Samsung Told To Pay Apple $119m In Patent Row

Samsung has been ordered to pay $119.46m (£70m) in damages to Apple after the South Korean company was found guilty of violating two patents on smartphone features.

In the latest lawsuit involving the two tech giants, a jury in a federal court in San Jose, California, ruled that Samsung had copied key features of the iPhone in creating its own line of smartphones, including universal searching and slide to lock.

But the verdict was a far cry from the $2.2bn Apple sought and the $930m it won in a separate 2012 trial making similar patent infringement claims against Samsung products, most of which are no longer for sale in the US.

In a counter-claim, the jury found that Apple had infringed one of Samsung's patents in creating the iPhone 4 and 5.

The jury awarded Samsung $158,400 - a fraction of the $6m sought by Samsung.

Brian Love, assistant professor at Santa Clara University's school of law, said: "Though this verdict is large by normal standards, it is hard to view this outcome as much of a victory for Apple.

"This amount is less than 10% of the amount Apple requested, and probably doesn't surpass by too much the amount Apple spent litigating this case.

"Apple launched this litigation campaign years ago with aspirations of slowing the meteoric rise of Android phone manufacturers. It has so far failed to do so, and this case won't get it any closer."

Apple said the ruling reinforced its stance that "Samsung willfully stole our ideas and copied our products."

Samsung representatives were not immediately available for comment.

The verdict marks the latest intellectual property battle between the world's top two smartphone makers.

For over three years, Apple and Samsung have sued each other in courts and trade offices around the world.

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Former Cadbury Chair Warns Over Pfizer Deal

By Mark Kleinman, City Editor

The businessman who oversaw the sale of Cadbury in 2010 has warned against formal state intervention in the £63bn takeover bid for AstraZeneca, the British pharmaceuticals giant.

Speaking to Sky News, Sir Roger Carr, who chaired Cadbury for three years before its acquisition by Kraft Foods, said it was primarily the duty of AstraZeneca's executives and shareholders to decide on the fate of the bid.

And he said that ministers should only intervene in takeover situations where there was a clear case to do so based on the UK's national interest.

"In any takeover bid it is the duty of management to fight for stakeholders and value, and the responsibility of shareholders to judge when value has been achieved.

"It is not a place for government intervention unless truly in the nation's interest."

Sir Roger declined to comment specifically on the Pfizer bid for AstraZeneca or on whether preserving jobs in the UK's life sciences sector was sufficiently a matter of national interest for the Government to intervene.

His remarks came as AstraZeneca rebuffed the £50-a-share proposal tabled by its US rival, saying that it "substantially undervalued" the British company.

"The large proportion of the consideration payable in Pfizer shares and the tax-driven inversion structure remain unchanged. Accordingly, the Board has rejected the Proposal," it said in a statement.

Leif Johansson, AstraZeneca's chairman, said that a combination with Pfizer would "dilute AstraZeneca shareholders' exposure to our unique pipeline and would create risks around its delivery."

Sir Roger's intervention in the debate about a prospective sale of AstraZeneca comes four years after Cadbury was bought by Kraft in a deal which exposed political tensions about the rules governing hostile and foreign takeovers.

Promises made by Kraft on British jobs and manufacturing were subsequently reneged upon by the US food manufacturer.

The City's Takeover Code was revised in the wake of the deal to make it more difficult for bidders to force target companies into public 'bear-hugs' for protracted periods of time.

Those bidding for listed companies now have 28 days from the beginning of an offer period to make a firm takeover proposal.

Chuka Umunna, the shadow business secretary, told Sky News on Friday that he would be "amenable" to reforming the Code to provide greater emphasis on "long-term decision-making".

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US Jobless Drops To Lowest Rate Since 2008

The jobless rate in the United States fell to 6.3% in April, its lowest level since September 2008.

A total of 288,000 new jobs were created last month, more than a third up on the figure forecast by economists.

The Labor Department said job creation was picking up after the country's long winter freeze.

It said the upsurge in jobs has sent the unemployment rate down to 6.3% from 6.7% previously.

