-Kort Builders has started construction of a 1,000-square-foot addition to Recess Restaurant at 4907 N. College Ave. The addition will serve as a separate restaurant called Room 4.
-Kort Builders has started construction of a 2,400-square-foot retail space for Sharkey’s Cuts for Kids at 12525 Old Meridian St., Suite 110, Carmel.
-Kort Builders has completed a 4,000-square-foot medical space for Massage Envy at 4000 W. 106th St., Suite 200, Carmel.
Most House Democrats skipped Thursday's floor sessions, extending their stay at an Urbana, Ill., hotel to a 10th day and preventing action on the bills because too few members are present.
Scott N. Flanders, who took over as CEO of Chicago-based Playboy Enterprises Inc. in July 2009, will pick up a 3-percent ownership stake if 84-year-old Playboy founder Hugh Hefner closes on a pending deal to take the company private.
Instead of offering to help would-be buyers of new houses sell their old homes, Marketplace is offering to become a rental property manager for as long as six years.
Without adequate funds, [Carmel] has been forced to subsidize the [Center for the Performing Arts] with taxpayer money. This is unsustainable, and we therefore need the assistance of the citizens of Indianapolis to help patronize this center by attending many of the scheduled performances now and in the years ahead.
Carmel-based ChaCha Search Inc., operator of an online question-and-answer site, sued Taiwanese company HTC Corp. for trademark infringement over the planned introduction of a smartphone called the ChaCha.
Activity won’t gain much steam until more entrepreneurs become optimistic, and optimism won’t materialize until the economy gets warmer, said John Barnard, managing director of Pearl Street Venture Funds.
Indiana-based Omnicity Corp. has filed countersuits against the owners of two companies it acquired who are charging in court that Omnicity failed to fully pay them for the acquisitions.
Carmel-based KAR Auction Services Inc. announced Wednesday that it pulled in profit of $7.3 million in the three months ended Dec. 31, a 38-percent jump from the $5.3 million earned in the same quarter the prior year.
The Republican-ruled Senate voted 31-18 Tuesday for the bill, which contains penalties for businesses that hire illegal immigrants and allows police officers to ask someone for proof of immigration status if they have a reasonable suspicion the person is in the country illegally.
It’s no secret Wall Street analysts take a dim view of Eli Lilly and Co.’s future profit potential. Only two out of 22 analysts recommend buying the Indianapolis-based company’s stock. And here’s why: Lilly ranks last among nine pharmaceutical companies in pipeline sales potential by the year 2015, according to an analysis by Dr. Tim Anderson, a pharmaceutical analyst at Bernstein Research. Anderson adds up the five-year sales forecasts for all drugs under development by the nine drugmakers. Pharmaceutical journalist Jim Edwards noted that such predictions are notoriously unreliable, but it’s the best investors have to go on for predicting the pharma future. At the top of Anderson’s ranking is Switzerland-based Novartis AG, estimated to generate $4.5 billion in sales from pipeline drugs by 2015. Lilly brings up the rear with $1 billion in projected sales. Smack in the middle of the list is New York-based Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., which is roughly equal in size to Lilly and is projected to pull in $3.2 billion from pipeline drugs.
CNO Financial Group Inc. boosted its operating profits 62 percent in the fourth quarter, besting analysts’ estimates by 2 cents per share. The Carmel-based life and health insurer on Tuesday said it earned $168.2 million in the final three months of last year, a big jump from the $18.2 million profit it posted in the same quarter the prior year. Most of the increase in the most recent quarter came from investment gains. Excluding those, as well as special accounting and debt charges, CNO had a quarterly operating profit of $51.7 million, or 18 cents per common share. On that same basis, Wall Street analysts were expecting the company to earn 16 cents per share, according to a survey by Thomson Reuters. A year ago, CNO’s operating profit was $32 million, or 15 cents per share. Revenue for the quarter rose nearly 2 percent to $1.08 billion. The main improvement came on policies that CNO still holds but is no longer actively selling. That division, called “Other CNO Business,” recorded a fourth-quarter profit of $6 million, compared with a nearly $30 million loss in the same quarter last year. That helped mask a drop in profit at CNO’s main Bankers Life unit, based in Chicago. It earned $71.4 million in the quarter, a fall of 16 percent.
The Carmel-based life and health insurer, in an after-markets announcement, said it earned $168.2 million in the final three months of last year, a big jump from the $18.2 million profit it posted in the same quarter the prior year.
