Santa Monica’s Week In Business

Michael Rosenthal

   Apparently, Santa Monica-based Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer is for sale. The Kirk Kerkorian-controlled public company is asking $7 billion. Its primary asset is its 4,000-film library. Located at 2500 Broadway, MGM expects its fourth quarter earnings to make it the most profitable quarter in the Company’s 77-year history. It can thank Reese Witherspoon, in part, for her performance in “Legally Blonde.” MGM is the ninth largest film distribution company in the U.S. “Hannibal,” starring Anthony Hopkins, was the company’s highest grossing film in 2001, with over $165 million in gross domestic box office receipts.
   MJW investments of Santa Monica is planning to advance its real estate portfolio with additional investments in downtown Los Angeles. President Mark J. Weinstein announced plans to build 604 loft style apartments and approximately 200,000 square feet of retail, office and other commercial space downtown in a project called Santee Court. MJW owns and manages nearly 2 million square feet of commercial space and nearly 1,000 apartments in California.
   Santa Monica-based American BioScience, Inc. was defeated in court by Ivax Corp. in its attempt to patent a generic version of the cancer-fighting drug Taxol. Ivax claimed the patent request was invalid because it did not contain anything new, but was in fact a cover for Bristol Myers Squibb Co. which wanted to maintain its monopoly of the $1.6 billion a year product.
   Santa Monica public company Specialty Labs is planning to vacate its 50,000 square feet offices at the Water Garden and its 80,000 square feet lab at Cloverfield. The company has purchased 14 acres in Valencia where it will construct a new 200,000 square feet headquarters. According to a report in the Los Angeles Business Journal, Gerald Porter, Vice chairman of CRESA Partners, said it had “determined that the real estate costs in Santa Monica were really prohibitive.” CRESA is also working with Santa Monica-based Symantec, now in the Water Garden, which is looking for 200,000 square feet to purchase and Rubin Postaer Associates which is rumored to be looking for 150,000 square feet in downtown Los Angeles.
   Santa Monica resident Richard Eamer, former President and co-founder of National Medical Enterprises (now Tenet Healthcare), is suing his former company for $32 million, claiming that stock options he was entitled to upon his departure were not honored. Tenet claims the options were only good for 3 years after Eamer’s departure in 1991. Eamer claims he had 10 years to exercise his options.
   Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel has made Vice President John Thacker manager of the flagship west coast hotel.
   There is a strong possibility that Trader Joe’s will take over the 10,000 square foot space left vacant by Bristol Farms at the Brentwood Country Mart. The Trader Joe’s store planned for Wilshire Blvd. in Santa Monica is in trouble. A lot of politicking will have to be resolved before the store wins permission to build out next to a residential neighborhood.
   Kiwanis member Carla Barret wrote to tell me how pleased she is with Dee Menzies becoming the first woman president of the Rotary Club of Santa Monica. She also informed me that the Kiwanis Club of Santa Monica has had three woman Presidents. Donna Alvarez, who is now Lt. Governor for Kiwanis in California, Dee Eckman and, currently, Jean Wyner, who is with Santa Monica Hospital. The President-Elect for next year is Tara Pomposini, who is with the Santa Monica YMCA. After her term, the club appears ready to let a man try his hand at it again.
   Santa Monica public company, National Golf Properties, Inc., saw a rise in its stock price recently when it traded for $11.40 a share on Jan. 9. The company has been going through a restructuring that will examine the extensive relationship the firm has had over the years with privately held American Golf, which manages the majority of National Golf properties. An independent board will ensure fair oversight and hopefully put the company back on track.
   Santa Monica-based Morley contractors has been busy building the first wave of new apartments in Playa Vista and completing the student housing at the Loyola University Campus in Westchester. The Playa Vista development, one of the largest in LA County history, will provide lots of work for contractors. Let’s hope PV president Steve Soboroff, a Santa Monica businessman, finds room for some soccer fields!
   Santa Monica-based (25 years) Muselli Commercial Realtors has been busy on Main Street. Recently the firm helped a buyer acquire the 27,000 square foot parcel of vacant land at 2209 Main for $3,160,000. Just across the border in Venice at 235 Main Street, Muselli represented Yoga Works in a 5,000 square foot lease in the former World Gym space.
   Urobis at 2407 Main Street has purchased the 2,500 sf of real estate they currently occupy for $800,000. Muselli represented the owner & tenant in the original lease.
   A 5,288 square foot vacant lot at the corner of Main and Hollister sold for $815,000 to an owner user who plans on building a café.
   A 13-unit complex apartment complex at 511 Hill St., sold for $1.34 million. The buyer was Corporate Realty Associates. The seller was Sklut Family Trust. Both parties were represented by Francyne Shapiro of Lambert Investments, Inc.
   An outdoor nursery is planned for the front half of the 2935 Main St. property along with a new retail building to be used for incidental food service. The site is vacant and located between two one-story retail buildings. The proposed building will be set toward the rear of the property.
   The developer of the property at 1315 Twenty-Sixth St. is proposing a 10-unit apartment building.