Dole buys blueberry business
Dole Food Co. has purchased a Florida blueberry company, it said Oct. 11. Westlake Village-based Dole, the largest producer of organic bananas in the world and of the biggest players in the fresh fruit and vegetable industry, said it had acquired all of the capital stock of the parent of SunnyRidge Farm. Terms of the Read More →
UCSB lab gets $15M from Dow Chemical Co.
UC Santa Barbara’s Materials Research Laboratory has received up to $15 million from Dow Chemical Co. to establish a new institute to study materials that can further technological discovery. The recent five-year gift comes just weeks after the research lab received $20 million from the National Science Foundation to fund its studies through at least Read More →
Windset Farms readies first tomato crop
Windset Farms’ 3 million-square-foot greenhouse — one of the largest hothouse tomato facilities in the United States — is up and running in Santa Maria. The first crop of tomatoes will be ready for picking in mid-October, Windset President Steven Newell said on Friday. The tomatoes were planted in August in what Newell calls “Greenhouse Read More →
Guest op-eds: Tech execs remember Steve Jobs
Editor’s Note: The Business Times asked technology executives in the region to share their thoughts on the death of Steve Jobs, the Apple co-founder who died Oct. 5 at age 56. To contribute, email newsroom@pacbiztimes.com. We’ll post more remembrances as they become available. Click here to read a column by Technology Editor Stephen Nellis on Read More →
Transphorm gets $3.6M grant
Transphorm, the Goleta-based energy efficiency firm backed by $63 million from Google and other investors, has received a $3.6 million federal grant to improve solar panels. Transphorm’s technology uses a semiconducting material called gallium nitride to drastically reduce heat waste in electronic systems. The grant from the U.S. Department of Energy went to Transphorm in Read More →
Vitesse slashes workforce, dims sales outlook
Vitesse Semiconductor, the Ventura County chipmaker rocked by a stock-options scandal in 2006, has laid off 10 percent of its workforce and shuttered one of its Camarillo facilities. Vitesse disclosed the pink slips in a regulatory filing Oct. 3. The company said it ended its lease on facilities at 4721 Calle Carga and terminated 10 Read More →
