The year is drawing to a close, so let’s look back at some of the business-related events that made news. Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard, Mayor Karen Bass’ directives designed to reduce the tax burden on local companies and the Hollywood strikes top the list of 2023’s news happenings, but so much more took place. This special report takes a month-by-month look at the year that was.
JANUARY
TRANSIT PROJECT GETS $407M
The California State Transportation Agency awards a transit project linking downtown Inglewood with SoFi Sta- dium for $407 million. The agency had previously awarded $93 million in transit funds for the project, bringing the total to $500 million. The project consists of a 1.6-mile elevated guideway connecting the K-Line at downtown Inglewood on the north and ending across from SoFi Stadium on the south.
TETRA TECH MAKES $691M BUY
Pasadena-based engineering and infrastructure tech firm Tetra Tech Inc. closes on its acquisition of British environmental consulting firm RPS Group. The $691 million transaction is the biggest in Tetra Tech’s 57-year history.
FEBRUARY
PIPELINE EXITS REORGANIZATION
Pipeline Health System in El Segundo emerges from Chapter 11 reorganization this month. It had filed to reorganize in October of last year and during the period sold two Chicago-area hospitals it had long been trying to offload. Also, on the same day as emerging from Chapter 11, Robert Allen, the health care system’s chief financial officer,
was appointed chief executive, replacing Andrei Soran.
FUND RAISES $1.4B
Mesa West Capital, the Brentwood-based private real estate credit arm of Morgan Stanley Investment Management, raises $1.37 billion for its Mesa West Real Estate Income Fund V LP, exceeding the firm’s original $1 billion fundraising target. Fund V is the latest and largest in Mesa West’s closed-end value-add series, which was established in 2005.
FINANCING PACKAGE ARRANGED
Culver City-based immunotherapy company ImmunityBio Inc. lines up another financing package that is expected to net $50 million toward ongoing clinical trials of several drugs. This follows a larger $157 million financing package – including a $107 million capital in-fusion from founder and billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong – announced late last year.
MARCH
LARGE DONATION MADE
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center receives a $140 million gift – the largest in the hospital’s 121-year history – from the estate of Susanne and Ervin Bard. The money will be used for clinical and research innovation at the medical campus’ newest building. As a result of the gift, the building has been named the Susanne and Ervin Bard Pavilion.
EATERY CLOSES
San Pedro Fish Market, one of California’s largest restaurants, closes its longtime San Pedro location. It will relocate to a temporary location nearby while a new permanent location is being constructed. Plans call for a three-level indoor and outdoor establishment able to seat more than 5,000 customers.
APRIL
BANKRUPTCY FILING
Virgin Orbit, a Long Beach-based space launch company, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings on April 4. Dan Hart, the chief executive, said in a filing that a launch failure in January, as well as challenges raising the necessary funds, were among the issues plaguing the company.
GOODRX GETS NEW CEO
Santa Monica-based prescription drug comparison price and discount platform GoodRx Holdings Inc. announced that Trevor Bezdek and Doug Hirsch, who co-founded the company in 2011, were out as co-chief executives. Bezdek was named chair and Hirsch chief mission officer.
MAY
OFFICE CAMPUS SELLS
A two-story office campus in Torrance sold for $24.8 million. The 116,200-square-foot property, known as DYAD South Bay, was bought by affiliates of Borstein Enterprises from the seller, an entity owned by funds managed by Westport Capital Partners.
WRITERS STRIKE
The Writers Guild of America goes on strike against the Hollywood studios on May 2. The action lasts more than 100 days and costs the Los Angeles area economy billions of dollars as film and television productions shut down.
PORT PLANS FOR WIND TURBINES
The Port of Long Beach unveils plans for a 400-acre floating platform to be installed in port waters, on which floating wind turbines would be made, constructed and towed out to sea. The turbines would be stationed off the state’s coast in areas of abundant wind. The project, named Pier Wind, is expected to cost about $4.7 billion and could see activity as soon as 2031.
JUNE
REGIONAL CONNECTOR OPENS
After nearly a decade of construction and street closures throughout downtown, the long-awaited $1.8 billion Metro Regional Connector rail project opened on June 16, two years late and $300 million over budget. The new 1.9-mile light rail line beneath downtown connects three of Metro’s light rail lines, allowing passengers to travel between Azusa and Long Beach and between East Los Angeles and Santa Monica without transferring lines.
COFFEE CO. RAISES $7M
Chamberlain Coffee Inc., a Beverly Hills food and beverage producer started by internet personality Emma Chamberlain, raises $7 million from investors in its series A fund. The coffee is available in cold brew singles, instant sticks, coffee pods, and ground- and whole-bean options. Chamberlain launched the coffee line in 2020.
