Dropbox plans to tap the money for expansion —through acquisitions and partnerships — as well as for new hires.The San Francisco-based company said it had 45 million users who access 1 billion files every three days. It provides a certain amount of storage for free before charging people for extra capacity.Dropbox, which has not disclosed its revenue, competes with other services like Google Inc’s free Docs.So far, Dropbox raised $257.2 million that includes early investors Sequoia Capital, Accel Partners, and Hadi and Ali Partovi.

Oct 18 (Reuters) - Genuine Parts Co , a distributor of auto parts, posted better-than-expected quarterly results helped by strong demand from the automotive aftermarket.Third-quarter net income was $151.8 million, or 97 cents a share, compared with $131.8 million, or 83 cents a share, a year ago.Sales rose 11 percent to $3.3 billion. Industrial business sales was up 18 percent, while sales at the electrical business rose 22 percent.Analysts on an average were expecting earnings of 94 cents a share, before special items, on revenue of $3.2 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.Shares of the Atlanta-based company were trading up 1 percent at $54.64 on Tuesday on the New York Stock Exchange.

But the gains are highly tentative and policy mistakes in Brussels this week could easily upend the outlook.Over the past three months, political gridlock in Washington over the U.S. budget deficit and infighting in European capitals resulted in the biggest falls in the prices of risk assets since the collapse of Lehman Brothers in late 2008.Global stock prices have since stabilized, and in Europe even posted gains over the past week, easing fears that the developed world would drive the global economy off a cliff.”Despite the dark policy backdrop, not all is bad,” said Joachim Fels, head of global economics at Morgan Stanley.Energy and commodity prices also have fallen sharply, boosting spending power, particularly in the United States where crude oil has tumbled 14 percent since July.The relaunch of unusual liquidity measures by the Federal Reserve, European Central Bank, and Bank of England has alleviated strains in bank funding and calmed markets, buying politicians some extra time to sort out their fiscal woes.”Things are looking a little bit brighter out there, but there are still enormous out-sized risks,” said Nigel Gault, U.S. chief economist for IHS Global Insight.Prime among them is Europe. If European Union leaders fail at their summit next weekend to deliver a comprehensive plan to resolve its sovereign debt crisis and recapitalize its banks, market volatility will return with a vengence, analysts warn.Even the extraordinary steps that central banks have taken to prevent the crisis worsening have brought large risks.Global liquidity, as measured by foreign exchange reserves and central bank balance sheets, has soared to $18.3 trillion, equal to 30 percent of global GDP, from $10.4 trillion three years ago, Bank of America/Merril Lynch has estimated. This massive monetary policy easing has stirred inflationary fears.There is only one solution. “Better policy decisions on both sides of the Atlantic are needed to get us out of this fix,” said Fels.Otherwise the negative feedback loop will resume, where bad policy decisions intensify risk aversion and worsen the sovereign debt crisis by destabilizing financial markets, undermining bank solvency, and upending world economic growth.U.S. AND CHINAIn the United States, there are few signals that lawmakers have the appetite for a medium-term resolution to the budget deficit before November 2012 elections.The U.S. Senate this week rejected President Barack Obama’s $447 billion jobs package after disagreement over how to fund the minor stimulus measure, with two Democrats facing tough re-election joining Republicans.Senators next week may agree to vote on some piecemeal jobs measures such as extending jobless benefits and cutting payroll taxes.Joel Prakken, economist at Macroeconomic Advisers in St. Louis, calculates that extending unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless would add 0.25 percent to real GDP growth in 2012, and support 200,000 jobs. Continuing the payroll tax holiday for employees would add 0.50 percent to GDP over the year and raise employment by 600,000, he said.”It is modest at best,” Prakken said.But combined with recent improvements in auto sales, retail sales in August and September, and better manufacturing and employment reports, the U.S. economy looks on more solid footing than a few months ago, he said.That would be good news for China, which relies heavily on its exports to the United States and where economic growth is clearly slowing. The question is by how much.Figures on Tuesday are expected to show China’s third-quarter GDP up 9.2 percent from a year earlier, according to a Reuters poll of economists. That would be down only modestly from the second quarter, when China recorded 9.5 percent growth.A less closely watched indicator, urban investment, may provide a better signal. Last week’s disappointing trade figures underscored China’s vulnerability to a global slowdown. Domestic growth has cushioned the blow so far, and investment is a big reason why.The data on Tuesday is expected to show urban investment up 24.8 percent from a year earlier, only slightly below the second quarter’s 25 percent rise. If external demand weakens dramatically, economists think China will compensate by ramping up investment, which accounts for the bulk of its GDP.

