Financial thoughts

Driven by growth in insurance services, outpatient medical care and physician services, operating income rose 13 percent or $130 million for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center for the six-month period ending December 31, the hospital network announced on Friday.

During the same period, operating revenue rose $216 million to $4.062 billion for a 5.6 percent increase, while the operating margin for the health insurance and medical giant improved to 3.2 percent from 3 percent.

The system’s earnings before interest, depreciation and amortization were $326 million for the first half of the fiscal year, up from $292 million for the same period a year ago and on target to exceed $600 million for fiscal 2010.

The results were released during a difficult period for health care providers and as UPMC’s cost of providing free care and contributions to the community rise, said CFO Robert DeMichiei. UPMC’s cost of charity care rose 16 percent to $518 million from 2007 to 2008, the most recent period data were available.

Key metrics for the six-month period include insurance services, up 8 percent to more than 1.4 million members; outpatient revenue, up 5 percent; and physician services, up 11 percent. During the same period, UPMC’s $3 billion investment portfolio gained $228 million, for a return of 11.8 percent, said Treasurer C. Talbot Heppenstall. UPMC reported a loss of $786 million for the same period a year ago.

Separately, UPMC’s pending $1.175 billion bond refinancing will be used to substitute fixed for variable rate debt and lower interest costs, Heppenstall said. Allegheny County Councilman Charles McCullough has been in court seeking to stop the refinancing because of UPMC’s decision to close Braddock Hospital Jan. 31, but Heppenstall predicted the litigation would not be a factor.

The biggest challenges may be ahead for UPMC and other hospitals, according to Moody’s Investors Service.

In a report released last month, Moody’s maintained its negative outlook for the nonprofit health care industry overall. The outlook was revised to negative from stable in Nov. 2008 based on credit market problems.

“Over the next 12 to 18 months, we believe the relative abilities of different not-for-profit hospital management and governance teams will become more apparent as they face one of the toughest environments in decades,” the report stated.

Source

Get help finding the best life insurance rates on the internet. Comparison shop for rates online and choose the best insurance for you.

As Toyota’s gas pedal recall expands into Europe, the carmaker says it has a fix for cars there and that one will be coming soon to drivers in the United States.

A Toyota spokesman has said that the carmaker is very close to announcing a solution to the issue for cars here in the U.S.

Toyota still needs to get regulatory approval for a proposed repair in the U.S. and in Europe before a fix can be made.

The recall is to correct a problem that could cause the gas pedal, as it ages and becomes worn, to stick partway down under certain circumstances. Toyota recalled 2.3 million vehicles in the U.S. for this problem this week, although no repair procedure had yet been put in place.

The European recall involves eight different models, several of them not sold here. The precise number of vehicles involved in that recall is still under investigation but it could be as many as 1.8 million, Toyota said in a statement.

The gas pedal recall is separate from an earlier one, begun in November to fix a problem in which the gas pedal can become caught on the edge of the removable floormat.

The floormat recall was recently expanded so that it now covers a total of 5.3 million vehicles.

In many cases, the same vehicles are involved in both recalls. It was not immediately clear how many different vehicles, in total, are part of the two actions. 

Source

Looking for health insurance? Find a variety of affordable medical insurance plans.

AWARDS

Communications and marketing agency Brighton won first place in the National Agri-Marketing Association’s Gateway Region competition for its work developing cottoncommunity.com, a social marketing site for cotton farmers.

Law firm Stinson Morrison Hecker LLP received the Legal Employer Diversity Recognition Award from the Black Law Students Association at Washington University.

EXPANDING
Maryland Heights-based Tagg Logistics is opening a new office in Reno, Nev., for distribution and packaging services.

Overland-based Clayco Inc., a real estate development, design and construction company, is opening a full service office in the Minneapolis area this year.

HELPING OUT

Ford Motor Co. and local Ford dealers raised $38,140 for St. Louis area schools through the "Drive One 4 UR School" program.

