Industry Briefs are provided as a free service to our readers. Company news information may be sent to brice@slenterprise.com. The submission deadline is one week before publication.
ACQUISITIONS
• Forum Health LLC, Salt Lake City, has acquired SevaMed Institute, a medical practice based in Lutz, Florida. Financial terms were not disclosed. Forum Health, launched June 24, unites practitioners nationwide under a new model for precision healthcare. The newly acquired practice is led by Dr. Shilpa P. Saxena, who also serves Forum Health as a co-chief medical officer. Saxena is a board-certified family physician with more than 15 years of experience in integrative and functional medicine. Saxena is on faculty at the Institute for Functional Medicine, as well as George Washington University’s Metabolic Medicine Institute. She is a fellow of the University of Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine. She also is a volunteer assistant professor of family medicine and community health at the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine.
ASSOCIATIONS
• Ibi Guevara has become chair of the Utah District Council of the Urban Land Institute (ULI Utah). She succeeds Brian Wilkinson, partner at Wilkinson Ferrari & Co., who was chair since July 1, 2017. As chair, she will guide the efforts of a 15-person executive committee that runs 20-plus events a year. Guevara is a shareholder and vice president of business development and marketing at Hunt Electric, where she has worked for the past 15 years. She has been active in ULI for more than eight years and has served as chair of the programs committee and chair of mission advancement for the past two years.
COMMUNICATIONS
• AT&T has announced it has invested more than $175 million in its Utah wireless networks during 2016-18, including nearly $100 million in its Salt Lake City networks. The investments are designed to boost reliability, coverage, speed and overall performance for residents and businesses. It also improved services that support public safety and first responders using the FirstNet communications platform. In 2018, AT&T made 443 wireless network upgrades in Utah, including 236 in Salt Lake City, that featured adding cell sites and boosting network capacity.
CONSTRUCTION
• The Redevelopment Agency of Salt Lake City (RDA) is inviting qualified housing developers to apply for a portion of the available $10.7 million set aside for use on affordable housing projects. As part of a citywide effort to increase the number of affordable housing units in Salt Lake City, the program provides low-cost financial assistance to stimulate the construction and preservation of affordable multi-family developments within city boundaries. An informational meeting for prospective applicants is set for July 18 at 9 a.m. at the City & County Building, 451 S. State St., Room 542, Salt Lake City. RDA staff will provide an overview of the application, requirements and selection process. The $10.7 million will be allocated through a competitive and transparent public process administered by the RDA. Details are at www.slcrda.com/development-opportunities.
• A partnership among Weber State University, Habitat for Humanity of Weber and Davis Counties, Dominion Energy, Rocky Mountain Power, Davis Technical College and Ogden-Weber Technical College has resulted in the first affordable net-zero home to be featured in the Northern Wasatch Parade of Homes, taking place through July 20. Ultimately, the 2,000 square-foot house will belong to a mother and six children, who lost their home to the tornado that hit Ogden in 2016. The home at 450 15th St., Ogden, will be part of Rocky Mountain Power’s subscriber solar program, in which participants purchase solar panels that are installed off-site throughout Utah. It will use an innovative gas boiler that simultaneously heats the house and hot water with electric heat pump technology for cooling. Weber State partnered with Davis Technical College and Ogden-Weber Technical College to build the home. Students in the plumbing apprenticeship program at Davis Tech worked on all of the house’s plumbing. Students in Ogden-Weber Tech’s Youth Build program helped with construction.
DIRECT SALES
• Young Living Essential Oils, Lehi, has announced a new partner farm in the Philippines, the Kalipay Coconut Farm. The farm donates each year to the Lao Foundation, a nonprofit organization that helps empower less-fortunate people in the Philippines through education, livelihood training and values formation. It also sponsors the children of local coconut farmers to receive training in electromechanical technology ‚ 84 students so far. The farm also uses green chemistry, a new discipline that optimizes the use of resources and minimizes waste.
