SiliconBeat

Salaries of the executive officers at Atheros Communications, which were reduced Feb. 1 in a cost saving measure, were restored Monday by the board’s compensation committee. Chief Executive Craig Barratt, who had his annual salary cut 40 percent to $204,000, will now be paid at an annual rate of $340,000. Other executives, who had their salaries cut 20 percent, also had their pay raised back to 2008 levels.

The committee re-evaluated the salary reductions light of better-than-expected results Atheros announced yesterday for its 2009 second quarter, and for its third quarter forecast earnings of from 29 to 31 cents a share, significantly higher than the 17 cents average analyst estimate in a Thomson Reuters survey were expecting. Shares of Atheros popped today, rising $1.83, or 8.1 percent, to close at $24.35.

It is certainly a welcome relief for the company, whose CEO warned in December that the “economic environment deteriorated significantly throughout the (2008) fourth quarter and consumer demand across multiple geographies weakened.”

Bloomberg News estimated today that New Enterprise Associates stands to make a 26-fold return on its initial investment in Data Domain, the maker of storage backup tools that agreed to be acquired for $2.1 billion by EMC after a bidding war with NetApp.

NEA should make Read the rest of this entry »

Hansen Medical extended for a second month the guaranteed monthly bonus of $16,667 it pays to its senior vice president of commercial operations, Christopher Sells, in addition to his $275,000 annual salary.

When Sells was first hired in June 2008, the company offered Read the rest of this entry »

Raise your hand if you recently quit your job and in the process got a severance package that was bigger than what you’d have gotten if you were let go by your employer?

Avistar Communications, the San Mateo company that was delisted from the Nasdaq stock market last month, reported today that Read the rest of this entry »

Pharmacyclics, the Sunnyvale biopharmaceutical whose chief executive, Robert Duggan loaned it $5 million in January to help it stay afloat, will receive at least $6.5 million more from the boss, who has agreed to take advantage of the company’s offer to all of its shareholders giving them the right to acquire about Read the rest of this entry »

If history is any guide, investors who are interested in buying shares of Microsoft might want to do that before it actually releases its new Windows 7 operating system upgrade.
That’s the conclusion of a Bloomberg story published today by reporter Dina Bass, who looked at Read the rest of this entry »

The  company formerly known as Macrovision that first changed its name to Macrovision Solutions last year following its acquisition of Gemstar-TV Guide, said today it is officially adopting an even newer name — and ticker symbol — thereby “highlighting the company’s evolution and growth and a digital entertainment technology leader.”

The Santa Clara company that used to describe itself as Read the rest of this entry »

Cannabis Science, the San Francisco company dedicated to developing medicines derived from marijuana, filled in a bit more detail on why it fired former Chief Executive Steve Kubby last week in a filing today with the SEC. The company has authorized an internal investigation and “review by counsel” of Kubby’s “apparently fraudulent Read the rest of this entry »

Electroglas, the San Jose supplier of wafer testing tools to the chip making industry, filed for bankruptcy protection saying that “as a result of the global economic recession, demand for semiconductor manufacturing equipment has declined dramatically,” according to a press release it issued.

Earlier today the company filed notice with the SEC that its chief executive  served notice Read the rest of this entry »

Electroglas, the beleaguered supplier of wafer testing systems to chip manufacturers, said Friday that Warren Kocmond, the chief executive it named on Feb. 9, announced  on Monday that he would be resigning as of Aug. 3, although he will continue to serve on the company’s board of directors. The company’s chairman and former CEO, Thomas Rohrs, will replace him as interim CEO.

The company cut its workforce by Read the rest of this entry »