Exclusive: Google Ventures beefs up fund size to $300 million a year

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Google will increase the cash it allocates to its venture-capital arm to up to $300 million a year from $200 million, catapulting Google Ventures into the top echelon of corporate venture-capital funds.

Access to that sizeable checkbook means Google Ventures will be able to invest in more later-stage financing rounds, which tend to be in the tens of millions of dollars or more per investor.

It puts the firm on the same footing as more established corporate venture funds such as Intel's Intel Capital, which typically invests $300-$500 million a year.

"It puts a lot more wood behind the arrow if we need it," said Bill Maris, managing partner of Google Ventures.

Part of the rationale behind the increase is that Google Ventures is a relatively young firm, founded in 2009. Some of the companies it backed two or three years ago are now at later stages, potentially requiring larger cash infusions to grow further.

Google Ventures has taken an eclectic approach, investing in a broad spectrum of companies ranging from medicine to clean power to coupon companies.

Every year, it typically funds 40-50 "seed-stage" deals where it invests $250,000 or less in a company, and perhaps around 15 deals where it invests up to $10 million, Maris said. It aims to complete one or two deals annually in the $20-$50 million range, Maris said.

LACKING SUPERSTARS

Some of its investments include Nest, a smart-thermostat company; Foundation Medicine, which applies genomic analysis to cancer care; Relay Rides, a carsharing service; and smart-grid company Silver Spring Networks. Last year, its portfolio company HomeAway raised $216 million in an initial public offering.

Still, Google Ventures lacks superstar companies such as microblogging service Twitter or online bulletin-board company Pinterest. The firm's recent hiring of high-profile entrepreneur Kevin Rose as a partner could help attract higher-profile deals.

Soon it could have even more cash to play around with. "Larry has repeatedly asked me: 'What do you think you could do with a billion a year?'" said Maris, referring to Google chief executive Larry Page.

(Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)

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Home blood pressure monitors show mixed results

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Home blood pressure monitors may be useful to some older adults who’ve suffered a stroke, but little help to others, a new study suggests.

Researchers found that overall, home monitors did not help stroke sufferers get a better handle on their blood pressure over one year.

The exception, though, was patients whose blood pressure was poorly controlled at the study’s start – meaning it was above the standard high blood pressure cutoff of 140/90 mm Hg.

In that case, patients given a home monitor cut an average of 11 points from their systolic blood pressure (the top number in a blood-pressure reading). That compared with just under five points among patients who were not given the devices.

That’s a meaningful difference, said Hayden B. Bosworth, a professor of medicine at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, who was not involved in the study.

The lack of overall benefit in the study doesn’t mean stroke patients shouldn’t use blood pressure monitors, according to Bosworth, who studies ways to improve people’s management of high blood pressure and other chronic conditions.

“It may be a matter of finding the right people to give them to,” he said.

Sally M. Kerry, the lead researcher on the study, said that many people who’ve had a stroke are “very motivated” to prevent another. So they may already be doing their best to keep their numbers under control.

“The main issue seems to be with those who already have relatively well-controlled blood pressure. Home monitoring is unlikely to improve this, although people do find it reassuring,” Kerry, a researcher at Queen Mary, University of London in the UK, said in an email.

She and her colleagues report their findings in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

Past studies have found that home monitoring may aid blood pressure control. A 2010 review of 37 clinical trials found that overall, people who used monitors shaved a few extra points from their blood pressure. They were also more likely to cut down on medication compared with patients who stuck with traditional doctor’s office measurements.

The new study focused on patients who’d recently had a stroke – a group, Bosworth noted, that hasn’t really been studied when it comes to home blood pressure monitoring. He said that’s probably in part because there is no real consensus on what stroke survivors’ blood pressure levels should be.

Kerry’s team randomly assigned the patients to either stick with standard care only or get a home monitor – along with instructions on how to use it and periodic phone calls from a nurse to check on how they were doing.

Over the next year, the results were mixed. Among the patients who didn’t seem to benefit were those who’d been left disabled by their stroke. Home monitors showed no effects on their blood pressure, while non-disabled patients cut about four points using a monitor.