The Moneta Group Charitable Foundation donated $42,500 to area charities during 2009, bringing its total charitable donations during the past decade to more than $700,000.

St. Louis-based law firm Armstrong Teasdale LLP gave $2,878 to the American Red Cross after a "dress down" fundraising event.

OPENINGS

The Moore Law Firm LLC opened an office.

— 1001 Boardwalk Springs Place

Suite 111

O’Fallon, Mo. 63368

Phone: 636-887-5297

PROJECTS

Belleville-based Holland Construction Services Inc. is building a major expansion of Eckert’s Country Store and Restaurant in Belleville. The $5 million project, scheduled for completion later this year, will include a new store, an expansion of the Eckert’s Country Restaurant, more parking and a new outdoor plaza.

Edwardsville-based Contegra Construction Co. has completed a 42,500-square-foot, $2.5 million John Deere dealership in Scott City, Mo., for Wm. Nobbe and Co..

RECOGNITION

Don Downing, a principal in Gray, Ritter & Graham PC, was selected as a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation.

The Media Financial Management Association named Larry Rubin, partner-in-charge of Clayton-based RubinBrown’s media and entertainment services group, one of its People to Watch for 2010.

St. Louis-based Energizer Holdings Inc. and its partner Universal Power Group Inc. received Popular Mechanics magazine’s 2010 Editor’s Choice Award for the new Energizer All-in-One Auto Charger.

Source

No faxing fast cash advance gets you cash fast and easily.

DETROIT—General Motors Co. chairman and CEO Ed Whitacre Jr., who said Monday he’ll stay on as head of the automaker for the time being, has reaffirmed that GM will repay in full the loans it got from the U.S. and Canadian governments by June.

Whitacre said GM’s board asked him last week to take on the position of chief executive permanently, ending a seven-week search for a new CEO.

“The board looked at the potential candidates and decided this place needs stability. We don’t need any more uncertainty,” Whitacre told reporters at a hastily called news conference at GM’s Detroit headquarters.

Whitacre also said GM will repay its $8.1 billion (U.S.) in loans from the U.S., Canadian and Ontario governments all at once and could pay them even earlier than June. The automaker owes $1.4 billion to the Canadian and Ontario governments, and has so far repaid $192 million.

Whitacre, 68, is a former CEO of telecommunications giant AT&T Inc.

He has been serving as interim CEO at GM since the board ousted former chief executive Fritz Henderson on Dec. 1. GM had hired a firm to conduct a global search for a successor.

Although GM had hired the search firm, there were strong signs that Whitacre would take the job permanently, or at least serve as CEO until the company is on solid enough ground to sell stock to the public in an effort to repay its government loans.

Whitacre wouldn’t name any candidates the board had considered. He said he intends to stay two or three years, or “long enough to get it done.”

Whitacre said he hadn’t planned to become CEO when he was named chairman, but feels comfortable at the company and knows what changes need to be made.

“I think this company is good for America. I think America needs this,” he said.

Whitacre often says in a folksy Texas drawl that he knows little about cars. But he’s already shaken up the company by hiring a new chief financial officer and transferring the old one to China, firing the Chevrolet and Buick-GMC brand managers, combining sales and marketing and consolidating control of GM’s core North American market under one executive no fax payday loans.

He also seems impatient to spur the plodding culture of GM, where decision by committee, an isolated upper management and fear of risk produced mediocre cars for years. He wants to increase GM’s sales and market share while shifting the company’s focus to cars from trucks.

Whitacre also confirmed Monday that Dutch luxury car maker Spyker Cars NV is still in talks with GM to buy its ailing Saab brand, but no deal has been reached.

Whitacre said GM is in “advanced talks” with Spyker but continues to wind down Saab’s operations.

“We do not have a deal to announce this morning,” he said.

GM spokesman Chris Preuss in Detroit would not say if the company is close to a deal with Spyker.

