Microsoft bets on cloud services

19 October 2010 Last updated at 14:49 ET By Maggie Shiels Technology reporter, BBC News, Silicon Valley

Microsoft has ramped up its battle with Google in wooing business customers with its next generation cloud-based product.

While the software giant dominates the office space with a 94% market share it has been facing increased competition from Google.

At a San Francisco event, Microsoft unveiled Office 365.

The product brings together Microsoft Office, SharePoint Online, Exchange Online and Lync Online.

This means instead of paying for packaged software and installing it on a PC or corporate server, Microsoft will host and deliver the software from its own giant data centres.

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This is really changing the way [Microsoft] make money via a subscription service and represents a big change in the way they sell things"

End Quote Ina Fried CNET.com

"We are at a pivot point in the adoption of cloud services," said Kurt DelBene, president of Microsoft's Office division.

"Customers will get the best of everything we know about productivity, 365 days a year."

Microsoft said it has around 40 million customers using one of its cloud-based services.

"The desktop or on-premises services are still king, where customers run their own software and their own data centre," Chris Capossela, senior vice president at Microsoft told BBC News.

"That is still the vast majority of the industry but it is moving rapidly. Office 365 offers the opportunity for Microsoft to reach more of those small and mid-sized customers who don't have the people to run their own IT services and now we can say you don't need them."

For the smallest customer, Office 365 will be available for $6 per user a month. For larger enterprises, the service will include added features such as phone support, and will cost between $2 per user per month to more than $20 per user per month.

"This is a big deal for Microsoft," said Ina Fried from technology news site CNET.com.

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We believe we will win by out-innovating our competitors and even by out-innovating ourselves,"

End Quote Chris Capossela Senior vice president, Microsoft

"They make most of their money from two products - Windows and Office. This is really changing the way they make money via a subscription service and represents a big change in the way they sell things.

"They only get paid when people upgrade and this product allows them to get paid on a more consistent basis," added Ms Fried.

'Head to head'

The battle for the office software market has intensified with Google offering its own suite of networked applications.

While a number of products like email and spreadsheets are free, businesses can also pay for premium versions. Google's share of the market has been estimated at 4%.

Other competitors include Salesforce and IBM.

Microsoft began offering its popular software as cloud services a couple of years ago in large part to respond to a trend championed by Google.

"We believe we will win by out-innovating our competitors and even by out-innovating ourselves," said Mr Capossela.

CNET's Ms Fried said: "This actually puts them more head to head with Google."

Providing Office as an online service will mean that Outlook exchange and document programmes that have been fixtures on business networks will now be accessible through smartphones, tablet computers and other gadgets used by a mobile workforce.

Jim Smith, a senior director of intranet services for Starwood Hotels, said moving to the cloud has really paid off.

"We have made tremendous savings especially in travel. We have over 1,000 hotels in our portfolio and it is virtually impossible for our senior leaders to travel to all these different properties.

"Now they can connect and collaborate remotely and share documents, calendars and have discussions and hold virtual meetings without having to buy that air ticket or take time out of the office," said Mr Smith.

Office 365 is available now in beta in 13 countries including the US, Canada, the UK, France, Japan, Mexico and Germany.

The product will go on sale next year.

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Users 'should get paid for data'

19 October 2010 Last updated at 04:03 ET By Maggie Shiels Technology reporter, BBC News, Silicon Valley

Companies that want to make use of the personal information people put online should pay for it, the US Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) has said.

It made the statement as it released a list of five technology trends to watch for the year ahead.

Privacy was top of the list, which also included mobile and green technology.

"The mining of personal data is here to stay; there is just too much money at stake to imagine otherwise," said Sean Murphy, of the organisation.

"Privacy is only going to continue to get increased attention in the years and months to come," said Mr Murphy who authored the report Selling The Stories Or Our Lives: Technology and Privacy.

Privacy has become a hot topic for net firms with a series of high-profile incidents over the last 12 months. The latest high profile glitch involved the leaking of data from some of the most popular applications on Facebook.

