eBay reaches deal to sell Skype

Online auction site eBay has agreed to sell the majority of internet phone company Skype for about $2bn (£1.2bn).

Skype is to be majority-owned by a group of private investors, including Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen and private equity firms.

EBay will keep a 35% stake in the firm, which it has been trying to sell for some time. It has said that Skype had “limited synergies” with it.

The deal values Skype at $2.75bn. EBay bought Skype for $2.6bn in 2005.
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‘More growth’ for China factories

China’s manufacturing sector continued to recover in August, two separate monthly surveys have indicated.

The China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing’s purchasing managers’ index rose to a 16-month high of 54 points in August, up from 53.3 in July.

With any figure above 50 indicating growth, this was the sixth month of expansion. A separate manufacturing index compiled by HSBC also rose.

The government’s stimulus spending is continuing to lift factory output.
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Brazil unveils oil rules changes

Brazil has unveiled plans to bring more state control to its oil industry and take advantage of offshore reserves.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has proposed switching to a system which would see the government own a part of all oil produced.

Currently, companies bid to win the rights to explore for oil in blocks.

President Lula said the rules, if approved by congress, would see a “new Independence Day” for Brazil, helping tackle poverty and fund education.
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Disney to buy Marvel in $4bn deal

Entertainment giant Walt Disney is to buy Marvel Entertainment in a shares and cash deal valued at $4bn (£2.5bn).

The deal means Disney will take over ownership of 5,000 Marvel characters, such as Spider-Man and the X-Men.

Marvel shareholders will get $30 per share in cash plus 0.745 Disney shares for every Marvel share owned.

The boards of Disney and Marvel have both approved the deal, which now needs the backing of Marvel shareholders and competition authorities.
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General Motors expands in China

General Motors has signed up to a 2bn yuan ($293m; £180m) joint venture with the Chinese state-owned carmaker FAW to make light trucks and vans.

The vehicles will initially be sold in China under the FAW brand, but could in future be exported under the GM brand.

They will be produced at existing FAW facilities in the cities of Changchun and Harbin.

GM sold 818,442 vehicles in China in the first six months of 2009, compared with 1,094,561 in the whole of 2008.
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China signs deal to sell iPhones

Mobile operator China Unicom has signed a deal with Apple to launch the popular iPhone into the world’s largest mobile phone market.

The phones are expected to go on sale in China later this year.

State-owned Unicom would be the first Chinese phone company to formally support the iPhone, although many unlocked iPhones are already in use.

China has more than 600 million mobile phone accounts and a deal to introduce the iPhone has been long-awaited.
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Big is back

Corporate giants were on the defensive for decades. Now they have the advantage again

IN 1996, in one of his most celebrated phrases, Bill Clinton declared that “the era of big government is over”. He might have added that the era of big companies was over, too. The organisation that defined capitalism for much of the 20th century was then in retreat, attacked by corporate raiders, harassed by shareholders and outfoxed by entrepreneurs.

Great names such as Pan Am had disappeared. Others had survived only by dint of huge bloodletting: IBM sacked 122,000 people, a quarter of its workforce, between 1990 and 1995. Everyone agreed that the future lay with entrepreneurial start-ups such as Yahoo!—which in late 1998 had the same market capitalisation with 637 employees as Boeing with 230,000. The share of GDP produced by big industrial companies fell by half between 1974 and 1998, from 36% to 17%.
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Facebook makes privacy changes

(CNN) — Facebook has announced it is to overhaul its privacy settings to make it clearer for users to know who has access to their personal data.

The news follows an investigation into the privacy policy of the social networking site by Canada’s Privacy Commissioner.

The social networking site has agreed to make changes that it believes will provide its users with greater transparency and control over their personal information and how it is used.

“These changes mean that the privacy of 200 million Facebook users in Canada and around the world will be far better protected,” said Canada’s Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart in a press statement.
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Boeing 787 to fly by year’s end

The first flight of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner will take place by the end of 2009, the company has announced.

Boeing also said it hoped to deliver the first plane for service in the last quarter of 2010.

There have been a series of delays in the development of the aircraft, and it is now running almost two years behind its original schedule.

Boeing chairman Jim McNerney said the extra time would enable the remaining work to be completed.

“The design details and implementation plan are nearly complete, and the team is preparing airplanes for modification and testing,” he said.
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‘Exploding’ iPhones investigated

French consumer groups are investigating reports of iPhones that explode or crack spontaneously.

An 80-year-old from the Paris suburbs was among eight people who said their phones’ screens were affected, according to the AFP news agency.

Consumers in the UK, Holland and Sweden have reported similar problems, prompting an earlier EU investigation.

Apple said it was aware of the reports and was waiting to receive the handsets from the affected customers.
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