San Francisco Business Times articles from December 1997

San Francisco Business Times archives from December 1997

Dr. Strange Glove. (Dennis Grahn, inventor of the postanesthetic warming device)
December 5, 1997... Top scientists lend hand to bankroll Stanford, UCSF The idea for a medical device that could save the lives of thousands of hypothermia victims crystallized as a Stanford University researcher gazed over the sunset-tinged spires of Utah's...

Japanese tech retailer rising in the region. (T-Zone Superstore opens second store in San Mateo, CA)
December 5, 1997... Elbowing its way into an already crowded market, Japan's Ado Electronic Co. is targeting the Bay Area as the U.S. hub for its expanding global chain of computer stores. Ado's second U.S. T-Zone Superstore opened in San Marco's Bridgepointe...

Longs Drug's Rx: $85M expansion. (Longs Drug Stores Corp. to open 16 to 18 new drugstores in 1998)
December 5, 1997... Seeking to take advantage of the strong California economy and to fend off growing competition, Longs Drug Stores is stepping up its expansion. After launching 14 stores and spending $80 million in 1997, the Walnut Creek company is planning to...

BofA, NationsBank rev up buys. (Bank of America acquires Robertson, Stephens and Company L.P. while NationsBank gets Montgomery Securities)
December 5, 1997... Montgomery, Robertson Stephens ready to go global BankAmerica and NationsBank are moving quickly to expand their recently acquired San Francisco investment banks. BankAmerica, which acquired Robertson Stephens, and NationsBank, the new owner...

SFO aborts plan to land hotel developer, takes controls. (San Francisco International Airport)
December 5, 1997... The San Francisco Airport has scrapped its search for a long-term developer and operator of a new hotel in a bid to gain more control of future profits from the lucrative project. The airport had put out a request for proposals last summer for...

Suiting up. (Esprit de Corp. signs licensing contract with Beach Patrol Inc.)
December 5, 1997... Esprit dives into swimwear market Esprit de Corp. is making a big splash into swimwear. The San Francisco-based clothing company has signed a deal with the industry's fourth-largest manufacturer to produce a line of bathing suits for juniors....

Cole beats a path to S.F. for new flagship. (Kenneth Cole Leather Goods plans new store in San Francisco, CA)
December 5, 1997... Kenneth Cole, the avant-garde shoe and leather goods retailer, is planning a new West Coast flagship store in Union Square to showcase its expanding portfolio of products. The New York-based company said it will occupy a roughly...

ABM: the largest company you've never heard of. (ABM Industries Inc.)(Company Profile)
December 5, 1997... Contractor is quietly cleaning up the nation's offices Bill Steele can't get any respect. Not on Wall Street. Not from the media. Not even in San Francisco, home to Steele's employer, ABM Industries Inc. "If we were in any other city in...

Columbia/HCA puts its North Bay units under the knife. (Columbia/HCA Healthcare Corp. to sell San Francisco Bay Area hospitals)
December 5, 1997... Columbia/HCA Healthcare Corp., as part of a major national fire sale and restructuring, has agreed to dump its two North Bay hospitals and may spin off another in the East Bay to shareholders. The North Bay hospitals to be shed: Palm Drive...

Slimmer, trimmer Colossal cuts back to commercials. (Colossal Pictures)
December 5, 1997... Colossal Pictures has emerged from 18 months in Chapter 11 and is focusing on television commercial work. To escape bankruptcy, the San Francisco-based film company has undergone a major downsizing. The company now has 22 employees, $6 million...

San Francisco rents climb. (office building leasing rates)
December 5, 1997... [TABULAR DATA OMITTED] San Francisco is experiencing a real estate bonanza, and nowhere is that more evident than in the heart of the city's business center in downtown San Francisco. With vacancy rates around 2 percent for Class A space and...

PacifiCare taps Badger to head expanded HMO region. (PacifiCare Health Systems Inc. appoints Rick Badger as president of northern California operations)
December 5, 1997... PacifiCare of California's highest-ranking executive in Northern California has just won a big promotion, adding responsibility for Monterey and a large chunk of the Central Valley. Rick Badger, previously the huge HMO's San Francisco-based...

