BANKING

• Bank of American Fork has promoted four employees. Marc Bule has been promoted to vice president/assistant audit manager. Bule’s banking career spans 11 years, all at Bank of American Fork. Gene Ahlstrom has been promoted to vice president/internal audit manager. Ahlstom’s banking career spans 35 years, 10 at Bank of American Fork. Stephen Gonzales has been promoted to assistant vice president/assistant controller. Gonzales has been with Bank of American Fork throughout his 11-year banking career. Dustin Phillips has been promoted to vice president/branch manager for the bank’s Saratoga Springs branch. Phillips’ banking career spans 19 years, the last five of which have been spent at Bank of American Fork.

 

COMMUNICATIONS

• AT&T plans to roll out 4G LTE in Salt Lake City later this year, bringing customers the latest generation of wireless network technology. AT&T 4G LTE provides faster speeds, faster response time and more efficient use of spectrum. AT&T offers several LTE-compatible devices, including new AT&T 4G LTE smartphones and tablets such as the first LTE Windows Phone Nokia Lumia 900, Samsung Galaxy Note and Pantech Element tablet.

 

COMPUTERS/SOFTWARE

• DigiCert Inc., a Lindon-based online security provider for some of the most recognized brands and websites in the world, has launched the DigiCert SSL Discovery Tool. Available to anyone free of charge, the Web-based application scans an organization’s network to locate SSL certificates deployed across several departments and business units, regardless of which Certificate Authority issued the certificate. The DigiCert SSL Discovery Tool is designed to help busy IT professionals save time and money, and avoid costly mistakes from manual inventory.

 

CONSTRUCTION

• Professional Service Industries Inc., an Illinois-based engineering and testing firm, has promoted Amy Crook, PE to special project manager of its PacifiCorp Special Project. Crook, who works in the firm’s Salt Lake City office, is a graduate of Brigham Young University with a bachelor and master of science in civil engineering. She was promoted from staff engineer and has been with PSI since February 2009.

• Rodrigo Gonzalez, project engineer with Steel Encounters Inc., Salt Lake City, has earned his LEED Green Associate accreditation through the Green Building Certification Institute. Gonzalez earned his bachelors of science in industrial engineering from the INCAP-Universidad Tecnologica de Chile in 2002 and is currently working on the Adobe Omniture headquarters project in Lehi, a facility designed to achieve LEED status later this year.

 

ECONOMIC INDICATORS

• For the eighth year in a row, CEOs rate Texas as the No. 1 state in which to do business, according to Chief Executive magazine’s annual Best & Worst States Survey. Florida rose one spot to take the No. 2 rank, while North Carolina slipped to No. 3. Tennessee remained at No. 4 while Indiana climbed a spot to capture the No. 5 rank. CEOs named the worst states to do business as California, New York, Illinois, Massachusetts and Michigan. For the 2012 survey, 650 CEOs from across the country evaluated the states on a broad range of issues, including regulations, tax policies, workforce quality, educational resources, quality of living and infrastructure. 

 

EDUCATION/TRAINING

• The Romney Institute of Public Management at Brigham Young University honored Sheila C. Bair as its 2012 Administrator of the Year. Bair was recognized for her service as the chair of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. during the recent economic downturn. When Bair arrived at the FDIC in fall 2006, she quickly realized that operational issues within the organization needed to be fixed. Employee morale was down after recent layoffs gave the perception that the reductions were not based on merit but on personal opinion. After commissioning an employee survey, Bair opened up lines of communication, initiated quarterly call-ins and revamped a troubled pay-for-performance system. Before long, employee morale soared as the FDIC was listed number three of the “Best Places to Work in the Government for 2010,” among more than 200 comparable federal organizations.

• Salt Lake Community College professor of management Don Gren has received the 2012 Teaching Excellence Award for the Western Council of Business Schools and Programs (ACBSP Region 7). As a regional recipient, Gren will now be considered for the 2012 ACBSP International Teaching Excellence Award, to be announced in June.

