Exclusive: Google to replace M&A chief

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Google Inc is replacing the head of its in-house mergers and acquisitions group, David Lawee, with one of its top lawyers, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Don Harrison, a high-ranking lawyer at Google, will replace Lawee as head of the Internet search company‘s corporate development group, which oversees mergers and acquisitions, said the source, who spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to speak publicly.

Google is also planning to create a new late-stage investment group that Lawee will oversee, the source said.

Google declined to comment. Lawee and Harrison could not immediately be reached for comment.

One of the Internet industry’s most prolific acquirers, Google has struck more than 160 deals to acquire companies and assets since 2010, according to regulatory filings. Many of Google’s most popular products, including its online maps and Android mobile software, were created by companies or are based on technology that Google acquired.

Harrison, Google’s deputy general counsel, will head up the M&A group at a time when the company is still in the process of integrating its largest acquisition, the $ 12.5 billion purchase of smartphone maker Motorola Mobility, which closed in May.

And he takes over at a time when the Internet search giant faces heightened regulatory scrutiny, with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission and the European Commission conducting antitrust investigations into Google’s business practices. Several recent Google acquisitions have undergone months of regulatory review before receiving approval.

As deputy general counsel, Harrison has been deeply involved in the company’s regulatory issues and many of its acquisitions. He joined Google more than five years ago and has completed more than 70 deals at the company, according to biographical information on the Google Ventures website.

Harrison is an adviser to Google Ventures, the company’s nearly four-year old venture division which provides funding for start-up companies.

While most of Google’s acquisitions are small and mid-sized deals that do not meet the threshold for disclosure of financial terms, Google has a massive war chest of $ 45.7 billion in cash and marketable securities to fund acquisitions.

Lawee, who took over the M&A group in 2008, has had hits and misses during his tenure. Google shut down social media company Slide one year after acquiring it for $ 179 million, for example.

The planned late-stage investment group has not been finalized, the source said. The fund might operate separately from Google Ventures, according to the source.

“Think of it as a private equity fund inside of Google,” the source said.

The company recently said it would increase the cash it allocates to Google Ventures to $ 300 million a year, up from $ 200 million, potentially helping it invest in later-stage financing rounds.

Google finished Friday’s regular trading session down 1 percent, or $ 6.92, at $ 684.21.

(Reporting By Alexei Oreskovic; editing by Carol Bishopric and Jim Loney)

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Edward Furlong's Probation Gets Revoked

After his October arrest, actor Edward Furlong has had his probation revoked in court, ET has learned.

RELATED: Edward Furlong Arrested for Alleged Domestic Abuse

Furlong was taken into custody on October 30 and charged with felony domestic violence after allegedly grabbing his girlfriend's arm at Los Angeles International Airport.

According to court documents, Furlong will be free from jail pending his next hearing, set for January 11, 2013.

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Obama asks for $60 billion in Sandy aid

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama asked Congress Friday for $60.4 billion in federal aid for New York, New Jersey and other states hit by Superstorm Sandy in late October. It's a disaster whose cost is rivaled only by the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and the 2005 Hurricane that devastated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.

Obama's request adds a huge new to-do item to a congressional agenda already packed with controversy on how to resolve the nation's budget woes and avoid the so-called fiscal cliff.

"Our Nation has an obligation to assist those who suffered losses and who lack adequate resources to rebuild their lives," Jeffrey D. Zients, deputy director of the budget office, wrote congressional leaders in a letter accompanying the formal request. "At the same time, we are committed to ensuring Federal resources are used responsibly and that the recovery effort is a shared undertaking."

The measure blends aid for homeowners, businesses, and state and local government walloped by Sandy and comes with just a few weeks to go before Congress adjourns. Whether it passes this month or gets delayed in whole or part until next year is unclear. Most of the money — $47.4 billion — is for immediate help for victims and other recovery and rebuilding efforts. There's another $13 billion for mitigation efforts to protect against future storms.

The massive request comes after protracted discussions into late Friday afternoon with lawmakers and officials from impacted areas. Officials from the affected states had requested significantly more money, but they generally praised the request and urged Congress to enact it as quickly as possible.

