Indian board rejects AstraZeneca’s patent plea on cancer drug

(Reuters) – India‘s patents appeal board has dismissed British drugmaker AstraZeneca‘s petition challenging an earlier ruling that refused patent protection for a cancer-fighting drug, in the latest blow for Big Pharma in the country.

The Indian patents office in 2007 refused patent protection to AstraZeneca’s quinazoline molecule, citing lack of invention. The Intellectual Property Appellate Board (IPAB) on Monday upheld the refusal.

The decision is also a setback for struggling AstraZeneca, which is battling to turn itself around as key drugs lose patent protection.

Global drug companies suffered a high-profile reversal in March when India granted the first ever compulsory license to domestic drugmaker Natco Pharma to sell cheap copies of Bayer’s cancer drug Nexavar. Bayer has appealed the order.

And early this month IPAB revoked a six-year-old Indian patent granted to Roche’s hepatitis C drug Pegasys, citing lack of evidence that the drug was any better than existing treatments.

Multinational drug manufacturers regard India’s $ 13 billion drug market as a huge opportunity, but are wary of what they see as lax protection for intellectual property in a country where generic medicines account for more than 90 percent of sales.

Indian generic companies, which do not need to plough money into future research, can produce drugs at a fraction of the cost of originator firms like Roche or Bayer.

Natco and another domestic drugmaker, G. M. Pharma, had opposed the initial patent application for AstraZeneca quinazoline derivative. The London-listed company filed a review petition, which India’s patent office dismissed in 2011.

A challenge to a review petition does not come under the purview of the IPAB, and even on merit the petition has failed, S. Majumdar & Co, the counsel for Natco Pharma, said in a statement.

AstraZeneca could not immediately be reached for a comment by Reuters. The company has the option to take its case to India’s Supreme Court.

(Reporting by Kaustubh Kulkarni in MUMBAI; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)

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S.Africa’s rand holds on to surprise gains

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – S.Africa’s rand held firm against the dollar Wednesday, consolidating a surprisingly strong performance in the previous session after weaker-than-expected economic growth figures.

The rand was little changed at 0611 GMT, trading at 8.8434 against the greenback after New York’s close of 8.845.

“The international backdrop remains negative this morning but the trend for rand gains remains strong,” Rand Merchant Bank said in a note.

Investors are likely to pay attention to a speech by Reserve Bank Governor Gill Marcus at a conference of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) at 0800 GMT.

Marcus left the repo rate unchanged at a four-decade low of 5.0 percent last week and warned that strikes in the mining sector and beyond since August would lead to job losses in a country already grappling with unemployment of over 25 percent.

Tuesday’s GDP statistics drove home that point, showing that growth slowed sharply in the third quarter after a big contraction in the strike-hit mining sector.

Government bond yields slipped one basis point each to 5.46 percent for the three year bond and 7.555 percent for the longer dated 14-year paper.

Power utility Eskom is due to auction 400 million rand between the EL29 and ES33 bonds at 0900 GMT.

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Rugby-England add flyhalf Burns to squad for All Blacks’ test

LONDON, Nov 27 (Reuters) – England called up uncapped Gloucester flyhalf Freddie Burns on Tuesday to their squad for Saturday’s test against New Zealand in place of the injured Toby Flood.

Flood sustained ligament damage to a big toe during the 16-15 loss to South Africa at Twickenham last Saturday.

Owen Farrell, whose last start was in the first test in South Africa this year, is set to replace Flood in the starting XV against the world champions.

Lock Courtney Lawes, who missed England’s first three tests of the November series because of a knee injury, has also been included in the 23-man squad. Two other locks, Mouritz Botha and Tom Palmer, have been omitted.

After beating Fiji in their opening match, England have lost to Australia and the Springboks and now face a daunting match against the All Blacks who are unbeaten in 20 tests since the start of their victorious World Cup campaign last year.

“For those in Saturday’s squad the message is clear – last week we went toe to toe with the second best team in the world and felt we should have won,” England head coach Stuart Lancaster said in a statement.

