Amgen’s recent investments throughout the world, where it will build and expand manufacturing plants, are illustrative of a growth strategy that will largely bypass Southern California. “Amgen remains committed to the Thousand Oaks site as our world headquarters, but the company has to plan for growth elsewhere,” said Amgen spokeswoman Mary Klem. “The majority of staff growth in Thousand Oaks will come from new hires. There aren’t any plans to scale back or relocate research and development or manufacturing that’s there, but as the company plans for growth it will probably be outside the Thousand Oaks area.” Over the last few weeks, Amgen has announced billion dollar investments in Ireland and at its existing Puerto Rico locations. The decision to build a plant in Ireland for more than $1 billion comes as no surprise to the biotechnology industry. Ireland has the fastest growing economy in Europe, and has positioned itself to attract investment from pharmaceutical companies in particular. The Irish government provided an unknown amount of grants in order to lure Amgen. The Thousand Oaks biotech giant is not the first company to set up shop in Ireland. Over the past two years, Wyeth, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Schering-Plough, Genzyme, Allergan and Bristol-Myers Squibb have all announced plan to invest in Ireland. It’s no accident that so many of these companies have decided to move to Ireland, its corporate tax rate is 12.5 percent, about a third of what other European companies charge. In Puerto Rico, the company is investing another $1 billion in order to expand its operations in the city of Juncos. Amgen plans to hire an additional 500 employees to staff its expanding Puerto Rico operations and it would be looking to hire more than 1,100 people in Ireland. In the fourth quarter of 2005, the company reported a net income of $824 million, compared with $689 million the previous year. For all of 2005, the company reported a net income of $3.7 billion, a 55 percent increase over $2.7 billion in 2004. In 2006, the company is also going to increase its research and development spending by $700 to $900 million, an increase of between 30 and 40 percent. The money will be used to put many of its pipeline drugs through the final stages of clinical trials. Amgen’s status in the world of biotechnology was cemented by the drugs it developed for cancer and chemotherapy patients. It has been unable to develop and market new drugs over the last several years, but that may be changing soon. “In addition to delivering financially, we achieved four major regulatory milestones and added six new molecules to our pipeline. We made significant progress in advancing our late stage pipeline,” said CEO Kevin Sharer in a news release. “Also during the fourth quarter, we received positive data from a pivotal trial with panitumumab, which could potentially advance the treatment of colorectal cancer. This contributed to our strategic decisions to acquire Abgenix.” Amgen’s proposal to buy Abgenix for $2.2 billion was approved in January, the companies were co-developing panitumumab. Developing new products is particularly important for Amgen now because drugs that are similar to Amgen’s current sellers will soon be on the market in Europe, and could take away some of the company’s sales. As Amgen moves closer to developing its new drugs, the manufacturing operations in Thousand Oaks will be changing as well. Its other plants will handle all of the company’s bulk manufacturing needs. The facilities in Thousand Oaks, which are still being used occasionally for bulk manufacturing, will transition to clinical manufacturing of drugs that are not yet in full production.

Once they find out Santa Clarita is not all that far from Los Angeles, production managers are finding the area to be an ideal filming location, close enough for the actors to easily get in front of a camera and filled with more forgiving neighbors than many Los Angeles neighborhoods. Efforts to lure film production from Los Angeles and its immediate neighbors have paid off. Since opening up a film office in 2003, the City of Santa Clarita has seen a 59 percent increase in film days. Film companies spent $16.1 million in the city during 2005, up from $12.2 million in 2003. Jason Crawford, film administrator for the city, said there are now half a dozen shows with filming operations based in Santa Clarita. One of his biggest challenges is merely convincing film industry people that Santa Clarita is really a close neighbor to Los Angeles. Before the film office opened, permits in the city were issued and managed by the Los Angeles-based Entertainment Industry Development Corp. (now Film LA), which was created in the early ’90s. The City of Santa Clarita decided the EIDC didn’t do enough to attract business to Santa Clarita, and that an office dedicated to the city could work better for production companies and approve applications much faster. “There’s always been some filming in Santa Clarita since the beginning, but the hardest part is getting (new productions) to come up here the first time,” said Crawford. “They always think it’s going to be much farther than it is, but once they come up here, they realize it’s so close, and easier and more flexible to shoot up here.” Paul Wilson, a location manager for CBS Productions who works on “CSI,” said that Santa Clarita has the right geographic look for a television show that is set in Las Vegas, and the residents are less bothered by filming than many Angelenos. “It was just easier in terms of some areas like Los Angeles,” said Wilson. “Some of Pasadena and Santa Monica have been filmed so much that the neighbors are starting to register a lot more complaints. Santa Monica has gone to where they don’t allow filming except between 8 a.m. and 8 in the evening.” The city has made a concerted effort to make it easy for people like Wilson to bring crews north, Crawford says. The city, he said, has some of the lowest film permit rates in the Los Angeles area, and has simplified its permitting process to the point where film crews can be shooting within hours of filing application forms, rather than days. He said he expects this year to be another period of growth for the city, with the help of two new HBO shows that will begin filming in Santa Clarita later this year. On January 25, the city debuted a new film guide, which will be one of the primary marketing tools used to lure more film crews. Santa Clarita Mayor Laurene Weste said last month that the city’s focus on the entertainment industry over the last four years has allowed it to retain its existing business while attracting new filming which supports the growth of businesses that support the entertainment industry. In 2000, Universal City-based Prime Post opened its first Santa Clarita Valley location in Valencia, and the following year it opened up a location at Santa Clarita Studios. It became the first full-service post production business in the area, and decided to stay open 24 hours in order to accommodate clients like Universal Pictures and Miramax Films. “I feel like there are already a lot of editing houses and stuff like that,” said Wilson. “I know that our effects guy lives up here.” Wilson, who lives in Los Angeles, said that since the drive to Santa Clarita in the morning is moving against traffic, it takes about half an hour for him to get there. Although “CSI” is now primarily filmed on the sound stages at Universal Studios, he usually films on location in Santa Clarita at least once a week.

