PhillyDeals: Big-time baker foils executive's plan, so far

Grupo Bimbo

is the Wonder Bread of Mexico - and much more:

Its Horsham-based Bimbo Bakeries USA division has taken over Arnold, Boboli, Brownberry, Entenmann's, Freihofer's, Stroehmann, Thomas' English Muffins, and other supermarket breads and cakes to become one of the biggest U.S. baking chains.

This Bimbo is no pushover: Its attorneys at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius L.L.P. last week persuaded a federal judge in Philadelphia not to let a Bimbo executive move to rival Hostess.

According to a Feb. 9 opinion by U.S. Judge R. Barclay Surrick, Bimbo executive Chris Botticella last fall accepted a job offer at rival Hostess Brands Inc. (formerly Interstate Bakeries Corp.), which makes Twinkies, among other sticky junk food.

After helping Bimbo save $75 million a year from its West Coast operations by closing factories and changing recipes, Botticella accepted Hostess' offer of a $50,000 cut in his base pay, to $200,000 (he also got stock options and bonuses).

Why move for less? After more than 30 years at Bimbo and its predecessors, he said "that the company had lost its soul," Botticella's attorney, Elizabeth K. Ainslie, of Schnader, Harrison, Segal & Lewis L.L.P., told me.

But Surrick noted that Botticella stayed on at Bimbo until January, without telling the company he was going to Hostess.

As a key executive, Botticella was one of a handful of trusted Bimbo employees with access to valuable company information, including "the secret process for making Thomas' English Muffins, and, specifically, their 'nooks and crannies' texture," Surrick wrote.

Asked to testify whether he downloaded secret information to take with him to Hostess in his last days at Bimbo, Botticella's "explanations were not credible," the judge wrote. So, on Feb. 9, Surrick granted Bimbo a "temporary and preliminary injunction" forbidding Botticella from joining Hostess.

Bimbo didn't return calls seeking comment. The company's attorneys at Morgan Lewis declined to comment through a spokeswoman.

Ainslie said her client had appealed. Meanwhile, Botticella is between bakers, without a job.

The case was first reported by the Legal Intelligencer.

Fast-growing

New Century Bank

, of Phoenixville, has raised $43 million from private investors, selling 10.1 million shares at $4.28 each, through investment bankers

Macquarie Capital USA Inc.

and

Stifel Nicolaus & Co. Inc

.

That's on top of $17 million raised in a previous capital raising, chief executive officer and chairman Jay S. Sidhu (formerly of Sovereign Bank) said yesterday in a statement.

The bank, with $352 million in loans and investment assets, has opened a handful of branches in Philadelphia's rich western suburbs, and it has hired a string of former Sovereign executives since Sidhu bought a controlling stake in the bank two years ago from original investors led by former chairman Kenneth B. Mumma, publisher Steve Forbes' brother-in-law.

Mumma and two other founding directors remain on New Century's board. They've been joined by London-based investor Bhanu Choudhrie and two former Sovereign directors, plus Sidhu, who has said in the past he's shopping for additional banks, in this buyers' market.

Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden

yesterday sued the owner of

Ryan Homes

, a Herndon, Va.-based building company with upscale developments in South Jersey, Chester County, and other East Coast markets. He is alleging Ryan took thousands of dollars from homeowners in a southern New Castle County golf course community to pay for amenities "that were never built."

"We have no comment," said Dan Malzahn, spokesman for Ryan owner NVR Inc.

In a statement, Biden said he filed a 39-count consumer-fraud lawsuit against NVR. He alleged Ryan "built several sections of homes in the Odessa National development, in Townsend, Del., where the alleged fraud took place." The civil suit, in New Castle County Superior Court, "seeks civil penalties of $10,000 for each violation of Delaware's Consumer Fraud Act, restitution for 39 home-buyer victims, punitive damages, and investigative costs."