The First Heritage Bank in Newport Beach was reopened on Monday as part of the Mutual of Omaha Bank, after the former was seized by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. last week for being undercapitalized.

The federal regulators declared First Heritage and First National Bank of Nevada, both owned by Arizona-based First National Bank Holding Co. insolvent. The deposits of both the banks had been bought by Mutual of Omaha  Bank and all the branches would also be operated by it. (more…)

With more than 310 biomedical firms, Orange county is a prominent place in the U.S. in health care technology. This area has the highest concentration of ophthalmic industry in the world with several small companies that develop eye care devices. One of the business- boosting group called the Orange County Technology Network or Octane has created about 27 such small companies. This is a six-year-old private organization that comprises more than two dozen of top executives of corporations in the county.

According to Octane, there are 310 biomedical firms in Orange County and out of which several dozen companies develop implanted lenses, known as intraocular lenses, which are used in cataract surgery, laser surgery for vision correction and instruments to alleviate glaucoma and other eye diseases. (more…)

Microsoft Corp. is all set to acquire Aliso Viejo- based DATAllegro Inc, a provider of data warehouse appliances, as announced on Thursday. Microsoft hopes the acquisition will extend its capabilities of mission-critical data platform.

Corporate vice president of the Data and Storage Platform Division at Microsoft, Ted Kummert said, “DATAllegro is a tremendously innovative company that has started to redefine the data warehouse market,” “Microsoft SQL Server 2008 delivers enterprise-class capabilities in business intelligence and data warehousing, and the addition of the DATAllegro team and its technology will take our data platform to the highest scale of data warehousing.”

“Integrating DATAllegro’s nonproprietary hardware platform and flexible software architecture into Microsoft SQL Server will provide customers with the strongest offering in the market,” said Stuart Frost, CEO of DATAllegro. “We are excited to join forces with Microsoft and continue the innovation this company was founded on,” he added. (more…)

Mountain View- based LinkedIn, an online social networking site that connects more than 23 million professionals in 150 countries and 170 industries from around the world, was launched in May 2003. Unlike other online networks, which serve the social lives of the members, LinkedIn basically focuses on business relationships among its users.

LinkedIn is funded by world-class investors including Sequoia Capital, Greylock, the European Founders Fund, Bessemer Venture Partners and Bain Capital Ventures. Recently, the company raised $ 53 million value in the fourth round of funding led by Bain Capital Ventures with participation from other existing investors. And the significant capital infusion has placed the value of the company about $ 1 billion. (more…)

Newport Beach- based Downey Financial Corp., the parent company of Downey Savings and Loan Association reported a loss for its second quarter in 2008.

For the April to June period, the company posted a loss of $218.9 million, or $7.86 per share, as compared to a profit of $32.7 million, or $1.17 per share a year-ago.

The huge loss in the second quarter was accompanied by a $258.9 million provision for credit losses, up from $9.5 million a year ago and a $26.2 million increase in operation expenses, due to higher costs related to the operation of real estate acquired in the settlement of loans. In the quarter, the net interest income or income generated from loans and deposits fell 26 percent to $82.9 million. (more…)

Irvine- based Broadcom Corp., which designs chips for networking equipment, cell phones, TV set top boxes, home networking gear has posted a  significant second quarter outlook on Tuesday, while beating the analysts’ expectations. In the second quarter, the company quadrupled its profits which even beat its own quarterly sales outlook of $1.075 billion to $1.125 billion.

Amid a successful second quarter result, suddenly the chipmaker’s shares continued to fall, as the expenses rise in the third quarter. However, it was expected by the company that its profit margins for the current or third quarter will slip. (more…)

Billionaire Bill Gates, the chairman of Microsoft Corp. bought a 5.5 percent stake in the U.S. no.1 dealership group AutoNation Inc., according to Securities and Exchange Commission. The 5.5 percent total stake makes him the AutoNation’s third-largest stockholder.

The total stake is shared by Bill Gates’ private investment fund, Cascade Investment LLC and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Trust. Cascade Investment LLC holds 2.9 percent and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Trust has 2.6 percent of stakes in AutoNation. (more…)

The stock of Mindspeed Technologies Inc. rose more than 8 percent at close of trading on a recent market value of about $76 million. The jump is likely due to the sale of its certain non-core patents for $10 million. Mindspeed is a leading supplier of semiconductor solutions for network infrastructure applications.
 
Mindspeed has a broad intellectual property portfolio with a number of patents. The company who sold off patents said that those patents are no longer core to its business focus. Since last year, the company has been generating revenues from patent sales and also expects to sell additional non-core patents or licensing arrangements in the future.
Mindspeed designs, develops and sells semiconductor networking solutions for communications applications in enterprise, access, metropolitan and wide-area networks. (more…)

The Employment Development Department reported that, Orange County’s unemployment declined to 25, 400 jobs in June 2008. The decline was the eight straight months of yearly job loss since November.

The unemployment rate in Orange County was 5.2 percent in June 2008, up from a revised 4.8 percent in May 2008 and above the year ago estimate of 4.0 percent.

Reportedly, total non farm wage and salary employment rose 1,494,500 to 1,496,500 between May and June 2008. This was an increase of 0.1 percent on a monthly basis. (more…)

According to Thomson Reuters and National Venture Capital Association, seventy-one venture capital funds raised $9.1 billion in the second quarter of 2008 in the U.S.

The venture capital investment fell 14 percent this year in the second quarter, as compared to the same period last year. Reportedly, the investment in second quarter of 2007 was the second-highest quarterly totals recorded since the end of the dot-com boom in 2001. 

National Venture Capital Association president Mark Heesen said, “Despite the significant challenges that the venture capital industry is facing in the exit market, this quarter demonstrates the long term perspective of our institutional investors,” he added, “Venture firms and general partners with proven track records will continue to be successful raising new funds as promising investment opportunities remain strong across a diverse set of industries including life sciences, clean technology and information technology. These are ten year funds which often have lives that stretch to 15 years or more. The long term view is the appropriate one to take.” (more…)