BBC sells stake in Discovery
The British Broadcasting Corp. is ending a long-standing partnership with Discovery Communications by selling its 50 percent stake in the global TV channel’s joint venture Animal Planet and Liv to Discovery for $156 million.
The two companies will continue to co-produce programming, extending until 2014 their partnership to develop shows like their successful “Planet Earth” and “The Blue Planet.”
Financial terms of the ongoing production agreement weren’t disclosed.
Orbital opens Dulles operations center
Orbital Sciences, which has a NASA contract to send supplies to the International Space Station when the Space Shuttle program ends next year, officially cut the ribbon on its Mission Operations Center in Dulles.
Orbital won a $1.9 billion Commercial Resupply Services contract from NASA in late 2008 and will carry out eight cargo delivery missions to the space station from 2011 to 2015. The launches will take place at the Wallops Flight Facility in eastern Virginia.
GTSI’s profits soar
GTSI Corp., which endured a temporary suspension of government participation in October, booked a 55 percent gain in net income in the months before as sales improved.
The Herndon seller of computers and systems integration services to federal, state and local governments reported net income of $5.9 million, or 62 cents per diluted share, in the third quarter of 2010, compared with net income of $3.8 million, or 39 cents per diluted share, in the third quarter of 2009.
Delinquencies drop at CapOne
Capital One Financial Corp. credit card customers are getting a better handle on their finances, with more of them making good on their accounts in October.
The McLean credit card issuer and regional bank reported that percentage of its credit card customers at least 30 days behind on their payments fell to 4.45 percent in October from 4.53 percent the month before.
Capital One wrote off $323 million in net principal credit card balances as uncollectable in October. That is lower the $378 million it wrote down in September. The company’s annual credit card charge off rate fell to 7.26 percent in October from 8.38 percent the month before.
