Highmark names new CEO
Highmark Inc., Pennsylvania’s largest insurance company, named William Winkenwerder Jr. as its new president and CEO on Monday. Winkenwerder, 58, has held a variety of jobs in the industry, including posts at Kaiser Permanente in Atlanta and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts. From 2001 to 2007, he served in the federal government as assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. Winkenwerder replaces Ken Melani, who was fired in April after fighting with the husband of an employee with whom he was having an affair. Winkenwerder holds an undergraduate degree from Davidson College, a medical degree from the University of North Carolina, and a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. — AP
Peco starts electric-vehicle incentives
Peco Energy Co. on Tuesday is launching incentives for residential and business customers who invest in new electric vehicle technology. The Philadelphia utility will pay residential and business customers $50 a car just for letting Peco know they have an electric vehicle, so the company can make sure its system is prepared to meet any increased demand for power. Peco will also pay government, institutional and nonprofit customers 1,000 for each public charger they install and will pay counties up to $3,000 to install a public charging station in each of the counties that Peco serves. The rebates are for Level 2 chargers, which operate on 240-volt circuits and can charge a vehicle for up to 20 miles of range in an hour. For more information visit www.peco.com/SmartIdeas. — Andrew Maykuth
Operator buys transfer station
Short-line rail operator Regional Rail L.L.C., of Kennett Square, announced Monday its acquisition of a waste-transfer station in Conshohocken. The station, formerly known as Conshohocken Rail, was part of Total Waste Logistics L.L.C., of Canfield, Ohio, which went bankrupt in 2009. Now operating as Conshohocken Recycling & Rail Transfer, the station at 1060 Conshohocken Rd. receives construction and demolition debris by the truckload and, after removing recyclable materials, ships the debris by rail to out-of-state landfills, primarily in Ohio, said vice president and chief commercial officer Alfred Sauer. The purchase was completed Friday for an undisclosed price, Sauer said.
— Paul Nussbaum
ELSEWHERE
Facebook may include children
Though Facebook Inc. bans children under 13, millions of them have profiles on the site by lying about their age. The company is now testing ways to allow those children to participate without having to lie. This would likely be under parental supervision, such as by connecting children’s accounts to their parents’ accounts. Like many other online services, Facebook prohibits children under 13 because federal law requires companies to obtain parental consent if they want to collect information about those children. Such information collection is central to Facebook. Every photo or status update a youngster posts on Facebook could count as information collection. Many companies consider the parental-consent requirement too burdensome, so they simply ban all children under 13 instead. But that ban is difficult to enforce. In many cases, parents themselves help children skirt it by setting up profiles for them and lying about their ages. There are an estimated 7.5 million children under 13 on Facebook, out of more than 900 million users worldwide. — AP
Verizon offering buyouts
Phone company Verizon Communications Inc. is offering buyouts to 1,700 workers, mainly call-center employees and technicians, as it continues to shrink its wireline business. The offer applies to less than 1 percent of Verizon’s overall workforce of 191,800 as of the end of March, and about 2 percent of its wireline workforce. Verizon is cutting its wireline costs as households cancel their phone lines, opting to go to competitors or to rely on cellphones. The latest offers went out last week and Verizon spokesman Rich Young says the target is to have employees leave in the first weeks of July. If not enough people accept the buyouts, he says, layoffs are possible. — AP
Shareholder vote shows dissent
Wal-Mart Stores Inc.’s final shareholder vote for its board of directors showed unprecedented dissent against key executives and board members, including CEO Mike Duke, in the wake of allegations of bribery in Mexico. All of the company’s nominees were reelected. But the rise in votes against key leaders underscores how the bribery case could distract the world’s largest retailer as it tries to continue its sales momentum in the United States and overseas. According to results released by Wal-Mart on Monday, 13 percent of the 3.4 billion shares were voted against the reelection of Duke to the company’s board. Nearly 13 percent went against Chairman Robson Walton, the son of founder Sam Walton, and 15.6 percent went against former CEO Lee Scott. A little more than 13 percent of the shares were cast against Christopher Williams, chairman and CEO of the Williams Capital Group, who serves as chairman of Wal-Mart’s audit committee. — AP
