£4.8m for Business Connectors plan - Jersey Evening Post £4.8m for Business Connectors plan - Jersey Evening Post

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

£4.8m for Business Connectors plan - Jersey Evening Post

£4.8m for Business Connectors plan - Jersey Evening Post

A Prince of Wales project to put business executives into disadvantaged communities to help forge links between community groups and local firms has received a £4.8 million boost from the Big Lottery Fund.

Riot-hit Hackney and Tottenham in north London and areas like Bristol and Middlesbrough have already benefited from the Business Connectors programme.

Piloted by Charles’s organisation Business in the Community (BITC) over a six-month period, the initiative has begun to build up a network of managers from leading companies.

The multimillion-pound grant will increase the number of seconded executives from 20 to more than 670, and will enable them to work in over 200 areas across England during the next five years.

The high-flying workers are trained by BITC and its partners to build partnerships between local businesses and community groups, helping to improve opportunities for residents and employment prospects.

Charles is visiting two projects in south London which have been helped by Will Popham, a Business Connector seconded from BT to work in Lambeth during the pilot project.

He will tour Brick Box, a community arts organisation in Brixton, and the Oval cricket ground, which is employing more than 100 local people thanks to the efforts of Mr Popham.

Stephen Howard, BITC’s chief executive, said: “With youth unemployment at over one million and one in seven shops on UK High Streets standing empty, it is vital to leverage private sector support to increase enterprise, employment and support education in the UK. Business Connectors has already proved to be an extremely successful way to make this happen.”

Companies that have signed up to Business Connectors include Sainsbury’s, Greggs, BT, Fujitsu, Royal Mail, Lloyds Banking Group and Waitrose.



House Financial Services Committee To Lose Hardest Hitting Members - Huffington Post

WASHINGTON -- Some of the toughest questions for JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon during Tuesday's House Financial Services Committee hearing came from lawmakers who will either not be returning to Congress next year or will face steep hurdles to reelection.

The House panel is already known on Capitol Hill as the "cash committee" due to its members' penchant for Wall Street fundraising, but it will have even fewer critics of the financial establishment next year.

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), the ranking Democrat on the committee, provided some of the harshest questioning of Dimon early in the hearing, accusing Dimon of a "filibuster" and of deliberately misconstruing Frank's questions.

"I'm disappointed," said Frank, who is retiring at the end of the year.

Rep. Brad Miller (D-N.C.) pressed Dimon on a potential securities law violation, forcing him to dodge questions and resort to legally open-ended language about his "knowledge at the time." Miller has been redistricted out of his seat.

Later in the hearing, Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) bluntly declared that Dimon's bank is "too big to fail," and criticized Dimon for sending billions to London for risky derivatives trades, instead of lending the money to companies at home.

"You put forward the idea that ... there weren't small- and medium-sized businesses in the United States that were creditworthy that wanted the money," Sherman said. "And I assure you, there isn't a member of this panel that couldn't bring you 100 small- and medium-sized businesses, creditworthy, in need of loans from you. And instead, you took the $350 billion to London."

Sherman is embroiled in a bruising campaign against Rep. Howard Berman (D-Calif.), a contest prompted by a separate redistricting plan.

Although the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill bears Frank's name, Sherman and Miller have been more critical of the Wall Street establishment during their tenure in Washington, and are almost certainly paying for that vocal opposition with their seats. Sherman has been out-fundraised by Berman, a favorite of Hollywood and the entertainment industry. Miller wrote the major consumer protection rules on mortgage lending for the 2010 Wall Street overhaul, and like Frank, was a critical legislative negotiator who shepherded the bill through Congress. That effort earned him the ire of a host of bank-affiliated business groups in North Carolina, where two of the most active subprime lenders of the past decade, Bank of America and Wells Fargo, have a major presence.

The Tuesday hearing followed Dimon's appearance before the Senate Banking Committee last week. House lawmakers were at times more aggressive than their Senate counterparts, who inspired a battery of criticism for their deferential treatment of Dimon. Freshman Rep. Sean Duffy (R-Wis.) pushed Dimon on whether his bank was "too big to manage" or "too big to regulate," while Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) hammered away at JPMorgan's reliance on flawed risk-modeling techniques.

But the committee's efforts in general this year have been overwhelmingly acquiescent to the preferences of big banks. Its official website lists nine pieces of bank deregulation that cleared the committee in 2011, plus one bill limiting debt issuance by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (even though, as wards of the state, Fannie and Freddie do not need to issue debt).