EDUCATION/TRAINING
• Neumont College of Computer Science, Salt Lake City, has announced its sixth bachelor’s degree. Effective in October, the college will offer a bachelor of science in software engineering. The degree will produce graduates prepared to enter a career path as a software engineer, back-end engineer, cloud engineer or IT consultant. The coursework is centered primarily on a technological focus around innovative and effective improvements in large-scale distributed systems developed and deployed in the cloud. Details are at https://www.neumont.edu/bsse.
FINANCE
• Mountain West Small Business Finance has named Randy Fischer as vice president and commercial loan officer — Bridgerland and Brooks Harbertson as vice president and commercial loan officer at the company’s Orem office. Fisher will be responsible for the company’s loan production in Northern Utah and Wyoming. He has more than 15 years of experience in the banking industry. He succeeds vice president and loan officer Judd Blakesley, who was recently named MWSBF’s manager of marketing and government relations, who previously had oversight for the Bridgerland region. Harbertson will support the company’s Central Utah operation. Harbertson has worked in several lending capacities for more than 15 years, most recently working at Mountain West Bank and Zions Bank.
GOVERNMENT
• The Governor’s Office of Economic Development has hired Deneise Coughlin as the Utah Works program specialist. The program helps accelerate hiring and technical skills training to support economic growth. Industry representatives developed the program with the Governor’s Office of Economic Development and post-secondary education partners through Talent Ready Utah. Coughlin’s primary responsibilities include promoting partnerships between industry and post-secondary institutions to fill high-demand positions or technical skills training. She will also work with state agencies to identify workforce gaps identified by companies. Coughlin has more than 17 years of human resource experience. She was previously the HR manager at Haemonetic and before that was HR manager at Boeing.
• The Utah Department of Workforce Services has appointed Collin Peterson as director of the Workforce Research and Analysis Division. Peterson will be responsible for the oversight and administration of the department’s management information systems (MIS), labor market statistics and economic analysis, and the Utah Data Research Center. Peterson has been with the department for 11 years. Prior to his most recent role as the assistant division director and chief of data systems, Peterson served as a senior MIS analyst, software applications system manager and MIS manager. Peterson is a graduate of Weber State University with a bachelor’s degree in psychology and graduated from the University of Phoenix with a Master of Business Administration.
GRANTS
• Harmons Neighborhood Grocer has awarded this year’s business development grants to Chocolate Conspiracy, Mamachari Kombucha and Shaffer Farms. Harmons has now awarded a total of $62,000 in business development grants to 13 emerging Utah vendors. Grant recipients are selected based on a unique niche of high-quality, local products the vendor provides to Harmons’ customers. Chocolate Conspiracy is a Salt Lake City-based company producing fine chocolate from bean to bar, without roasting. Mamachari Kombucha is a craft kombucha brewery and taproom located in Salt Lake City. Shaffer Farms is a small, family-owned business in Garland producing green beans for Harmons.
INVESTMENTS
• Amp Human, a Park City-based company focused on products for athletes, has received an investment from Next Ventures, a venture capital firm focusing on sports, fitness, nutrition and wellness markets. The amount was not disclosed. Amp said the investment will be used to grow the sales and marketing teams for its first product, PR Lotion. The company also plans to establish a scientific advisory board and expand its research and development for additional products. Lionel Conacher, Next Ventures managing partner, will assume a seat on the Amp board.
LAW
• Holland & Hart has added partner Tim Crisp to its commercial finance practice. Crisp counsels banks and nontraditional lenders such as commercial finance companies, equipment factors and accounts receivable factors to structure transactions in ways that identify and manage risk. He also represents consumer finance lenders and loan servicers for credit card programs, education loans, patient healthcare loans, and new credit facilities that continue to emerge. Before joining Holland & Hart, Crisp was a partner at Foley & Lardner and Michael Best & Friedrich.