The Wall Street Journal claimed apps sent details to dozens of advertisers and companies that track what people are doing online.

Facebook said that it would introduce new technology to limit the security breach.

Mr Murphy said that there were companies which wanted to give users control of their data and allow those people willing to give their information away a chance to make money from it.

"I haven't seen a successful business model yet but I reckon in the next year we will see people doing the behind the scenes work and aggregating this dossier of yourself and giving you something in exchange for it.

"Companies will embrace it because it becomes more of a transaction where the consumer is authorising the use of their information and carrying out a business deal," added Mr Murphy.

'Economic opportunity'

The report highlighted one start-up firm in favour of this approach.

Bynamite launched software earlier this year to let users find out which sites are tracking them online.

"There should be an economic opportunity on the consumer side," Ginsu Yoon, co-founder of the firm said in the report.

"In a few years...a person's profile of interests could be the basis for micropayments or discounts."

Consumer Watchdog, an advocacy group, said it had no trouble with such a scheme as long as users are fully aware of what they are doing.

"That is the key to the whole thing," the group's John Simpson told BBC News.

"If people are fully informed, have control of their data and choose to opt in to some sort of scheme that offers payments for sharing information or price reductions, then I think that is fine.

"The problem is that right now so much of this is done in the dark with online companies effectively looking over your shoulder while you are online and have no idea your information is being shared."

The CEA's Mr Murphy has also suggested government action is needed in the form of a major public awareness campaign to help users become better informed because so many are largely unaware of what they willingly share online and how the information can be used.

A poll by CEA showed that identity theft was the number one concern among respondents followed by the security of financial transactions and personal health records.

'Connectivity is the future'

The CEA, which hosts the world's biggest consumer electronics show in Las Vegas, said the other tech trends that will impact our future include how video will be delivered to users, advances in mobile broadband and 4G, the latest in green technology and the cottage industry of apps for numerous devices.

"One of the over-arching themes of the trends we covered is the importance of connectivity and having these devices integrated to create the seamless experience for the consumer," said Shawn Dubravac, chief economist and director of research for the CEA.

"The average household in the US owns 24 consumer products from multiple TVs, phones and computing devices from laptops to desktops to tablets. The next step in all of this is pulling these pieces together to create this seamless experience so the consumer, the end user, can toggle between all these devices.

"That means if you are reading a book on a mobile phone, you can put it down and pick up exactly where you left off when you go to read it on your tablet device. Connectivity is the future of technology," added Mr Dubravac.

Industry commentator Jon Healey, an editorial writer for the Los Angeles Times, said, for him, making devices more social was important.

"The emergence of social as a function on more and more devices, as a guide as an activity is the most important trend.

"It really does change the nature of who programmers are. For example when you think about what to watch on TV today, you are guided by people at TV studios.

"What we are seeing more and more in the content industries is that you will choose who is going to guide you by assembling friends you trust, people you admire, people you emulate.

This would influence interfaces, he said, so that they say "here is what your friends are watching, here is what they have added to their collection.

"That is a very different approach," said Mr Healey.

Holiday high

Despite the slow climb out of recession, the CEA is optimistic about the coming holiday season.

Mr Dubravac is predicting healthy sales in the fourth quarter and noted that "portability is going to play a big role in who wins and who loses this holiday season".

He said the product categories that will sell well include tablet computers, because they are a relatively new toy to the market and MP3 players.

Mr Dubravac also predicted connected TV's getting some traction as well as set top boxes and new accessories for games consoles such as the PlayStation and XBox.

"I would argue that this recession has highlighted that technology has moved from a pure luxury item to, in some instances, a necessity," said Mr Dubravac.

"An individual who is out of work is not going to give up their mobile phone because that phone is their lifeline to that next job. Many of these technologies have become so integrated into our lives that we forgo other things in our life like dining out and vacations.

"Technology is a part of our lives as we know it today," he added.

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Website to whet wildlife appetite

19 October 2010 Last updated at 07:03 ET By Richard Black Environment correspondent, BBC News, Nagoya, Japan

The UN Environment Programme is turning to the wiki-world in an attempt to improve protection of the natural one.

