San Francisco Business Times articles from September 1996

San Francisco Business Times archives from September 1996

On stand-by. (bomb detection equipment manufacturer InVision Technologies)
September 6, 1996... Bomb-detection company ready to boost production InVisionTechnologies has prepared a plan to quadruple production of its bomb detection equipment. The move comes in anticipation of word from the White House that the high-tech terrorist...

SciClone Pharmaceuticals blows into China.
September 6, 1996... Hepatitis B drug OK'd for country with 120M carriers SciClone Pharmaceuticals Inc. has gained approval from the Chinese government to enter the gigantic market with Zadaxin, the anti-hepatitis drug that is crucial to the company's future....

Financiers flee CB to form competition. (departure of CB Commercial Real Estate Group financiers)
September 6, 1996... More than half of the real estate financiers employed by CB Commercial Real Estate Group in California and Oregon have left the company as a result of a recent merger with a Houston-based mortgage banking firm. Those defecting include Michael...

Home-shopping stock exchange looks at building its own. (Pacific Stock Exchange's planned relocation)
September 6, 1996... The Pacific Stock Exchange is preparing to expand its search for a new home to include the option of having one built. The PSE expects to send out requests for proposals within 30 days to about 12 parties for locations in San Francisco and...

Another bug gives Sybase the creeps. (problems with its System 11 database software)
September 6, 1996... Sybase, still trying to recover from damage done to it by problems with its System 10 software, has been busy contacting customers about a bug in its latest database version System 11. The glitch in System 11 can corrupt data when a user tries...

Having another round. (Beverages & More's new managers)
September 6, 1996... Beverage chain adds execs as big expansion looms Food and liquor retailer Beverages & More has added a trio of top-level managers as it prepares for its next big round of expansion. The Concord-based company recruited new merchandising, real...

Working out on Nautilus pumps up drug market. (Argonaut Technologies Inc.'s Nautilus 2400 machine)
September 6, 1996... A new kind of Nautilus machine is ready to help the exploding drug-discovery market lift heavy weights. Rapidly synthesizing organic chemicals in large batches is one of the biggest challenges facing the worldwide pharmaceutical industry. But...

Dental plan fills the cavity left by loss of big contract. (increased membership for Delta Dental Plan of California)
September 6, 1996... Sharp growth in its HMO and PPO enrollments has allowed Delta Dental Plan of California, the state's largest dental plan by far, to bounce back from the loss of one of its largest customers in January. The San Francisco-based not-for-profit...

Southern move adds accent to BofA's nationwide push. (BankAmerica's entry into the Southern market)
September 6, 1996... BankAmerica, moving aggressively into the Southeast to capture corporate customers, has opened a southeastern regional commercial banking office in Atlanta. The move last month is the latest sign that the nation's largest banks aren't waiting...

Kaiser goes on the move: organization's S.F. hospitals not for sale. (Kaiser Foundation Health Plan Inc.)
September 13, 1996... Unlike several other Kaiser Permanente sub-regions in Northern California, Kaiser's San Francisco-based Golden Gate customer-service area isn't considering putting any of its hospitals on the sales block. Its massive San Francisco hospital...

Giant HMO prowling for acquisitions. (health maintenance organization) (Kaiser Foundation Health Plan Inc.)(Kaiser Goes On The Move)
September 13, 1996... Kaiser Permanente, already on its strongest national growth spurt in seven years, is pursuing acquisitions that could add 212,000 new members in the Washington, D.C., and Kansas City metropolitan areas. The Oakland-based health-care giant is...

Schwab's latest sell: guidance. (Charles Schwab Corp.)
September 13, 1996... Charles Schwab Corp. is extending a helping hand to novice investors. The San Francisco-based stock brokerage has long been wed to the proposition that it would offer low-priced securities transactions, serving as an order taker who offered no...

CNET's challenge. (CNET Technology Inc.)
September 13, 1996... S.F. company takes on the high-tech press In a major competitive push against the computer press, CNET: The Computer Network has launched a new online service devoted entirely to technology news. News.com takes advantage of the multimedia...

Latino entrepreneurship in U.S. continues to boom.
September 13, 1996... Ten thousand Latino business owners will meet in Denver from Sept. 18-21 for the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce's 17th annual convention. The meeting, attracting business owners, vendors and corporations, comes at a time when Latinos are...

New ground rules for coffee business: specialty brews.
September 13, 1996... When Edward Appfel started his own coffee company in 1914, he would ride his bicycle to the Oakland docks to pick up a bag of green coffee beans, then pedal back to his house and roast the beans in his oven. Customers drank Appfel's coffee one...

