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Business Journals
23-07-2025
- Business
- Business Journals
Five things: Ozzy Osbourne, Market Basket, Taste of Eastie
Good morning, Boston. RIP, Ozzy Osbourne. (Scroll down for a look at the controversy around Ozzy in Boston.) Here are the five things you need to know in local business news to start your Wednesday. 1. Covid vaccine-maker BioNTech lays off dozens in Cambridge Germany's BioNTech SE is laying off workers in Cambridge as part of a broader move to make "targeted adjustments to our U.S. organization." GET TO KNOW YOUR CITY Find Local Events Near You Connect with a community of local professionals. Explore All Events 2. Market Basket fires two senior executives Two longtime Market Basket executives who had been put on leave in May with the company's popular CEO were fired yesterday, Grant Welker reports. On the calendar: Join us for a fireside chat and a panel at Biotech's Future: Innovation, AI and our Competitive Edge at the Ritz-Carlton Boston on July 31 3. Veralto makes first investment in VC fund, but not in Mass. For the first time since becoming an independent firm in 2023, Waltham-based Veralto Corp. is joining forces with a venture capital firm to advance water innovation — pouring $23 million in Emerald Technology Ventures' Global Water Fund II, Lucy Maffei reports. 4. Associate lawyer salaries hold steady First-year associate salaries at Boston's largest law firms haven't changed since 2023 — and this fall they'll stay at $225,000, William Hall reports. 5. Consumer sentiment dips in Boston Consumer sentiment in Boston sunk deeper into pessimism territory in the second quarter, with 39% of people surveyed in the Boston metro region saying they expect business conditions to be bad over the next 12 months — up from about 35% in the first quarter, according to the Metropolitan Consumer Sentiment Index, a quarterly index published as part of a partnership between the Business Journal's parent company and Morning Consult. What else you need to know What's going on? Today is our annual CFO of the Year awards, but if you're not one of the 320 people who have already registered, you can still get to know our honorees by reading about them here. The Petri Dish A Cambridge lung disease company has raised $100 million, plus more biotech and pharmaceutical news from Hannah Green. Names and faces Zoo New England has found its next president and CEO: Stephanie Brinley, the current deputy director of Smithsonian's National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute Today in history On this day in 1903, the Ford Motor Co. sold its first car, a Model A, for $850. (AP) What's good on WERS-FM Tropicalia, by Beck What I'm reading The True Flag: Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire, by Stephen Kinzer What I'm watching It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, on Hulu What's hot in Eastie? Good food and a new brewery It's a week for good news if you're a foodie in Eastie. The annual Taste of Eastie event last night was sold out. The food-based fundraiser held at Lewis Wharf was so popular that the MBTA East Boston Ferry ran on extended hours so more attendees could get to and from The Tall Ship. If you're not familiar with the Taste of Eastie, it's a summer celebration of food from East Boston restaurants that takes place at the Tall Ship on the waterfront. You won't find better views of the downtown Boston skyline, and the food in Eastie speaks for itself. And while I'm on the subject, there's even more news in the East Boston restaurant and hospitality scene: Democracy Brewing, which has a taproom in Downtown Crossing, is now open in Eastie's Maverick Square. According to Caught in Eastie, the new location is called Democracy Brewing Eastie and offers outdoor dining at 154 Maverick St. If you haven't been to East Boston lately, there's more to it than an airport and stuck Blue Line trains. As one recent op-ed writer put it, "few places have a richer blend of collaborations, cultural events, and artists than East Boston." You should definitely check it out sometime. PARTING SHOT WBZ looked back at the controversy of Ozzy Osbourne, when the rock legend created a stir in the city of Boston over the possibility of "dead puppies." Subscribe to the Morning Edition or Afternoon Edition for the business news you need to know, all free. Largest Commercial Developers in Massachusetts Total sq. ft. developed in Mass. since Jan. 1, 2020 Rank Prior Rank Firm/Prior rank (*unranked in 2024)/ 1 1 The Davis Companies (Davis) 2 4 Cummings Properties 3 3 BXP View this list
Boston Globe
23-06-2025
- Business
- Boston Globe
After a quarter-century building Eastern Bank's foundation, Huntington Stager exits