“Now we have a chance to take on the number one side in front of a passionate Twickenham crowd, who have been fantastic throughout the Internationals, and it is a challenge we will meet head on.” (Reporting by John Mehaffey; Editing by Ken Ferris)

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Exclusive: Egyptian investor seeks to put stamp on Telecom Italia

DUBAI (Reuters) – Egyptian entrepreneur Naguib Sawiris aims to shake up debt-laden Telecom Italia and steer it towards expansion in Brazil if shareholders warm up to his proposal for a 3 billion euro ($ 3.9 billion) cash infusion.

The billionaire tycoon, who got to know Italy well when he owned the third-biggest mobile operator Wind, has put on the table a capital increase that could make him one of the biggest shareholders in Telecom Italia.

Details on the structure of the proposed transaction are scarce, but Sawiris told Reuters that he proposed that the capital increase be open to all shareholders, not just himself, and that it should be conducted around the current market price of 0.70 euros per share.

That is likely to draw the ire of other Telecom Italia shareholders, including Spain’s Telefonica and the three Italian financial institutions who together own 22.4 percent via an unlisted holding company called Telco.

They value Telecom Italia at 1.50 euros per share in their accounts, and Marco Fossati, whose family’s Findim Group SA owns 5 percent of the Italian operator, on Monday said 1.50 was the “correct price” for any capital increase.

Sawiris, going against a trend of retreating investment in crisis-hit southern Europe, said he might also bring in some of his old Wind associates to put Telecom Italia back on the path to growth.

“This proposal will provide a more stable financial structure for Telecom Italia going forward, more growth in Latin America and Brazil, and improved management through the infusion of people who have an excellent knowledge of the Italian market,” Sawiris told Reuters.

Sawiris initially approached Telefonica and the other shareholders in Telco about the possibility of carrying out a capital increase at the holding company level. He was rebuffed, so decided to approach the Italian group directly.

“We are willing to participate in the capital increase, but shareholders have the choice not to get diluted and join in putting the money,” he said.

“If they do not want to, we will come and replace them. But they will benefit from a higher stock price and a more stable company and a company that will grow.”

It remains to be seen whether his vision for the group will be shared by Telecom Italia’s management and core shareholders.

Telefonica, insurer Assicurazioni Generali, and banks Mediobanca and Intesa Sanpaolo had the Sawiris’ offer dropped onto them as a bombshell two weeks ago, insiders have said.

“Sawiris is not a man to go in without being sure he can drive the strategy,” one source familiar with the thinking of the core shareholders said.

Sawiris told Reuters he was also opposed to a current plan to spin off Telecom Italia’s fixed-line network, which is backed by some core investors as a way to raise badly needed cash, and by the Italian government as a means to speed up broadband investment.

“I believe this is a catastrophe,” Sawiris said. “If Telecom Italia does that, they will lose the only differentiator they have left in the telecom market in Italy.”

Telecom Italia is now in talks with an Italian state-backed investment fund over such a spin-off. Under the plan, the fund would take a minority stake in the new company in exchange for Telecom Italia effectively becoming a wholesaler of broadband capacity to other companies.

Proponents of the spin-off argue the move would help Telecom Italia reduce debt while accelerating the modernization of the woeful Internet infrastructure in Europe’s fourth-largest economy.

STRATEGY CROSSROAD

Telecom Italia’s board will meet on December 6 to discuss the network spin-off and whether to bid for Vivendi’s GVT, a broadband specialist in Brazil, to complement its TIM Brasil mobile business unit in the fast-growing market.

GVT’s owner, Vivendi, is seeking up to 7 billion euros for GVT, which provides fixed telephone, broadband, and TV services in 120 Brazilian cities. Preliminary bids are due in December, sources have told Reuters.

Sawiris is waiting in the wings, though he says he has not had any direct contact from Telecom Italia since sending a letter of interest two weeks ago.

However, advisers from both sides – Lazard for Sawiris and Rothschild for Telecom Italia – have been communicating, according to people familiar with the matter.

Meanwhile, sources close to the telecom group’s shareholders have complained of a lack of detail in the Sawiris proposal.

Nuno Matias, a telecoms analyst at Espirito Santo bank, said while Sawiris’s arguments about seeking growth in Brazil via the GVT takeover were persuasive, the tycoon could face an uphill battle getting the board and shareholders onside.

“Sawiris isn’t alone; there are controlling shareholders of Telecom Italia, and they have their own interests,” he said.

“If Telecom Italia strengthens in Brazil then it sets up a conflict with Telefonica.”

