OSLO (AFX) – Fast Search & Transfer ASA said it has won a deal with US biotechnology group Millipore for the deployment of its Fast Enterprise Search Platform.
While no financial details were disclosed, Fast said the deal is based on software licence and maintenance fees.
Millipore specialises in the provision of products and services that improve productivity in biopharmaceutical manufacturing and in clinical, analytical and research laboratories.
alastair.reed@thomson.com
ar/ms1
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BANGKOK (XFN-ASIA) – The head of Thailand’s junta reiterated that elections will be held to restore democracy by the end of the year, in a wide-ranging televised defense of the military coup six months ago.

‘We will have free and fair elections on schedule,’ General Sonthi Boonyaratglin said in a more than two-hour news conference at the army headquarters, carried live on all Thailand’s television stations.

He did not rule out the possibility that he would keep a political role after the polls.

‘I’m Thai, and I want to protect the national well-being, so I will do anything I can for the good of the country.’

The junta has long promised to hold a referendum on a new constitution followed by general elections before the end of the year.

Efforts to write a new charter have been held up by contentious debate over issues ranging from whether the prime minister should be appointed to whether Buddhism should be declared the official religion.

‘It is a very difficult and slow process to solve problems resulting from the pseudo-democracy and capitalist dictatorship’ of Thaksin (Shinawatra’s) government, Sonthi said, referring to the ousted premier.

‘The constitution will be completed on time and will be approved in a referendum. National elections will eventually be held by the end of this year,’ said Decho Savananont, deputy chief of the Constitutional Drafting Council, during the conference.

Polls show public support for the regime has steadily dropped, amid growing worries about the nation’s political and economic future.

During the briefing, eight agencies — including the constitution drafters, the Election Commission and the attorney general’s office — gave 15-minute rundowns on their work since the coup.

Thaksin’s lawyer, Noppadon Pattama, said the junta’s lengthy briefing only highlighted how little the military government has accomplished since then.

‘The junta should explain what they will do in the next six months instead of reiterating the same old things,’ Noppadon said.

‘A military dictatorship is worse than a capitalist dictatorship.’

LONDON (AFX) – The concerns related to high current account deficits of some emerging European countries could lead to a crisis similar to the Asian crisis of 1997 are misplaced, Moody’s Investors Service said.
In a report titled ‘International Policy Perspectives’, Moody’s however said the vulnerability to capital outflows and the associated output contraction and balance sheet adjustments is rising, with potentially serious implications and policymakers have very few viable options to address the problems.

The report focuses on the group of European countries with a current account deficit equal to or higher than 10 pct of GDP. These are the three Baltic countries of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia as also Romania and Bulgaria.

‘Current account deficits in these countries have reached very high levels, prompting fears that a repeat of the Asian crisis could be in the making. Such concerns are aggravated by the countries’ fixed or heavily managed exchange rates – usually a recipe for financial disaster,’ says Pierre Cailleteau, Moody’s Chief International Policy Analyst and author of the report.

‘However, comparisons with Asia 1997 ignore the nature of EU integration, which lends support to a realistic real income convergence scenario and reduces considerably the risk of a sudden and prolonged halt to external financing,’ Cailleteau added.

The Asian crisis is not the relevant reference for these countries, which are in fact more exposed to a ‘Portuguese syndrome’ — economic stagnation brought about the slow adjustment of overextended balance sheets in the private sector,’ Cailleteau said.

‘EMU accession, which may ironically be facilitated by the materialisation of such a deflationary scenario, will eventually remove any balance of payment risk. However, it would not eliminate the need to get through the painful unwinding of financial excesses,’ he noted.

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vsr/aku

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UATEMALA CITY (AP) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s radical policies pose ‘substantial risk’ for private firms and are expected to drive down the South American country’s economic growth in 2007, the world’s leading banking organization said Sunday.

The Institute of International Finance presented the doom-and-gloom outlook for Venezuela in its annual Latin American Regional Overview report released at a conference on the sidelines of the Inter-American Development Bank’s annual meeting, which ends Tuesday.

The report called Chavez ‘the all-powerful president,’ noting that his supporters entirely control congress, and said his ‘hostility toward markets poses substantial risk to private firms.’

The institute, which represents 375 banks, said Chavez may turn to more extreme policies as the economy worsens, though it did not explain why it expects such a turn toward more radical stances. It predicted Venezuela will continue struggling with high inflation and will be forced to devalue the bolivar in 2007 as oil prices decline. Venezuelan officials have said they do not plan to devalue the currency.

The institute forecast Venezuela’s economic growth at 7 percent, down from 10.3 percent in 2006. High world oil prices have in recent years boosted the economy of Venezuela, a major producer.

Venezuelan officials could not be reached for comment Sunday about the report.