Advertisement 'I feel like the bank and I grew up together,' Stager said. 'It's been a great ride. We've done a lot of good in our communities. I'm very proud of what the whole team has done.' The foundation previously had its own executive director, Laura Kurzrok , who reported to Stager; as a mutual bank at the time, Eastern gave 10 percent of its income to the foundation. In 2020, shortly after Eastern's initial public offering, chairman Bob Rivers announced that Stager would run the foundation on a full-time basis, relinquishing her HR role at the bank. That IPO also turbocharged the foundation by giving it shares valued at around $90 million, doubling its size. Today, the foundation's assets total around $250 million. It gives out community grants ranging from $100 to $10,000, and makes even larger grants focused on four core areas: advancing equity among small businesses, helping early childhood education efforts, providing affordable housing, and promoting workforce training for people facing barriers to employment. Advertisement Stager borrowed an idea from Google to create a 'foundation fellows' program in which subject matter experts join the foundation in full- or part-time roles. Dorsey, who served as chief of education for then-mayor Martin J. Walsh , was the first such fellow before becoming the foundation's chief impact officer. Other fellows include Jeff Fuhrer (economic and racial justice), Jerry Rubin (workforce development), Dina Scianna (affordable housing), Natalia Urtubey (small-business equity), and Tom Weber (early childhood education). The Eastern foundation, which gave out $16 million in grants last year, also has an army of Eastern Bank employees who chip in by volunteering. It's important, Stager said, to have the humility to understand that Eastern and its foundation are just one part of the process. 'It's about building stronger communities,' she said. 'If you talk about 'those needy people,' you can't help because you're not listening to what their needs are.' At Bio Convention, Healey beats the drum for Massachusetts MassBio chief executive Kendalle Burlin O'Connell, Thermo Fisher Scientific chief executive Marc Casper, and Governor Maura Healey spoke on a panel at the BIO convention in Boston on Tuesday. John Wilcox The headaches keep coming for Massachusetts biotech firms: tariffs, pricing crackdowns, research funding cuts, an exodus at the Food and Drug Administration. Governor Maura Healey and Marc Casper , the chief executive of Waltham-based lab equipment maker Thermo Fisher Scientific , made subtle nods to those challenges when they spoke at the annual BIO conference at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center last week. But they chose to focus on the strengths of the Massachusetts biotech ecosystem, rather than gripe about the negatives. Healey said she recognizes the tariff and funding issues, but she also told those gathered at the Massachusetts section of the convention floor that 'I want you to know we have everything we need' in this state. (Everything except an uninterrupted flow of National Institutes of Health funding, that is.) Advertisement Kendalle Burlin O'Connell , chief executive of the Massachusetts Biotechnology Council , moderated the discussion. She asked Healey and Casper what Massachusetts should do to remain the top state for the life sciences sector. Healey responded by saying the state needs even more partnerships among the hospitals, universities, and venture capitalists here. 'That kind of communication is what makes this ecosystem so powerful,' Healey said. 'It's also going to help us get through the moment that we're in.' Casper had a similar message about the importance of industry collaboration. He also talked about Thermo Fisher's domestic manufacturing efforts, including a Plainville factory that it opened in 2022 to make viral vectors (a key component in gene therapies). He noted his company's announcement in April to spend $1.5 billion over four years to enhance and expand its US manufacturing. 'As we get commitments from our clients, you'll see us adding new lines to our infrastructure,' Casper said. 'It's an exciting time.' The positive vibes continued with the subsequent panel, in which Eli Lilly executive Vanessa Barth , Deborah Glasser of Sanofi , and Maurice Phelan of Sartorius talked about why their companies chose to grow in Massachusetts. The consensus: It's hard to beat the potent mixture of talent, universities, research, and venture capital in Greater Boston. 'There's no other place in the world that's like Kendall Square, and it's now expanding beyond Kendall Square,' Glasser said of the Cambridge life sciences hub. 