Sawiris pointed out that he tried talking to Telefonica.

“I met with them, but my feeling is that they are conflicted. They are happy where they are today holding Telecom Italia as a hostage and preventing it from growing into Latin America.”

Telefonica and Telecom Italia are the number one and number two players in Brazilian mobile, respectively, and also compete in Argentina. The conflict means that Telefonica cannot take part in board deliberations at Telecom Italia over the Latin American units.

Telefonica’s Chief Financial Officer Angel Vila said last week that the group wanted to remain a long-term shareholder in Telecom Italia, and opposed a capital increase.

Telecom Italia has made debt-cutting a priority since late 2008. Cost cuts and asset sales have trimmed net debt more than 4 billion euros to 29.5 billion at the end of September.

Morgan Stanley predicted its net debt was likely to stand at 27.8 billion euros at year-end, or 2.7 times earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA), above sector averages and in the warning zone for rating agencies.

Sawiris, who sold Wind to Vimpelcom last year, wants to re-enter Italy by investing in the incumbent operator, betting on low valuations and turnaround potential in old-world telecoms.

“I’ve worked in Italy for five years and what I’ve learned that very few investors have the insight on what is the real story in Italy,” Sawiris said.

($ 1 = 0.7713 euros)

(Additional reporting by Leila Abboud in Paris and Lisa Jucca in Milan; Editing by Will Waterman)

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Bin Laden movie “Zero Dark Thirty” based on first-hand accounts

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The makers of a Hollywood movie about the U.S. operation to kill Osama bin Laden denied asking for classified material for their film, but say they did conduct interviews with a CIA officer and others at the heart of the decade-long hunt for the al Qaeda leader.

“It was all based on first-hand accounts so it really felt very vivid and very vital and very, very immediate and visceral of course which is very exciting as a filmmaker,” Kathryn Bigelow, director of “Zero Dark Thirty,” told ABC News in an interview airing on Monday.

Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal said in a “Nightline” interview that they were originally working on a film about the failed bid to find bin Laden in the Tora Bora mountains of Afghanistan during the U.S-led invasion there in 2001.

But their plans changed swiftly after U.S. President Barack Obama announced in May 2011 that a Navy commando unit had killed bin Laden in a compound in Pakistan.

“I picked up the phone and started calling sources and asking them what they knew and taking referrals and knocking on doors and really approached it as comprehensively as I could,” Boal told “Nightline” according to an advance excerpt.

“I certainly did a lot of homework, but I never asked for classified material,” he said. “To my knowledge I never received any.”

The release of “Zero Dark Thirty” – seen as a strong contender for Oscar nominations – was pushed back to December after the film got caught up earlier this year in a U.S. election year controversy.

The U.S. admiral who oversaw the secret operation in May denied a claim that the Obama administration arranged for Bigelow and Boal to be given special access to top officials while researching their movie.

The film reconstructs the hunt for bin Laden largely through the eyes of a young female CIA officer, played by Jessica Chastain, who helps find him through a long-forgotten courier. Obama only makes a fleeting appearance in the film.

“It was a couple of months into the research when I heard about a woman, part of the team, and she has played a big role and she had gone to Jalalabad and been deployed with the SEALs on the night of the raid,” Boal told ABC News reporter Martha Raddatz in the “Nightline” interview.

While some of the dialogue is word for word and based on interviews with the young CIA officer and others, some of the dialogue is dramatized, said the Oscar-winning makers of 2008′s “The Hurt Locker,” about a U.S. Army bomb disposal team during the Iraq War.

The assault on bin Laden’s Pakistan compound was recreated as accurately as possible, using a full-scale version built in Jordan. The floor, the tile, the carpet, the furniture and the marks on the walls were copied from images seen in ABC News footage that Bigelow said they reviewed frame by frame.

The full interview can be seen on “Nightline” on Monday evening.

“Zero Dark Thirty” opens in U.S. movie theaters on December 19. Nominations for the 2013 Academy Awards are announced on January 10 ahead of the February 24 Oscar ceremony.

(Reporting By Jill Serjeant)

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Nobel winner and organ transplant pioneer Joseph Murray dies at 93

(Reuters) – Dr. Joseph Murray, the surgeon who carried out the first successful kidney transplant and later won a Nobel Prize for his work in medicine and physiology, died on Monday in Boston at the age of 93.

