IN BRIEF (Page 16)

Ventana purchase

Roche Holding has agreed to buy Ventana Medical Systems Inc for $3.4 billion to boost its diagnostics business, the Swiss drugmaker said yesterday, raising its earlier bid.

"Roche will increase the purchase price in the tender offer for Ventana common shares to $89.50 per share in cash," Roche said in a statement.

Sweet result

Barry Callebaut, the world's largest chocolate maker, posted a forecast-beating 22 percent rise in first-quarter sales yesterday, but warned margins could face pressure due to high raw material prices.

Sales for the period rose to 1.42 billion Swiss francs ($1.29 billion), beating the 1.34 billion franc average forecast in a Reuters survey of six analysts.

Schneider growth

French electrical engineering group Schneider Electric yesterday posted 2007 like-for-like sales growth of 13.9 percent, slightly ahead of market expectations, and confirmed its growth target for this year.

Schneider reaffirmed targets for organic growth of between 6 percent and 8 percent in 2008, after the group posted full-year sales of 17.309 billion euros.

RUSAL's plans

Russia's United Company RUSAL, which is buying a strategic stake in metals major Norilsk Nickel, is discussing a full buyout or a merger, one of RUSAL's shareholders told a newspaper yesterday.

Billionaire Viktor Vekselberg told Vedomosti business daily RUSAL was in talks with Vladimir Potanin, who owns over 25 percent in Norilsk, after having already agreed with Mikhail Prokhorov to buy his 29 percent stake in Norilsk in exchange for 11 percent in RUSAL and an undisclosed cash sum.

Boost for retailer

Australian electrical goods and furniture retailer Harvey Norman Holdings Ltd said its second-quarter sales rose 13.1 percent, driven by strong demand for consumer electronics.

Harvey Norman said sales for the second quarter ended Dec 31, including the busy Christmas trading period, rose to A$1.65 billion ($1.42 billion). Like-for-like sales were up 7.9 percent over the quarter on the same period the previous year.

Record figure

Sony Corp, the world's largest video-game console maker, sold a record number of PlayStation 3 machines in Europe during the holiday shopping season after lowering prices to compete against Nintendo Co's Wii.

Sony, which began selling PlayStation 3s in Europe in March, shipped about 1.2 million consoles in the region during the five-week period ended Dec 31, said Kazuo Hirai, president of Sony's game division. That's in line with US shipments during the period, he said.

Job cuts

Yahoo! Inc, owner of the most- visited US website, will cut about 700 jobs, or 5 percent of its workforce, as it reorganizes to compete with Google Inc, according to a person with knowledge of the plans.

The company may announce the reductions to its staff of about 14,000 around the same time as it reports earnings on Jan 29, said the person, who declined to be identified because the cuts haven't been disclosed. A Yahoo spokeswoman declined to comment. In a statement , the company said it will "eliminate some areas of the business".

PC sales up

Sales of personal computers in the Asia-Pacific region outside Japan totaled 66.6 million in 2007, up 20.9 percent over the previous year, an industry research group said.

International Data Corp (IDC) said robust sales of portable PCs powered the growth. "It was a spectacular year for the PC market in Asia," IDC analyst Bryan Ma said.

Agencies

(China Daily 01/23/2008 page16)