 

FINANCE 

• Grandeur Peak Global Advisors, Salt Lake City, said it has now surpassed $200 million in assets under management. Of that total, roughly $140 million is in the Global Opportunities Fund and $60 million is in the International Opportunities Fund. Both funds are new and have limited operating history. The firm’s bias is toward small and micro cap companies. Grandeur Peak Global Advisors, LLC is an employee-owned investment adviser.

• The U.S. Small Business Administration is inviting experienced early stage investment fund managers to apply for licensing as Early Stage Innovation Funds as part of SBA’s Small Business Investment Company capital investment program. Licensed Early Stage Innovation Funds can receive SBA-guaranteed funding to match their privately raised capital up to a maximum of $50 million.  Early Stage Innovation Funds must invest at least 50 percent of their investment dollars in early stage small businesses. More information on the Early Stage Innovation Fund initiative and the regulations governing SBICs may be found at www.sba.gov/inv/earlystage. For more information about the SBA’s Investment Division, SBIC program, Impact Investment Initiative and Early Stage Innovation Funds, go to www.sba.gov/INV. 

 

HEALTH CARE

• Health Choice, a managed care organization that is part of the IASIS Healthcare system, has signed a five-year contract with the Utah Department of Health to provide health care services to Medicaid beneficiaries, effective April 1. The initial service area includes Davis and Salt Lake counties.

• Intermountain Health-care’s board of trustees has named Utah business leaders Scott Anderson as chairman and Bruce Reese as vice chairman of the Intermountain board. They succeed Kem Gardner, chairman, and Doug Black, vice chairman, who remain on the board after completing five-year terms in those positions. Anderson is president and chief executive officer of Zions First National Bank. Reese is president and chief executive officer of Hubbard Radio LLC, which operates 21 radio stations in Chicago, Washington, D.C., Minneapolis/St. Paul, St. Louis and Cincinnati. He has held this position since Hubbard Radio’s formation and acquisition of Bonneville International in April 2011. Prior to joining Bonneville, Reese practiced law in Washington, D.C. and Denver.

• Randall J Olson, M.D., CEO of the John A. Moran Eye Center at the University of Utah, has received the Binkhorst Medal of Honor presented by the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery. The medal is given to an individual whose career has made significant contributions to the science and practice of ophthalmology and established that person among the world’s most prominent ophthalmologists. Olson is a specialist in the research of intra-ocular lens complications, teleophthalmology and corneal transplantation techniques.

 

INSURANCE

• SentryWest Insurance Services, Salt Lake City, has chosen Ogden as the site for its sixth Utah location. Jason Call manages the new office.  A graduate of Weber State University, he obtained his Certified Insurance Counselor designation in 2010 and was given the Young Agent of the Year award in 2011 by the Utah Association of Independent Insurance Agents. Call is currently serving as the co-president of the Utah Northern chapter of the Utah Association of Independent Insurance Agents. SentryWest, founded in Salt Lake City in 1976 is an independent general lines insurance agency specializing in business insurance, including property and casualty and employee benefits as well as personal insurance offerings for home, auto and personal health.

 

LAW

• Jones Waldo has created a new collection of “spotlight” blogs that which can be found at joneswaldo.com. Staff attorneys will provide more in-depth information about their areas of practice. From videos to e-newsletters to blogs, the spotlight sites take advantage of the latest technology making information available on a multitude of platforms. Readers can subscribe, visit linked social media profiles, research a topic of interest using resources offered by attorneys and catch up on the latest Jones Waldo Twitter feed (@joneswaldo). Currently, attorneys have developed spotlight sites on environmental law, consumer safety, estate planning, insurance regulatory law and other topics.

 

LIFE SCIENCES

• Great Basin Corp., a privately-held West Valley City life sciences company developing sample-to-result molecular diagnostic solutions, said the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has granted approval for its first molecular diagnostic test for Clostridium difficile (C. diff), one of the most common and deadly hospital-acquired infections. Such infections impact about 700,000 people in the U.S. annually, according to the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention. With the number of outbreaks for the difficult-to-treat infection on the rise since 2003, the new diagnostic test from Great Basin will empower health care providers to quickly diagnose patients with C. diff, resulting in faster time to treatment and better patient outcomes.