'Everybody is trying to copy that Kendall Square recipe.' Advertisement Nucci retires from role shaping Suffolk University John Nucci posed for a portrait near his East Boston home in 2021. Erin Clark/Globe Staff Suffolk University has shifted its center of gravity from the Beacon Hill neighborhood to the Tremont Street corridor over the past two decades, and perhaps no one is more responsible than senior vice president John Nucci . Now, after 19 years in Suffolk leadership, Nucci has decided to retire at the age of 73. He leaves at the end of August. Dorm conversions at One Court St. and 10 West St. The Modern Theatre rehab, plus more dorms on top. And now, even more When he joined the Suffolk administration in 2006, after teaching there as an adjunct for 14 years, it was important for Nucci to move the school away from the residential areas of Beacon Hill, in part to improve town-gown relations. 'If you stroll from one end of our downtown campus to the other . . . you can see the hand of John Nucci,' president Marisa Kelly said in a memo to staff, calling Nucci a critical liaison between Suffolk and local civic leaders. Retirement is not the same as goodbye. Nucci will still serve on the Massachusetts Port Authority 's board of directors, and he suspects he might get involved in civic affairs in some other capacity. 'The odds say that I won't be able to stay away from the action,' Nucci said. 'For now, it's time to get off the merry-go-round.' Charities win big in Boston Marathon Runners crossed the finish line during the 129th Boston Marathon on April 21. Brett Phelps for The Boston Globe Another big record was set at the The Boston Athletic Association announced that the Marathon raised $50.4 million for 176 nonprofits, besting the record set last year of $45.7 million. While most of the 30,000 runners earned a spot by meeting a qualifying time, about 10 percent ran because they raised funds for a charity. Advertisement This marks the second year since Bank of America John Hancock . BAA president Jack Fleming said the bank's approach to highlighting everyday runners and their charitable quests made a difference in the fundraising. Bank executive Miceal Chamberlain said the fund-raising legacy started by the BAA and John Hancock in 1989 was one of the big factors behind the bank's interest in becoming a sponsor. The bank put its marketing muscle behind the effort, using TV ads and signage on its national network of ATMs to highlight charity runners, and created a web portal that allowed people to donate to runners, or to specific charities. The BAA does a great job highlighting the elites, Chamberlain said, but bank executives wanted to spotlight the charity runners and their causes. Bank employees look forward to Patriots Day to volunteer for the race, and in many cases, cheer on colleagues. 'There's a tremendous sense of pride,' Chamberlain said. 'This race means so much to the people who grew up in the region.' Jon Chesto can be reached at
Boston Globe
16-06-2025
- Business
- Boston Globe
Scott Eckert believes in e-commerce, taking over as Americas CEO at Mirakl in Boston
Advertisement Eckert joins at a time when Mirakl is expanding its e-commerce offerings, including software for sellers to upload their catalogs and coordinate the online venues where they sell their goods, new advertising options, as well as new software for business-to-business sellers. Mirakl's Boston base can be traced back to a decision more than a decade ago by Mirakl executive Kamal Kirpalani to persuade co-chief executive Adrien Nussenbaum to make the Boston area its launchpad in the United States instead of New York. (Kirpalani, now chief revenue officer, has fond memories of attending Boston University as an undergrad.) Mirakl relocated its local corporate office from Somerville to 100 Summer St. in downtown Boston two years ago, and 108 of the company's roughly 800 employees are based there today. Advertisement Eckert led Rethink Robotics before joining Bain Capital Ventures for a stint as an executive in residence in 2019, and then was hired by Walmart to oversee a portfolio of the retail giant's tech ventures. That work ended last year, and his former colleagues at Bain Capital Ventures suggested he check out Mirakl for his next act. (Bain Capital Ventures is among Mirakl's investors.) He found Mirakl's potential for growth, particularly in the United States, to be appealing. 'I was interested in getting into a Boston-based CEO position running an interesting business [and] this one was by far the most interesting,' Eckert said. 