January 15, 2001

San Diego-based Fresh Start Surgical Gifts has opened its first overseas chapter in Bombay, India.

On Jan. 17, Fresh Start will hold an opening ceremony in Bombay, followed by the first international "Fresh Start Surgery Weekend" on Jan. 20.

Diagnostic and surgical sessions will be performed simultaneously in San Diego, Johnson City, TN and Bombay, India, helping over 400 patients to get the chance for a "Fresh Start" worldwide.

Recent statistics report, annually more than 80,000 children are born with congenital deformities and another 45,000 children are injured with serious burns covering more than 25 percent of their bodies, just in the United States.

"There are thousands of children in the United States who are in need of reconstructive surgery today,” says Steve Edwards, international v.p. of Fresh Start Surgical Gifts. Imagine how many there are throughout the world."

In order to extend the gifts of surgery, Fresh Start Surgical Gifts has decided to open an associated Chapter in India under the leadership of Dr. Ashok Gupta.

"Fresh Start is delighted to have Dr. Gupta leading the way for our India Chapter," says CEO Martin Davis, who will be visiting the Indian Chapter for the official opening ceremonies. "I am confident that Dr. Gupta and the experience he brings will enhance the success of the chapter's programs and services."

Fresh Start Surgical Gifts Inc., based in San Diego, is a nonprofit organization providing free reconstructive surgery to children and young adults who are afflicted with physical deformities. The children who receive a Fresh Start Surgical Gift are deserving individuals who would not otherwise have the financial means to afford this important medical attention.

Since 1991, a devoted team of more than 60 doctors, nurses, anesthesiologists, dentists, and other medical professionals have performed thousands of reconstructive surgeries in San Diego for individuals from across the United States and around the world.

For more information about Fresh Start Surgical Gifts Inc., visit www.fssg.org or send e-mail to freshstart@fssg.org.

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Nitches Inc., a San Diego-based importer and wholesale distributor of women's garments, reports a profit of $519,000 on sales of $11 million for the first quarter ended Nov. 30, compared with a profit of $558,000 on sales of $11.5 million in the same quarter a year earlier.

The company says sales were mainly down in its private label sleepwear line.

The company reports it had unfilled customer orders of $14.5 million at Nov. 30, 2000.

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Leo Spiegel has joined Mission Ventures as general partner.

Mission Ventures is a Southern California venture capital firm, headquartered in San Diego, with more than $280 million under management.

The firm invests primarily in early-stage companies as the lead or co-lead investor in the first institutional round of financing for businesses in the information technology sector, including Internet infrastructure, communications, wireless, and software.

"Having Leo join Mission Ventures is a real coup," says Dave Ryan, managing partner of Mission Ventures. "He has a broad range of experience in a variety of software and communications technologies, both as chief technology officer and as a very highly-regarded senior operating executive. ... We are very pleased to have attracted a person with Leo's strong industry and Wall Street reputation to our firm. His contacts and skills in building entrepreneurial high technology companies will serve Mission Ventures well."

"I have known Leo for several years now and had the pleasure of being on his board of directors at Sandpiper Networks and Digital Island," says Robert Kibble, managing partner of Mission Ventures. "It would be difficult for me to name a person who is better-suited to the venture capital business than Leo. His knowledge, skill set and background as a highly-successful operating executive, combined with his understanding of technology and passion for the entrepreneur, make Leo a strong addition to the Mission Ventures investment team."

Spiegel served as president of Digital Island since December 1999 and previously served as Sandpiper Networks' chairman, president and CEO.

He is a member of the board of directors of Digital Island, Videoscape.net and Nuasis Corp. He has received numerous awards, including Ernst & Young's Entrepreneur of the Year Award for the greater Los Angeles area.

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Aldila, a designer and manufacturer of high performance graphite wood and iron shafts, re-introduced the original HM-40 Tour Gold wood shaft and introduced two new HM-40 models.

The San Diego company reports that the HM-40 Tour Gold is the all time best selling high performance graphite shaft for better players. Along with the original 95 gram design, Aldila now offers an ultra light weight 65 gram design and a light weight 80 gram design.

These two new models offer the same performance attributes of the original shaft but in today’s popular lighter weights. All three HM-40 models are available in Regular, Stiff and X-Stiff flexes and are all 46 inches in length.

