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Wireless venture LightSquared Inc., emerging from bankruptcy, asked U.S. regulators to clear the way for its renewed quest to set up a mobile broadband service covering the U.S., Bloomberg News reported yesterday. Regulators should transfer airwaves licenses to the entity to be known as New LightSquared, a company subsidiary said in an April 6 filing posted yesterday on the website of the Federal Communications Commission. LightSquared last month won U.S. court permission to exit bankruptcy protection, where it has been stalled since 2012 when regulators said its wireless broadband service would interfere with GPS global-positioning navigation technology. The new company will have $1.25 billion in operating funds to help “make full use of its spectrum to provide existing and innovative services,” according to the FCC filing.

EveryWare Global Inc, a marketer of cookware and tabletop products, filed for chapter 11 protection, Reuters reported yesterday. The company listed assets of $100 million to $500 million and liabilities of $500 million to $1 billion in its petition in bankruptcy court. Earlier this month, EveryWare said it expected to file for a pre-packaged bankruptcy that would give its lenders control of the company after it emerges from bankruptcy within 60-75 days. The company said its secured lenders would own 96 percent of common stock and it would no longer trade publicly after emerging from bankruptcy. EveryWare which was formed through the merger of Anchor Hocking LLC and Oneida Ltd. in March 2012, markets and distributes products such as bakeware, storageware and cookware in the United States, Canada, Mexico and Asia.

A bankruptcy court issued an order denying the ad hoc group of NII Capital 2021’s noteholders' motion for an order directing NII Holdings to participate in mediation, BankruptcyData.com reported today. The noteholders had argued in their mediation motion that the debtors were holding companies, “and as such, a hypothetical chapter 7 liquidation of the debtors would permit going-concern sales of the debtors' equity in their nondebtor subsidiaries that hold valuable businesses.” 

Fresh Produce Sportswear LLC, a women's clothing retailer based in Boulder, Colo., has filed for chapter 11 protection in the face of what its founder called "significant and material financial challenges,” the Denver Business Journal reported today. Fresh Produce has 27 company stores across the country, but the majority of its locations are in Florida. According to the bankruptcy filing, the company's creditors are Wells Fargo Bank and Irvine, California-based Realty Associates Fund V LLC. These two creditors hold $3.98 million in Fresh Produce's debt, stemming from a bank loan and commercial rent.

Xinergy Ltd., a U.S. producer of metallurgical and thermal coal, announced that the company and 25 of its subsidiaries filed for chapter 11 protection yesterday, Nasdaq.com reported. The company stated that it will operate its businesses and continue customer shipments without interruption during the reorganization. Xinergy will continue to pay its employees in the normal course and also filed a motion with the court seeking to honor its pre-petition employee obligations.

A New Jersey-based company with a history of trying to revive struggling businesses has acquired the SkyMall catalog out of bankruptcy, the Los Angeles Times reported on Saturday. C&A Marketing, which makes and distributes photographic and electronic equipment, purchased SkyMall at a bankruptcy auction in Phoenix on Wednesday for $1.9 million. C&A also purchased Ritz Camera & Image out of bankruptcy two years ago and purchased the licensing rights for Polaroid still cameras after it came out of bankruptcy in 2008. C&A Executive Vice President Chaim Pikarski said that SkyMall was the victim of advances in technology that allowed airline passengers to shop online, making a catalog that was stuffed in nearly every airline seat back pocket "less relevant and more entertaining." C&A promised to save SkyMall but offered few details.

Patriot Coal Corp. said on Friday that Bennett K. Hatfield has resigned as the coal company’s chief executive, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. Robert W. Bennett, Patriot’s marketing chief since 2009, has been named his successor. Bennett is an industry veteran who has also held senior-level positions at Peabody Energy Corp. and Magnum Coal. Patriot Coal mines for coal throughout Appalachia and emerged from bankruptcy in late 2013. Patriot filed for bankruptcy protection in July 2012 to get a grip on its $3 billion in liabilities, much of which is tied to the company’s environmental and legacy labor obligations. Its bankruptcy-exit plan contained two settlements with Arch Coal Inc. and Peabody, which spun off the mining units that came to comprise Patriot.

Citing what he said was “major progress” in the Freedom Industries bankruptcy, a federal judge on Friday called off a hearing he had scheduled to force Freedom management to explain why key aspects of the case were stalled, the Charleston (W.V.) Gazette reported on Saturday. Bankruptcy Judge Ronald Pearson had scheduled a “show cause” hearing for Freedom for next week, saying that he wanted the company’s lawyers and its chief restructuring officer, Mark Welch, to explain why the case should continue down its current path, rather than being transferred to a more traditional liquidation through chapter 7. In a two-page order, Judge Pearson noted that the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection had accepted Freedom into the state’s more flexible “voluntary” toxic-cleanup program and that DEP lawyers had reported in a motion filed on Thursday that the company and the agency had reached an agreement on a cleanup timeline. “This fact is indicative of major progress toward bringing this case towards conclusion,” the judge wrote. Judge Pearson said that the development also indicates that Freedom officials “may not be in a position to fully outline the steps and costs in an environmental remediation plan” by the scheduled hearing date of April 8.

While RadioShack may be a shadow of its former self, Standard General, whose lender takeover of about 1,700 of RadioShack’s 4,000 stores won court approval last Tuesday, does not see it that way, the New York Times reported today. “We always believed that when you stripped away its relatively heavy cost structure, and some of the legacy ways they did business, there actually was a core here that was worth saving,” said Soohyung Kim of Standard General. Many in the industry are skeptical. “In the consumer’s mind, RadioShack is a name that has come and gone,” said Craig R. Johnson, founder of retail consulting company Customer Growth Partners in New Canaan, Conn. “What’s its reason for being? What consumer problem are they solving?” That is a question that RadioShack, the 94-year-old electronics chain, has tried to answer for years as the digital revolution sapped demand for its staples and its stores tracked a slow decline. In February, it filed for bankruptcy protection, buckling in the face of bigger rivals and online competition. RadioShack’s biggest creditor, Salus Capital Partners, pushed a plan that would probably have liquidated the retailer, prompting a showdown in bankruptcy court. But Standard General’s bid, and its promise to save some 7,500 jobs, prevailed.

The U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Texas yesterday confirmed a joint reorganization plan for Falcon Steel Co. and its affiliates, according to a press release. The confirmation hearing, held on March 30, declared Falcon Steel officially out of bankruptcy and gives management court approval to proceed according to its proposed plan. Throughout the restructuring process, Falcon Steel has continued to operate as normal. Since the chapter 11 filing was about covenants and not the company's ability to pay, its day-to-day operations were never compromised, said Falcon Steel CEO Jim Taylor.