Average state wage rises to $40,385

The average annual wage in Washington state last year rose to $40,385, a 3.5 percent increase over 2004, the state Employment Security Department said Tuesday.

The increase — the biggest annual change since 2000 — means the minimum unemployment benefit also will rise, from $112 to $116 a week, starting July 1. The maximum benefit, which is set by state law, will remain at $496 a week.

Unemployment taxes paid by employers also will rise. Starting Jan. 1, employers will pay tax on the first $31,400 paid in wages to each worker.

Total wages paid to the state's workers rose 6.4 percent last year, to $108.4 million, while the number of covered workers rose 2.8 percent, to nearly 2.7 million workers.

Amgen

Hospital to get royalty payment

Drug maker Amgen has agreed to pay Massachusetts General Hospital $186 million to settle a dispute over royalties the hospital was paid for its role in helping develop Enbrel, a drug used to treat rheumatoid arthritis and psoriasis.

The one-time payment will free Amgen from obligations to pay future royalties from North American sales of Enbrel, the hospital said Tuesday. The hospital will continue to earn royalties on sales of Enbrel made outside North America.

Massachusetts General received $65 million in combined Enbrel royalties last year, a hospital spokeswoman said.

The arthritis drug's creation stems from research done at Massachusetts General. The hospital signed a licensing agreement with Immunex, the Seattle company that developed Enbrel in the 1990s. Amgen, based in Thousand Oaks, Calif., acquired Immunex in 2001 and began reviewing its licensing contracts.

State settles case under spyware law

Washington has settled with a third defendant accused of deceiving consumers under the state's new computer-spyware law.

Seth Traub of Portsmouth, N.H., allegedly advertised a bogus anti-spyware program as a Microsoft product. He will pay $2,000 in legal expenses but admitted no wrongdoing in the settlement, announced Tuesday by Washington Attorney General Rob McKenna.

The settlement comes as part of a larger suit brought against Secure Computer of White Plains, N.Y.

Microsoft

Product combines business-data tools

Microsoft aims to unite several of its business intelligence products with PerformancePoint Server 2007, a new product it announced Tuesday.

The software would help companies gather, analyze and forecast business data by combining tools such as Microsoft Excel and scorecards to track performance.

A test version of the server software is due out in the fall with a broad release planned for mid-2007.

General Motors

Company touts new products

General Motors has made significant progress on its turnaround plan in the past year, reducing costs and rolling out new products, the company's chairman and chief executive told shareholders Tuesday.

But shareholders, gathered for their annual meeting, passed two nonbinding shareholder-sponsored proposals that would change election procedures for the world's biggest automaker. It was the first time such shareholder initiatives have won majority votes at GM. Yet a plan to replace the entire board was shot down, with each of the current directors getting 96.6 percent of the vote.

Before the votes were announced, Chairman and CEO Rick Wagoner touted increased sales in Europe and Asia and pointed to successful new product launches in North America expected to account for nearly 30 percent of U.S. retail sales this year and about 40 percent next year.

Company to invest $6 billion in India

IBM plans to triple its investment in India to $6 billion over the next three years to take advantage of the country's lower-cost labor and diverse engineering skills for technology-services customers around the world.

Chairman and CEO Sam Palmisano said Tuesday the investment will expand the software, services and customer-support work IBM does in India, while also funding new service-delivery centers in Bangalore and a telecommunications-research facility in New Delhi.

In the past three years, the company has invested more than $2 billion in India and increased staff from 9,000 to 43,000.

U2 is featured on another iPod

Apple Computer introduced a new version of its special edition iPod featuring the band U2 as part of a partnership with the Irish group and their record company, Universal Music Group.

The music and video player holds as many as 7,500 songs or more than 75 hours of video, Apple said Tuesday. The newly designed iPod, with an all-black stainless-steel case, went on sale for $329.

Apple is banking on the popularity of U2, which won five Grammy awards this year with the album "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb," to fuel even more demand for the iPod. The first black U2 iPod, with the band members' autographs etched on the back, was introduced in November 2004.

Sales of iPods and content sold through iTunes accounted for 50 percent of Apple's sales in the first quarter, up from 38 percent a year earlier.

Money manager to pay $100 million

The Justice Department has agreed to settle a civil fraud lawsuit accusing prominent money manager Mario Gabelli in a scheme to gain unfair advantage in cellphone-spectrum auctions, a government spokeswoman said Tuesday.

The deal — announced at a hearing Tuesday in U.S. District Court — would include a $100 million payment from Gabelli to the government, The Wall Street Journal reported on its Web site, citing people briefed on the negotiations.

The deal came after the government sought to intervene in a 5-year-old lawsuit brought by private parties alleging Gabelli and others should pay hundreds of millions of dollars in damages for their participation in auctions conducted by the Federal Communications Commission between 1995 and 2000.

Hewlett-Packard

2nd-quarter profit rises $443 million

Hewlett-Packard, a maker of computers and printers, raised its second-quarter profit by $443 million Tuesday and boosted its income forecast for the remainder of the year to reflect a tax settlement with the U.S. government.

The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company said the settlement increased its previously reported second-quarter profit by 15 cents a share, bringing net income for the three months ending April 30 to $1.9 billion, or 66 cents a share.

The settlement, signed with the Internal Revenue Service on June 1, also prompted HP to raise its profit forecast for the remainder of the fiscal year by 15 cents a share. The company expects profit before amortization and other costs to be $2.19 to $2.23, versus $2.04 to $2.08 forecast in May.

Analysts on average had been expecting a profit of $2.08 for the fiscal year, which ends in October, according to a survey by Thomson Financial.

Compiled from Seattle Times staff, The Associated Press and Bloomberg News