But the drop occurred because the number of people working or seeking work fell sharply.

In the US, people not seeking work aren't counted as unemployed.

American employers also added more jobs during February and March than those previously estimated.

The job totals for those two months were revised upwards by a combined 36,000.

A number of sectors in the US economy have been affected over winter, including construction and retail.

But job creation is now accelerating.

Official data showed employers added an average of 238,000 jobs during the past three months.

The figure was up more than 40%, from 167,000 in the previous three months.

Job creation also appeared to be widely spread across various sectors.

Hirings last month were broad-based and included higher-paying jobs.

The Labor Department said manufacturing gained 12,000 positions, construction added 32,000 while professional roles including accounting, engineering and technical services, were boosted by 25,100.

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Four Million Households Owe Energy Supplier

Almost four million households owe money to their energy supplier - with debts averaging £128, a survey has found.

The amount owed by the 14% of households in debt has increased by an average of £5 since last year, after a mild winter failed to offset price hikes, the uSwitch poll found.

The average energy bill has risen to £1,265 a year, which is £53 more than a year ago and £793 higher than in 2004.

A quarter of households said they choose to "turn a blind eye" to the debt in the hope it will decrease over time, while 21% intend to pay it off with a lump sum and 43% plan to increase their direct debit.

Only 9% of those in debt owe less than they did a year ago. A third have seen the size of their debt rise.

Almost one in 10 (9%) have approached their supplier about a repayment plan, the survey found.

uSwitch's director of consumer policy Ann  Robinson said: "This is a clear indication of the extreme pressure families are under to meet the rising cost of energy.

"For many consumers, the only thing that has kept this particular wolf from the door is the fact that this winter has been exceptionally mild.

"Those in energy debt can face a catch-22. Despite knowing they could reduce their bills by moving to a cheaper energy plan, many see debt as a barrier to switching.

"With a difference of over £300 between the cheapest and most expensive tariff on the market, consumers cannot afford to have this avenue closed to them."

A spokeswoman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: "The Government is doing everything within its power to help hard-pressed families keep their energy bills down.

"In December we announced plans that will save customers around £50 on their energy bills, protecting support through the ECO scheme for vulnerable households, extending the scheme for an extra two years, and making an additional £450m available to make Britain's homes more energy-efficient.

"This is on top of the support already available to vulnerable households through schemes like the Warm Home Discount, whereby well over one million low-income pensioners will receive £135 off their bill, and Winter Fuel Payments."

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RBS Pre-Tax First Quarter Profit Hits £1.6bn

The taxpayer-backed Royal Bank of Scotland has seen a large rise in its first quarter profit, sending its share price up by more than 12%.

After the initial stock price surge, trades eased to high single digits and remained a key driver of the FTSE 100 on Friday.

RBS said its pre-tax profit reached £1.64bn in the first three months of 2014, up 98% from £826m in 2013.

It said operating profit for the quarter was £1.5bn, up from £747m last year.

But the company, which is 81% owned by the UK taxpayer, said certain problems still require rectification.

Chief executive Ross McEwan said: "Just over two months ago, I set out our plan for making RBS the most trusted bank in the UK.

"Today's results show that in steady state, RBS will be a bank that does a great job for customers while delivering good returns for our shareholders.

"But we still have a lot of work to do and plenty of issues from the past to reckon with."

The profit boost came from no new write-offs for action over mis-selling payment protection insurance or toxic assets.

It also continued to reduce its costs.

However, it said: "The ongoing conduct and regulatory investigations and litigation continue to create challenges and uncertainties for RBS, as for other banks.

"The timing and amounts of any further settlements or redress remain uncertain."

RBS said it had seen a small rise in lending volumes during the first three months of the year, both in UK retail and business banking.

The trading update is RBS' first since the group announced that it had suffered a £8.2bn loss in 2013, amid plans to cut costs by £5bn within three years.

It also said that as part of a plan to reduce IT glitches that have affected customers, it was separating computer systems between its RBS, NatWest and Ulster banks.

