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Loews Corp posted a better-than-expected 8 percent rise in quarterly net profit, as the hotels and energy conglomerate recorded a gain on investments compared to significant investment losses a year earlier.
Loews, run by the billionaire Tisch family, posted investment gains of $1 million in the second quarter. A year earlier, Loews lost $178 million on investments. Get the full story »
Research in Motion Ltd. plans to introduce a tablet computer in November to compete with Apple Inc. iPad, Bloomberg News reported Friday on its website, citing two people familiar with RIM’s plans.
The computer, to be called Blackpad, will include Wi-Fi and Bluetooth wireless technology, allowing users to connect to the Internet through BlackBerry smartphones. It is to be priced in line with the iPad, which starts around $499, one person said. Get the full story »
Tribune Co. proposed paying its top 43 executives a severance package of cash and benefits if they are asked by a new board to leave the company after the Chicago-based media conglomerate emerges from bankruptcy.
The company didn’t put a price tag on the package, but said it amounts to 2.5 times salary and bonus for Chief Executive Randy Michaels, and 2.25 times salary and bonus for Chief Operating Officer Gerry Spector. Both would be entitled to 24 months of the company’s group health benefits.
Nine other top executives, including Tony Hunter, the publisher of the Chicago Tribune, and Eddy Hartenstein, publisher of the Los Angeles Times, would get 1.75 times salary and bonus plus 24 months of benefits. A list of 32 others would get 1.5 times salary and 18 months of benefits.
Tribune Co. filed the plan late Thursday as part of a supplement to its plan of reorganization.
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U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Carey signed an order providing certain key parties access to the full examiner’s report in the Tribune Co. bankruptcy case so they can evaluate its momentous conclusions before an Aug. 6 voting deadline.
He also indicated he might move the deadline out by a few days, but said he was determined not to disrupt the schedule for confirmation hearings on the Tribune Co. plan which are slated to begin Aug. 30.
Carey stopped short of ordering full public disclosure of the report. But he indicated he would prefer to make it public if parties in the case can resolve a series of confidentiality disputes raised by several big lenders to Tribune Co.’s ill-fated 2007 leveraged buyout, which was led by Chicago real estate magnate Sam Zell. Get the full story »
Goldman Sachs might be cleaning up its potty mouth — telling workers that it’ll bar filthy language in e-mails and use software to screen for it — but some Chicago-area companies have different philosophies.
“We do not have a policy on the use of curse words in e-mails,” said Lee Mitchell, managing partner for Chicago-based Thoma Bravo LLC.
But “now that Congress’ ‘financial reform’ legislation has made us subject to SEC regulation, I guess the SEC will be telling us which words are a systemic threat to the global economy and, therefore, have to be banned,” the private equity executive cheekily added. Get the full story »
Habit, the nationally recognized Chicago boutique dedicated to championing emerging Chicago designers, is closing its doors on Saturday after five years.
Habit owner Lindsey Boland sent an email notice to customers Wednesday announcing that she was shutting down the shop.
Boland, a clothing designer who trained with Cynthia Rowley in New York, opened the store at 1951 W. Division St. in September 2005 with high hopes of turning the spotlight on local talent. Her mission was to carry independent, high-crafted designs created in small quantities, making sure to stock half the store with inventory from Chicago-based companies.
Habit joins a growing number of high-profile, independent Chicago boutiques that have closed this year in the wake of the recession as well-heeled shoppers cut back on spending. Get the full story »
Amazon.com launched a cheaper, wireless-only Kindle Wednesday, betting that the $139 price will turn its latest electronic reader into a mass-appeal device as Apple Inc’s iPad gains ground.
The world’s largest online retailer and leading e-reader seller also revealed its third generation Kindle, some 21 percent smaller and 15 percent lighter than the previous version, but still priced at $189.
Amazon does not give sales figures for the Kindle, but said last week that its growth rate tripled after it cut its price on the device from $259 and said e-books were outselling hardcover books. Apple has said it sold more than 3 million iPads, starting at $499, since the product was introduced in April. Get the full story »
Motorola Inc. saw its second-quarter profit jump significantly from last year, with executives sounding increasingly confident about the mobile device devision’s ongoing transformation into a profitable smartphone maker.
