Daily Business Report: Tuesday, Oct. 5, 2021
Qualcomm and SSW Partners to acquire Swedish
automobile technology company for $4.5 billion
Qualcomm Inc. and investment firm SSW Partners announced they have reached a deal to acquire Swedish automotive technology company Veoneer Inc. for $4.5 billion, squashing a buyer agreement Veoneer had previously made with Canada’s Magna international Inc.
Veoneer has terminated its prior acquisition agreement with Magna International Inc. and canceled its Oct. 19, 2021 special meeting that was previously scheduled to approve that agreement.
Under the deal, SSW Partners will acquire Veoneer for $37 a share and then sell Veoneer’s Arriver sensor perception and drive policy software platform to Qualcomm.
Qualcomm will incorporate Arriver’s Computer Vision, Drive Policy and Driver Assistance assets into its leading Snapdragon Ride Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) solution. This will augment Qualcomm’s ability to deliver an open and competitive ADAS platform for automakers and Tier-1s at scale.
TOP PHOTO: Courtesy of Qualcomm Inc.
Scripps Researcher Ardem Patapoutian
receives 2021 Nobel Prize in physiology
Scripps Research Professor Ardem Patapoutian has been awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for groundbreaking research that solved a long-standing mystery of how the body senses touch and other mechanical stimuli.
Patapoutian, a professor of neuroscience at Scripps Research and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator, shares the prize with David Julius, PhD, at the University of California San Francisco for “their discoveries of receptors for temperature and touch.”
The Nobel Prize committee cited the discoveries by Patapoutian and his colleagues of two ion channels, PIEZO1 and PIEZO2, that are necessary for the cells to respond to mechanical stimuli.
“The breakthrough by Patapoutian led to a series of papers from his and other groups, demonstrating that the Piezo2 ion channel is essential for the sense of touch,” the Nobel committee wrote. “Moreover, Piezo2 was shown to play a key role in the critically important sensing of body position and motion, known as proprioception.”
Two-story office building in Hillcrest to be
demolished for construction of apartments
SRM Hillcrest LLC has purchased a 1.08-acre residential development site in Hillcrest for $20.4 million and plans to build a new Class A multifamily apartment community on the property.
The property is located at 770 Washington St. at Eighth Avenue. An existing two-story office building and structured parking on the site will be demolished.
Kevin Nolen, Tim Winslow and Jason Kimmel with Cushman & Wakefield represented the seller in the transaction.
“This is a prime site ready for residential redevelopment to accommodate the growing workforce and add Class A stock to a shortage of housing supply in the area,” said Nolen.
What’s at stake for governor’s
biggest recall campaign donors?
Gov. Gavin Newsom has six days left to decide the fate of some 400 bills. And many of his decisions will impact donors who just spent millions helping him defeat a recall. CalMatters’ Laurel Rosenhall takes a look at some of the powerful interest groups that spent big — and whether those investments help them influence state policy. Top players include tech and Native American tribes, which each chipped in $3.8 million; Hollywood, which spent $3.9 million; real estate groups, which contributed $5.3 million; and labor unions, which spent a whopping $25.7 million to keep Newsom in office.
SDSU selected to join $102 million
nationwide initiative on school principals
San Diego State University has been selected by the Wallace Foundation to join a $102 million initiative to build pipelines of school principals who are better equipped to meet the changing needs of diverse districts nationwide.
SDSU’s Department of Educational Leadership will join San Diego-based National University and the California Department of Education in a five-year partnership with the Fresno Unified School District. The project is based on research showing comprehensive principal pipelines can boost student achievement.
As part of the initiative, SDSU faculty will help transform the Fresno district by supporting the recruitment of aspiring leaders, designing a principal preparation program, building a support program for current principals and launching an assistant principal academy. SDSU’s National Center for Urban School Transformation will also be involved with the initiative by exploring developing supports for principal supervisors in the district.
Commentary:
Women on corporate boards is good for business — and it’s California law
By Betty T. Yee, Special to CalMatters
Betty T, Lee is the California State Controller
Change is easier for some than others. It’s true of California companies that have refused to add female directors to their boards, as required under SB 826, a 2018 law that requires all public companies headquartered in California to appoint women to their boards.
Although the KPMG Board Leadership Center found that 96 percent of all California public companies had at least one woman on their board by the end of 2019, a few holdouts have filed two lawsuits questioning the law’s constitutionality, citing “sex-based discrimination.” These suits were initially thrown out but three 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judges acted to reinstate them in June.
This decision is bad news for investors, including our state’s public pension funds.
According to research by McKinsey & Company, public companies in the top quartile for gender diversity were 25 percent more likely to outperform industry-median growth than bottom quartile companies. Credit Suisse Research Institute reports companies with women on their boards are more profitable, more productive and the workforce more engaged. A Morgan Stanley Capital International study found that over a five-year period, U.S. companies with three or more women directors reported earnings 45 percent higher per share than companies with no female directors.
