Second Danone unit probes bribery allegations in China

By Adam Jourdan

SHANGHAI | Wed Sep 25, 2013 5:11am EDT

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Danone SA's advanced medical nutrition unit Nutricia has started an internal investigation after a Chinese newspaper published a report alleging it had bribed more than 100 doctors in Beijing to boost sales, the company said on Wednesday.

It was the third time in two weeks that a division of French food group Danone has had to respond to accusations of bribery by Chinese media, after its infant milk formula group Dumex was twice the subject of bribery allegations reported by China's state television.

China is a magnet for foreign milk powder makers, with a $12.4 billion market that is expected to double by 2017. But foreign firms are under scrutiny after recent media reports alleging corrupt sales practices in the industry. Authorities last month also fined a group of mostly foreign milk powder producers $110 million for price fixing.

Nutricia, which makes Karicare milk formula, bribed doctors at 14 hospitals in the Chinese capital with kickbacks, gifts, funded-travel and complementary show tickets between 2010 and 2013, the 21st Century Business Herald said on Wednesday, citing an unnamed whistleblower who claimed to be a student doctor.

The whistleblower had 52 documents detailing payments from Nutricia, the largest portion of which were to Beijing Aerospace General Hospital and Xuanwu Hospital Capital Medical University, according to the paper.

Nutricia had paid a sum of 300,000 yuan ($49,000) to a dozen doctors at the two hospitals over a three-year period, it said.

"We only saw the report this morning, so we've only just started an internal investigation into the matter," Zhao Qinghua, a spokeswoman for Nutricia in China, told Reuters.

"At the moment we still don't know the details... We need to wait to see the outcome of the investigation before we can make our next plans."

The two hospitals at the center of the allegations did not immediately respond to telephone queries about the report.

Corruption in China's pharmaceutical industry remains widespread, fuelled in part by low base salaries for doctors at the country's 13,500 public hospitals.

The 21st Century Business Herald said the documents also showed that sales representatives had made bribes through more unusual means, such as cleaning doctors' fish tanks and organizing strawberry picking trips for staff.

SALES THREAT?

In the milk powder sector, hospitals are an important sales and marketing channel because a recommendation from medical staff can help persuade new parents to choose a particular brand, which they often stick with, industry insiders said.

Milk powder firms typically spend close to 5 percent of their revenue "opening" medical sales channels, a separate recent report in the 21st Century Business Herald said, citing a China-based former employee at a foreign milk powder brand.

International guidelines used in China say doctors should promote breastfeeding unless there are medical reasons not to.

Recent salvos against international milk powder companies - allegations of widespread corruption, pricing probes and strong official reaction to a food scare at New Zealand dairy producer Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd - suggest global formula makers may face a more competitive playing field, analysts said.

A statement from China's health ministry last week said it would crack down on hospital sales tactics and punish staff who accepted bribes.

This could result in a slowdown of sales and marketing activity in hospitals for infant formula and hit sales performance, said Katherine Wang, chief China life sciences advisor for law firm Ropes & Gray.

Recent investigations into bribery in the pharmaceutical sector have hit sales operations and dented revenues for Chinese and international drug firms.

"I think (the corruption probes) will definitely create a sense of threat and also probably prevent regular interaction between the healthcare services providers and sales reps of the infant formula manufacturers," said Shanghai-based Wang.

"Because of the public oversight and the government scrutiny, I suspect within the infant formula manufacturers there's going to be an enhanced wave of internal compliance control investigations and audits."

Whistleblowers have made a beeline for the 21st Century Business Herald, with the paper publishing allegations against drugmakers Eli Lilly and Co, Novartis AG and Sanofi SA. The newspaper has declined an interview request from Reuters on why whistleblowers keep speaking to it.

In Wednesday's report, it said that under the direction of the Ministry of Supervision, Beijing and other cities had set up teams to look into the recent spate of anonymous whistleblowing, and would check the authenticity of the latest allegations against Nutricia.