Revised plan to give Mission Bay new life: mayor will make major announcement. (Mayor Willie Brown)
September 20, 1996... Catellus Development Corp.'s long-stagnant Mission Bay project is about to get a breath of new life. Company officials are expecting a major announcement from San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown in the next few weeks. The mayor will publicly...

Granny Goose sales gaining altitude in Asia.
September 20, 1996... After years of simply maintaining its decades-old sales in Japan and the Philippines, Oakland potato chip giant Granny Goose has created a game plan for Asia that will launch its products from Mainland China to Malaysia. CEO Keith Kim said...

The marketing fight of its life: Young & Rubicam takes on Microsoft. (Young & Rubicam Inc.; Microsoft Corp.)
September 20, 1996... Novell Inc. has picked Young & Rubicam San Francisco to wage an all-out marketing war against computer giant Microsoft Corp. The prize: domination of the $6 billion market for network operating system software. Young & Rubicam is rolling out a...

49er stadium may take hit from new bill. (Candlestick Park)
September 20, 1996... A bill working its way through Congress could add millions of dollars to the price tag of a new $250 million football stadium for the San Francisco 49ers. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan is sponsoring legislation that would forbid state or local...

The search is on: Internet 'search engines' try to find profitability.
September 20, 1996... The advent of browsers such as the Netscape Navigator transformed the Internet into a place where even the most inept wanderer through cyberspace could move about with the simple click of a mouse button. Gone were the need to use arcane commands....

Columbia makes play for East Bay hospital. (Columbia/HCA Health Care Corp.; Eden Medical Center)
September 20, 1996... Columbia/HCA Healthcare Corp. is exploring a joint-venture with Castro Valley's Eden Medical Center that could help undo years of tradition at the huge, for-profit hospital chain - and give it a major new foothold in the East Bay....

Spanish Inquisition: vino anyone? (Spanish vintners enter San Francisco Bay Area market)
September 20, 1996... Spanish vintners are popping the cork on one of the most crowded wine markets in the world: the Bay Area. In the process, they are leaving few labels untouched. While France made its name by sticking to its old, regional labels - Burgundy,...

Talk dirty to me: flagging KPIX places its bet on Don Imus.
September 20, 1996... Hoping to buttress its sagging ratings, KPIX-FM is bringing radio shock jock Don Imus to Bay Area airwaves. The "Imus in the Morning" syndicated radio show kicks off a new all-talk radio format at KPIX beginning Sept. 23. The station is...

Financial Women's Assoc. packs the house, raises $100,000.
September 20, 1996... The Financial Women's Association of San Francisco's newly launched awards luncheon is off to an auspicious start. Reflecting the 40-year-old group's rising profile in the business community and the caliber of the speakers on the dais, a...

Fidelity wants to insure mutual funds - at your expense. (Fidelity Investments Inc.)
September 20, 1996... Businesses that invest in money market mutual funds may get an extra layer of protection - at a price - if Fidelity Investments receives SEC approval to insure its funds. A caveat: The protection won't match the full faith and credit of the...

Fremont firm inks chip agreement. (Therma-Wave Inc.; Siemens AG Semiconductor Division)
September 20, 1996... A Fremont semiconductor equipment company has just signed a deal with Siemens Semiconductor Division to provide the measuring systems for its European factories. The venture, which began with a $9 million equipment sale for three of Siemens'...

H-P targets small business with low-cost servers. (Hewlett-Packard Co.)
September 20, 1996... Hewlett-Packard is preparing to go to market with the first server specifically designed for the kinds of small computer networks increasingly used by small- and medium-sized businesses. With the market for such networks exploding, H-P is...

The fight for survival against ... Microsoft. (Microsoft Corp.)
September 20, 1996... Twelve years ago, a small Marin County software company called MicroPro was sitting pretty. Its leading product, Wordstar, was the word processing program of choice in the pre-Macintosh world of DOS operating systems. With operating profits at...

For venture capitalists, it's seek and ye shall find.
September 20, 1996... Some facts of life about the Bay Area's venture capital industry: * The region is the epicenter at the sizzling hot venture capital industry, with most of the fields firms congregated in low-slung office buildings along the famed Sand Hill...

Federal bill to halt union 'salting' is dead - for now.
September 20, 1996... The last-minute dash by Congress to finish up overdue budget work has put a very important small business-related bill on the back burner. The Truth in Employment Act, which in recent weeks generated enough momentum to reach the House floor, is...

Phone companies hustle the Internet.(Telecommunications Update)
September 20, 1996... The Big Three long distance carriers are taking their marketing wars to the Internet. AT&T, MCI, and Sprint are all offering customers easy Internet and World Wide Web access as Congress opens up the entire telecommunications industry to...

Children's expo is no greasy kid stuff. (San Francisco Children's Interactive Expo)
September 20, 1996... The once sizzling multimedia industry may have been cooled in recent years by the Internet craze, but at least one sector of the industry appears as hot as ever. If San Francisco's Children's Interactive Expo is any barometer, the appetite for...

