Dallas Business Journal articles from May 1995

Dallas Business Journal archives from May 1995

Investors set to buy 700 acres in Frisco. (Frisco, Texas)
May 12, 1995... Land investor Ken Good, who has taken his checkered career from Dallas to Denver to Tampa Bay, Fla., is back in the Dallas real estate game, recently signing a contract for a group of unnamed clients to buy about 700 acres of land in West Frisco....

Brokers say Lincoln has tenant for Sherry Lane development. (real estate brokers; Lincoln Property Co.; Dallas, Texas office development)
May 12, 1995... Lincoln Property Co. has lined up a tenant to occupy an office development it plans to build on 1.2 acres near the intersection of Sherry Lane and the Dallas North Tollway, according to local office and land brokers. Lincoln has contracted to...

It's the food, stupid! (Wyatt Cafeterias Inc.)
May 12, 1995... Wyatt's Cafeterias chief wants to change more than just buildings Buckets of paint, tools and construction workers on ladders adorn the inside of the three Wyatt's Cafeterias in Oak Cliff. As the crews tear down and remodel the dated...

Long-distance companies gain ground in telecom war. (Texas' telecommunications laws)
May 12, 1995... Twilight has fallen on the battle to reform Texas' telecom laws, and long-distance telephone companies captured a small piece of territory. After passing Texas' House of Representatives, a bill opening Texas' local telephone markets to...

Quaker State relocation may signal readiness for acquisitions. (Quaker State Corp.)
May 12, 1995... When Quaker State Corp. moves to the Dallas area in about six months, the oil packaging firm will bring to town its money, some jobs and an appetite for acquisition. The company, currently headquartered in remote Oil City, Pa., has acquired...

Office space squeeze creates shift to 'landlord's market.' (Dallas, Texas)
May 12, 1995... With a plethora of companies consolidating their suburban office space, relocating to the Dallas area or rapidly expanding along LBJ Freeway and Richardson's Telecom Corridor, large blocks of space are growing scarce. And large office tenants...

Dallas' high-tech salaries fall in the middle. (Texas)
May 12, 1995... While Dallas' high-tech market booms, the salaries paid for the brains behind the boom fall in the middle of a nationwide trend. On the one hand, the paychecks earned by Dallas' engineering professionals come in below the median salary...

Pharmaceutical company plans $5.6 million public offering. (Cytoclonal Pharmaceutics Inc.)
May 12, 1995... A small Dallas pharmaceutical company is taking its first trip to Wall Street in hopes of raising $5.6 million. The 4-year-old company, Cytoclonal Pharmaceutics Inc., plans to sell 1.4 million shares of common stock and use $3.2 million of the...

Punitive damage reform may increase attorneys' business. (Texas)
May 12, 1995... Texas' punitive damages statute may mean busier attorneys before and after it takes effect Sept. 1. "There will be a tremendous number of suits filed before Sept. 1," said Jim Jordan, an attorney at Munsch, Hardt, Kopf, Harr & Dinan who...

Prudential is considering selling Renaissance Tower. (Prudential Insurance Company of America)
May 12, 1995... The Prudential Insurance Co. of America has hired a consultant to find out how much money it could fetch by selling Renaissance Tower, the second-largest multitenant office building in the Dallas area. Prudential spokesman Mark Friedlander said...

Box Energy owners won't respond to buyout offer. (Box Energy Corp.)
May 12, 1995... Majority owners of Box Energy Corp. have not responded to a recent $231-million buyout bid from Idaho billionaire J.R. Simplot despite clamoring by some shareholders at the company's annual meeting who want the company to be sold. Simplot,...

Dal-Mac environmental unit finds money in remediation. (Dal-Mac Environmental Services Inc.)
May 12, 1995... Dal-Mac Construction Co. had been building houses and commercial property since 1958 when it decided, seemingly on a whim, to start an environmental services division two years ago. Suddenly, the fledgling operation is making money. The...

War on health care fraud spreads to North Texas.
May 12, 1995... Conventional wisdom says health care reform died a natural death while visionary providers are reforming themselves and moving to managed care. But one aspect of reform continues - the war on fraud. The first volley was lobbed on Capitol Hill,...

