A Texas investment group has purchased the AT&T Building in downtown Little Rock for $1.8 million.
The deal between AT&T, formerly Southwestern Bell Telephone Co., and Valk Properties Two LLC of Rockwall, Texas, closed on Dec. 18, according to Pulaski County online property records. The transaction was first reported by Arkansas Business.
The 10-story office building at 1111 W. Capitol Ave. and two blocks east of the state Capitol building totals 370,566 square feet. It encompasses 134 parking spaces, including a 24-space garage.
Valk Properties Two is led by Shawn Valk, a Texas real estate developer. It was incorporated in Arkansas on Nov. 18.
The listing agent was CBRE Group Inc. of Los Angeles, which calls itself the world's largest commercial real estate services and investment firm based on 2017 revenue. The firm also is the listing agent for Bank of America Plaza, a 24-story office building also on West Capitol Avenue.
-- Noel Oman
VW set to add 1,000 jobs in Tennessee
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. -- Volkswagen plans to invest $800 million in its Chattanooga plant to make electric vehicles and will hire 1,000 more workers, officials said Monday.
"The U.S. is one of the most important locations for us, and producing electric cars in Chattanooga is a key part of our growth strategy in North America," Volkswagen Chief Executive Officer Herbert Diess said.
"The shift toward electric vehicles is a trend that can be seen worldwide, and Volkswagen's decision to locate its first North American EV manufacturing facility in Chattanooga underscores Tennessee's manufacturing strength and highly-skilled workforce," Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam said in a statement Monday.
Volkswagen employs 3,500 people in Tennessee and at year's end will have invested $2.3 billion in the facility. The Chattanooga plant produces the midsize Atlas SUV and Passat sedan and will begin building the Atlas Cross Sport, a five-seat version of the model, this year.
State officials said they could not yet provide information on financial incentives for the electric production and that they are still completing negotiations. The Chattanooga plant has received more than $800 million in federal, state and local incentives in the past decade.
-- Chattanooga Times Free Press
LR port's activity, tonnage rise in '18
Barge activity and cargo tonnage handled at the Little Rock port set a record in 2018, surging more than 35 percent in both categories compared with the previous year.
The 551 barges the Arkansas River port worked by the port's stevedore company, Logistic Services Inc., last year was 149 more than the 402 it handled in all of 2017, a 37 percent increase, according to data from the Little Rock Port Authority.
Cargo tonnage handled increased 228,000 tons to 838,020 tons in 2018 compared with the previous year, a 37 percent increase.
The 2018 totals in barges and cargo tonnage exceeded marks set in 2015 when the dock worked 543 barges and handled 834,000 tons of cargo, according a port spokesman.
The 2018 total came after December barge activity "closed the year on a strong note," with the port working 41 barges and handling 62,000 tons of cargo for the month.
The barge and cargo activity didn't include work by Buzzi Unicem, an Italian company that operates seven cement plants in the United States. The company worked 77 barges and unloaded 115,000 tons of cement at the port.
Together, the activity totaled 628 worked barges and 953,000 tons of cargo handled, the port authority said.
-- Noel Oman
Heart-repair device OK'd for infants
LOS ANGELES -- A pea-sized device used to seal tiny but potentially deadly holes in the hearts of premature infants has been approved by U.S. regulators, making it one of the smallest complex medical devices ever invented and cleared for sale.
Abbott Laboratories' Amplatzer Piccolo Occluder is one of the first treatments to become available for a common congenital defect that can become dangerous for premature infants. The device can be used in babies weighing as little as two pounds in cases where a hole in the heart used to deliver oxygen-rich blood in the womb doesn't close after birth.
The Piccolo is threaded into the heart using a catheter that runs through the femoral vein in the thigh. That avoids a taxing surgery for the undersized patients, who are often on ventilators, said Evan Zahn, director of the congenital heart program at Cedars-Sinai Smidt Heart Institute in Los Angeles.
Everyone is born with a small hole in their heart, a condition called patent ductus arteriosus. In the womb, the hole allows a fetus's blood to bypass the lungs and get oxygenated blood directly from the mother.
Usually, the hole closes a few days after delivery. In some premature newborns, however, it never does, making breathing difficult and leading to a host of potential complications.
The company hasn't yet announced a price for the Piccolo.
-- Bloomberg News
Business on 01/15/2019