GM and Spyker negotiated through the weekend trying to work out a deal to save Saab, which GM has decided to jettison as part of its restructuring plan to focus on four core brands: Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick and GMC.

Swedish media reported that a deal was close, but Preuss said nothing had been finalized as of Monday afternoon in Sweden.

A deal for Spyker to buy Saab by itself is unlikely: Spyker sold 23 cars in the first half of 2009, its most recent reporting period, and it posted a net loss of 8.7 million euros. The six-year-old company has yet to make a profit, but it says funding for its operations has been guaranteed through 2010.

Money for a deal to buy Saab could come from Spyker’s largest shareholder, Russia’s Conversbank Financial Group, or other shareholders. It would also likely involve a large loan from the European Investment Bank, backed by the government of Sweden.

Saab Automobile sold around 90,000 cars in 2008, a 30 per cent decline from 2007. With another sharp sales decline expected, it filed for protection from creditors while it reorganized in February 2009. GM said at the time it expected to sell Saab and take $1 billion in losses.

GM filed for bankruptcy itself in June. Its attempts to sell Saab by a Dec. 31 deadline failed.

Source

Solve your money worries and apply for a faxless payday loan today!

Starting Thursday, investors will be able to bet on famed investor Warren Buffett’s company without breaking the bank.

Shareholders of Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway (BRKA, Fortune 500) met Wednesday to approve a stock split covering one class of Berkshire shares. Effective Thursday morning, the split will cut the price of these shares to around $66 each, from a recent $3,300.

The move, which was approved last year by Berkshire’s board, could attract some new investors by eliminating the sticker shock long associated with Berkshire shares.

It could also, some observers have suggested, pave the way for Berkshire to join the S&P 500 since it would increase the amount of shares outstanding. The people in charge of maintaining the S&P 500 have typically been wary of adding stocks with low levels of liquidity.

Berkshire has two classes of stock: Class A shares that recently traded for around $101,700 each, and the Class B (BRKB) shares that are to be split 50-for-1. The Class A shares won’t be affected by Wednesday’s vote.

Berkshire asked shareholders to approve the split so it could offer Berkshire shares to all investors in Burlington Northern (BNI, Fortune 500), the railway company Berkshire agreed in November to acquire in a deal valued at $34 billion in cash and stock. The deal is scheduled to close early this year.

Splitting the Class B shares will make it cheaper for investors to take Buffett’s side in the Burlington bet, which he called an "all-in wager on the economic future of the United States."

The split would mark the second time in the company’s 45 years under Buffett that it has made some of its shares more affordable.

In 1996, Berkshire sold the cheaper Class B shares to the public for the first time fast cash. The company said it made the move in response to the plans of some investment companies to sell products that would let investors invest in Berkshire without paying the full price of a Class A share, then around $35,000.

At the time, the value of the Class B shares was fixed at 1/30th of a Class A share. That will change to 1/1,500th with Wednesday’s vote. Class B shares also carry reduced voting rights and can’t be converted into Class A shares.

Buffett warned in his 1996 letter to shareholders that the proposed "Berkshire look-alikes" from other investment firms would have tried to "entice naive small investors and would have charged these innocents high fees and commissions."

Buffett said that the 1996 offering, which raised $565 million for Berkshire, was "generally successful" in drawing in shareholders who would hold the stock for the long term. He said it added about 40,000 shareholders to Berkshire’s rolls.

Trading in the Class B shares was light initially, with daily volume rarely rising above a few thousand shares through 1997 — a fraction of the trading in the more expensive Class A shares.

But as Berkshire began using the Class B shares for acquisitions in the late 1990s, trading picked up. Average daily trading volume in the Class B stock has exceeded a million shares in every month since December 2005. Trading in the pricier Class A shares, by contrast, has only rarely exceeded 300,000 shares. 

Source

Fast and Secure application for cash advance lenders and payday loans. We offer cash advance loans with a low cost guarantee.

