Sunday, June 14, 1998
The name game isn't too popular at the Midland Co. these days.
Amelia-based Midland, engaged in the insurance and transportation businesses, last week had to issue a statement clarifying news reports that misidentified the company, causing senior managers and investors grief.
Michael Conaton
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The latest mishap came Monday when Reuters named Midland Co. in a story about the resignation of its chairman and CEO. The story, it turns out, was about Midland Inc., a Texas-based shipping company. That followed a late May report from the Associated Press that Columbus-based Midland Life Insurance Co. lost a $1 million lawsuit but identified the Amelia company as the loser.
Both news agencies corrected the errors, though reports caused Midland Co. investors some discomfort.
"It's beyond us how this could get screwed up (twice)," said Michael Conaton, Midland's vice chairman. "Investors wanted to know what's up with our CEO, and not a doggone thing happened." -- Jeff McKinney
Applegate taps her past
Here's one way to get ahead in business -- rely on lazy reporters.
This from syndicated small-business columnist and author Jane Applegate, who spoke to a crowd last week at the Women Entrepreneurs Inc. WAVE Awards ceremony.
Ms. Applegate highlighted several points to be a success in business, all based on vision and thinking clearly. The fourth point was to determine one's place in the community and the industry. Ms. Applegate suggested that to become a specialist in the industry, one should get her name in the paper. How? Ms. Applegate offered the best approach -- call a reporter and volunteer yourself as an industry source.
"Reporters are basically very lazy," she proffered.
Perhaps it takes one to know one. Ms. Applegate had been a reporter herself. -- Lisa Biank Fasig
Local banks cash in
Out-of-town super-regional banks operating in Cincinnati are having a tough time taking customers and deposits away from the Queen City's big three hometown banks.
At least, that's what a report from the Federal Deposit Insurance Co. indicates.
Pittsburgh-based PNC Bank Corp., Cleveland-based KeyCorp and Huntington Bancshares Inc. and Banc One Corp., both of Columbus, have steadily lost deposit market share to Fifth Third Bancorp, Star Banc Corp. and Provident Financial Group Inc. the past five years.
At the same time, Fifth Third held onto its spot as the city's largest bank, while Provident bumped Star from the No. 2 spot in share of deposits locally.
Here's how deposit share for the city's seven largest banks stacked up from June 1992 through June 1997, the FDIC said: Fifth Third, up to 22.54 percent from 18.82 percent; Provident, up from 12.78 percent to 17.33 percent; Star fell to 14.12 percent from 16.47 percent; PNC, down to 10.64 percent from 12.20 percent; Huntington off to 3.79 percent from 5.31 percent; Banc One, down to 2.55 percent from 4.23 percent; and KeyCorp, down to 2.29 percent from 3.38 percent. The data included an analysis of an 11-county area, the core market for Cincinnati's three biggest banks. -- Jeff McKinney
Software firms on list
It might not rank up there with Silicon Valley, but Cincinnati landed three companies on Software Magazine's list of the 500 largest software companies.
Springdale-based Cincom Systems Inc. ranked 59th with revenue of $165.9 million last year. SCH Technologies in Cincinnati ranked 247th with revenue of $21 million and MedPlus Inc. in Symmes Township was 407th, with revenue of $4.9 million.
The list, compiled from information submitted by the companies, includes only software and not consulting and other service revenue for the 1997 calendar year, the magazine said in its June issue. Dayton, Ohio's NCR Corp. ranked 34th with revenue of $428 million. IBM, with software revenue of $12.84 billion, edged out Microsoft at $12.83 billion for the top spot on the publication's list. -- Mike Boyer
Items for Tipsheet are gathered by Enquirer business reporters.
