Business news in brief

The University City Science Center, a 51-year-old business incubator in West Philadelphia, has received a $1 million grant from the U.S. Economic Development Administration for a new program to help start-ups get to commercialization. Phase 1 Ventures will vet technologies that have moved beyond initial proof-of-concept stage, provide management and other project-development resources, and help arrange financing. It will draw on the participation of a range of experts - in science and technology, academia and industry - as well as involve entrepreneurs and venture capitalists. - Diane Mastrull

Shares of Philadelphia-based Urban Outfitters Inc. plunged as much as 18 percent in late trading after the retailer said a sales slump had persisted in the third quarter. Sales that have been lower than expected may put more pressure on gross margin than in the first half of the year, which could affect quarterly earnings, the company said. Urban Outfitters has posted two straight quarters of shrinking earnings, though sales have continued to grow for its brands Anthropologie and Free People. Shares, already down 6.8 percent this year through Thursday's close, dipped as low as $28.50 in extended trading. - Bloomberg News

Sunoco Logistics said Thursday that it continues to work with local, state, and federal agencies on containment and recovery at the site of a crude-oil pipeline release in Caddo Parish, La. Spokesman Jeff Shields said crews have built two underflow dams, where oil can be collected on the surface while water flows underneath, along the Miller branch of the Tete Bayou, with containment boom and absorbent boom placed throughout. Caddo Lake has not been affected, he said, and about 1,400 barrels (58,800 gallons) of crude oil have been recovered. The total amount of crude released is still undetermined, he said. The release was discovered Monday. - Inquirer staff

Health-care providers will be getting $200 million from Pennsylvania in a settlement announced Thursday. The Corbett administration said the state would pay $139 million in refunds to cut what providers must pay into the Medical Care Availability and Reduction of Error Fund by $61 million through a revised formula. Groups that represent doctors and hospitals sued in 2009 after the state transferred $100 million from the so-called Mcare Fund to the state's general fund to help balance the budget. The groups argued they were being overcharged, allowing the state to accumulate a large surplus in the fund. Hospital and Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania president Andy Carter hailed the agreement. The other parties were the Pennsylvania Medical Society and the Pennsylvania Podiatric Medical Association. - AP

Houston-based driller Southwestern Energy Co. has signed a $5.37 billion deal with Oklahoma City-based Chesapeake Energy Corp. to acquire 413,000 net acres in West Virginia and southwestern Pennsylvania targeting natural gas, natural-gas liquids, and crude oil contained in the Upper Devonian, Marcellus, and Utica Shales. The assets include about 1,500 wells along with related property, plants, and equipment. The deal is expected to close by the end of 2014. - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

St. Louis Fed president James Bullard told Bloomberg TV that the Federal Reserve should consider putting off its planned wind-down of bond purchases in October. Currently, the Fed's monthly bond purchases are $15 billion. In its Sept. 17 policy statement, the Federal Open Market Committee said the bond purchases would end at the October meeting if expectations for improvements in the labor market and inflation continued to be met. "Inflation expectations are declining in the U.S.," Bullard said. "That's an important consideration for a central bank. And for that reason I think that a logical policy response at this juncture may be to delay the end" of quantitative easing. - Inquirer wire services

Athena Capital Research will pay a $1 million penalty in what federal regulators say is the first case of market manipulation brought against a high-speed trading firm. The Securities and Exchange Commission also censured Athena, which it said used a trading algorithm code-named "Gravy" to manipulate the closing prices of thousands of stocks on the Nasdaq market and boost its profits. Athena placed a large number of rapid trades in the final two seconds of nearly every trading day between June and December 2009, the SEC said. - AP

Chiquita Brands International Inc. rejected a sweetened takeover offer from Brazil's Cutrale Group and Safra Group, and said it would proceed with its proposed purchase of rival banana producer Fyffes P.L.C. The Fyffes deal, announced in March, would create the world's largest banana company and cut Chiquita's tax bill by enabling it to move its headquarters to Ireland. Cutrale-Safra's offer of $14 a share, raised from $13, is "inadequate," Charlotte, N.C.-based Chiquita said. - Bloomberg News