Chinese stealth fighter jet may use US technology

China may have bought parts of US F-117 Nighthawk shot down over Serbia in 1999, say experts
Associated Press
Source: guardian.co.uk, Sunday 23 January 2011 12.11 GMT
A Chinese stealth fighter jet that could pose a significant threat to American air superiority may borrow from US technology, it has been claimed.

China's J-20 stealth fighter pictured at Chengu airbase, Sichaun province, this month. Photograph: Kyodo/Reuters

Balkan military officials and other experts said China may have gleaned knowledge from a US F-117 Nighthawk that was shot down over Serbia in 1999.

"At the time, our intelligence reports told of Chinese agents crisscrossing the region where the F-117 disintegrated, buying up parts of the plane from local farmers," said Admiral Davor Domazet-Loso, Croatia's military chief of staff during the Kosovo war. "We believe the Chinese used those materials to gain an insight into secret stealth technologies ... and to reverse-engineer them."

The Nighthawk was downed by a Serbian anti-aircraft missile during a bombing raid on 27 March 1999. It was the first time one of the fighters had been hit, and the Pentagon blamed clever tactics and sheer luck. The pilot ejected and was rescued.

A senior Serbian military official confirmed that pieces of the wreckage were removed by souvenir collectors, and that some ended up "in the hands of foreign military attaches". Efforts to get comment from China's defence ministry and the Pentagon were unsuccessful.

Parts of the F-117 wreckage, including its left wing, cockpit canopy, ejection seat, pilot's helmet and radio, are exhibited at Belgrade's aviation museum. Zoran Milicevic, deputy director of the museum, said: "I don't know what happened to the rest of the plane. A lot of delegations visited us in the past, including the Chinese, Russians and Americans ... but no one showed any interest in taking any part of the jet."

Zoran Kusovac, a Rome-based military consultant, said the regime of the former Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic routinely shared captured western equipment with its Chinese and Russian allies. "The destroyed F-117 topped that wish-list for both the Russians and Chinese," Kusovac said.

China's multi-role stealth fighter – known as the Chengdu J-20 – made its inaugural flight on 11 January, revealing dramatic progress in the country's efforts to develop cutting-edge military technologies. It is at least eight or nine years from entering service.

Russia's Sukhoi T-50 prototype stealth fighter made its maiden flight last year and is due to enter service in about four years. It is likely that the Russians also gained knowledge of stealth technology from the downed Nighthawk.

How much money do you need for your MBA ?

By: Stephanie Landsman
Source: CNBC
Twenty-six year old Craig Rosen is taking a $100,000 gamble on his future.

That's how much Rosen, a first year MBA student at the University of Southern California, will owe in loans when he graduates.

"Having a bachelor's degree is no longer enough to be competitive in corporate America. A graduate degree is a way to set yourself apart from competition," said Rosen. "I think most students at USC are optimistic that they will be able to find an internship or full time position after this school year ends."

It's the faith that would make almost any law school student envious these days.

Several weeks ago, we took a look at whether going to law school was worth it. Then, just college in general. Now,we're sticking our nose into MBA programs—post-apocalyptic financial crisis.

NetNet got an exclusive sneak peak at the Graduate Management Admission Council's (GMAC) latest 2010 Alumni Perspectives Survey. GMAC, the international nonprofit association of business schools and owner of the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT), is expected to release it early next week.

When it comes to higher learning, MBA degrees appear to be best in class. GMAC reports 93% of the respondents in its latest poll are employed.

It surveyed 2,490 with MBA degrees. GMAC finds the average median salary for all respondents was $94,542 in 2010 with bonus compensation of $17,683. The median salary in 2009 was $91,300 with bonus compensation of $15,000

Those working in the field since 2000 earned a median salary of $131,000 with bonus compensation of $32,000.

Those salaries come at a price. Tuition at many of the top business schools exceed than $50,000 a year. If you have to take out loans, most will need an iron stomach to take on this degree of debt in an economy that's still on the mend.

