Restaurant

Washington, D.C. -- Retail Properties of America, Inc., has it closed on its $162.8-million acquisition of the retail portion of Downtown Crown, a class A mixed-use project located in Gaithersburg, Maryland (Washington, D.C. MSA). RPAI acquired the project from The JBG Companies and JBGR Retail.

St. Paul, Minn. -- Paster Properties announced that Northway Center is undergoing major interior and exterior renovations, scheduled to be completed summer 2015. The 92,197-sq.-ft. center is located in Lexington, Minnesota.

New York -- TGI Fridays Inc., in partnership with Microsoft Corp., is upping its guests’ experience by equipping servers with eight-inch tablets on which they can process orders and payments while at the table and respond promptly to requests. The chain has completed a six-city pilot in Texas and Minnesota, and plans to deploy the tablets in 80 additional restaurants, with more than 2,000 tablets in place by March.

Oak Brook, Ill. - McDonald’s USA is turning to digital menu boards for improved merchandising at more than 14,000 stores. AT&T has collaborated with Stratacache and LG Electronics to provide a completely integrated digital menu board solution.

Dallas -- Corner Bakery Café has named Salil Bapat as CFO, effective immediately. Bapat previously was CFO for YUM Brands' Latin America and Caribbean region.

Canton, Mass. -- Dunkin' Brands Group, the parent company of Dunkin' Donuts and Baskin-Robbins, announced that in 2014 its U.S. franchisees opened a total of 422 net new Dunkin' Donuts and Baskin-Robbins.

Denver -- Sandwich quick-serve chain Quizno’s has named Doug Pendergast as its new president and CEO, succeeding Stuart Mathis, who resigned the company.

Pendergast joins Quizno’s from The Krystal Co., where he was president and CEO; he also has held senior executive positions with Craftworks, Church’s Chicken and AFC Enterprises.

New York -- At the National Retail Federation’s Annual Convention & EXPO on Monday, Microsoft Corp. and CKE Restaurants Inc. (parent company of Hardee’s and Carl’s Jr.) showcased a self-order kiosk solution running on Windows 8 devices that enables Hardee’s customers to customize and place their own orders.