“Some patients had difficulty in carrying out monitoring because they did not have a carer who lived with them to help,” Kerry said.

Bosworth pointed out that many people with high blood pressure already have home monitors, and these findings do not mean that stroke survivors can’t benefit.

It may just be that an elderly person left disabled by a stroke is “not the best” candidate, he said.

And for a monitor to benefit anyone, the numbers have to be put to good use, Bosworth said. That means a person’s healthcare provider has to know what the numbers are and make any needed adjustments in the patient’s medication.

Traditionally, people have had to bring their home readings to their doctor at each visit; some monitors automatically record each reading and allow you to print them out. But there is also “telemonitoring,” wherein wired or wireless technology is used to automatically send blood pressure readings to the doctor’s office.

That’s not widely used in the real world yet, but studies have suggested that telemonitoring boosts the effectiveness of home blood pressure measurements.

Home monitors range in cost from about $ 25 to more than $ 100, depending on the features. Experts generally suggest that you choose a monitor that has been validated for accuracy according to international criteria.

Some groups, like the British Hypertension Society and the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation, test blood pressure monitors’ reliability and keep lists of validated monitors on their websites.

The current study was funded by The Stroke Association, a UK charity.

If you do use a monitor, Kerry cautioned against interpreting the readings on your own and changing your medication dose.

In this study, she noted, some patients using home monitors did take it upon themselves to cut down on medication when they saw that their numbers looked good. And that, Kerry added, might be one reason why patients with fairly good control at the outset did not see a further improvement when they used a monitor.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/STMwU2 CMAJ, online November 5, 2012.

Seniors/Aging News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Look who’s talking! Kirstie Alley calls Travolta “greatest love”

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Actress Kirstie Alley described on Wednesday how she fell in love more than 20 years ago with John Travolta, and rejected widespread Hollywood speculation that the “Grease” star is secretly gay.

Alley, former star of the 1980s TV comedy “Cheers,” told ABC television journalist Barbara Walters that she fell for both Travolta and actor Patrick Swayze in the 1980s, although their romances never got physical.

Alley, 61, said she was attracted to Travolta while the pair were making the 1989 movie “Look Who’s Talking,” calling him “the greatest love of my life.”

“Believe me, it took everything I had inside, outside, whatever, to not run off and marry John and be with John for the rest of my life,” Alley told Walters in an interview broadcast on breakfast TV show “Good Morning America.”

Asked by Walters to comment on persistent rumors about Travolta’s sexuality, she said: “I know John with all my heart and soul. He’s not gay.”

Alley added: “I think in some weird way, in Hollywood, if someone gets big enough and famous enough, and they’re not out doing drugs and they’re not womanizing, what do you say about them?”

Travolta was single at the time, but Alley was on her second marriage, so she never pursued her feelings, she explained.

Travolta later married actress Kelly Preston, his wife for the past 20 years. But the actor was the target of two lawsuits earlier this year, which were quickly dropped, from two male masseurs who claimed Travolta made unwanted sexual advances.

Alley, who talks more about her love life in her new book, “The Art of Men,” said she fell for Swayze while they were filming the 1985 Civil War TV miniseries “North and South.”

“We did fall in love. I was more willing to break up my marriage and I wasn’t willing to break up his marriage,” Alley said, explaining why the relationship failed to go further.

Swayze, best known for his lead role in “Dirty Dancing,” died of pancreatic cancer in 2009 at the age of 57. He was married to dancer Lisa Niemi from 1975 until his death.

Alley has been married twice. Her second marriage, to actor Parker Stevenson, ended in 1997.

(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; editing by Matthew Lewis)

Celebrity News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Loughner gets life for deadly Ariz. rampage

TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — Former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, partially blind, her right arm paralyzed and limp, came face to face Thursday with the man who tried to kill her last year, standing beside her husband as he spoke of her struggles to recover from being shot in the head.

