Analysts who follow newspaper stocks are dropping their coverage because investor interest in the industry has shriveled. Citing the circulation trend, one Goldman Sachs Group Inc. analyst compared himself to the Maytag repairman no one wants to call, according to Bloomberg. Others are following different industries or pursuing new careers. Long-time analyst John Morton wrote […]
This isn’t just a feel-good story. It’s a feel-great story. It’s all about a young guy, full of ambition, yearning to grow, thirsting for knowledge, deciding to take a chance. Rolling the dice on a dream. Pursuing his passion. There he was seven years ago, fresh out of DePauw University, working in a promising marketing job for our local pharmaceutical giant, Eli Lilly and Co. He was making some nice change. If he wasn’t was just around the corner. So…
I’ve noticed a trend in restaurants lately. Most of them seem to have dropped those customer comment cards they used to keep clamped at each table. I can see why. In my whole life, I’ve probably filled out fewer than half a dozen of those things, and always when I was particularly irked about the service. I’ve never turned them in, consoling myself with filling them out to blow off steam and then heaving a sigh as I tore them…
It’s a rite of spring. The annual arrival of Lilly Endowment Inc.’s annual report provides a rare glimpse into the operations of the secretive-butsuper-powerful Indianapolis-based foundation. This year, there’s more anticipation than usual. Beyond the listings of who received the hundreds of millions of dollars in grants the endowment passed out last year, the report-due to be released by the end of this month-also will show where the endowment invests its $7 billion in assets. Until now, that part of…
Fred Glass, president of the city's Capital Improvement Board, headed historic transitions in both the mayor’s and governor’s
offices and has become the go-to guy for some of the city’s biggest initiatives, most of them sports-related.
Competitive. That’s how Shelbyville community leaders describe Tony Lennen. Indeed. Any CEO of the city’s Major Hospital needs to be. Shelby County residents can, in just 20 to 45 minutes, drive up Interstate 74 or Interstate 65 to any of Indianapolis’ large hospitals, many of which boast massive marketing budgets and stables of specialists. But in nearly 14 years at the helm of Major Hospital, Lennen has found creative ways to boost profits, enhance technology, woo specialists and even-through aggressive…
Its past work with Eli Lilly and Co. and the presence of central Indiana’s universities led executive search firm PrincetonOne to commit to adding 200 jobs in Indianapolis, the company said today. And $2.1 million in city and state incentives didn’t hurt, either. The city offered PrincetonOne $55,600 in tax abatements, and the […]
The latest data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis show that Indiana ranks 33rd in per capita personal income. Fifty years earlier, in 1956, Indiana ranked 17th in the nation. Our state is in long-term economic freefall and we suffer with representatives who piddle away their time on raising revenue through gambling. Per capita personal income in Indiana has not been on par with the nation since 1966. We have a record of ongoing decline, interrupted briefly from time…
The screen comes alive with the tale of a woman trying to track down her on-thelam husband even as she deals with her imprisoned brother and a grown son addicted to porn. The next night features a violence-packed trilogy of films about warring Asian gangs. Toto, we’re not at the Heartland Film Festival anymore. No, the 191 films set to be screened at the Indianapolis International Film Festival starting this month are grittier-helping it build a reputation for attracting a…
It’s a program with big promises and big profits. Yet it’s hard to measure its payoff. It’s disease management-an industry euphemism for health insurers’ efforts to make sure chronically ill customers receive the best health care they can-before they get rushed to the hospital. Indianapolis-based WellPoint Inc. says disease management helps it win business over other health benefits companies. It also says it saves its customers nearly three times as much money as they invest and improves the quality of…
When The New York Times ran an article about Indianapolis’ Stone Soup Inn several years ago, owner Jeneane Life got calls from people on airplanes looking to book a room. And the phone’s still ringing in the aftermath of a fall Chicago Tribune review of the new wellness program at Life’s Villa Inn. “People will say, ‘I kept that article because I’ve been meaning to come and stay with you,'” said Life, who also owns the Looking Glass Inn in…
Wellness is good for business. At least that’s what Community Health Network and other Indianapolisarea hospitals are finding as they ramp up the wellness programs they offer onsite to area employers. Community has grown its health promotion division an average of 30 percent in each of the last three years. And this year, it had two corporate clients ask to have wellness staff at their offices daily. Community parks a wellness coordinator five days a week at Celadon Group Inc.,…
Indianapolis-based WellPoint Inc. is in a tussle with the nation’s largest drug maker over the nation’s top-selling drug. New York-based Pfizer Inc., facing the loss of billions in sales of its Lipitor cholesterol-fighting drug, sent letters last month to doctors, encouraging them to protest the attempts of health benefits firms to switch patients to generic cholesterol drugs. The letter, which says the change is being pushed “for cost reasons alone,” reached doctors several days after Well-Point expanded a promotion to…
Bonuses for WellPoint Inc.’s 42,000 employees now hinge at least in part on whether the company’s customers actually get healthier. The Indianapolis-based health benefits company announced this morning that it has linked every worker’s compensation to how well its patients do in 20 clinical areas. WellPoint claims it is the first company to launch such […]
After the passing of the restaurant’s general manager, “Mama” stepped into the grief-filled void, providing leadership while consoling the staff. During a charity silent auction, Camerone auctioned off herself as an inhome chef for an evening. She ended up generating the most proceeds, enough to make a dream come true for a child during the Make-a-Wish Telethon. Pamela Evans, customer service agent, American Airlines Evans is a customer service agent for American Airlines and her territory often can be among…
Pfizer Inc.’s new inhaled insulin product, Exubera, has stumbled out of the gate. That would appear to keep the door open
for Eli Lilly and Co., as well as for other companies racing to develop inhaled insulin. But Pfizer’s troubles might cause
doctors and patients to sour on all inhaled insulin products.
A bill moving through the Indiana General Assembly could remove one of the major weapons Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield
has used to preserve its market dominion. Senate Bill 114 would forbid health care providers from granting Anthem–or any
other health insurer–so-called “most favored nation” clauses.
Since the mid-1990s, cities have been trying to take advantage of a captive audience by incorporating major public art installations into airport expansion projects. Long before Indianapolis began forging an ambitious public arts plan for its midfield terminal project, airports in Miami, Denver and Washington, D.C., commissioned millions of dollars’ worth of statues, mosaics and fountains. Smaller airports, such as Austin-Bergstrom International in Texas, which is on par with Indianapolis in terms of passenger counts, also have latched onto the…
Most of us have those “who-knows” people in our lives. Meaning, “who knows” what might have become of us had these people not come into our lives. P r o f e s s i o n a l l y, right at the top of my list is Cyrus W. “Cy” McBride. Cy died last week in Montgomery, Ala. He was 78. I would be remiss if I let his passing go without sharing the profound impact he had….
After about seven months without a leader, the Indiana Small Business Development Center network has found one in Jeff Heinzmann. An attorney by training, the 39-year-old is charged with getting the statewide system of 11 regional centers on track in their efforts to help entrepreneurs get started and grow. Despite their connection, the Indiana centers for the most part have operated independently, and some-like the central Indiana office serving Marion and the surrounding counties-have struggled for stability. Heinzmann aims to…
