Mergers

One of Orange County's pioneer developers of planned communities, the Mission Viejo Co., will be sold to J.F. Shea Co., an expanding Southern California building firm, it was announced Friday. The deal is expected to fetch more than $400 million, although terms were not disclosed by Philip Morris Cos. Inc., which has owned the Mission Viejo Co. since 1972. Shea will acquire about 900 acres of undeveloped land in Mission Viejo and Aliso Viejo, and 3,600 acres in Colorado.

Airline mergers, a deep recession and surging fuel prices have led to sharp cuts in airline service around the country. Hardest hit: medium-size airports. Bob Hope Airport in Burbank, John Wayne Airport in Santa Ana, LA/Ontario International Airport and other mid-size airports lost an average of 26.2% of their flights from 2007to 2012, according to a new study by Massachusetts Institute of Technology's International Center for Air Transportation. The cuts are a result of airlines eliminating less-profitable routes and focusing on more popular, high-profit routes, the report said.

West Germany is scrambling to prepare for an impending invasion from the East on a scale that North Atlantic Treaty Organization war games never dared to imagine. On Wednesday, the entire 90,000-strong East German Volksarmee will join forces with the West German Bundeswehr in a military merger of former foes.

American Airlines, hoping to reinvent itself by coming out of bankruptcy with a new logo, freshly painted planes and a merger plan that will make it the nation's largest carrier, suffered a setback Tuesday when a computer outage grounded hundreds of planes across the country. The computer problem forced the airline to cancel 745 flights, frustrating thousands of passengers who were left to fume and wait at crowded terminals from Los Angeles to Dallas and New York. Even after the system was restored about two hours later, passengers waited in long lines as airline officials struggled to rebook them on new flights.

Philip Hsiang and his wife, Mary Ann, used to pay almost $1,000 a year for a pair of cellphones under a family plan contract. But as recession gripped the economy a few years back, the Davis couple opted for low-cost prepaid phone service and never looked back. They shaved $800 off their annual phone bill, even though Hsiang could easily afford the pricier plan on his salary as an electrical engineer. "As a Chinese immigrant to the U.S., it's a virtue to be frugal," Hsiang said.

Casual attire may rule in the office, but as men find themselves needing a tux more than once a decade, a rise in rentals is fueling a national consolidation in the men's formal-wear industry. Gary's Tux Shops of Van Nuys on Wednesday agreed to merge with Chicago-based Gingiss Formalwear in a stock transaction to create the first nationwide chain of tuxedo rental stores. Additional terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Takeovers Headed for Second-Biggest Year: U.S. corporate takeovers are headed for their second-highest annual level, based on the strength of mergers in telecommunications, media and medicine. The value of announced mergers and acquisitions in the first 10 months of 1994 totaled $284.4 billion, according to Securities Data Co., which tracks financial markets. The year's totals will probably surpass the $292.9 billion mark set in 1989, Securities Data said. A record of $335.

What a difference a year makes. With the virtual collapse of credit markets and the drying up of money from private equity firms, 2008 turned out to be a very slow year for mergers and acquisitions. Globally, there were 37,445 deals, totaling $3.3 trillion, down 29% from record volume in 2007, according to Dealogic, a data research firm in New York. In the United States the value of deals dropped 29% to $1.1 trillion.

Senators and independent concert promoters took turns at a hearing Tuesday slamming a proposed merger of two of the biggest forces in the music industry -- Ticketmaster Entertainment Inc. and Live Nation Worldwide Inc. "It seems to be monopolistic, plain and simple," Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said. "This is not the American dream, as the companies' witnesses might have you believe."