“Apple plans to hold an invitation-only memorial service for Jobs apart from an employee event. Samsung’s president Lee Jae-yong plans to attend the service to offer condolence to Jobs,” the source said.Lee is the only son of an heir apparent to Samsung chairman Lee Kun-hee.Media reported that Lee would have a separate meeting with Apple CEO Tim Cook after the memorial service and discuss bilateral cooperation, but the source did not confirm the report.Apple Inc co-founder and technology visionary Steve Jobs will be memorialized at a private service at Stanford University on Sunday, a source with knowledge of the event told Reuters on Friday.A Dutch court on Friday turned down Samsung’s request for an injunction against all of Apple’s mobile products that use 3G telecommunications technology, denying it revenge over a similar move by Apple.

* Owners say will now focus on Hulu’s futureLOS ANGELES, Oct 13 (Reuters) - An attempted sale of online video website Hulu has fallen through after months of difficult and complex negotiations between owners such as Walt Disney Co and potential buyers.Hulu’s owners, which also include News Corp , Comcast Corp’s NBC Universal and Providence Equity, said in a statement on Thursday they had decided against a sale of the video service.”Our focus now rests solely on ensuring that our efforts as owners contribute in a meaningful way to the exciting future that lies ahead for Hulu,” they said in a statement.Reuters reported last month that the auction was in danger of getting derailed by conflicts over convoluted digital rights, a wide bid-ask gap, and a lack of commitment to sell by Hulu’s owners, among other things.This was the second time Hulu’s owners had envisioned a full or partial exit strategy that failed. After nearly six months of planning, they ditched an initial public offering last December that might have raised up to $300 million.Sources with knowledge of the talks said last month a rift had developed between the price bidders offered and the amount that Hulu’s owners were willing to accept.Bids had ranged from as low as $500 million to as much as $2 billion, the sources said at the time. The most serious suitors included Google Inc , Amazon.com Inc , DirecTV and DISH Network Corp .Yahoo Inc had been viewed as one of the most enthusiastic bidders — before its leadership imploded with the abrupt firing of CEO Carol Bartz.Hulu’s owners had always faced an uphill battle in valuing a nascent Web content-streaming service with no long-term content deals and with unclear digital rights for newer Internet or mobile platforms for which there exists no established model.Some analysts had thought an outright sale to be an abandonment of Hulu’s future growth potential, particularly if, as some experts say, Internet streaming will become mainstream in coming years.

