Briefcase, Dec. 11, 2015

CONTRACTS

Startup PlanetiQ, which moved its headquarters from Bethesda, Md., to Boulder over the summer, has reached a deal with the commercial arm of the Indian Space Research Organization for the launch of two weather satellites that eventually will be part of a constellation of 12. Terms of the deal with Antrix Corp. Ltd. were not announced. The launch is scheduled to take place in the fourth quarter of 2016 aboard a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle. The other 10 satellites are slated for launch for 2017.

The Loveland Chamber of Commerce selected the Warehouse to provide small-business development services in support of the city’s approved Economic Development Strategic Plan. The contract is effective Jan. 1. The Warehouse, along with its partner the Larimer Small Business Development Center, will provide a one-stop-shop for all Loveland business owners and startups looking for assistance. Loveland businesses will benefit from broader, more specialized consulting, a robust adviser network and the addition of industry-specific services and events through the Warehouse. The Warehouse, a 501(c)(3) founded in September 2013, is run by executive director Kelly Peters. It will add two office spaces within the chamber space, located at 5400 Stone Creek Circle in Loveland. The Warehouse continues to maintain its location at 1215 S. Grant Ave. in Loveland.

SPONSORED CONTENT

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Internet search giant Google will buy 200 megawatts of renewable energy from Broomfield-based RES Americas’ Bluestem wind farm in Beaver County, Okla., as part of the 842 megawatts it plans to buy over the next two years to power its 14 global data centers. In a media release, Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) described the contracts as the largest and most diverse renewable-energy purchases ever by a company that is not a utility. The agreements boost Google’s total purchases of wind- or solar-sourced energy to 2 gigawatts.

DEADLINES

Nominations of outstanding business leaders that shape our community are being accepted for the Boulder County Business Hall of Fame until Jan. 29. The hall’s board of directors is looking for names of those from the past and present whose business efforts have resulted in community-wide economic, social or cultural benefits to Boulder County and its citizens. Nominations can be submitted at halloffamebiz.com. Nominations will be evaluated by the board based on favorable impact on the community, notable business innovations, corporate philanthropic activities, and business and civic achievements. The candidates for this award will be announced in mid-February. The new honorees will be saluted and inducted at a luncheon attended by interested members of the business community on Wednesday, April 27, at the Plaza Convention Center in Longmont.

Nominations for the 38th annual Judge Conrad L. Ball Award must be submitted by Monday, Feb. 29. The nomination form is available online at larimer.org/comcor/conrad_ball_award.htm.  Each spring this award is given in the judge’s memory to a recipient who has significantly contributed toward improving the quality of criminal justice in Larimer County. The Larimer County Community Corrections Department, on behalf of Larimer County Commissioners, handles the awards process.

EARNINGS

Semiconductor manufacturer Avago Technologies (Nasdaq: AVGO) reported a $1.36 billion profit for its 2015 fiscal year that ended Nov. 1. The net income amounted to $4.85 per diluted share, up from $263 million, or 99 cents per share, in 2014. The gains came on $6.8 billion in revenue, an increase of nearly $2.6 billion over the prior year, fueled in part by acquisitions of LSI Corp., PLX Technology and Emulex Corp. San Jose-based Avago has its largest facility in Fort Collins, where the company employs some 1,300-plus people. Avago logged net income of $429 million, or $1.49 per share, in the fourth quarter, up from $240 million, or 84 cents per share, a year earlier. Revenue climbed from $1.59 billion a year earlier to $1.84 billion for the fourth quarter of the 2015 fiscal year.

Vail Resorts Inc. reported earnings for its first quarter of fiscal year 2016 that exceeded expectations despite a $59.9 million net loss. The loss for Broomfield-based Vail (NYSE: MTN) amounted to $1.63 per share, for the fiscal quarter ending Oct. 31. That was compared with a $64.3 million loss, or $1.77 per share, for the previous year. Revenue for the quarter, meanwhile, rose from $128.3 million last year to $174.6 million this year.

