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ASSOCIATIONS
• Scott Bennion has been re-elected to the Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) Regional Nominating Committee. Bennion is senior property/asset manager for Riverpark Development and BOMA Utah president. He will serve another two-year term on the committee, which recommends the future officers and other leaders of the association. Also, Gary Bullock, director of operations for Millrock Management and BOMA Utah board member and government affairs chairman, has been elected president of the BOMA International Pacific Northwest Region. The president is responsible to oversee and conduct all meetings, including coordinating the region meeting and directing the board of directors, which includes members from Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wyoming.
BANKING
• Bank of Utah, Ogden, has hired Phill Wright as a vice president and mortgage area manager at the bank’s new Bountiful branch. Wright has more than 30 years of experience in the financial and mortgage industries. Wright has also served several years as a senior chair member within a political organization, as a board member of a nonprofit veteran’s charity, and as a motivational speaker and trainer. Wright majored in communication and media studies at Brigham Young University.
CONSTRUCTION
• WesTech Engineering Inc., Salt Lake City, has appointed Philip Lake as industrial branch leader. He will focus on driving growth in industrial markets. Lake most recently served as the company’s international business manager. He succeeds replaces Ralph A. Cutler, who became WesTech’s president on July 1. Lake has 23 years of experience in the water technology solutions field. Prior to joining WesTech, he was the operations director at Eimco Water Technology.
EDUCATION/TRAINING
• Salt Lake Community College (SLCC) has appointed Sonia Alarcon Parker as director of career and student employment. She will lead the work within Career and Student Employment Services and continue to seek partnership opportunities with the industry that lead to employment and internship experiences for the students. Parker previously was SLCC’s director of academic and career advising for 16 years and was publisher/editor of the local Spanish language newspaper America Unida and international TV producer for several organizations. She is a graduate from Brigham Young University and University of Utah. Parker succeeds Jack Hesleph, who retired after 32 years of service at SLCC.
ENERGY/NATURAL RESOURCES
• Vivint Solar Inc., Lehi, has expanded availability of its solar energy systems into Virginia. The company now operates in 20 states.
HEALTHCARE
• Regence BlueCross BlueShield of Utah has appointed James Swayze as plan president. He will be responsible for strategy development and execution for the company’s operations in the state, which serve a customer base of nearly a half-million people. Swayze comes to his new role from the Denver metro area where he served for the past nine years as president and chief executive officer of the state’s largest third-party administrator of employee benefit plans. Prior to that, he held leadership roles at Colorado health insurance firms, including Rocky Mountain Health Plans, Secure Horizons, PacifiCare Health Systems and FHP Health Care.
• The Community Foundation of Utah has awarded a $545,182 two-year grant to the Fourth Street Clinic. The grant is the first awarded through the Housing and Homelessness Prevention Fund, a fund established by the foundation in 2015. The grant will support the launch of the clinic’s Nurse Care Management (NCM) pilot program, a program designed to connect homeless individuals with comprehensive medical services. The Fourth Street Clinic will serve as the central “hub” for medical services and service provider locations as the “spokes.” It will partner with YWCA Utah, the Salt Lake County Housing Authority, First Step House, Volunteers of America Utah and The Road Home over the first two years of the program, providing nurse care managers on rotation between locations depending on the needs of patients.
INVESTMENTS
• Impartner, South Jordan, has closed on a $15 million funding round from Emergence Capital, based in San Mateo, California. Impartner said it will use the funding on research and engineering to continue to advance its flagship Impartner PRM solution. Impartner was assisted in the transaction by Mark Bonham, a partner at Stoel Rives, and his team.
• APiO, a Sandy-based financial technology company, has closed on a $2.5 million seed funding round led by a group of private investors. APiO’s financial advisor on the transaction was Salt Lake City-based Crewe Capital. Founded in the fourth quarter of 2016, the company leverages direct integration with first- and third-party data, AI and machine learning (ML) to create a new working capital solution for small- to medium-sized business (SMBs) worldwide.
MEDIA/MARKETING
• Blue360° Media, Park City, has acquired more than 150 law enforcement publications from LexisNexis Group, covering 40 U.S. states. Financial terms were not disclosed. Blue360° Media publishes law enforcement manuals, code books, field guides and an officer series focused on professional development.
PHILANTHROPY
• The Grainger Foundation, an independent, private foundation based in Lake Forest, Illinois, has donated $5,000 to the Friends of the Salt Lake County Children’s Justice Center Inc. in support of its mission to help support child abuse victims in the area. Friends of the Salt Lake County Children’s Justice Center Inc. is a nonprofit established to support the mission of the Salt Lake County Children’s Justice Center program, which is administered by Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill. The center is an award-winning program that serves more than 1,600 child and teen victims annually. This donation was recommended by Michael Cook and JT Grainger, operations managers, and Sean Casey, branch manager of W.W Grainger Inc.’s Salt Lake City location.