Chavez has said his government wants to maintain a flourishing private sector and will fully respect private property rights. While Chavez has moved to nationalize key companies in areas such as telecommunications and electricity, his government has struck deals with affected companies to pay investors for their shares.

Charles Dallara, general manager of the institute, said the ‘radicalization of Chavez is suffocating’ the country’s already deteriorating democratic institutions.

He has justified the nationalizations as necessary to give the government control of sectors ‘strategic’ to Venezuela’s interests.

The report said: ‘As Chavez seeks to convert Venezuela into a socialist state, it is likely that he will extend the nationalization drive to other sectors and increase state intervention by, for example, capping private sector earnings and imposing mandatory contributions to finance social programs.’

The institute said that, overall, Latin America recorded a year of rapid growth in 2006, but economic growth is forecast to lose momentum in 2007.

Argentina is expected to have the strongest economic growth in 2007 at 7.2 percent, but that is down from 8.5 percent in 2006. The report said the biggest risk to Argentina’s economic growth is the government’s non-market approach to economic policy.

Copyright 2007 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

NEW YORK (AP) – WPP Group PLC, the world’s second-largest marketing conglomerate, is buying online advertising company 24/7 Real Media Inc. for $649 million in the latest deal to plunge media and technology companies further into the Internet advertising boom.
The deal announced Thursday came fast on the heels of Internet search leader Google Inc.’s $3.1 billion acquisition of DoubleClick Inc. in mid-April, a move that gave Google a major foothold in online display advertising.
Yahoo Inc. also struck a deal last month to buy the rest of privately held online ad exchange Right Media Inc. that it didn’t already own for $680 million.
Those moves by Google and Yahoo are motivating traditional advertising agencies such as WPP to act quickly so as not to get left behind in the race to offer online advertising services, particularly since Internet ad spending is growing far faster than advertising through traditional media outlets such as television, radio and newspapers.
Youssef Squali, an analyst with Jefferies & Co., says advertising agencies are trying to ‘protect their turf’ by preserving their relationships with clients, and that the flurry of recent deals has heightened tensions between technology companies and traditional ad agencies over divvying up the spoils of the online ad boom.
24/7 Real Media ran an online advertising network, allowing advertisers to make one deal that would allow an ad to appear on hundreds of sites at once, saving advertisers the headache of making many separate deals.
In January another major advertising conglomerate, the Paris-based company Publicis Groupe, purchased the online advertising company Digitas, and last month the Interpublic Group of Cos. said it would acquire a privately held marketing agency, Reprise Media Inc., for an undisclosed price.
With 24/7 Real Media now sold — unless a higher bidder emerges — relatively few publicly traded online advertising companies remain, says analyst Brian Pitz of Banc of America Securities, a result of the recent ‘land grab’ in the sector.
The two remaining companies of any scale in the online advertising arena are ValueClick Inc. — which runs an online advertising network along the lines of 24/7 Real Media, but with a greater number of smaller sites — and aQuantive Inc., which acts as a broker for buying and selling keyword advertising on search leaders like Google.
Microsoft Corp. has been widely seen as a potential bidder for an online advertising company such as 24/7, but so far the software giant has yet to make a move.
WPP is paying $11.75 per share for 24/7 Real Media, a 30 percent premium over the company’s average closing price over the past two months.
Shares of New York-based 24/7 rose 39 cents, or 3.5 percent, to $11.65 Thursday, while shares of WPP edged up 11 cents to $75.14.
London-based WPP is a major advertising services company and includes several major agencies, such as Grey Worldwide, JWT, Ogilvy & Mather and Young & Rubicam. It’s the second-largest marketing conglomerate in the world after Omnicom Group Inc.
Online:
http://www.247realmedia.com.
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WARSAW (AFX) – The Polish treasury has called for the terms of the 2004 sale of the PHS steel group to Arcelor Mittal to be reviewed, to see if a more favourable deal for Poland could be renegotiated.

Deputy Treasury Minister Pawel Salamacha called for the review during a parliamentary debate on the sale of Poland’s biggest steel concern.

In a recent report issued by the Polish Auditors’ Court, the value of PHS was ‘under-estimated by around two billion zlotys’ (513 mln eur) at the time of the group’s acquisition by Arcelor Mittal.

The Auditors’ Court recommended that the Treasury renegotiate the terms of a call option that was part of the 2004 deal, which would allow Arcelor Mittal to acquire an additional 25 pct stake in PHS for one zloty per share, or a total of 67 mln zlotys.

But the court did not complain about Arcelor Mittal winning the tender to buy PHS, saying that its offer was the best on the table at the time.

The full details of the sale contract have not been made public.

PHS comprises the four main steel mills in Poland — Huta Sendzimira, Huta Katowice, Huta Florian and Huta Cedler — which between them account for 70 pct of Polish steel production.