MEDIA/MARKETING
• The Walton Group Inc., a Provo-based marketing and media relations firm, has hired Baylie Duce as an account coordinator. She will be working with clients, initiating new business development and providing in-house management. Duce is a public relations major at Brigham Young University. A junior, she is also pursuing a second major in Portuguese. Duce has co-owned a small business in Montana, where she managed the print and social media marketing of a mobile food vending business alongside her two sisters. She also worked as a customer relations agent with the BYU Independent Study Department. And gained social media marketing experience working as a content creator for Petals and Pastries.
MILESTONES
• Impartner, a Salt Lake City-based partner relationship management solutions company, has announced it has surpassed the 10 million mark for partners signing into partner portals using Impartner technology.
OUTDOOR PRODUCTS/RECREATION/SPORTS
• The Utah Office of Outdoor Recreation has launched its Every Kids Outdoors (EKO) Initiative, designed to encourage children and families to get outside, be active and try new affordable and accessible activities. The EKO summer explorer passport is possible thanks to the support of Walmart, Lifetime and Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Salt Lake. Families can download and complete an activity passport for their children, and they will receive a certificate for engaging in outdoor recreation activities. Details are at business.utah.gov/outdoor/eko.
RECOGNITIONS
• Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski was among 12 mayors who recently received Mayors’ Climate Protection Awards at the United States Conference of Mayors annual meeting. Biskupski was among five mayors receiving honorable mention in the large-city category. She was recognized for Salt Lake City’s efforts to transition to net-100 percent clean electricity, which made significant strides in 2019 with the passage and enactment of HB 411, the Community Renewable Energy Act.
• Qualtrics, a Salt Lake City-based experience management company, has been named the top enterprise leader in the most recent “G2 Grid Report for Customer Experience and Employee Experience.” The company’s Research Core product was rated in the top three in its category. Qualtrics is the only experience management company listed as a leader in multiple categories. G2 releases Grid and Index reports that rank products based on reviews gathered from its community, as well as data aggregated from online sources and social networks. Products in the report are ranked by customer satisfaction and market presence. Qualtrics’ Customer Experience, Employee Experience and Research Core products are built on the Qualtrics Experience Management Platform.
TRANSPORTATION
• The Arnold Cos. has appointed Joe Gibney, currently director of business development, as vice president and chief operating officer for Salt Lake City-based TAC Air. As part of Gibney’s new role, he will oversee the business management of Salt Lake City-based Keystone Aviation, a TAC Air company. The Arnold Cos. also has promoted Aaron Fish, controller for Keystone Aviation, to vice president and chief operating officer. Gibney will focus on the company’s established plan for growth and introduce new opportunities and initiatives. Prior to this appointment, Gibney was responsible for strategic development and execution of commercial activities, including large contracts, into-plane, ground handling and airport development projects for TAC Air as the director of business development. Before joining TAC Air in 2017, Gibney served in leadership and operations management for over 20 years with ASIG and Signature Flight Support. Fish joined Keystone Aviation from Resource Management Inc. in 2005 as assistant controller and was promoted to controller in 2010, when he expanded his duties across corporate initiatives for both TAC Air and Keystone Aviation. He holds a bachelor of arts degree in finance from the University of Utah and is expected to complete his Master of Business Administration from Brigham Young University’s Marriott School of Business in the spring of 2020.
• The Salt Lake City Department of Airports will have a public information meeting July 17, 6-7:30 p.m., to seek public input on an update to the master plan for The New SLC. The department is updating the master plan to determine the future facility needs of the Salt Lake City International Airport and to evaluate solutions for implementation. The update will set a strategic course for the airport’s next 20 years and create a blueprint for long-term development. The meeting will take place at the Salt Lake City Public Library, fourth-floor conference room, 210 E. 400 S., Salt Lake City. The meeting will be streamed live at www.facebook.com/SaltLakeCityInternationalAirport.