What do pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, IT player Cisco Systems and credit powerhouse American Express have in common?  They’ve ditched the traditional hourly model for legal fees to cut costs. Pfizer, which spends over $500 million annually on legal fees, says it will cut legal costs by up to 20%, mostly through flat-fee arrangements, according to [...]

The Obama Administration’s plans to upgrade the food safety system could bring welcome relief to local and state agencies who have struggled to prevent food illness outbreaks amid bureaucracy as well as limited resources and federal leadership. Plans include a new, public health-focused approach to food safety based on three core principles: prioritizing prevention; strengthening [...]

According to the Better Hearing Institute, http://www.betterhearing.org/index.cfm,  one out of every ten Americans has hearing loss with the majority of people being male (60 percent) and below retirement age (65 percent), often as young as 18 years old. Hearing loss can come from multiple sources.  While age and continued exposure to noise of 85 dB [...]

Cenzic Inc. has announced the cybersecurity initiative, GovShield ™ which aims to protect the government Web infrastructure from potential attackers. The program will be overseen by David Kimball, who brings 20 years of experience to the position. GovShield will support government agencies in complying with federal regulations, including the Federal Information Security Management ACT (FISMA) [...]

Former Secretary of the Air Force, Michael W. Wynne, has been appointed to the advisory board of Frederick, Maryland based, Widearea Systems. The firm is a provider of unified communications solutions and services. Wynne’s previous experience includes seven years in the Air Force, where he was an assistant professor of astronautics at the US Air [...]

Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle Corp., has joined the heads of both Apple Inc. and Google Inc. in accepting a $1 per year salary for fiscal 2010. In fiscal 2009 he was paid $1 million. Ellison, who founded the company in 1977, has ownership of 23.4 percent of Oracle’s outstanding shares, as of July, which [...]

Qwest Communications International Inc. has named former McDonald’s Corp. COO and current CEO of Westside Holdings LLC, Michael Roberts to its board.  This appointment brings the total membership of Qwest’s board to 13. In a career spanning almost 30 years with the fast-food giant, Roberts has served as CEO of its U.S. division, McDonald’s USA, culminating as [...]

The focus of Monday’s Energy Futures show will be SAIC’s plans for the Hawaii Energy Efficiency Program. The State Legislature of Hawaii awarded SAIC responsibility for the Hawaii Energy Efficiency Program on July 1 after they determined an independent third party would be a more suitable administrator than the Hawaiian Electric Company. Ray Starling, SAIC’s [...]

Northrop Grumman is looking to sell TASC, its unit that advises military and intelligence agencies in a deal that could be worth up to $1 to $2 billion. The Department of Defense has tightened its conflict-of-interest rules this year as ordered by Congress on firms like Northrop’s TASC. Many contractors offer services to government agencies [...]

Though state officials have faced difficult choices as they struggle to finalize 2010 budgets across the country, it’s clear the task would have been even more grim without a crucial infusion of federal money. According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, as dire as the states’ fiscal condition is – with dramatic revenue [...]