By Jim BrummWILMINGTON, N.C., Oct 13 (Reuters) - U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission certification of new reactor technology has been delayed by the agency’s evaluation of the earthquake and tsunami damage to Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi power plant in March, NRC spokesman Scott Burnell said on Thursday.He said the full commission is still expected to act on the final certification of Westinghouse Electric’s AP1000 design by year-end, which would make the certification effective in 2012.The NRC staff has been analyzing the Fukushima Daiichi plant after the earthquake and tsunami and making recommendations for future NRC action aimed at averting such an accident in the United States.NRC consideration of GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy’s Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor (ESBWR) has been delayed until next year, Burnell said in a telephone interview.The NRC staff is in the process of preparing a final rule for both reactors and the AP100 has priority over the ESBWR for the commission’s available resources, he said.Burnell said the NRC staff would update GE Hitachi soon on the ESBWR’s certification status, which now appears to have been delayed at least six months from “the June to September time frame” seen earlier this year by Danny Roderick, senior vice president of nuclear plant projects at GE Hitachi’s headquarters in Wilmington, North Carolina.Noting the company has worked closely with the NRC on licensing the ESBWR since 2005, GE Hitachi spokesman Michael Tetuan said the company has completed its required licensing work and is looking forward to receiving final design certification from the NRC.GE Hitachi is owned 60 percent by General Electric Co and 40 percent by Japan’s Hitachi Ltd .If the AP1000 certification is effective early next year, this would allow Southern Co to stay on schedule to begin producing electricity with the reactors built by Toshiba Corp’s Westinghouse in 2016 and 2017, Southern spokesman Steve Higginbottom said on Thursday.He said that schedule is based on the utility’s expectation it will get an NRC license for the two reactors around year’s end and noted that license is dependent on NRC certification of the reactors built by Toshiba Corp’s Westinghouse.The agency has already given Southern permission to perform limited construction in preparation for the new reactors at its Vogtle power plant near Augusta, Georgia, Higginbottom noted.Meanwhile, Michigan’s DTE Energy has begun site preparation for a GE Hitachi ESBWR next to its existing Fermi 2 plant south of Detroit.

Well the first round of Champions League group results were fairly predictable, except for Trabzonspor winning at 2010 champions Inter Milan of course. Here’s my attempt at predicting the scores in this week’s action. If you agree or disagree then please leave a comment below. Don’t worry, registering takes about five seconds. Playing on Tuesday Group A Bayern Munich v Manchester City City obviously pose a big threat but Bayern have been in such good form I can’t see an away win. 1-1 Napoli v Villarreal A good Champions League debut against City for the Naples side last time out but Villarreal’s Giuseppe Rossi will want to make an impact on home soil. Boring I know but another 1-1 Group B CSKA Moscow v Inter Milan Not the ideal game for Inter to bounce back from their shock opening defeat but at least it is not in the middle of the bleak Russian winter. New boss Claudio Ranieri is looking for a second win in two games and might just get it even with Wesley Sneijder out and an artificial pitch to deal with. 0-1 Trabzonspor v Lille Can the Turks continue their great start? I’m not sure they can given the French champions will be seething at dropping two late points against CSKA two weeks ago. 0-2 Group C Manchester United v Basel Injuries galore for United but not even the biggest Basel fan will be expecting victory. 2-0 Otelul Galati v Benfica The Portuguese looked decent against United and should be too strong in Romania despite the unfamiliar surroundings. 1-3 Group D Olympique Lyon v Dinamo Zagreb A home win you would think. 2-0 Real Madrid v Ajax Amsterdam Not everything is going perfectly at the Bernabeu but Ajax were great, they are not now. 3-1 - - Playing on Wednesday Group E Valencia v Chelsea Juan Mata to score on his return to the Mestalla? I actually think it will be 0-0. Bayer Leverkusen v Racing Genk Genk look lively but the Germans will be too strong. 2-0 Group F Arsenal v Olympiakos Piraeus We’ve got to have one shock this week don’t we? It won’t be here. 2-0 Olympique Marseille v Borussia Dortmund Difficult one. Dortmund are nothing like last season’s worldbeaters but neither are the hosts. 1-1 Group G Zenit St Petersburg v Porto 1-1 Shakhtar Donetsk v APOEL Nicosia Goals galore in eastern Ukraine. 3-2 Group H BATE Borisov v Barcelona Here is your shock. BATE are unbeaten in nine European matches, including six in this season’s qualifiers. The holders might not fancy it in the chilly Belarus air. 1-1. AC Milan v Viktoria Plzen Milan have still to convince this term and injuries don’t help. But they should scrape a win. 2-1