(Reporting by Adam Jourdan; additional reporting by Shanghai Newsroom; Editing by Alex Richardson)

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Google's Motorola issues second appeal of dismissed ITC case against Apple

Google's Motorola issues second appeal of dismissed ITC case against AppleGet the lowest prices anywhere on Macs and iPads with exclusive coupons: Apple Price Guide updated May 25th. (Get the lowest prices anywhere) HomeReviewsBackpagePrice GuidesNew MacsMacs with AppleCarePrevious MacsiPadsApple Wireless DevicesBid on New & Used Apple ProductsFollow UsTwitterFacebookGoogle+RSS Feeds & QriusiPhone AppTip UsSend us a tiptip us anonymouslyContact us by e-mailForumsAAPL: 445.15 ( +3.01 )Never miss an update Follow AppleInsiderFollow @AppleInsider –A+
Friday, May 24, 2013, 07:08 pm

Google's Motorola issues second appeal of dismissed ITC case against AppleBy Mikey Campbell

Motorola has given notice to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that it will be contesting the International Trade Commission's dismissal of a case against Apple, the second time the now Google-owned company has filed an appeal tied to that investigation.


The appeals notice, uncovered by FOSS Patents' Florian Mueller after recently being made public, is in regard to an ITC decision to throw out a case against Apple after finding six Motorola patents-in-suit invalid.

In its dismissal, which was filed a month ago, the trade body found Motorola's last standing patent, a property for an infrared proximity sensor, invalid. The company was asserting U.S. Patent No. 6,246,862 for a "sensor controlled user interface for portable communication device," which covers a system that ignores errant screen touches during a phone call.

As noted by Mueller, Google's latest appeal is the second such action for the ITC investigation. The first came in November 2012, which questioned a decision that cleared Apple of infringing on three patents. The contention from Google resulted in a review of the findings, and that appeal has yet to be resolved.

Mueller pointed out that Apple may want to combine the two appeals, thus saving court resources, but the tactic is likely to fail due to the long span between Google's filings.

Motorola's Second Appeal of ITC Dismissal by Mikey Campbell

Tags:patentsMotorolaGoogleJump to comments (17)Categories:General(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));Tweet!function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); On Topic: patentsGoogle's Motorola issues second appeal of dismissed ITC case against AppleApple granted patents on push-to-talk, double-sided touch panelApple invention adjusts audio based on a display's orientation, user positioningApple investigating advanced AirPlay system with device-specific UIsSamsung Galaxy S4 & Google Now accused of violating Apple patents for SiriToday's' HeadlinesNo news headlines yet todayRelated ArticlesITC throws out Motorola patent suit against AppleITC to review decision that cleared Apple of infringing on Motorola patentsApple cleared of infringing Motorola patents, avoids U.S. import banApple cleared of infringing on Motorola patent in ITC caseGoogle cites quote from Steve Jobs biography in attempt to win iPhone import banPrevious Comments View Alljohn.b2013/05/24 07:39pm

Clearly, holding a phone against the side of your face was a new and unique idea that had never been thought of prior to this patent...

?

?

Though I'm not really sure why Apple would want to combine Motogoogle's appeals.

frood2013/05/24 08:23pm

Hooray!?? Seeing?more or less trivial patents invalidated never gets old.? The new digital age is less about inventions and more about obstruction.?? Only 939488583738292 more patents related to 'touching' 'shaping' 'looking at' and 'methods for performing "an operation" on a list' to go and maybe our court system can start working on legitimate stuff

ericthehalfbee2013/05/24 08:29pm

Waiting for GG to claim Google never initiates anything.

starbird732013/05/24 08:46pm

Court to Google/Motorola: You lose.

?

Google/Motorola: But, no, we don't.

?

Court to Google/Motorola: Yes, you do.

?

Google/Motorola: But, but, no, we don't.

?