Murray died after suffering a stroke last Thursday, Brigham and Women’s Hospital spokesman Tom Langford said.

Murray and his team completed the first human organ transplant in 1954, taking a kidney from one identical twin and giving it to his twin brother, opening a new field in medicine, the hospital said.

“The world is a better place because of all Dr. Murray has given. His legacy will forever endure in our hearts and in every patient who has received the gift of life through transplantation,” hospital president Dr. Elizabeth Nabel said in a statement.

Later in his career, Murray continued to search for ways of suppressing a patient’s immune response to prevent it from rejecting foreign tissue, eventually becoming a co-winner of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1990.

“Difficulties are opportunities. This is a quote that sits atop my father’s desk at home. It reflects the unwavering optimism of a great man who was generous, curious, and always humble,” his son Rick said in a statement.

Murray began a career in medicine on graduating from Harvard Medical School in the 1940s, and developed an interest in transplanting tissue while working with service personnel injured in World War Two, according to the Britannica Online Encyclopedia.

He completed his surgical training at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and later returned to join the staff and serve as chief of plastic surgery.

With broad interests beyond medicine, Murray said in a brief autobiography for the Nobel Prize organization that he and his extended family had been “blessed in our lives beyond my wildest dreams.”

“My only wish would be to have 10 more lives to live on this planet. If that were possible, I’d spend one lifetime each in embryology, genetics, physics, astronomy and geology,” he said.

“The other lifetimes would be as a pianist, backwoodsman, tennis player, or writer for the National Geographic.”

More than 600,000 people worldwide have received transplants since Murray’s innovation, the hospital said.

(Additional reporting by Tim Gaynor; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

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ResCap creditors target cash from Ally asset sales: WSJ

(Reuters) – A group of creditors of Ally Financial Inc‘s mortgage subsidiary is laying claim to cash from Ally asset sales that was intended to help repay the U.S. government, which funded a $ 17.2 billion bailout of the financing firm, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The creditors of mortgage firm Residential Capital LLC (ResCap) are eyeing more than $ 9 billion that Ally plans to collect from sales of its international operations, the business daily said.

Ally, which is 74 percent owned by the U.S. government, agreed to sell its European and Latin American auto lending operations to General Motors Co’s financing arm General Motors Financial Co for about $ 4.2 billion last week.

The sale was part of Ally’s efforts to speed up the repayment of bailout funds. The company is focusing on its U.S. business and has already sold operations in Canada and Mexico.

In a letter sent on Monday to Ally’s board, the creditors question transfers made in 2009 from Residential Capital to Ally, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people who have reviewed the letter.

The creditors said Ally stripped ResCap of most of its value when it transferred Ally Bank, a depository unit valued at $ 10 billion, to the parent company and asked the company to repay them before others receive proceeds from Ally.

Ally, the former financing arm of GM, confirmed a letter had been received and said the company disagreed with the creditors’ claims, although it did not elaborate on the content of the letter.

“The letter from ResCap’s unsecured creditors‘ committee is a predictable tactic. We strongly disagree with the allegations in the letter and believe the claims are wholly without merit,” Ally spokeswoman Gina Proia said in an e-mailed statement.

Ally has maintained that it is insulated from ResCap’s liabilities because of their distinct ownership structures.

The Wall Street Journal said a representative for the creditors’ committee did not respond to a request for comment.

ResCap filed for bankruptcy in May and earlier this month a bankruptcy court judge approved the sale of its mortgage operations to Ocwen Financial Corp and Walter Investment Management Corp for $ 3 billion.

(Reporting by Ashutosh Pandey in Bangalore and Rick Rothacker in New York; Editing by Edmund Klamann)

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Dog days in Cuba: from shih tzus to schnauzers

HAVANA (AP) — The Cuban capital has played host to political summits and art festivals, ballet tributes and international baseball competitions. Now dog lovers are getting their chance to take center stage.

Hundreds of people from all over Cuba and several other countries came to a scruffy field near Revolution Plaza this past week to preen and fuss over the shih tzus, beagles, schnauzers and cocker spaniels that are the annual Fall Canine Expo’s star attractions. There were even about a dozen bichon habaneros, a mid-sized dog bred on the island since the 17th century.

