Business and Finance

Some big names in the local business and community scene have joined the Xavier University board of trustees.

Joining the board are:

• Jim Wainscott, chairman, president and CEO of West Chester-based AK Steel Corp. (NYSE: AKS);

• David Joyce, president and CEO of Evendale-based GE Aviation (NYSE: GE);

• Bruce Brown, chief technology officer for Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG);

• Donna Jones Baker, president and CEO of the Urban League of Greater Cincinnati;

• and Vincent Caponi, CEO for St. Vincent Health in Indianapolis.

Xavier also named John LaRocca to a lifetime emeritus trustee position.

Source

Online Real estate company Move Inc. said Tuesday it paid $13 million to acquire Threewide Corp., the operator of online real estate listing company ListHub.

Campbell-based Move (NASDAQ:MOVE) said that West Virginia-based Threewide will operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Move Sales, Inc., which is a subsidiary of Move, Inc. ListHub products, services and the management team of professionals will remain with the ListHub brand.

ListHub products and services include syndication of 2.4 million property listings from more than 270 multiple listing services and 38,000 brokers to more than 70 real estate marketing websites. It also provides streamlined data management and reporting analysis used to monitor online listing performance.

To read the press release, click here.

Source

Southland gas prices are just pennies away from dropping to their lowest point of the year, with several areas now below the $3-a-gallon threshold.

According to the Automobile Club of Southern California’s Weekend Gas Watch, the average price of self-serve regular gasoline in the Los Angeles-Long Beach area is $2.972 per gallon, which is 3.5 cents less than last week, 17 cents lower than last month, and 17 cents lower than last year.

On the Central Coast, the average price is $3.045, down seven-tenths of one cent from last week, 16 cents lower than a month ago, and 18 cents below last year.

In the Inland Empire, the average per gallon price is $2 payday loans direct lenders.957, which is 3.4 cents lower than last week, 18 cents lower than last month, and 17 cents less than last year.

“Local prices are just two or three cents higher than their 2010 low point in late February, but we’ve already seen some small price jumps this week in central and northern cities, so it’s uncertain whether we’ll continue to experience price decreases,” Auto Club Spokesperson Jeffrey Spring said in a statement.

Source

Reliv International Inc. named Khairul Abdul Karim general manager of its operations in Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and Indonesia, the company said Monday.

The Chesterfield, Mo.-based nutrition and direct selling company said Abdul Karim, 35, spent the last nine years with Nu Skin Enterprises in Malaysia, and most recently was responsible for business development and account management for the Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei region.

"Khairul's direct experience and solid knowledge of the direct selling industry in Southeast Asia is a tremendous benefit for Reliv and our distributors," said Ryan Montgomery, Reliv's executive vice president, worldwide sales, in a statement cash advance.

Abdul Karim previously held management jobs with Hewlett Packard, Amerada Hess and Siemens Power.

Reliv International Inc. (Nasdaq: RELV) develops, manufactures and markets nutritional supplements and skin-care products. It sells its products through an international network marketing system of about 64,000 independent distributors.

Source

Hispanic Business magazine has named the University of New Mexico’s Anderson School of Management as one of the top 10 graduate business schools for Hispanics. It was ranked as the nation’s sixth best business school for Hispanic students.

The school also ranked sixth last year. Each year, Hispanic Business measures and ranks the effectiveness of the nation’s universities in attracting Hispanic students, and providing them with the academic support they need to be successful.

Anderson School Dean Doug Brown says the high ranking is a good starting point.

“We are pleased with the recognition from Hispanic Business magazine,” said Brown. “But we regard the current position as only a foundation upon which we will build programs that are ever more-responsive to the needs of our Hispanic constituents.”

All universities were ranked in terms of Hispanic diversity according to the following criteria: percent of Hispanic student enrollment, percent of Hispanic faculty, progressive programs aimed at increasing enrollment of Hispanic students, Hispanic student retention rate and Hispanic reputation bad credit unsecured personal loans.

The schools ahead of Anderson School on the list were: University of Texas at El Paso, New York University, University of Texas at Austin, University of Miami, and the University of Texas at San Antonio. Rounding out the top 10 are Stanford University, Florida International University, Duke University, and the University of Wisconsin Madison Wisconsin.

For more information on the rankings visit www.hispanicbusiness.com.

Source

Shares of Mariner Energy tumbled Thursday after a fire in one of the company’s production platforms in the Gulf of Mexico.

The fire, on Mariner’s Vermilion Oil platform 380, took place at least 80 miles south of Vermilion Bay on the Louisiana coast, according to John Edwards, chief petty officer of the U.S. Coast Guard in New Orleans.

Mariner Energy said that all 13 members of the crew were evacuated safely from the fire. There were no injuries, the company said.

The Coast Guard said there was no oil spill, though there were conflicting reports earlier on. On Thursday, the company said that a flyover of the area showed no evidence of a spill. But later in the afternoon, at about 2 p.m., the Coast Guard said that there was a sheen at the site about one mile long and 100 feet wide - a statement that it eventually retracted.

The Coast Guard also said the fire was out. The company said the cause of the fire was "not known and an investigation will be undertaken."

Shares of Mariner Energy (ME) plunged about 5% during its lowest point on Thursday, but had recovered most of its losses by the close, dropping 60 cents to $22.75 per share.

The Coast Guard said the platform is in 340 feet of water. The workers started emergency shut down procedures before abandoning the platform, which does not have a blowout preventer, according to the Coast Guard.

The Coast Guard initially said that the platform was in production at the time of the accident, but then retracted that statement.

A faulty blowout preventer has been blamed for the devastating spill from the BP (BP)-controlled platform that killed 11 workers in April, also in the Gulf of Mexico.

Neal Dingmann, analyst for Wunderlich Securities, said that the occurrence of two high-profile platform accidents within a few months of each other is rare. The likely outcome will be a more tightly regulated industry.

"Although this incident is very different from Macondo [the well operated by BP,] I think the government will continue to look at this and will add more rules and regulations," he said.

In April, Mariner Energy announced that it had formed a merger with another oil exploration company, Apache Corp. (APA, Fortune 500) The stock price for Apache slipped on Thursday by $1.16 per share, closing at $91.30.

Mariner Energy would still be considered the operator of the platform because the merger isn’t scheduled to be completed for several weeks, according to Apache spokesman Bob Dye.

A production platform is built after the drilling of an oil or gas well. The platform often remains in operation for years, pumping pressure down the hole to keep the well flowing.

Nicholas Pope, an analyst for the investment bank Dahlman Rose, said the Mariner Energy platform is in the Gulf Shelf, which is not a deepwater area so it would not be affected by the ban on deepwater drilling.

CNN’s Tim Lister contributed to this story. 

Source

Cox Communications is embracing its social media side with a contest that could give someone a free year of cable, Internet and phone service.

Cox in Arizona has developed a Digi’s Summer Vacation application on Facebook that allows users to upload their photos and place them where the company’s jump-suited and helmeted mascots took their summer trips.

The grand prize is a year of free cable, but there are weekly prizes as well. Each week the company is giving away a “staycaction” at the Loews Ventana Canyon resort in Tucson, 10 $100 Cox gift certificates and 100 plush Digi dolls.

Cox started the social media campaign after garnering 21,000 Facebook members who like the company’s site.

“Social media has become a very important piece of our marketing mix,” said Ivan Johnson, vice president of community relations and televideo for Cox Arizona.

For more: www.facebook.com/CoxArizona.

Source