"This is a powerful first step," said New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo at a news conference in New York City. He said the Obama administration is open to more funding if needed in the future. "We're going to be OK, if we get this funding. This is going to be a significant asset for this state."

Cuomo, a Democrat, and New Jersey GOP Gov. Chris Christie came to Washington this week to press for as large a disaster aid package as possible. Friday's request was at the top end of what had been expected and came after Obama allies like Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., had criticized the White House following reports it had settled on a $50 billion figure.

Christie — who endured some criticism from Republicans for praising Obama at the tail end of the campaign — joined Cuomo in praising the administration.

"We thank President Obama for his steadfast commitment of support and look forward to continuing our partnership in the recovery effort," the two governors said in a joint statement.

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New equity options exchange owned by Miami company starts trading on Friday

MIAX Options Exchange, a new fully electronic, equity options trading exchange, said it will begin trading on Friday.

MIAX Options Exchange is based in Princeton, N.J., but its parent company is Miami International Holdings. While MIAX’s executive offices, technology development center and national operations center are based in Princeton, additional executive offices, and a multi-purpose training, meeting and conference center will be located in Miami, the company said.

MIAX Options Exchange’s trading platform has been developed in-house and designed for the functional and performance demands of derivatives trading, the company said.

INA PAIVA CORDLE

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Driver of fatal MIA bus crash that killed two offers his “deepest sympathy.”

The driver behind the wheel of a bus that rammed into an overpass at Miami International Airport — killing two passengers and leaving many more injured — expressed his sympathies Thursday to those affected, while a group of survivors began speaking with a lawyer.

On Thursday, a relative sent out a short statement in Spanish from driver Ramon Ferreiro. In it, Ferreiro extended his “deepest sympathy” to the families of those killed in “the terrible accident.”

“I know there are no words of comfort for what happened, but my family and I are praying for all those affected and their loved ones,” he wrote in Spanish. “I’m emotionally and physically very shocked by what happened, and for this reason I ask you to respect my family’s privacy during this difficult time.”

The crash happened a few minutes before 7:30 a.m. Saturday. The bus carried members of a Jehovah’s Witness congregation on their way to the annual general assembly meeting in West Palm Beach.

Ferreiro, 47, took a wrong turn on Le Jeune Road. He sped past multiple signs warning of the low clearance at the airport’s arrival concourse, smashing the 11-foot-tall bus into an overpass.

Two people sitting in the front were killed; the remaining 30 passengers went to hospitals for examinations and treatment.

As of Thursday, four people from the crash remained at Jackson Memorial Hospital, spokeswoman Lidia Amoretti said. Of the group, three were in good condition and one was in critical.

Another eight people admitted after the crash already had been discharged.

And some of the survivors have begun speaking with West Palm Beach lawyer Patrick Cousins.

Cousins, who also is Jehovah’s Witness, said that members of his religion tend to shy away from legal battles, and that’s why he hopes to settle the matter with the bus service’s insurance company out of court.

The goal, he said, would be to get compensation for costs such as their hospital bills.

“We are not the type of people to create problems or issues,” Cousins said. “But this is not something we really created. We just want to make sure everybody gets their compensation.”

Saturday’s accident appears to be the first blemish on the record of both the driver and the bus company, Miami Bus Service Corp., which is owned by Mayling and Alberto Hernandez.

Ferreiro has a valid commercial driver’s license with the proper endorsement to carry passengers, according to records from the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles.

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For his next crisis

Saving the planet isn’t easy — or cheap — especially in California. The state’s anti-global-warming cap-and-trade program is the latest gimmick to leave it with yet another big hole to fill in its budget.

The Golden State’s new carbon-trading program is the world’s second largest, after the European Union’s. The stated goal is to cut greenhouse-gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 and another 80 percent by 2050.

But California held its very first “carbon credit” auction last month — and it was a big disappointment.

Under cap-and-trade, regulators set a limit on how much carbon dioxide a business or utility may release into the atmosphere. (Yes, the government now considers CO2, the same gas you and I release every time we exhale, a pollutant it can regulate.)

AP

Brown: California gov falls billion or so short on revenue anticipated from “carbon credit” sales.