 

MANUFACTURING

• Orem-based Mity-Lite Inc., a leading manufacturer of durable lightweight banquet, meeting and event furniture, has received the 2012 Manufacturing Leadership 100 award for Operational Excellence from Manufacturing Executive. The national award, sponsored by Manufacturing Executive magazine, identifies and honors manufacturers and individuals that are shaping the future of global manufacturing. Mity-Lite received the honor for undertaking an operational transformation process that sped new product innovation for growth, re-invented key production processes to drastically reduce costs and customer lead times,  as well as improving  supply chain performance and employee safety. Since 2008, Mity-Lite has introduced 18 new specialty furniture products.

 

NATURAL RESOURCES

• Savage Services, Salt Lake City, has entered into an agreement to manage the supply chain logistics from the Northland iron ore mine in Kaunisvaara, Sweden to the Port of Narvik in Norway for Northland Resources S.A., a development-stage mining company with a portfolio of iron ore projects in northern Sweden and Finland. This supply chain will handle a planned daily volume of 14,000 tons of concentrated iron ore. The ore will travel 150 kilometers by truck, to be transloaded into railcars for a 225 kilometer trip to the port where it will be loaded onto ships for export. With 150 locations and over 2,500 employees, Savage is a global leader in the creation and delivery of bundled supply chain management services.

 

NONPROFIT

• United Way of Salt Lake relocated its office to 257 E. 200 S., Suite 300, effective May 1. All phone numbers and e-mail addresses will remain the same. The new location is a smaller, more cost-effective space, allowing the organization to better accommodate a collaborative working environment to meet the needs of staff, partners, volunteers, donors, board members and the children and families that United Way serves. An open house will be held June 12 from 4 to 6 p.m.

 

RESTAURANTS

• Beehive Cheese Co., Union Grill and Roosters Brewing Co. and Restaurant will unite for the sixth annual Union of the Birds and Bees tasting event May 12 from 5:30 to 9 p.m. at Ogden’s Historic Union Station. New this year, the event beneficiary is the Union Station Foundation. Tickets are $50 per person and are available online at www.beehivecheese.com. Tickets can also be purchased on site at Beehive Cheese Creamery, Roosters’ Ogden and Layton locations or at Union Grill. Guests will receive a commemorative glass to mark the occasion.  

 

SPORTS/RECREATION

• OnTheSnow.com, the most visited snow sports website in the world, announced last week that Snowbird Ski and Summer Resort was voted the Best Overall Resort in North America by readers of the website as part of its Visitors’ Choice Awards. Snowbird also won the Best Terrain in the Rockies award. Over the course of the winter, the OnTheSnow community collectively posts thousands of resort reviews. Users rank resorts on a scale of one to five stars in five categories: Family, Park and Pipe, All Mountain Terrain, Nightlife and Overall Excellence. 

 

TRANSPORTATION

• Salt Lake City-based Professional Sales and Services, a regional outfitter of emergency vehicles, has been awarded a two-year contract by Salt Lake City Corp. to provide equipment, parts and installation of emergency equipment on all city vehicles. The scope of work for the new contract encompasses providing and installing various emergency lighting and equipment components for vehicles in the city’s Fleet Management Division and other city divisions as requested. To be installed are light bars and other emergency lighting, computer tables and hardware, consoles, cages, sirens, controllers and gun mounts. Salt Lake City Corp. has approximately 1,511 vehicles with emergency lighting including.

• SkyWest Airlines, St. George, has won Bombardier’s 2011 Annual Airline Reliability Performance Award. Topping the CRJ100/200 product category for the North America region, SkyWest took the title for the second year running and for the fourth time in the last five years. SkyWest earned the title in the same product and region category in 2007, 2008 and 2010. The airline also received top honors for overall dispatch reliability.

• England Logistics, Salt Lake City, has hired Benjamin Blake, John Porter, Heath Capps, Chad Carter, Jordan Nielson, Cameron Cornelius, Philip A. Stats, Vance Sowdgren, Tyler Neal, Cameron Evans and Wyatt Meldrum as full truckload account managers. The firm, the nation’s 10th largest freight brokerage, currently has openings for professionals interested in sales positions.