Its new venture - protectedplanet.net - aims to help people visit little-known protected areas, so generating revenue and improving knowledge about them.

The launch at the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) meeting came amid reports warning that protection of the sea needs to be increased rapidly.

A target to protect 10% of oceans by 2012 will be missed by a long way.

Protected areas are one of the most effective ways of safeguarding plants, animals and ecosystems, said Charles Besancon, head of the protected areas programme at the UN Environment Programme (Unep).

"We know national parks and protected areas are important for many functions - they provide fresh water to one-third of the world's largest urban areas, they protect carbon, they protect endangered species," he told BBC News.

"For example, the last 600 mountain gorillas are in protected areas surrounded by communities - without the protected areas, we'd lose the mountain gorilla."

Unep maintains a database of protected areas around the world, based on data from governments and other authorities.

But with an estimated 150,000 sites in existence, data on what is in the sites and how they are protected is, in many cases, scanty.

"[The database] doesn't get updated as much as we'd like; so we've recognised that the best way is to reach out to the public," said Mr Besancon.

Park life

Protectedplanet.net links into and from existing web-based resources, such as Google maps, Wikipedia and the Google-owned photo-sharing site Panoramio.

Species information comes from the less well-known Global Biodiversity Information Facility (Gbif).

Users can search for sites close to a holiday destination, for example - and may find there are protected areas or national parks that do not usually feature in tourist itineraries.

Unep hopes this will increase the number of people visiting such sites, generating revenue that can help with their upkeep.

It will also allow first-time visitors to create Wikipedia entries on the areas, or post photos, that can attract others.

Meanwhile, public feedback on how sites are managing their wildlife could enhance standards.

Protecting land and sea features in a number of targets agreed under the Convention on Biological Diversity.

But whereas about 13% of the Earth's land area is now under some form of protection, the record for marine areas is barely 1% - way short of the 10% by 2012 target, for example.

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It is certainly the worst coral die-off we have seen since 1998"

End Quote Andrew Baird James Cook University

In a major report launched here, a number of organisations including the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) say that needs to be increased rapidly.

Failing to do so, they warn, will make it harder for marine ecosystems to survive in a world where ocean water is becoming on average warmer and more acidic as a consequence of greenhouse gas emissions.

As the report was being launched here, scientists were warning that coral reefs in Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean are seeing a major die-off due to unusually warm water conditions.

The Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, a network of university research facilities, said the warming caused coral "bleaching" in Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Burma and Sri Lanka.

"It is certainly the worst coral die-off we have seen since 1998," said Andrew Baird, a scientist at James Cook University.

"It may prove to be the worst such event known to science."

Warm water causes coral to expel the algae with which they usually live in a symbiotic relationship - without which they die.

The unusually high temperatures of 1998 were caused by El Nino conditions in combination with the gradual warming attributable to greenhouse gas emissions.

Francois Simard, deputy head of IUCN's Marine Programme and an author on the new report, suggested the issues of climate change and marine protection were closely linked.

"Marine life is under threat, that's absolutely clear - and (with warming and acidification) it's not a matter of management of the sea, it's a matter of management of our activities as human beings, of our emissions.

"But at least we should take care of what we have in a proper way."

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Top Microsoft executive resigns

18 October 2010 Last updated at 18:41 ET

Ray Ozzie, chief software architect of Microsoft and proponent of cloud computing, has resigned unexpectedly.

Mr Ozzie was a top member of the company's management, having taken over the software role from Bill Gates.

Chief executive Steve Ballmer announced his colleague's departure in an email to company staff.

He said Mr Ozzie would remain with Microsoft during a transitional period, and that the company was not looking for anyone to replace him.

Microsoft shares dropped 2.2% in after-hours trading on the news.

Unknown direction

"With our progress in services and the cloud now full speed ahead in all aspects of our business, Ray and I are announcing today Ray's intention to step down from his role as chief software architect," said Mr Ballmer in his email.