"Her life has been forever changed. Plans she had for our family and her career have been immeasurably altered," said astronaut Mark Kelly, both he and his wife staring at the shooter inside a packed courtroom. "Every day is a continuous struggle to do those things she once was so good at."

Jared Lee Loughner, 24, was then ordered to serve seven consecutive life sentences, plus 140 years in federal prison for the January 2011 shooting rampage that killed six people and wounded 13 others, including Giffords, outside a grocery store in Tucson, Ariz.

Loughner pleaded guilty under an agreement that guarantees he will spend the rest of his life in prison without the possibility of parole. He avoids a federal death sentence, although state prosecutors could still decide to try him.

One by one, survivors of the attack at a Giffords political event approached the courtroom podium to address Loughner, each turning toward him where he sat stoic and emotionless at a table with his attorneys.

"You took away my life, my love and my reason for living," said Mavanell Stoddard, who was shot three times and cradled her dying husband in her arms as he lay bleeding on the sidewalk after shielding her from the spray of bullets.

Susan Hileman, who was shot, spoke to him, at times visibly shaking.

"We've been told about your demons, about the illness that skewed your thinking," she said. "Your parents, your schools, your community, they all failed you.

"It's all true," Hileman said. "It's not enough."

"You pointed a weapon and shot me three times," she said, staring directly at Loughner. He looked back at her. "And now I will walk out of this courtroom and into the rest of my life and I won't think of you again."

Loughner's parents sat nearby, his mother sobbing.

Some victims, including Giffords, welcomed the plea deal as a way to move on. It spared them and their families from having to go through a potentially lengthy and traumatic trial and locks up the defendant for life.

Giffords didn't speak, but stood by Kelly and kissed her husband when he was done. He grabbed her hand and they walked away, her limping.

Earlier, Loughner told Burns that he would not speak at the hearing.

Both sides reached the deal after a judge declared that Loughner was able to understand the charges against him. After the shooting, he was diagnosed with schizophrenia and underwent forcible psychotropic drug treatments.

Christina Pietz, the court-appointed psychologist who treated Loughner, had warned that although Loughner was competent to plead guilty, he remained severely mentally ill and his condition could deteriorate under the stress of a trial.

When Loughner first arrived at a Missouri prison facility for treatment, he was convinced Giffords was dead, even though he was shown a video of the shooting. He eventually realized she was alive after he was forcibly medicated.

It's unknown whether Pima County prosecutors, who have discretion on whether to seek the death penalty against Loughner, will file state charges against him. Stephanie Coronado, a spokeswoman for Pima County Attorney Barbara LaWall, said Wednesday that no decision had been made.

It's also unclear where Loughner will be sent to serve his federal sentence. He could return to a prison medical facility like the one in Springfield, Mo., where he's been treated for more than a year. Or he could end up in a prison such as the federal lockup in Florence, Colo., that houses some of the country's most notorious criminals, including Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols and "Unabomber" Ted Kaczynski.

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Merkel says Germany, Britain must work together on EU

LONDON (Reuters) – Germany and Britain must cooperate to work round their differences on the European Union‘s long-term spending plans, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Wednesday.

“Despite differences that we have it is very important for me that the UK and Germany work together,” Merkel said through a translator before a meeting in London with Prime Minister David Cameron to discuss the EU‘s 2014-2020 budget.

“We always have to do something that will stand up to public opinion back home. Not all of the expenditure that has been earmarked has been used with great efficiency … We need to address that,” she said.

EU leaders meet in Brussels on November 22-23 to try to secure a seven-year budget for the 27-nation bloc amid signs of differences of opinion over what action should be taken.

(Reporting by Peter Griffiths; Editing by Andrew Osborn)

Europe News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Apple shares slide to five-month low, competition grows

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Pediatric clinical trials not going overseas – study

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Despite some concerns that medical studies involving children could make an ethically dubious shift to developing nations, a new study suggests that’s not happening.

It’s really only in the last decade that clinical trials – even in the U.S. and Europe – have started to focus on children, said Dr. Dianne Murphy, director of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Office of Pediatric Therapeutics.

