San Francisco Business Times articles from March 2000

San Francisco Business Times archives from March 2000

S.F. to hatch brood of big net incubators.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... 1 million square feet of office space sought to birth next generation of web startups Five high-tech incubators are seeking 1 million square feet of office space in San Francisco as the city fast becomes the preferred launching pad for new...

BofA Securities battles back.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Bruised but bullish, BofA investment bank seeking a bundle from bundling A year after its well-publicized breakup with former chief Thomas Weisel, Banc of America Securities has refocused and restaffed and is being counted onto pump up the...

Luxury goods colossus LVMH to jump on Net.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton, the $9.3 billion, Paris-based luxury goods conglomerate, is launching a San Francisco e-commerce venture aimed at well-heeled consumers. The site, called eLuxury.com, is expected to roll out this spring...

New hospital to be born.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... S.F. facility to target women and children California Pacific Medical Center is quietly planning to build San Francisco's first new hospital in a decade, a facility that will treat women and children. Plans to turn CPMC's California...

Small banks join forces on insurance.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Community banks are banding together to take on their mammoth financial industry competitors as banks rush into the insurance and securities business. Thirty California banks have anted up $20,000 each to buy into the Community Bankers...

Fair, Isaac puts Mann HQ complex in question.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Fair, Isaac & Co. has halted work on its 15-acre future headquarters campus and may put the downtown San Rafael site up for sale. New CEO Tom Grudnowski ordered a review of the project, company officials said, as Fair, Isaac works to cut...

Tri-Valley sows its future.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Still harvesting bumper crop of losses, its CEO plants seeds of growth Jeff Shaw didn't hesitate to bruise a few tomatoes after taking over tattered Tri-Valley Growers following a record loss. He's still got a tough row to hoe, but a year...

Stock Answers.
March 3, 2000... Web site helps stock pickers play follow the leaders If you believe that old market adage "the trend is your friend," then Chan Chiu is ready to play social director for you. Chiu, founder of San Mateo-based AboveTrade.com Inc., has...

Clorox aims to clean up at P&G's expense.
March 3, 2000... Oakland-based Clorox Co. is sending an array of new products to shelves this quarter in a major new product push aimed at intensifying competition with industry leader Procter & Gamble. With at least seven new products rolling out of the...

B- 52s fly in to save launch party from dropping bomb.
March 3, 2000... Salesforce.com was hoping to make a big splash with its swanky San Francisco launch party on Feb. 22, but 24 hours before the big event (rumored to cost $450,000), founder and CEO Marc Beniof looked like he was going to be all wet. First,...

Urban Decay breaks nails and ties.
March 3, 2000... Tech companies may cling to the Silicon Valley by their fingernails, but fingernail businesses are another matter. Sandy Lerner knows about both. The Cisco Systems veteran founded Urban Decay in 1995, and saw it chart a Cisco-like...

Rise & Fall.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... A barometer of the region's movers, shakers and fakers Michael Tilson Thomas The hits just keep on coming for San Francisco Symphony's energetic conductor, as his orchestra walks off with not one, not two, but three Grammies. Mark...

S.F. port eyes south waterfront projects.
March 3, 2000... After spending the last four years jumpstarting a series of multimillion-dollar projects stretching from Fisherman's Wharf to China Basin, Port of San Francisco officials are focusing their attention on the gritty, industrial South Waterfront....

H&Q Asia Pacific raises $750 million equity fund.
March 3, 2000... Fresh from raising a $750 million fund to invest in resurgent Asian economies, H&Q Asia Pacific has ponied up $20 million for 45 percent of a South Korean Internet TV venture. It's the third such fund for H&Q Asia Pacific Growth fund since...

Inside Traders.
March 3, 2000... Inside Traders A look at buying and selling of shares by Bay Area executives Arthur Levinson Chairman, CEO Genentech Inc. Shares sold: 90,000 Were shares sold options? Yes...

CORRECTION.(Correction Notice)
March 3, 2000... A Feb. 25 Worklife story did not indicate where to reach Joel Garfinkle of Dream Job Coaching. He can be reached at (510) 357-2522 or at joel@dreamjobcoach.com. For more information, visit www.dreamjobcoach.com.

B2B education startup gobbles up $30 million.
March 3, 2000... Internet startup Epylon Corp. has raised $30 million in venture capital financing and is readying a test launch of its business-to-business marketplace for the education and government markets. Highland Capital Partners, the Boston-based...