Businesses buy credits from the state, which allows them to “pollute.” Those who don’t exceed their licensed limit on CO2 emissions may sell surplus credits to other businesses that do.

On Nov. 17, California’s Air Resources Board announced the first auction’s results: the full allotment of 23.1 million credits had sold out.

Environmentalists and bureaucrats hailed it as a big success. But the accountants at the state’s nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office killed the buzz quickly.

Turns out, state budgeteers had assumed the fisc would balloon with $1 billion in new cap-and-trade revenue in the program’s first year alone. Half of the money would go toward various state initiatives to cut greenhouse gases, and the rest would help balance the state’s perpetually off-kilter budget.

Lawmakers had such high hopes for that cash. So high, in fact, that the money’s already spent.

Now we learn California will likely take in just $191 million, the legislative analyst says. The state already faced a deficit in June, but the disappointing carbon-credit sales mean it will be much larger — $1.9 billion and counting.

That’s tough news, just a month after voters passed a $6 billion tax hike to help fill last year’s $16 billion deficit.

How could regulators and budget forecasters be so far off? The evidence suggests that was the intention.

California’s budget hasn’t really balanced in at least a decade. Year in, year out, state leaders rely on a complex series of accounting gimmicks and far-fetched assumptions to reach “balance.” For example, the state Department of Finance said Facebook’s stock offering would generate a cool $1.5 billion; it was off by at least $625 million.

Supply and demand also helps explain the disparity. The opening bid for California’s carbon credits was $10 per metric ton of CO2. The final bid: just $10.09 per metric ton. Nine cents higher.

Even though the credits sold out, the demand just wasn’t as great as regulators hoped. Right now, businesses — especially manufacturers — aren’t interested in paying a premium for the privilege of “polluting” when they aren’t planning to grow or are looking to abandon California entirely, thanks to the state’s foul business climate.

Comcast just closed its call centers in California, laying off 1,000 workers; Campbell’s Soup this summer announced it would shut down a plant outside of Sacramento, shedding 700 jobs.

But Golden State politics played an even bigger role in the cap-and-trade bust. Despite a sluggish economic recovery and persistently high unemployment, California’s political class holds fast to the idea that the state’s future is green and that a top-down cap-and-trade scheme is the key to it all.

Earlier this year, Gov. Jerry Brown claimed cap-and-trade would pay for his beloved $68 billion bullet train, which is behind schedule and about $60 billion short of funds.

“We do have other sources of money” for high-speed rail, the governor assured an interviewer in January. “For example, cap-and-trade . . . will be a source of funding going forward for the high-speed rail.” Oops.

Nor was that the only goof. As the legislative analyst pointed out, building a high-speed rail system would put a lot of carbon in the air, from all those diesel-burning bulldozers and trucks.

California’s green fantasy appears to have met cold reality. Perhaps, instead of putting faith in policy gimmicks, Brown and his fellow Democrats can try fiscal discipline sometime.

Southern Californian Ben Boychuk is an associate editor of the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal and a contributor to PublicSectorInc.org.

Have a comment on this PostOpinion column? Send it in to LETTERS@NYPOST.COM!

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Innovate MIA puts spotlight on startup community

If you think the next week is all about art, you may be surprised to learn there are also six entrepreneurship events vying for your time.

And that is all by design.

In much the way that Art Basel helped put Miami’s arts community on the international map, organizers of the first Innovate MIA hope their weeklong grouping of events will shine a light on the city’s growing tech startup community and its position as the gateway to Latin America.

Many of the events — ending with Florida International University’s Americas Venture Capital Conference — are after Art Basel. That’s also why the third annual AVCC was moved to Dec. 13-14 from its previous mid-November dates.

“Our message is come for Art Basel, and stay for AVCC,” said Juan Pablo Cappello, a lawyer, entrepreneur and investor who is on the steering committee of the venture capital conference and several other Innovate MIA events. And all week, there will be plenty of opportunities for Miami’s entrepreneurs, creatives and investors to mingle with their counterparts from all over the Americas and beyond.

