Also

* Northrop Grumman Corp. said shareholders approved its plan to triple the amount of company stock available to compensate senior executives. Northrop said the move was needed because acquisitions, including TRW Inc. in December, have boosted the number of people eligible for the program.

* Blackstone Group, Thomas H. Lee Partners and Texas Pacific Group are in talks with Bombardier Inc. to buy its Ski-Doo snowmobile business for about $960 million, people familiar with the situation said.

* A new station wagon, DaimlerChrysler’s Chrysler Pacifica, and Ford Motor Co.’s 2003 Lincoln Town Car luxury sedan received the best safety ratings in the latest round of U.S. crash tests.

* National Semiconductor Corp. of Santa Clara, Calif., said it would eliminate about 340 jobs by closing a cell phone semiconductor business the company had planned to sell.

* Western Digital Corp., the Lake Forest computer disk-drive maker, said company executives and directors sold a record $14.6 million in stock from April 28 to May 14.

* San Diego-based retailer Petco Animal Supplies Inc. reported first-quarter net loss of $29.7 million, or 57 cents a share, compared with $8.7 million, or 15 cents, a year earlier. Sales rose 10% to $384.7 million.