RECOGNITIONS
• Six Utah companies are listed in the 2017 Cloud 100 List, a list of the top 100 private cloud companies in the world, compiled by Forbes, in collaboration with Bessemer Venture Partners: No. 6 Qualtrics, No. 15 Domo, No. 20 Pluralsight, No. 58 Workfront, No. 64 Health Catalyst and No. 92 InsideSales. A panel of mostly cloud company chief executive officers selected and ranked the companies. The evaluation involved estimated valuation, operating metrics, people and culture, and market leadership.
• The Interstate Renewable Energy Council has honored Utah Clean Energy with its Regulatory Champion of the Year award, part of its 2017 3iAwards. Recipients were honored for their “innovation, ingenuity and inspiration in renewable energy and energy efficiency.” Awards were presented in four categories. Utah Clean Energy partnered with Salt Lake City to develop a 10-year solar plan for industry, regulators, local governments and utilities to work together to simplify and expand rooftop solar and reduce costs.
• Two Utah companies have been named among “America’s Best Employers” in the large-company category and six more are in the midsize-employers category in a list compiled by Forbes magazine. The large employers are No. 33 Intercontinental Hotels Group and No. 141 University of Utah. The midsize employers are No. 68 Harmons, No. 71 DoTerra, No. 165 Brigham Young University, No. 171 CHG Healthcare Services, No. 231 Sinclair Oil, and No. 273 Nu Skin Enterprises Inc.
• Scott Thompson and DiVi Energy recently were recognized by the U.S. Department of Energy during the Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) annual conference. The recognition is for companies that are making significant contributions in energy savings with LED lighting as part of the DOE’s Interior Lighting Campaign.
• Six winners were recently honored as Skyline Challenge Awards recipients for their building efficiency efforts by Salt Lake City: the Boston Building (Unico Properties and Hamilton Partners), Zions Bank, the Goldman Sachs Group, VCBO Architecture, Dominion Energy and XMission. Launched in May 2014, the Skyline Challenge is a multi-year competition that encourages organizations across Utah to proactively achieve high levels of energy savings by evaluating their building’s energy use, setting energy-saving goals, and undertaking energy-saving projects.
• Brian Rubow, director of client training and support at Cimetrix Inc., was awarded the Leadership Award at the annual SEMI International Standards Awards reception July 11 during the SEMICON West show. The Leadership Award recognizes those who volunteer their time and demonstrate outstanding leadership within the SEMI standards program. Rubow has over 20 years of experience in the semiconductor, electronics assembly, robotics, PV and HB-LED industries, and has been a key contributor to the SEMI Standards programs throughout his career. He also has been involved in training and supporting the many customers of Cimetrix equipment connectivity and control products over the years.
• World Trade Center Utah honored Qnergy, Ogden, with the Vanguard in International Business Award at the recent Weber County International Business Forum. To qualify, Qnergy had to be a business headquartered in Weber County, successfully exported for at least one year and have potential for increased export activity. Qnergy was incorporated in October 2013. The PCK80 was Qnergy’s first product and launched in 2014. In 2015, Qnergy established its first commercial partnership with an Austrian company to use the PCK80 in its clean-burning wood pellet boilers. Qnergy has since launched two more products — SmartBroiler and SmartGen — and its products are shipped worldwide, with 75 percent of Qnergy’s sales in 2016 being from exports.
• The Jordan Valley Water Conservancy District has been honored by Rocky Mountain Power as the 2017 “wattsmart” Business Utah Partner of the Year. Rocky Mountain Power said the district last year engaged in energy saving efforts that saved over 9.3 million kilowatt hours, equivalent to the energy used by 1,040 homes in a year. Rocky Mountain Power provided $275,134 in incentives for two capital improvement projects as well as a strategic energy management program, which resulted in $372,275 in annual energy costs savings.
SERVICES
• VFI Corporate Finance, a Salt Lake City-based equipment leasing company, has named Richard Hickmon as vice president of intermediary relations. Hickmon will serve the intermediary market and the middle market arena for VFI. He previously served as vice president of the Lease Advisory Group of Varilease Finance Inc. from 2005-2017, and earlier as national sales manager of ACC Capital Corp. He has worked in the leasing industry for the past 20 years. He graduated from the College of Eastern Utah with an associate degree in communications and later attended the University of Utah.
TECHNOLOGY/LIFE SCIENCES
• Qualtrics, Salt Lake City, has appointed John Torrey as head of corporate strategy, corporate development and business development. Torrey’s experience includes serving as chief corporate development officer for SAP; executive vice president of corporate strategy for Concur Technologies; and an equity research analyst at Adams Harkness, Credit Suisse First Boston Technology Group and Montgomery & Co., where he was also director of research.