Business briefs

Hybrid sales on record pace

DETROIT -- Hybrid vehicles are on track to achieve record U.S. sales this year. An estimated 187,000 hybrids were sold in the first six months of 2007, or 2.3 percent of all new vehicle sales, J.D. Power and Associates said Thursday. J.D. Power forecasts total sales of 345,000 hybrids for 2007, a 35 percent increase from 2006 when the current record of 256,000 hybrids were sold. The Toyota Prius continues to be the best-selling hybrid model, accounting for just more than half of all hybrids sold.

United's LA-China route a benefit

LOS ANGELES -- The city of Los Angeles projects that if awarded, a daily, nonstop United Airlines flight from Los Angeles-to-Shanghai could contribute $647 million annually for the region's economy, including $164 million in wages and 3,120 direct and indirect jobs. While the demand for flights to China is increasing, Los Angeles remains the largest metropolitan area in the country without nonstop service to China from a U.S. carrier.

Mixed ruling made in TiVo dispute

WASHINGTON -- TiVo Inc., a pioneer in digital-video recording, lost part and won part of a regulatory review of its DVR patent that's at the center of its lawsuit against EchoStar Communications Corp. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office rejected aspects of the patent that covered hardware for recording television shows, while upholding parts that cover software to run the system. The decision is subject to review by a board within the agency.

Yahoo to add jobs in Illinois

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- Yahoo Inc. plans to open an engineering center in Champaign next month, one of its largest offices in the Midwest with about 100 employees, an executive from the search engine company said Thursday. Most of the center's employees will be engineers, and there's an "extremely high" probability Yahoo will add more before the end of the year, the Sunnyvale, Calif.-based company said.