As dog lovers talked shop, the merely curious strolled the field, checking out the more than 50 breeds on display while carefully dodging the prodigious output of so many dogs.

The four-day competition, which ended Sunday, included competitions in several breeding categories, and judges were flown in from Nicaragua, Colombia and Mexico.

“This is a small, poor country, but Cubans love dogs,” said Miguel Calvo, the president of Cuba’s dog federation, which organized the show. “We make a great effort to breed purebred animals of quality.”

Winners don’t receive any trophy or prize money, but that doesn’t mean the competition is any less fierce.

Anabel Perez, owner of a cocker spaniel named Lisamineli after the U.S. actress, spent more than half an hour coifing the dog’s hair in preparation for the competition, while the owner of a shih tzu named Tiguer meticulously brushed his coat nearby.

“I’m a hairdresser for humans,” explained Tiguer’s owner, Miguel Lopez. “So it’s easy for me. I like shih tzus because they are a lot of work to keep well groomed.”

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After His Vulgar Assault on Jenny Johnson, Chris Brown Quits Twitter

Chris Brown is really bad at public relations. The 23-year-old rapper went on a memorably vulgar tirade against comedian Jenny Johnson on Sunday and apparently realized soon thereafter that it was a bad idea, because he scrambled to cover his tracks. But deleting tweets does not erase their previous existence and deactivating your Twitter account does not take away all of the bad things you did with it.

RELATED: The New York Times’s Bill Keller Riles Up Twitter

We’re getting ahead of ourselves, though. Did you hear about Chris Brown’s memorably vulgar tirade against comedian Jenny Johnson on Sunday? It was truly despicable. Johnson, if you haven’t heard of her, is pretty big on Twitter and pretty funny, too. She’s also deeply disapproving of Brown’s existence, more specifically his history of beating women. And she didn’t miss a chance to take a swipe at Brown on Sunday, when he complained about his appearance. “I look old as fuck! I’m only 23…” Brown tweeted. “ ”I know! Being a worthless piece of shit can really age a person.” Johnson replied.

RELATED: The Twitter Skirmish While You Were Sleeping Over #RomneyStrength

Then things got ugly. In a series of tweets, Brown told Johnson to suck his dick, threatened to fart on her, threatened to shit and called her a “ho” about seven times. After tweeting — and this is a direct quote — “mom says hello… She told me not to shart in ur mouth, wanted me to shit right on the retina, ….#pinkeye” Brown tweeted, “Just ask Rihanna if she mad??????” You can read the entire exchange here.

RELATED: Morning Twitter Meme: Journalists Tiring of Royal Wedding

Brown’s rant was not well received by the Twitter community or the media. Then again, at this point, it’s not like anybody expected more from Brown. This is the same guy that dressed up like a terrorist for Halloween. It’s unclear how or why, but within a couple hours of the blowback, Brown’s Twitter account was gone. We’ll let you know if we find out any more details. For now, we’re going with Eli Braden’s theory: “Chris Brown’s publicist finally figured out his Twitter password.”

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Donald preparing for surgery on sinuses

DUBAI (Reuters) – World number two Luke Donald is planning to have an operation in the off-season in an attempt to cure a lingering problem with his sinuses.

“My sinuses are all completely clogged up and every time I get a little bit run down they turn into infections,” the 34-year-old Briton told reporters after finishing in a tie for third place at the DP World Tour Championship on Sunday.

“Hopefully the surgery will fix it. It’s a pretty quick and easy operation.”

Donald said he was affected by the problem over the last two rounds in Dubai, the final event of the European Tour season.

The former world number one wanted to make it clear, however, that his disappointing one-under-par final round of 71 should not be blamed on his physical ailments.

“I don’t like to make excuses but the last couple of days I’ve had the sinus issue again,” added Donald. “I felt a little bit flat and unfortunately I couldn’t get things going on Sunday.”

The Chicago-based Englishman went into the last 18 holes sharing the lead with Ryder Cup team mate Rory McIlroy.

Donald went a remarkable 102 holes without carding a bogey in the Dubai tournament, this year and in 2011, but a dropped stroke at the third on Sunday ended that sequence and put him on the back foot for the rest of the round.

He finished five strokes adrift of world number one and tournament winner McIlroy, who birdied each of the closing five holes to shoot a six-under 66.

(Editing by Peter Rutherford)

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