Think recessions spur laid-off workers to launch new ventures? Think again.

A study released this week by the Kauffmann Foundation found that the number of new businesses incorporated annually in the U.S. has remained remarkably consistent over the years.

"We have a surprisingly steady supply of new firms, despite frequent and sometimes sharp changes in economic conditions," the study’s authors concluded. "No matter which data set one examines, any given year’s total of new companies is consistent with other years, with annual numbers fluctuating only mildly."

Researchers Dane Stangler and Paul Kedrosky crunched data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Small Business Administration and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, covering 1977 through March 2009. About 600,000 new businesses were formed each year during that 30-year period. The data includes formally established new enterprises as well as new franchise locations and other outposts of existing companies.

For more than a year, the potential for startup growth has been promoted as the silver lining of the recession.

The conventional wisdom goes that as people lose their jobs, they are inspired to launch that innovative little company that’s been percolating in the back of their minds for years.

Recessions also lower the cost of entry for new companies and make customers more willing to explore less-expensive alternatives to current products or services they’re using, said Rhonda Abrams, founder of entrepreneurial consulting firm The Planning Shop.

"I liken a recession to a forest fire — it can be devastating, but can clear out weak and old growth," Abrams said. "Small upstart companies have a chance to get a hold better when their competitors are weakened."

But Kaufmann researcher Stangler said there just isn’t data to back up that kind of ‘hopeful thinking."

"It’s not that the reasons behind that thinking are bad, it’s just that from the evidence, we don’t expect there to be a huge increase in the amount of startups or a decrease during this recession," he said. The Kaufmann Foundation, based in Kansas City, Mo., is a nonprofit organization focused on entrepreneurship research and advancement.

To check their findings from the last three decades, Stangler and Kedrosky went back even further, to census reports from the 1940s and 1950s. There, they found remarkably similar results. Only one year — 1946 — had a noticeable startup spike, a result the researchers attribute to the effects of the end of World War II and a flood of returning war veterans.

What’s behind the consistency in startup launches? Stangler said two findings stood out: Even in down times, the U.S. has a fairly stable and consistent economy. Also, the number of working-age adults in the workforce fluctuates little.

But just because there’s no data to prove that economic turmoil spurs business growth doesn’t mean recession-era entrepreneurs should be disheartened, Abrams said. Citing her own research, she notes that the majority of current Fortune 500 companies were started during tough economic times.

The Kauffman Foundation has similar findings: More than half of 2009’s Fortune 500 companies launched in bear markets, it reported in June.

"Even if the numbers of new companies are consistent, you have a better chance at being a big success if you form during a recession or a depression than in good times," Abrams said.

She also believes that when the dust has cleared, this recession will have spurred more new businesses than past downturns because the percentage of those who are unemployed will remain persistently high.

"More people will turn to consulting and other kinds of low-cost-of-entry businesses to tide them over," Abrams said. 

Source

Get up to $1500 with an fast cash loans in less than 1 hour - 100% online.

Federal Reserve officials are more confident the U.S. economy is moving toward self-sustaining growth, giving urgency to discussions about the tactics and timing of an exit from record-low interest rates.

Kansas City Fed Bank President Thomas Hoenig said Jan. 11 the central bank should end purchases of mortgage-backed securities because the market is “healing.” Philadelphia Fed Bank President Charles Plosser said the next day that the recovery is “sustainable even as the fiscal and monetary stimulus programs eventually wind down.”

Policy makers are still studying ways to drain $1 trillion in excess cash from the financial system and debating how to signal a rate increase that economists say is at least 10 months away. The first test of their exit strategy will come in March, when the Fed’s purchases of $1.25 trillion of mortgage-backed securities are scheduled to end.

“They’ll tell themselves the unusual support is no longer necessary, the recovery is self-sustaining,” said Vincent Reinhart, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington who served as director of the Fed’s Division of Monetary Affairs under Chairman Ben S. Bernanke. “Deep down, they probably also believe they have the option of starting up again.”

