There must be some serious teeth-grinding going on among Facebook executives today after their product received a lower customer satisfaction rating than the IRS’s e-filing program in the American Customer Satisfaction Index E-Business Report (see the survey results here). Larry Freed, president and CEO of ForeSee Results, which produced the report, noted that “privacy concerns; frequent changes to the website; and commercialization and advertising adversely affect the [Facebook] consumer experience.”

Not what Zuckerberg and Co. want to hear. But if they can get past the sting of being outclassed by the IRS, they can take some comfort in the fact that tax authorities worldwide may soon be among their most enthusiastic customers. more

The news yesterday that Nokia Siemens Networks will purchase Motorola’s network equipment business for $1.2 billion is one sign of an emerging trend in M&A: the increase in midmarket deals.

To be sure, the first half of the year was sluggish for all mergers and acquisitions. A total of 2,969 deals were completed in the first five months of 2010, slightly below the 3,065 for the same time period if 2009 and nearly 40 percent of the 4,754 that were closed in 2007, PricewaterhouseCoopers reports. more

You might think that, given the country’s notoriously high income tax rates (both personal and corporate), few companies would be knocking on the doors to set up shop in France and domestic businesses might well be lining up to pull out.

Au contraire. Despite its high tax burden, France is among the best countries in the world in which to start or expand a business, according to a story today in IndustryWeek. more

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