Don Fleming has lived in Santa Clarita for close to 10 years and has been visiting for more than 20, which is long enough to watch the valley grow from a place with only two restaurants to one of Los Angeles County’s fastest growing cities. Although growth has resulted in more traffic, Fleming says efforts to lure good jobs are paying off and the city’s star is on the rise. Fleming opened up Valencia Acura with his wife Cheri in 1997, and has been a presence in the Santa Clarita Valley ever since. He helped start the Santa Clarita Valley Auto Dealers Association shortly after opening his business. The group, made up of the owners of one of the largest auto malls in Southern California, is one of the biggest economic forces in the region and one of the most active charity contributors. It supports the hospital, the Sheila R. Veloz Breast Imaging Center and numerous others. He has nothing but praise for the city’s infrastructure and economic development efforts. Santa Clarita’s successful efforts to lure high-paying jobs, retail businesses and home developers have made it easier for people to live and work in the Santa Clarita Valley, spending as little time as possible on the freeway system, he says. Question: How has Santa Clarita changed in the 20 plus years you’ve been familiar with the area? Answer: Oh my gosh, it’s changed for the better. When I started coming up here it was all onion fields, there was no development. Valencia was way out in the sticks, where today we have industrial parks with jobs, and one of the largest auto malls in Southern California. Q: How has traffic increased as development has continued? A: Oh, that old story. The old “I’m here now, and nobody else can come.” Yes we have traffic issues, and yes we do have some problems. But my gosh, the style of living, the school system and other things, that really offsets a lot of the bad things. We’re very strongly in favor of the cross-valley connector, which has been going on for more than a year. We’re getting more money for it on a daily basis. I think it’s really going to relieve a lot of the traffic congestion as people go on the I-5 and the 14. Q: Can the region handle increased growth and how is business involved in planning? A: One thing we have in our favor is a super city council, and city manager in Kenneth Pulskamp. Those people have their finger on the pulse. It has gotten easier for people to move about the valley, and traffic is the topic of conversation wherever I go. Businesses are participating in areas where they can help he city. There are several different groups, like a coalition that is working to figure out ways to get money to make improvements on the I-5. Everybody’s involved. I just read an article that said over 40 percent of the people that live here are commuting out of the area, but that’s getting better every month because there are more jobs coming here, and they’re well-paying jobs. Q: As co-owner of Valencia Acura with your wife, you were one of the first auto dealers in the area, how has the sector grown? A: Since I’ve been here they’ve added a Mercedes dealership, a new Honda store, a Hyundai store, we’ve had an Infiniti added and Volkswagen, as well as a Land Rover and Hummer. Q: You were a major force in starting the Santa Clarita Valley Auto Dealers Association, how is that group active in local affairs? A: It was just a situation where the dealers decided to band together so that they have a voice for the situations where we need something from the city, like a reader board on the I-5. So we formed the association and I served as president from 1998 to 2005. We also do an awful lot of charity events and we put money together in order to advertise. The biggest thing we do is speak as one group. This auto mall does somewhere in the neighborhood of $1 billion per year in retail sales, we’re the single largest tax generator that the city of Santa Clarita has, a third of its general fund. Based on that, I guess we do have some clout. Q: You’ve been involved in a number of different community groups over the years like the Boys and Girls Club, the United Way and several others. What makes community service important to you? A: It’s my belief, everybody doesn’t have to have the same belief, that if you have a business in the community and you take money out of it, you have to give some of it back. Q: The business community in Santa Clarita seems to have taken your lead, somewhat? A: I have never seen anything like it. They support more nonprofits up here than any place I have ever been. It’s just a sense of giving. I don’t know where it comes from but it’s the most amazing thing I have ever seen. Businesses support the hospital, the Boys and Girls Club, the Samuel Dixon Family Health Center, the Child and Family Center Foundation, I could go on and on. I think there are over 1,000 nonprofits here. Q: What are some of the more exciting business developments you’ve witnessed? A: Well, we have a lot of filming going on in this community. We’ve opened a film commission office and we have more studios. That filming creates jobs, it generates location fees and contributes to our economy. There are high-tech companies that are focusing here now, and there are biomed companies up here, there are some big companies coming into town with very high-paying jobs. Q: Have you been involved at all in trying to lure businesses to Santa Clarita? A: Yes, I’ll do whatever I can to help if they’re looking for someone to get involved in the community or get in touch with car dealers. As a matter of fact, there was a bus through here recently carrying a group of Japanese businesspeople looking at dealerships and different businesses. They wanted to know about the community, whether it was well-heeled financially. Q: One of the complaints about Santa Clarita used to be that people had to come down to Los Angeles, do you think that’s changed at all? A: Absolutely. If there was a Nordstrom here I’m not sure I’d ever go over the hill, or at least my wife wouldn’t.