In addition to the AVCC, there’s Incubate Miami’s DemoDay, where its class of startups present their companies, the martial arts-inspired TekFight and HackDay, which dangles a $50,000 cash prize. Endeavor, the global nonprofit that promotes high-impact entrepreneurship in emerging economies, is bringing its two-day International Selection Panel to Miami, and Wayra, an international accelerator, is holding a one-day event to showcase its promising startups from Latin America and Spain. It’s all part of Innovate MIA week: “I don’t think anything like it has ever been organized here in South Florida,” Cappello said.

The AVCC will be the big draw, with about 300 people expected to attend the two-day event at the JW Marriott Brickell. The conference, themed “Data, Design & Dollars,” will feature thought leaders from all over the world, particularly Latin America, and presentations by 29 selected companies. This year, the format has been overhauled and energized, with lots of short talks and more time for question-and-answer sessions and networking, said Jerry Haar, associate dean of FIU’s College of Business, director of the Pino Global Entrepreneurship Center and AVCC co-chair.

The AVCC’s 36 speakers include Martin Varsavsky, Argentine tech entrepreneur, investor and founder of Viatel, Ya.com, Jazztel and FON; Hernan J. Kazah, co-founder and managing partner at Kaszek Ventures and co-founder of Mercadolibre; and Jason L. Baptiste, CEO and co-founder of Onswipe. There’s also Michael Jackson, former COO of Skype and now a venture capitalist; Albert Santalo, founder and CEO of Miami-based CareCloud; and Bedy Yang of 500 Startups.

Chosen from more than 100 applicants, the 29 presenting companies hailing from all over the Americas will be giving either two-minute or five-minute pitches, fielding questions from a panel of judges and competing for prize packages valued at about $50,000. Eight of the startups are from South Florida: itMD, Kairos, Trapezoid Digital Security, Esenem, LiveNinja, OnTrade, Rokk3r Labs and Zavee.

The presenting companies have “proven innovation, proven management teams and the ability to scale well and be a pan-regional player,” said Faquiry Diaz Cala, president of Tres Mares Group and co-chair of AVCC. “The word is out this is a great place to come and pitch to great investors in addition to potentially being one of the prize winners.”

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To win in 2014, Florida Democrats must build on momentum

Democrats just concluded their most successful Florida election cycle in more than three decades, not just delivering the state to President Barack Obama and re-electing Sen. Bill Nelson, but also picking up state House, state Senate, and Congressional seats.

But don’t get cocky, Florida Democrats. In many respects, 2014 is more important for the vitality of the party than 2012.

As you prepare to elect a new state party chairman there’s every reason to worry heading into the new election cycle, even against vulnerable Republican Gov. Rick Scott.

You won’t have the massive Obama grassroots machine registering and turning out tens of thousands of new voters. Or a lavishly funded TV campaign like Obama’s. And if past is prologue, Florida Republicans will have far stronger turnout than Democrats.

“Democrats have a long history of not coming out to vote in the non-presidential election years. We’ve seen that four times in a row,” Alex Sink, the 2010 Democratic nominee for governor and potential 2014 candidate, said in a Political Connections interview on Bay News 9.

“The big question I believe for Democrats in the next election is how much of that energy and enthusiasm that we had during this presidential election can carry on to the 2014 races,” Sink said. “I think it’s probably going to be unfortunately very difficult.”

On Jan. 26 in Orlando, Democratic Party leaders will elect a new leader to succeed former state Sen. Rod Smith of Alachua, who took the helm of the state party after a GOP wave left Democrats holding just one of Florida’s six statewide offices, Nelson’s Senate seat.

Against that change of leadership, there is no more important question facing the party than whether it can take advantage of demographic changes in Florida and come even close to following the model set by the Obama campaign.

“We’re at the threshold of a new Florida, and we’ve got to seize that opportunity,” said Alan Clendenin, an air-traffic controller and union organizer in Tampa running for party chairman against Annette Taddeo-Goldstein, a Miami-Dade County businesswoman and former candidate for Congress and County Commission.

“Demographics are on our side, the issues are on our side, the wind is at our back, and we just can’t screw it up,” said Clendenin, 53, whose extensive “Rebrand, Rebuild, Recruit” plan for the state party includes decentralizing to create at least five “regional hubs,” more emphasis on low-dollar fundraising, and a “bottom-up” structure for grassroots organizing.

