Brazil deal

Abbott Laboratories, the Illinois-based drug company, reached agreement with the Brazilian government to sell its AIDS drug Kaletra there for a reduced price — lifting the threat that Brazil might license it compulsorily. On 4 July, the company said it would sell it there for $1,000 per patient per year, down by about 30%. Abbott has drawn criticism from AIDS activists for its approach to marketing Kaletra in Thailand, where it has withdrawn an application to sell a heat-stable version of the drug (see Nature 448, 14; 2007).

All in hand

A 2,000-page guidebook has been compiled to help specialists in public health and agriculture to navigate their way through the thickets of intellectual property. The IPHandbook (http://www.iphandbook.org) has been produced by two non-profit organizations that specialize in opening up access to intellectual property in health and agriculture, respectively, as a resource for scientists and government officials, especially in poor countries. Support from the Rockefeller Foundation and other sponsors will permit its free distribution in low-income nations.

Float abandoned

A company seeking to develop medical technologies at the University of Liverpool, UK, withdrew plans for an initial public share offering on London's Alternative Investment Market (AIM). ULive, which has been seeking to exploit intellectual property developed at the university's labs, had hoped to raise £20 million (US$40 million) in late June, in a flotation that would have valued it at £70 million. But the number of initial public offerings on the AIM is down by half on last year, and lack of investor interest in recent offerings from small companies led ULive to withdraw its plan.