Apparel
Australia-based online retailer SurfStitch Group Ltd. said a wave of recent losses have prompted it to delay a global rebranding effort that would have consolidated its online operations into a single website named after its e-commerce subsidiary in Irvine. It also said it plans to sell Surf Hardware International, a San Diego-based hard goods manufacturer it acquired in November for $16.6 million. The moves were announced as it posted a loss of $116.4 million on $176.9 million in revenue for its fiscal year ended June 30.Â
Education
University of California-Irvine School of Law is accepting applications for a new master’s law degree for non-American lawyers. The master of laws degree is a one-year, full-time course of study primarily for foreign lawyers, judges and government officials. The school also has hired four new full-time faculty members, bringing the total number of full-time professors to 48, and started a criminal justice clinic for students. It just welcomed its largest class ever since it opened in 2009.
Brandman University announced that Laurie Dodge, vice chancellor of institutional assessment and planning, was named one of the “Sixteen Most Innovative People in Higher Education” by Washington Monthly. The designation honors those “creative and passionate people around the country who are working to make higher education more accessible, affordable, and effective.”
Finance
Irvine-based Banc of California was named the official bank of the Los Angeles Rams Foundation in a partnership that will focus on expanding economic opportunity, access to capital and financial literacy across Los Angeles. The bank also announced franchise deals this year that include a $100 million naming right for the Los Angeles Football Club’s new soccer stadium and signing on as the official bank of Los Angeles 2024, which is working to bring the Olympics and Paralympic Games to the U.S.
Healthcare
UC Irvine Health in Orange was scheduled to start providing emergency room services on Catalina Island last week. Services for 4,500 island residents and 1 million annual visitors will be offered at Catalina Island Medical Center in Avalon through UCI Health’s emergency medicine department. The agreement is part of UC Irvine Health’s expansion of telemedicine and specialty consultation services. The Catalina hospital said the deal lets its primary care physicians “work only in the clinic and not have to cover the emergency [room].”
Hospitality
Burba Hotel Network in Costa Mesa will manage the Caribbean Hotel & Resort Investment Summit for the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association. Burba presents trade shows and conferences on hospitality and for specific areas of the industry that include law and finance. The Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association is a trade and advocacy group for the region.
Sports
The parent company of Aliso Viejo-based startup FantasyAces LLC entered an agreement to acquire a database of fantasy sports players from Gaming Nation Inc. that will bring Fantasy Aces Daily Fantasy Sports Corp. more than 35,000 unique users for $19,000 in cash and an additional payment to be determined. Both companies are traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange, which must approve the deal. FantasyAces has over 24,000 members who pay as little as a dollar a day to participate in some fantasy leagues in baseball, basketball and football.
Technology
Smith Micro Software Inc. regained compliance with the NASDAQ Stock Market’s minimum bid price requirement, the Aliso Viejo company said. Its share price had been above $1 for 10 consecutive business days, thanks in part to a reverse stock split initiated this month that reduced the number of outstanding shares of common stock from about 49.3 million to 12.3 million. The share price had languished under $1 for the better part of a year, prompting NASDAQ to issue a written notice on Sept. 15 informing it that it hadn’t met listing standards.