The Schaumburg-based company posted net profit of $162 million, or 7 cents per share, for the second quarter, compared with a year-earlier profit of $26 million, or 1 cent per share. The profits were driven mostly by Motorola’s enterprise mobility and networks units, although its mobile phone business showed signs of progress. Get the full story »
Boeing Co. is feeling the squeeze as the Obama Administration pares military spending and the Chicago-based defense contractor is mulling layoffs and other measures to reduce its costs, Boeing CEO Jim McNerney told analysts Wednesday.
Boeing’s second quarter net income and revenues dipped as the aerospace manufacturer delivered fewer airplanes and encountered defense-spending constraints.
Chicago-based Boeing reported a net income of $787 million, down 21 percent from the year ago period, on revenues of $15.6 billion, which declined 9 percent. Although Boeing’s earnings per share of $1.06 were down 25 percent from the prior-year period, they still topped the $1.02 that analysts had estimated. Get the full story »
White House budget chief Peter Orszag said on Wednesday it would be “foolish” to cut the U.S. deficit while economic growth was still frail, but it would be equally foolish not to significantly curb the deficit by 2015.
Orszag told an audience at The Brookings Institution, a Washington think-tank, that failing to take real steps toward closing the record U.S. budget gap would do as much harm to the economy has choking off fiscal stimulus now. Get the full story »
The Chevy Volt.
General Motors Tuesday set a price of $41,000 for its electric Chevrolet Volt — $8,000 more than its nearest competitor, the Nissan Leaf.
GM also said Tuesday that it has begun taking orders for the Volt and would offer a $350 per month lease option for the much-anticipated vehicle as it launches in a handful of U.S. markets beginning with California. Get the full story »
Demonstrators hang signs on a fence they have used to barricade a BP station in London, July 27, 2010. (AFP/Getty Images)
BP’s embattled Chief Executive Officer Tony Hayward will be replaced by American Robert Dudley on Oct. 1, the company said Tuesday, as it reported a record quarterly loss and set aside $32.2 billion to cover the costs of the devastating Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
BP said the decision to replace Hayward, 53, with the company’s first ever non-British CEO was made by mutual agreement. In a mark of faith in its outgoing leader, BP said it planned to recommend him for a non-executive position at its Russian joint venture and will pay him 1.045 million pounds ($1.6 million), a year’s salary, instead of the year’s notice he was entitled to.
“The BP board is deeply saddened to lose a CEO whose success over some three years in driving the performance of the company was so widely and deservedly admired,” BP Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg said in a statement accompanying the quarterly earnings update. Get the full story »
The U.S. copyright office issued exemptions to a copyright law, giving legal protection for people who unlock their smartphones like Apple Inc.’s iPhone.
Changing operators’ fixed phone settings — a concept known as “jailbreaking” — has become widely popular around the world since the 2007 introduction of Apple’s iPhone.
The move by the copyright office to give exemptions to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) will undermine handset makers like Apple’s ability to control the installation of software programs on their phones. Get the full story »
Tribune Co. warned Monday that its nearly 20-month-old bankruptcy proceeding could be delayed again over a brewing dispute involving the release of a court-appointed examiner’s report in the case.
The report, which is being prepared by Los Angeles lawyer Kenneth Klee, is due before midnight Monday. But in a filing Friday, Klee said wrangling with various parties over the confidentiality of documents attached to his report would force him to submit a heavily redacted version, pending a judge’s ruling on the issue. Get the full story »
(Chuck Berman/Chicago Tribune)
Kraft Foods will double the whole-grain content of its Nabisco crackers over the next three years, the company said today. That means Wheat Thins, Premium, Ritz and Honey Maid graham crackers will all be getting an overhaul.
“Nine out of 10 Americans eat less than the recommended daily amount of whole grains,” Rhonda Jordan, president-global health & wellness at Kraft said in a statement. “And a growing number of consumers are trying to increase their consumption of whole grains. By significantly increasing the amount of whole grain in our crackers, we’re giving them an easy, delicious way to get the whole grain they need in the foods they already enjoy.” Get the full story »
