A California man filed suit against printer manufacturer HP and office-supply retailer Staples Inc. in federal court on Monday, alleging the two companies broke antitrust law in a price-fixing collaboration on ink cartridge sales. Ranjit Bedi of Pacific Palisades, California accused HP of approaching Staples Inc. in 2006 with at least $100 million in "market development funds" and incentives, in exchange for an agreement to stop selling third-party HP-compatible ink cartridges. According to the lawsuit, Staples then used HP's exclusivity to raise prices on the HP cartridges it offered. Staples is the largest retailer of aftermarket ink in the United States, with profits from HP-compatible ink sales exceeding $300 million in 2006. Of that total, $75 million came from the sale of third party ink.

Intel has announced the formation of the USB 3.0 promoters group, a consortium that aims to create a "super speed personal USB interconnect."

The first members of the promoter group (HP, Intel, Microsoft, NEC Corporation, NXP Semiconductors and Texas Instruments) said that USB 3.0 will deliver more than ten times the data transfer bandwidth of USB 2.0, which tops out at 480 Mb/s. The new interface will be designed to be used in consumer electronics and mobile applications and able to deal with digital media file sizes that are likely to exceed 25 GB.

Intel stated that USB 3.0 will be based on current USB technology and ports and cabling will be backwards compatible; however version 3.0 will offer enhancements for better protocol efficiency and lower power consumption. The development group will also integrate an upgrade path to optical capabilities for USB. A completed USB 3.0 specification is expected to be released in the first half of 2008.

According to market watcher NPD, Apple was the third largest laptop vendor during June, with only Toshiba and HP selling more machines. This puts Apple ahead of other major names such as Dell, Gateway and Lenovo, as buyers continue to choose Apple's updated MacBook and MacBook Pro notebooks over the more conventional brands. Figures show that Apple accounted for 17.6% of the laptop market, up from 14.3% in May, which also means that more than one in six laptops sold in the USA are made by Apple. However, these are only based on retailer sales, so the direct-to-buyer figures may tell a completely different story. This news comes soon after Apple managed to take the third-spot in overall computer sales, tied with Gateway on 5.6% (behind Dell and HP).

SAN FRANCISCO, July 13 (Reuters) - Two years into his role as leader of Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ.N: Quote, Profile, Research), Chief Executive Mark Hurd says the the world's biggest computer company has improved but has a very long way to go.
"I would give us a good grade on improvement. I think we are better incrementally. I think we are still poor absolutely," Hurd said in an on-stage interview at Fortune Magazine's annual technology conference in San Francisco.
Hurd joined Palo Alto, California-based Hewlett-Packard a little over two years ago from a smaller computer rival, NCR Corp. (NCR.N: Quote, Profile, Research), and has seen a sharp revival in the company's stock price built on solid market-share gains.
"We are doing better. We are not doing great," Hurd said. "On an absolute basis, we have a ton to do.