'I knew that this was the best technology in the industry.' Fuel supplier fumes over MassDOT pick Of the six bidders for the state's big service plaza redevelopment lease, only two are based in Massachusetts. And now one of those local bidders, Waltham-based fuel supplier Global Partners , is fuming: It was passed over in favor of Applegreen , an Irish company backed by private equity giant Blackstone , for the hefty 35-year contract to redo the state's 18 highway service plazas. Last Wednesday, Massachusetts Department of Transportation board's capital planning committee recommended Applegreen's bid to the full MassDOT board for approval. Applegreen committed to invest $750 million in improvements, including full replacements of nine plaza buildings, and to pay the state an average of at least $28 million a year. It didn't take long for Global and a nonprofit partner, CommonWealth Kitchen , to express their dismay. On Friday afternoon, Global issued a press release urging MassDOT's board to reconsider the Applegreen recommendation at a meeting this Wednesday. Max Slifka , Global's senior vice president of real estate, said in a statement that Global would pay roughly 50 percent more in rent than Applegreen would. He added that state highway officials are missing an opportunity to invest in a business with 'deep Massachusetts roots' rather than handing off this important infrastructure 'to outsiders with no proven stake in our state.' Advertisement Global already runs four service plazas that Applegreen would take over in 2027, at rest stops on Route 6 in Barnstable, Route 24 in Bridgewater, and Route 128 in Beverly. Most of the others are along the Mass. Pike, and run by McDonald's and Gulf. (McDonald's was not a bidder this time around, but Gulf owner RaceTrac was.) A MassDOT spokeswoman said Applegreen was picked because of its demonstrated preparedness for the job and its track record of successful operations in other states. (Boston-based Suffolk Construction is Applegreen's general contractor on the bid.) Jen Faigel , chief executive of the CommonWealth Kitchen food-business incubator, said she saw the service plaza project as a way to broaden the nonprofit's work with Global. The two organizations had previously started discussing ways to get more locally made products into Global convenience stores, and then developed plans to sell some of the foods made by CommonWealth Kitchen businesses at the rest areas if Global were to win the bid. 'It was very surprising to me that a proposal like Global's didn't win,' Faigel said. 'For me, it just seemed like a missed opportunity, to not . . . support a business like this.' BJ's gets bigger on its home turf With a big presence in its home state of Massachusetts, BJ's Wholesale Club chief executive Bob Eddy has looked elsewhere for expansion in recent years. However, with the success of the Advertisement Toward that end, BJ's announced it's building a store in Springfield, its first new club in Massachusetts in 13 years — as it opens stores at a clip of 10 to 15 a year. The pace is much faster lately, compared to the days in the mid-2010s when BJ's was only opening one or two a year, or none at all. The chain had 215 stores at the time of its 2018 initial public offering. That number is now up to 255. The other Western Mass. stores include locations in Greenfield, Pittsfield, and Chicopee. Springfield, Eddy said, will open by the end of the year. About 100 to 150 people will work at the new store, typical for a BJ's (though a warehouse going up in Ohio will run almost entirely on robot labor). 'Once we started to turn the ship around from a new club perspective, . . . we started looking around the chain about where we wanted to put new locations [within our existing footprint],' Eddy said. 'We've already heard a lot from the community now that they know we're coming.' BJ's is still smaller than its wholesale club rivals, Costco and Walmart -owned Sam's Club. But Eddy says his company offers lower prices than supermarkets while offering more variety than its two big club competitors — a recipe that has proven attractive to customers, new and old. 'It's causing us to try to accelerate even more,' Eddy said. 'People have been through a lot from an inflation perspective in the past couple of years [and] we're just a great destination when people want to save money.' Advertisement A new tune comes to Logan Add Logan Airport to Boston's long list of live-music venues this summer. Yes, you heard that correctly: Professional musicians and college students will perform in the baggage claim areas of terminals B and C in July and August as a test run to see if it improves the experience of travelers stuck waiting for their luggage to roll out. Massachusetts Port Authority chief executive Rich Davey announced the initiative at a Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce meeting on Thursday. 'One of the top five customer complaints: 'It takes too much time to get my bags at baggage claim,'' Davey told the chamber crowd. 'The perception [is] our baggage claim is slow. How can we make sure we're keeping folks entertained or amused at baggage claim? We're going to start some live music and see if that works.' The news prompted Brendan Joyce , public policy manager at Lyft , to pose a light-hearted question to Davey during the Q&A portion of the event. 'Rich, I have a very important question for you,' Joyce said. 'Are you performing live this summer at baggage claim, and if so, originals or covers?' Davey didn't miss a beat: 'If we want customer satisfaction to improve, no, I will not be performing.' Jon Chesto can be reached at
