High court won't hear Tiffany's eBay appeal The Supreme Court won't overturn a ruling that says eBay isn't violating Tiffany's trademarks by selling items on its website that might be counterfeit. The court Monday refused to hear an appeal from Tiffany Inc. Tiffany sued eBay in 2004, saying eBay engaged in trademark infringement because most items that sellers list for sale as genuine Tiffany silver jewelry on its sites were fakes. But lower courts said eBay took down listings when Tiffany informed it that materials were counterfeit. Microsoft will get another day in courtMicrosoft Corp. won a legal victory with the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to hear its appeal in a patent-infringement battle. Toronto-based i4i Inc. filed suit against Microsoft in early 2007. Late last year, the firm was awarded $290 million in damages, after Microsoft's Word software was found to have infringed on one of its patents. Microsoft was later denied a petition for rehearing by a federal appeals court. But the Supreme Court now has given Microsoft another opportunity to present its case.
BP to sell stake in Argentine oil and gas firmLondon-based oil company BP PLC announced over the weekend that it has agreed to sell its 60 percent stake in Argentina-based oil and gas producer Pan American Energy for $7.1 billion. The sale to Argentina's Bridas Corp., which already owns the other 40 percent of Pan American, is part of BP's plans to sell tens of billions of dollars of assets to help pay for the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The deal takes BP within range of its target of $25 billion to $30 billion in asset sales by the end of next year.
New delay projected for Boeing DreamlinerMarket analysts projected a six-month delay in the first delivery of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner and cut estimates of how quickly the company would increase production of the plane. The latest forecasts came in response to Boeing's announcement last week that it expected to come up with a new delivery schedule over the next few weeks for the much-delayed plane. Boeing said it was working on design changes for power distribution panels after a recent fire forced a test plane to land in Texas. The fire, which lasted less than 30 seconds, was probably caused by debris left in a panel, the company said.
GM sells a subsidiary to Chinese firmGeneral Motors said Monday that it had completed a deal to sell a subsidiary that makes power-steering components to an affiliate of the Beijing municipal government. The sale of the unit, Nexteer Automotive, to Pacific Century Motors represents China's biggest single investment in the global auto parts-making industry, the companies said. It also will turn Beijing into the largest private employer in Saginaw, Mich., where Nexteer's headquarters and centers for research and engineering have nearly 3,000 workers. Terms of the transaction, which will take effect Tuesday, were not disclosed.
Kraft seeks arbitration against StarbucksKraft Foods said it has launched an arbitration proceeding against Starbucks Corp., which earlier this month said it wants to end its supermarket distribution deal with Kraft. Kraft seeks the fair-market value of the business it has helped develop with Starbucks over the past 12 years, plus up to a 35 percent premium. The business has grown to $500 million in annual sales.
Seagate ends talks about going privateSeagate Technology PLC, the world's largest maker of disk drives, ended talks to be taken private and authorized the repurchase of as much as $2 billion of its own stock.
FROM NEWS SERVICES