Natalya Kasatova is carrying $65,000 in business school loan debt. She graduated last Spring with an MBA degree from New York University's Stern School of Business.

Despite the cost, she says going to business school full-time was well worth it. Kasatova was recruited by IBM Global Business Services as a student.

"I am absolutely certain the MBA degree allowed me to change my career path and obtain a job in one of the largest companies in the world. I wouldn't be able to become a senior consult in such a short period of time," said Kasatova.

Stern School of Business MBA graduate Brett Gering feels the same way.

Gering, who works at Thomson Reuters, said, "I wish I had done it ten years ago."

Like Kasatova and Gering, Stephanie Smeriglio received her degree from Stern. But, she is not sure yet if her MBA degree was worth it.

She attended school while working in a digital advertising agency. She owes $25,000 in student loans. Her company picked up the rest of the tab.

"My liberal arts undergraduate degree prepared me for many things, but I did not feel as savvy in the hard business skills side of things," said Smerigli. "I work for a smaller entrepreneurial company now and really thought I would benefit from a stronger business background."

Lee Miller, the author of the book Get More Money on Your Next Job... in Any Economy, teaches in Seton Hall University's MBA program. He says students who went to business school during the financial crisis made a good move.

According to Miller, accounting firms, technology companies and in sales have been on the prowl for new employees with MBAs.

"It's very different than a year ago. Most feel like the job market is getting better," said Miller.

We'll get more clues on the health of the overall employment picture today when the government releases its January employment report. It will break at 8:30am ET on CNBC's "Squawk Box."

Stephanie is Squawk Box producer and senior NetNet retail correspondent. Follow her on twitter @StephLandsman

Obama signs Russia nuclear treaty documents

Associated Press - Wednesday February 2, 2011

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama pushed a key foreign policy goal a step closer to completion Wednesday with the signing of documents for a nuclear arms treaty with Russia.

The treaty is a cornerstone of Obama's efforts to "reset" U.S. relations with Russia.

AP – President Barack Obama signs the New START
Treaty in the Oval Office of the White House
in Washington, …

The New START treaty (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty), negotiated last year, limits each side to 1,550 strategic warheads, down from 2,200. The pact also re-establishes a monitoring system that ended in December 2009 with the expiration of an earlier arms deal.

Although Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and other administration officials had argued strongly and repeatedly that the treaty was a key foreign policy goal of the president's, he signed the documents in the Oval Office in the presence of news photographers only.

Obama also did not issue a statement afterward.

He was joined by Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry, D-Mass., and Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., the committee's top Republican, among others.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed similar documents last week after the treaty cleared Russia's parliament. The U.S. Senate approved the pact in late December after Obama and others lobbied hard for passage.

Ratification becomes final when the U.S. and Russia exchange the signed papers. Clinton and her Russian counterpart, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, are set to make the swap this weekend when they meet on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference in Germany.

U.S. hit by biggest storm since 60 years. 25 States affected

US hit by major snowstorm
Wednesday February 1, 2011
Source: France24
AFP - A massive winter storm began dumping fresh snow, ice and sleet across a huge swathe of the US early Tuesday, with bitter winds bringing an icy blast to some 100 million people, a third of the country.

High winds and freezing rain threatened to turn roads into deadly ice rinks and knock down trees and power lines and forecasts warned of dangerously cold temperatures.

Pre-dawn television footage showed heavy snow in the plains city of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and lightning and sleet pounding Dallas, Texas.

A snow figure sits on a bench
in New York's Central Park.
A massive winter storm has begun
dumping fresh snow, ice and
sleet across a huge swathe of
the US, with bitter winds bringing
an icy blast to some 100
million people.

Blizzard, winter storm and freezing rain warnings were issued for more than half of the country's 50 states, from North Dakota and Colorado down to New Mexico, then up through Texas, Kansas and Missouri to the Great Lakes region and across Pennsylvania to New England.

