Intel chips may go beyond graphics

Computers

Intel today is releasing the first technical details of a new family of chips intended to soup up computer graphics and, eventually, a broad range of computing tasks.

The new family, code-named Larrabee, will be available in late 2009 or early 2010.

Larrabee would be first aimed at the personal-computer graphics market, where its "many-core" design, with more than a dozen and eventually hundreds of processing units on a single silicon chip, would be especially useful.

But engineer Anwar Ghuloum said Intel later plans to make the chip design available to a broad spectrum of the computing world, from Windows and Macintosh desktop personal computers to handhelds and supercomputers.

The market for add-on graphics accelerators, which are prized by PC game players, is dominated by Nvidia and the ATI division of AMD. Intel's approach will be distinguished by its reliance on the industry standard x86 instruction set, which will allow the chips to take advantage of a huge library of existing software.

Auto industry

Chrysler unit renews credit lines

Chrysler said Sunday its financial unit had renewed lines of credit totaling $24 billion that will fund its dealers and financial-services business.

Chrysler Financial initially sought $30 billion but reduced the amount "due to conditions in the credit markets and changes in the company's retail strategy," the company said.

Last month, Chrysler said its financial arm was getting out of the auto-leasing business because economic conditions have made leasing more expensive than buying, for both consumers and the company.

The move came amid a sharp drop in values for leased trucks and SUVs that are returning to automakers as leases end. Chrysler wants to allocate its limited resources to retail incentives and financing.

The company said Friday it was ahead of its financial goals for the first half of this year.

Chrysler, private since Cerberus Capital Management bought it last year, isn't required to release financial data.

Labor

Verizon, unions extend negotiations

Verizon Communications and two unions representing some 65,000 of its workers remained in talks after agreeing to "stop the clock" on contracts that were set to expire at 12:01 a.m. Sunday.

The company expects "business as usual" today as talks continue, Verizon spokesman Eric Rabe said late Sunday.

Major bargaining issues include health-care coverage for employees and retirees, wages and union representation for new job areas. The contracts cover Verizon workers on the East Coast.

One of the unions, the Communications Workers of America, said Sunday a strike had been postponed due to progress in the talks. The other is the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

The union workers are on the traditional telephone side of the business. Verizon Wireless, the company's big growth driver, has few union workers.

Computers

Stumbling blocks seen in $100 laptop

An effort to create a laptop for developing markets that costs $100 will take at least three years because the price of packaging and software will probably remain constant, research firm Gartner said.

So-called mininotebooks cost $175 or more today and prices won't fall by much more than 10 to 15 percent in the next two or three years, Gartner said.

Compiled from The New York Times, Bloomberg News and The Associated Press