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DIRECT SALES
• New U Life Corp. recently celebrated the official opening of its new headquarters in Lehi. The field team for the direct sales company has grown to more than 100,000 members in its second year. The new headquarters houses the company’s in-house legal counsel, creative, marketing and sales, customer service and product development teams as well as vice presidents and administration. The new location is looking for call center professionals.
ECONOMIC INDICATORS
• St. George is the No. 8 in a list of the fastest-growing cities in America, based on local economic growth, according to a report from personal finance website WalletHub. It compared 515 U.S. cities across 17 metrics over seven years. The data set ranges from population growth to unemployment rate decrease to growth in regional GDP per capita. Other overall rankings for Utah cities are No. 93 Layton, No. 102 Orem, No. 178 Provo, No. 179 Sandy, No. 183 West Jordan, No. 196 Salt Lake City, No. 215 West Valley City and No. 231 Ogden. St. George was No. 2 in its jobs and economic rank, behind only Hesperia, California. The fastest-growing city is Lehigh Acres, Florida. The slowest-growing city is Shreveport, Louisiana. Details are at https://wallethub.com/edu/fastest-growing-cities/7010/.
EDUCATION/TRAINING
• The University of Utah School of Computing, part of the College of Engineering, has launched a new bachelor’s degree in data science. It will address all aspects of compiling, organizing and analyzing data. It is one of only a handful of universities in America with an undergraduate degree in the discipline. The new degree requires at least 108 credit hours of study and involves studying four core areas related to data science: machine learning, data mining, databases and visualization for data science.
ENERGY
• Utah is ranked No. 22 in the 2019 State Energy Efficiency Scorecard, released by the nonprofit American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy. It ranked states based on policies and programs that deliver energy savings to families and businesses. The top-ranked state is Massachusetts. The No. 51 state is Wyoming.
EXPANSIONS
• Red Points, a brand intelligence company and leader in online IP infringement detection and removal, has opened an office in downtown Salt Lake City. It is the company’s third location and is expected to have 15 employees from the sales and support team in 2020. Its other offices are in Barcelona, Spain, and New York.
HEALTHCARE
• Dustin Lipson has been named administrator of Intermountain Primary Children’s Hospital. He will oversee the hospital’s day-to-day operations and will work with Katy Welkie, who remains the CEO of Primary Children’s Hospital and will expand her role to oversee pediatrics throughout the Intermountain Healthcare system as the new vice president of children’s health. Lipson has worked as a Primary Children’s operations officer since 2013. He joined Intermountain Healthcare in 2011 as an Intermountain fellow, after which he was hired as the director of healthcare transformation. He previously worked more than a decade at GE Capital in numerous national and global leadership roles. Welkie has served as administrator/CEO of Primary Children’s Hospital since 2012. She has more than 35 years of specialized experience in pediatrics at Intermountain Healthcare in roles including intensive care nurse, chief nursing officer and chief operating officer at Primary Children’s Hospital.
INVESTMENT
• Pelion Venture Partners, a Salt Lake City-based early-stage venture capital firm, has added Jeff Kearl as managing director. Kearl co-founded Stance in 2009 and was its CEO from inception until joining Pelion. Kearl still serves as Stance’s chairman of the board and also serves on the board of directors of Domo, Scopely and Just Water. Prior to Stance, Kearl was the chairman of the board of directors for Skullcandy for over a decade and was executive vice president and served on the board of directors at Logoworks, which was acquired by HP in 2007. Following the acquisition, he ran strategy and new ventures for the Internet group at HP. Kearl also has been involved in angel and venture investing in consumer tech and software, investing in more than 40 companies.
• Peterson Ventures, an early-stage venture fund based in Salt Lake City and the Bay Area, has named Ilana Stern as the firm’s newest general partner. Stern will be the firm’s first partner in San Francisco, spearheading the firm’s Bay Area efforts. Peterson Ventures invested in Stern’s company, Weddington Way, eight years ago, after which it went on to be acquired by Gap Inc. After joining the executive team at Gap Inc., she moved on to angel investing. Peterson Ventures is part of the Peterson Partners platform, with more than $650 million in assets under management and headquartered in Salt Lake City for over 20 years.
PHILANTHROPY
• Nu Skin has surpassed more than 650 million meals purchased and donated since 2002 in its Nourish the Children (NTC) initiative. The program feeds more than 120,000 children each day. Malnourished children in more than 50 countries around the world have been fed VitaMeal, a nutrient-dense food, from one of NTC’s third-party charity partners after Nu Skin sales leaders, customers and employees purchase and donate the bag of food.
• Young Living Essential Oils, Lehi, and the D. Gary Young, Young Living Foundation have made a $70,000 donation to combat recent fires in the Amazon and to support reforestation efforts. The donation will go to the Institute of Conservation and Sustainable Development of the Amazon (IDESAM), based in Manaus, Amazonas State, Brazil. IDESAM will use a portion of the funds to support immediate firefighting needs. The remaining amount will be used to fund long-term efforts to rebuild the rainforest, empower communities, and continue to campaign for change to protect the area.