Since children cannot give informed consent to enter a study (their parents have to do it), kids have historically been left out of clinical trials testing vaccines, drugs and other therapies.

But that’s a problem, Murphy explained, because children are not small adults, and study results from adults cannot simply be extended to them.

“We don’t know if we’re giving them the right dose, or if it’s even going to be effective,” Murphy explained.

So pediatric clinical trials are necessary. But since most children are, fortunately, healthy, researchers have to cast a wider net for study participants.

“You do have to reach out to more countries and more locations,” Murphy said.

And that has led some to question whether there could be an inappropriate shift to countries where ethical guidelines – like making sure parents give truly informed consent – might not be closely monitored.

In the new study, however, Murphy and her colleagues found that the number of pediatric clinical trials in developing countries has actually declined in recent years. And the U.S. remains, by far, the most common trial location.

Of 346 pediatric trials the FDA reviewed, the U.S. participated in 86 percent, providing three-quarters of the patients. Less developed and transitional countries, like Mexico, Brazil and India, took part in 22 percent and accounted for 10 percent of all kids involved.

The figures come from trials submitted to the FDA in support of therapies approved between 2007 and 2010.

Developing nations, the agency found, played a smaller role in those trials than they had just a few years earlier.

In an earlier study of trials submitted between 2002 and 2007, the FDA found that developing countries took part in 38 percent of trials, and accounted for almost one-quarter of patients.

Those numbers will naturally shift depending on the diseases and treatments being studied in a given time period, Murphy noted.

If there are more trials testing vaccines or treatments for infectious disease, developing nations will tend to be more involved. And that’s appropriate, Murphy said, because those diseases are a far bigger problem in developing countries.

“Children shouldn’t be in a trial unless there’s an opportunity for them to benefit,” Murphy said.

The researchers didn’t find evidence that kids in developing countries were being recruited into trials for diseases that are irrelevant to them. Of children enrolled in Mexico, for example, 97 percent were involved in vaccine trials.

In addition, most trials being done in developing countries (75 percent) were also running in wealthy ones.

Murphy said the FDA is taking steps to ensure that pediatric trials are being done appropriately. “For one,” she noted, “everyone should be aware that we’re reviewing this. That alone is important.”

But she said the agency also offers training to regulators in other countries, and has regular conference calls with officials in developing nations to help them with “in-the-weeds kinds of questions.”

“These conversations, particularly for (trials with) children, are very important,” Murphy said.

Continuing to do trials involving kids is also vital, according to Murphy.

“If we don’t, then your child becomes an experiment of one,” she said, noting that research suggests that products that work for adults’ ills do not work for children about one-fifth of the time.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/UwOXbC Pediatrics, online November 5, 2012.

Medications/Drugs News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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A Minute With: Taylor Lautner finding new dawn after “Twilight”

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – As dusk sets on the “Twilight” saga with the final film, actor Taylor Lautner is looking at a new dawn for the next stage in his career.

Lautner, 20, shot to fame after being cast as werewolf Jacob Black in the “Twilight” films, entangled in a torrid love triangle with Kristen Stewart‘s Bella Swan and Robert Pattinson‘s vampire Edward Cullen. He became a household name and pin-up for his clean-cut good looks and shirtless scenes.

In “Breaking Dawn – Part 2,” out in U.S. theaters on November 16, Lautner’s character finds new love, albeit unusual, and indulges his comedic side as the story comes to an end.

Lautner spoke to Reuters about leaving Jacob and his cast mates behind, and why the final film may leave fans in tears.

Q: What’s different about Jacob in “Breaking Dawn – Part 2″?

A: “He’s always been so stressed and emotional and things aren’t going his way and there was a huge weight lifted off his shoulders in this one, huge. It was nice to play that side of Jacob where he could sit back and relax and have a smile on his face and crack a few funny jokes every now and then.”

Q: Jacob finds his soul mate in Bella and Edward’s daughter Renesmee from the moment she is born. Was it challenging to balance his affection for her without coming across creepy?

