BizTimes MKE: Milwaukee Business Insights

Starting July 1, Jim Paetsch will takeover as executive director of Milwaukee 7, the regional economic development entity that covers southeastern Wisconsin.  Paetsch has been with M7 since it was started in 2005, but his work has primarily focused on corporate attraction and expansion. He doesn’t expect much of his job will change when it comes to trying to encourage companies to locate and expan...

BizTimes associate editor Arthur Thomas is joined by reporter Maredithe Meyer and editor Andrew Weiland to discuss the news of the week. Maredithe was in the arena for the Milwaukee Bucks playoff victory on Thursday and posted a slideshow Friday with scenes from the game and the crowd. She discusses the feeling of a return to live sports with a full capacity crowd and the scene surrounding the are...

Lauren Anderson and Alex Zank join Arthur Thomas for the Weekly Debrief on the BizTimes MKE Podcast. They discuss Deshea Agree leaving the King Drive BID before previewing the Innovate Wisconsin issue of BizTimes Milwaukee.  The annual Innovate issues publishes on June 7 with a cover story highlighting how Milwaukee Tool has used innovation to fuel a decade of remarkable growth. The entire issue d...

BizTimes Media's Arthur Thomas and Andrew Weiland follow-up on a discussion from last week's episode where Andrew described the future site of a 32-story mixed-use tower in the Third Ward as one of those sites where it is hard to believe nothing significant has been developed. Andrew said there are a number of sites like that around the city, so Arthur asked him to put together a list of...

Milwaukee Department of City Development commissioner Lafayette Crump spoke at the Rotary Club of Milwaukee recently, highlighting the city's comprehensive plan and development throughout the city. “We just have to find a way to implement the vision that exists in that plan and (I’m) really excited to see so many people trying to find ways to make everything we see on paper, to make those thi...

BizTimes Media associate editor Arthur Thomas is joined by editor Andrew Weiland and real estate reporter Alex Zank to discuss the week's big stories, including a plan from Houston-based Hines to build a 32-story, $140 million luxury mixed-use residential tower at a key gateway site in Milwaukee's Third Ward. They also touch on the cautious guidance increase Menomonee Falls-based retaile...

Joan Prince, retired vice chancellor of global inclusion and engagement at UW-Milwaukee, leads a conversation with Ellen Gilligan, president and CEO of the Greater Milwaukee Foundation, and JoAnne Anton, director of Herb Kohl Philanthropies, during a recent Tuesday program at the Rotary Club of Milwaukee. The group addresses the thinking leading philanthropists are bringing to addressing pressing...

BizTimes editors Andrew Weiland, Lauren Anderson and Arthur Thomas discuss the news of the week, including a title sponsor for the NASCAR race at Road America, background on how Rexnord and Regal Beloit's $3.69 billion merger came to be, and a whole lot of developments in the reopening of the economy. The Weekly Debrief is a chance to quickly catchup on news of the week in the Milwaukee busin...

Jeff Hoffman, principal at Cushman & Wakefield│Boerke joins Arthur Thomas and Alex Zank of BizTimes Media to discuss the industrial real estate market in southeastern Wisconsin. Jeff goes into great detail on what his firm is seeing (or not seeing) from national developers, factors driving companies to move from Illinois (it isn’t just taxes and politics), where the next waves of industrial de...

Andrew Weiland, Lauren Anderson and Arthur Thomas of BizTimes Media discuss significant stories from the week, including The Couture finally moving forward, Summerfest announcing its lineup, Goodwill changing its headquarters, trade data showing economic activity picking up, more small businesses starting and passenger traffic taking off at Mitchell Airport. Read more on these stories at BizTimes....

This week's episode features BizTimes editor Andrew Weiland moderating a panel discussion during the recent Racine/Kenosha County 2035 event. The panel featured  Wes Saber, executive vice president and chief financial officer of Haribo of America, John Batten, CEO of Racine-based Twin Disc, Chad Navis, director of industrial developments at Zilber Property Group and Ted Matkom, Wisconsin mark...

The April 26 issue of BizTimes Milwaukee features two stories on the conversion of the Warner Grand Theatre into the Bradley Symphony Center. Associate editor Lauren Anderson wrote the cover story focusing on how the MSO pulled together funding for the $139 project, how plans to open the facility evolved because of COVID-19 and the impact of the project on the western side of Milwaukee's down...