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afp/jsa

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WARSAW (AFX) – Icelandic investment fund Novator Telecom and fixed line operator Netia said they are launching a fourth mobile telephone network in Poland, with the long-term aim of gaining a 20 pct share of a market worth an estimated 7.45 bln eur.

The operator will offer subscriptions and tariffs some 35 pct lower than those offered by existing providers, under the Play brand, the network’s managing director Christopher Bannister said.

Novator holds a 25.24 pct stake in Netia, the second largest fixed-line operator in Poland behind France Telecom-controlled TPSA. The company is co-owned by Third Avenue Management, which controls 18.41 pct, and SISU Capital, which holds 6.1 pct.

Over half of the company’s share capital is floated on the Warsaw stock exchange.

Three operators dominate the Polish mobile telecoms market — Orange, which held a market share of 37.7 in 2006, Deutsche Telekom-controlled Era, with 35.5 pct, and More, a venture of Vodafone, TDC, KGHM and ORLEN, with 30.6 pct.

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afp/har/jsa

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COPENHAGEN (AFX) – Vestas Wind Systems market share for wind turbine generators (WTG) slipped 7 percentage points in 2006, still leaving it with a leading stake of 25 pct, Denmark’s MAKE Consulting said in a research note.

‘Vestas lost around 7 percentage points of its market share in 2006, whereof Siemens took a large part,’ Morten Keller at MAKE Consulting said, adding that there are many ways of calculating market shares and that estimates may differ between analysts.

In 2006, Vestas’ competitors GE, Enercon and Gamesa Eolica had around 15 pct each of the market, while Siemens Wind Power and Suzlon held market shares just below 10 pct each, MAKE Consulting said.

gustav.sandstrom@thomson.com

gs/hjp

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WASHINGTON (AP) – Banana company Chiquita Brands International said Wednesday it has agreed to a $25 million fine after admitting it paid terrorists for protection in a volatile farming region of Colombia.

The settlement resolves a lengthy Justice Department investigation into the company’s financial dealings with right-wing paramilitaries and leftist rebels the U.S. government deems terrorist groups.

In court documents filed Wednesday, federal prosecutors said the Cincinnati-based company and several unnamed high-ranking corporate officers paid about $1.7 million between 1997 and 2004 to the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, known as AUC for its Spanish initials.

The AUC has been responsible for some of the worst massacres in Colombia’s civil conflict and for a sizable percentage of the country’s cocaine exports. The U.S. government designated the right-wing militia a terrorist organization in September 2001.

Prosecutors said the company made the payments in exchange for protection for its workers. In addition to paying the AUC, prosecutors said, Chiquita made payments to the National Liberation Army, or ELN, and the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, as control of the company’s banana-growing area shifted.

Leftist rebels and far-right paramilitaries have fought viciously over Colombia’s banana-growing region, though the victims are most often noncombatants. Most companies in the area have extensive security operations to protect employees.

In Colombia, authorities reported Wednesday that nine geologists searching for gold were captured by the FARC. In addition, the army confirmed that four contractors hired by Colombian oil giant Ecopetrol were missing near Colombia’s border with Venezuela.

Colombia has one of the highest kidnappings rates in the world. Arrangements between companies and either guerrillas or paramilitaries are not uncommon, but it is impossible to know how much money is paid each year.

‘The information filed today is part of a plea agreement, which we view as a reasoned solution to the dilemma the company faced several years ago,’ Chiquita’s chief executive, Fernando Aguirre, said in a statement. ‘The payments made by the company were always motivated by our good faith concern for the safety of our employees.’
Chiquita sold its Colombian banana operations in June 2004.

Details of the settlement were not included in court documents, but Aguirre said Chiquita would pay $25 million in fines, which it set aside this year. The company reported the deal to the Securities and Exchange Commission. A plea hearing was scheduled for Monday.

The payments were approved by senior executives at Chiquita, prosecutors wrote in court documents. Prosecutors said Chiquita began paying the right-wing AUC after a meeting in 1997 and disguised the payments in company books.

‘No later than in or about September 2000, defendant Chiquita’s senior executives knew that the corporation was paying AUC and that the AUC was a violent paramilitary organization,’ prosecutors wrote in Wednesday’s court filing.

Company attorneys made it clear the payments were improper, prosecutors said.

‘Bottom line: CANNOT MAKE THE PAYMENT,’ the company’s outside counsel advised in February 2003, according to an excerpt of a memo included in court documents.

In April 2003, company officials and lawyers approached the Justice Department and told prosecutors they had been making the payments. According to court documents, the payments continued for months.

The document filed by federal prosecutors is known as an information. Unlike an indictment, it is normally worked out through discussions with prosecutors and is followed by a guilty plea.

Associated Press writer Toby Muse in Bogota, Colombia, contributed to this report.

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