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BANKING
• D.L. Evans Bank has hired Shay Munk as assistant vice president branch manager for its branch at 312 W. Main St., Tremonton. He will be responsible for directing and administering the operational and commercial lending efforts of the branch and he will assist customers with commercial lending requests. Munk has been in the financial industry for over eight years and he achieved his bachelor’s degree in finance at Utah State University.
ECONOMIC INDICATORS
• Utah is ranked No. 22 among a list of “best states for nursing professionals in 2021,” compiled by The Senior List. It used the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Census Bureau and Projections Central. The rankings were determined by analyzing income, projected job growth and housing costs in each state for different types of nurses. Nurse practitioners in Utah earn $111,200 on average and by 2028 jobs for home health and personal care aides are projected to grow by 50.9 percent. The average wage for home health/personal care aides in Utah is $27,340. Nursing assistants make an average of $29,740. Registered nurses average $67,180. In a breakout list of combined nursing professional employment (per 1,000 jobs), Utah was last, at 35. New York was tops, at 85.6. The highest-ranked state overall is New York, The lowest-ranked is Alabama. Details are at https://www.theseniorlist.com/research/nursing-jobs-wages-state-rankings/.
• Salt Lake City is ranked No. 29 on a list of “Best Cities to Get (and Stay) Married,” compiled by LawnStarter. It compared the 150 biggest U.S. cities across 11 key indicators of nuptial success. Fremont, California, led the rankings. Worcester, Massachusetts, was No. 150. Details are at https://www.lawnstarter.com/blog/studies/best-cities-get-married/.
• Half of Utahns plan to vacation within the state this summer, according to a survey conducted by OnePoll and commissioned by Cooper Tires. Those travelers will drive no more than 115 miles to get to their destinations this summer. For the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic began, 63 percent will be leaving their homes for more than two days this summer.
• Park City tops a list of “10 best places to retire in Utah,” compiled by SmartAsset. Its seventh annual study considered four criteria, including tax burden, access to medical care and opportunity for recreation and social activity. Following Park City are, in order, Salt Lake City, Bountiful, Ivins, Washington, Cedar City, Vernal, Logan, Price and Ogden. Details are at https://smartasset.com/retirement/retirement-calculator#Utah.
• Sixty-six percent of young Utah entrepreneurs worry they won’t be taken seriously when starting a business because of their youth, according to a study conducted by OnePoll and commissioned by Herbalife Nutrition. The national figure is 62 percent. The average age Utah respondents say is the best to start a business is 30. Forty-eight percent of young Utahns would like to work in clothing/apparel, perhaps launching their own fashion labels. In second place was starting up in the food service industry (43 percent), followed by wellness and fitness (28 percent), technology (28 percent), professional services (25 percent), trade (20 percent), and education (19 percent).
EDUCATION/TRAINING
• The Center for Growth and Opportunity at Utah State University has hired Mia Love as national outreach director. She will drive the CGO’s national coalition-building efforts in immigration, the environment, and technology and innovation. Love is a former U.S. representative, elected in 2014 and serving two terms, and also served on the city council and was elected mayor in Saratoga Springs. Love currently is a CNN correspondent, has been serving as a nonresident senior fellow at The United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, and is a fellow of the Institute of Politics and Public Service at the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown University. The Center for Growth and Opportunity is an economic research center focused on immigration, technology, and the environment with an emphasis on innovation and collaboration.
EXPANSIONS
• Kiln, a flex-office and coworking company with locations in Salt Lake, Lehi and Park City, as well as Boulder, Colorado, has announced it will open this winter at 1120 S. Rackham Way, Suite 300, Meridian, Idaho. The 50,000 square-foot layout will accommodate teams range from two to 50. Kiln Boise is being built in partnership with Ball Ventures Ahlquist.
FITNESS
• ICON Health & Fitness, a Logan-based fitness software, content and equipment company, has changed its name to iFIT Health & Fitness Inc., after the company’s proprietary software platform. The company said the change “reflects iFIT’s commitment to delivering personalized connected health and fitness experiences to its growing community.” It has more than 5 million members in 120 countries. Its brands are NordicTrack, ProForm and Freemotion.