A blinding flash of technological innovation. (Arkenstone Inc.'s Atlas Speaks digital map)
September 20, 1996... Now, even the blind and visually-impaired can "see" where technology is headed. In their case, it is digital maps that talk and can help them navigate their way through 20,000 cities in 3,000 U.S. counties. The new talking map product -...

Industrial advancements are a virtual reality.
September 20, 1996... In a small Smithsonian exhibit, visitors plug into a computer, put on a helmet and gloves and take a walking tour of Mars, "touching" the rocks and "stepping over" the boulders in their path. In another, they take the controls of a fighter jet...

Hardwired for success: startup computes for H-P alumnus. (Craig Stouffer; Mobius Computer Corp.)
September 20, 1996... In the process of building Mobius Computer Corp. into a $4.2 million supplier of multi-user servers, founder Craig Stouffer learned that developing cutting-edge technology can be risky business. "It's like that old saying," Stouffer observed....

Myths and facts about flexible work-week legislation.(Legislative Issues)(Column)
September 20, 1996... The demands for flexibility in the workplace continue to mount as employees juggle the demands of work, home and other personal needs. Caring for an aging parent has added new time pressures to those already stretched too thin. In 1994, the...

Take these tips along when moving your business.(Small Biz Success)(Column)
September 20, 1996... If your business is doing well enough to pay rent, it might be time to move out of the back bedroom or garage. Moving into commercial space is scary, though, and a major step for an entrepreneur. Moving is expensive, and signing a lease is a...

Netscape navigating real estate market for expanded digs. (Netscape Communications Corp.)
September 20, 1996... Netscape Communications Corp. may soon be calling the old Fairchild Semiconductor property in Mountain View home. The company, which develops software for navigating the World Wide Web, is negotiating with the Lovewell Co. to lease most of the...

Non-CPA body count rising at local accounting firms.
September 20, 1996... Accounting firms may be known for counting beans, but these days they can surely afford to feast on better fare. At a time when off-the-shelf computer programs threaten to take away a significant amount of work for these firms, they are booming...

CB Commercial contemplates IPO. (CB Commercial Real Estate Group Inc.; initial public offering)
September 27, 1996... CB COMMERCIAL Headquarters: Los Angeles Chairman: James Didion 1995 revenues: $470 million U.S. offices: 86 Bay Area offices: 5 U.S....

Kaiser doctors launch enterprise. (Kaiser Permanente)
September 27, 1996... HMO's medical groups form national federation, business unit Kaiser Permanente's nearly 10,000 doctors have written a revolutionary prescription for the future. The giant Oakland based HMO's 9,300 member physicians in 12 historically...

Office supply stores draw battle lines. (San Francisco Bay Area)
September 27, 1996... The battle for marker share among the nation's three largest office supply superstores is about to intensify in the Bay Area. No. 3 ranked Office Max is making an aggressive push to open new stores in the region just as the two leading chains,...

PG&E asks Oakland to pull plug on 500% tax hike. (Pacific Gas and Electric Co.; Oakland City Council)
September 27, 1996... Utility threatens legal action: "We believe that it is an unfair tax... that is illegal" Pacific Gas & Electric said it will appeal a decision by the Oakland City Council last week to raise the business license tax on the utility by 500...

Touch method. (new computer game from Other 90% Technologies Inc.)
September 27, 1996... Brainy software seeks thumbs-up from consumers A San Rafael-based software company is marketing a new computer program with a remarkable claim: Users can move the cursor with their minds. The Other 90% Technologies Inc., a fledgling game...

Stock option grants lose touch with CEO performance.
September 27, 1996... Do stock options. represent the ultimate form of pay-for-performance? Most of the folks in the business world would answer yes. After all, if the market price of a company's stock on the date an option grant is made is $50 per share, and if the...

Neckwear maker arrives in style. (Mulberry Neckwear)(Company Profile)
September 27, 1996... In the volatile and fiercely competitive apparel industry, entrepreneurs Henry Jacobson and Katie Smith have built a $12 million neckwear business on the strength of a unusual silk fabric. A former pro tennis player, Jacobson was on vacation in...

Architecture firms draw strength from Asian demand.
September 27, 1996... Bay Area architecture firms continue to boost overall billings, spurred on by a strong domestic economy, a resurgent real estate market and continued demand from overseas clients. The 25 largest architecture firms in the Bay Area posted gross...

Top Bay Area tourist attractions. (tabular data only)(1996 Bay Area Market Fact Guide)(Directory)
September 27, 1996... Number Rank Attraction of visitors 1 Fisherman's Wharf 13.1 million 2 Chinatown 12.0 million 3 ...