Midwest Air Group Inc. moved a step closer Tuesday to ending its yearlong effort to fend off a hostile takeover by AirTran Holdings Inc. when shareholders approved a sale to private equity firm TPG Capital. Nearly all votes cast by Midwest shareholders approved the sale, worth $450 million in cash, company officials said at a special shareholder meeting. The only hurdle left is scrutiny by antitrust regulators. They must approve the Midwest Airlines sale because it includes Eagan-based Northwest Airlines as a passive investor. TPG will own Milwaukee-based Midwest, but Northwest put up nearly half of the money. Midwest Chairman and Chief Executive Timothy Hoeksema said he expects the government will clear the deal and the sale will close by the end of the year. Wal-Mart says it didn't cheat workers
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. didn't force hourly employees in Minnesota to work off the clock or deny them meal and rest breaks, a lawyer for the company told a judge in Hastings. The hourly workers voluntarily skipped breaks and were paid for overtime when earned, Wal-Mart attorney Neal Manne claimed Tuesday in the company's opening statement in a non-jury trial in Minnesota state court. The lawsuit, brought on behalf of 56,000 Wal-Mart and Sam's Club hourly employees in the state, argued the company shortchanged them, breaking state laws. The workers claim Wal-Mart managers forced hourly employees to work without pay to keep down labor costs. The Minnesota workers are seeking back pay to 1998 and as much as $1,000 each for millions of missed breaks.Xcel postpones Colorado coal plant
Xcel Energy is shelving for at least two years a decision on building a widely hailed clean-coal power plant in Colorado that would have been the first in the nation to capture its carbon emissions and bury them underground. Although Xcel is convinced the technology will work, the $1 billion-plus plant would be too costly to build without a partner and the utility doesn't need the power, Chief Executive Dick Kelly said in Denver Tuesday. Minneapolis-based Xcel, which also serves Colorado customers, had proposed the plant last year as a symbol of its commitment to lead the utility sector in addressing carbon dioxide emissions, a major contributor to global warming. Kelly said the decision to delay consideration of the plant marked no fallback in the company's green leadership.Execs defend CO use to keep meat red
Hormel Foods and Cargill Inc. told U.S. lawmakers that using carbon monoxide to make aging meat look fresh is safe and that concerns from consumer groups are unwarranted. A packaging process that uses carbon monoxide with other gases to keep meat red, maintaining a fresh appearance, saves $1 billion a year in food that would otherwise be rejected by consumers, according to an industry-funded study. While the U.S. Food and Drug Administration says the treatment is safe, food-safety activists say it's deceptive. Executives for the two Minnesota companies appeared before the House Agriculture Committee in a hearing Tuesday in Washington. Consumer groups criticized the hearing, part of a series the committee is holding on food safety, because they said they weren't allowed to testify. Cargill is based in Minnetonka and Hormel in Austin.3M ends patent suit over batteries
3M Co. dropped a patent-infringement suit against Hitachi Koki Co. and CDW Corp., the last defendants in a case over batteries used in computers, power tools and other electronics. The dispute was over cathode materials used in lithium-ion batteries, the most widely used power source in electronics. Maplewood-based 3M said Tuesday it agreed to drop the case against the two companies after they certified they import and sell only batteries using materials from manufacturers licensed by 3M. The agreement brings to a close a lawsuit and trade complaint that 3M filed in March against companies including Sanyo Electric, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. and Sony Corp.
BRIEFLY
D.E. Shaw & Co., New York, bought a 3.3 percent stake in Eagan-based Northwest Airlines, making it the company's seventh-largest shareholder. The hedge fund run by David Shaw held 6.46 million shares of the airline as of June 30, according to a filing Monday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. ... Richfield-based Best Buy has launched Best Buy Video Sharing for customers to store and share home movies and videos on the Internet.
- Staff and wire reports
