Bono sees return on investment

Bono has been rewarded for investing $100m (€75.5m) to rescue smart telephone maker Palm Inc.

The singer has earned $84m (€63m) after the company's stock prices sky rocketed.

Bosses at the Irish musician's Elevation Partners company announced they would make the investment to save the debt-riddled firm, the maker of Treo and Centro smart phones, as it prepared to introduce new products this month.

The new touch-sensitive technology helped Palm's shares soar by 34% on Friday.

Elevation Partners, a California-based private-equity business, which counts Bono as a managing partner, pumped $325m (€245m) into Palm in October 2007, in exchange for a 25% stake in the company.

But it reported a loss of $506m (€381m) in the company's most recent quarter, prompting Elevation to invest the latest multi-million dollar sum, raising the firm's stake to 39%.

The hike boosted the value Bono gambled by an estimated 84%, to $184m (€139m).