NationsBank takes aim at El Paso. (NationsBank of Texas N.A.; State National Bank El Paso, Texas)
May 19, 1995... Dallas-based unit hopes to expand Texas dominance with bid for $1 billion-asset State National Bank In a play to expand its statewide banking empire, Dallas-based NationsBank of Texas is trying to buy the $1.1 billion-asset State National Bank...

Cawley buying Ray Hunt's Wilcox Realty. (Cawley and Associates Inc.; Wilcox Realty Group co-owner Ray Hunt)
May 19, 1995... Dallas-based real estate firm Cawley & Associates Inc. is close to an agreement to buy Wilcox Realty Group, according to sources close to the deal. The transaction would marry a tenant-representation firm to one specializing in building...

Banks jump senior-housing bandwagon. (Dallas, Texas-area banks)
May 19, 1995... Dallas-area lenders stand ready to put millions of dollars into special housing complexes for the elderly, signaling the onset of a long-anticipated boom in the senior health care market. "It's a service. That's one of the things we like about...

Heartland stockpiles expansion cash. (Heartland Wireless Communications Inc.)
May 19, 1995... Wireless cable operator has $100 million more to gobble up rural markets Wireless cable operator Heartland Wireless Communications Inc. hit up investors for $100 million to finance its play for the cable television market. Dallas-based...

Demand for nurses slows in Metroplex. (Dallas-Fort Worth Metropolitan Area)
May 19, 1995... After years of recruiting internationally for registered nurses and pushing schools to graduate more RNs, the demand for these skilled workers has slowed at Dallas-area hospitals. The overall number of available registered nursing positions in...

Old buyout offer holds up sale of Interstate National. (Interstate National Bank)
May 19, 1995... The owners of Interstate National Bank are ready to sell the institution. They even have a suitor in Fidelity Bank. But the spectre of a past buyout bid threatens to keep the deal from closing. For more than a year Fidelity Bank has planned...

Proposed affordable housing tax scares Dallas apartment owners. (Texas)
May 19, 1995... When the Dallas City Council adopted a legislative agenda earlier this year to comply with a court order to create affordable housing, local apartment owners couldn't believe the city was suggesting they pay a "fee" of $10 per unit per year to...

Florida-based gift shops move into Metroplex. (Balloons and Bears; Dallas-Fort Worth Metropolitan Area)
May 19, 1995... A Florida-based gift shop will franchise up to 12 stores in the Metroplex within 30 months. The first two Balloons and Bears stores will open in September and November, said CEO Brad Daniel. Sites are undetermined. The stores will operate in...

Legal wrangling looms over Sam Ware and Lazarus Property. (Lazarus Property Pres. Sam Ware)
May 19, 1995... To those who knew Lazarus Property Corp. President Sam Ware during the 1980s' real estate boom, his company must seem aptly named. In 1991, financial backers resurrected Ware's career after his association with Ed McBirney and the infamous...

Labor needs put Metroplex in race for high-tech plants. (Dallas-Fort Worth Metropolitan Area; Austin, Texas employment)
May 19, 1995... With billion-dollar chip plants at stake, Dallas and Fort Worth are preening for semiconductor companies that traditionally court Austin. The ballooning market for semiconductors - chips used in everything from personal computers to electronics...

Area banks aren't worried about unrecognized losses. (Dallas-Fort Worth Metropolitan Area; equity losses)
May 19, 1995... Nine banks m the Metroplex reported losses of 20% or more in equity by the end of 1994 because of depreciating investment portfolios. Some bank rating services and financial pundits have jumped on the issue, but an important question remains: So...

Tough Abilene-Dallas market sends Texas Airways packing. (Texas)
May 19, 1995... Commuter airline Texas Airways has shut down operations at Love Field, ending the battle over Abilene. The airline began operations to Abilene in February, going nose to nose with another commuter airline, Dallas Express Airlines. The two...

Spec office project slated for Richardson: Granite Properties and Dal-Mac will roll dice on 300,000-square-foot park in crowded telecom corridor. (Richardson, Texas)
May 26, 1995... Richardson's dearth of office space finally has inspired somebody to build - and to do it without a tenant signed on. Granite Properties Inc. and Dal-Mac Cos. are teaming to build a 300,000-square-foot speculative office and technical park in...

