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RETURN ON TECHNOLOGY: What are your workers hiding from you?

Many years ago, when I worked for a machine-tool dealership, I learned a lesson about technology and employees. As I was watching an employee run a part, I noticed he was doing something I knew hadn’t been in the engineering setup requirements. When I asked about it, he replied that he knew his decision hadn’t been sanctioned by the “idiots with slide rules,” but if he had done it the approved way, it wouldn’t work. Further, if he had notified…

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Bruce R. Frank & Associates LLC: Business, basketball give adviser a leg up International perspective useful for Indianapolis consulting firm

At 6 feet 8 inches, consultant Bruce R. Frank is an imposing figure. But it’s the 30 years of business experience the former professional basketball player has accumulated that he says helps him tower over his competition. Frank, 51, is the founder of Bruce R. Frank & Associates, an Indianapolis-based consulting group that helps life-sciences companies develop business strategies. So far, he has found most of his clients outside Indianapolis: Frank spent seven months on the road last year. The…

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Celadon Group’s foray into e-commerce rolls on: Demand by truckers for discount fuel helps propel TruckersB2B despite flattened tire business

TruckersB2B Inc. ought to have been among the road kill of the technology bust of 2000, when the restless ghost of Adam Smith dope-slapped investors out of their hypnotic drool over anything high-tech. But unlike scores of dubious e-commerce ventures, the 5-year-old Web site offering small to midsize trucking fleets group discounts on everything from fuel to tires turned out to be built on a sustainable business model. The Indianapolisbased business now claims more than 19,000 participants representing 445,000 trucks….

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Art school to compete with Herron, U of I: For-profit Art Insitutue has designs on new programs

The city’s newest art school has existing programs here sharpening their colored pencils and preparing for a showdown at the easel to attract new students. The Art Institute of Indianapolis earlier this month launched a marketing campaign seeking students for its first classes, which start Jan. 9. The for-profit school at the Pyramids is owned by a Pittsburgh firm. It plans to offer a two-year degree in graphic design and four-year degrees in graphic design, interior design and interactive media…

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In a race for robotics: Crash doesn’t quell Jones’ hope of building new industry

One day in the not-so-distant future, robot drones will drive the military’s supply vehicles through dangerous war zones. They’ll pilot tractors across farm fields and steer plows as they scrape snowy highways. Automatic cars will even whisk you to and from work. High-tech entrepreneur Scott Jones, 44, believes with a zealot’s fervor this all will happen. More than a gee-whiz observer, the man who helped invent voice mail hopes to establish a robotic vehicle business-and ultimately the robotic vehicle industry-in…

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Premiums continue to climb: Rate increases may dip, but not by very much

After four years of double-digit rate hikes, average health care insurance premiums rose less than 10 percent in 2005. And they’re expected to rise less than 10 percent again in 2006, according to several national surveys. But excuse employers if they don’t get excited about the trend. They are still faced with having to pay much higher prices or trimming benefits-or both. Health care insurance premiums this year increased 9.2 percent, a 2-percent drop in the average increase from the…

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Pathway to growth: Production firm’s storytelling attracts national attention

Despite a wall lined with Emmy Awards and a client list including ESPN and VH1, Pathway Productions founder Michael Husain is as eager to talk about corporate work and Web site development as his firm’s latest Peyton Manning documentary or his work showcased in this year’s Heartland Film Festival. “The new media side of our business, and that includes Web site development, grew 100 percent in each of the last two years,” Husain said. “So you can see why we’re…

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Backing home again: CID changes out-of-state course, invests $50M in Indiana

Indiana’s flagship venture capital firm has changed direction. Often criticized for not investing frequently enough within state lines, CID Equity Partners over the last five years has quietly put nearly $50 million to work in 10 Indiana companies. In the decade before, CID invested in just a half-dozen local deals. And after struggling to weather the 2001 recession, CID’s managers believe the wind is finally at their back. Three years ago, massive losses threatened to sink the firm. Since then,…

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Web service hungry for business: 46 local restaurants sign up for online takeout ordering

When pharmaceutical rep Andy Knopfmeier needed lunch for a 29-person obstetrics office he was calling on recently, he made it happen without picking up a phone or idling in a drivethrough lane. Instead, Knopfmeier-who provides lunch to doctors as a way to get in the door-went online two days before the meeting and ordered sandwiches, chicken nuggets and waffle fries from a Noblesville Chick-Fil-A. He prepaid the bill with a credit card and entered instructions on when he’d pick up…

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Born again: Old churches gain new life as commercial space

God may be eternal, but His houses aren’t. Congregations expand, move or fade away. When they leave a house of worship behind, sometimes they find a different congregation to take over the brick-andmortar expression of their faith. Sometimes they don’t. In the latter case, finding a new life for churches and temples-often solidly built and packed with unique architectural details-can be something like working a miracle. But a handful of developers have managed to give new life to old churches,…

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Child-safety concerns lead to new division: Company uses R&D to manufacture innovative car seat