Shorenstein on real estate: buy, sell and stay in control. (Doug Shorenstein, chief executive officer of Shorenstein Co.)(Interview)
December 5, 1997... As one of the best real estate years in recent memory comes to a close, we checked in with Doug Shorenstein, the 42-year-old Boalt Law School-trained chairman and chief executive of San Francisco's Shorenstein Co. Shorenstein - the nation's...

Jeanne Myerson. (chief executive officer of Swig Investment Co.)
December 5, 1997... Name: Jeanne Myerson. Title: President and CEO. Company: The Swig Co., the San Francisco-based real estate company whose assets include hotels, office space and development sites. Education: Undergraduate degree from Grinnell College,...

Developers buoyed by rising rents and shrinking space. (Michael Covarrubias, president of The Martin Group; Joe Selger, president of Vintage Properties)(Interview)
December 5, 1997... With commercial rents sky-high and percentage of available space plummeting well into the single digits, the need for new development has flourished. To fill that need, the developers on this year's List of the Largest Commercial Developers in...

Tired of moving up slowly at a big company? (LinkExchange Inc.)
December 5, 1997... In less than two years, Tony Hsieh and Sanjay Madan have built San Francisco-based LinkExchange Inc. from a startup in their apartment to the largest advertising network on the web and the recent recipient of $3 million in venture capital. "We...

Elliott Hoffman. (founder of Just Desserts)
December 5, 1997... Name: Elliott Hoffman. Company: Just Desserts, the $14 million San Francisco bakery operation with 310 employees. Founded: 1974 Source of startup capital: $10,000 from friends, family and bank. Background: Ran a friend's jewelry...

Pacific Exchange to build new headquarters.
December 12, 1997... Two-year search for a home leads to South of Market After several failed attempts to find a home, the Pacific Exchange has decided to build its own. Exchange officials confirmed that they are "in negotiations" with the city of San Francisco...

Sardine smoothie. (marketing campaign of King Oscar USA Inc.)
December 12, 1997... Marketing whiz swims against current to lure health-conscious buyers They're smelly, oily and crammed into tins. Sardines are also getting, a new image with help from San Francisco s King Oscar USA Inc. To fight the "ick" factor, a...

William Wilson closes in on $90M portfolio. (William Wilson and Associates)
December 12, 1997... Real estate company snaps up 13 buildings in Redwood City William Wilson & Associates is close to adding 13 buildings worth $90 million to its growing portfolio of Bay Area holdings. The San Mateo-based real estate company confirmed that...

Boston Market chickens out on expansion.
December 12, 1997... Boston Market has grounded aggressive plans to blanket the Bay Area with restaurants, scrapping an ambitious franchising strategy in an attempt to reverse disappointing results. Local franchisee BC Golden Gate's plan for up to 64 Bay Area...

Merry Oseibo. (Internet-based wine brokerage Virtual Vineyards)
December 12, 1997... Japanese holiday a gift for web winery Virtual Vineyards is sending its cyber wine cellars into Japan in time for the Oseibo gift-giving season. The Palo Alto wine brokerage, accessed through the Internet, is expecting to build wine...

Disney decides Bay Area radio is child's play. (San Francisco, California)
December 12, 1997... After four decades of classic rhythm and blues, KDIA-AM (1310) is changing its format this week to children's programming. ABC Radio Networks, a Dallas subsidiary of ABC Corp., is buying Oakland-based KDIA for about $6 million and on Dec. 16...

Investors on board for launch of cyber-coupons. (Internet marketer Planet U)
December 12, 1997... Internet marketer Planet U has raised $6 million from a trio of venture capital firms to fund next month's launch of its groundbreaking coupon distribution program. In its second round of financing, the 1-year-old company has again enlisted...

Rockefeller shopping Embarcadero Center: tycoon, Prudential seek billion-dollar buyer. (real estate tycoon David Rockefeller; Prudential Insurance Co. of America)
December 19, 1997... Tycoon, Prudential seek billion-dollar buyer Real estate tycoon David Rockefeller has changed his mind and will consider selling his 50 percent share of the Embarcadero Center - a move that puts all of San Francisco's largest office property on...