Electronic Clearing House and DTS Inc. reported earnings for their first and fourth quarters, respectively. Camarillo-based Electronic Clearing House, Inc. reported earnings of $592,000, or $0.09 per share, on revenues of $16.9 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2006, a 104 percent increase in earnings compared to $52,000, or $0.01 per share on revenues of $12.8 million in the same period last year. The company provides electronic payment and transaction processing services. Audio system-maker DTS Inc. reported earnings of $1.3 million, or $0.07 per share in the fourth quarter of 2005 on revenues of $17.9 million compared with earnings of $192,000, or $0.01 per share on revenues of $16.6 million a year ago. Low earnings in fourth-quarter 2004 were a result of a charge of $2.5 million charge, or $0.14 per share, caused by a write down of inventory. For the full year, DTS reported earnings of $7.9 million, or $0.43 per share on revenues of $75.3 million down from 2004’s earnings of $10 million, or $0.55 per share on revenues of $61.4 million.

Valley Industry and Commerce Association (VICA) Membership Committee Meeting 4:00 p.m. VICA Office, 5121 Van Nuys Blvd., Suite 203, Sherman Oaks, CA 91403 Contact Jessica Yasukochi, (818) 817-0545 or [email protected]

The auction to decide who will buy the long idle site of the former Bermite Powder Co. plant was delayed again, pushing the date for a decision back to March 7. It is believed that just two potential bidders remain for the 1,000-acre property, which was contaminated when perchlorates, a toxin believed to cause cancer and other diseases at certain levels, seeped into the soil and groundwater as a result of the munitions manufacturing conducted on the site for more than 50 years. The most-recent auction date, slated for February 8, was moved for a second time so that an insurance settlement agreement could be completed. The agreement, which defines the funding available for the cleanup of the site, is important to potential buyers as they analyze their costs to acquire and redevelop the property. “The main reason for the delay is the insurance settlement agreement with regard to remediation,” said Lisa Hardy, planning manager for the city of Santa Clarita. “It’s a very complicated agreement that took a significant amount of time to finalize. With that in place, it provides a lot of the financial information that these bidders need to know.” The amount of the remediation funding could not be determined. Officials at Whittaker, which acquired Bermite some years ago and holds ultimate responsibility for the contamination, declined to discuss the agreement. (Whittaker has since been acquired and now operates as Meggitt Whittaker.) The property, in the heart of the Santa Clarita Valley, has been idle for over a decade while lawsuits over who holds responsibility for the cleanup were settled. Late in the 1990s, it was acquired by RFI Realty Inc., a Phoenix-based remediation specialist. But RFI failed to move forward with the project, which is now being sold as part of a Chap. 11 reorganization plan. Suncal Companies, which bills itself as the largest privately held developer of planned communities, and Cherokee Investment Partners, a fund that acquires brownfield sites and cleans them up for development, may be joined by other interested bidders when the property finally comes up for sale in Arizona bankruptcy court next month. “Our interest really has not changed,” said Dwight Stenseth, managing director of Cherokee. “We’ve been around the project for three years now, and we’d love to be the owners of it. We think we’d be best given that we have sufficient capital and we have the expertise to solve a serious, serious problem that the city has and the water purveyors have.” Besides the danger to the city’s water supply, the site is also central to the economic development plans for Santa Clarita and can provide housing for thousands of new residents expected as the city grows. Officials at Suncal did not return phone calls seeking comment, nor did Alisa S. Lacey, an attorney with Stinson Morrison Hecker LLP, who represents RFI. But in earlier interviews, Lacey said that the court is likely to follow the recommendation of representatives of RFI as to who submits the highest and best offer. RFI had named the property Porta Bella when it was still planning to clean up and redevelop the site. The hearing will take place in Phoenix.

