Jack Hartung, who’s been a key executive at Newport Beach-based Chipotle Mexican Grill during its rise to national prominence, has been named to the board of directors of Tesla Inc., the world’s biggest maker of electric vehicles. He’ll start his role on June 1, including on Tesla’s auditing committee. Tesla Read More
Orange County’s unemployment rate fell to 3.7% in April from a revised 3.8% in March and above the 3.4% in April last year, according to the state’s Employment Development Department. The state’s unemployment rate of 5.0% The U.S.’s was 3.9%. Nonfarm OC employment increased by 5,000 jobs from March to Read More
MeridianLink Inc., a Costa Mesa-based software provider for small banks and credit unions, said President Larry Katz will become chief executive, effective Oct. 1. Current CEO Nicolaas Vlok plans to depart the post, while remaining on the board of directors (NYSE: MLNK). Katz joined MeridianLink in early 2024 as chief Read More
The Surfing Heritage & Culture Center is moving from a warehouse in a San Clemente business park to downtown Laguna Beach. The new site is located at 239 Broadway, which previously housed Laguna Drugs and is owned by the Duda family, according to the Stu News Laguna website. “The Duda Read More
Crisp Imaging, a Costa Mesa-based provider of digital print and reprographic services across the West Coast, said it acquired Orange-based AAA Blueprint & Digital Reprographics Inc. Terms weren’t disclosed. AAA Blueprint & Digital Reprographics was founded in 1968 as a small, garage-based operation and steadily grew through two locations and Read More
Edwards Lifesciences Corp.’s Sapien 3 platform has been approved for a new indication. The Food and Drug Administration recently cleared the line of catheter-based heart valves, which includes Sapien 3, Sapien 3 Ultra and Sapien 3 Ultra Resilia, for severe aortic stenosis in patients before they’ve begun to show symptoms. Read More
Jeff Moorad has been a superstar agent of major league baseball players and co-owner and chief executive at the Arizona Diamondbacks and the San Diego Padres. Following that, he’s moved onto what he considers the most interesting sport in the world – Formula 1 (F1) racing. “It’s the only global Read More
Steven Gardner, a hockey-loving MBA dropout, in 2000 took over a small bank on the brink of failure that was for a long time considered an underdog. He renamed it Pacific Premier Bank, moved it to Irvine, acquired other banks and built it to the biggest bank with headquarters in Read More
This 23,000-acre community, hailed by the developer as Orange County’s last frontier of development, has a giant problem — it sits in the middle of a high fire hazard zone. Given recent disasters that have befallen Pacific Palisades, Altadena and other communities, fires are top of mind for any buyer Read More
Pacific Premier Bancorp., which is the largest bank headquartered in Orange County, agreed to sell itself for $2 billion to Columbian Banking System Inc. in Washington state. Columbia Banking, the parent company of Umpqua Bank, will acquire Pacific Premier Bancorp Inc. in an all-stock transaction (Nasdaq: PPBI). The combined company Read More
