Business Desk
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
BANKING
CITIGROUP SAYS UPS LOST DATA ON 3.9 MILLION CUSTOMERS
Citigroup said United Parcel Service lost computer tapes containing personal data on about half its consumer finance customers in North America – some 3.9 million people. Citigroup had hired UPS, the largest package courier, to deliver the tapes to a credit bureau last month. The files contained information on customers from branches of its CitiFinancial business, as well as those with closed accounts, the New York-based company said yesterday. Citigroup said it had no reason to believe the information was used inappropriately. “It’s a simple case of something getting lost,” Deborah Hopkins, Citigroup’s chief operations and technology officer, said in an interview. The missing package contained four data tapes and was one of 17 boxes Citigroup had shipped to a credit-score company last month. The tapes contained Social Security numbers, account numbers, and payment histories, Citigroup said.
– Bloomberg News
COMPUTERS
APPLE WILL USE INTEL CHIPS TO WIN SALES, JOBS SAYS
Apple Computer CEO Steven Jobs said yesterday the company will switch its computers to Intel chips, a sign he plans to sell cheaper laptops and extend gains in market share. Mr. Jobs unveiled a prototype computer using an Intel chip yesterday at an Apple developer show in San Francisco. Intel chips will debut in Apple’s Macintosh personal computers starting by June 2006, and all Macs will use Intel by the end of 2007, he said. The shift would help Mr. Jobs court laptop buyers, a market that’s growing more than three times faster than desktop PCs. Intel chips cost less, run faster, and generate less heat than the products built by Motorola and IBM that Apple has relied on for 21 years.
Using Intel chips may enable Apple to make smaller, lighter laptops and “more macho higher-performance laptops” than possible with IBM and Motorola’s chip business, said Jean-Louis Gassee, who oversaw Apple’s products and R&D in the 1980s.
– Bloomberg News
REAL ESTATE
PROLOGIS TO BUY CATELLUS TO ADD LAND FOR DEVELOPMENT
ProLogis, the largest American REIT focused on warehouses and distribution sites, agreed to buy Catellus Development for $3.6 billion in cash and stock to almost double its holdings of land for development. It is the biggest domestic real estate acquisition this year. The deal will create the world’s largest network of distribution centers, with more than 350 million square feet of space, about one-fifth the size of Washington.
– Bloomberg News