Re mergers: Why aren't environmental impact studies conducted prior to the merger of giant corporations? Why are we outraged by the destruction of a rodent's habitat, yet do nothing when thousands of people lose their jobs so corporate executives can line their pockets in the name of efficiency? MARGARET MOOD Santa Ana

Dish Network Corp. is taking a run at Sprint. The satellite television company made an unsolicited $25.5-billion bid for Sprint Nextel Corp. on Monday in an attempt to marry one of the nation's biggest pay-TV providers with the third-largest U.S. wireless carrier. A merger would give Dish the ability to package Internet and phone service with its satellite offerings. "A transformative DISH/Sprint merger will create the only company that can offer customers a convenient, fully integrated, nationwide bundle of in- and out-of-home video, broadband and voice services," Dish Chairman Charles W. Ergen said.

Federal budget cutters are merging the two West Coast administrative regions of the National Marine Fisheries Service, a move that could leave California at a disadvantage. The merger will create one administrative region for the West Coast, saving an estimated $3 million in management costs. Currently the agency has two West Coast regions: The Southwest, headquartered in Long Beach, oversees California. The Northwest, based in Washington state, covers Washington, Oregon and Idaho.

ATHENS - Greek bank stocks plunged 30% on Monday, the maximum allowed in a day, after plans to merge the country's two biggest lenders were suddenly frozen. The surprise freeze came amid testy talks between the government and international lenders, and renewed fears about Greece's efforts to fix its faltering economy. The European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund are keeping Greece afloat with a multibillion-dollar rescue package in exchange for strict fiscal reforms.

The proposed merger of American Airlines and US Airways will reduce competition and lead to higher fares, critics of the union argued before a U.S. Senate panel Tuesday. But supporters of the merger said the creation of the nation's largest airline will improve service and protect the jobs of hundreds of airlines workers. The testimony came Tuesday before the Senate Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights. The merger, which was announced last month, must still get approval of the U.S. Department of Justice and the judge overseeing the bankruptcy proceeding of AMR Corp., the parent company of American Airlines.

Defending its proposed merger with T-Mobile, MetroPCS on Tuesday urged its shareholders to approve the deal, which is under regulatory review. In a letter to shareholders , Roger D. Linquist, chief executive of MetroPCS Communications, Inc., called the low-cost wireless carrier's planned combination with  T-Mobile USA Inc., announced last year, "the best strategic alternative for our stockholders. " Linquist's letter follows criticism of the proposal by two major shareholders: P. Schoenfeld Asset Management, a hedge fund leading a challenge against the transaction, and Paulson & Co., which owns 9.9% of MetroPCS stock.

The Federal Communications Commission has approved the merger of T-Mobile USA and MetroPCS. The deal still has to be approved by MetroPCS shareholders during an April 12 meeting. “With today's approval, America's mobile market continues to strengthen, moving toward robust competition and revitalized competitors," FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said in a statement. The carriers announced the proposed deal in October, saying a merger would create a stronger carrier focused on value.

* France's Rhone-Poulenc and Germany's Hoechst are expected to announce a merger of their drug and agricultural-chemical businesses as early as Monday, sources told Reuters. The merger would create the world's largest "life sciences" group, with a combined stock market value of about $46.78 billion. American depositary receipts of Hoechst rose 25 cents to close at $44.63 and Rhone-Poulenc's rose $1.06 to close at $51.19 on the NYSE.

Sorry, old chum. Ticketmaster Entertainment Inc. and Live Nation Inc. may have to divest assets in the United Kingdom to go ahead with their proposed merger, British regulators said Thursday. The Competition Commission, which investigates mergers for the British government, issued a provisional ruling that the merger of ticketing giant Ticketmaster and concert production company Live Nation could "severely inhibit" German ticketing company CTS Eventim. CTS signed a deal before the proposed merger was announced in February to sell tickets to music events for Live Nation in Britain.

MOCA has been known as "the artist's museum" since its founding in 1979 because of hands-on support from its creative community. So what do L.A. artists think about the news of a possible acquisition by LACMA, which would create a combined organization run by LACMA Director Michael Govan? Here are some early reactions. John Baldessari, a former MOCA trustee said: "LACMA is an encyclopedic museum, but they are weak when it comes to contemporary art, and this would make their holdings in contemporary art better than the Metropolitan [Museum of Art in New York]