A: “It was a challenge, and it is so complicated, but really nobody understands it more than Stephenie Meyer who created it. I was picking her brain all day long about it. She basically told me over and over again, ‘Taylor, stop trying to overthink it, stop trying to take it different places … It’s a life-long bond between two people, that’s it.’ In the movie, (Renesmee) is 10 years old, it’s much more of a protector relationship right now, and of course the relationship will grow but we don’t explore that, but it was important for me to keep it simple.”

Q: What are you going to miss most about your character and the franchise?

A: “These characters have never stopped changing throughout the entire franchise, and that’s what I love about Jacob. Jacob himself has grown up so much and gone through so many hurdles and it was a fantastic character to play. For me, it’ll be tough to say goodbye to spending time with people that I love. We’ve grown so close over the past few years. Our relationships will go on past this but to not have that excuse to spend day after day together while filming or promoting will be different.”

Q: “Twilight” fans are not just interested in your characters, they’re also interested in your personal lives. The past summer has seen a lot of attention on Robert and Kristen’s relationship. How do you handle that level of scrutiny?

A: “It’s unlike anything else because when we do talk about the movies, 90 percent of the time people want to know more about ourselves than the characters and what’s going on. I guess that just comes with a fan base like this, it comes with the job and you try and not let it affect you too much, but I have no complaints … The scrutiny, is it unfortunate? Yeah, but you just got to make your way around it and think about things more.”

Q: Do you feel protective of your cast members?

A: “Yes, I definitely do, we’re so close by this point, I think that it’s hard not to.”

Q: What do you hope “Twilight” fans take away from “Breaking Dawn – Part 2″?

A: “I just hope they’re happy and they’re proud because we really do make these movies for them. They’re the reason we are able to make them, their support is unreal and we’re so proud of this last one. This last one specifically wraps it up so nicely, it’s an amazing movie. During the movie, it’ll keep you on the edge of your seat but by the end, I think more than a few of the fans will be in tears.”

Q: Post-Twilight, where do you want to take your career to, what roles would you like to explore? I hear you have a cameo in the comedy “Grown Ups 2″?

A: “It was great to do (comedy), just hop in and show a different side, do something fun and work with somebody like Adam (Sandler). But now I’m looking forward to doing something different from that. There are a few projects that I’m very excited about that are extremely challenging and dramatic and would be tough.”

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy, editing by Jill Serjeant and Patricia Reaney)

Movies News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Boehner, Reid in talks to avert 'fiscal cliff'

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Fresh off the election, the two top leaders of Congress began tentative discussions on Wednesday aimed at heading off potential economic disaster at year's end, when simultaneous tax increases and spending cuts threaten to throw the United States into a recession.

The leader of the Senate's Democratic majority, Harry Reid, said he had conferred Wednesday morning with his Republican counterpart in the U.S. House of Representatives, Speaker John Boehner, and both had agreed not to "draw any lines in the sand" for the time being.

At the same time, Reid stressed that Democrats were not likely to budge from their standard negotiating position, that tax increases should apply to the wealthy, not those in the middle class or below.

The re-election of President Barack Obama and Democratic gains in the U.S. Senate, Reid said, had validated the party's position on taxes.

"I'm willing to negotiate at any time on any issue ... I want to work together but I want everyone to understand you can't push us around," Reid said

Reid said it was his preference they reach agreement in the post-election session of Congress that begins next week on ways to avoid the so-called "fiscal cliff" - the combination of expiring tax cuts and automatic across-the-board reductions in federal spending due at year's end.

He said would prefer a solution in this year's so-called lame duck session rather than enact a temporary fix for the fiscal cliff and would push the issue into the newly elected Congress, which starts in January.

"I'm not for kicking the can down the road," he told reporters. "We need to solve it."

Boehner, will deliver a statement at 3:30 p.m. EST on Wednesday on the need for a bipartisan deal.

Boehner will make his case a day after American voters gave Obama a second term, but maintained a divided government, with Republicans still in control of the House and Democrats still holding the Senate.

Boehner will argue that Republicans and Democrats must "take steps together," a spokesman said in a press release.