GOVERNMENT
• Gov. Spencer Cox has appointed Rich Saunders as Utah’s first-ever chief innovation officer. In his new position, Saunders will take a lead role in supporting the Cox-Henderson commitment to aggressively upgrade state government efficiencies, innovations and responsiveness to Utah residents. Saunders has served as executive director of the Utah Department of Health. He joined the department in 2015, where he was a consultant in Medicaid. He joined the agency’s executive leadership team in 2017. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Saunders was appointed as chief deputy, and in August 2020, he was appointed as interim executive director. In that role, he served in the leadership of the state’s Unified Command. He was installed as executive director in February. Prior to his service in state government, Saunders was an organizational health consultant and founder of multiple businesses in the private sector. Saunders will retain his role as incident commander over the state’s pandemic response and will remain engaged as part of the effort to consolidate the Department of Health and the Department of Human Services into the Department of Health and Human Services. Tracy Gruber, current executive director of the Department of Human Services, has been named as executive director of the Department of Health and Human Services. Gruber previously was director of the Office of Child Care at the Utah Department of Workforce Services and senior advisor for the Intergenerational Poverty Initiative. Prior to joining DWS, Gruber was the senior policy analyst and director of state fiscal policy at Voices for Utah Children. Gruber’s work experience also includes serving as an analyst in the Illinois Senate, overseeing a public employee retiree organization, and administering the Utah State Bar New Lawyer Training Program. Nate Checketts, currently a deputy director at the Department of Human Services, will take over as interim executive director of the Department of Health. Checketts previously was a deputy director at the Utah Department of Health. He coordinated Utah’s COVID-19 testing efforts for the first year of the state’s pandemic response and was Utah’s Medicaid director. He has also previously been Utah’s CHIP director, a budget analyst in the Governor’s Office of Planning and Budget, and a senior auditor for the California State Auditor’s Office. Checketts has a master’s degree in public administration from Brigham Young University.
HEALTHCARE
• ASEA, a Salt Lake City-based company focused on cellular health, has appointed Meredith Tieszen as senior vice president of ASEA Americas and Howard Chow as regional vice president of ASEA Asia. Tieszen will lead the ASEA sales team across the Americas, including North and Latin America, and Chow will manage and grow sales in Asia. Tieszen has been a senior sales executive for over 18 years with high-level business experience working with organizations ranging from startups to large organizations. She has senior leadership experience in sales systems and programs from within the network marketing industry to her role at ASEA. Chow joined the company in 2019 as sales director for ASEA Hong Kong, bringing more than 20 years of experience from top-10 worldwide network marketing companies, manufacturing, and local and overseas property development. He has worked in Hong Kong, Macau, and the United States, and has led sales management and promotion incentives in eight countries across Asia.
• South Texas Accelerated Research Therapeutics (START), based in San Antonio, has announced the creation of its newest site, START Mountain Region in Salt Lake City. The START Mountain Region program has been created in partnership with Utah Cancer Specialists, consisting of 19 oncologists. START, with the support of 20 early-phase drug research physicians, conducts Phase I clinical trials for anticancer drugs in San Antonio; Grand Rapids, Michigan; and Madrid, Spain.
INVESTMENTS
• RET Ventures, a Park City-based venture capital firm focused on technologies for the multifamily, single-family rental (SFR), homebuilding and broader real estate asset classes, has closed its second round. The oversubscribed $165 million fund will complement RET’s $109 million initial fund raised in November 2018. Its investors include more than 40 multifamily and single-family real estate owners, operators and developers in North America who serve as technology development partners and customers for the startups RET invests in. Participants in RET Ventures Fund II include affiliates of major multifamily real estate investment trusts (REITs), including Essex Property Trust Inc., Invitation Homes Inc., Mid-America Apartment Communities Inc. and UDR Inc., and as well as private owners and managers such as BH Management, Bozzuto, Cortland, Edward Rose & Sons, Greystar Real Estate Group, Starlight Capital, Starwood Capital Group and Waterton.
• Tula Health, based in Kaysville, recently raised $24.1 million in debt and equity financing from two venture firms: Springtide Ventures and Sandbox Capital Advisors. Springtide is a health tech venture firm based in Utah and Boston, and Sandbox Capital Advisors is based in Salt Lake City. The investment came in two stages. In December, Tula received $17 million from Springtide Ventures, and in April, $7.1 million was invested by Sandbox Capital Advisors. The funds will be used to grow inventory, as well as hiring and training additional staff. Tula Health offer on-call support, hardware and software to help their customers manage chronic health conditions such as Type 2 diabetes.
• Altitude Lab, a Salt Lake City-based healthcare and life sciences incubator, has launched an Investor Coalition, a partnered network of healthcare venture capitalists to fund, mentor and provide resources for Altitude-incubated startups in Utah. It intends to collectively invest $50 million in Altitude’s startups over the next three years. Founding investors in the coalition include Alaa Halawa, Mubadala Capital; Andrea Jackson, Northpond Ventures; Austin Walters, SpringTide Capital; Greg Yap, Menlo Ventures; Jack Boren, Epic Ventures; Katelin Roberts and Dr. Branden Rosenhan, MedMountain Ventures; Keith Marmer, University of Utah Innovation Fund; Michael Schmanske, AngelMD; Nan Li, Obvious Ventures; Nathaniel Horwitz, RA Capital; Nickolas Mark, Intermountain Ventures; Zachary Bogue, DCVC; and Zavain Dar, Lux Capital. Altitude Lab was founded in 2020 by Recursion and the University of Utah’s PIVOT Center.
LAW
• Parsons Behle & Latimer has hired associate Patrick J. Neville for the firm’s Intellectual Property Litigation practice team in its Salt Lake City office. Neville assists clients in issues of patent infringement, trademark infringement, trade secret misappropriation, false advertising and unfair competition. He is a recent graduate of the S.J. Quinney College of Law at the University of Utah.
