Parker Howell

A Montana company is preparing to serve up "all-natural" breads and meats at a new, farm-themed South Hill eatery. Bozeman-based Wheat Montana Bakery and Deli plans to open an outlet at South Regal Street and East 44th Avenue in mid-December, shortly after the debut of a similar Coeur d'Alene branch, said Jason Rummer, director of development and marketing. After "extensive research" on Spokane, the company determined the South Hill matches its demographics, he said.

A private, high-speed fiber-optic network tying local research, educational and health care institutions and touted as an economic development and collaboration tool, has gone dark – at least for now. Citing insufficient use to justify the cost of maintaining the Virtual Possibilities Network, an oversight board late last year voted to shut down the network, and it was turned off in March, said VPnet President Steve Trabun. But he said VPnet is only dormant, and the board is willing to work to reactivate it for specific projects.

Spokane telecommunications company OneEighty Networks Inc. plans to sell its assets to a South Dakota telephone corporation next week in the face of "insolvency," forming a regional business that provides voice, data and Internet services. But a group of shareholders is questioning the ethicality of the roughly $5.2 million cash deal with OrbitCom Inc., saying most stockholders won't benefit while CEO and majority owner Greg Green will.

Washington's economic development agency is moving staff from Olympia into other regions in an effort to better align state resources with local priorities. But the affected division of the Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development already has two workers assigned to Eastern Washington, and the eight-county area isn't slated to receive more, representatives said.

Liberty Lake-based SprayCool Inc. announced Monday it will provide electronics chassis for radar used in new unmanned aerial vehicles as part of a U.S. Army contract with Lockheed Martin Corp. The Army awarded Lockheed roughly $40 million to include the radar systems, which are capable of penetrating foliage, into three Warrior UAVs, said Dan Kinney, SprayCool's director of business development for aerospace. SprayCool technology will cool electronics on the Warrior – an Army version of the Predator flown by the U.S. Air Force – used for processing the low-frequency radar systems, which will function at all hours and in all weather conditions and relay information to ground troops, according to the company.

A Hawaii court on Wednesday determined a Spokane Valley corporation that arranges sports tournaments should pay $87,579 in unpaid hotel charges and other costs to a Hawaii hotel company, an attorney for the company said. ResortQuest Hawaii LLC of Honolulu this summer sued Hoopsmart USA Inc. and its president, Aaron Alteneder, alleging they didn't pay the total bill for more than 150 rooms occupied for several nights in December and January for a softball tournament. Alteneder said he disputed the charges because tournament attendees had a "disastrous" time at the Waikiki Beach Hotel and didn't fight ResortQuest in court because he expected it to negotiate.

A Spokane Valley board game company and one of its co-founders violated state law by raising at least $354,000 from investors without offering necessary information about the company's finances, sales projections or risks, according to preliminary charges by a division of the state Department of Financial Institutions. Chum Chum Game Co. and former company President Charles Smaltz may both face fines of $10,000 for violating the Securities Act of Washington by improperly offering or selling securities from at least 162 investors, many of them from Washington, according to charges by the Securities Division. Chum Chum representatives, however, contended while the company may have been "naïve" and made some errors, it wasn't intentionally misleading and will follow the department's recommendations.

A new Spokane pharmacy faces a lawsuit from the competitor its founders left to start the business. The owners of ReliantRx LLC, a pharmacy serving long-term care facilities, allegedly used resources and trade secrets of their former employer, Northwest Health Systems Inc., to launch their company, according to a lawsuit Northwest Health filed in Spokane County Superior Court last week.

In an attempt to avoid a costly legal battle, Pullman and Moscow city officials say they won't challenge a recent attempt by Time Warner NY Cable LLC to eradicate the cities' ability to review and regulate basic cable rates. But they criticized Time Warner's petition to the Federal Communications Commission, which contends the company shouldn't be subject to city oversight because it faces "effective competition" from national satellite-TV services. That competition partly stems from a dispute between Time Warner and a local Fox affiliate that resulted in the cable company dropping Fox and upset customers switching to satellite, officials contended.

A new downtown Spokane small-business incubator offers cheap rent, included utilities and on-site parking to entrepreneurs looking to take their businesses out of the home and into an office. The Spokane Entrepreneurial Center in the historic Lorraine Hotel building on First Avenue has 18 lease-free offices open for startup companies, said building owner Steve Salvatori. As the chief of a national company and recent transplant to Spokane, Salvatori wants to help fellow entrepreneurs, he said.

Avista Utilities and a Washington State University laboratory will contribute $1 million to a grant fund for sustainable energy research, officials announced Wednesday. To gain funding, projects require collaboration between Avista engineers and scientists at WSU's Applied Sciences Laboratory, benefit to utility customers, and use of outside money, according to Avista. The program will leverage the "brain trust" established at the lab, said Roger Woodworth, Avista's vice president of sustainable energy solutions.

A Pennsylvania-based international telecommunications company on Tuesday purchased B&C Telephone Inc. of Spokane, B&C's former owner said. Black Box Corp. bought privately held B&C, which had annual revenues of about $18 million last year, for an undisclosed amount, according to the companies. Founder and former owner Bill Brouillet said he expects Black Box will keep "most all" of the business's roughly 125 employees, who work out of 13 offices in four Western states.

Fair-labor advocates will scrutinize sources of apparel and other goods bearing Washington State University logos in the wake of the school's decision to join two nonprofit organizations devoted to ending sweatshop labor. WSU joined the Washington, D.C.-based Worker Rights Consortium and Fair Labor Association on Wednesday following a recent student protest, said Mel Taylor, WSU's executive director of real estate operations and external affairs. The Cougars join at least 174 post-secondary schools that participate in the consortium and 200 in the association.

Small businesses and would-be entrepreneurs in Ferry, Stevens and Pend Oreille counties can receive free advice on subjects such as business planning, marketing and e-commerce through a new program. The Inland Northwest Women's Business Center of Spokane will offer the Northeast Washington Business Development Network using $98,164 in federal grant money.