei-based newspaper said. By skipping wholesale distributors, Nokia will boost its profit margin by 2 to 3 percentage points, the newspaper said. Synnex Technology is the nation's biggest distributor of mobile phones and Senao is the second.

■ Entertainment
US game sales hit new high
Video-game industry sales in the US rose 6 percent last year, driven by a 42 percent gain in software for portable devices such as the Nintendo Co's DS and Sony Corp's PSP. Sales of games for portable machines reached US$1.4 billion, pushing industry sales to a record US$10.5 billion last year, including hardware, software and accessories, market researcher NPD Group said yesterday in a statement. Games for consoles such as Microsoft Corp's Xbox and Sony's PlayStation 2 fell 12 percent, Port Washington, New York-based NPD said. Rising portable-game sales reflect the popularity of mobile products such as the DS, released in 2004, and the PlayStation Portable, released last year. Consumers delayed purchases of console-based games as they waited for new versions to arrive. Microsoft began selling an updated Xbox in November, which sold out within days. Tokyo-based Sony will begin selling a new PlayStation this year. The previous record for US video-game industry sales was US$10.3 billion in 2002.

■ Banking
Armenian heirs sue banks
Heirs of Armenians killed 91 years ago in the Turkish Ottoman Empire sued Deutsche Bank AG and Dresdner Bank AG on Friday, claiming the German banks owe them millions of dollars and other assets deposited by their ancestors. The class-action lawsuit was filed in the US Superior Court on behalf of seven Armenians living in Southern California. It is the latest bid by Armenians in the US to recover assets they believe belonged to some 1.5 million Armenians who perished in massacres beginning in 1915. At that time, Armenia was part of the Ottoman Empire. Litigation brought against New York Life Insurance Co by Armenian descendants led to a US$20 million settlement; French life insurer AXA has agreed to pay US$17 million to settle a separate class-action claim. Both lawsuits made similar allegations. The lawsuit against the German banks seeks to recoup unspecified millions of dollars for assets such as gold, cash and jewelry that the Armenian descendants claim were deposited by thousands of their ancestors at the banks' Turkish branches or otherwise looted by the Ottoman Turkish government and later transferred to European banks.