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World Business Quick Take

■ Software
64-bit Windows released
Microsoft is now offering its Windows XP Professional operating system in a version for 64-bit processors. The so-called x64 Windows is offered at the same prices as the traditional 32-bit variant, the software giant said. The new system increases the power of desktop applications such as those use to create digital content for videos, the firm claims. x64 Windows offers 32 times more physical memory and more than 1000 time more virtual memory. The 64-bit system can also still run older applications. There has, in fact, to this point been little software that is programmed to run natively at 64 bits. This will change in the coming months, Microsoft reports: More than 400 applications are slated to hit the market. Hardware for x64 is offered by AMD, Dell, Fujitsu Siemens Computers and Intel, among others.

■ Textiles
Mandelson decries quotas
Restoring import quotas that were abolished at the start of the year isn't the solution to the EU's efforts to quell surging textile exports from China, European Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson said at the World Economic Forum in Jordan on Saturday. Bowing to pressure from more than a half-dozen EU governments, Mandelson on May 17 gave China a final chance to limit exports of T-shirts and flax yarn to the bloc before the EU imposes quotas. The US has also tried to protect domestic industry from Chinese garment exports that have grown since 40- year-old quotas were lifted on Jan. 1. China last Friday agreed to raise export tariffs on 74 products starting June 1. While the increases are five times higher than previous taxes for most of the items, US and European businesses said the duties won't curtail the growth in exports.

■ Broadcasting
Electronics firms to profit
Rapid growth of high-definition television during the next two years will help electronics makers such as Motorola Inc, Sony Corp and Matsushita Electric Industrial Co, Barron's reported. US government rules that force broadcasters to increase high-definition programming and consumer electronics makers to include new capabilities in their products mean that the consumer interest in the product will jump in the next two years, Barron's said. Television makers such as Japan's Sony and Matsushita will see higher sales and face "fierce" competition from Samsung Electronics Co, LG Electronics Inc, Dell Inc and Hewlett-Packard Co, Barron's said. Companies that make the infrastructure required to deliver the new television signals to consumers will get more demand for equipment from cable, satellite and telephone companies, the newspaper said.

■ Piracy
`Star Wars' DVDs found
Unauthorized disks of the latest "Star Wars" blockbuster were on sale on the streets of Beijing yesterday, just days after the film premiered in China. Star Wars: Episode III -- Revenge of the Sith opened across China at midnight on Thursday, about the same time it premiered elsewhere in the world, in an attempt to beat the pirates. But pirated disks were available everywhere by yesterday. "These just came in this morning. The quality is very good, they're not like those pirated copies that are filmed in the cinema," a Beijing vendor said as he fished a pirated DVD from behind a bush and offered to sell it for 7 yuan (US$0.85).

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