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Carlyle Steers RAC Group Towards £1.5bn Exit

By Mark Kleinman, City Editor

The private equity firm which owns the RAC breakdown recovery service is mapping out a £1.5bn sale or stock market listing.

Sky News has learnt that The Carlyle Group has appointed Lazard, the investment bank, to provide advice on an exit from the RAC, which it bought from Aviva, the insurer, in 2011.

Directors are understood to have taken a decision to press ahead with a process to appoint additional banking advisors at an RAC board meeting earlier this week.

Insiders said that Lazard was focused on a strategic review of the business and that it was open-minded about the timing and structure of a sale.

The RAC, founded by the Royal Automobile Club in 1897, has more than 7m members, and has about 2000 patrols which attend 2.5m breakdowns every year.

Carlyle is said to be keen to undertake a sale before that of its principal rival, the AA.

Sky News revealed in March that a group of City investors were pressing the AA's owner to consider a listing of the company despite concerns among some of them about its substantial borrowings.

The RAC, which is owned by the same private equity group as Addison Lee, the London-based taxi company, is chaired by Rob Templeman, one of the UK's most successful executives.

Its chief executive is Chris Woodhouse, with whom Mr Templeman worked at Debenhams, the department store chain.

Aviva sold the business in 2011 to focus on its core insurance operations, but was widely regarded to have undervalued the RAC by selling it for £1bn.

Last November, the RAC paid its owners a £163m dividend as it emerged that the company was on track to make £145m in pre-tax profit last year, almost double its 2010 earnings.

It recently announced the launch of its first mobile electric vehicle charging unit and has begun selling telematic tracking devices, a growing trend among motor insurers.

Carlyle declined to comment on Friday.

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The Week's Big Business Stories

Sky's Naomi Kerbel offers a round-up of what's been and what is coming up in the week's business news.

:: Monday, May 5 - financial markets closed

:: Tuesday, May 6 

Barclays will announce its first-quarter results for 2014 on Tuesday and Just Eat, the online food takeaway service, is expected to transfer to a premium listing. This level of stock market listing means the company is expected to meet the UK's highest standards of regulation and corporate governance.

:: Wednesday, May 7

On Wednesday, Lord Myners, the former City minister who has been tasked with reviewing the corporate governance structure of the Co-Operative Group, will appear in front of MPs from the Treasury Select Committee to give an update on his progress.

Also, that day Sainsbury's is reporting preliminary results.

It has already reported fourth-quarter like-for-like sales so there should not be many surprises in the results but we will get the profit figure for the year. The major supermarkets are locked in a price battle. Morrisons cut prices on 1,200 products, in a campaign launched May 1.

:: Thursday, May 8

The Bank of England will announce its latest interest rate decision. In April it maintained the rate at the historic low of 0.5%, unchanged since March 2009, and the size of its quantitative easing Asset Purchase Programme at £375bn. 

First-quarter sales and revenue from Morrisons. This is likely to have been another tough quarter as Morrisons competes with both the discounters and the other major supermarkets in cutting prices. 

Barclays will give an update on its strategy on Thursday. Analysts expect chief executive Antony Jenkins to detail a radical attack on costs, particularly in the investment banking division.

 :: Friday, May 9

On Friday, International Airlines Group, the parent company of British Airways and Iberia, along with Telefonica and O2 report first-quarter results. And annuity provider Resolution also reports first-quarter earnings that day.

It has been hit by the annuities shake-up revealed in the Chancellor's Budget, as well as the capping of pension fees and a regulatory review of the insurance sector. 

:: Missing something? Tweet your business stories to @SkyNKTweets

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AstraZeneca Rejects New £63bn Pfizer Bid

Pfizer Letter To David Cameron Over Deal

Updated: 7:52am UK, Friday 02 May 2014

American drugs giant Pfizer has written a letter to David Cameron, in an attempt to take the political heat out of its bid for UK rival AstraZeneca. Here is the letter from Pfizer chief executive Ian Read:

Dear Prime Minister,

I am writing to you to address the concerns of the UK Government and science community and your desire to have firm and enduring assurances from us about our commitment to the UK and its life sciences agenda.

