Engineering Firm to Move To Thousand Oaks
CB Richard Ellis (CBRE) has filed a $1.2 million permit application with the city-county Department of Construction Code Enforcement to make alterations to office space at Thousand Oaks Business Center near Interstate 240 and South Perkins Road.
That will pave the way for SSR Ellers engineering firm to relocate to the building from Clark Tower. SSR Ellers designed Clark Tower and had been operating there since 1994. The company, founded in 1968, is headquartered in Nashville and has 12 locations in six states.
SSR Ellers has signed a 10-year, 26,005-square-foot lease at Thousand Oaks Business Center, a three-building center with 420,000 square feet of space. The business center’s occupancy has grown from 25 percent to 72 percent in the past two years since CBRE took over as property manager and leasing agent.
Tenants in the complex, according to CBRE’s Web site, include Clear Channel Broadcasting, LEDIC Management, FedEx Trade Networks, Sedgwick CMS, Strayer University, HYC Logistics and Xerox.
Source: The Daily News Online & Chandler Reports
Commission to Consider Shelby Farms Plan
The Shelby County Board of Commissioners is expected to vote today on the Shelby Farms master plan.
The new master plan, which recently was presented to board members during a committee meeting, calls for 1 million new trees and an expanded Patriot Lake among other changes.
Commissioners are expected to approve the master plan. Once the plan receives approval, the Shelby Farms Park Conservancy plans to begin a fundraising campaign for the park’s first phase of development, which is expected to take two years to complete.
The meeting will begin at 1:30 p.m. at the Shelby County Administration Building, 160 N. Main St.
Northwest Adds $80 Fuel Surcharge
Northwest Airlines Corp. is planning to add fuel surcharges of up to $80 for many domestic round-trip tickets.
The surcharge will apply to travel to about 7,000 city pairs beginning Jan. 10, Northwest spokeswoman Michelle Aguayo-Shannon said. She said Northwest is matching surcharges added by competitors in those markets. Northwest already has fuel surcharges in other markets, she said.
Rick Seaney of farecompare.com wrote in a newsletter that by his count, there have been 21 fare increases this year. He did not count Northwest’s surcharge as the 22nd hike because it covered less than two-thirds of Northwest’s city pairs. But he said Northwest’s surcharge was noteworthy because the carrier generally has not initiated fare increases. Aguayo-Shannon said Northwest did not initiate this one either.
Airlines have pulled back from some of their earlier increases after competitors failed to match them. If Northwest’s new surcharge sticks, it will be the largest one on Seaney’s list. The largest previous increase was a $70 base fare hike by United Airlines in April.
Luminetx 2008 Sales Surpass ’07 Numbers
Luminetx Corp. completed the first half of the fiscal calendar year 2008 on an upward trend with the total number of units sold surpassing all of 2007’s total sales, company officials said.
U.S. sales growth of Luminetx’s signature product, the VeinViewer, is being fueled by national penetration of the acute health care marketplace, they said. International sales continue to expand to new regions, such as Italy and Canada, adding to the Asia and Middle East partnership already in play.
The VeinViewer is a vascular imaging system that allows physicians, nurses and other health care professionals to clearly see accessible veins in real time.
IP to Sell Mineral Rights in La.
International Paper Co. will sell about 13,000 net acres of subsurface mineral rights in the Haynesville Shale natural gas formation in northwest Louisiana to Chesapeake Energy Corp. for about $263 million.
The proceeds will go toward paying down debt.
The agreement is part of International Paper’s plan to focus on global uncoated paper and packaging and its North American distribution business, xpedx.
The transaction is expected to close in late August.
Harrah’s Receives Communications Honors
The communications department for Harrah’s Entertainment Mid-South Region has received several honors in the 2008 Hermes Creative Awards, an annual international competition for media professionals.
The department won one platinum, three gold and two honorable mentions in the contest, for which there were more than 4,000 entries this year.
Among the projects for which Harrah’s received an award this year was in the category of “special event” in which Harrah’s took home a platinum award for the planning and implementation of the Harrah’s Casino and Paula Deen partnership.
US Manufacturing Flat in July
U.S. manufacturers’ business was flat in July, as higher prices and tight credit kept them from expanding, but exports propped them up again.
The Institute for Supply Management reported its reading of activity from the country’s producers of cars, airplanes, appliances and food hit 50, down from 50.2 in June.
That beat economists’ prediction of a reading of 49.2, according to the consensus estimate of Wall Street economists surveyed by Thomson Financial/IFR. A reading above 50 signals growth.
The report has been hovering near 50, which economists call “the bottom-bust line,” for the last 12 months.
The index of prices manufacturers pay for raw materials grew, but at a slower rate than June, when it hit its highest level since 1979. About 88.5 percent of manufacturers said prices in July were higher than June. No commodities prices fell, according to the report.
Kevin O’Marah, chief strategist at AMR Research, a manufacturing industry consultant, said he expects manufacturer price increases to continue.
“If you’re a manufacturer, you’re not going to go into losses to absorb the higher costs of plastic resins and corn syrup,” he said. “You’ll cut production and raise prices. You will not just eat it.”