Facebook poised for $5-10 bn IPO

Eight years after its launch, social networking giant Facebook is poised to file papers for an initial public offering seeking to raise at least $5 billion.

The prospectus for an IPO could be filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) as early as Wednesday morning, according to US media reports, although they stressed there was still a possibility it could be delayed.

The Wall Street Journal broke the news of Facebook's impending IPO last week, saying the Palo Alto, California-based company planned to raise $10 billion at a valuation of between $75 billion and $100 billion.

The $10 billion target had been halved to a more conservative $5 billion in reports emerging late Tuesday in The New York Times and International Financing Review.

The publications stressed, however, that $5 billion was only a preliminary fund-raising target and could always be raised after gauging investor interest.

The initial IPO filing was not expected to specify how many shares were being offered or their list price.

It would also not put a valuation on the company nor identify which exchange Facebook shares would be traded on -- the Nasdaq stock market or the New York Stock Exchange.

In any case, Facebook shares are not expected to begin trading until at least May, once the IPO process is finalized.

With a deal size of $10 billion, Facebook would slip into sixth place on the list of largest US IPOs between AT&T Wireless Group ($10.62 billion) and Kraft Foods ($8.68 billion), according to Renaissance Capital.

Even at $5 billion, it would still be the largest IPO ever by a US Internet company, surpassing that of Google which raised $1.9 billion in 2004 and valued the Web search giant at $23 billion.

A market capitalization of $100 billion would put Facebook on a par with McDonald's ($101 billion), well ahead of Boeing ($55 billion) but behind Apple ($426 billion) and Google ($189 billion).

A Facebook IPO would be "the biggest financial event in the tech industry for 2012," Forrester Research analyst Josh Bernoff said, and would eclipse those of several other Internet companies that went public in 2011.

Career-oriented social network LinkedIn was undervalued while online daily deals site Groupon and social games titan Zynga have both been trading at or below their list price.

Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has deflected IPO talk for years, saying he is focused on building the company and not on going public.

But Zuckerberg, who launched Facebook from his Harvard University dorm room in February 2004 and has seen it grow to more than 800 million members, has recently seemed to bow to the inevitability of selling stock to the public.

Morgan Stanley is expected to be the lead bank for the IPO and IFR said Goldman Sachs, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Barclays Capital and JP Morgan would also play a role.

According to eMarketer, Facebook's global revenue was $4.27 billion last year, mostly from online advertising.

EU probes Samsung, Germany blocks its tablets

Samsung took a double-hit in its battle against archrival Apple on Tuesday, when the European Union announced it would investigate whether it was illegally trying to hinder competitors and Germany blocked sales of some of its tablet computers.

Samsung Electronics and Apple Inc. are engaged in a strategic war over patents in many countries across the world as they try to draw market share away from each other.

The EU's antitrust watchdog thinks the South Korean company may be overstepping the bounds and launched a formal investigation into whether Samsung is using law suits over key patents on 3G wireless technology to hinder competitors — including Apple.

The European Commission, which is acting as the EU's antitrust enforcer, said it suspected Samsung of not giving other companies fair access to patents it holds on standardized 3G technology for mobile devices — despite committing to do so in 1998.

A spokeswoman for the Commission said the probe also affected tablets such as Apple's newest iPad, which uses standardized wireless 3G technology.

The Commission said that Samsung last year sought legal injunctions against other device makers in several EU states, alleging patent infringement.

Under EU patent rules, a company that hold patents for standardized products are required to license them out indiscriminately at a fair price.

If Samsung is found guilty of unfairly restraining competition, it can be fined up to 10 percent of annual revenue related to the investigation.

"Samsung now has to think carefully about how it wants to deal with (the probe)," said Florian Mueller, a patent analyst who has been closely following the battle between Samsung and Apple.

In the EU, Samsung has sued Apple in Germany, France, Italy, the U.K., the Netherlands and Spain. It also has legal proceedings against its competitor in the U.S., South Korea, Japan and Australia, Mueller said. However, Mueller said, Samsung may now be inclined to withdraw its lawsuits against Apple following news of the European investigation.

The battle between the two companies began in April, when Cupertino, California-based Apple sued Samsung in the United States, alleging the product design, user interface and packaging of Samsung'sGalaxy devices "slavishly copy" the iPhone and iPad.