We would like to confirm that today, Pfizer made a non-binding cash and share proposal valuing each AstraZeneca share at £50 to the Board of AstraZeneca, as detailed in our accompanying public statement. We believe the industrial logic for a combination between Pfizer and AstraZeneca is compelling.

A combined company would bring together powerful and world leading research expertise in key therapeutic areas such as oncology, inflammation, and cardiovascular and metabolic disorders, in which the world class academic research resources in the "golden triangle" of Oxford, Cambridge and London would represent a vital component, along with the positive environment for inward investment that the UK Government has created.

Ultimately, establishing the world's largest research-based pharmaceutical company in the UK, together with the commitments made in this letter represent a strong indicator of the incentives that your Government has created to attract successful business to the UK.

We recognise that our approach may create uncertainty for the UK Government and scientific community given the strategic importance of life sciences to the Government's Industrial Strategy and the significance of the transaction.

We would therefore like to assure the Government of our long term commitment to the UK where Pfizer already employs a significant number of colleagues across research, commercial, and administrative roles.

To that end, therefore, subject to successful completion of our combination with AstraZeneca on the basis proposed by us, we will make the following series of significant and tangible commitments:

* Pfizer commits to establishing the combined company's corporate and tax residence in England.

* Pfizer commits to complete the construction of the currently planned AstraZeneca Cambridge campus, creating a substantial R&D innovation hub in Cambridge and the wider scientific community, which will include core research units, laboratory based scientific support lines and European clinical development and regulatory functions.

* Pfizer will base key scientific leadership in the UK who will lead all European and certain global R&D functions based in Cambridge.

* Pfizer commits to integrate the operations of the combined company so as to employ a minimum of 20% of the combined company's total R&D workforce in the UK going forward.

* Pfizer will actively look to locate manufacturing operations of the combined company in the UK, subject to the timing of the UK Patent Box proposals, and will retain substantial commercial manufacturing facilities in Macclesfield.

* Pfizer commits to base the combined company's European business HQ in the UK.

* Pfizer commits to base the combined company's EU Regulatory HQ in the UK.

* Pfizer commits to invite at least two AstraZeneca Board Members to join the Board of the new company.

* Pfizer commits to hold, as appropriate, board meetings in the UK and participate meaningfully in the UK commercial, economic and social community.

Clearly, predictability and stability in the local and global commercial environment, as well as the UK Government's efforts to maintain incentives for investment, are important factors to enable success.

We make these commitments for a minimum of five years, recognising our ability, consistent with our fiduciary duties, to adjust these obligations should circumstances significantly change.

Our board has endorsed these commitments in a formal Pfizer board resolution and will publish a statement describing these promises to the British public.

In reflection of the binding nature of these commitments, we are including this letter in our public announcement issued pursuant to the UK Takeover Code regarding the possible combination.

As mentioned above, we view our partnership with the UK Government as a critical part of this potential transaction. We look forward to continued discussions with you.

Yours sincerely,

Ian C. Read

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The True Cost Of London's £140m Apartment

It's tempting to see the story of the £140m London apartment that just sold to a Ukrainian buyer as yet more evidence of the madness in the UK housing market.

But while there is now little doubt that the London property market is in the midst of a bubble, and that the exuberance is now spreading out around the UK, the sale of the One Hyde Park apartment is, from an economic perspective, a bit of a red herring.

The reality is that the super-prime London property market - the oligarchs and hedge fund bit of it - has begun to slow considerably in the past six months.

Aerial view of One Hyde Park (in the foreground) and the Serpentine

While multimillion-pound Mayfair properties were by far and away the fastest-growing part of the housing market a year or so ago, activity has ground to a near halt more recently, due in part to a host of tax avoidance measures brought in by the Treasury.

There are exceptions. Some buyers are still desperate to invest in London whatever the cost - the clue is this buyer's nationality.

But the reality is that the super-prime market looks far less frothy now than other parts of the capital.

Prices in Kensington and Chelsea, which not all that long ago were rising by around 30% a year, are now going up at a far more leisurely 12.8%, according to the most recent Land Registry figures.