(Reporting By Thomas Ferraro; Editing by Fred Barbash and Jackie Frank)

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Officials: New mass graves found in Ivory Coast

ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) — Up to 10 new mass graves have been discovered near the site of a July attack on a camp for displaced people, officials said Tuesday, amid allegations that initial casualty totals were downplayed to mask killings carried out by the national army.

Rights groups claim summary executions were carried out by the Republican Forces of Ivory Coast, known by its French acronym of FRCI. Last month, officials found six bodies in a well close to the former campsite in the western town of Duekoue.

Government, army and U.N. officials toured 10 more graves in the same area on Saturday, said Paul Mondouho, vice-mayor of Duekoue. He said the graves had first been identified by civilians, and that officials did not know the number of bodies they contained because they had not yet been properly exhumed.

“People were suspecting the presence of bodies in these graves because of the smell coming out of them and because of the shoes we saw nearby,” Mondouho said.

Prosecutor Noel Dje Enrike Yahau, who is based in the commercial capital of Abidjan, confirmed that multiple new graves had been discovered but could not provide details. U.N. officials and the local prosecutor in charge of investigating the suspected killings could not be reached Tuesday.

U.N. spokeswoman Sylvie van den Wildenberg confirmed that U.N. forces helped Ivorian authorities secure a perimeter around 10 wells “similar to the one in which six bodies were found,” and that “some of those wells are suspected mass graves.”

She stressed that Ivorian authorities were leading the investigation but that the U.N. was able to provide assistance.

Army spokesmen could not be reached Tuesday. The Justice Ministry has previously vowed to investigate the discovery of the initial grave.

On the morning of July 20, a mob descended on the U.N.-guarded Nahibly camp, which housed 4,500 people displaced by violence in Ivory Coast, burning most of the camp to the ground. Officials said at the time that six people were killed.

The attack was prompted by the shooting deaths of four men and one woman on the night of July 19, according to local officials and residents. In response a mob of some 300 people overran the camp on the morning of July 20 after the perpetrators of the shootings reportedly fled there.

The victims in the July 19 attack lived in a district dominated by the Malinke ethnic group, which largely supported President Alassane Ouattara in the disputed November 2010 election. The camp primarily housed members of the Guere ethnic group, which largely supported former President Laurent Gbagbo.

Gbagbo’s refusal to cede office despite losing the election to Ouattara sparked months of violence that claimed at least 3,000 lives.

Albert Koenders, the top U.N. envoy to Ivory Coast, said one week after the attack that U.N. security forces had been inside and outside the camp at the time but that no Ivorian security forces were present. He said the U.N. forces decided not to fire at a large group of people that were attacking the camp in order to avoid “a massacre.”

Several witnesses have said soldiers and traditional hunters, known as dozos, participated in the attack on the camp. Both military and dozo leaders have denied the claims, saying they had tried to protect the camp.

In a statement released Friday, the International Federation for Human Rights, known by its French acronym of FIDH, said it had information — including the preliminary results of autopsies — confirming that the six bodies found in October were men who had been summarily executed by the army.

“The disappearance of dozens of displaced persons after the attack, as well as confirmation of cases of summary and extra-judicial executions, suggest a much higher victim rate than the official figures report,” said the organization, which counts Ivorian civil society groups among its members.

Duekoue was one of the hardest-hit towns during the post-election violence. The U.N. has established that at least 505 people were killed in and around the town, including during a notorious March 2011 massacre that claimed hundreds of lives and was allegedly carried out by fighters loyal to Ouattara.

Duekoue residents belonging to ethnic groups that supported Gbagbo have long complained about abuses carried out by the FRCI, with some pointing to the direct involvement of the local commander, Kone Daouda. FIDH said in its statement that Daouda had been transferred following the discovery of the grave in October, and called for him to be interrogated over the matter.

The group also said two FRCI members were being “actively sought” after failing to return to their barracks on Oct. 16, noting that they are believed to have fled to neighboring Burkina Faso.

Africa News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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