Reported by Star-Bulletin staff & wire
Wednesday, May 6, 1998
Kauai Electric parent sees 8% rise in profit
Citizens Utilities Co., the Connecticut-based parent of Kauai Electric Co. and the Gas Co. in Honolulu, today reported an 8 percent increase in its first-quarter profit.The company earned $39.5 million, compared with $36.5 million in the year-earlier quarter. Per-share earnings were up 14 percent at 16 cents, from 14 cents in the 1997 quarter.
The company is in the natural gas, electricity, water supply and wastewater treatment businesses in 21 states and has been expanding into the communications business. First-quarter revenues were up 8 percent at $403.9 million from $375.1 million last year.
EntreMed: Cancer drug may be 5 years away
WASHINGTON EntreMed Inc., could take more than five years to bring its experimental cancer drug to market, even working at top speed, the company's chairman said."The fastest those things have ever occurred from concept to clinic is just under seven years," said John Holaday, chairman, chief executive and co-founder of EntreMed told Bloomberg News. "We would like to beat that fastest-ever development time," he said. "I would like to make that as a promise . . . unfortunately I can't."
EntreMed is about a year and a half into development of its now-hot cancer drug, endostatin, which means that even working at record speed, the drug could be another five years off. EntreMed is working on endostatin and another compound, angiostatin, shown to rid mice of tumors.
Shares in the Rockville, Md.-based biotechnology firm more than quadrupled on Monday driven by enthusiasm over reports on angiostatin's and endostatin's potential. Since peaking Monday at $85, the company's shares have declined. In Nasdaq trading today, EntreMed shares closed down $12.00 at $31.12-1/2.
AT&T to add 95 cents to residential bills
NEW YORK AT&T Corp. is imposing a new monthly fee of up to 95 cents on its residential customers, saying it needs to recover the cost of completing long-distance calls to local phone networks. The nation's largest telephone company imposed the 95-cent fee in April for its 45 million customers who subscribe to one of the company's discount calling plans. AT&T has told the Federal Communications Commission it will charge its remaining 35 million customers a monthly fee of up to that amount, starting July 1.
See expanded coverage in today's Honolulu Star-Bulletin.
See our [Search] [Info] section for subscription information.