BASS SIGNS DIRECTIVE
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass signs an executive directive to identify hidden city taxes and fees on business, with an eye toward reducing or eliminating as many of them as possible. The executive order also establishes a committee made up of representatives of various city departments to evalu- ate the state of commerce in the city and recommend strategies to promote investment in and growth of local businesses.
JULY
ARRIVE RAISES $16M
Arrive Recommerce Inc., a Santa Monica tech company powering the logistics for brands reselling returned or used merchandise, raises $16 million in a series A funding round. Arrive does resale management of non-new returns, excess or damaged inventory for brands as reverse logistics. Arrive co-founder and Chief Operating Officer Ross Richmond said, “Recommerce is a trend that is exploding with demand from both the brand and the consumer side.”
WATTEV OPENS CHARGING STATION
Long Beach-based electric vehicle charging station deployer WattEV Holdings Inc. opens its first charging depot for heavy-duty trucks at the Port of Long Beach. The station, which cost roughly $9 million to develop, features 13 dual-cord 360 kilowatt chargers with the ability to charge 26 trucks concurrently. WattEV invested about $5.5 million toward the depot’s construction.
ACTORS STRIKE
The 160,000-member Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists goes on strike against the Hollywood studios.
AUGUST
IMPULSE SPACE RAISES $45M
Impulse Space Inc., a space logistics startup in Redondo Beach, closed its series A round with $45 million in new capital commitments to develop its line of orbital trans- portation vehicles. The influx of money will be used in the development of Helios, a high-energy vehicle designed to push payloads from low-Earth orbit farther out to what is called geostationary equatorial orbit.
SUPPORTIVE HOUSING PLANNED FOR SKID ROW
Related California and the Weingart Center Association closed escrow in early August on a 1.12-acre site downtown that will become the largest 100% permanent supportive housing development in the city of Los Angeles. The site, currently a parking lot in Skid Row, will be the location of 600 San Pedro, a 17-story high-rise that will include 302 units of 100% permanent supportive housing, part of a city- wide effort to address homelessness.
VERVE SIGNS BIG LEASE
In one of the largest office leases of the year, Verve Talent and Literary Agency signs a 53,000-square-foot lease at a creative office campus and is relocating its global headquar- ters from the Miracle Mile to Hollywood. The five-story campus, called BA/SE, located at 6555 Barton and 959 Seward, is a class A creative office campus that opened in the Hollywood Media District in 2015.
SEPTEMBER
MAJOR DONATION MADE
AltaMed Health Services Corp. in City of Industry gives the University of LaVerne $15 million toward construction of a $44 million health sciences college that aims to train health care workers to fill a critical shortage in the state. AltaMed’s donation is the largest single one to the project to date and brings the total raised so far to $38 million.
HPP MAKES $72M SALE
Brentwood-based Hudson Pacific Properties Inc. sells two large Santa Monica office properties, equating to over $72 million in sales. The two buildings, located at 604 Arizona Ave. and 3401 Exposition Blvd., are both fully occupied and together house tenants that include ZipRecruiter, Method Studios, Greenspire and Bonfire. The buyers of the buildings were not disclosed.
WESCOM ANNOUNCES MERGER
Wescom Credit Union is merging with Central Coast Federal Credit Union. Central Coast will be folded into the Wescom name. The deal expands Pasadena-based Wescom’s footprint past its current operations in eight Southern California counties into Monterey and King counties, adding nearly 15,000 members to total nearly a quarter million customers overall.
OCTOBER
ONLINE PLATFORM SELLS
Santa Monica-based Songtradr Inc. is buying online audio distribution platform Bandcamp for an undisclosed amount from Epic Games. Bandcamp has long been popular among independent musicians as a place where artists can upload and sell their music and merchandise. Songtradr is a busi- ness-to-business platform that facilitates music-licensing management for brands, content creators and artists.
AMGEN MAKES BIG BUY
Amgen Inc. closes on its deal to acquire Horizon Therapeutics for $27.8 billion in cash. The portfolio of Dublin, Ireland-based Horizon consists of treatments for rare diseases, gout, thyroid eye disease and more. The transaction was announced almost a year earlier.
MAJOR DEAL CLOSES
Microsoft Corp. acquires gaming giant Activision Blizzard Inc. on Oct. 13, in one of the largest video game deals ever. The Redmond,Washington-based company paid $69 billion for the Santa Monica-based game developer The deal makes Microsoft the third largest gaming company in the world.
NOVEMBER
STRIKE ENDS
The actors strike comes to an end Nov. 9. It marks the first time that actors initiate a labor dispute in the United States since 1980.
$14M FUNDING ROUND
Needed PBC, a perinatal nutrition company, raises $14 million in a funding round. The money will be used to accelerate product innovation, content creation and the launch of Needed Labs, the company’s clinical insights and research arm. The company was founded by Julie Sawaya and Ryan Woodbury in 2017.
