Indianapolis has largely reinvented itself over the last four decades. Most of our modern skyline—the major office towers and hotels that define downtown—came about in the last 20 years. The IUPUI campus took shape in the early 1970s and has continued to grow. The sports venues that helped put us on the map, the vast convention center, our impressive new airport terminal—all built within a generation.
The inaugural Prairie Plates event Sept. 20 represents a big step in the Hamilton County living history museum’s increasing effort to target grown-ups—a trend happening around the country as once-staid institutions look to expand audiences and increase revenue.
The Colts home opener this year scored a television rating more than 20 percent higher than last year's opener. Colts Chief Operating Officer Pete Ward’s synopsis of the game’s ratings in Indianapolis: “Pretty strong football town!”
Most of Indianapolis’ major hospitals and physician practices will not be available through Anthem’s exchange plan, but instead will be working with a health plan run by Indianapolis-based MDwise Inc.
Merchandise sales for the six NFL teams represented by Indianapolis-based MainGate Inc. is up 27 percent over the same period a year ago. And it could go higher as the company is planning a special line of goods for Peyton Manning's return to Lucas Oil Stadium Oct. 20.
While it’s way too early to tell whether the NextRadio app woos back listeners and generates big ad dollars for the radio industry, it’s safe to say it’s functional and idiot-resistant enough to warrant interest from the mobile masses.
NFL season ticket holders to be offered free Red Zone feeds on their cell phones, exclusive downloads for the Madden football video game and more. NFL executives are promising new perks will be offered each season.
Indianapolis-based Harlan Laboratories may violate loan covenants in the next three to six months, and its ability to refinance a $280 million loan that matures in July 2014 is “highly questionable,” according to a report by Moody’s Investors Service. It’s unclear if the privately held company has an escape plan brewing. Harlan Laboratories employs about 330 people in the area and has annual sales of $326 million. The company appeared on the verge of pulling off a $305 million refinancing in February, but the deal fell apart and was shelved in April, according to Standard & Poor’s Ratings Corp. The ratings agencies say the company is not performing well enough to attract lenders. And even if it could engineer a refinancing, it likely would struggle to make the required payments. By Moody’s tally, Harlan’s “adjusted debt” is a whopping 7-1/2 times its so-called EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization).
Indianapolis-area hospitals are billing patients insured by their employers 264 percent more for outpatient services than what the federal Medicare program would pay for the same services for the same patients in the same facilities. That’s what researchers at the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Studying Health System Change found when they analyzed claims data for 590,000 patients, all below the age of 65, who were covered in 2011 by the union-negotiated health plans at automakers General Motors, Ford and Chrysler. The study was paid for by an organization that is funded by the automakers, the UAW and the International Union. The study compared the claims from 13 metro areas against one anther, all of them in the Midwest. Indianapolis had the highest hospital outpatient prices among all cities and the second-highest inpatient prices, behind only Kansas City. Interestingly, Kokomo had the third-highest inpatient prices and the second-highest outpatient prices. Physician prices in Indianapolis were in the middle of the pack, about 10 percent to 20 percent higher than Medicare prices. The authors of the study say hospitals’ market power, which has increased in recent years due to consolidation among hospitals and doctors, is the most likely explanation for the higher prices.
New Jersey-based Covance Inc. has formed a collaboration with the Indiana Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute to conduct early-stage clinical trials for biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. The Indiana CTSI, which was formed by partnership of Indiana, Purdue and Notre Dame universities, will provide access to a 13,606-square-foot, 24-patient facility at IU Health University Hospital in Indianapolis. The institute also could, if needed, expand operations into a recently renovated 33,078-square-foot, 50-patient facility in the same building. This space reopens to clinical research for the first time in six years due to the efforts of the Indiana CTSI. The alliance between Covance and the Indiana CTSI was facilitated by BioCrossroads, an Indianapolis-based life sciences business development group. Covance already conducts Phase 1 clinical trials at an 80-bed facility in Evansville. But there has been a paucity of Phase 1 clinical trial work in Indianapolis since locally based drugmaker Eli Lilly and Co. shut down its clinic at the IU School of Medicine in 2007.
Indianapolis firefighters spent more than four hours overnight battling a four-alarm fire that destroyed an abandoned warehouse on East Raymond Street near South Keystone Avenue before getting the blaze under control after 1 a.m. Monday. Holcomb & Hoke Manufacturing Co. Inc. operated in the two-story, 159,000-square-foot brick building for more than 100 years before closing in 2009. Police closed roads in an eight-block radius and evacuated 15 nearby houses as a precaution. One firefighter suffered minor injuries.
Even in the face of alarmingly high hospital prices, no one should conclude that hospitals are the bad guys in the health care system. Hospital executives are doing exactly what they’re supposed to be doing as the business leaders of their institutions.
The university in Terre Haute has given permission for Pioneer Oil of Lawrenceville, Ill., to drill on university-owned land.
IU reports record number of students at its regional campuses in Richmond, Kokomo and Gary. The largest campuses are Bloomington with 42,327 students and IUPUI in Indianapolis with 30,488 students.
The Marion County sheriff can’t control the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, but Mayor Greg Ballard can’t tell the sheriff how to operate jails or secure the City-County Building, and, much to his frustration, he’s been unable to control the sheriff’s spending.
The first new non-residential building at the former Central State Hospital campus, at the corner of West Washington Street and Tibbs Avenue, will be a charter school. Christel House Academy West broke ground last month on about nine acres donated by the city.
Public finance these days reminds me of those fellows we used to encounter at the county fairs—the ones who twisted balloons into fantastic shapes, making horses or dogs from oblong balloons they blew up. Push the balloon here and watch a shape emerge there, and wonder if it would pop.
Indianapolis officials hope to include plans for a new downtown luxury hotel in their bid for the 2018 Super Bowl, but they’re not sure all the pieces for a deal—potentially on Pan Am Plaza—can be put together before a bid presentation for 32 NFL owners in May.
It’s hard to imagine topping Indy’s hosting of the 2012 Super Bowl, but it can be done.
Feinstein Initiative to team up on exhibition project, a downtown gallery gets international attention, the Pacers search for halftime acts, and more.
Indianapolis Super Bowl Bid Committee officials said Friday they’ll need to raise $5 million more in advance corporate and private donations for the 2018 game than they did for the 2012 Super Bowl.
The $2.5 billion purchase of ExactTarget will add $140 million to $145 million in revenue this year for Salesforce.com, the firm said Thursday. Its shares soared 13 percent in Friday morning trading.