Milwaukee Public Museum president and CEO Ellen Censky and chief planning officer Katie Sanders joined the Milwaukee Rotary Club recently to discuss the transformation of the Milwaukee Public Museum. MPM is planning to build a new 230,000-square-foot development at the northeast corner of North Sixth Street and McKinley Avenue.   In partnership with the Rotary Club of Milwaukee. 

Mark Murphy, president of the Green Bay Packers, joined the Rotary Club of Milwaukee’s Tuesday program recently to discuss developments with the team on and off the field.  Murphy discussed the challenges created by a shrinking salary cap, the desire to keep Aaron Rodgers as the team’s quarterback and how restructuring the front office helped improve communications.  He also details why the team w...

 Presidents from three private colleges and universities in southeastern Wisconsin – John Walz of MSOE, Dan Johnson of Wisconsin Lutheran College, and Christine Pharr of Mount Mary University – discuss how Wisconsin Association of Independent Colleges and Universities members impact the state economy during the Rotary Club of Milwaukee’s Tuesday speaker series. They touch on how they’ve navigated...

Few, if any, sectors in Wisconsin have been more at the center of the COVID-19 fight than the biohealth industry.  Lisa Johnson, chief executive officer of BioForward Wisconsin, said the sector includes life sciences, medical devices, digital health and health systems. BioForward is a membership organization that represents more than 200 companies in the sector in Wisconsin.  On the latest BizTime...

Vallabh Sambamurthy, the Albert O. Nicholas Dean of the Wisconsin School of Business at UW-Madison, joins BizTimes associate editor Arthur Thomas to talk about his first two years on the job. Dean Samba accepted the position in early 2019 and came to Madison in August of that year. Even before arriving, he had started laying the groundwork for a new strategic plan for the business school. A group...

Wisconsin Center District CEO Marty Brooks joins BizTimes associate editor Arthur Thomas and reporter Alex Zank to discuss the latest news coming from the downtown Milwaukee convention center. Brooks talks about how the work the WCD did on its culture after his arrival in 2018 paid off when the COVID-19 pandemic hit; what its like planning for an expansion amid a pandemic; and how he is approachin...

This episode of the BizTimes MKE Podcast features Baird market strategist Michael Antonelli’s recent presentation to the Rotary Club of Milwaukee on Bitcoin. Antonelli offers a primer on the basics of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, a review of some of Bitcoin’s strengths and weaknesses, the challenges financial services firms have with it and his view on why Bitcoin will not end up as a curre...

Pindel Global Precision entered 2020 making no ventilator parts for its customers. The New Berlin-based precision machining manufacturer exited the year having made thousands of parts for five customers.  Bill Berrien, chief executive officer of Pindel, and his team were among the companies that moved quickly as the COVID-19 pandemic hit to find a way to contribute. The experience led Berrien to s...

In this episode, BizTimes associate editor Arthur Thomas takes listeners through some of the highlights from the 2021 BizTimes Economic Trends event, including economist Mike Knetter's thoughts on the need for political leadership to help the economy, consumer confidence and inflation; a closer look at labor markets with Ryan Festerling of QPS Employment Group; and a tour through the manufact...

Every year, BizTimes editor Andrew Weiland puts together a list of the biggest stories for the year from the southeastern Wisconsin business community. It is always interesting to recall all of the things that transpired during the year, but 2020 took things to another level. On this episode, Weiland joins associate editor Arthur Thomas to discuss what made the list this year and dive deeper on so...

Marie Moody started Oak Creek-based pet food maker Stella & Chewy's in the early 2000s because she couldn't find the raw food her dog needed. In the last 17 years, the company has continued to grow, including a recently approved 140,000-square-foot expansion of its facilities and plans to add another 100 jobs in the coming years. On this episode, Moody discusses what is driving the c...

Generac chairman and CEO Aaron Jagdfeld joined BizTimes Media associate editor Arthur Thomas for a one-on-one interview as part of the 2020 Next Generation Manufacturing Summit. The event was held virtually and is now available on demand here. In this interview, Jagdfeld discusses how demand for Generac's products has been shaped by the COVID-19 pandemic, business lessons from Briggs & St...

On this episode, Kathy Thornton-Bias, president and CEO of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Milwaukee, discusses how her organization is navigating during the COVID-19 pandemic at the Rotary Club of Milwaukee. "It's knowing what your stakeholders and your customers need and going after that and going after it really hard," she said, noting the Boys & Girls Clubs moved into...