A snapshot from within the One Hyde Park site

By contrast, the four boroughs of London with house prices rising at an annual rate of more than 20% are Islington, Lambeth, Southwark and Waltham Forest.

As often happens, what started as a boom in the multimillion-pound property sector has long since transmogrified into a boom in other, less smart parts of the capital.

And the same is starting to happen around the country: the housing boom that began in London is starting to spread out throughout the rest of the UK. Prices in the East of England are now rising by 7.1%.

While this is hardly bad news - prices fell far more outside London, so won't be anywhere near dangerous levels for some time - it poses greater threats for the financial system.

A promotional photo of an apartment at the prestigious location

A collapse in prime London house prices will be difficult for some, but many of those who can afford multimillion-pound properties have enough capital to weather the storm.

Elsewhere, the rest of us are far more reliant on mortgages to finance our homebuying - and the more we're borrowing and faster house prices are rising, the greater the risk that people could find themselves in trouble.

That's why the Bank of England's deputy governor Jon Cunliffe sounded so concerned about rising prices in his speech on Thursday night. The question is what he and the rest of the institution do about it.

At this stage, the most likely eventuality is that next month the bank's Financial Policy Committee imposes new stricter limits on the so-called stress tests mortgage companies must apply to customers before granting them a loan.

That may be followed by increases in interest rates next year. Some economists fear, though, that by then the London bubble will have become a nationwide bubble waiting to burst.

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Ex-Trade Minister Queries Pfizer Bid Pledges

By Mark Kleinman, City Editor

The trade minister in the last Labour government has questioned the integrity of a pledge by Pfizer to protect British jobs if it acquires AstraZeneca and suggested that a dedicated panel should be established to rule on takeovers of strategically important companies.

Speaking to Sky News, Lord Davies said Pfizer's commitment to locate at least 20% of its research and development workforce in the UK may be little more than a "chocolate promise".

The phrase was a reference to the takeover of Cadbury, the British confectionery group, by Kraft Foods of the US while Lord Davies was minister for trade and investment in 2010.

"Promises often not kept by chief executives are not enough," he said.

"The undertakings made by large corporations have to be legally watertight…One really has to question whether this type of bid should be allowed, when such critical UK research and scientific capability is at risk."

Lord Davies, a respected City figure who now holds seats on the boards of companies including Diageo and Chime Communications, also criticised the Coalition for negotiating directly with Pfizer executives about future jobs and tax commitments.

"My question would be: shouldn't their first port of call be to speak to AstraZeneca, not an international hostile bidder?"

Dozens of important UK-based companies were taken over by foreign rivals during the three Labour administrations which governed between 1997 and 2010.

They included BAA (now Heathrow Airport Holdings), P&O, Scottish Power and Thames Water.

But the former minister said that Pfizer's desire to reap tax benefits from an AstraZeneca takeover raised questions about whether the deal was "more about financial engineering rather than industrial logic".

"Is there a danger that Pfizer makes lots of chocolate promises? Kraft made promises which they did not fulfil, were rebuked, but (there were no consequences)."

Lord Davies said there was already too much "intrusion" into business by governments and that more would be damaging.

However, he added that the UK needed to "reflect on whether certain industries, certain research capability, certain companies, certain clusters are of such national importance that the country should have a view".

He said that one solution could be to establish a small board comprising politicians and business people, who in cases like AstraZeneca would provide their views about the merits of a foreign takeover.

"Either way we must protect ourselves and yet be open. That is the nature of the dilemma.  Leaving it just to the shareholders and boards may not be enough."

On Friday, Sir Roger Carr, the former chairman of Cadbury, who oversaw the takeover by Kraft, told Sky News that management and shareholders should usually be left to decide the fate of takeover bids unless there was a clear national interest and basis for politicians to be involved.

Pfizer's latest offer for AstraZeneca, worth £63bn, was rejected by the British company, which said on Friday that the proposal had "substantially undervalued" it.

Major City shareholders appear to be broadly supportive of the AstraZeneca board's stance, leaving Pfizer with the prospect of raising its bid again or going hostile with its existing offer.

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