Boston Globe
11-06-2025
- Business
- Boston Globe
MassDOT taps Irish firm Applegreen to redevelop 18 highway service plazas
Applegreen would completely replace buildings at nine of the 18 service plazas, and make significant retrofits to the others. In total, Applegreen has pledged to make $750 million in capital improvements over the life of the contract. The company also would share a portion of the revenue it earns at these plazas with the state, totaling at least $28.4 million a year on average over the contract term — or nearly $1 billion that would go to the state over time. MassDOT chief development officer Scott Bosworth told the board members that Applegreen would also improve traffic flow at many of the rest stops. One goal is to reduce conflicts between truckers and car drivers as part of reconfigurations that will add nearly 500 new spaces across the rest areas, a 24 percent increase. Advertisement 'They have demonstrated real-world experience in turning over these facilities, and state-of-the-art revitalization programs,' Bosworth said of Applegreen. 'We feel we've got a strong partner, we're excited about this partnership [and] we're on the cusp of beginning a new day for our service plazas in Massachusetts.' Advertisement The contract, which has a 10-year extension option, will take effect on Jan. 1, 2026 for 14 of the 18 service areas: the 11 on the turnpike, plus rest areas in Lexington, Newton, and Plymouth; Applegreen is slated to replace McDonald's as the food concessionaire and Gulf for the fuel. The contract for the other four plazas — currently operated by Waltham-based petroleum supplier Global Partners in Bridgewater, Barnstable, and Beverly — will switch over on June 30, 2027. There isn't much time to make the transition, with leases expiring in six months on most of the plazas. Applegreen was picked in part because of its readiness to get started with the extensive permitting and construction work necessary. Its team includes general contractor Suffolk Construction and designers at Upland Architects. Active in the US since 2014, Applegreen has been expanding in this country lately, fueled in large part by Blackstone after the private equity firm acquired a controlling stake in 2021. Applegreen is wrapping up a 27-area redevelopment in New York; Bosworth said the Applegreen team that's leading the New York project will move over to Massachusetts. An Applegreen spokesperson offered a brief statement when asked about the committee's vote on Wednesday: 'We're proud of our proposal, and hope to have the opportunity to work with the state and MassDOT to improve the travel experiences of drivers across Massachusetts.' MassDOT's procurement process has been shrouded in secrecy until now — a fact that irked Quincy Mayor Tom Koch, a MassDOT board member. 'I'm disappointed I didn't have more information ahead of time,' Koch said. 'This is a big vote. I just think we're just kind of glossing over ... a major vote of this board.' Advertisement Bosworth told Koch that he would have preferred to share more information but was advised by MassDOT legal counsel to limit the public information on the process while the procurement was still ongoing. At Wednesday's meeting, Bosworth disclosed that six companies had made initial bids for the service-plaza contract last fall: Love's Travel Stops, 7-Eleven, Applegreen, Gulf owner RaceTrac, Global, and fuel distributor Energy North. Among other things, MassDOT's original bidding documents called for Applegreen has promised to keep operating bathroom and gas services at the rest areas while they are under construction, Bosworth said, and to not shut down two consecutive plaza buildings along the turnpike at the same time. Susan Snyder, a top lawyer at MassDOT, told the planning committee that the state faces a big financial risk if a new operator isn't chosen soon. Six months, she said, is the minimum amount of time necessary to transition to a new rest stop operator, and MassDOT wouldn't have much leverage if negotiations were needed to extend the leases beyond Jan. 1. 'There's just a ton of work that has to be done,' Bosworth said. 'Having said that, we have selected an operator that has proven they can do it under the gun.' Advertisement Jon Chesto can be reached at
Boston Globe
06-05-2025
- Business
- Boston Globe
What's the most pressing concern for big companies this earnings season? Hint: It starts with ‘T.'
