The news that Lompoc Mayor Dick DeWees had died came to me completely out of the blue. I literally picked the news out of the fax machine when Tom Pfeifer of U.S. Rep Elton Gallegly’s office sent out a message of condolence. I had no idea Dick was ill or had a medical condition that [...]
Santa Barbara-based Pacific Capital Bancorp released its second-quarter earnings on July 30, revealing a staggering net loss of $362.6 million and unveiling a three-year plan to improve the company’s capital position. The net loss, $7.77 per common share, compares to $5.9 million, or 13 cents per share, in the same period a year ago. The [...]
The business empire controlled by developers Ron Hertel and Bob Fowler racked up $100 million in debts, acquiring five aircraft, a boat, a horse ranch and vineyards before it collapsed last year amid a mountain of real estate-related liabilities. At a hearing in the Santa Barbara office of the U.S. Trustee on July 24, Fowler [...]
Amgen shares soared in after-hours trading Monday as the Thousand Oaks-based biotech giant reported sharply higher-second quarter profits and raised earnings guidance for the full year. Amgen said it earned $1.29 per share on revenue of $3.7 billion, sharply higher than analyst estimates of $1.15 per share and revenue slightly below $3.6 billion. Amgen said [...]
Camarillo-based power supply maker Power-One slashed 300 more jobs July 24 as its losses steepened sharply in the second quarter. The net loss felt by common shareholders spiked to $6.8 million from a loss of $3.9 million in the second quarter last year, the company said in an earnings announcement. Net sales also tumbled 39 [...]
Firefighters in Ventura County had a blaze off Highway 33 near Ojai 75 percent contained late in the evening July 21, according to the Ventura County Star. The fire started that afternoon and scorched more than 30 acres by 7 p.m. It was burning in a rugged, hard-to-reach area with several oil fields nearby. [...]
A union representing technical employees at television station KSBY, a San Luis Obispo and Santa Maria NBC affiliate, is demanding advertisers boycott the local station for the remainder of a labor dispute. The union is currently in a labor contract dispute with the station’s South Carolina-based owners. The boycott asks that advertisers support the [...]
Goleta-based Kaai has raised a $3.5 million series B round of financing from a group of investors that includes clean-tech investment firm Khosla Ventures, according to regulatory filings. The secretive start-up is working on an LED lighting technology developed by Steven DenBaars and Shuji Nakamura, two researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Nakamura [...]
We’ll take a few words to honor Ray Shaw, a journalist and entrepreneur who died suddenly this month at age 75. Beginning in the late 1980s, Shaw led Charlotte, N.C.-based American City Business Journals, the nation’s foremost owner of weekly financial news publications. As a former Wall Street Journal reporter, Shaw rose through the ranks [...]
As this newspaper was going to press, the California budget was little more than a thumbnail sketch produced for the media and the credit markets. Nonetheless, the compromise had the required impact — headlines for the press and a dramatic decline in the interest rate on Golden State bonds. Although the heavy lifting on the [...]
It’s all smiles and sauvignon in Happy Canyon’s vineyards
Towbes Group grabs Goleta with Groupon-like deals at retailers
Social-media IPOs could launch Golden State sustainability fund
Ventura County brokers hold out ’til 2013 for real recovery
Name changes and new faces at SLO and Oxnard law firms
From apartments to industrial spaces, deals close in the region