KUDOS

BluFlux, a radio-frequency design, engineering and test company, was certified as a CTIA-authorized test laboratory for over-the-air performance of wireless devices – the only lab with that authorization in the Rocky Mountain region. The certification authorizes Louisville-based BluFlux as a professional services laboratory for testing and certifying the performance of mobile, Internet of Things, Machine-to-Machine and other devices on wireless networks, and is required for all companies and hardware developers seeking to connect a device on a nationwide cellular network. Washington, D.C.-based CTIA-The Wireless Association, which was founded in 1984 as the Cellular Telephone Industries Association, coordinates the industry’s best-practices standards and runs an annual trade show.

Larimer County Commissioner Steve Johnson accepted a 2015 Commissioner of the Year award on during the Nov. 30-Dec. 2 annual winter conference of Colorado Counties Inc. in Colorado Springs. During the conference, Larimer County Commissioner Lew Gaiter III was voted president-elect of the CCI Board of Directors.

The Best Western University Inn in Fort Collins received the Best Western Director/s Award for outstanding quality standards, recognizing hotels scoring in the top 20 percent of more than 2,100 North American properties in cleanliness and maintenance.  Hotels must also meet Best Western’s requirements for design and high customer service scores to qualify for the distinction.

The WaveContact whreless I/O solution from Boulder-based FreeWave Technologies Inc. and its white paper, “M2M Wireless I/O for Hazardous Environments” by Glenn Longley were awarded silver status in the 2015 Golden Bridge Business and Innovation Awards.

Grant Muller and Scott Sammons, co-owners of Spaces Real Estate, a Boulder/Denver boutique residential real estate firm, received honors recently. Grant Muller won the Entrepreneurial Man of the Year Award at the Denver Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce’s 19th annual Business Awards, held at the Palazzo Verdi Event Center in Greenwood Village, Earlier this fall, Sammons was elected to the board of directors for the Boulder Area Realtor Association and will serve a three-year term.

MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS

BizWest Media LLC sold the Wyoming Business Report to APG Media of the Rockies LLC. In the wake of the deal, the WBR became the sister publication to several community newspapers in Wyoming, including the Wyoming Tribune Eagle. BizWest Media, which has offices in Fort Collins and Boulder, is the publisher of BizWest, the biweekly business newspaper formed out of the merger of sister papers Boulder County Business Report and Northern Colorado Business Report in early 2014.

Family Hospice LLC, which has provided in-home hospice and palliative-care services to patients in Boulder, Broomfield and Larimer counties for a decade, was acquired by Dallas-based New Century Hospice Inc. Purchase price and terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Boulder-based Family Hospice was founded in 2005 by Luther and Melody Stanton and their son, Jerry Kopack. New Century operates hospices in Castle Rock and Colorado Springs as well as 17 other locations in Georgia, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas and Virginia. Family Hospice, with offices at 1790 30th St., Suite 308, will begin doing business as New Century Hospice of Boulder after transition and integration. Its fundraising arm, the Family Hospice Foundation, was not part of the transaction.

Townsquare Media (NYSE: TSQ), whose portfolio includes five radio stations that serve Northern Colorado, took over ownership of Taste of Fort Collins, the annual summer festival that features food, beverages and music in Old Town. Townsquare, based in Greenwich, Conn., and Cincinnati, bought the festival from Denver-based Team Player Productions, which started the festival in the 1990s. Financial terms of the transaction were not released. Radio stations owned by Townsquare include country music KUAD-FM 99.1 (“K99”); adult contemporary KTRR-FM (“Tri 102.5”), active rock KMAX-FM 94.3 (“94.3X”), alternative-rock KKPL-FM (“99.9 The Point”) and classic rock KARS-FM (“Rock 102.9”).

HoloBeing Wellness Institute, an incubator for holistic practitioners, merged with another Boulder company, Women in Community, which offers training programs for female entrepreneurs. HoloBeing owner Lesley Glenner described the merger as a partnership between the two companies, with both she and WINC owner Myka McLaughlin running the new entity, which has been dubbed HoloWINC. The two will share space at HoloBeing’s 3008 Folsom St., location. They’ll also be expanding into space next door at 3012 Folsom, giving HoloWINC about 2,000 square feet in all come next month.

TLC Employer Services, a payroll-services company based in Fort Collins, acquired a Longmont-based competitor in a transaction that expands its relationship with the parent firm that sold it. TLC, which employs 12 people at 201 S. College Ave., Suite 215, in Fort Collins, purchased Peak Payroll Solutions, which housed a staff of three at 2420 Trade Centre Ave., Unit B, in Longmont. Peak Payroll was a division of Digital Retirement Solutions, at the same Longmont address. DRS provides recordkeeping and administration services for companies’ 401(k) plans – services to which TLC clients now will have access.

