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John Koss Sr., a trumpet player in a big band and an entrepreneur who went on to invent the first stereo headphone, launched Koss Corp. in 1953 as a television rental service catering to Milwaukee-area hospitals. By 1973, the company had grown to provide headphone jacks in all portable electronics and to create the industry standard high-fidelity headphone.

Over the past 13 years, Berbee Information Networks Corp. has evolved into a $390 million information technology provider that thrives by delivering cutting-edge solutions for its customer. Last September 2006, the Madison-based company was acquired by CDW Corp., a technology products and services provider based in Vernon Hills, Ill., for $175 million.

Suppliers to the Big Three U.S. automakers, including Milwaukee-based Strattec Security Corp., have had to get leaner and leaner in recent years. Two of the Big Three, Ford and General Motors, have been hemorrhaging money and losing market share to foreign competitors for years. Through the third quarter of 2006, Ford had net losses of about $7 billion, and GM had net losses of about $3 billion.

Businesses in the metro Milwaukee area see continuing gains in key growth indicators for 2007, according to the new first-quarter Business Outlook Survey conducted by the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce (MMAC). The metro area finished 2006 with a solid job trend. The local area has posted seven consecutive months of year-over-year job gains and is likely to post overall annual employment gains for the third consecutive year.

Members of the Council of Small Business Executives (COSBE) board of directors are optimistic about the year ahead for their own companies, but they are much more divided about the direction of the regional economy in 2007, according to a new survey by Small Business Times.

SBT received survey responses from 21 board members of COSBE, which is an affiliate organization of the Metropolitan Milwaukee Chamber of Commerce (MMAC).

Led by the suddenly high-flying Midwest Air Group Inc., half of the top-performing stocks of southeastern Wisconsin’s publicly traded companies in 2006 were corporations in the midst of significant change. The best-performing stock in the BizTimes Stock Index in 2006 was that of Midwest Air Group Inc., the parent company of Oak Creek-based Midwest Airlines. Buoyed by December speculation that the company could be acquired by AirTran Holdings Inc., Midwest Air Group’s stock shot up 103.9 percent to close the year out at $11.50 per share.

The U.S. economy will struggle to shrug off a cooled housing market and a burgeoning fiscal deficit in the first half of 2007, but will regain some momentum in the second half of the year. That’s the prognosis of Michael Knetter, dean of the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Business.

Tempered by a housing market hangover, a slumping American automotive industry and the costly war in Iraq, most economists are projecting slow growth of 2 to 3 percent for the U.S. economy in 2007. As the figures suggest, growth will be attainable. However, that growth will have to be earned, and it will usually come in small increments, as companies that are prepared to make the slow climb are able to grind through or around the obstacles in their paths.

It’s that time of year. The 2007 budgets are in place, business plans have been reviewed, and there’s excitement and consternation in the air. The economy remains a growing concern due to fourth-quarter expectations and results. It seems that with respect to the last three years, nothing can be taken for granted or assumed with any degree of confidence in terms of business growth and profit expectations.

Company Address: 600 Northshore Drive, Hartland, WI 53029 Web site: www.cdmfg.com, www.spincards.com Industry: ...