Hospital giant CHW in talks with UniHealth. (Catholic Healthcare West)
December 19, 1997... Catholic Healthcare West, which lost faith in a huge Arizona merger earlier this year, is now talking about adding eight debt-ridden Southern California hospitals to its growing statewide empire. Officials at the San Francisco hospital system...

Chevron revs up: toy cars drive future sales.
December 19, 1997... Toy cars drive future sales The runaway merchandising success of its talking-car advertising campaign is putting Chevron Corp. on a fast lane into the toy business. After selling more than 5 million of the smiley advertising icons in less...

Company plugs 'green' power: Green Mountain sells energy at Macy's. (Green Mountain Energy Resources LLC)
December 19, 1997... Green Mountain sells energy at Macy's As bigger rivals chase corporate customers, a small Vermont power company is betting $30 million that its environmental focus can help it grab the residential electric market in California's deregulated...

Highrise derby has self-declared winner. (partnership between Myers Corp. and Cousins Properties Inc.)
December 19, 1997... A dark-horse partnership between Hawaiian developer Jack Myers and Atlanta-based Cousins Properties Inc. has surged ahead in the race to build downtown San Francisco's first office building this decade. Myers, who last month purchased a...

Lawyers' venture bets on winning in court of appeal. (Judgment Purchase Corp.)
December 19, 1997... Winning a lawsuit can be almost as bad as losing one. The cost of collecting damages can financially stretch the "winner" to the breaking point. That's where San Francisco's Judgment Purchase Corp. comes in, operating as a sort of venture...

Shocked into action: power research group to charge off in new direction. (Electric Power Research Institute)
December 19, 1997... Power research group to charge off in new direction The electric industry's research arm is getting a market-driven makeover in hopes of luring increasingly scarce research dollars in a newly deregulated market. As California launches...

The dawning of law's Renaissance age in San Francisco.
December 19, 1997... Don't dare call it Frisco, but you might consider dubbing San Francisco "Silicon Valley North." The legal boom touched off by the Valley's technology industries is reverberating in San Francisco, where old stalwart firms and newcomers alike...

Lawyers wrestle rustlers and robbers on wild 'Net.
December 19, 1997... The Internet is often called a virtual Wild West, a wide open frontier for which laws have yet to be written. The analogy rings particularly true for lawyers, who are struggling to develop rules for an arena with neither physical boundaries nor...

Failed merger has Pasqua looking to fill its cup elsewhere.
December 19, 1997... Stunned by the collapse last month of a deal to merge with New York's Coffee Station, San Francisco-based Pasqua Inc. is scrambling to raise capital or find another buyer. Pasqua founder Martin Kupferman said the coffee retailer is in other...

'Bloated' State Bar may soon find itself going hungry. (State Bar of California)
December 19, 1997... The State Bar of California faces the biggest crisis in its 77-year life because it: a) gave a former executive director a $900,000 lobbying contract; b) charged exorbitant membership dues; c) bloated the size and salary of its work force;...

Fast forwarding: lightning-quick pagers help messenger firm deliver. (Studebaker Messenger)(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... Messenger service is a demanding business, where minutes, even seconds, define a competitive edge. At Studebaker Messenger, wireless technology is the backbone of a communications system that allows the Berkeley-based business to stay on top of...

Combining personal and company goals. (Arlen Group)(Growth Strategies)
December 19, 1997... Like many entrepreneurs, Roger Arlen, president of the Arlen Group, a San Francisco employee benefits consultant and broker, had a vision of the ideal enterprise. "I had ideas about how to run a service business that were hard to implement in...

World wide sales: instrument seller's web site is making beautiful music. (Lark In The Morning)(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... Mickie Zekley, owner of Lark In The Morning, a Mendocino-based retailer of unique musical instruments, discovered the marketing power of the World Wide Web in 1994 - not so long ago, but early in the life of the web. A self-taught web master,...

Inside information: small tech company's staffers ride the intranet WAVE. (WAVElink Media Inc.)(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... Big corporations were among the first to embrace intranet technology, using intranets to improve communication and information exchange in large work forces. However, the benefits are not limited to companies with thousands of employees. Small...

