COMPANY TOWN ANNEX

Loews Hired to Build Hotels at Universal Studios Florida: MCA Inc. said the New York-based chain will develop two luxury hotels as part of a $2-billion effort to turn its Universal Studios theme park into a sprawling resort. Universal City-based MCA said it hopes the hotels would put some heat on Walt Disney Co., which controls the high-end hotel market in Orlando, Fla. Loews said one hotel, called Portofino Bay Resort, will have a Mediterranean fishing village theme and will open in 1999; the other scheduled hotel is the Royal Bali. The hotels will be linked to Universal City, the new name of the complex, by a series of rivers and canals that will have ferries and trams to move people from one venue to another.