Court to Google/Motorola: Yes, yes you do.

jungmark2013/05/25 12:51am

Do no evil, google.

applesauce0072013/05/25 07:04am

Three strikes and they're out...

suddenly newton2013/05/25 11:09am

LOL More reporting of court paperwork as 'news.'

ankleskater2013/05/25 11:17am

Quote:Originally Posted by starbird73?

Court to Google/Motorola: You lose.

?

Google/Motorola: But, no, we don't.

?

Court to Google/Motorola: Yes, you do.

?

Google/Motorola: But, but, no, we don't.

?

Court to Google/Motorola: Yes, yes you do.

How is that different from what virtually every company does? Appealing is a legal option and most companies, including those you worship, employ that option liberally, frequently and almost automatically. It's absurd, ridiculous, ignorant, hypocritical and unintelligent to mock any company for appealing.

?

Quote:Originally Posted by EricTheHalfBee?

Waiting for GG to claim Google never initiates anything.

This is a fair comment (about Google, not about GG - that part I couldn't care less about). Motorola is part of Google now, and Google did once declare a non-aggression policy on patents. Whether one agrees with Apple's legal actions, their objective is quite clear. This is not true of Google.

ankleskater2013/05/25 11:19am

Quote:Originally Posted by Suddenly Newton?

LOL More reporting of court paperwork as 'news.'

?LOL. More people reading and mocking it. Yet the joke is clearly, squarely on the mocking reader.

jessi2013/05/25 11:25am

I'm glad to see that Patent Troll Google has lost again, but let's not assume that this is a trivial patent simply because the people describing it do so in simple terms.

Multi-touch is a very sophisticated technology, never seen before (despite the claims from idiots who don't know how it works and who always bring up systems working on a different method, such as pushing two wires tougher as if they were "prior art".) ... and deserves to be protected.

Most of these "trivial" patents are not actually trivial. And getting them tried in court IS the way the patent system was designed.

The idea that there's a problem here is asinine-- the only problem is that innovators like Apple can't get timely resolution to these violations, while companies like google skate by.

But it's embarrassing that people would claim that patents stifle innovation-- patents ARE innovation, and the people being "stifled" weren't being innovative, they were being copycats.

If these patents really are trivial they don't stand up in court.

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Time for those six second 'selfies' with latest Vine update

Time for those six second 'selfies' with latest Vine update | iMore.com Skip to main content Android BlackBerry iPhone / iPad Windows Phone webOS SIGN UP|LOG IN iMore Forums Apps Games Accessories Reviews How-To Podcasts Contests iPhone iPad mini iPad iPod touch Apple TV iOS iCloud iTunes Mac Hot: iPhone 5S Guides: iPhone buyers | iPad buyers | iOS users Free: Wallpaper | iPhone apps, games | iPad apps, games Shop Online Cases Chargers Screen protectors Headsets & More Free shipping on orders over $50 Time for those six second 'selfies' with latest Vine update By Richard Devine, Tuesday, Apr 30, 2013 a 1:04 pm 1

If all those Instagram 'selfies' just isn't enough for you, then the latest Vine update for iOS has you covered. Until now, the social mini-video sharing service has limited budding film makers to using the rear camera. The update pushing out today in the App Store adds to the toolbox the front facing camera, so you can film yourself doing, well whatever you can do in six seconds. It's real simple to flick between the two cameras, just as it is in the main iOS camera app, with a single button on screen to tap.

It isn't all about the front facing camera though, as mentions get some much needed attention as well. You can now tag people with their username within the post, and those users will get a notification in Activity. As you begin typing, Vine will show up suggestions as to who it thinks you're writing about. Simple, but much needed. Grab yourselves a copy of the latest update from the App Store now, but do please give us your front-facing Vine ideas in the comments below too.

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More of: Vine, Twitter ? PreviouslyHow to disable location reporting in Google Search for iPhone and iPad Next up ?Infuse plays videos in multiple formats, keeps track of what you watch There is 1 comment. Add yours. asuperstarr says: Apr 30, 2013 at 6:22 pm - 12 hours ago

I still don't get it, what's with the six seconds. But maybe that's why it's not for me.

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