REAL ESTATE
• Promontory, a private vacation home community in Park City, has begun construction on Double Deer, a 17,722-square-foot expansion of the Jack Nicklaus Clubhouse designed to accommodate members’ private events. The multipurpose space can accommodate functions for up to 250 guests. It is expected to open July 4, 2020. Promontory consists of 1,674 homesites. More than 581 homes have been built, and there are approximately 656 members of the private Promontory Club.
RECOGNITIONS
• OrthoGrid Systems Inc., a Salt Lake City-based company focused on the development, innovation and commercialization of alignment technologies and platforms for orthopedic surgery, has been was selected as one of MedTech Outlook’s “Top 10 MedTech Startups of 2019.” The annual list awards medtech companies at the forefront of tackling surgical challenges in the orthopedic industry. OrthoGrid’s intelligence-guided systems are designed to work within the surgical theater and interface with existing hospital equipment revealing fluoroscopic distortion and enhancing surgical outcomes by providing surgeons with greater interoperative accuracy and proficiency.
RETAIL
• CenterCal Properties LLC, a commercial real estate company, has announced several new national and local retailers coming to its Utah properties. Opening in November or later this winter at Station Park in Farmington will be Barnes & Noble, Bohme Relocation, Cotton On, Cotton On Kids, Harmons Fuel Station, Hip & Humble, J. Jill and REI. DM Fashions will open in early 2020. Opening this fall at Mountain View Village in Riverton is StretchLab. Opening in November or later this winter are Aubergine, Chase Bank, Chip Cookie and G.O.A.T. Haircuts. Bank of America and Pacific Dental will open in early 2020. Opening this winter at Canyon Corners in Park City will be S.T.E.M. Elevated and Polish Nail Bar.
• U-Haul Company of Utah Inc. has announced that Aspen Springs Storage, 159 N. 1250 W., Centerville, has become a U-Haul neighborhood dealer. It will offer U-Haul trucks, trailers and moving supplies.
RURAL UTAH
• The Governor’s Office of Economic Development (GOED) board, at its October meeting, endorsed a pair of $50,000 Rural Fast Track grants that previously had been approved by the Governor’s Rural Partnership Board. Lotus Spa and Salon, of North Logan in Cache County, was endorsed for a grant to help the company build a full-service salon in a new 15,500-square-foot, three-story building. The $1.9 million project is expected to result in 12 new full-time positions. The company also is eligible to quality for a grant fund reimbursement of up to $18,000 if it retains the jobs for 12 consecutive months. The Spoke LLC, of Moab in Grand County, was endorsed for a grant to help it build a brewery and brewpub for manufacturing, canning and kegging services. The $521,000 project is expected to result in three new full-time positions. The company also is eligible to quality for a grant fund reimbursement of up to $4,500 if it retains the jobs for 12 consecutive months.
SERVICES
• Gava Talent Solutions, a professional staffing and consulting services company, has expanded its Utah operations with two hires: Pam Clawson and Danielle Helberg. Clawson has more than 10 years of experience in recruitment and has worked for several companies and professional staffing firms in Utah. Helberg comes to GTS with over 10 years of Salt Lake-based accounting and finance industry experience from a leading global accounting and advisory firm.
TECHNOLOGY/LIFE SCIENCES
• HireVue, a Salt Lake City-based talent assessment and video interviewing solutions company, has hired Tom Benton as chief sales officer. He has more than 25 years of experience, most recently serving as chief revenue officer/chief customer officer at WorkMarket. Prior to WorkMarket, Benton held global sales leadership positions at Salesforce, Oracle and Intershop.
• Vivint Smart Home, a Provo-based smart home company, has announced that Dale R. Gerard will serve as interim chief financial officer while the company searches for a successor to Mark Davies, who has left the company to pursue a CFO opportunity outside the smart home industry. Gerard is currently senior vice president of finance and treasurer. Since 2010, he has led finance, investor relations and treasury at Vivint Smart Home. Before Vivint, he worked as the assistant treasurer and director of finance at American Commercial Lines and was senior treasury and financial analyst at Wabash National Corp.
TRANSPORTATION
• American Logistics Co., a St. George company that provides transportation in 18 states for the healthcare and transit sectors, has hired Ron Brooks as vice president of transit market development. Brooks has more than two decades of management experience in the accessible transit and paratransit industry, in both public agencies and private companies. Prior to joining American Logistics, he served as the manager of accessible transit services at Valley Metro in the Phoenix metropolitan area. He also spent 13 years with Veolia Transportation, where he served in a variety of leadership roles before being named vice president of Intelliride and paratransit business development in 2012. Before joining Veolia in 2000, he spent several years during the 1990s managing accessible transit and paratransit services for the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District (BART) and for the Palm Beach County (Florida) Public Transit System.