Business

St. John Properties Inc. has acquired an 82-acre site in rural Southern Maryland with plans to create Berry Pointe, a sprawling business complex with retail, flex and office space. The private Woodlawn developer recently bought the property on Route 228 near Crain Highway in the Charles County town of Waldorf for an undisclosed price, the company disclosed on Tuesday. St. John is planning to launch construction next year on 635,000 square feet of single-story office, flex and retail space at Berry Pointe, a project the developer said could create up to 2,100 new jobs.

Nearly 50 restaurants and drink-focused spots opened in Greater Baltimore in the first three quarters of 2023, with more planned to come by next year. In an industry still rebounding from the lingering impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic, Greater Baltimore continues to add new dining options for customers. At least 47 have opened this year, with a handful still expected to debut. Many of the new spots come from new restaurant owners trying their luck in the industry for the first time, while others come from restaurant veterans who are expanding their concepts or adding new ventures to the mix.

A global transportation company has moved its headquarters to downtown Frederick and is involved in the historic preservation of the building it bought. Transportation Management Services (TMS) purchased a roughly century-old building at 46 S. Market St., on the south bank of Carroll Creek, for $1.35 million. The building has been vacant for more than four decades.

With about $6.5 billion in new investment headed to Baltimore by 2028, plans to revamp the city’s image in the coming few years need to “go big,” veteran developer Bill Struever said on Monday. Struever’s charge was issued during a nearly four-hour forum that drew dozens of local stakeholders to debate and detail ongoing projects they say will help reinvent Baltimore and spark a transformation for generations to come.

The benefits and risks of artificial intelligence took center stage during a panel discussion at a regional technology forum last week at Anne Arundel Community College in Arnold, Maryland. During the Maryland Tech Council Chesapeake Regional Chapter’s Emerging Industries Forum on Wednesday, panelists expressed bullish enthusiasm on how AI might become a new powerful economic engine for our region. But there was also a great deal of concern about the nature of the technology itself.

Gino Palma’s longtime dream to open a restaurant in Baltimore will soon come true. The owner of Facci Ristorante, which has locations at the Maple Lawn development in Fulton and Ellicott City’s Turf Valley, signed a lease last week at 414 Light St. for a third location, with plans to open next year. The Italian restaurant will replace the shuttered vegan eateries from California chef Matthew Kenney, Double Zero and Liora, which closed earlier this year.

John Varvatos walked into a conference room at Under Armour’s new Baltimore Peninsula offices last week sporting a very simple black hoodie. The new chief design officer for the sportswear maker had the hoodie created after seeing some of Under Armour’s new performance fabric. Though the hoodie is plain with no logos or other markings, it quickly became the most wanted product in the halls of the company.

Media company Sinclair may be best known for its empire of television stations and local news programming across the United States, its founders’ conservative bent and its recent failed foray into regional sports network ownership. Now, officials say the Hunt Valley-based company’s future will become more tied to industries outside broadcast. Instead of buying more television stations, the company is shifting its investment strategy to acquire growing, nonbroadcast businesses, Sinclair President and CEO Chris Ripley said in a recent interview.