Corporate Report

Corporate Report

Lennar and US Home finalize 2000 merger

US Home is no more in Southwest Florida. Lennar Corp., one of the three largest homebuilders in the country, acquired US Home in 2000, but just recently changed the company's name to Lennar.

Miami-based Lennar, which had revenue of $13.9 billion last year, says the name change is effective July 4 in Collier, Lee, Desoto, Charlotte, Manatee and Sarasota counties.

In the second quarter ended May 31, Lennar posted a 33% rise in quarterly profit, thanks in large part to increased discounts that attracted more buyers. Net income rose to $325 million, or $2 a share, in the second quarter, up from $244 million, or $1.48 a share, a year earlier. Revenue rose 56% to $4.6 billion.

Tampa area firms enter and

exit the Russell 3000 Index

Quality Distribution, a Tampa company that operates a bulk tank truck network, is expected to join the Russell 3000 Index while Tampa-based Odyssey Marine and Sarasota's Sun Hydraulics will be removed.

Quality Distribution is included on a preliminary list of additions to the index that was to be finalized on July 3. Odyssey Marine Exploration, which focuses on deep-ocean shipwreck explorations and Sun Hydraulics, which designs and manufactures hydraulic cartridge valves and manifolds, were both deleted June 30 from the index.

The Russell indexes are used by investment managers and institutional investors for both index funds and as benchmarks for passive and active investment strategies. They are reconstituted once a year to capture the 3,000 largest U.S. stocks at the end of May, ranking them by total market capitalization.

Tampa company

expands to Maryland

Let's Eat!, a Tampa-based dinner preparation franchise, has opened its first store outside of Florida, in Ellicott City, Md., near Baltimore. The franchises provide ingredients, cooking tools and a kitchen for customers to cook a week's worth of meals at one time and take them home.

Let's Eat!, which has a minimum franchise fee of $25,000, has eight stores in Florida, including three in Tampa, one in St. Petersburg and one in Sarasota, near Lakewood Ranch. The chain's owners hope to open 15 stores by yearend and nearly 300 nationwide over the next five years.

Stock buyback plan

approved by Jabil Circuit

St. Petersburg-based circuit board and computer component maker Jabil Circuit Inc.'s board approved a buyback plan of up to $200 million in common stock.

Shares of the company dropped 36% in 2006; the company said it had about 209.5 million shares outstanding.

Tampa's Brown & Brown

buys Kentucky firm

Brown & Brown Inc., a Daytona Beach- and Tampa-based provider of insurance and reinsurance products, bought the assets of The Anderson Group for an undisclosed price. Brown & Brown bought The Anderson Group's employee benefits portion in 2003. The transaction brings all of The Anderson Group's lines of business under Brown & Brown.

The Owensboro, Ky.-based, Anderson Group serves property and casualty insurance needs of individual and commercial clients in the Owensboro and Evansville, Ind., areas. Its property and casualty arm, TEBA Inc., has $1.2 million in annualized revenue. Principal Todd Anderson and his staff will continue to serve clients from Brown & Brown's existing Owensboro location.

JetBlue adds Sarasota

flight to New York

JetBlue, a low-cost upstart, will begin non-stop service between Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport and New York's John F. Kennedy Airport starting Sept. 21. Introductory one-way fares start at $79 and are valid for travel between Sept. 21 and Oct. 31, and must be purchased by July 18.

This is the second recently announced new addition to the Sarasota airport's flight schedule. U.S. Airways obtained regulatory approval last month to fly non-stop to Ronald Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C.

JMX opens overseas office

to improve operations

Sarasota-based JMX International Corp. opened an office in Shanghai, China, to monitor the importation of bamboo flooring and molding, along with other products to the United States. JMX recently expanded to the international market by importing bamboo flooring and molding.

JMX International is the parent company of numerous online stores and specializes in handcrafted furniture made by Amish woodworkers in Pennsylvania and Ohio.

Sunrise Senior

to buy properties for $457 million

Sunrise Senior Living Inc., the largest U.S. operator of senior homes, agreed to buy six Florida assisted-living communities for $457 million, to expand in the state with the highest percentage of senior residents.

Five of the Aston Gardens communities are on Florida's Gulf Coast, from Tampa to Naples. Sunrise will own a 25% stake in the communities, and an undisclosed venture-capital partner will own the rest. The six communities have annual revenue of about $65 million, McLean, Va.-based Sunrise said in a June 30 statement.

Florida has 2.8 million residents who are at least 65 years old, or 18% of its population, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Sunrise agreed to buy four other Florida properties last month, and two in January.

About $297 million of the purchase price will be paid for with financing obtained by the joint venture, Sunrise said. Sunrise said it plans to fund its $40 million portion of the acquisition with cash on hand.

The Aston Garden sites are mostly dedicated to independent living, with some assisted-living and Alzheimer's-care services, Sunrise said. The communities range from 252 units to 359 units, and are clustered near Sunrise's existing Florida properties. Two are in Sun City, and the others are in Tampa, Venice, Naples and near Boca Raton.

-Bloomberg News