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Refiner enjoys oil boom: Calumet Specialty Products sees stock price take off

Indianapolis is headquarters for Little Oil-Calumet Specialty Products Partners LP. Few locally have heard of the west-side refining and petroleum products company, let alone of its Jan. 25 initial public stock offering that raised $144 million. Calumet is controlled by an equally obscure group of families that still own the bulk of company shares. Yet shares of little Calumet-sales last year of $1.3 billion-are up 40 percent since the January IPO intended to fuel acquisitions. The appreciation is partly due…

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Reebok should fit into Adidas’ global plan: Indianapolis facility finds an ally in NBA after 11-year apparel deal

Adidas-Salomon AG’s $3.8 billion acquisition of Reebok International is having ripple effects from Boston to Beijing. Those waves are likely to wash right through Reebok’s design and manufacturing plant on Indianapolis’ east side, which employs nearly 1,000. Reebok’s headquarters will remain in Canton, Mass., and Adidas will maintain its state-side headquarters in Portland, Ore., but officials for the German sporting goods giant have revealed little else about their plans for Reebok facilities. Adidas officials have said they project saving $212…

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Bloomington’s Cook tightens women’s health focus: New business unit plans summer product rollout

Privately held Cook Inc. has added a seventh business unit in a bid to strengthen its presence in the growing market for gender-specific health care products, a move that could bring jobs to southern Indiana. The Bloomington-based medicaldevice maker will unveil its Women’s Health unit May 8 in Spencer. The unit actually started operating last September, initially taking on a combination of products pulled from the company’s urological unit, also in Spencer. But Women’s Health leader Christina Anné said it…

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BioCrossroads seeks help teaching math and science: Education center to bolster students’ careers

Indiana life sciences initiative BioCrossroads wants to improve the science and math skills of Indiana’s elementary and high school students. To figure out how, it’s asking the public for ideas. BioCrossroads released a “request for interest in participation” in the creation of a new K-12 Indiana Science, Technology, Engineering and Math Education Resource Center. Patterned after the North Carolina Science, Mathematics and Technology Education Center, BioCrossroads’ STEM is meant to be a Web-based, largely virtual organization. It would coordinate math…

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IEDC hopes to establish regional venture capital funds: Counties may balk at spending tax money elsewhere

It is the kind of business stimulus program that few oppose on paper, but to get the idea off the drawing board, IEDC must convince counties to relinquish their parochialism and ingrained spending habits. That’s likely to be tricky. “One of the things we’re trying hard to do as a state is to break down county borders where you have infighting, wasted resources and missed opportunities,” said IEDC Executive Vice President and General Counsel Nathan Feltman. “We want to make…

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Stadium off diversity mark: Some minority, female contractors say they’re being left out

Black businessman Lorenzo Gibson is optimistic that AFI Manufacturing Group will still get a chance to participate in the construction of the $950 million Lucas Oil Stadium and Indiana Convention Center expansion. But like Indianapolis Colts reserve quarterback Jim Sorgi, the owner of the Kokomobased metal fabricator has spent most of his time observing from the sidelines. “To watch a project of this magnitude go right by us is very disappointing,” Gibson said. “It’s very disheartening because you have companies…

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NASCAR a big deal for IRST: Role as security products provider could be worth $100M

Ingersoll Rand Security Technologies has been named NASCAR’s first official provider of security products, a deal that could mean substantial growth for the company’s Carmel headquarters and an Indianapolis manufacturing plant, which together already employ 900. IRST is a division of Bermuda-based behemoth Ingersoll-Rand Co., which is better known for agricultural, construction and transportation equipment sold under names such as Bobcat and Thermo King. The link with the racing circuit is expected to drive home the point that Ingersoll-Rand is…

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Gamer cashes in on hobby: Arcade cabinets combine old titles, new technology

Rick Barretto started filling his basement with arcade games soon after graduating from Indiana University. An avid gamer since his youth, he loved to play, but to get the games he wanted, he had to buy fullsized arcade cabinets-12 of them. His basement was only so big, and his wife’s tolerance only so high. “My wife was saying, ‘There’s got to be a better way,'” said Barretto, 39. So he put his college computer-science classes to work and spent more…

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ECONOMIC ANALYSIS: Measuring jobs: How to get handle on how we’re doing

Getting a good read on the Indiana economy is harder than you might think. That’s partly because there really is no such thing as the Indiana economy. State borders are, after all, purely legal contrivances that flows of dollars, workers and goods don’t worry much about. We’re a collection of regions, in actuality, some centered within our state’s borders and some not. But it is the public sector that does the scorekeeping on the economy, and it is public officials…

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ECONOMIC ANALYSIS: Diversifying economy requires new mind-set

The microwave oven has been a staple in most American kitchens for so long that there is now a generation of young adults who’ve never lived without them. And for that same generation, the doughy, limp texture of foods like pizza quick-cooked in a microwave, in contrast to the crisped, browned texture produced over a longer time by conventional heat, is associated with the food, not the technology. If you’ve grown up eating from a microwave, that’s the way food’s…

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READY TO EXPLODE: State’s new fireworks law has retailers predicting their sales will skyrocket

