LodgeNet Entertainment Corp., a Sioux Falls, S.D.-based provider of interactive TV and broadband services to hotels and health-care facilities, announced Wednesday it has completed the acquisition of Denver’s Ascent Entertainment Group Inc. from Douglas County-based Liberty Media and its Liberty Satellite & Technology Inc. subsidiary for $380 million.
The deal includes On Command Corp., which delivers content to more than 1.8 million hotel rooms throughout the United States, Canada and Mexico.
Additional business news briefs:
BROOMFIELD
Level 3 gains rights of fiber to 200 buildings
Fiber-optic network operator Level 3 Communications Inc. said Wednesday it had acquired some assets that AT&T Corp. was ordered to divest when it was purchased by SBC Communications. No financial details were available.
Level 3 said it acquired indefeasible rights of use for dark fiber connections to more than 200 buildings and more than 1,600 metro fiber route-miles in Detroit; Hartford, Conn.; Kansas City; Milwaukee; San Francisco; and St. Louis.
CHICAGO and DENVER
Apartment firms sell 53,000 in market shift
Equity Residential, the biggest U.S. apartment owner, and Denver-based Apartment Investment & Management Co., the fourth-largest owner, sold 53,000 apartments last year as they shift their holdings to faster-growing markets.
Chicago-based Equity Residential sold 31,000 units, and Apartment Investment & Management sold 22,000, according to the National Multi Housing Council, a Washington-based trade association.
Both companies said they plan to reinvest their proceeds in cities with higher growth.
DOUGLAS COUNTY
EchoStar launches 7 HD sports networks
EchoStar Communications Corp. announced it has launched seven regional sports networks in high definition, including the Rocky Mountain Fox Sports Network.
“Sports fans have been driving the HD movement for quite some time now, so naturally we’re excited to offer regional coverage of games and sporting events in this amazing and graphic picture quality,” said Eric Sahl, senior vice president of programming for Dish Network.
LOS ANGELES
Market union leaves talks to mull options
Union officials representing 65,000 supermarket workers walked away from contract talks Wednesday after three chains said they would join together and lock out employees at their Southern California stores if any of the chains becomes the target of a strike.
“We’ve broken off negotiations at this point, and we’re regrouping to discuss our options,” said Mike Shimpock, a spokesman for the seven Southern California chapters of the United Food and Commercial Workers.
NEW YORK
Apartment vacancies climb to 6 percent
The vacancy rate for U.S. apartments climbed to 6 percent in the first quarter, the highest in seven quarters, as the number of available properties increased, real-estate research firm Reis Inc. said.
Memphis, Tenn., had the highest vacancy rate at 11 percent, followed by Colorado Springs and Tulsa, Okla., according to the study.
NEW YORK
U.S. rejects bids to fill crude-oil stockpile
The U.S. Energy Department said Wednesday it rejected bids to replenish the nation’s crude- oil stockpile because the price was too high.
The government had planned to add 4 million barrels of oil next month to sites in Louisiana and Texas for the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve. It was part of a plan to add 11 million barrels of oil to the reserve, replacing crude released after Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005.
HOUSTON
Former Merrill Lynch execs to be retried
Three former Merrill Lynch & Co. executives whose 2004 fraud and conspiracy convictions connected to an Enron Corp. deal were overturned last year will be retried in January, a judge said Wednesday.
James A. Brown, Daniel Bayly and Robert S. Furst were convicted of conspiracy and wire fraud for helping push through Enron’s sham sale to the brokerage of three power barges moored off the coast of Nigeria in 1999.
ALBANY, N.Y.
AG probes stock gifts to student-aid officers
New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo’s office is investigating stock grants from student-loan companies to financial-aid officers at three major universities as part of a widening investigation into the $85 billion student-loan industry.
Cuomo’s office on Wednesday sent a subpoena to Columbia University and sent letters to the University of Southern California and the University of Texas seeking information about financial-aid officers’ ownership of stock in a loan company that appears on each school’s list of preferred lenders.
NASHVILLE, Tenn.
Union gets tentative pact with tire firm
The United Steelworkers union said Wednesday it has reached a tentative contract agreement with tiremaker Bridgestone Firestone North American Tire covering workers at six U.S. plants.