A government report yesterday showed business inventories rose more than forecast in November as companies tried to keep up with a jump in sales. Fed officials are watching to see if inventory restocking sparks gains in jobs and incomes that will boost spending, leading to further increases in hiring.

Rate Forecast

The Fed will keep its target for overnight lending among banks unchanged through September and raise it by half a point in the fourth quarter, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey of economists. Policy makers, who have kept the benchmark rate near zero since December 2008, next meet Jan. 26-27.

The world’s largest economy will expand 2.7 percent this year, the best performance in four years, the Bloomberg survey showed. Consumer purchases will grow 2 percent, up from a December estimate of 1.8 percent and the first gain since 2007, according to the median forecast of 60 economists.

Macroeconomic Advisors LLC, a St. Louis-based forecasting firm, says the economy probably expanded at a 5.5 percent annual pace in the fourth quarter, the fastest in more than five years.

Demand will be partly driven by business investment and exports, their forecast shows. Consumption should be supported by household wealth as stocks climb and housing prices steady. The Standard and Poor’s 500 Index is up 36 percent over the past year.

Consumer Spending

“The drag on consumer spending from rapid declines in wealth has gone away,” said Ben Herzon, an economist at Macroeconomic Advisers. “Demand will pick up.”

Reports today indicated the recovery is being sustained into 2010 without generating inflation. Industrial production climbed 0.6 percent in December, the sixth straight increase, the Fed said. Consumer prices rose 0.1 percent last month, less than forecast by economists, according to the Labor Department.

The Fed’s Beige Book business survey released Jan. 13 signaled the recovery is broadening, with 10 of the Fed’s 12 district banks reporting an improvement last month. Home sales increased toward the end of last year in most Fed districts, the report showed, and manufacturing improved or held steady while the labor market and loan demand remained weak short term personal loan.

Housing Stabilizes

Fed purchases of mortgage-backed securities have helped stabilize the housing market, which was at the epicenter of the financial crisis, by pushing down borrowing costs for home buyers. Government tax credits also helped propel existing home sales to the highest level in almost three years in November.

Yields on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgage securities are near the lowest relative to Treasuries in nearly two decades.

The difference between yields on Washington-based Fannie Mae’s current-coupon 30-year fixed-rate mortgage bonds and 10- year Treasuries stood at 0.69 percentage point Jan. 14, up from 0.65 percentage point on Jan. 6, which was the lowest since May 1992, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Central bankers, like private economists, expect some increase in mortgage rates as purchases of securities tail off.

“As our agency mortgage-backed securities purchases come to an end, we’ll probably see a little bit of upward pressure on interest rates,” New York Fed President William Dudley said on Jan. 13 in an interview with PBS Television’s Nightly Business Report. “But there’s a big debate about whether they’ll be small or medium or large. So I think we’ll have to wait and see.”

Mortgage Rates

Economists expect the rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage to rise 30 basis points after the Fed’s purchases end, according to the median of 39 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News between Jan. 5 and Jan. 12. The average rate on Jan. 14 was 5.06 percent, according to Freddie Mac.

Central bankers are likely to keep rates unchanged until they see convincing signs the rebound in manufacturing generates enough jobs and income to spur household demand and reduce unemployment that’s near a 26-year high.

The U.S. unexpectedly lost 85,000 jobs in December, and revisions showed payrolls increased in November for the first time in almost two years, a Labor Department report showed this month. The jobless rate stayed at 10 percent in December.

‘Accommodative’ Policy

Job growth “will not likely be rapid enough to put a large dent in the unemployment rate,” Fed Bank of Boston President Eric Rosengren said in a speech on Jan. 8. “This should allow for accommodative monetary policy to continue to support the economy until the underlying demand of consumers and businesses becomes self-sustaining.”