The shift is no surprise, given the stock market's violent reaction to " Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Executives on these earning calls present a stoic front: Most don't sound all that happy about the turn of events, though they don't criticize the president directly for picking trade fights with other countries. The prices on everything from aluminum cans to Dungeons & Dragons box sets could be affected. Just how much gets passed on to clients and consumers will vary greatly, from business to business and product to product. Advertisement Consider Cambridge-based energy company GE Vernova, where chief executive Scott Strazik and chief financial officer Kenneth Parks probably would have preferred fielding questions about order backlogs and Advertisement Instead, they responded to queries about how the Trump tariffs are resulting in an additional $300 million to $400 million in inflationary costs this year for the company, though the executives will continue to try to 'mitigate' the impacts (to use the buzzword of the moment). If it's any consolation to Strazik and his crew, their former colleagues at For GE Vernova, the supersized tariff that Trump is imposing on Chinese imports is the biggest headache, though the broader tariffs of 10 percent for numerous other countries aren't helping matters. But for now, at least, GE Vernova is holding firm on its overall outlook for 2025. On the same day as GE Vernova's earnings, Waltham-based lab equipment supplier Thermo Fisher Scientific warned of a '$400 million headwind' in 2025 from the China tariff, because of the effects on China-sourced parts and China's retaliatory tariffs on products that Thermo Fisher makes in America and ships to that country. Also that day, Marlborough-based Boston Scientific chief executive Michael Mahoney forecast a $200 million hit to his company from the tariffs this year. As a result, BSX is Advertisement Hasbro, meanwhile, is speeding away from China as quickly as it can, with hundreds of items currently made in China being moved to factories in other countries by the end of this year. Chief financial officer Gina Goetter said Hasbro execs hope to be making fewer than 40 percent of its products in China by 2026. Hasbro, based in Pawtucket, R.I., is moving hundreds of items currently made in China to factories in other countries by the end of this year. Jonathan Wiggs/Globe Staff CEO Chris Cocks seemed happy to report that the Pawtucket company is still making most of its board games, such as Monopoly, at a factory in Cocks said he is accelerating a $1 billion cost savings plan as a result of the tariffs. And he had just announced he's putting off a decision about whether to move the company headquarters to Boston or stay closer to home in Providence. Meanwhile, the bad news keeps piling up. Teradyne's customers in the semiconductor sector are pulling back, preventing the North Reading-based manufacturer from offering any financial predictions beyond the current quarter. Boston Beer executives got peppered with questions about how tariffs are driving up expenses and driving down consumers' thirst for Sam Adams. And at New Britain-based tool maker Stanley Black & Decker, executives said that Not everyone seems to be worrying, though. Michael Battles at Norwell-based Clean Harbors promised that tariff concerns are 'a winner for us' in part because it could mean more reshoring of manufacturing in the US; that in turn means factories here will have more industrial waste to discard, possibly to Clean Harbors crews. And at Yankee Candle parent Newell Brands, chief executive Chris Peterson boasted that his company is well positioned to benefit from the craziness — he used the phase 'global trade alignment' ― after a 'period of temporary disruption.' That's primarily because the company had already started aggressively moving production out of China to other countries. Advertisement Citi analyst James Hardiman seemed to sum up the tumult perfectly, when he asked the Hasbro executives this simple question on their call: 'How do you even make decisions in this current environment?' Cocks replied by saying he's assuming the US will get to a 'reasonable and logical trade policy ultimately, once all the negotiations are done.' Can Hardiman and other analysts take that to the Monopoly bank? That remains to be seen. For now, these earning season comments sure make Trump's trade fights look like a roll of the dice. Jon Chesto can be reached at
