Lions Gate is offering to combine its business with MGM in a deal supported by billionaire investor Carl Icahn, who owns stakes in both studios.

Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. said Tuesday it has sent a proposal for a combination with financially troubled Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc.

Lions Gate said the combined company would be owned by its shareholders and by MGM's creditors. These include Icahn.

Terms weren't disclosed, though a report in the Los Angeles Times said the deal would give MGM's lenders a 55 percent in the combined company. Lions Gate and MGM declined to comment.

Icahn said the deal is better than a current proposal to combine MGM with privately held production company Spyglass Entertainment.

Icahn has been trying to buy Lions Gate for more than a year but has been rebuffed by the boutique film studio. Icahn's tender offer for Lions Gate worth $7.50 per share expires Oct. 22.

Originally posted at Breaking Legal News. Please visit http://www.breakinglegalnews.com/.

Johnson & Johnson said Wednesday it is buying Crucell N.V. for about $2.41 billion in a move that will boost the American health care company's vaccine business.

The move had been expected since September, when the companies announced they were in advanced talks. Johnson & Johnson already owns a 17.9 percent stake in the Dutch biotechnology company. The current offer is worth 1.75 billion euros, or 24.75 euros per share in cash for the remainder. That marks a 58 percent premium to Crucell's closing price on Sept. 16., the day before the companies announced a potential deal.

Johnson & Johnson, based in New Brunswick, N.J., has about $64 billion in annual sales and makes a broad range of products from Band-Aids to prescription drugs. It is new to the vaccine market and the Crucell buyout would give it vaccines aimed a childhood, endemic and respiratory diseases.

Johnson & Johnson said it will retain Crucell's existing facilities and senior management, along with current staffing levels. It will use Crucell as the center of its vaccines business and maintain headquarters in Leiden, Netherlands.

Crucell's board supports the deal.

The companies have been working together since 2009 to develop a universal flu vaccine and vaccines directed against infectious and noninfectious diseases.

"This potential combination would provide us with a new platform for growth and advances our goal to deliver integrated health care solutions, with particular emphasis on prevention," said Paul Stoffels, global head of pharmaceutical research and development at Johnson & Johnson, in a statement.

Originally posted at Breaking Legal News. Please visit http://breakinglegalnews.com/.

Intel Corp. agreed to buy McAfee Inc. for $7.68 billion, its biggest-ever acquisition, adding security software to its chipmaking arsenal.

McAfee investors will receive $48 a share in cash, Santa Clara, California-based Intel, the world’s largest chipmaker, said in a statement today. That’s 60 percent more than McAfee’s closing price yesterday. Both boards have unanimously approved the deal, Intel said.

The acquisition of McAfee, which trails Symantec Corp. in security software, will give Intel an advantage over other chip companies that must use outside security programs, said Hans Mosesmann, an analyst at Raymond James Associates in St. Petersburg, Florida. The deal also helps Intel expand beyond PCs as Chief Executive Officer Paul Otellini is trying to break into mobile handsets and grow in other portable devices.

“Their ability to be successful in the non-PC market, and even in the PC market, is going to depend more on system solutions, and security is becoming a really big deal,” said Mosesmann. “The security threats that are out there are not going away -- you could argue that they are going to get worse - - and having a tightly coupled hardware and software is a strategic advantage.”

Originally posted at Breaking Legal News. Please visit http://www.breakinglegalnews.com/.

RCN, the cable operator, said on Friday that it has agreed to sell itself to the private equity firm ABRY Partners for $1.2 billion, including debt, as the leveraged buyout industry continues to get back to business.

ABRY, a media and telecom specialist based in Boston, will pay $15 a share in cash, a 22 percent premium over Thursday’s closing price.

Private equity firms have been more active this year as they finally put their billions of dollars in untapped funds to use. Earlier this week, Bain Capital agreed to pay $1.63 billion to acquire a unit of Dow Chemicals, and last week CKE Restaurants reached an accord to sell itself to THL Partners for $928 million.
One of the main enablers for the upswing in private equity activity has been the opening up of the credit markets and the willingness of banks to lend to riskier transactions again. ABRY said that it has lined up financing from SunTrust Robinson Humphrey, General Electric’s GE Capital and Societe Generale, among other firms.

Shares in RCN, which provides cable TV and broadband services in the Washington, Philadelphia, New York City, Boston and Chicago areas, have risen about 185 percent over the past 12 months ended Thursday.

Originally posted at Breaking Legal News. Please visit http://www.breakinglegalnews.com/.