He added that Mr Ozzie would focus on "the broader area of entertainment, where Microsoft has many ongoing investments".

Nonetheless, his resignation may cast some doubt over the technological direction Microsoft will take next.

Mr Ozzie's decision to step down also follows a number of other senior departures at the company.

Business head Stephen Elop left in September to head up Nokia, while entertainment and devices head Robbie Bach is also planning to leave.

Cloud computing

Mr Ozzie joined the firm in 2005 as chief technology officer after his own company was bought out by Microsoft.

A year after his arrival, he successfully pushed the software leviathan towards tackling the challenge of the internet, by adopting "cloud computing" technology.

Microsoft traditionally focused on desktop computers, but Mr Ozzie convinced management that in the future, processing power and functionality would be provided remotely via the web.

Previously, he also designed the Lotus Notes system, which allows groups to share documents and emails.

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Apple shares fall despite profits

18 October 2010 Last updated at 17:33 ET

Apple shares dropped 7% in after-hours trading, despite reporting expectations-beating profits of $4.3bn (�2.7bn) for the last quarter.

The net income figure - announced after the close of trading in New York - was up 70% on a year earlier, and beat expectations of $3.8bn.

But the company's stock responded by falling sharply.

Apple's shares have hit historic highs lately, and the drop may be due to speculators selling to lock in profits.

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Trading on the Nasdaq exchange closed just before the results were announced, with Apple's shares at $318.30, up more than 50% since March.

iPads flat

The after-hours selloff may also have been influenced by underwhelming sales of Apple's new tablet computer - the iPad, which came it at just 4.2 million.

That represents a rise of just 28% on the previous quarter, which was when the company first launched the new product.

However, Apple can take solace that iPhone sales were not hit by bad publicity over antenna problems with the newly-launched iPhone 4.

The firm sold 14.1 million of its smart phones in the quarter.

Total revenues for the quarter rose 67% to $20.3bn, topping already high expectations by $1bn, thanks largely to the strong iPhone sales.

Sales of its Macintosh computers were up 27% on a year ago, while those of its iPod were down 11% - partly because the latter has been superseded by the iPhone.

The company revised its revenues forecast for the current quarter up to $23bn.

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Violent images &#39;boost aggression&#39;

18 October 2010 Last updated at 20:10 ET

Repeated viewing of violent scenes in films, television or video games could make teenagers behave more aggressively, US research suggests.

The National Institutes of Health study of 22 boys aged 14 to 17 found that showing dozens of violent clips appeared to blunt brain responses.

Dr Jordan Grafman said it might make aggression feel more "acceptable".

However, a UK expert said the reasons behind violence were too complex to be explained by laboratory research.

The effect of violent imagery on young people has been debated from the early days of television, and, more recently, that debate has expanded to include video games.

Various studies have suggested that exposure appears to have an effect on the way that the brain processes emotional responses, yet it is unclear whether this can have a direct impact on behaviour.

The US study, published in the journal Social Cognitive & Affective Neuroscience, involved 60 violent scenes from videos being collated, mostly involving street brawling and fist fights.

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"Start Quote

The suggestion is that, over a period of time, people can develop a kind of tolerance to these images - but another word for that is just boredom"

End Quote Professor David Buckingham Director of the Centre for the Study of Children, Youth and Media

The violence was ranked "low", "mild" or "moderate", and there were no "extreme" scenes.

The response of the boys as they watched the clips was measured in a number of ways.

They were asked to rate whether they thought each clip was more or less aggressive than the one which preceded it, and were brain scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging, which shows in real time which areas of the brain are active.

In addition, electrodes attached to the fingers detected increasing sweat - a sign of an emotional response.

The longer the boys watched videos, particularly the mild or moderate ones, the less they responded to the violence within them.

In particular, an area of the brain known as the lateral orbitofrontal cortex, thought to be involved in emotional processing, showed less activity to each clip as time went on.

'Social problem'

Dr Grafman said: "Exposure to the most violent videos inhibits emotional reactions to similar aggressive videos over time and implies that normal adolescents will feel fewer emotions over time as they are exposed to similar videos."