Perot team plans mall at Circle T. (Ross Perot's Alliance Development Corp.; General Growth Properties Inc.; Circle T Ranch)
May 26, 1995... Ross Perot Jr.'s Alliance Development Corp. and Des Moines, Iowa-based General Growth Properties Inc. plan to co-develop a shopping mall on part of the former Circle T Ranch, 2,000 acres along State Highway 114 in northeast Tarrant County. As...

TPA firms find themselves at a crossroad. (third party administrators)
May 26, 1995... For seven years, Dallas-based Southern Benefit Consultants Inc. grew by leaps and bounds by convincing clients like Wright Brand Foods Inc. that they could save money by self-funding their insurance plans. In one year alone, for example,...

Boom or bust, big D still small-business hotbed. (Dallas-Fort Worth Area, Texas)
May 26, 1995... Through the deep recession of the late 1980s to the doorstep of the Clinton era, Dallas-Fort Worth was fertile ground for small business growth, though other major U.S. markets grew even more companies in the same period, a Dallas Business...

Seibu buys more apartments, plans upscale renovations. (Seibu Corp.)
May 26, 1995... Seibu Corp., the young Dallas company known for its apartment renovations in the Knox Street neighborhood, is extending its work in the area to several sites south of Fitzhugh Avenue. Seibu's subsidiary Parkwood Development Inc. has purchased...

Third Box brother wants to unload energy company. (Box Energy Corp.)
May 26, 1995... Box Energy Corp. may be inching closer to a sale as a third Box family member and owner has decided to ask the company's board to entertain buyout bids. Don Box has joined brothers Gary Box and Douglas Box - who already have voiced their...

'We are going through chaos.' (Columbia Health Care founder Rick Scott)
May 26, 1995... Rick Scott, head of the largest health care provider in the country, talks about hospitals, money and why he wishes he lived in the Metroplex Rick Scott formed Columbia Health Care in Fort Worth in 1987 after running a legal practice in which...

Banc Tec, Recognition: instant attraction. (Banc Tec Inc.; Recognition International Inc.)
May 26, 1995... In as little as 20 days, BancTec Inc. wooed Recognition International Inc. and put a ring on its finger. In a conference call with analysts on May 22, BancTec CEO Grahame Clark and Recognition CEO Robert Vanourek said they first considered...

NationsBank stills wants El Paso stake. (NationsBank of Texas; State National Bank of El Paso, Texas)
May 26, 1995... Even after its buyout bid for State National Bank of El Paso was brushed aside, NationsBank of Texas still is set in its resolve to get a stake in the state's westernmost city. NationsBank was one of two front runners in bidding for the bank,...

Merger deals can increase employee claims.
May 26, 1995... As mergers and acquisitions increase in the business world, so does the number of local and national claims against companies whose employees don't like the effect these deals have on their benefit plans. Employee claims for alleged...

Dallas Child publisher issues sibling publication for parents.
May 26, 1995... An offspring of Dallas Child magazine will be launched next week targeting pregnant parents and those with infants. Baby Dallas will be distributed twice a year at 40,000 copies. The first edition is 36 pages with a slick cover and newsprint...

First National of Port Neches moves into Metroplex. (First National Bank)
May 26, 1995... First National Bank has made its living in small towns such as Port Neches and Port Arthur, but the bank will try its hand in the Metroplex with a new branch in Irving. First National, based and chartered in Port Neches, which is outside of...

Factors feed cash-hungry businesses that can't get traditional credit.
May 26, 1995... John Dicker was laying the foundation for a temporary employment service and found himself a little short of cash. He needed money to make the payroll for the employees he contracted out. Unable to secure a line of credit from a bank, Dicker...

For ten years, Oaks Bank has focused on local entrepreneurs. (Oaks Bank and Trust Co.)
May 26, 1995... "We are a successful community bank in the land of giant banks," says Max W. Wells, chairman of Oaks Bank & Trust Company. But, Oaks Bank doesn't worry about the giants, he adds. "For ten years, we have focused exclusively on providing...

Quick change. (Bencey Bryan and Kat Krone's resale clothing store)
May 26, 1995... Mother-daughter find new careers in resale clothing The day Bencey Bryan and Kat Krone were fired from their jobs was the beginning of an entrepreneurial venture for the mother-daughter team. Bryan had been the marketing director of a small...