vnunet.com Asia news wrap: 24 January 2006

Asia news wrap: 24 January 2006

A Google programming competition in China attracted more than 13,500 entrants, the People's Daily has reported.

The contest's final round, held this week in Beijing, was won by a post-graduate university student, Huang Huan. His prizes included an IBM notebook PC and an LCD monitor, according to Yan Hui of China Programmer Magazine.

This was the first programming contest, or 'codejam', that Google has organised in China.

The company has previously run similar competitions in the US which have attracted entrants from all over the world, including China.

The contests give Google an opportunity to meet and assess the abilities of potential recruits, as well as generating positive publicity.

Google's search engine has been gradually increasing its market share in China. According to recent research, the company has around 30 per cent market share in China, behind local competitor, Baidu, which holds approximately half the market.

Sony is trying to revive its fading Walkman brand by consolidating management and recruiting staff from Apple, according to a report in Japanese newspaper the Asahi Shimbun. 

A single manager, Hiroshi Yoshioka, is now responsible for global sales of Sony's portable digital audio players and the company's Connect online music distribution service.

Previously, multiple managers had been in charge of the two divisions and of their Japanese and international operations.

In December, the company poached an engineer from Apple to lead software development for all Sony products. This followed the discovery of a series of bugs in the latest Walkman digital music players.

The Walkman A series has received five software updates since it was put on the market in late November. The launch had already been delayed for two months at that time.

Apple's iPod devices hold a 60 per cent share of the digital music player market in Japan, compared to around 15 per cent for Sony's Walkman series, the Asahi Shimbun reported.

Worldwide, Apple's music players have a market share of approximately 70 per cent.