WisBusiness FRI News Summary

— The CEO of the nation’s largest newspaper chain says two Journal Media Group shareholders are trying to “bully Gannett” into buying the company for a higher price.

Those shareholders have been buying more Journal Media Group stock, posing a hurdle as the company tries to get shareholder approval in March for its merger with Gannett. That merger, announced in October and still needing regulatory approval, would have Gannett paying $12 per share to acquire Journal Media Group, whose largest newspaper is the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

That’s already a 44.6 percent premium from Journal Media Group’s closing price on Oct. 7. But two Journal Media Group investors say the company should be more transparent, with one of them arguing the deal doesn’t accurately reflect the company’s real estate properties. Both companies have disputed the shareholders’ claims.

The latest salvo came this week from Gannett CEO and President Robert Dickey, who slammed Water Island Capital LLC and GAMCO Investors, Inc., an investment firm led by the well-known investor Mario Gabelli. Dickey made the comments in a letter to Timothy Stautberg, his counterpart at Journal Media Group.

“We are of the view that the unsupported claims that we have undervalued the company are merely an attempt to bully Gannett into offering additional consideration that exceeds that fair value of the shares,” Dickey wrote. “Let me be clear — we will not offer or consent to any additional consideration to your shareholders.”

See more on the dispute in a new WisBusiness.com story:

http://www.wisbusiness.com/index.iml?Article=364101

— UW-Whitewater’s entrepreneurship program was the runner-up in an award from a national academic group.

The U.S. Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship gave the designation at its national conference in San Diego. UW-Whitewater ranked highly in the National Model Undergraduate Program award, which considered criteria such as innovation, quality comprehensiveness and amount of support.

Jeff Vanevenhoven, a UW-Whitewater associate professor of management, said the university’s program “represents an achievable model” for other regional comprehensive universities.

“Our UW-Whitewater entrepreneurial ecosystem exemplifies the power of an engaged community with talented people to overcome the obstacle of limited resources and produce exemplary results,” he said. “I hope this recognition continues to shine light on our students and their continued achievements.”

See the release:

http://www.wisbusiness.com/index.iml?Article=363999

— Madison-based EatStreet will work with Uber to grow its food delivery service in Chicago.

Uber announced yesterday it’s expanding the UberRUSH service, which helps with deliveries. And that expansion includes partnering with EatStreet on a pilot program in Chicago, “with the intention of taking it to additional cities.”

EatStreet, launched by former UW-Madison students in 2010, has quickly become one of the most successful startups in the area, pulling in $15 million in a fundraising round that closed last month. It operates in 250 cities already, although it’s focused on college towns.

“It’s a really exciting time for EatStreet. Partnering with a national player like Uber quite literally puts the next stage of our growth into overdrive,” Howard says. “We’re still on the road to revolutionize how people place delivery and takeout orders online.”

See the EatStreet release:

http://www.wisbusiness.com/index.iml?Article=364102

See Uber’s announcement:

http://newsroom.uber.com/uberrush-api/

— Union membership in Wisconsin cratered last year, dropping almost in half from where it was a decade ago.

New figures out from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed 8.3 percent of the state’s workforce belonged to a union in 2015. That’s down from 16.1 percent in 2005, the earliest year for which BLS said it had those figured broken down by state.

Union membership has been declining nationally for years and had been trending down in Wisconsin during the past decade as well.

But the membership rolls dropped dramatically in 2015, a year in which Republicans pushed through right-to-work legislation four years after Gov. Scott Walker’s collective bargaining changes for public employees took effect.

In 2010, the year before Walker took office, 14.2 percent of Wisconsin workers belonged to unions. It was still 11.7 percent in 2014 and above the national rate, according to BLS, before the drop of more than 3 percentage points.

The data on union membership is collected as part of the Current Population Survey, a monthly sample of about 60,000 eligible households.

See the release on the latest numbers:

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/union2.pdf

See the percentage of Wisconsin workers who belonged to a union going back to 2005:

http://wispolitics.com/1006/160128BLS.xlsx

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