He said that this could actually produce more violent reactions from the teenager.

"The implications of this include the idea that continued exposure to violent videos will make an adolescent less sensitive to violence, more accepting of violence, and more likely to commit aggressive acts since the emotional component associated with aggression is reduced and normally acts as a brake on aggressive behaviour."

However, another academic said it was almost impossible to explain violence in these terms.

Professor David Buckingham, the director of the Centre for the Study of Children, Youth and Media, said that violence was a "social problem" with many contributing factors, not simply a matter of looking at how the brain worked.

"The suggestion is that, over a period of time, people can develop a kind of tolerance to these images - but another word for that is just boredom.

"This debate has been going on since before we were all born. In the 19th Century people were panicking about the effect of 'Penny Dreadfuls'.

"If we are truly interested in violence and aggression, rather than blaming the media for everything wrong in the world, we need to look at what motivates it in real life."

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UK net is "not ready" for future

18 October 2010 Last updated at 03:25 ET

The UK is slowly climbing up the broadband world rankings, but is still not "ready for tomorrow," according to a global study of net services.

The annual report, commissioned by network giant Cisco, looks at how well countries are doing in terms of both quality and penetration of net services.

The UK is now ranked 18th out of 72 countries, up from 25th place last year.

South Korea is once again ranked first.

The annual study, conducted by the University of Oxford's Said Business School and the University of Oviedo in Spain looks at a range of factors, including both the number of homes to have broadband and the quality of the services.

Quality, for the purposes of the study, encompasses the speed of the connection and the latency - the amount of time it takes data to arrive at a machine.

It put 14countries in the elite category of being ready for the "applications of tomorrow", including the obvious; Korea, Japan and Sweden and the less obvious; Latvia, Bulgaria and Portugal.

In 2008, when the first study was commissioned, only one country - Japan - was judged ready for tomorrow.

The applications ascribed to tomorrow's internet include high definition internet TV and high-quality video communications.

The report found that such applications would require an average download speed of 11Mbps and an upload speed of 5Mbps.

The average global upload speed currently is just 1.7Mbps.

In this year's report the UK is categorised as "comfortably enjoying today's applications", alongside 19 others including the USA, France, Canada, Greece and Poland.

A further 19 countries - including Vietnam, Egypt, China and India, are characterised as being "below today's application threshold" while five countries - Algeria, Peru, Nigeria, Kenya and Angola - are viewed as having only the most basic of services.

The report finds that average broadband speeds in the UK now stand at 6.4Mbps (megabits per second), which is more than double that in 2008, when the first report was compiled.

It is also above the global average of 5.9Mbps.

"The UK is not on average ready for tomorrow but there has been significant improvements in the last two years," said Fernando Gil de Bernabe, a senior director at Cisco.

Mr de Bernabe said the UK was likely to experience a "step-change" in its broadband footprint over the next 12 months, because of increased fibre optic roll-outs from BT and extensions of Virgin Media's cable network.

"Where similar fibre roll-outs have happened the download speeds improved by 50 or 60% in just one year," he said.

Those countries which are categorised as ready for tomorrow in the report have one thing in common, according to Mr de Bernabe.

"There is a clear digital strategy. These countries have placed a bet on broadband and think it will have the same impact on their economies as the infrastructures of the past. They want a society that is based on knowledge," he said.

The UK government has ambitions to be the best broadband economy in Europe by 2015, although it has so far only committed to the rollout of basic 2Mbps broadband by that date.

That decision could mean the UK falls foul of European legislation. The European Union wants member states to provide citizens with a minimum of 30Mbps broadband by 2020, with all nations offering basic broadband - generally regarded as 2Mbps - for all by 2013.

Mr de Bernabe said the UK needed to put its pledge into practise.

"What I hear repeatedly is the question about who is going to pay for it. The leadership countries aren't asking those questions," he said.