Online consumer research firm AtPlan opens S.F. office.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Market research firm AtPlan, a major player in online consumer research, has expanded its presence in the West with the opening of a San Francisco office. Nearly 50 of the Stamford, Conn.-based company's 425 clients are in the greater Bay...

Granny Goose to move, lay off 170.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Granny Goose announced it will shut down plant operations in East Oakland. The company, which has made potato chips in Oakland since being founded there in 1946, will lay off about 170 unionized employees who work at the plant, due to the...

Oracle, Commerce One join venture.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Redwood City's Oracle and Commerce One of Pleasanton will participate and have an ownership stake in a new Internet automobile supply venture with three auto manufacturers. Both companies were integral in creating the systems used individually...

Expanding the Gap.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Gap Inc. announced it will add up to 660 new stores this year. Last year the clothier opened 472 new locations. Gap Inc. owns the Gap, BabyGap, GapKids, Old Navy and Banana Republic chains, and will be rolling out its new chain, GapBody, out of...

Traffic at Oakland airport takes off.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Year-over-year passenger traffic surged 7 percent at Oakland International Airport. Airport officials said 9.8 million passengers departed or arrived there last year. The airport averages 153 scheduled passenger flights a day on 11 airlines,...

S.F. finally gets cable modem service.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... ExciteAtHome and AT&T announced they plan to offer high-speed Internet service via cable modems to 7,000 San Francisco homes in Bernal Heights starting March 6. It could take as much as four years to make the equipment upgrades necessary to...

Jupiter Communications buys two.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... For more than $50 million in cash and stock, Internet research firm Jupiter Communications acquired Net Market Makers, a Berkeley-based research firm focused on the business-to-business e-commerce market, and Internet Research Group of Los...

Niku debuts to cheers.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Internet professional services firm Niku made a strong debut on Wall Street, with shares in the Redwood City company rising more than twice their offering price. The company opened for trading at $64 after pricing its shares at $24. Niku shares...

Gas prices pumped up -- again.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Bay Area gasoline prices surged 16 cents over the last two weeks and are threatening to top last summer's high prices soon. On March 1 the average price for a gallon of unleaded regular was $1.71 in San Francisco, and $1.66 in Oakland. Industry...

Santana has 'Supernatural' sweep.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... San Francisco resident and now-legendary musician Carlos Santana won a record-tying eight Grammy awards with "Supernatural," his multiplatinum 1999 album. The record, which won album of the year, among other accolades, catapulted Santana out of...

Lucas complex gets thumbs up.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Filmmaker George Lucas' large Mat-in county office complex, first proposed in 1996, was approved by the Mann Planning Commission. The five-building, 184,694-square-foot complex will house 300 employees. Lucas will turn over 3,000 acres to the...

BroadBand's broad industry support.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... San Mateo-based startup BroadBand Office Inc., which wires buildings for Internet access and telecommunications, has signed on two big investors: Sun Microsystems Inc. and Microsoft Corp. Each invested $25 million in the company.

$1.4B transportation plan moving.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... The Alameda County Transportation Authority board unanimously approved a $1.4 billion transportation plan to improve streets, fund BART extensions and pay for more transit options. The 20-year spending plan, known as Measure B, only becomes...

Bionic chip is born.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... UC Berkeley professor Boris Rubinsky invented a bionic chip -- a living cell enclosed in a minuscule silicon circuit. The chip, which allows scientists to insert DNA into cells to alter their genetic makeup, will be used for gene therapy...

Franklin converting bank charter.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Franklin Templeton Group, one of the largest mutual fund groups in the United States, plans to convert its existing California-chartered commercial bank into a federally chartered savings and loan. The plan, approved by the federal Office of...

GREG QUESNEL.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Name: Greg Quesnel. Title: President and CEO. Company: CNF, the $5.6 billion diversified transportation and logistics company, based in Palo Alto. Education: Bachelor of science degree in finance from the University of Oregon;...

Online financial sites crunch their own numbers.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Among online financial web sites, the Bay Area sports the industry leaders, and the latest audience ratings from Media Metrix only underscore that standing. Sure, Internet traffic figures are volatile from month to month and, as Salomon...

