Ford Motor chief executive Bill Ford called on Congress to provide tax credits and other incentives to help drive development of more fuel-efficient vehicles.
Ford, who met with White House officials on his ideas to lessen consumer dependence on foreign oil, also said he would not accelerate the time frame for announcing the company's domestic cost cuts even though rival General Motors (GM) unveiled its cost-savings strategy.
GM said on Monday it would cut 30,000 manufacturing jobs and close all or part of a dozen plants in the United States and Canada to save $7 billion by the end of 2006.
Ford (F) announced last week that it would cut 4,000 white-collar jobs, or about 10 percent of its salaried North American work force.
In September, Bill Ford asked President Bush to hold a summit with automakers and related companies to explore strategies for saving energy. A Ford spokesman said the meeting with senior White House officials went well and the administration has not ruled out Ford's idea of a summit.
Ford also called for Congress to increase research and development tax credits for companies working on alternative fuels and consider tax incentives to help manufacturers convert outmoded plants into high-tech facilities.
He also recommended that governments at all levels consider fleets powered only by gas-electric hybrid technology or other alternatives by 2010. The automaker plans to accelerate its production of hybrid and ethanol powered vehicles over the next several years.
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Idle activism: A new project in the fight against AIDS will tap into the unused power of individual and business computers to help research and identify drugs used to combat the HIV virus.
An internet-based initiative, called FightAIDSatHome, hopes to enlist about 100,000 computer users to donate the use of their machines when they would otherwise be idle. Participants' machines can request data from a central server, process it and send back the results.
The organizers hope to develop new chemical strategies to treat HIV-infected individuals, according to the San Diego-based Scripps Research Institute, which is behind the effort. By being able to tap into a vast reservoir of computer processing power, researchers will be able to approach problems more aggressively and quickly.
It is the second research project using the network of computers, called the World Community grid, which is funded by IBM.
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Arrogance abroad: South Korea's anti-trust agency said it was delaying a long-awaited ruling on Microsoft's business practices to next week, after the review committee failed to reach an agreement.
The Fair Trade Commission began its investigation in 2001 when Daum Communications, South Korea's top internet portal, complained Microsoft (MSFT) had breached antitrust rules by incorporating its Internet Messenger and Media Player services into the Windows operating system.
Despite Microsoft reaching a $30 million settlement with Daum over the antitrust allegations in early November, the commission has said it would rule on the case.
Microsoft has previously said the complaint was without merit and that it would cooperate fully with the probe. The deadline for the final ruling has been pushed back to November 30, when the committee meets again.
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The ravenous rich: Forget day trading -- the best way to make a buck this holiday season may be to flip your Xbox 360.
Some people fortunate enough to get their hands on Microsoft's new videogame console when it was released immediately resold them on eBay, occasionally fetching thousands of dollars for packages that sometimes also included games and other add-ins.
The online auction site said about 1,800 Xbox 360s were sold there between midnight and noon Pacific time Tuesday. EBay said the average price for consoles, including those sold with games and other add-ons, was $660. However, the company said some console packages were selling for as much as $2,500, with bidding and sales prices varying widely.
Amazon.com and the websites for Circuit City, Best Buy and Wal-Mart all listed the consoles as being sold out Tuesday. Best Buy spokesman Jay Musolf said the company also sold out of the consoles at most of its brick-and-mortar stores Tuesday.
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Compiled by Keith Axline. AP and Reuters contributed to this report.