Samsung — the global No. 1 in TVs and No. 2 in smartphones by sales — responded by filing its own lawsuits that accused Apple of patent infringement of its wireless telecommunications technology.

A spokesman said the European Commission launched its probe after its own investigation of the market, rather than reacting to complaints from Samsung's competitors. However, the Commission last year sent antitrust questionnaires to both Apple and Samsung.

The spokesman added that similar probes could also be launched against other companies strategically using patent suits to stop competitors from selling similar devices.

Nam Ki-yung, a spokesman at Samsung Electronics in South Korea, said his company was looking at details of the news on the probe but had no immediate comments.

EU antitrust probes don't have a deadline and the Commission stressed that its investigation does not mean Samsung did indeed breach the bloc's competition rules. Samsung now gets the chance to respond to the Commission's concerns, as will other market participants.

Also Tuesday, in a separate case, an appeals court in Germany ruled in favor of Apple, saying Samsung could not sell its Galaxy Tab 10.1 nor the Galaxy Tab 8.9 in the country because they too closely resembled the iPad2, in violation of unfair competition laws.

"Samsung wrongly used the enormous reputation and prestige of the iPad," Duesseldorf state court Presiding Judge Wilhelm Berneke wrote in his ruling.

Samsung's successor tablet, the Galaxy Tab 10.1 N, was not affected by the ruling, and the company said that while the decision was disappointing, it was largely irrelevant.

"Today's ruling is of little factual relevance due to the new model Galaxy Tab 10.1 N, and ... the decision therefore is of no indicative value with respect to other legal proceedings involving the Galaxy Tab 10.1 N," Samsung said in an email to The Associated Press.

"Samsung will continue to take all appropriate measures, including legal action, to ensure continued consumer access to our innovative products."

Mueller said the German court ruling won't have a commercial impact on the South Korean company, since it has already been selling a new model of the Galaxy tablet since November.

"The defeat in Germany is more of a symbolical nature," said Mueller, whose clients include Apple competitor Microsoft.

The probe and victory in the German court for Apple come after the California company has met with several setbacks recently in its fight with Samsung.

Most recently, a Dutch court ruled on Jan. 24 that Samsung's Galaxy Tab tablet was not a copy of Apple's iPad, and that it could continue to be sold in the Netherlands. That came on the heels of a December decision in Sydney, where the High Court dismissed Apple's appeal and said Samsung was free to sell its Galaxy tablet computers in Australia.

Germany returns two millennia old Afghan sculpture

Germany this week returned an ancient pre-Islamic sculpture looted during Afghanistan's civil war, giving hope to Kabul's cultural mavens that the rest of its stolen treasures will also make their way home.

Eight figures, one missing a torso and others without noses, make up the 30-cm high (12 inches) limestone antiquity from the second century AD, a reminder of Afghanistan's rich classical past as a confluence of cultures on the crossroads of Asia.

Faces turned to their left, they are believed to be audience members watching Buddha on his throne in the ancient kingdom of Gandhara, which stretched across part of Afghanistan and Pakistan, the Foreign Ministry said.

"This is a masterpiece ... I am optimistic that in the future we will get the other artifacts back," said Omara Khan Massoudi, the director of Afghanistan's National Museum, which housed the sculpture before it was stolen.

Afghanistan's embassy in Berlin has been investigating who owned the sculpture since it appeared in Munich a year ago. It was flown to Kabul earlier this week.

As warlords battled for control of Kabul in the early 1990s following the Soviet exit, fighters pillaged around 70 percent of the museum's antiquities, or around 70,000 pieces, selling the choicest artifacts on the black market.

Massoudi, whose museum was also heavily shelled in the war, is working to get them back. "This is our responsibility... According to our laws, they must be returned to Afghanistan," he told Reuters.

Afghanistan's looted treasures have appeared across Europe, the United States and Japan. Kabul might see twenty ivories currently held in the British Museum return sometime this year, Massoudi said.

An agreement with UNESCO, the U.N.'s Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, and global police Interpol to recover stolen gems is proving successful: he said over 8,000 artifacts have returned since 2007, including a fifth century wooden Buddha. Tens of thousands are still missing however.

