VENTURE CAPITAL POST

South Africa has signed a nuclear power agreement with France, the government said on Friday, three weeks after it reached a similar deal with Russia as part of Pretoria's first tentative steps towards building up to 9,600 MW of nuclear power.

Air France-KLM is pressing ahead with expansion of its low cost brand in France and has a back-up plan if a deadlock with pilots continues, its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Alexandre de Juniac said in an interview published on Sunday.

France will tax drugmakers whose costly hepatitis C drugs threaten to throw off course its healthcare budget, the government has said, heaping pressure on pharmaceutical companies like Gilead Sciences to cut their prices.

Italian tycoon Andrea Bonomi has written to directors of his bid target Club Mediterranee (CMIP.PA) asking for updated financial information, a letter seen by Reuters shows, in a sign he still hopes to win control of the French holiday company.

Venerable old airlines Lufthansa (LHAG.DE) and Air France (AIRF.PA) know the smart money is in the low-cost market –Ryanair (RYA.I) raised its forecasts again on Thursday - but powerful labor unions are keeping them from the bounty.

Germany and France will try to reconcile divergent visions of how to fix Europe's economy on Monday when Manuel Valls makes his first visit to Berlin as French prime minister and holds talks with Angela Merkel.

French media group Vivendi has finalised an agreement to sell its Brazilian broadband business GVT to Spain's Telefonica for cash and shares worth around 7.2 billion euros ($9.29 billion), the companies announced on Friday.

Asian shares held firm while the euro hit one-year lows on Tuesday as investors increasingly expect the European Central Bank to expand liquidity as soon as next week to boost the sagging euro zone economy.

U.S. stocks advanced on Monday, with the Dow Industrials up roughly one percent, as the threat of an escalation of tensions in Ukraine appeared to wane and the latest flurry of merger action supported equities.

Telecoms operator Orange's investment in faster fiber and mobile broadband networks in its French home market has started to pay off, as its high-end focus insulates it from cut- price fixed plans offered by rival Bouygues.

PSA Peugeot Citroen plans to build its next C3 compact model in Slovakia instead of France, sources close to the French carmaker told Reuters on Thursday.

France's controversial decree widening its control over takeovers in strategic industries is meant to help discussions over alliances and is not there to block deals, Economy Minister Arnaud Montebourg told lawmakers on Tuesday.

Marks & Spencer Plc is making a new push to expand abroad, hoping e-commerce will give Britain's biggest clothing retailer a better chance to succeed than earlier attempts to enter new markets.

The collapse of the $35 billion merger of New York-based Omnicom with France's Publicis is likely to lead the world's biggest ad agencies to think small as they try to counter the challenge from internet giants like Google.

Paris-l’hospital, France-based car rental startup Drivy secured $8.3 million (€6 million) in a new funding round with Index Ventures and Alven Capital as lead investors to fuel its expansion in Europe.