BAE Systems to sustain critical carrier landing
systems with $68.5 million Navy contract
BAE Systems Inc. will continue providing lifecycle sustainment, integration, and engineering services to support U.S. aircraft carriers after being selected for a five-year, $68.5 million contract from the Navy.
“With this win, BAE Systems retains a key air traffic control contract that we have held since 1973 to provide industry-leading systems integration capabilities and solutions that ensure the safety of critical carrier-based landing systems,” said Lisa Hand, vice president and general manager of BAE Systems’ Integrated Defense Solutions business.
BAE Systems’ technicians deploy around the world to support the warfighter. The company’s employees utilize established and proven methods as well as their systems engineering and software development expertise to sustain these critical landing systems. The company’s work results in improved hardware reliability, system precision, minimal downtime through onsite and remote technical assistance, and a certified landing system.
PriceSmart announces sale of Aeropost package
forwarding and marketplace businesses
San Diego-headquartered PriceSmart Inc. announced the sale of the legacy cross border casillero (package forwarding) and online marketplace businesses operated by its Aeropost subsidiary to Click to Collect Company Ltd., a company based in Nassau, Bahamas. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
PriceSmart acquired Aeropost in 2018 to leverage Aeropost’s technology, its management’s experience in developing software and systems for e-commerce and logistics, and its distribution and logistics systems to advance PriceSmart’s development of an omni-channel shopping experience for its members. PriceSmart will retain key Aeropost personnel and technology in the transaction, and Aeropost will continue to be a provider of cross border logistics and last mile delivery services for PriceSmart.
Grasp Technologies partners with Traxo to
upgrade its corporate travel data management
Grasp Technologies, a company that provides data management, consolidation, payment integration, and data visualization for the corporate travel industry, announced its new partnership with Traxo, a leader in corporate travel data capture and pre-trip auditing. The partnership provides corporate travel managers worldwide with the ability to see the most complete data picture of their companies’ business travel, including all on and off-platform bookings, within Grasp’s robust data and intelligence suite.
An industry leader for more than 25 years, Grasp, which has offices in San Diego, serves more than 150,000 corporate travel departments in over 70 countries through its footprint.
Southern California Bancorp completes
acquisition of Bank of Santa Clarita
Southern California Bancorp announced that it has completed its previously announced acquisition of Bank of Santa Clarita. The acquisition was accomplished by merging Bank of Santa Clarita with and into Bank of Southern California, N.A., the wholly owned subsidiary of Southern California Bancorp.
The acquisition, which was first announced on April 27, 2021, was concluded following the receipt of the requisite approvals from the shareholders of Southern California Bancorp and the shareholders of Bank of Santa Clarita and the requisite regulatory approvals. As of June 30, 2021, Bank of Santa Clarita had $416 million in assets and Southern California Bancorp had $1.8 billion in assets. As of June 30, 2021, on a pro forma combined basis with Bank of Santa Clarita, Southern California Bancorp had approximately $2.2 billion in assets, including net loans and total deposits of approximately $1.6 billion and $1.9 billion, respectively.
Five universities team up to program
biological cells to design futuristic materials
Rae Robertson-Anderson, chair and professor of physics and biophysics at the University of San Diego, is leading a team of researchers who were recently awarded a $1.8 million grant from the National Science Foundation to design and create next-generation materials inspired and empowered by biological cells.
Robertson-Anderson will be working alongside a team of physicists, biologists and engineers, four of whom are women, including: Prof. Megan Valentine at the University of California Santa Barbara, Prof. Jennifer Ross at Syracuse University, Prof. Michael Rust at the University of Chicago and Prof. Moumita Das at Rochester Institute of Technology.
The team’s goal is to create self-directed, programmable, and reconfigurable materials — using biological building blocks including proteins and cells — that are capable of producing force and motion. This research could pave the way for future materials applications ranging from self-healing bridges and self-propulsive materials to programmable micro-robotics, wound healing and dynamic prosthetics.
Newsweek recognizes Rady Children’s as
among world’s best specialized hospitals
Newsweek has awarded Rady Children’s Hospital-San Diego a spot on its list of World’s Best Specialized Hospitals 2022. This prestigious designation is presented by Newsweek and Statista Inc., the world-leading statistics portal and industry ranking provider. The awards list was announced on Sept. 22, 2021 and can currently be viewed on Newsweek’s website.
The World’s Best Specialized Hospitals 2022 ranking identifies the best hospitals that specialize in Cardiology, Endocrinology, Gastroenterology, Oncology, Neurology, Orthopedics, Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine, Cardiac Surgery, Neurosurgery, and Pulmonology.
