Microsoft will spend $8 billion annually on research and development efforts to prop up segments ranging from entertainment, Vista to cloud computing.

On Monday, as Microsoft COO Kevin Turner announced three new virtualization products, he claimed that the company had set aside the largest R&D budget in the industry to develop its entertainment software, Vista-enabled desktop computing as well as both the commercial and consumer segments of cloud computing.

While admitting that Microsoft still required catching up on the consumer aspect of the cloud computing software, Turner claimed that on the business side of the software, it was definitely the industry leader. He also acknowledged that a lot of work still needed to be done on the Windows Vista front as well which has not received the level of acceptance from consumers across the world that the company was hoping for.

The Microsoft COO also used the occasion to come down heavily against Google which was criticized for restricting consumer options on cloud computing. Turner claimed that while Google forced cloud computing consumers to use a Google-hosted cloud, Microsoft’s virtualization software could be used to support clouds hosted in three separate places – on customer premises, by partners and by Microsoft itself.

A popular American discount retailer, 99 Cents Only Stores, has decided to raise prices for the first time since it was founded 26 years ago.

On Monday, the low price retail chain announced that it was raising the prices of food, household and other items to 99.99 cents. The increase of prices by almost a penny was attributed to soaring inflation and higher food as well as energy costs.

Company CEO Eric Schiffer announced that while the new top prices at the 99 Cents Only Stores will still remain below a dollar, the rise will enable the company to offset some of the increased business costs it had been facing for some time.

According to reports the 99 Cents Only Stores has posted losses for two straight quarters. Last month the company revealed that the total losses for the quarter ending June this year stood at $1.5 million or 2 cents a share whereas it had earned $3 million or 4 cents a share during the same period last year.

99 Cents Only Stores is the oldest dollar chain store of the country. It opened its first store at Los Angeles in 1982 and since then it has now expanded to 277 locations in California, Arizona, Nevada and Texas.

The London Stock Exchange suffered a major systems failure on Monday which led to a suspension of trading for nearly seven hours.

As stock markets all over the world rebounded on news of the US government’s takeover of mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, traders at London Stock Exchange were dismayed to find out that they could not trade due to a major systems outage. Trading was also suspended at the Johannesburg Stock Exchange which uses the LSE’s trading platform.

The London Stock Exchange opened for trading according to schedule at 0700 GMT. However after a while it was found out that some brokers were unable to trade due to problems in connectivity. This led to a suspension of trading so that a section of market players would not be disadvantaged. Trading resumed only at 1500 GMT which is just thirty minutes before the usual closing time of the stock exchange.

London Stock Exchange is the third largest share market in the world on the basis of trading volume evaluated for the first half of this year. Representatives of the exchange declined to give reasons behind the systems failure on Monday morning and refused to speculate that the exchange had been unable to handle the unusually high volume of trading.

A federal panel in the US has ruled that benefits of Pfizer’s proposed osteoporosis drug Fablyn outweigh the risks for women who carry a high risk of fractures and have unsuccessfully gone through other treatments.

The osteoporosis drug went through close scrutiny by a panel of medical experts among whom nine felt that the potential benefits outweighed the potential risks while three experts did not agree. One member of the panel abstained.

However the federal panel has recommended that the osteoporosis drug be restricted to use among those women who fall under the high-risk category for fractures and those who fail other forms of treatment. The drug had been brought before the panel after concerns that its use caused a higher mortality rate among women than the placebo group.

Fablyn is being developed by Pfizer for the treatment of osteoporosis, a condition which causes bone loss and increases the risk of fractures especially among post-menopausal women.

Pfizer is keen to get approval from the US Food and Drug Administration so that the osteoporosis drug can be launched in the market at the earliest. According to an estimate, the drug might bring in peak sales of $1 billion a year for Pfizer and an FDA rejection will set back its chances of launching the drug which has already been brought twice before the FDA.

Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama and Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin clashed over federal earmarks, each accusing the other of aggressively pursuing money for pet spending projects.

Threatened by a resurgent John McCain, Obama came down heavily on Palin for presenting herself as an opponent of wasteful spending on pet local projects when in fact he claimed that she had earlier supported the now-infamous “Bridge to Nowhere” in Alaska. The bridge is a federal earmark which has now become symbolic of unnecessary expenditures incurred by the country and eventually shouldered by taxpayers.

Palin in turn accused Obama of seeking earmarks worth nearly $1 billion during the time he was in the U.S Senate and expressed surprise that he was raising the issue at all. Earmarks have featured notably in McCain’s election speeches and have been generally lambasted in the national capital for increasing the burden of federal budget.

The heated exchanges come in the wake of recent polls which show Republican presidential candidate John McCain regaining lost ground and bouncing back from his party convention last week. McCain now appears to be running even with or even ahead of his Democrat rival in the seven national polls taken after the Republican convention.

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