The virtual office: groupware creates consultants' office without walls. (GroupWorX LLC consulting firm)(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... GroupWorX LLC is a virtual company, a fact made possible by groupware. The 10-person consulting firm, which specializes in knowledge management solutions for Fortune 100 clients, has a mailing address and phone number in San Francisco, but you...

Built for speed: speedy 'Net access puts design firm on fast track. (Birdsall Designs Inc.)(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... As a designer of web sites and marketing materials for such corporate clients as Silicon Graphics, Sony, Arthur Anderson, Clorox and Hewlett-Packard, Birdsall Designs Inc. needs a heavy-duty lifeline for speedy transfer of web content and...

Say it in pictures: research firm's far-flung staffers stay in touch via video. (West Ed)(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... WestEd, a San Francisco-based educational research and development company, has 10 offices in the West, plus one in Boston and one in Washington, D.C. WestEd employees are currently working on more than 300 projects, and, in many cases,...

Paperless offices: bulletin boards allow distributor to tap into new deals. (Laminated Fabricators)(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... Laminated Fabricators, a San Bruno distributor of engraving materials, has long relied on business from local military bases. Orders from nearby military installations have historically accounted for 10 percent to 15 percent of total sales for...

Double duty: ChemOil finds the PC and telephone make a nice couple.(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... When ChemOil Corp. installed a new phone system a year ago, the San Francisco-based company, which sells marine fuel to customers nationwide, stepped up its telecommunications power with computer-telephone integration, which links the functions...

Making contact: high-tech sales: software keeps reps on right track. (sales-force automation)(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... Actuate Software Corp., which develops reporting systems for Internet and client/server applications, helps Fortune 1000 clients distribute corporate content throughout their enterprise. The four-year-old San Mateo company is using sales-force...

Mixed messages: Internet training goes on 24-hour duty at security firm. (Golden Bay Protective Services)(Technology 2000)
December 19, 1997... Multimedia Top 10 computer-based training topics Data processing/IS 39% End-user computing 36 Technical skills 24 Management skills ...

Fairmont Hotel buyer backs out. (Great Eagle Company Ltd.)
December 26, 1997... Great Eagle flies coup on $140 million deal with Swig Asia's economic flu has apparently torpedoed a Hong Kong real estate company's plan to buy the Swig family out of the Fairmont Hotel chain for $140 million. In a statement, Great Eagle...

Shorts sell. (Joe Boxer Corp. to increase its advertising budget for 1998)
December 26, 1997... Joe Boxer drops its advertising inhibitions Joe Boxer Corp. will break out of the box in 1998, increasing its advertising budget by about 600 percent. Nicholas Graham, founder, chairman and chief underwear officer, said the San Francisco...

Wells Fargo Bank recovering from merger hangover.
December 26, 1997... Wells Fargo appears to be taking the first steps on the road to recovery following one of the messiest mergers in banking history. Deposits and loans are starting to stabilize after more than a year of dramatic declines. The bank's share price...

PG&E computers crawl toward market. (Pacific Gas and Electric Co.)
December 26, 1997... System still needs overhaul after deregulation arrives While state agencies' computer glitches put electricity competition on hold last week, Pacific Gas & Electric Co. says its computers will be ready to roll with the changes - if only just....

Medical financier ready to operate after raising $23M. (Skyline Ventures)
December 26, 1997... Veteran medical industry financier John Freund has set out on his own, with a $23 million venture fund targeting startups. Palo Alto-based Skyline Ventures had a final closing in early December, raising seed money from two institutions and a...

Home improvement. (U.S. Home and Garden Inc. raises $20 million in new securities offering)
December 26, 1997... U.S. Home chain set to continue acquisition binge San Francisco's U.S. Home & Garden Inc. has raised another $20 million to support a buying binge that has driven the company from sales of $2.9 million to $71 million in five years. The fresh...

Keeping their business on the right track. (LeadTrack Systems Inc.)(Company Profile)
December 26, 1997... In the five years since they founded LeadTrack Systems Inc., a San Mateo supplier of contact management software and sales force automation (SFA) consulting services, Bill de Lambert and Steve Raizes have twice repositioned the business. Early...