West Wireless Health Institute Names First CEO, Leap Wireless Trims Operations, MaxLinear Sets Price Range for IPO, & More San Diego BizTech News

Bruce V. Bigelow3/15/10Comments (5)Follow @bvbigelow

A recent Harris poll found that most Americans have never heard of a smart meter and they don’t know what the smart grid is, but these new technologies are coming anyway. We’ve got a lot of cleantech news, which we’ll dispense as efficiently as possible.

—Is Leap Wireless, (NASDAQ: LEAP) optimizing its operations for a possible merger? Or is it trimming its costs in an increasingly competitive market for low-cost service? The San Diego company, which provides flat-rate wireless services through its Cricket Communications operating company, said it has laid off 180 employees and closed or transferred 38 of its Cricket storefronts.

—San Diego Gas & Electric is on schedule to complete installation of 1.4 million electric smart meters and 850,000 gas smart meters by the end of 2011. But SDG&E’s senior vice president for customer services, Anne Shen Smith, told a Metering America conference last week the industry is “lagging in developing the kind of software that goes with this technology.”

—A Harris Poll recently found that … Next Page »

Bruce V. Bigelow is the editor of Xconomy San Diego. You can e-mail him at bbigelow@xconomy.com or call (619) 669-8788