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Mark Crandall has been regional president for Massachusetts and Rhode Island at The Toronto-Dominion Bank and TD Banknorth Inc., since Dec. 31, 2006. He also became regional president for Connecticut in April 2012.Crandall also serves as senior vice president of U. S. personal and commercial banking at TD Bank. He has served as an executive vice president and regional commercial-lending manager of TD Banknorth Inc. Crandall discusses TD Bank’s growth plans and its growing presence in Rhode Island.
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By Michael Souza |
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John Picerne was raised on the real estate business in the third-generation Picerne Real Estate Group. But the further he went in the family business, the less comfortable he became with the boom-and-bust cycles of residential housing. Craving a more stable slice of the market, Picerne ventured into military housing, particularly building apartments on Army bases, and broke off the independent Picerne Military Housing in 2005.
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By Patrick Anderson |
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SJ Corio Co. President Salvatore Corio Jr. has been running liquidation auctions in Rhode Island since 1983, so when he took on the 38 Studios LLC bankruptcy sale, he knew he was in for a big job. With over 2,000 lots on the block, selling everything in one session while maximizing returns for taxpayers would take speed and endurance. Over a nearly uninterrupted 10 hours of bidding, the auction recovered $650,000 for the state as Corio mixed his trademark blend of rapid-fire humor with salesmanship. More than once, he asked for a bid of $75 million, the amount of the 38 Studios loan guarantee.
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By Patrick Anderson |
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Andy Cutler, founder of Cutler & Co., has spent the past two years and plenty of his own money working on an initiative that aims to connect Providence with other smaller cities around the world. Drawn to the similarities between Providence and Copenhagen, he selected the Danish city as the first focus of Smaller Cities Unite!, an initiative designed to link Rhode Island’s capital with other cities that have populations of 1.5 million or less, and that share commonalities such as student engagement, economic development, policy, entrepreneurship and arts and culture. After months of forging virtual connections with residents of Copenhagen and trying to build local support, Cutler recently traveled to the city. He spent 11 days there discussing ways to form lasting connections between the two cities.
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By Lindsay Lorenz |
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Providence-based VCharge Inc. coined the term “transactive load” to describe a concept company founders believe will change the world. It’s the idea that end users of electricity can save money by determining when they buy power, taking advantage of the pre-dawn hours when demand is low and generators are pumping out far more energy than needed. To take advantage of this concept, VCharge is developing smart-grid applications, such as its Smartbricks for electric thermal-storage systems, that could potentially balance supply and demand on the electric grid and pave the way for alternative energy. Jessica Millar is VCharge’s founder and chief security officer.
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By Patrick Anderson |
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Gary Cloutier is a Rhode Island native who returned to the Ocean State on May 14 as executive director for Groundwork Providence, a nonprofit dedicated to the greening and cleaning of the metropolitan Providence area through several initiatives.
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By Michael Souza |
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Growing up a distant cousin of Kurt Vonnegut and going to Harvard didn’t make him a novelist, but 15 years immersed in the cut-throat culture of Wall Street drove Norb Vonnegut to the pen. The stock broker turned writer, who worked at Kidder, Peabody in Providence 20 years ago, is now settled in Rhode Island and just released his third novel, “The Trust.” The thriller is about a network of financial criminals involved in adult entertainment who hide behind the Catholic Church and infiltrate a wealthy family.
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By Patrick Anderson |
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When Lisa Ranglin helped announce the creation of the Rhode Island Black Business Association in October 2011, she said there was a serious need for a central advocacy program for small businesses owned by minorities and females in Rhode Island.
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By Rebecca Keister |
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Saul Kaplan isn’t about to get “Netflixed.”
That’s the term he uses to describe a business’ inability to anticipate change and, worse, failure to reinvent itself for future success, referencing what happened to the Blockbuster franchise when Netflix came along with a new business model for the same product.
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By Rebecca Keister |
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Brown University senior David Emanuel garnered some attention for a student business called Lock’d when he won first place in the statewide Elevator Pitch competition at Johnson & Wales University’s Harborside Campus in Providence on Dec. 5.
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By Rhonda Miller |