Indiana Mills & Manufacturing Inc. is creating a new division, launching a new product, and cutting a new path straight to retail consumers. It’s a big departure from the 45-year-old company’s historical path to profitability. Westfield-based IMMI has long made its money supplying a lengthy list of manufacturers and distributors in the transportation and heavy-equipment sectors with its innovative seat belts, rollover systems for heavy trucks, and restraint systems for school buses and on- and off-road commercial vehicles. But company…

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Speaking of health care: Local experts weigh in on rising costs, the uninsured and whether our current system needs an overhaul Public health priorities, executive salaries and the “gold rush” of health care construction were among the topics tackled Sept

Public health priorities, executive salaries and the “gold rush” of health care construction were among the topics tackled Sept. 21 in the latest installment of Indianapolis Business Journal’s Power Breakfast Series. IBJ reporter Tom Murphy moderated the panel discussion, attended by some of the area’s foremost health care experts. Following is an edited transcript of the often-spirited discussion, which included a brief interruption by protestors seeking medical insurance coverage for janitorial staff who clean Anthem Inc. buildings. IBJ: Can you…

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BULLS & BEARS: Even after public dissing, analysts still too upbeat

Where can a retail investor go to get accurate recommendations and opinions on a stock? Back in the old, old days, an investor would call a stockbroker, also called a “customer’s man,” and get a copy of a research report. Only good clients could get the research reports so there was an air of exclusivity about them. Or if an investor were really diligent, he could go to the public library and leaf through the super-thin pages of the giant…

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RETURN ON TECHNOLOGY: Don’t let unclear language doom your next project

At a meeting the other day, an acquaintance shared a story about getting a “Webinar” together for his organization. A Webinar is like a seminar, only performed entirely online. The presenter is usually seen in a small, jerky video, but often there’s not even that much visual stimulation. In many cases, it’s just a series of slides and a voice. Most Webinars are no more interesting than inperson seminars, but at least you don’t feel as noticeable if you have…

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Parents banking on storage of umbilical cord blood: Founder keeps research alive through Genesis Bank

Blood from the umbilical cord of a baby expected to be born in Indianapolis later this month will be collected after her birth and saved for her 5-year-old sister, who has been diagnosed with cancer. The stem cells extracted from the baby’s umbilical cord blood might someday save the life of her sibling. While doctors at Riley Hospital for Children wait and see if the young cancer patient responds to standard treatment over the next couple of years, the stem…

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Atlas tenderloin tradition lives on: Family pays homage to ‘sticker lady’ at Carmel deli

But her connection to the grocery runs deeper. Her mother, Debbie Davis, was an Atlas institution, earning her “sticker lady” nickname from children who received the treats she kept in a toy treasure chest at her register. Debbie died in June 2004 at age 52, following a prolonged battle with breast cancer. In her memory, husband Mike Davis created the “Debbie’s Make You Smile Fund” to benefit the Indiana University Cancer Center. It is supported by the sale of the…

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So far, VC deals scarce: BioCrossroads: Networking should spawn commitments

Almost two years ago, in October 2003, BioCrossroads debuted its $73 million Indiana Future Fund. In the time since, just three Indiana startups have received IFF-backed investments. But it’s not for BioCrossroads’ lack of trying. Both in public and behind the scenes, BioCrossroads is working diligently to put promising local life sciences prospects in front of venture capitalists. This year, BioCrossroads has already held two well-publicized Indiana Future Fund Entrepreneurial Forums: the first in April at Purdue University in West…

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Digital TV crystal-clear, but ‘multicasting’ model blurry: Making a buck from spare digital TV channels is a challenge, though one firm is eyeing city for wireless cable

While Multicast Networks Group plans to offer TV stations a network of programs they can run on their digital channels, pioneers in so-called “multicasting” of digital signals have had other visions. And like many pioneers, they’ve taken arrows. Jeff Smulyan, president of Indianapolisbased radio and TV empire Emmis Communications Corp., last year proposed leasing unused digital bandwidth from TV stations. Once he gained enough of these unused channels in a given market, he planned to deliver a sort of over-the-air…

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Are you prepared for DISASTER?: Despite warnings, many businesses fail to plan for the worst

Are you prepared for Despite warnings, many businesses fail to plan for the worst Frank Hancock didn’t have a disasterrecovery plan when a tornado tore past his east-side printing company two years ago, causing $5 million in damage. Severe wind gusts from the Sept. 20, 2003, storm shredded Sport Graphics Inc.’s 5-month-old warehouse and manufacturing facility and tore 13 1,800-pound air-conditioning units from the roof, dumping them on the parking lot below. One was never recovered. Amid the mayhem that…

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Building boom out of hand?: Critics say hospital construction boosting health care costs

The network has launched a growth spurt that will take it into new markets, boost technology and strengthen Riley Hospital for Children all over the next few years. This construction also will pile on to the cost of health care, according to several researchers and health care experts. How that trickles down to the average patient bill, or if it does, remains to be seen. Consultant Edmund Abel has to think back more than 20 years to recall a capital…

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