Historically, that deference to finance is a bipartisan phenomenon. For years, both political parties have packed the Financial Services Committee and its Senate counterpart with vulnerable lawmakers who can use their perch on the panel to leverage campaign contributions from Wall Street. And the major focus of the committees' efforts over the past three decades has been to deregulate Wall Street, with the Riegle-Neil Act of 1994, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999, and the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. Dodd-Frank, passed nearly two years after the financial crash of 2008, was pilloried by loopholes imposed by members of the House and Senate banking committees.

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Pearl Jam's former financial manager charged with stealing from the band - The Guardian

A former member of Pearl Jam's management team has been charged with stealing $380,000 (£242,000) from the band.

Rickey Charles Goodrich was chief financial officer with Curtis Inc, the band's management company, when he is alleged to have taken money from the band's accounts. Prosecutors say he committed the theft beween 2006 and September 2010, when he was fired. He had begun working for Pearl Jam in 2005 and joined Curtis Inc the following year.

Goodrich has been charged with 33 counts of theft, and is expected to enter a plea on 28 June at his hearing at Seattle's King County Superior Court. Prosecutors say he transferred money from company accounts to pay debts he and his wife had accrued. He is also alleged to have used company credit cards to pay for personal items, including family holidays and wine.

The charging documents claim that hired investigators found Goodrich had claimed to have paid thousands of dollars to band-members and crew that remained unaccounted for. The band's manager had reviewed areas of their cash flow after becoming concerned by Goodrich's management of their money in late 2009.

According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, police claim the thefts cost the management company $556,000 (£354,000), including investigative expenses. Kelly Curtis of Curtis Management said, "We are deeply saddened by this situation," but added that he is "looking forward to a resolution".

Pearl Jam are due to headline the Isle of Wight festival this Saturday.



IBM Leads In Social Software For Business, Study Finds - techweekeurope.co.uk

IDC has ranked IBM as the number one in worldwide market share for enterprise social software, for the third consecutive year.

According to IDC’s analysis of 2011 revenue, IBM grew faster than its competitors and nearly two times faster than the overall market which grew approximately 40 percent, IBM said.

Social Popularity

The growing popularity of social networking continues to explode, with more and more organisations looking for ways to adopt social business practices to integrate global teams, drive innovation, increase productivity and better reach customers and partners. Microsoft’s reported recent $1.2 billion (£772m) agreement to buy enterprise social networking specialist Yammer is evidence of this, as is Salesforce.com’s acquisition of Buddy Media and Oracle’s buy of Vitrue.

According to IDC, the enterprise social platforms market is expected to reach $4.5 billion (£2.9bn) by 2016, representing growth of 43 percent over the next four years.

While this demand is on the rise, organisations are still looking for ways to embrace social capabilities to transform virtually every part of their business operations, from marketing to research innovation and human resources, but lack the tools to gain insight into the enormous stream of information and use it in a meaningful way, IBM said in a press release.

“Social software is gaining in momentum in the enterprise,” says Michael Fauscette, group vice president for IDC’s Software Business Solutions Group, in a statement. “Companies are seeing significant gain in productivity and increasing value from successfully deployed social software solutions including supporting ad hoc work by bringing people, data, content, and systems together in real time and making more effective critical business decisions by providing the ‘right information’ in the work context.”

IBM said more than 35 percent of Fortune 100 companies have adopted its social software offerings including eight of the top 10 retailers and banks. IBM’s social business software and services combine social networking capabilities with analytics to help companies capture information and insights into dialogues from employees and customers and create interactions that translate into real value, the company said.

IBM Connections

Moreover, IBM’s social networking platform, IBM Connections, allows for instant collaboration with one simple click and the ability to build social communities both inside and outside the organisation to increase customer loyalty and speed business results. IBM Connections is available both on premise and in the cloud.

In the past year, new IBM Connections clients include Lowe’s Home Improvement, Electrolux, TD Bank, Newly Weds Foods, Russell’s Convenience stores, Bayer Material Science, The Ottawa Hospital, Premier Healthcare Alliance, Earthwatch, and the law offices of LaVan & Neidenberg.

“The opportunities for organisations to adopt social business processes to connect people and speed innovation are limitless,” said Alistair Rennie, general manager for social business at IBM, in a statement. “A successful social business can break down the barriers to collaboration and transform the next-generation workforce, from device to delivery vehicle of your choice, to improve productivity and speed decision making.”

Are you an expert on social networks? Try our quiz.



Infogix Unveils a New Strategy for Improving Business Operations - YAHOO!

Business Operations Management” strategy and new updates to existing software suites can help organizations more effectively monitor, detect and prevent information errors in critical business applications and processes.