A key to Obama winning Florida’s 29 electoral votes was his strong performance among African-Americans, Hispanics, and voters under 30 — overwhelmingly Democratic groups that tend to show up in much lower numbers during off-year elections.

“The question is how do we take what is the Obama coalition and translate that to a Democratic coalition that outlasts Obama,” said outgoing party chairman Smith.

Consider that in 2008 the Florida electorate was 42 percent Democratic and 39 percent Republican. Two years later, when Scott narrowly beat Sink, it was 45 percent Republican and 39 percent Democratic.

In non-presidential years, the Florida electorate is invariably older, whiter, and much more Republican.

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In brewing rivalry, Instagram trims ties to Twitter

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Facebook Inc’s recently acquired photo-sharing service Instagram removed a key element of its integration with Twitter, signaling a deepening rift between two of the Web’s dominant social media companies.

Instagram Chief Executive Kevin Systrom said Wednesday his company turned off support for Twitter “cards” in order to drive Twitter users to Instagram’s own website. Twitter “cards” are a feature that allows multimedia content like YouTube videos and Instagram photos to be embedded and viewed directly within a Twitter message.

The move marked the latest clash between Facebook and Twitter since April, when Facebook, the world’s no. 1 social network, outbid Twitter to nab fast-growing Instagram in a cash-and-stock deal valued at the time at $ 1 billion. The acquisition closed in September for roughly $ 715 million, reflecting Facebook’s recent stock drop.

The companies’ ties have been strained since. In July, Twitter blocked Instagram from using its data to help new Instagram users find friends.

Beginning earlier this week, Twitter’s users began to complain in public messages that Instagram photos did not seem to display properly on Twitter’s website.

Systrom confirmed Wednesday that his company had decided its users should view photos on Instagram’s own Web pages and took steps to change its policies.

“We believe the best experience is for us to link back to where the content lives,” Systrom said in a statement, citing recent improvements to Instagram’s website.

“A handful of months ago, we supported Twitter cards because we had a minimal Web presence,” Systrom said, noting that the company has since released new features that allow users to comment about and “like” photos directly on Instagram’s website.

The move escalates a rivalry in the fast-growing social networking sector, where the biggest players have sought to wall off access to content from rival services and to their ranks of users.

“They’re both competing for slices of the same pie, the pie being users’ attention,” said Ray Valdes, an analyst with research firm Gartner.

If Facebook decides to offer advertising on Instagram, it’s important that the users visit Instagram’s own website, said Valdes. “If the eyeballs are elsewhere, you have less to work with in terms of monetization,” he said.

Photos are among the most popular features on both Facebook and Twitter, and Instagram’s meteoric rise in recent years has further proved how picture-sharing has become a key front in the battle for social Internet supremacy.

Instagram, which has 100 million users, allows consumers to tweak the photos they take on their smartphones and share the images with friends, a feature that Twitter has reportedly also begun to develop. Twitter’s executive chairman, Jack Dorsey, was an early investor in Instagram and had hoped to acquire it before Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg made a successful bid.

When Zuckerberg announced the acquisition in an April blog post, he highlighted Instagram’s inter-connectivity with other social networks.

“We think the fact that Instagram is connected to other services beyond Facebook is an important part of the experience,” Zuckerberg wrote. “We plan on keeping features like the ability to post to other social networks.”

A Twitter spokesman declined comment Wednesday, but a status message on Twitter’s website confirmed that users are “experiencing issues,” such as “cropped images” when viewing Instagram photos on Twitter.

(Reporting By Alexei Oreskovic and Gerry Shih; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Leslie Adler)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Neon Trees Kicks Off Stageside Live Concert Series

Alternative rock back Neon Trees is kicking off CBS' new concert series, Stageside Live, streaming now!

RELATED: New Music Tuesday!

Neon Trees hit the scene in 2010 with their first major release, Habits, featuring the double platinum lead single, Animal. From there the band made it to No. 6 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart with the release of their second album, Picture Show, in 2012, and it looks to be a promising New Year for the Utah natives, as they're set to join Maroon 5 on their North American arena tour, launching on February 13.

Tonight's performance comes to you live from The Moody Theater in Austin, Texas. Click here to stay up-to-date on who will next appear on the concert series.

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