LOCAL BUSINESS
Tiffany opening Ohio store
Jewelry retailer Tiffany & Co. will open its first store in Northeast Ohio at 10 a.m. today at the Eton Chagrin Boulevard shopping center in Woodmere, outside Cleveland.
With the Eton store, Tiffany — known for its signature blue boxes — has about 90 U.S. stores, including two other locations in Ohio. The other Ohio shops are at Easton Town Center in Columbus and at Fountain Place in downtown Cincinnati.
The 2,670-square-foot Tiffany store at Eton has moved into space formerly occupied by Berger and Silver Jewelers, a longtime retailer that closed this summer.
The Eton center east of Cleveland was developed by Bob Stark and the Milstein family. Stark is developing Portage Crossing at the former State Road shopping center in Cuyahoga Falls. His shopping-center portfolio includes The Strip in Jackson Township, Crocker Park in Westlake, Rosemont Commons in Fairlawn and the Shops of Fairlawn. Eton Chagrin Boulevard is home to other upscale retailers, including Brooks Brothers, Anthropologie and Sur La Table.
On Tuesday, Tiffany & Co. [NYSE: TIF] reported a second-quarter profit that was higher than analysts’ estimates, according to Bloomberg News. Increases in prices and a decline in product costs helped offset slow growth in the Americas. Tiffany has 275 stores and boutiques in 24 countries.
Signet Jewelers Ltd. [NYSE: SIG], parent of Akron’s Sterling Jewelers, will report its second-quarter results on Thursday. Sterling operates the Kay and Jared jewelry chains, and has more than 1,300 stores nationwide.
— Katie Byard
Babcock & Wilcox honored
Babcock & Wilcox Co.’s Barberton-based subsidiary, Babcock & Wilcox Power Generation Group Inc. has been recognized as a key member of the project team for the John W. Turk Jr. Power Plant in Arkansas.
The 600 megawatt Turk power plant, owned by American Electric Power’s Southwestern Electric Power Co., was named 2013 Plant of the Year by Power Magazine. It began commercial operation in December 2012.
The Turk plant in Hempstead, Ark., is the first of what is called a commercial ultra-supercritical power plant built in the United States and features a B&W boiler and emission control systems.
Reactor project wins funding
The U.S. Department of Energy has awarded $20.5 million to Babcock & Wilcox Co.’s small modular nuclear reactor project called mPower.
The award means the department has made its full commitment to B&W mPower Inc.’s initial budget period. The first installment of $79 million was made in April 2012.
The mPower pressurized water reactor project remains on target for commercial operation by 2022 at the Clinch River mPower Plant near Oak Ridge, Tenn.
RPM settles contract lawsuit
Medina-based RPM International has settled a federal whistle-blower lawsuit involving its Tremco roofing subsidiary for nearly $61 million, with nearly 18 percent of that going to the whistle-blower, a Cleveland law firm said late Tuesday afternoon.
The lawsuit alleged Tremco starting in 2002 through 2011 made false claims to the U.S. government by offering less favorable pricing to the government for its products and services, according to the law firm representing the whistle-blower.
Court records in the case were unsealed Monday in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.
Tremco and RPM on Aug. 13 agreed to pay the government $60,958,963 plus interest. The whistle-blower, a former Tremco employee, is entitled to 17.9 percent of the settlement, according to Cleveland law firm McCarthy, Lebit, Crystal & Liffman.
TELECOMMUNICATIONS
Sprint to cut about 800 jobs
Sprint Corp., the third-largest U.S. wireless carrier, said it will cut about 800 customer-service jobs, the largest employee reduction since SoftBank Corp. of Japan acquired a controlling stake in the company last month.
Customer complaints have decreased, and satisfaction levels are higher, requiring fewer positions, Sprint said. There are also fewer users to serve. The company shut down its Nextel network in June as part of a plan to revamp its technology, contributing to a loss of 1.05 million monthly subscribers in the second quarter.
The firings are “organizational adjustments being made to meet the changing needs of our business,” Jennifer Schuler, a spokeswoman for Overland Park, Kan.-based Sprint, said in an email. Sprint started notifying most of the affected employees last week. Almost half of the workers — 384 employees — are based in the Texas cities of Fort Worth, Irving and Temple, according to a letter to the state’s workforce commission.
Sprint plans to keep its total workforce steady at about 40,000, Schuler said.
Compiled from staff and wire reports