For Chicago, the National Weather Service said that the "dangerous, multifaceted and life threatening winter storm" with high winds and heavy snowfall would make travel "impossible" at times.

It offered residents an ominous warning: "Do not travel!"

The agency also warned that shoveling sidewalks during such a significant snowfall can be deadly, noting that more than 40 died of heart attacks in the aftermath of a 1999 blizzard in Chicago.

"Do not underestimate the task at hand," it said.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) urged residents to prepare in earnest for the fury of the storm.

"A storm of this size and scope needs to be taken seriously," said FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate, who warned that "it's critical that the public does its part to get ready."

A woman walks her dog in New York's
Central Park. The Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) urged residents
to prepare in earnest for the fury
of the storm as it barrels eastward
across the country.

Fugate urged residents in storm affected regions to "check on your neighbors, especially the elderly and young children -- those who can be most vulnerable during emergencies."

Scores of schools and government offices were already closed in anticipation of dangerous conditions.

Airport delays had already begun early Tuesday in the Midwest and Airlines had warned of significant travel interruptions, offering customers a chance to rebook flights at no fee.

The worst of the storm was expected Tuesday afternoon and evening as a large amount of moisture sucked up from the Gulf of Mexico feeds the huge system and is transformed into snow and thunderstorms.

Powerful winds and heavy snow could create white-out conditions and drifts as high as six to eight feet (1.8 to 2.4 meters).

"Lurking behind this impressive winter storm is a powerful shot of Arctic air as a frigid surface high drops down from central Canada," the National Weather Service warned.

Wind chills were forecast to drop to 30 to 50 below in Colorado, Wyoming, the Dakotas, Kansas, Idaho and even parts of Texas.

Officials warned the public to stay at home rather than try to brave the crippling and potentially record-breaking storm.

"It doesn't take a whole lot to make everything slick and if roads aren't treated they're going to get icy and then it's going to snow on top of that, which is going to make matters worse because you can't see the ice," Pat Slattery, a spokesman for the weather service, told AFP.

A woman navigates a large pile of snow
on Madison Avenue in New York on January 28.
A mammoth storm stretching from the US
heartland to the east coast is threatening
to dump mounds of fresh snow and ice on
an already winter-weary region,
weather forecasters said Monday.

"One of the concerns about the freezing precipitation is if it gets heavy and starts taking down power lines and trees because people have no way to keep their homes warm, and a bitter cold will follow right on the heels of the snow and freezing rain."

As much as 18 inches (45 centimeters) of snow was expected in the Chicago area and officials warned that plows would not be able keep the streets clear, making side streets impassable.

Gusts up to 60 miles per hour could also lead to flooding along the lake shore as waves build up to 25 feet.

Many other areas were predicted to get over a foot (30 centimeters) of snow.

"With weather systems like this it's not uncommon to see widespread power outages lasting for several days," said Joe Wainscott, head of Indiana's department of homeland security.

"While utility companies will be working as hard as they can to repair any outages, storms of this size and magnitude often make it very difficult to keep up."

The storm was to arrive just days after a rare thunder-snow storm paralyzed air and ground travel from Washington to Boston.

That storm blindsided the US capital at the height of the evening rush hour Thursday, not even sparing President Barack Obama, who faced travel delays upon returning from a day trip to the US Midwest.

U.S. and Chinese firms engaged in war over technology

U.S. Firms, China Are Locked in Major War Over Technology
By JOHN BUSSEY
Source: Wall Street Journal
A titanic battle is under way between U.S. business and China, a battle reflected in President Barack Obama's State of the Union address last week and destined to dominate relations between the two countries for years.

At issue: Innovation.

China's bureaucrats have been rolling out an array of interlocking regulations and state spending aimed at making their country a global technology powerhouse by 2020.