Naperville, Illinois (PRWEB) June 20, 2012

Infogix Inc., a leading developer of data integrity software that helps businesses manage and improve their operations, today announced it has developed a set of best practices dubbed “Business Operations Management” that operations personnel at any company can implement to reduce risk and improve business decision-making. Infogix today also announced several updates to its Controls Suite and Visualization Suite software products that will help its customers adopt this Business Operations Management strategy.

“Organizations receive, process, produce, store and send an ever-increasing volume of information to support and manage their operations, satisfy regulators and make important business decisions, and IT alone can no longer shoulder the information management burden,” Sumit Nijhawan, Chief Executive Officer of Infogix. “We have developed the Business Operations Management model to enable the operations team, CFO, risk management and IT to all work together to ensure the success of information management initiatives such as adopting Business Intelligence, analytics and Business Activity Monitoring systems.”

Business Operations Management: Three Key Steps

The Business Operations Management strategy calls first for a company to establish continuous, end-to-end controls that automatically monitors all information as it moves in and out of a company and reports on errors to appropriate personnel, eliminating the risks and costs associated with performing those tasks manually.

Next, the information is analyzed in real-time to reduce risk, improve compliance and provide the operations team with immediate 24/7 visibility into operational intelligence.

The third step is using that intelligence to help guide business leaders in their decision-making processes, and provide operations and risk management teams with measurements on how various systems are performing and where inefficiencies can be eliminated.

Infogix Controls Software


Companies use Infogix’s software to establish controls that monitor business information moving among disparate systems, and detect and prevent errors to improve operating efficiencies and profitability, mitigate potential risks, and increase the cost-effectiveness of audit, compliance, and governance requirements.

Infogix today announced new features to existing products within both the Infogix Controls Suite and Infogix Visualization Suite.

The solutions that comprise the Infogix Controls Suite (Infogix Assure, Infogix ER and Infogix ACR) validate critical business information by verifying content, reconciling details, and tracking the timing, sequence, and latency of processing steps.

While the Infogix Controls suite solutions monitor and report on information errors, operations personnel can implement the solutions within the Infogix Visualization Suite (Infogix Perceive, Infogix Insight, Infogix Nexix) to interpret that data and gain a higher level of visibility into the detail of possible problems.

“For 30 years, the development of our software solutions have been directed by what our customers have told us they need to improve their business operations, and that close working relationship we have with our customers led directly to the addition of these new product features,” added Nijhawan. “Additionally, in September we will send customers our annual survey of what their operations priorities will be for the coming year, and use that feedback to guide product development.”

Availability


All new versions of the Infogix Controls Suite and Infogix Visualization Suite solutions are now available. For more detailed information on all the updates, please follow the following hyperlinks to view these webinars:


About Infogix Inc.


Many of the world’s largest enterprises depend on Infogix to transform their operations. Through the use of Infogix solutions, customers are able to control, analyze, and improve their operations by realizing the full value of the Infogix Business Operations Management solution. Since 1982, Infogix has been providing Infogix Controls Solutions to Global 2000 enterprises. Millions of Infogix Controls continuously monitor and assure the integrity of information in hundreds of enterprises each day. For more information, call +1.630.649.6800 (U.S, Canada, and International), or visit http://www.infogix.com today.

Christina Quarnstrom
Infogix, Inc
630-505-1800
Email Information




Vibra Bank Hosts CANEMEXA Business Mixer for 100 of San Diego's Leading Latino Entrepreneurs - msnbc.com

CHULA VISTA, Calif., June 20, 2012 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- On June 13, 2012, Vibra Bank  (OTCBB:VBBK), San Diego County's exclusive locally owned community bank, hosted a CANEMEXA Business Mixer with over 100 Mexican-American entrepreneurs from across San Diego County. The business mixer was centered on helping business owners become better accustomed with America's business culture and to promote business relationships among local businesses and entrepreneurs.

Recently recognized for 'Super Premier Performance' by The Findley Reports on Financial Institutions, Vibra Bank's CEO Scott Parker and his executive team provided insight and tips for the various business owners on how to navigate through the personal and business banking process. Several political and key business leaders attended and served as resources for the Latino entrepreneurs, some of whom included:

  • Mary Salas - Former California Assembly Member
  • Xavier Rivas - Director of Economic and Tourism Development for the City of Ensenada
  • Ruben Garcia - San Diego Regional Director of the Small Business Administration
  • Edward Lopez - Attorney and principal of Lopez Law Group and President of Board of Directors at Sharp Hospital Chula Vista
  • Javier Islas – Director of Finance for Accion San Diego
  • Larry Breitfelder – Candidate for the City of Chula Vista City Council

"We were honored to host several of San Diego's most prominent leaders from the Latino community," said Vibra Bank CEO Scott Parker. "In partnership with CANEMEXA, an organization dedicated to development of Mexican American business connections, we are pleased with the turnout and thrilled to have been able to host all of the dedicated Latino business owners."

