Market Minute: Johnson & Johnson Wins Court Battle; JCP Opens Boutiques

J.C. Penney (JCP) today opens its first store-within-the-store boutiques. They'll offer home goods from designers such as Michael Graves, Jonathan Adler and Sir Terence Conran. The boutiques featuring Martha Stewart are is still in limbo pending a court challenge from Macy's (M). Penney is banking on this new strategy to help it turn around after posting a big sales decline last year.

A federal appeals court has ruled that Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) did not infringe on the patent for a heart stent. The court threw out a $593 million dollar judgment against the company. The ruling could help Abbott Labs (ABT), which faces a lawsuit for violating the same patent.

Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) Chairman Raymond Lane and two directors are resigning their posts. This comes in the wake of HP's disastrous acquisition of Autonomy in 2011. That led to an $8.8 billion writedown last year. The company has had three CEOs and two chairmen in the past seven years, and the search for a new chairman is starting now.

Boeing (BA) may make a key test flight of its grounded 787 Dreamliner as soon as today. If all goes well, the company hopes to win FAA certification to move ahead with plans to upgrade the batteries throughout the fleet, and resume commercial flights within the next month or so.

Chevron (CVX) says it won't be able to restart a major crude oil facility in California until at least June. The company has completed repairs to the plant after an explosion there last August, but it says regulatory approvals will delay the re-opening.

And F5 Networks (FFIV) is set to tumble after warning that earnings and revenue will fall short of expectations in the current quarter. The company sells information technology and services.

Produced by Drew Trachtenberg

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