Ideas

First Business Financial Services Inc., the Madison-based parent company of First Business Bank-Milwaukee, reported first quarter net income of $3.3 million, or 84 cents per share, up from $3.2 million, or 83 cents per share, in the first quarter of 2013.

After a moderate expansion in 2013, the pace of Wisconsin's economic recovery is picking up in 2014, according to a special report by BMO Economics on the economic output from the Great Lakes region.

Stamford, Conn.-based Charter Communications will take over 1.4 million existing Time Warner Cable customers, including those in the Milwaukee area, from Philadelphia-based Comcast Corp. in a divesture deal.

Sussex-based Quad/Graphics Inc. has completed its $1.9 billion debt financing, which incorporates refinancing, extending and expanding its $1.6 billion senior secured credit facility and a high-yield offering of $300 million in bonds.

Milwaukee-based UMB Fund Services has been honored as “US Fund Administrator of the Year (Alternative Investments)” by ACQ Magazine.

PNC’s Corporate Banking Group and Schenck S.C. will host “Business and Banking in China” on Wednesday, May 21, from 7 to 9 a.m. at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, 10499 W. Innovation Drive in Wauwatosa.

Milwaukee-based LauberCFOs Inc. has assisted with the launch of a new industry association, the Finance and Accounting Consultants Alliance.

U.S. Bank has become the first large bank in the country to offer Brookfield-based Fiserv Inc.’s person-to-person social payment technology.

What has been termed by the media as a “squabble” over a transit bidding process between the County Board and the County Executive is instead a clear and simple difference of opinion over how Milwaukee County will move forward on transportation and deliver transit services.

The Better Business Bureau Serving Wisconsin and the Concordia University Wisconsin School of Business Administration have formed a partnership to present the Torch Awards for Ethics beginning in 2015.