March 2011 Archives

Opening a Fatburger restaurant can be a nightmare. Literally.
A friendly couple from Wilmington recently opened the South Bay's newest Fatburger restaurant.
Going into business for yourself can be risky and scary but very satisfying.
Here's how I started my Business Casual column.

Wearing exceptionally high heels, Yesenia Santillan operated her burger restaurant with little help from clueless employees.

With difficulty from her impractical footwear, she frantically dashed up and down stairs as customers waited to be served.

Read the rest of Business Casual.

I wonder if Mattel's employees also got raises.

(AP) The CEO of El Segundo-based Mattel Inc., the largest U.S. toy maker, received compensation valued at $10.8 million in 2010, up 20 percent from 2009, according to an analysis by The Associated Press of a company filing.

Robert A. Eckert, 56, chairman and chief executive of Mattel Inc. since 2000, received a base salary of $1.25 million both years. The bulk of his pay came in stock and option awards valued at nearly $6 million when they were granted, according to a document the company filed late Wednesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Read more on Mattel CEO's pay.

Last year, the World Trade Organization also ruled that Airbus took illegal subsidies. Boeing made a big stink about that. Now will Airbus do the same.

(Reuters) - Planemaker Boeing received at least $5.3 billion of banned U.S. subsidies, the World Trade Organization said Thursday.

The subsidies included banned support in the form of research and development payments from the NASA space agency.

Read more about Boeing's illegal subsidies.

The quake and tsunami make Toyota's problems with its unintended acceleration seem almost trivial.

(AutoWeek) Toyota's quake-hammered Miyagi assembly plant, which makes the Yaris small car for export to the United States, is expected to be offline for at least another month.

Workers have completed repairs at the factory and restored electricity, but the facility cannot get supplies of natural gas, a person familiar with the situation said.

Read more about Toyota's Yaris plan.

This recall has the add effect of providing consumers a scary image of shattered glass. Too bad for Honda, but the car company is acting on it and as long as there are no horror stories, like motorists being impaled by glass, then Honda could skate by with little bad PR from this recall.

(Edmunds) WASHINGTON -- Honda is recalling 2,800 2011 Odyssey minivans because the front windows may shatter into the cabin, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

"There is a potential failure with the driver and front passenger door power windows in which the window may come off the track, causing the window to become inoperative and preventing it from being rolled up or down, or it could drop into the door," said NHTSA in its recalls summary of the problem. "The window may shatter into the passenger cabin, causing a risk of injury to the vehicle occupants."

Read more on the Honda Odyssey recall.

The sooner this and other related lawsuits against Toyota are over, the quicker the car company can get past the whole issue of unintended acceleration. These trials are almost like death by a million pin pricks, as far as the company's PR is concerned.
However, from a consumer angle, it's good that motorists can take a giant car company to court over allegations of putting the public at risk.

(Bloomberg) Jury selection has begun in a case against Toyota Motor Corp. in which a Long Island, New York man claims his 2005 Scion sped up uncontrollably and didn't stop until he hit a tree.

Amir Sitafalwalla's lawsuit, filed in 2008, is the first sudden acceleration claim against Toyota to reach a jury trial in the U.S. Toyota, the world's largest automaker, recalled millions of U.S. vehicles, starting in 2009, for defects related to unintended acceleration.

Read more on Toyota's trial.

I wonder if the Japanese disaster will create sympathy for Toyota and help consumers forget about the recalls of 14 million vehicles and the three fines the US government hit Toyota with for its slow reaction to safety problems.

(Detroit News) Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. have again extended their auto-production stoppages in quake-ravaged Japan.

The two automakers had said production would be halted at least until the middle of this week, but now don't see a resumption in making vehicles before the start of next week.

Read more on Toyota and Honda.

El Segundo- based Mattel Inc. Chairman and CEO Robert Eckert earned more than $11.4 million in total compensation for 2010.

Meanwhile, El Segundo- based DirecTV Chairman and CEO Mike White reaped $32.9 million in total compensation.

Northrop Grumman's Global Hawk was meant primarily for war. But, like with the C-17 cargo transport plane, the Global Hawk has other uses.

