Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, November 18, 1994 TAG: 9411180126
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A-19 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
BASTIAN - General Injectables and Vaccines and three companies with which it consolidated this week cut 41 jobs from its overall payroll and temporarily shut down its Lotus Biochemical operation in Radford.
The job cuts affected GIV in Bland County, Lotus and Insource Inc.
Willard Lester, vice president of administrative services for the companies, said the reductions stemmed from management's desire for better operating efficiency.
He said the recent consolidation of the three companies, together with technological advances in computer systems, created a work-force surplus and the shutdown at the Radford plant is temporary.
GIV was founded in Bastian in 1984 as a marketer of pharmaceuticals.
- New River Valley bureau
Hotel center to get global video link
The Hotel Roanoke Conference Center Commission on Thursday approved an $11,400 contract that will allow the center to receive satellite video transmissions from around the world.
Roanoke-based ACS Inc. was the lowest of four bidders for the downlink system, which will allow corporations or educational institutions to beam programming into the $13 million conference center, now under construction.
The downlink allows video and sound reception only. But the conference center has hookups that will allow satellite transmissions from the center on borrowed or leased "uplink" equipment, which is vastly more expensive.
Use of uplink hardware would allow two-way video conferences. Those also may be accomplished by digitally compressed video signals sent over fiber-optic telephone lines.
The downlink will feed into two large rear-projection television screens in the center's lecture hall. The video also can be routed to other meeting rooms.
- Staff report
Briefly ...
Dominion Resources Inc., Richmond parent of Virginia Power, and Household International Inc., a Prospect Heights, Ill., financial service company, said Thursday their subsidiaries have agreed to create a national commercial lending company that will serve the nation's growing demand for loans from middle-market corporations undergoing buyouts, expansions, refinancing and recapitalizations. The new company will provide senior and subordinated debt to public and private businesses. It will begin with capitalization of about $700 million.
Hayes, Seay, Mattern & Mattern Inc., a Roanoke-based architectural, engineering and planning firm, has been named the 1994 mechanical and electrical engineering firm of the year in the Washington, D.C., area by the Metropolitan Washington Chapter of Associated Builders and Contractors.
Trigon Blue Cross Blue Shield, Richmond-based health insurer with operations in Roanoke, has donated $25,000 to Bradley Free Clinic of Roanoke. It is the company's third year of support for the facility, which offers health care to people who cannot afford to pay for it.
S&K Famous Brands Inc., a Richmond menswear retailer with stores in Roanoke, has received an award of excellence from Value Retail News, an industry trade publication. The award cites growth, merchandising, advertising, store design and public service.
by CNB