Health care workers with the Service Employees International Union – United Health Workers West staged a protest at Kaiser Permanente’s Woodland Hills location on Feb. 22 in response to the company’s purported plans for layoffs at its local call center. “We’re out here today for our patients here and to help our co-workers keep our jobs,” Danielle Gabison, a 15-year employee of Kaiser’s Woodland Hills call center, told the Business Journal. The single parent of two, including a four-year-old who requires monthly medical treatments, is concerned that she would not be able to afford health insurance if she lost her job. Between 250 and 300 Kaiser employees and supporters came out to the protest, which was one of 32 taking place across California through mid-March. The picketers’ goal is to raise awareness of job and wage cuts at Kaiser’s facilities, which the union claimed it learned of in November during a meeting with the company. The purported layoffs are slated for the next two to four years and include 160 jobs in Woodland Hills along with 81 pharmacy warehouse positions in North Hollywood, the union said. The positions allegedly will be relocated to San Diego and Orange County, where workers will be paid $2 an hour less, according to the union. Kaiser denied any definite job or wage cuts, calling the union’s allegations “simply not true.” The Oakland-based health care system, which operates dozens of hospitals throughout the state, has made no official announcements about either layoffs or wage cuts. “(The union’s) decision to stage picketing and make misleading and inaccurate statements about Kaiser Permanente is uncalled for and counterproductive,” Kaiser said in a statement. “If the union’s leadership is truly interested in working constructively and as a partner, as they claim, they should reconsider this path.” Kaiser is exploring new technology to streamline its appointment booking process, the company said. It was not clear how such developments would affect employees; Kaiser declined to comment further on the implications for jobs but said in its statement that it would communicate any changes “transparently and thoughtfully.” Kaiser’s contract with the union – which represents more than 1,800 employees at the company’s Woodland Hills location – is set to expire on Sept. 30. ImmunoCellular Seeks Sale After a rocky 2017, ImmunoCellular Therapeutics Ltd. in Calabasas is on the hunt for a buyer. The biotech announced Feb. 22 that it had retained Miami-based investment bank Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc. to explore “strategic opportunities” for the company, which could include a merger or a sale. “We have been successful … in strengthening our financial condition,” Chief Executive Anthony Gringeri said in a statement. “Our goal is to work with our experienced advisor to determine appropriate strategies to identify the best potential opportunities for creating stockholder value.” ImmunoCellular has not yet developed a viable product. The company, which was formed in 2006 and went public in 2012, has for years been attempting to develop vaccines for brain and ovarian cancer along with technology that would grow cancer-fighting immune cells from stem cells. It has reported losses for nearly every quarter since its initial public offering, and was notified in July that it was at risk of being delisted from the New York Stock Exchange. The company announced in August that the exchange had accepted its plan for regaining compliance. The firm’s struggles were amplified last May, when it became a target of multiple investor lawsuits after the Securities and Exchange Commission launched an investigation into the affairs of former Chief Executive Manish Singh for alleged shareholder fraud. Singh – who resigned from ImmunoCellular in 2012 – was accused of conducting illegal stock promotion schemes that involved the publication of “puff pieces” touting ImmunoCellular’s product candidates, including its brain cancer vaccine. Singh also was purportedly running a similar scheme with Lion Biotechnologies – now Iovance Biotherapeutics – in Santa Clara. ImmunoCellular and Singh later settled with the SEC, with Singh paying nearly $3 million in penalties. ImmunoCellular filed a motion in November for the dismissal of investors’ proposed class action lawsuit against the company, saying the articles about its product candidates and the SEC’s investigation of Singh were not to blame for losses incurred by investors. ImmunoCellular closed out 2017 with around $6.6 million in cash after exercising nearly $8 million of $9 million in stock warrants. Staff Reporter Helen Floersh can be reached at (818) 316-3121 or [email protected].