The new initiatives—shaped by rising nationalism and a belief that foreign companies unfairly dominate key technologies—range from big investments in national industries to patent laws that favor Chinese companies and mandates that essentially require foreign companies to transfer technology to China if they hope to sell in that market.

To hear U.S. business executives describe it, Beijing's mammoth new industrial policy is like the Borg in "Star Trek"—an enormous organic machine assimilating everything in its path, in this case the inventions of other nations. Notably, China's road map, which is enshrined in the "National Medium- and Long-Term Plan for the Development of Science and Technology (2006-2020)," talks in those terms. China will build its dominance by "enhancing original innovation through co-innovation and re-innovation based on the assimilation of imported technologies."

"It's a huge, long-term strategic issue," says a top executive at a U.S. technology firm operating in China. "It isn't just the crisis of the day for U.S. business. It's the crisis."

So it is that Mr. Obama, fresh from wrangling with Chinese President Hu Jintao over these issues, made U.S. innovation—China-beating innovation—a centerpiece of his State of the Union speech. China and India are "investing in research and new technologies," he warned. "We need to out-innovate, out-educate and out-build the rest of the world."

President Obama also wrested some concessions from President Hu during their summit last month, including getting China to scrub—or promise to scrub—new government-procurement lists that discriminate against foreign companies that don't design their products in China.

Spats over market access have been endemic to the U.S.-China business relationship from the start. But China's latest initiatives, which began getting traction at the end of 2009, have changed that game, revealing a much broader national battle plan for conquering global technologies.

Deluged by complaints from companies, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a business trade group, commissioned a report to measure the scope of China's actions. It found what it calls, in sometimes sparky language, an "intricate web" of new rules "considered by many international technology companies to be a blueprint for technology theft on a scale the world has never seen before."

The 44-page report, "China's Drive for 'Indigenous Innovation': A Web of Industrial Policies" (http://www.uschamber.com/reports/chinas-drive-indigenous-innovation-web-industrial-policies), maps the complex set of new initiatives that foreign companies face. The report received media attention when it was published last summer and then gathered steam over subsequent months, becoming a talking point in corporate and government offices globally in advance of recent negotiations with China.

"It's an outstanding piece of work," says Charlene Barshefsky, the top US trade negotiator in the Clinton administration. "It provided policy makers a far better understanding of China's policies than ever before."

It also sent up a warning flare over the broader business community. Representatives of companies as diverse as IBM, Praxair, Microsoft, Alstrom, Motorola, Cisco, Corning and Caterpillar got briefings. Chinese academics also lined up. And GE distributed the report to its senior management.

China says there's nothing threatening in its efforts: It simply wants to modernize. Developing homegrown technology is better than continuing to pay stiff royalty fees for foreign inventions, the Chinese ministries say. As for "re-innovating" or "assimilating" foreign technology, that's no different from what Japan and Western countries did when they industrialized, they add.

U.S. companies don't see it that way. They worry, for example, that China's new approval process is holding up products at the border as technicians examine designs with the intent of doing a little early "assimilating."

"We just connected the dots for the first time to show the scale of this industrial policy," says James McGregor, the author of the report and a senior counselor for APCO Worldwide in Beijing. (Mr. McGregor was also the Wall Street Journal's bureau chief and corporate representative in China during the 1990s.) "I had no idea this amount of stuff was going on, including the turn back toward emphasizing state industries."

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Which puts Mr. Hu's promises to President Obama in context. China's commitment to its broad new program— "the government's highest strategic economic priority," the Chamber says—overwhelms any incremental market concession.

In the innovation race, China is thinking long term—and big. Its goal isn't just to tinker with foreign technology. It plans to supplant it.

As any competitor might.

Joseph Bates' vision about computers

Innovator: Joseph Bates
Processors are very accurate. An MIT computer scientist says making them more error-prone could mean faster, more powerful computers
Source: Bloomberg Business Week
By Drake Bennett
What's the square root of 10? If you had to do it in your head, you might say "a little more than three." Computers, unlike humans, don't do back-of-the-envelope calculations. They just crunch the numbers to the last requested decimal place.