Rosengren like Hoenig is a voting member of the Federal Open Market Committee this year.

Sales at U.S. retailers unexpectedly fell 0.3 percent in December, a Commerce Department report showed yesterday. After- tax personal income adjusted for inflation was up 1.5 percent in the year ended in November, compared with an average 3.3 percent gain in the decade before the recession.

“Short-term rates are going to stay low for a considerable period of time,” the New York Fed’s Dudley said Jan. 13. The policy of keeping borrowing costs low could remain in place “at least six months,” Dudley said. “It could be a year from now, two years from now. It’s going to depend on how the economy develops.”

Source

Free online car insurance quotes. Get insurance rate comparisons, and buy your auto insurance policy instantly.

Dutch brewer Heineken NV said Monday that it will buy the beer-making operations of Mexico’s Femsa in an all-share deal that values the maker of Dos Equis, Tecate and Sol beers at $5.5 billion, excluding debt.

The buy increases Heineken’s presence in growth markets and cements its position as the world’s second-largest brewer by sales. It also continues a decadelong trend toward concentration among the biggest players in the global beer market. Heineken is based in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Femsa Cerveza brands have a 43 percent market share in Mexico and a 9 percent share in Brazil — two of the world’s top four most profitable beer markets, and both still fast-growing. Femsa’s Tecate and Dos Equis brands are also significant players in the U.S. imported beer market, where Heineken vies with Grupo Modelo’s Corona.

"This is a really good deal for Heineken, for our position in the Americas," Heineken Chief Executive Jean-Francois van Boxmeer said on a conference call. "As a worldwide brewer, this was a (region) where we perhaps were weaker."

Femsa Cerveza had sales of $3.8 billion in 2008, Heineken said. Including debt that Heineken will assume, the deal is worth $7.6 billion (euro5.3 billion).

Analysts welcomed the buy as a pleasant surprise, given that many had expected SABMiller PLC — now the world’s third-largest brewer by sales behind Anheuser-Busch InBev SA and Heineken — to win the race for Femsa.

Analyst Kris Kippers of Petercam Bank praised the deal as a "a great acquisition for Heineken" because Femsa was one of the few remaining large independent brewers in growth markets — and Heineken didn’t overpay. Heineken now has 40 percent of its operations in developing markets, up from 32 percent.

Femsa, or Fomento Economico Mexicano S.A.B. de CV, is based in Monterrey, Mexico. It is one of Mexico’s largest conglomerates, bottling Coca Cola and operating the Oxxo convenience store chain throughout much of Latin America, among other activities.

"In the context of the reconfiguration of the global brewing landscape, scale and geographic diversification are more important than ever," said Femsa CEO Jose Antonio Fernandez Carbajal on Monday.

"This transaction responds to that imperative."

Heineken said it expects the deal to close in the second quarter, pending approval from regulators and shareholders.

Heineken’s unusual holding structure allows descendants of the Heineken family to control Heineken NV, and the company said Monday they have agreed to the deal. A trust holding 39 percent of Femsa shares has also agreed, Heineken said.

Source

Payday loans no faxing fall on the less risky side simply because the money loaned to you is a percentage of your next paycheck.

Six Colorado companies will receive $75,239,310 in tax credits under the federal economic stimulus program for clean-energy manufacturing projects, officials said Friday.

The Colorado companies receiving the credits are Abound Solar, Advanced Energy Industries, Coolerado Corp., Hexcel Corp., ReflecTech Inc. and Vestas, with Vestas receiving by far the largest pool of credits.

They are among 183 companies nationwide that are getting $2.3 billion in tax credits from the U.S. Department of Energy under the stimulus, formally known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

The companies chosen say they will create more than 17,000 jobs.

The investment tax credits are worth up to 30 percent of each planned project, and are intended to leverage private capital for a total investment of nearly $7.7 billion, officials said.