Bay Area banking vet leaves institution he built.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Richard Kahler, who helped found and build San Leandro-based Bay Bank of Commerce -- and sold it 19 years later -- will leave the day-to-day banking business. When Kahler turns 65 on May 12, he will formally hand the CEO reins to William...

Visa strikes down penalty as fraud numbers tumble.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Visa U.S.A., while saying that overall credit card fraud losses dropped to a low of six cents for every $100 in transactions in 1999, struck down a penalty on cardholders whose plastic is used fraudulently. Previously, cardholders were...

Cornerstone pulls plug on deal for 100 Pine St.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
March 3, 2000... It isn't over until the fat lady sings -- and in real estate, it isn't a deal until a thorough due diligence is completed. Such was the scenario recently with 100 Pine St., a 33-story office tower in downtown San Francisco. The...

Grubb & Ellis Inc.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Kurt Houtkooper has left Grubb & Ellis Inc. to join Tishman Speyer in San Francisco. Houtkooper, who will be helping Tishman lease its downtown properties, including 525 and 575 Market St., spent five years at Grubb as a senior leasing...

Presidio Trust.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Ira Heyman has joined the Presidio Trust board of directors. The 69-year-old Heyman, a former UC-Berkeley urban planning professor and longtime Berkeley resident, will serve as the Secretary of the Interior's designee, replacing John Berry. ...

Don Shaver has left Cushman & Wakefield.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Telecom leasing specialist Don Shaver has left Cushman & Wakefield to head Internet Telecommunications Infrastructure Inc., a subsidiary of real estate and project management services company WorkPlaceUSA. Shaver, who helped complete some...

Sonnenblick-Goldman Co.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Sonnenblick-Goldman Co. has closed its Los Angeles office and is consolidating its West Coast operations in San Francisco. Paul Lee, managing director of the firm's San Francisco office, will oversee all investment sales and financings in the...

Online real estate association formed.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... With proliferation of real estate sites on the Internet, especially on the residential side, the formation of an online association seemed inevitable. Now it's happened. The group was announced at the Real Estate Connect 2000 conference...

Benjamin Cummings in S.F.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Benjamin Cummings, a division of educational publishing giant Pearson Education, has relocated to San Francisco after 23 years on the Peninsula. The 85-person company signed a 15-year lease for an entire 35,000-square-foot office building at...

Dot-corn mania continues.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Three dot-corns recently took short-term space at 563 Mission St., a site slated to be demolished for a new high-rise development 4Charity.com, Sectorbase.com and ThirdAgeMedia.com signed six-month leases for a total of 32,000 square feet. ...

Lendlease gains portfolio.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Lendlease Real Estate Investments has completed its $131.5 million acquisition of all the real estate assets of San Mateo-based Franklin Select Realty Trust. The portfolio of Franklin Select, a real estate investment trust, consists of...

Local agency's casino ads hit comedy jackpot.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Two creatives at Goldberg Moser O'Neill are getting accolades from Comedy Central's World's Funniest Commercials for two of 15 television spots touting a casino called Ameristar. Haven't heard of it? That's because this gambling palace is...

Agency not for sale.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Bob Hoffman of Hoffman-Lewis advertising agency would like to drive a stake through the heart of the reanimated rumor that the partners are looking to sell the shop. "I have no intention of leaving the agency business for at least 10...

Kmart's BlueLight special to shine at Fisherman's Wharf.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Having gone from bricks to clicks, Kmart is going back again. Its new online venture, BlueLight.com, will be opening a showcase store at its Fisherman's Wharf headquarters. The store will be on the second and third floors of 145 Jefferson...

HotShots score in East Bay.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Where there's a will there is away. When Martin Hendren and Kip Quakenbush sought year-round facilities for their daughters to play soccer, they weren't impressed with what was available. "We live in one of the best places on the planet and...

Charter punches up $400M in late-stage finance round.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
March 3, 2000... Charter Growth Capital just raised $400 million for a second late-stage venture fund, doubling its target in the course of fund raising to meet both. supply and demand. "What has changed is that the size of the financing rounds is much...

Exec to help entrepreneurs.(Brief Article)
March 3, 2000... Gib Myers pulled back from active involvement as a general partner in new Mayfield Fund partnerships a few years ago to concentrate on starting the Entrepreneurs Foundation. The foundation now has $12 million in stock to start actively...