CANEMEXA is a nonprofit, founded in the South Bay of San Diego, dedicated to promote and support the development of the Mexican-American business members and affiliates. CANEMEXA also works to promote business partnerships with governments and large companies, and represent and advocate for the rights of Mexican Americans.

Vibra Bank's prominent Super Premier Performance designation was recently noted in the highly recognized The Findley Reports Newsletter, a monthly publication providing essential banking transactions and regulatory updates that is viewed and referenced by key leaders throughout the banking industry. Vibra Bank has also been presented with a certificate designating the Chula Vista bank as one of California's leading financial institutions.

Vibra Bank currently has 33 employees and, as of fourth quarter 2011, maintained $104.4 million in total assets with a net profit of $1,286,000 for the fiscal year.

For more information about Vibra Bank's recent event and their partnership, please contact Tomas Urtasun at 619-233-7778 or tomas.urtasun@focuscominc.com.

About Vibra Bank:

Vibra Bank offers customers a wide range of services to meet their needs, including online banking and remote deposit. In addition, Vibra Bank provides a full range of loan products, including SBA loans, with a focus on loans to businesses and business owners. For more information, please visit www.vibrabank.com

The Vibra Bank logo is available at http://www.globenewswire.com/newsroom/prs/?pkgid=13049

CONTACT: MEDIA CONTACT          Tomas Urtasun          619-233-7778          tomas.urtasun@focuscominc.com

© Copyright 2012, GlobeNewswire, Inc. All Rights Reserved



History points to Olympic boost for UK stocks - The Guardian


Rangers: 'Make right financial choice' urges Charles Green - BBC News

Rangers chief executive Charles Green believes Scottish football should do "what is right financially" as the club await a vote on their future status.

Scottish Premier League clubs will decide on 4 July whether Green's 'newco' Rangers can replace the old club in the top flight.

Green's group will get a vote and Rangers need the support of seven other clubs to gain an SPL place.

"There is no easy solution," Green told the Rangers website.

Continue reading the main story

We're not here to make huge profits and to pay those profits out in dividends back to investors

Charles Green Rangers chief executive

"It's something we all have to deal with, we all have to take responsibility for and we all have to come up with something that works not just for an individual club but for the whole collective.

"We've always said that we bought the club because we want to play a team in Europe, we want to rebuild the image of this club and everybody wants to play in the Premier League.

"Whether that can happen is out of my control. It's in the hands of the other members of that league."

Should Green not get the necessary support, Rangers would have to apply to the Scottish Football League for the vacancy that would arise in Division Three after various clubs are moved up a division.

Fans of SPL clubs have expressed a desire to see Rangers' application turned down on grounds of sporting integrity, but club chairmen may also be influenced by the potential financial implications of the Ibrox side's absence from the top division.

"My emails are blocked at the moment with fans thanking me for saving their club but making it very clear that Rangers fans will unite whether we play in the SPL the First Division or the Third Division," said Green.

"I know that Rangers fans will not desert this club. But it's important, not just for Rangers but for the whole of Scottish football, because the financial implications for the whole of Scotland, not just for SPL clubs, is a massive, massive problem to face up to.

"I think some of the views we see and some of the comments are not based on business and, of course, the criticism I regularly get burdened with is, for me, every decision is about business.

"It's not about passion, it's not about commitment to a cause.

"It's purely about doing what is right financially because if there is no money - and that doesn't just include Rangers Football Club, it includes the SFA, SPL and the old mantra of going right down to grassroots football - we go out of business."

Meanwhile, Green insists his group, which bought Rangers' assets last week, is "not in here to make a fast buck and disappear".

Former director Dave King has expressed concern about cutbacks, while former manager Walter Smith, who fronted an unsuccessful attempt to gain control of the club, has also been lukewarm about Green's plans.

"The investors who have come in have seen this as an opportunity to rebuild the club, but they see this as a long-term investment," added Green.

"We will be announcing further investors in the next few weeks.

"I'd just like to clear up one issue. We're not here to make huge profits and to pay those profits out in dividends back to investors.

"But this club has to make a profit because any business, whether it's a football club, a petrol filling station or a corner shop, has to do that.

"If it doesn't make a profit, it goes out of business and we haven't spent all our time and resources to acquire this club then allow it to go back the same way within a year."


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