For Boeing, 2005 is a record year for airplane orders
Seattle, USA: The Boeing Company recorded 1,002 net commercial airplane orders during 2005, which is a new Boeing record for total orders in a single year.

The 2005 total surpasses the previous Boeing record of 877 net orders in 1988, which includes both Boeing and then-McDonnell Douglas totals, with the companies having merged in 1997. Boeing posted 272 net orders for commercial airplanes in 2004.

Fresh orders finalized since Dec 20, 2005, also include 68 737, 777 and 787 airplanes for Air India.

"Clearly, 2005 was an incredible year for our customers and for Boeing," said Alan Mulally, Boeing Commercial Airplanes president and chief executive officer. "We continued to stay focused on bringing efficiency and value to the airlines of the world through world-class services and airplanes that fly passengers how they want to fly -- point-to-point, nonstop, with more frequencies and more choices."
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IBM too moves away from traditional pension plans
San Francisco: Becoming yet another U.S. company to move away from a traditional pension plan, IBM said on Thursday that it intends to save billions of dollars by freezing its current retirement policies and will instead boost its 401(k) savings offering for employees.

International Business Machines Corp. said the changes would affect existing employees and fresh recruits but not the 125,000 current U.S. retirees, former employees with vested benefits or employees who retire before January 1, 2008.

In freezing its US$48bn pension plan, IBM has said it could save up to US$3bn over five years. IBM rival Hewlett-Packard Co. decided in 2004 to offer only a 401(k) to U.S. employees hired from 2006.

IBM said changes to the U.S. plans and changes under consideration in other countries would save US$450mn to US$500mn for 2006 and between US$2.5bn to US$3bn for 2006 through 2010, based on year-end 2005 pension assumptions. IBM has more than 329,000 employees worldwide.

The information and technology company said it would redesign its 401(k) savings plan to give current participants an annual company-funded contribution of as much as 10 percent of their pay.
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Howard Stern gets US$220mn in Sirius Radio shares
New York: Howard Stern has been awarded US$220mn worth of shares in the satellite radio company Sirius Satellite Radio. The company's offering to Stern comes on the back of Sirius tripling its subscriber base to 3.3 million listeners during 2005.

The company attributes a big part of the jump in subscriber base to Stern's high-profile signing for a five-year contract in October 2004. He begins his show with Sirius on Monday after working out his contract with Infinity Broadcasting, until recently a part of Viacom.

Stern's shows have earned notoriety and observers expect much more to be on offer now, for federal decency rules do not apply on satellite.

Sirius and rival service XM Satellite Radio Holdings can be received across the United States and offer more than 100 channels of commercial-free stations. Both services need special radio receivers and charge US$12.95 a month.

XM on Wednesday said it had signed up almost 6 million listeners but Sirius is closing the gap and beat its rival in the race to sign up listeners for the first time in the fourth quarter. The two have been competing to hire high-profile radio personalities.
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S&P lowers ratings for Ford and its credit arm
New York: Standard & Poor's Ratings Services on Thursday lowered Ford Motor Co.'s corporate credit rating further, citing concerns about the company's ability to turn around its North American operations. S&P also downgraded Ford's financial arm, Ford Motor Credit Co.

The agency downgraded the ratings from BB+ to BB- and assigned Ford a negative outlook. S&P first lowered Ford into non-investment grade status last year. The No. 2 U.S. automaker lost US$284mn worldwide and US$1.2bn in North America in the third quarter. Even as its health care and labor costs have been rising, the company has also been losing U.S. market share at the same time.

S&P said weakened sales of mid-size and large sport utility vehicles have particularly hurt Ford, which depended on those products more heavily than other automakers.

Ford is expected to announce job cuts and plant closures when it reports its fourth-quarter earnings on Jan. 23. It will be the company's second major restructuring plan in four years.

S&P said it will take Ford several years -- at best -- to turn around its North American automotive business. S&P said Ford's consolidated debt totals $141.7 billion and the company has $19.6 billion in cash.
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