New Jersey-based Pinnacle Foods Inc. (NYSE: PF) struck a deal to acquire Boulder-based packaged-foods company Boulder Brands (Nasdaq: BDBD) for $710 million or $11 per share. In addition, Pinnacle will assume about $265 million in Boulder Brands’ debt, bringing the full value of the deal to $975 million. The deal is expected to close in the first quarter of 2016. Pinnacle officials said their intent is to retain the 43,000-square-foot downtown Boulder headquarters of Boulder Brands, whose offerings include the Glutino, Udi’s Gluten Free, Earth Balance, Level Life and Smart Balance brands. Pinnacle’s brands include Duncan Hines, Vlasic and Mrs. Butterworth’s.

Boulder-based broadband infrastructure provider Zayo Group Holdings Inc. (NYSE: ZAYO) is acquiring Toronto-based Allstream Inc. in an all-cash transaction worth roughly $348 million in U.S. currency. Allstream is a subsidiary of MTS Inc., which provides bandwidth and telecom services across Canada. The deal would give Boulder-based Zayo 9,000 kilometers of metro fiber that is concentrated in Canada’s five largest metropolitan markets. Allstream also has about 20,000 kilometers of long-haul fiber that connects all of the major Canadian metro markets and 10 U.S. network access points.

MOVES

Veterinarians Trish Miller and Ken Bixel, owners of Berthoud Animal Hospital, closed Nov. 16 on the $575,000 purchase of the building at 505 W. Mountain Ave. that for decades housed the Wayside Inn but has sat vacant for the past six years. The seller was JPCL Enterprises of Fort Collins. The veterinary hospital, which opened in 1977 at 115 Turner Ave. and occupies less than 2,000 square feet, will be able to more than double its size when it moves into the building, probably in mid-2016.

Having parlayed its 18 months at the Innosphere startup incubator in Fort Collins into a steepened growth curve, software company AllProWebTools moved back to Loveland, setting up shop in a 1,325-square-foot space at 1339 S. Garfield Ave. AllProWebTools, officially 1on1 Business LLC, makes a software platform that helps small businesses manage everything from their online web content to marketing to contacts to employee tasks to sales. The company had been based at 2956 Ginnala Dr. in Loveland before moving into Innosphere.

Trebuchet Group, a Fort Collins-based organizational- and leadership-development consulting firm, moved to a new headquarters is at 405 Mason Court, Suites 111 and 113 in Fort Collins.

OPENINGS

Construction is under way in Loveland for The Human Bean’s seventh stand-alone coffee dispensary. Fort Collins-based The Human Bean, owned by Frank Sherman, expects to open a 500-square-foot coffee shop at 6180 Crossroads Blvd. between Palomino Mexican Restaurant and Schrader’s Country Store. It will have a long drive-through lane, outdoor patio seating and additional parking for walk-ups. Construction started Nov. 9, with an anticipated opening in March.

Mariah DeGear of Fort Collins opened Charmacy at 1220 S. College Ave., selling items including locally made balms, handcrafted jewelry and nature-inspired candles.

Fort Collins-based New Century Software Inc., which supplies integrity-management pipeline software and consulting for the oil and gas industry, has opened an office under its new “Integrity Plus” division in Houston’s “Energy Corridor,” west of downtown along the Katy Freeway. The space offers Integrity Plus the square footage to grow its Houston staff of analysts, compliance engineers and integrity-management professionals along with space for training and education.

PRODUCT UPDATE

Longmont-based Oskar Blues Brewery and Brevard, N.C.-based Hotbox Roasters collaborated to introduce a national, limited-release brew, Hotbox Coffee Porter. It has a malted base extracted from English and German roasted and caramel malts, and is comprised of flavors like roasted nuts, crème brûlée, cocoa and caramel, infused with cold-extracted coffee from Burundian and Ethiopian beans as well as flavors and aromas of dark plums, chocolate and hints of blueberry.

Fort Collins-based New Belgium Brewing is going into uncharted territory with Blackberry Barley Wine, the brewery’s latest Lips of Faith offering and its first foray into the barley wine category.