Joseph Bates, however, thinks we'd be better off if we were to let computers make some mistakes. Bates, 55, a computer scientist at Carnegie Mellon and the MIT Media Lab, has designed a chip that does what computer engineers call "sloppy arithmetic," or guesstimating. Slightly inaccurate chips would be "much, much littler and much, much more efficient" than current chips, he says. Accurate calculation is a series of discrete tasks, such as carrying numbers when summing figures, that take up valuable processing power. By ignoring some of those tasks, Bates's chip, he predicts, would have something like 100,000 times the computing power of a traditional processor.

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With an error range around 1 percent, Bates's chip wouldn't be wildly inaccurate: One plus one might equal 2.02. In many applications, the resulting errors would either be imperceptible or automatically corrected. In digital photography and medical imaging, for instance, errors in the range of 1 percent would be invisible to the human eye. With other tasks, such as needle-in-a-haystack searches for particular images or sound files, Bates's chip could rifle through enormous databases, winnowing the list down to a few candidates for a more deliberate processor—or human being—to pick from. Bates foresees his chips being paired with traditional Intel (INTC)-style chips for this purpose. The result: smartphones with the computing power of desktops, and desktops with the power of supercomputers.

While he hasn't fabricated a sloppy chip yet, Bates sees the engineering as fairly basic. There's a consensus among chip engineers that, as Bob Colwell, formerly the chief designer of Intel's Pentium chips, puts it, "whatever challenges are down the hardware path are probably overcome-able." Bates says several companies are looking at the technology, though nondisclosure agreements prevent him from naming them.

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Bates's central research interest has always been artificial intelligence—like many researchers, he came to the topic by reading Isaac Asimov as a boy. Growing up in Baltimore, he skipped high school and went to Johns Hopkins University at 13. In some of his earliest research, he tried to get computers to think like creative human mathematicians, to do the equivalent of word problems rather than the abstract language of sets and equations. His turn to sloppy arithmetic follows in this vein: Part of its promise is that it could help computers act more like the human brain, which takes all sorts of shortcuts to answer problems. "By allowing things to be approximate, you're a lot closer" to achieving true artificial intelligence, says Bates.

The private sector created 187,000 jobs

Economic Report
Feb. 2, 2011, 9:05 a.m. EST
U.S. private-sector payrolls up 187,000: ADP
Source: Market Watch
By Ruth Mantell, MarketWatch

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — Private-sector employment rose in January, and “strength was evident” in all major industries and sizes of business, according to Automatic Data Processing Inc.’s employment report released Wednesday.

The ADP report showed that private-sector employment rose 187,000, with the service-producing sector gaining 166,000 and the goods-producing sector increasing 21,000.

Employment rose 97,000 at small businesses, 79,000 at medium businesses and 11,000 at large businesses.

For December, ADP reported that private payrolls gained 247,000, compared with a prior estimate of 297,000.

“According to this measure, employment is accelerating and while January’s addition is less than December’s, we remain of the belief that employment gains will continue over the course of the year,” wrote Dan Greenhaus, chief economic strategist with Miller Tabak, in a research note.

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On Friday, the government will report on January’s nonfarm payrolls, which also include government workers. Economists polled by MarketWatch are looking for a gain of 140,000, and for the unemployment rate to rise to 9.5%. See economic calendar. For December, the government reported that nonfarm payrolls gained 103,000, while the unemployment rate fell to 9.4%.

The ADP report echoes other recent positive jobs data. On Tuesday, the Institute for Supply Management reported that a gauge of manufacturing employment rose in January. Read more about manufacturing.

Elsewhere Wednesday, outplacement consultancy Challenger, Gray & Christmas reported that employers announced plans to cut almost 39,000 jobs in January, down from about 71,000 job cuts a year earlier.

Ruth Mantell is a MarketWatch reporter based in Washington.