M. David Paul & Associates has put its portfolio of Burbank properties up for sale, a transaction that could fetch upwards of $800 million, sources said. The Santa Monica-based developer is selling about 1.6 million square feet of office property, including the second phase of The Pinnacle, one of the most prestigious buildings in the city and arguably in Los Angeles. The move comes as prices for office properties have skyrocketed, persuading a number of owners, including Arden Realty and Maguire Properties to divest their holdings. “I think it’s fair to say it’s really good timing,” said Paul Stockwell, managing director of Studley, who is not involved in the sale. “Everyone knows office buildings are selling for lots of money. They’ve had a great run and I’m sure they’ll take their profits and deploy them to other projects.” Officials at M. David Paul did not return phone calls seeking comment. But brokers and others in the real estate community have been told that the Pinnacle, with about 235,000 square feet of space; Media Studios North, a 1.2 million-square-foot campus with about five buildings, and Central Park, with about 250,000 square feet of office space, are being marketed for sale. The portfolio does not include a parcel of land remaining to be developed at the Media Studios North site or a 9-acre property that M. David Paul recently acquired from NBC’s parent General Electric Co. Sources said that M. David Paul plans to retain and develop those properties. Several brokers estimated that the portfolio is likely to be valued at about $500 a square foot, a record price for office properties. But brokers said the building tenants, an escalating demand and limited supply of office space and a hunger for properties, particularly by institutional investors, would justify the pricing. “There’s a lot of institutional capital in the market and L.A., and especially Burbank, are some of the best performing office markets in the U.S.,” a broker said. Among the tenants occupying the properties in the portfolio are Warner Bros., Yahoo and WMC, a mortgage banking division of G.E. “When you are selling a property that has long term leases with Warner, Yahoo and WMC, the good news is you have tenants locked in,” said Stockwell. “The bad news is there isn’t a lot of upside.” Some investors acquire properties that have vacancies and some marginal tenants with the intention of renovating the buildings, bringing in a better class of tenants and raising the rents. The M. David Paul properties already are considered top of the line with corresponding tenants, a profile that is sought after by institutional buyers, who tend to buy and hold properties for long periods of time. Several years ago, M. David Paul sold off the first phase of The Pinnacle to RREEF, an institutional investor. While prices for institutional quality office buildings have been skyrocketing, they have yet to break the $400-per-square-foot mark, even in Burbank which attracts many entertainment industry tenants. At the same time, rental rates, which are already inching up to more than $3 a square foot in Burbank, are rising even more dramatically in other parts of Los Angeles that also attract the same kinds of media tenants. Recently, a portion of the Arden Realty portfolio sold to Trizec Properties for $1.6 billion. Earlier, another Los Angeles based real estate investment trust, Maguire Properties Inc., sold a controlling interest in its $1.2 billion, 4-million square-foot portfolio of office buildings to an Australian-based real estate investment trust.

Westcord Commercial Real Estate Services has been named to market two Conejo Valley buildings for Arden Realty. Marc Riches, Tony Principe and Cory Richmond will handle leasing for the buildings, which include Hillside Corporate Center at 555 St. Charles St. in Thousand Oaks and 5601 Lindero Canyon, a two story Westlake Village office building.

Camarillo-based, Pride Business Development Holdings, Inc., a personal protective clothing manufacturer, hired Tom McMillan to head the corrections armor department of its body armor division, Bodyguard Inc. McMillan will develop and implement sales programs for the division’s corrections and private security markets in the United States and abroad. Prior to joining the company, McMillan was a corrections armor specialist for Protective Apparel Corporation of America and an instructor for the Academy at Georgia Department of Corrections.

MGA Entertainment Inc., headquartered in Van Nuys, has signed an agreement with DreamWorks Animation SKG, a division of the feature film production company, to make toys and games based on the “Shrek” movie franchise. The toy manufacturer will produce “Shrek”-themed products for the retail market beginning in spring of 2007, when the third film in the “Shrek” series will be released. MGA will produce a wide array of toys under the license, including dolls and collectible figures, plush toys, youth electronics, games, puzzles and room decorations.