"Our HM-40 graphite shaft has always been one of our most requested products year after year on the PGA Tour,” says Mike Rossi, Aldila's v.p. of sales and marketing. “It’s unique design optimizes distance while still maintaining the controlled ball flight and accuracy demanded by better players. With the addition of the new ultra light and light weight models, Aldila's new HM-40 Tour Gold Series of shafts is the most complete performance oriented line of graphite shafts available on the market today.”

The HM-40 Tour Gold Series is available now through all major golf distributors worldwide as well as premium club manufacturer's custom club departments.

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Performance Technologies Inc., a leading provider of packet-based telecom and networking products based in New York, will demonstrate the first integrated solutions built around the company’s Internet protocol backplane architecture at the Bus & Board Conference in San Diego, Jan. 15 and 16.

Performance Technologies' backplane architecture overlays an embedded ethernet switching network onto the existing CompactPCI backplane standard, enabling ethernet to connect all system elements within the confines of each chassis.

Ethernet is also used for communications between chassis in a system and to external IP networks. The demonstration will highlight Performance Technologies' IPnexus family of network access products, installed in a new IP backplane-enabled chassis developed by APW Ltd.

APW is a leading designer of large, complex infrastructure products for OEMs in the communications and Internet markets.

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Intuit Inc. of San Diego reports its product TurboTax for the Web is ready for use online at www.turbotax.com.

This is the only tax preparation solution to offer the Automated Tax Return feature.

The Automated Tax Return delivers revolutionary simplicity and convenience by retrieving common tax information — wages, dividends, interest and stock transactions — from participating employers and financial institutions and automatically filling in the correct forms in TurboTax.

"TurboTax for the Web is far and away the most convenient and easiest online tax preparation solution,” says Bob Meighan, v.p. of Intuit’s Consumer Tax Group. “Our phenomenal growth last year is evidence that millions of ordinary people are embracing online tax preparation and have come to appreciate the convenience, speed and simplicity of doing taxes on the Internet. And this year, we’re introducing the Automated Tax Return and a host of other new features designed to make TurboTax Web-based tax preparation even easier, faster and hassle-free."

Consumers don’t have to purchase or download software because they can prepare their return entirely online at any time from any computer with Internet access.

There is absolutely no charge to try TurboTax for the Web. Taxpayers are charged only when they are ready to print or electronically file their tax return. Last year, 1.4 million federal and 900,000 state tax returns were filed using TurboTax for the Web.

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California Healthcare Institute, based in San Diego and representing more than 200 biotechnology, medical device, pharmaceutical and academic research organizations in California, applauded Gov. Gray Davis for his efforts on behalf of biomedical research and innovation in California.

Gov. Davis has proposed tax and small business incentives, and transit and education initiatives that will promote biomedical science, biotechnology, pharmaceutical and medical device innovation in California.

"Governor Davis has demonstrated a strong commitment to California's biomedical research enterprise," says David Gollaher, CHI president and CEO. "He has been a valuable partner in advancing basic science, along with research and development of promising new medicines that will benefit patients in our state and around the world."

Highlights of Gov. Davis' proposals that will benefit biomedical innovators and the patients they serve include:

• Creation of the California Institutes of Science and Innovation.
• Gov. Davis announced the establishment of three major research institutions dedicated to nanotechnology, biotechnology and telecommunications and computing in December. The California Institutes for Science and Innovation will concentrate on complex scientific challenges and serve as training grounds for future scientists.
• Increase and extension of the manufacturers' investment credit.
• Many of California's leading biomedical R&D companies are making the transition from technology development to manufacturing. The state manufacturers' investment credit is an important incentive to help keep these job-creating functions located within the state. The governor's budget proposes to increase the manufacturers' investment credit from 6 to 7 percent and extends the sunset date to Jan. 1, 2008. The credit is designed to partially offset the sales taxes that manufacturing businesses must pay on their California investments.
• Increase in the capital gains exclusion for small business stock
• In order to help fund critically important R&D projects, biotechnology companies rely heavily on capital markets. The governor's budget proposes to encourage long-term investment in these innovative companies by increasing the current 50 percent exclusion for gain from the sale of small business stock held more than 5 years to 100 percent (applies to stock purchases after Jan. 1).
• Another proposal in the governor's budget is designed to help relieve the traffic congestion that plagues many of California's high-tech centers.
• Tax credit for employers who provide subsidized transit passes for employees.
• Teacher credits and sales tax holiday.

On the important issue of education, Gov. Davis has proposed a tax credit for employers who loan employees to public schools to teach math and science. Further, a sales tax holiday is included in the budget to help parents with the costly burden of preparing their children for the school year.

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