President Barack Obama hosted the chief executives of Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ), Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT), Nucor Corp. (NUE) and Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) for lunch at the White House Friday, the administration said in a statement.

The 75-minute lunch, which the White House announced late Thursday without identifying the president's guests, is part of the administration's effort to reach out to the business community, and follows a series of other meetings between officials and executives.

In a statement released after the meeting, the White House said the five men discussed the state of the U.S. economy, health-care reform and energy.

"The president and his economic team look forward to continuing to hold informal meetings with members of the business community to seek their input," the White House said.

Last month, Obama had lunch with the CEOs of Honeywell International Inc. (HON), Coca-Cola Co. (KO), Xerox Corp. (XRX) and AT&T Inc. (T).

The guests at Friday's luncheon were Ivan Seidenberg, CEO of Verizon and chairman of the Business Roundtable, Mike Duke, CEO of Wal-Mart, Dan DiMicco, CEO of Nucor, and Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks.

The executives left the White House without speaking to reporters.

-By Henry J. Pulizzi, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-9256; henry.pulizzi@dowjones.com