READY TO State’s new fireworks law has retailers predicting their sales will skyrocket Indiana’s fireworks industry officials say their business is about to explode faster than a gas-soaked cherry bomb, thanks to a new law that makes it legal to ignite bottle rockets and Roman candles in back yards. And best of all for retailers, the law makes it almost impossible for new competition to get a piece of the action. “I’m going to sell more stuff,” said Elizabeth Howard,…

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IDEM pollution fines fall: Violators assessed lowest amount since ’99, but Daniels administration speeds up process

Under Republican control for the first time in 16 years, the Indiana Department of Environmental Management in 2005 handed out $2.03 million in fines for pollution violations, the lowest annual assessment since at least 1999. The 2005 penalties were down nearly $600,000 from a year earlier, when the department was under the administration of Gov. Joe Kernan. But IDEM records show Gov. Mitch Daniels’ team had comparatively little patience for unresolved cases, in which the commission and alleged violators couldn’t…

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Schneider Corp. has designs on big growth in Lawrence: Long-time engineering firm gets boost from state as it plans to make $4.4 million investment, add 140 workers

The voluminous building the Schneider Corp. occupies on the former Fort Benjamin Harrison property was built as a barracks for enlisted men and later converted to a dormitory. So it’s fitting that the locally based engineering firm has a vision to create a university-type setting on its nearly fouracre campus where employees can receive training without stepping foot off the property. “We’ve worked on a strategic plan for the last couple of years, and Schneider University is part of that…

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TechPoint names up-and-coming Mira nominees: Annual award celebrates excellence in innovation

TechPoint won’t distribute its annual Mira awards until its banquet at the Indiana Roof Ballroom May 19. But the state’s largest high-tech trade association has completed the nomination process for its top awards, pulling together a list of 49 innovative companies and educators in such categories as information technology, life sciences and advanced manufacturing. About 750 people usually attend the Mira banquet. But the awards are meant to reverberate among a far wider population all year long as confirmation which…

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ECONOMIC ANALYSIS: Revised data shows state faring better than thought

If you were watching this space to see what-if any-silver lining for Indiana could be found in the harsh blows about to fall on the high pay, full benefit, Big Three automaker production jobs I promised to talk about last week, I ask your forbearance. The Toyota Corp. has beaten me to the punch. The company’s announcement that it plans to build its top-selling Camry in Lafayette says it better than any words I could come up with. The future…

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You can take it to the bank: Financial experts say state’s economy is rising, merger mania isn’t over and regulatory laws could take a toll

On Feb. 24, IBJ Publisher Chris Katterjohn, Managing Editor Greg Andrews and banking reporter Matt Kish sat down with four leaders from Indianapolis’ banking and finance sector: Judith Ripley, director of the Indiana Department of Financial Institutions; Kit Stolen, CEO of Union Federal Bank of Indianapolis; Steve Beck, president and CEO of the Indiana Venture Center; and Keith Slifer, senior vice president of LaSalle Bank. Among the topics of conversation: How’s the state’s economy doing? Are more bank mergers on…

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BEHIND THE NEWS Auditor jabs Obsidian as it prepares to go private:

If all goes as planned, a Tim Durham-led investment group will take publicly traded Obsidian Enterprises Inc. private by the end of the month. The Indianapolis company’s five-year run on Wall Street has been inglorious by any measure. Stock in the transportation and manufacturing firm has tumbled, from a split-adjusted $12 in 2001 to $1.80 today. Over the last three years, Obsidian has posted a combined $22 million in losses. As if that weren’t enough, now the company’s former outside…

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Emerging India: Indians explore prospects in Indiana: Delegation of 15 execs finds opportunities during tour of Indianapolis, Purdue tech park

Indians explore prospects in Indiana Delegation of 15 execs finds opportunities during tour of Indianapolis, Purdue tech park J.V.V. Satyanarayana spent the last three years launching his Chennai, India-based software firm. But after only 24 hours in Indianapolis, he was ready to expand his operation. Satyanarayana was part of a delegation of 15 Indian executives who visited Indiana last week. His business, SVL Infotech, manages the IT end of medical billing. It has 100 employees and handles claims worth $100…

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Emerging India: Opportunity or threat?: Indiana businesses brace for growing global competition

Opportunity or threat? Indiana businesses brace for growing global competition Next month, President Bush will make his first official visit to India. To most of the American media, it’ll be just one more round of global terrorism discussions with a distant foreign nation, perhaps worthy of a brief. The Indian press knows better. Six weeks ahead of Bush’s trip, banner headlines about it ran in every newspaper. Al Hubbard knows better, too. Friends with Bush since their days at Harvard…

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Roll the cameras: State cranks up efforts to court film industry under new task force

North Carolina offers a 15-percent tax credit to filmmakers to help offset production costs. The credit recently helped sway a national retailer to shoot an in-store commercial there instead of in Indiana. While the $600,000 production hardly compares to a multimillion-dollar motion picture, losing it was a big deal for local companies that didn’t get the work. Holli Hanley of Grand Illusion Lighting Inc. in Zionsville, which rents lighting equipment to production companies, lamented the loss. “Everyone in the entire…

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