Endemic corruption, poverty and insecurity after thirty years of conflict mean even new discoveries do not reach cultural authorities.

Ancient Jewish scrolls, which Massoudi confirmed were recently smuggled out, are currently being kept by private dealers in London. [ID:nL3E8CK1V9]

Most of those that have been recovered and are in Afghanistan are under lock and key until larger spaces are built with the top-notch security systems museums in the West have.

Ten million dollars have been committed, half from the United States, for a new museum with such features and climate control, to be built next door to the old one over the next three to four years.

"It is my dream to have such museums across Afghanistan," Massoudi said.

Germany returns two millennia old Afghan sculpture

Germany this week returned an ancient pre-Islamic sculpture looted during Afghanistan's civil war, giving hope to Kabul's cultural mavens that the rest of its stolen treasures will also make their way home.

Eight figures, one missing a torso and others without noses, make up the 30-cm high (12 inches) limestone antiquity from the second century AD, a reminder of Afghanistan's rich classical past as a confluence of cultures on the crossroads of Asia.

Faces turned to their left, they are believed to be audience members watching Buddha on his throne in the ancient kingdom of Gandhara, which stretched across part of Afghanistan and Pakistan, the Foreign Ministry said.

"This is a masterpiece ... I am optimistic that in the future we will get the other artifacts back," said Omara Khan Massoudi, the director of Afghanistan's National Museum, which housed the sculpture before it was stolen.

Afghanistan's embassy in Berlin has been investigating who owned the sculpture since it appeared in Munich a year ago. It was flown to Kabul earlier this week.

As warlords battled for control of Kabul in the early 1990s following the Soviet exit, fighters pillaged around 70 percent of the museum's antiquities, or around 70,000 pieces, selling the choicest artifacts on the black market.

Massoudi, whose museum was also heavily shelled in the war, is working to get them back. "This is our responsibility... According to our laws, they must be returned to Afghanistan," he told Reuters.

Afghanistan's looted treasures have appeared across Europe, the United States and Japan. Kabul might see twenty ivories currently held in the British Museum return sometime this year, Massoudi said.

An agreement with UNESCO, the U.N.'s Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, and global police Interpol to recover stolen gems is proving successful: he said over 8,000 artifacts have returned since 2007, including a fifth century wooden Buddha. Tens of thousands are still missing however.

Endemic corruption, poverty and insecurity after thirty years of conflict mean even new discoveries do not reach cultural authorities.

Ancient Jewish scrolls, which Massoudi confirmed were recently smuggled out, are currently being kept by private dealers in London. [ID:nL3E8CK1V9]

Most of those that have been recovered and are in Afghanistan are under lock and key until larger spaces are built with the top-notch security systems museums in the West have.

Ten million dollars have been committed, half from the United States, for a new museum with such features and climate control, to be built next door to the old one over the next three to four years.

"It is my dream to have such museums across Afghanistan," Massoudi said.

Police nab Mexican drug boat north of Los Angeles

Police seized a motorboat packed with more than a ton of marijuana north of Los Angeles and arrested three Mexican men, the latest seizure as traffickers try to beat tougher border security by taking to the waves, authorities said on Tuesday.

U.S. Border Patrol agents intercepted the open-topped "panga" style vessel packed with plastic-wrapped bundles of marijuana atPoint Dume State Beach in Los Angeles County on Saturday, theU.S. Border Patrol said in a news release.

The three men on board the boat had entered the United States illegally and were turned over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

As security has tightened in recent years along the United States' porous border with Mexico, trafficking organizations have increasingly taken to smuggling drugs and illegal immigrants by sea to the Los Angeles area.

In the 12 months to the end of September 2011, authorities recorded 26 maritime smuggling incidents in the greater Los Angeles area, including seven in Ventura County. Since then, there have been 14 incidents including three in Ventura County and one in Santa Barbara County.

U.S. authorities have in recent months ramped up efforts to target sea-borne smugglers taking the longer route to the Los Angeles area, expanding the use of marine patrols, land-based surveillance, and cooperation with their Mexican counterparts.

The seizure on Saturday followed a tip from the California National Guard.