There's a there there in downtown Pleasant Hill.
March 3, 2000... On a raw late winter day, the nearly completed development that will create Pleasant Hill's first "downtown" commercial core is still a little rough around the edges. Though shivering and dodging an occasional mud puddle, Craig Semmelmeyer...

Oracle limits venture capital dough to customers only.
March 3, 2000... The $500 million Oracle Venture Fund has made an undisclosed investment in web-based meeting service WebEx of San Jose. And guess what WebEx has decided to ditch its Microsoft technology platform in favor of the Oracle8i database product....

Cybergold buys email marketer iTarget.com.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
March 3, 2000... Oakland-based Internet incentives firm Cybergold Inc. has acquired iThrget.com, an email marketing firm for $32.8 million in stock. iTarget, based in San Diego, uses permission-based direct email to market products and services to...

ChemConnect attracts cash from Mitsui & Co.
March 3, 2000... Mitsui & Co. Ltd one of Japan s largest trading companies, is taking an equity stake in ChemConnect Inc., aSan Francisco-based Internet exchange for the chemicals industry. In addition to its undisclosed investment, Mitsui's chemicals and...

Beauty e-tailer Eve.com.
March 3, 2000... expands beyond cosmetics When it comes to beauty e-tailers, is Eve.com the fairest of them all? Some recent developments put the San Francisco company in a flattering light Two weeks ago, Eve was named a top-performing site during the...

BuildPoint, Timberline enter joint venture.
March 3, 2000... BuildPoint.com and Timberline Software, both technology companies focused on the construction industry, inked a partnership last week. Timberline will integrate its estimating and accounting software with Redwood City-based BuildPoint's...

Nowhere to grow.
March 3, 2000... Making the most of scarce office space in a tight real estate market It's a common plot in the Bay Area: Firm grows quickly, firm goes on hiring spree, firm recruits bushel of bright new employees - then firm crams them in like sardines...

Build a healthy workplace, make a healthy work force.
March 3, 2000... Some of today's modern offices are doing more than making their offices environmentally friendly to the outdoors -- they're making them look like the outdoors. Take Gap Inc.'s headquarters in San Bruno, for example. When the company...

All work and no play not an option in Silicon Valley.
March 3, 2000... Bicycles cruise from one building to another across a grass-lined courtyard. Bodies hurtle feet-first down a big red slide amid peals of laughter. In the background, the faint tinkle of the ice cream man's bell can be heard as he tempts...

Largest Executive Business Suites in Bay Area.
March 3, 2000... Largest Executive Business Suites in Bay Area Company name Rank Address last Phone/Fax Rank year Web site 1 1 HQ Global Workplaces [*] Two Embarcadero Center, Ste. 200, San Francisco...

A new tune in the cacophony of small business web sites.
March 3, 2000... So what's your problem? Whatever it is, a choir full of small business cyber-saviors wants to help you. They've got solutions to problems you didn't know you had. Some small business web sites will just nab a nice rate on toner cartridges....

Trade show secrets.
March 3, 2000... Savvy strategies netted Exhibitron $9M in revenue after two years A typical trade show exhibit can cost anywhere from $15,000 to $1 million. But San Francisco-based Exhibitron had only $600 to begin construction on its first and most...

ADRIANO PAGANINI.
March 3, 2000... Title: President, CEO. Company: Pasta Pomodoro, a San Francisco-based chain of Italian restaurants. Founded: 1994. Employees: 400. Source of startup capital: Earnings from Cafe Adriano on Fillmore, his first restaurant...

PEOPLE ON THE MOVE.
March 3, 2000... ACCOUNTING/CONSULTING Oakland-headquartered Base Consulting Group has named Richard Plosscowe a consultant. Plosscowe was most recently with Influence Software as senior consultant. Na'dir AbdulHaqq and Vincent Trujillo have also joined as...

A patchwork of tax fiefdoms won't work for Internet.
March 3, 2000... Sales taxes on the Internet have yet to raise a buck -- but President Clinton is already looking eager to pass it. The question of whether to tax e-commerce transactions at all, not to mention how and how much, should not be a federal...

Quick! Dial up 1-800-HELP-A-GEEK.
March 3, 2000... I can't help it. I feel sorry for them. There they sit, all day and into the night, alone at their desks. They stare at computer screens and think in code. They hunt for venture capital. They point and click through a maze of work the rest of...

