ECONOMIC INDICATORS
Down: Financial stability as the number of local bankruptcy filings was 1,714 in July, 25% higher than July 2009 and 1% higher than in June, according to the U.S. Bankruptcy Court Central District of California.
TECHNOLOGY
Costa Mesa’s Emulex Corp., a maker of electronics that speed up the flow of data on corporate storage networks, promoted its Chief Operating Officer Jeff Benck to the additional title of president. He was hired on in 2008 as senior vice president and operations chief. In other Emulex news, the company completed its acquisition of Sunnyvale’s ServerEngines Corp. for about $159 million in cash, debt and stock.
Local.com Corp., which runs a search engine for finding local businesses, relocated its headquarters to larger space in Irvine. The company moved to 34,000 square feet at 7555 Irvine Center Drive in the Irvine Spectrum. The space is 50% larger than Local.com’s previous Irvine space. Local.com leased the space for five years. Financial terms weren’t disclosed.
REAL ESTATE
The median price of an existing Orange County home slipped by nearly $3,500 in July from June, while sales declined almost 15% from a month earlier, according to the California Association of Realtors. The median price for an existing stand-alone home sold in July was $514,180, a 0.7% decrease from a month earlier, but a 2.8% increase from a year earlier. The number of sales here fell by 14.5% from a month earlier and was down 12.6% from a year ago.
Hines Nurseries LLC, which has been part of Orange County’s agricultural industry for 53 years, will stop growing plants and flowers in Irvine at the end of the year and lay off about half its 160 workers here as a lease for 288 acres the company now farms on expires at the end of the year. Landowner Irvine Company plans to develop homes on the land. Hines’ headquarters is set to stay remain in Irvine.
The Costa Mesa City Council voted 4-1 in favor of a ground lease with Facilities Management West, the Newport Beach-based company that will finance and operate the Orange County Fairgrounds for the city. The city and Facilities Manage-ment still have key issues to work out, such as community use and access. The $96 million purchase of the fairgrounds still needs approval by the state Legislature. In order for escrow to open by the end of September, the Legislature must sign off on the sale by early next week.
APPAREL
Anaheim-based mall retailer Pacific Sunwear of California Inc. reported a quarterly loss and warned of more red ink for the current quarter. For the three months through July, Pacific Sunwear posted an adjusted loss of $14 million, flat from a year earlier and beating the $14.7 million expected on average by analysts. Sales came in at $218 million, down 10% from a year earlier but topping the $213 million expected by Wall Street. The company projected a loss of $5.7 million to $10.2 million for the three months through October, versus the $7.7 million analysts had been figuring on.
Shareholders of West 49 approved the $93 million sale of the company to Irvine’s Billabong USA, which faced a brief contest to acquire the Canadian retailer in July. The deal is set to close later this month or in early September. The deal stands to more than double Billabong’s North American stores to 230.
St. John Knits International Inc., the Irvine-based maker of upscale women’s clothes, laid off 129 people this month. The layoffs are a result of the company’s 2006 sale an Irvine building that it now leases. The building is set to be redeveloped as offices, but that project’s stalled. The layoffs stem from moves St. John made when it thought it would be leaving the building.
The debt rating arm of Moody’s Corp. upped its rating on Huntington Beach-based Quiksilver Inc. one notch to “B2” from “B3.” The rating still falls under what’s known as speculative, high yield or junk status. A rating on $400 million in unsecured debt from Quiksilver was raised to “Caa1” from “Caa2,” the middle tier of Moody’s junk ratings. The upgrade came after Quiksilver earlier this month completed an exchange of shares for $140 million in debt in a move that bolstered the company’s once crippling balance sheet.
OTHER NEWS
A Los Angeles jury ruled in favor of Irvine Company’s Donald Bren in a dispute over more than $100 million in child support for two adult children he fathered out of wedlock. The jury ruled 9-3 that Donald Bren had satisfied his parental obligations with $9 million he has spent to support his children. The children plan to appeal.
Irvine-based Brand Affinity Technolo-gies Inc., an advertising startup with technology that aims to automate celebrity endorsement deals, raised $20 million in a third venture funding round. The latest money is set to be used to build out what the company calls netBAT, a new service geared toward consumers, and to expand the company’s celebrity endorsement database. The round was led by Corona del Mar’s Miramar Venture Partners, along with existing investors.