(Bloomberg) A Northrop Grumman Corp. (NOC) Global Hawk drone is set to fly over Japan's crippled Fukushima Dai- Ichi nuclear plant today to collect data and imagery for the Japanese government, according to a senior Air Force official.

"We have flown missions already and I know we are flying more missions in support of Operation Tomodachi," Lieutenant General Herbert "Hawk" Carlisle, the Air Force deputy chief of staff for operations, said in an e-mail. The Fukushima mission, by a drone based in Guam, "is currently on the schedule" for today, he said.

Read more about Northrop and Japan's nuclear crisis.

It's not just the fans who would be hurt. El Segundo-based DirecTV would lose big bucks in an NFL lockout.

(Bloomberg) DirecTV the largest U.S. satellite-television provider, could lose out on more than $600 million in revenue this year if the National Football League cancels the 2011 season, according to analysts' estimates.

Read more on DirecTV's NFL woes.

This is especially tough for Toyota, which is just getting over the hit it took from its 14 million worldwide recalls.

(Reuters) Toyota, the world's No.1 automaker, said on Wednesday it will keep its 12 local assembly plants shut for a further week at least. The plants have been closed since Friday's 9.0 magnitude earthquake unleashed a tsunami which killed at least 10,000 and damaged a nuclear plant north of Tokyo.

Read more on Toyota's factory closures.

That's according to Craig Cooning, who runs Boeing's satellite operation in El Segundo.

WASHINGTON, March 15 (Reuters) - Boeing Co (BA.N) has retooled its satellite business to remove extra costs and become more competitive, allowing it to generate more profits than in the past, a top company executive said on Tuesday.

"We're doing a lot better than we used to," Craig Cooning, chief executive of Boeing Satellite Systems International, told reporters, giving an upbeat assessment of his division's current outlook after less than stellar results in the early to mid-2000s.

Read more on Boeing's satellite business.

A clever PR effort.

(Boston Globe) Even as we speak, hundreds of apple pies are being readied for delivery to math and science teachers at public middle and high schools located within a 3.14-mile radius of Raytheon Co. headquarters in Waltham.

That's because today is Pi Day, as in March 14 (3/14), and Pi, the mathematical constant, is equal roughly to 3.14, notes a Raytheon press release. A big extracurricular activity for defense contractor Raytheon is encouraging young students to pursue math and science careers. To that end, Raytheon sponsors a program called MathMovesU.

Former LA Times journalist Bill Boyarsky discusses South Bay military contractors and their relation to politics. I think a lot of people who depend on the local aerospace industry will disagree with him. Others will cheer his words.
Here's how the column starts:

(Truthdig.com) El Segundo Boulevard, near the Southern California beaches, represents the heart and soul of the military-industrial complex. On either side of the boulevard--its streets mostly barren of pedestrians--are the offices and plants of companies locked in permanent embrace with Washington. War and space activities fuel them. Their campaign contributions and lobbying spending fuel Congress.

Read more about El Segundo Boulevard's companies.

I often here people use the word "greed" to describe various companies from banks to car makers. So this week I was inspired to write about greed in the context of Toyota's actions for the Business Casual column.
Here's how I started Business Casual:

Greed is good.

Or as corporate raider Gordon Gekko, the character Michael Douglas played in the 1987 classic movie "Wall Street," said: "The point is, ladies and gentlemen, that greed - for lack of a better word - is good. Greed is right. Greed works."

Read more about Toyota's "greed."

The Pentagon's $35 billion tanker contract was a huge win for Boeing. But, Robert Scheer, former LA Times columnist and current head of political website Truthdig.com says the money will go to waste.
The tanker work will bring create about 50,000 U.S. jobs including many in Southern California. But the money can be used better elsewhere, Scheer says.

Here's how he starts his piece:

(Truthdig.com) "The gift that keeps on giving" should have been the headline on the Pentagon's decision to award the Boeing Co. a $35 billion defense contract. Defense of the nation, of course, had nothing to do with it, since the end of the Cold War also ended the need for midair refueling of the nuclear-armed bombers intended to retaliate after a Soviet first strike, a scenario brought to the public eye in the 1964 movie "Dr. Strangelove."

Read more about the Boeing tanker win.