CEO 'rock stars' won't always like the tune.
March 3, 2000... The high-tech business titans of the Bay Area should be careful about what they wish for -- especially if what they wish for is fame. Our culture has a low tolerance for CEO "rock stars." For example, Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos...

A few clouds remain despite sunny employment figures.
March 3, 2000... From a labor market perspective, these are amazing times in the state, and particularly in the Bay Area. We recall being taught in college that unemployment couldn't go below the 3 percent "frictional" rate of job change. Today, unemployment in...

LETTER.
March 3, 2000... Keep an eye on how bean counters count those beans Regarding "'Bean-counting cops' ambush tech mergers," in the Feb. 11-17 issue: An interesting editorial. You indicate that the market determines value, not the bean counters. Well, if...

Biggest office deal in S.F. history.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Chase H&Q agrees to $650M lease for South of Market headquarters Chase H&Q has agreed to the largest lease transaction in San Francisco history, snapping up an entire office tower in the South of Market area for its new West Coast...

A.G. Ferrari revs engine.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Specialty foods chain bites into venture capital to fuel online expansion The term "clicks and mortar" hadn't even been coined three years ago when A.G. Ferrari Foods began to expand its Italian specialty food chain. But as the $10...

Bloomies' labor pains could sink downtown store.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Bloomingdale's is embroiled in a dispute with unions that threatens to delay or even derail the $400 million redevelopment of the former Emporium site on Market Street. Local labor leaders are pressuring Bloomingdale's parent company,...

E-Loan, Fair, Isaac lock horns on credit scores.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Against the wishes of Fair, Isaac & Co., online lender E-Loan is handing consumers their Fair, Isaac credit scores, a potentially powerful and controversial peek into why loans are approved or rejected. So-called "FICO" scores are the...

Big Peninsula project nearly full before it starts.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Four high-tech companies have gobbled up more than 1.2 million square feet of space at the proposed Pacific Shores Center in Redwood City. ExciteAtHome, Phone.com Inc., Informatica Corp. and BroadVision Inc. have signed leases for a...

New economy, old manners.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Manners maven attempts to teach e-businesses some e-tiquette Lisa Mirza is teaching Internet workers a new application: table manners. The New Economy's warp-speed growth has left social skills in the dust, says Mirza, an etiquette and...

Battle for Levi media business won by TBWA.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Levi Strauss & Co. is handing its $40 million, broadcast media business to TBWA/Chiat/Day following an extensive review among several agencies. TBWA edged out longtime Levi co-agency Foote, Cone & Belding, which has been handling media...

Rising rates have online lenders in numbers crunch.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Rising interest rates -- and the likelihood of more hikes soon -- are forcing mortgage lenders to cut costs and look for business operations less sensitive to interest-rate swings. For example, after already laying off 25 percent of its...

All you need for global yacht race is a boatload of cash.(Brief Article)(Company Profile)
March 10, 2000... San Francisco's twin bids to bring the America's Cup here both failed, but the even harder-core thrill of round-the-world-yacht racing is here, and it can be yours -- for a price. So says Challenge Business International Inc., a company...

Mailroom workers go postal.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... No one will ever again work their way up from the mailroom of Banc of America Securities. That's because the mailroom is no more. In their cost-cutting Grinchiness, BofA's braintrust decided around Christmas to can the mailroom staff...

Rise & Fall.(People in the news.)(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... A barometer of the region's movers, shakers and fakers Jeanne Jackson Gap's top banana -- Jackson has been head honcho of Banana Republic and also Gap's online operations -- wanted a new challenge. She got one: CEO of Wal-Mart's...

Hines acquires Redwood City property for $71M.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Adding to its Peninsula war chest, Hines has purchased the year-old Woodside Technology Center in Redwood City. Houston-based Hines paid $71 million for the 252,000-square-foot business complex, which had been tied up by Carlyle Realty, a...

Chiron to sell meningitis C drug in U.K.(Brief Article)
March 10, 2000... Chiron Corp. is expecting to bring in more than $100 million in sales this year from a vaccine to fight the deadly meningitis C disease. The Emeryville-based drug maker received a license to market the vaccine, Menjugate, in the United...

Biotech firms head back to the Wall Street trough.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
March 10, 2000... Biotechnology companies are replenishing their coffers as investor interest in the industry continues to surge. Barely more than two months into the year, biotechs nationwide have raised twice as much in follow-on offerings as in all of...