VENTURE CAPITAL POST

Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd, a Canadian property and casualty insurer, said it would buy Brit Plc, a specialty insurer and reinsurer, for about $1.88 billion to gain a significant presence in the Lloyd's of London market.

Samsung Electronics recently offered to buy BlackBerry Ltd (BBRY.O) (BB.TO) for as much as $7.5 billion, seeking its valuable patents as it battles Apple (AAPL.O) in the corporate market, according to a person familiar with the matter and documents seen by Reuters.

The following bids, mergers, acquisitions and disposals were reported on Monday including Forbes, Axel Springer, MidCap Financial LLC, Goldman Sachs and others.

Canadian private equity firm Fairfax Holdings Ltd. said that it would acquire a controlling stake in Keg Restaurants Ltd. Keg president and chief executive officer David Aisenstat will retain a minority stake of 49%.

Investors from US, Canada and Qatar backed up a USD1 billion debt sale deal to boost BlackBerry's cash position.

Investors such as Qatar Holding and Fairfax Financial have picked up sizeable amounts of BlackBerry's USD1 billion convertible debt offer.

Blackberry agreed to enter into a USD billion convertible debenture sale, which would saw its top executives including cheif executive officer Thorsten Heins leaving the company

Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd had until November 4 to negotiate a definitive agreement to buy out Blackberry Ltd.

SAP CFO Werner Brandt squashed rumors of SAP's interest in BlackBerry through an interview with Euro am Sonntag.

In a released statement, Blackberry Ltd said that it would be cancelling its quarterly earnings call and webcast scheduled for Friday this week.

Prem Watsa, the Canadian Warren Buffett, expressed confidence as to his consortium's bid for the floundering Canadian smartphone maker.

The USD4.7 billion bid by Fairfax for BlackBerry would be backed up by loans, equity investments and its own shares in the smartphone maker.

Financing for the Blackberry Ltd buyout by Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. would be largely dependent on the smartphone maker's debt-free assets, said financial analysts.

Fairfax Holdings formalized a bid for BlackBerry at USD9 per share.

Bids, mergers, acquisitions and disposals involving European, U.S. and Asian companies.