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Cyber crime among top UK threats

18 October 2010 Last updated at 07:24 ET <!-- Embedding the video player --> <!-- This is the embedded player component -->

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Home Secretary Theresa May: International terrorism and cyber attacks are key threats

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Attacks on computer networks are among the biggest threats to the UK, Theresa May has said ahead of the publication of a new National Security Strategy.

Cyber terrorism was a "new and growing" danger, the home secretary said.

The BBC has learned there will be new money to bolster cyber security, focused on protecting critical infrastructure and defence assets.

The strategy will form the background for Tuesday's Strategic Defence Review, with defence cuts of 8% expected.

The National Security Council, set up by David Cameron in May, is publishing an updated approach to national security which identifies 16 threats to the UK.

The most serious - which they are calling "Tier 1" - comprises acts of international terrorism, hostile computer attacks on UK cyberspace, a major accident or natural hazard such as a flu pandemic, or an international military crisis between states that draws in the UK and its allies.

Intelligence priority

Speaking ahead of the strategy's launch in the Commons on Monday afternoon, Mrs May said she was not prepared to rank these in order of gravity but acknowledged they were of a "different nature" to other potential threats.

On terrorism, she said the threat level to the UK had been at severe - which means an attack is likely - for "some time".

"We are facing a very serious threat from international terrorism... we must all be vigilant," she told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

Rather than focusing on different areas in isolation, she said the security strategy had looked at the overall picture "in the round" and as part of the exercise, officials had identified attacks on government and business IT systems as as a "new and growing threat".

The BBC's security correspondent Frank Gardner said ministers were likely to announce �500m of new money to bolster cyber security, amid evidence that hundreds of malicious e-mails were already being aimed at government computer networks each month.

This would combat concerns that terrorist groups might be able to hack into critical infrastructure such as air traffic control networks and over cases of "cyber espionage" where rogue groups or even foreign states seek to break into computer systems to obtain top secret information.

There would also be extra protection for online business transactions from fraud and theft.

Ahead of Wednesday's Spending Review, Mrs May said the Home Office had to "play its part" in cutting spending to deal with the deficit, stressing that the police could make savings without hitting officers on the beat by cutting bureaucracy and increased collaboration between forces.

While welcoming efforts to tackle cyber attacks, Labour - which developed the first national security strategy in 2008 - said the plan offered little new.

"The government seem to be producing a reheated security strategy to provide cover for a rushed defence review rather that producing a renewed and careful consideration of the UK's defence and security priorities," said shadow foreign secretary Yvette Cooper.

'Re-do' defence?

Two days away from the spending review, Defence Secretary Liam Fox has said personnel numbers in the armed forces will "fall a bit" in future but there would be no weakening of the UK's strategic position.

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Bill Gates: ''People depend on the reliability of the internet''

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The Treasury had wanted cuts of between 10% and 20% to the Ministry of Defence's budget, but it is understood that Mr Fox has negotiated this down to 8%.

The Conservative MP Bernard Jenkin, who is chairman of the Commons Public Administration Committee, said it was difficult to see how an effective National Security Strategy could be developed against the backdrop of cuts.

"We seem to be operating under the imperative of deficit reduction," he said.

"But, there's very little in what's being done now that reflects deep and sustained analysis about what sort of country we want to be in 10 or 20 years time."

In a new report, the cross-party committee said there was a lack of strategic thinking at the heart of government over security, defence and foreign policy and a tendency to "muddle through" rather than be forward thinking.

"And the SDSR [strategic defence and security review] is a case in point because the Ministry of Defence should have done the work, saying 'look, if we are going to have to live within a much smaller envelope, how do we completely re-do the way we do defence?'.

"Instead it's just been about 'what do we have to cut? What do we hang on to and what do we cut?'."

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Satellite to demonstrate UK tech

18 October 2010 Last updated at 04:51 ET By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News

The UK is going to develop a satellite to trial innovative space technologies.

It is hoped the components and instruments flying on TechDemoSat (TDS) can prove their worth and go on to win substantial international business.

Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL) will lead the project.

Payload participants are likely to include a novel instrument to measure the state of the sea, another to track ships from orbit, and even one to destroy TDS at the end of its life.