“The world urgently needs to move toward clean energy technologies, and the United States has the opportunity to lead in this new industrial revolution,” U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu in a statement Friday. “Today’s awards will create new jobs and jumpstart the industries we need to both solve the energy problem and ensure America’s future competitiveness.”

“The Recovery Act is giving a much-needed boost to Colorado companies that are creating jobs and helping to drive the New Energy Economy,” Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter said in the statement. “These tax credits will help our companies grow and keep Colorado on the road to economic recovery.”

Ritter’s office released these details of the local recipients and the amount of credits:

• Abound Solar in Longmont, $12.6 million — Abound Solar will expand facility capacity with an additional manufacturing line. This facility will be solely dedicated to commercial production of photovoltaic (PV) solar panels using cadmium telluride semiconductor technology.

• Advanced Energy Industries in Fort Collins, $1 payday loans guaranteed no fax.2 million — Advanced Energy Industries plans to establish a manufacturing facility for the production of commercial and utility-scale solar inverters. Inverters are used to integrate solar PV installations.

• Coolerado Corp. in Denver, $750,000 — Coolerado will manufacture commercial and residential air conditioning units that use a heat exchanger incorporating an innovative thermodynamic cycle to cool the air. The patented process creates a healthier, more comfortable living environment while significantly reducing energy costs.

• ReflecTech in Arvada, $750,000 — ReflecTech will manufacture Mirror Facets made with ReflecTech Mirror Film which will reflect sunlight onto the receivers of Parabolic Trough Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) collector systems. Facets will match or exceed the optical and structural characteristics of the existing glass mirrors, but will aim to be more cost-efficient and durable. The end product will aid domestic solar power production.

• Hexcel Corp. in Windsor, $8.1 million — Hexcel Corp., a Vestas supplier, will establish a technologically advanced manufacturing facility to produce high-performance epoxy, glass, and carbon fiber composite materials. The composites will be used in the manufacture of wind turbine blades.

• Vestas: The credits are split among two units of the company: Vestas Blades America Inc. in Brighton, $30.2 million — Vestas Blades produces blades for wind turbines used in the production of wind energy. The utility-scales blades, which convert wind into mechanical motion, are approximately 44 meters in length. And Vestas Towers America Inc. in Pueblo, $21.6 million — Vestas Towers will produce tubular wind towers that support wind turbines at heights ranging from between 80 and 95 meters above ground.

Source

Information Technology Services Qualifications Center is spinning off from Carnegie Mellon University to become ITSqc LLC in order to extend research started at the university.

ITSqc started in 2000 as a consortium of information technology companies and university researchers to study best-practices within the information technology service provider industry. Since then, the organization has developed models and a certification process that can be used by clients and providers to ensure that the right expertise is brought on board and services meet client needs.

“The research was done and the models were created and focus shifted from creating and gathering, which universities are great at, we produced the models and now it’s a more commercial adoption issue,” said company director Jeff Perdue of the decision to spin-off.

The intellectual property was licensed in October and the new company started Jan. 1, Perdue said. The company has three employees: Perdue, an associate professor in the Institute for Software Research within the CMU School of Computer Science; Jane Siegel, senior systems scientist in the Institute for Software Research and the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at CMU; and Bill Hefley, faculty at the Katz School of Business at the University of Pittsburgh business card design.

Hefley was previously with the Institute for Software Research.

Some of the companies involved in the consortium include IBM and Accenture, Perdue said. ITSqc already has six organizations that have licensed the models and are working with clients, he said.

“The evolution of the Internet and the growth of the world’s telecommunications infrastructure now enables companies to seek out IT expertise from providers anywhere on the globe,” said Raj Reddy, chairman of the ITSqc Advisory Board in a written statement. “But without a set of commonly accepted best practices, many providers will routinely fail to deliver on their promises and potential clients will have no basis for comparing prospective providers. By establishing these best practices, the ITSqc has helped to bring order to the outsourcing marketplace.”

Source