(Reporting By Tim Gaynor; Editing by Greg McCune)

‘Flying People’ Stun New Yorkers to Promote New Movie ‘Chronicle’

Ads for 1978's "Superman: The Movie" proclaimed "You'll believe a man can fly."  This past weekend, a very different kind of promotion for a new superhero film actually did convince some New Yorkers that human beings had taken to the skies.

What looked to be three people were spotted flying around the skies of lower Manhattan last Friday, causing a lot of double-takes and dropped jaws from onlookers.  But while it appeared to be a sight straight out of a comic book, it was actually a clever bit of viral marketing for this week's upcoming film "Chronicle."  Those aren't people in the air, but some very intricately designed radio-controlled airplanes.  Watch the video of their flight, and keep reading to learn how it was done.

The movie tells the story of three high school students who discover they have superpowers, including the ability to fly.  To promote it, the studio called on Thinkmodo, a company that specializes in creating viral sensations.  They first made a splash with a video that seemed to show a man using an invention to hack into the video screens in Times Square.  It was later revealed to be a tie-in for the Bradley Cooper movie "Limitless," which went on to be a surprise hit.  For "Chronicle," though, the team had a different direction in mind.

Related: Buzzy Viral Video Actually a Promotion for 'Limitless' >>

I interviewed James Percelay, the co-founder of Thinkmodo, over email about the video.  He said he and his partner Michael Krivicka were approached by 20th Century Fox, the studio behind "Chronicle," and they hatched a plan to do a live event they would also film for a viral video.  Percelay said they received approval for the project just three weeks ago.  They employed model airplane builders in Oregon, Pennsylvania, and New York to build the three featured planes and two back-ups.

Percelay said, "The planes are highly sophisticated dacron/carbon fiber, battery-powered, radio-controlled units," each with over 200 parts.  Percelay described the individual pieces as being "light and delicate as potato chips."  Their "flying people" are six feet tall, but they weigh only four pounds.  The aircraft were all built in a week, half the time it would normally take to construct them.

Percelay wouldn't reveal exactly who was piloting the planes in the video, only to say "[They] are expert AMA (Academy of Model Aeronautics) members with amazing skills."  They practiced flying for two days in Long Island before taking them out for a spin in New York.  According to the Los Angeles Times, the three people-planes made six trips over the Hudson River, each lasting only five minutes due to the short lives of their batteries.  One flyer did take a tumble into the river and had to be fished out by the NYC Harbor Patrol.

Watch new clips from 'Chronicle' >>

Unlike the "Limitless" video, where the promotional aspect was hidden until the viral element has spread across the Internet, the "Chronicle" stunt actually shows how it was done.  Percelay said the Thinkmodo team felt "the behind-the-scenes aspect of this video was even cooler than trying to create a hoax."  In an age when we assume everything we see has been digitally manipulated in one way or another, it is especially impressive to watch real aircraft being piloted to such an amazing effect.

Percelay said that the spectators in New York -- notoriously a hard-to-impress bunch -- were uniformly astounded by the flying people.  He said, "We loved that nobody felt threatened by them since their movements were so life-like and graceful... A number of people said it looked like an 'aerial ballet.'"

"Chronicle," the movie that inspired the stunt, opens this Friday. Watch the trailer below.

Be my guest

Those who have been here a while know that I love it when certain guests come on Elle DeGeneres’ show. Allison Janney in particularly, but Emma Thompson worked that pole like a pro. But now, well, now there may be a new rival for my affection in the Great Panted One’s guest chair. And that someone is Melissa McCarthy. Now my love for Melissa is no secret. I’ll say it loud and say it proud. But the best way to really appreciate her is to see her in action. Not just her films, though come on if you haven’t seen her in “Bridesmaids” I seriously fear for your mental health, but also her overall persona which is fun and honest and flat-out hilarious. She comes off as real, which is what she is. And a real funny lady is something the world could always use more of, sitting next to Ellen or not. So here is a little taste of the funny business that ensues when Melissa and Ellen get their chat on. I can’t wait for her to come back after the Oscars. Oh yeah, and about that, I don’t know about you but I can’t get enough of the sound of Academy Award nominee Melissa McCarthy.

On the Golden Globes


On her Spanx


On a test scene for “Bridesmaids 2”