Cognos agrees to purchase by IBM

Canada's largest software developer, Cognos, has agreed to a $5 Billion buyout by IBM. The move comes on the heals of similar deals for Cognos competitors Business Objects by SAP and Hyperion Solutions Corp. by Oracle. "We chose Cognos because of its industry-leading technology that is based on open standards," said Steve Mills, senior vice-president in IBM's software group. CBC has more here.

IBM to help pharmaceutical industry in fight against couterfeiters

We've all received the annoying e-mail spam offering cheap pain relievers or erectile dysfunction drugs, and in many cases what you'd receive, if you actually fell for it, is counterfeit medication. IBM has created a system that it calls "ePedegree" to track medications from the manufacturer, to the pharmacy, and all points in between. Using RFID (radio-frequency identification) tags similar to those already employed in the retail industry, the system allows the drug companies to create electronic certificates of authenticity for medications. It's a cat and mouse game however, as other measures have already been employed only to be faked within a few months. IBM says the system has other uses "for keeping track of expiration dates, batch numbers in case a drug is recalled, and so on." Globe and Mail story here.