The latter is a "sail" that would be deployed from the satellite to force it out of the sky to burn up in the Earth's atmosphere. Efficient technologies to retire defunct spacecraft are expected to have big markets in the future.

The core mission design of TDM is being funded with a grant of �770,000 from the UK government's Technology Strategy Board (TSB) and the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA).

Assuming that all goes well, a further �2,730,000 will be released to move the project into the build and test phase.

"One of our key philosophies is to help companies overcome barriers to market," said the TSB's Michael Lawrence.

"There are a number of British-based space companies out there that have great technology but they need to demonstrate it in orbit. Hopefully, this initiative will help them prove the technology works and that will open up commercial markets for them," he told BBC News.

Reflected GPS signals

TechDemoSat will have a challenging timetable. SSTL wants to be able to ship the satellite to the launch pad in 18 months' time.

All the companies and academic institutions hoping to fly payloads must pay their own costs.

The participants, while still under final selection, are expected to include Com Dev Europe, SSTL, Selex Galileo, Qinetiq, Aero Sekur, RAL Space, Oxford University, University of Surrey, Leicester University, MSSL and the Langton Star Centre (which will be providing a UK schools experiment).

One of the biggest proposed payloads at 7.5kg is SSTL's own - an Earth observation instrument designed to measure the state of the ocean.

"It makes use of the fact that there are a lot of GPS signals coming down from space and these get reflected off the ocean's surface. The instrument can intercept them to infer things about the sea state. So depending on whether the water is choppy or smooth, you get a different type of return signal," explained Doug Liddle, SSTL's head of science.

One of the smallest payloads, weighing just 750g, is being provided by Selex Galileo. This is a sugar-cube-sized gyroscope that can sense the orientation of the spacecraft.

Aero Sekur is behind the space sail. It takes the form of a deployable membrane. Residual air molecules still present in the spacecraft's low-Earth orbit will catch the sheet and pull TDS out of the sky much faster than would normally be the case - certainly, within the international 25-year-guideline recommended for redundant space hardware.

It is hoped the TechDemoSat project can emulate the Mosaic (Micro Satellite Applications in Collaboration) programme of a decade ago.

Then, �11m of public investment in spacecraft projects led by SSTL ultimately resulted in the company winning almost �300m in export business.

Launch funds

It is just the sort of initiative recommended by the recent Space Innovation and Growth Strategy (Space-IGS) which set out a 20-year plan to maximise the potential of the UK's highly successful space sector.

There are more payload ideas in British industry and academia than can be accommodated on the demonstrator, and Michael Lawrence said it was possible the opportunity could be repeated in the future.

"We'll need to see how this one works - if it delivers to time, to budget," he said. "There will be many factors to consider, but if this goes the way we want it to then I would hope there will be a TechDemoSat-2."

One matter which still needs to be resolved is how TDS-1 gets into orbit.

With the TSB/SEEDA funding and the payload participants carrying their own costs, there is sufficient cash to get the satellite built - but not launched.

The cost of a ride to space for a 150kg spacecraft like TDS can be about �2.5m if the spacecraft shares the rocket with a group of other satellites. This is an issue the UK Space Agency will have to address in due course.

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk

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Internet use campaign under way

17 October 2010 Last updated at 21:20 ET

A major drive to get more people to use the internet has started, with the aim of persuading reluctant users that the web can save them money and time.

The BBC will be involved in the Get Online campaign, which will see some celebrities going online for the first time.

More than nine million Britons have never used the internet, and they tend to be more elderly and less well-off.

Events promoting web use will take place across the UK.

Web training

BBC technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones says the campaign will hammer home a simple message, that the internet can save you money.

Research by UK Online Centres, which was set up by the government to provide public access to computers, found that a third of new internet users reckoned they had already saved more than �100 by being online.

Among the events, companies including Google and McDonalds will descend on Bridlington in Yorkshire to offer free web training in a town where one in four people are not online.

BBC programmes will also take part, with Sir Terry Wogan acting as a web ambassador and a character in Radio 4's The Archers having their first computer lesson.

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