OUTDOOR PRODUCTS/RECREATION/SPORTS
• Former Utah Gov. Gary Herbert has joined Teton Sports, a Salt Lake City-based provider of camping, hiking and backpacking gear, as chairman of its advisory council. Herbert recently agreed to serve as executive chair of the Utah Valley Chamber of Commerce.
PHILANTHROPY
• Zions Bank is accepting nominations from the public until July 15 for its “Paint-a-Thon” service project, which involves its employees sprucing up homes in low-income elderly, disabled and veteran residents in communities across Utah and Idaho. Typically, homes are referred to Zions Bank by city and state housing agencies, aging services, community organizations and local churches. This year, the public is invited to nominate up to 20 of the 41 homes employees will scrape, paint and landscape. Details are at zionsbank.com/paintathon.
• Daz 3D, the Salt Lake City-based sister brand of Tafi Co and focused on 3D digital art, has released its latest non-fungible token (NFT) in partnership with The Diigitals, an all-digital modeling agency. Building on their prior NFT collaboration in support of Black Girls Code, The Diigitals and Daz are releasing an NFT designed in collaboration with Asian and Pacific Islander artists to showcase the Asian American and Pacific Islander experience. To provide further benefit to the cause, Daz 3D will release an exclusive bundle of 3D content on its leading Daz 3D digital content marketplace. All proceeds from the NFT sales, both primary and secondary, and 50 percent of the 3D content sales on the Daz 3D marketplace will be donated to Stop AAPI Hate, an organization addressing anti-Asian racism.
• 1heart1mind, an affiliate of Salt Lake City-based residential solar installation company Go Solar, recently released an updated impact statement data for 2019-2021 that shows the overall progress both organizational entities have made toward bringing quality education, clean solar power and economic empowerment to people in Uganda. The impact statement reveals 138 more living-wage jobs for the Ugandan economy, 29,609 more meals, 78 more solar-powered households, and quality education/healthcare for 156 more students in 1heart1mind’s Ugandan solar-powered boarding school. It also included clean water for 350 more people, safe housing for 45 more children via 1heart1mind.org’s scholarships and boarding school, 16,380 more meals for the boarding school’s students and staff, 1,200 more pounds of donated clothing, and 277 more micro-finance solar products.
REAL ESTATE
• Construction has begun on Canyons Village Employee Housing in Park City. It was announced by Canyons Village Management Association Inc. and Columbus Pacific Development LLC. It will offer more than 1,100 residents year-round, flexible housing options as Canyons Village at Park City Mountain continues its expansion. A public-private partnership between CVMA, CPD and Summit County, the venture is on 7.7 acres in the Lower Village. It will accommodate 1,107 employees across 789 bedrooms, seven buildings, four unit types and three distinct and flexible living arrangements. A phased opening is expected to begin in the summer of 2022, with a final completion date in December 2023.
• Colliers Utah has hired Spencer Strong as part of the Jarrod Hunt Industrial Team in Utah County. Strong will focus on tenant representation, landlord representation and investment sales in the land and industrial markets. Strong began his career in the residential market while finishing his finance degree from the Brigham Young University Marriott School of Management. He then worked almost exclusively alongside Millcreek Commercial Properties and their retail and medical properties before joining Hunt’s team.
SCHOLARSHIPS
• Fox Pest Control, a Logan-based provider of commercial and residential pest control services, is offering a $2,000 scholarship to a student who is a standout leader and steward in their community, giving back through volunteer service and projects. The scholarship is open to U.S. citizens in Fox Pest Control service areas who are either high school or college students with a current GPA of 2.5 or higher and who plan to be full-time college students in fall 2021. The application deadline is Aug. 1. Details are at www.fox-pest.com/scholarship. Fox Pest Control operates more than 25 branches across 14 states.
TECHNOLOGY/LIFE SCIENCES
• Salty Dot Inc., a Salt Lake City-based insurance technology company, has announced that Mike Maroone has joined its board of directors. Maroone has more than four decades of experience in auto retail and currently serves as CEO of Maroone USA, which operates auto dealerships in various markets across Colorado and Florida. He also participates in multiple ventures in the automotive, healthcare, aviation, insurance, and real estate sectors. Maroone is a former president, COO and board member of AutoNation and is the lead director at Carvana. He also serves on three other boards: chairman of Cleveland Clinic Florida, and a member of the Cleveland Clinic Enterprise board and MDH board.
• Pluralsight Inc., a Draper-based technology workforce development company, has promoted Will Clive to chief people officer. He previously was vice president of people. Clive joined the company in 2015 and has served in several strategy and operational roles across the company. Prior to joining Pluralsight, Clive spent several years working in the financial services industry across a variety of roles and firms, including Goldman Sachs & Co. He holds a Master of Business Administration and a bachelor of science in finance from Brigham Young University.
• Code Corp., a Salt Lake City-based company focused on barcode scanning and data capture technologies, has hired Justin McKelvy as senior manager of data and infrastructure. With an extensive background in data analysis and system architecture, McKelvy most recently was vice president of technology for ETTMA.