The chief executive of GMAC Insurance's personal-lines division, Larry Pentis, has resigned, the company confirmed Friday.

Pentis was named as chief executive when a subsidiary of AmTrust Financial Services Inc. completed its purchase of the GMAC division in March 2010.

"Larry Pentis will be leaving his position," AmTrust said in a statement. "We appreciate Larry's efforts and contributions over the past two years, and we wish him the best in his future endeavors."

The company declined to comment beyond its statement. Pentis could not be located for comment.

The company said Byron Storms has been named as president of GMAC Insurance and would be based in Winston-Salem. AmTrust recently bought California-based Clearside General, where Storms served as chief executive.

The company did not say who would serve as chief executive of GMAC Insurance.

Storms has served as executive director of Farmers Insurance and also managed personal-lines businesses for Foremost and Bristol West Insurance.

"Byron brings energy, vision and passion for excellence to GMAC Insurance," the company said.

Pentis' resignation is the latest development involving GMAC Insurance.

About 700 local employees have been bracing for months for the company to announce whether it will keep its operations in Winston-Salem or move them to Cleveland.

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Chief of GMAC Insurance division resigns

PHILADELPHIA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Philadelphia trial lawyers John M. Dodig and Mark W. Tanner of Feldman Shepherd Wohlgelernter Tanner Weinstock & Dodig LLP, recently presented Trial Strategy: Building Blocks of Persuasion to students of Temple University Beasley School of Law LL.M. Trial Advocacy program. The course, presented in April, addressed techniques for building a persuasive case, beginning prior to trial and continuing through closing arguments.

Dodig is an experienced trial attorney representing plaintiffs in complex litigation matters, including medical negligence, product liability, construction accidents, consumer class actions, motor vehicle accidents and civil rights claims. He has successfully obtained multiple seven- and eight-figure verdicts and settlements on behalf of his clients including a $31 mil. jury verdict for an individual injured as a result of a dangerous highway. Dodig has served as president of the Philadelphia Trial Lawyers Association and on the Board of Governors of the Pennsylvania Association for Justice. He is a frequent lecturer in courses designed to teach practicing lawyers trial advocacy skills.

Tanner is an accomplished trial attorney with a wide ranging practice in complex litigation. In addition to securing one of the largest medical malpractice verdicts in the courts of Pennsylvania, he has also secured what is believed to be the largest jury verdict in the state in a bad faith case against an insurance company. His practice includes medical negligence, disability insurance claims, insurance bad faith, product liability and class action litigation. A sought-after lecturer, he often serves as a faculty member in programs devoted to the development of trial advocacy skills, and teaches at Temple University's Academy of Advocacy. He is a fellow of the International Academy of Trial Attorneys and was selected for membership in theAmerican Board of TrialAdvocates. Certified as a Civil Trial Specialist by theNational Board of Trial Advocacy, Tanner has been recognized for five consecutive years by Thomson Reuters, published annually inPhiladelphia magazine, as one of the Top 100 Super Lawyers in Pennsylvania.

About Feldman Shepherd Feldman Shepherd Wohlgelernter Tanner Weinstock & Dodig LLP (www.feldmanshepherd.com) has handled cases producing some of the largest verdicts and settlements in Pennsylvania.

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Philadelphia Personal Injury Attorneys John M. Dodig and Mark W. Tanner Present Trial Techniques to Temple Law Students

Arlington, VA The Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA), a standards developing organization that represents the manufacturers and suppliers of global communications networks, today invited the public to participate in the development and advancement of intersystem core networks standard for mobile phone roaming.

TIAs subcommittee on Mobile and Personal Communications - Core Networks (TR-45.8) has developed the below standards and opened them once again for public review. The subcommittees focus is on developing performance, compatibility and inter-operability standards for equipment supporting wireless packet data that is independent from a system that supports any combination of public, non-public or residential mobile and personal communications. The subcommittee members develop circuit-switched core network, packet data core network and multimedia core network standards. These standards pertain to service definition and network interface standards to promote interoperability and intersystem operations, for interfaces between those network elements that comprise the infrastructure, in support of seamless service to wireless subscribers, other mobile and personal communication network systems, auxiliary systems, and to other networks. TR-45.8 is also developing standards pertaining to regional regulatory capabilities.

The following standards are open for public review and comment until June 25.

TIA-41.321-E [E] Mobile Application Part (MAP) - VOICE FEATURE SCENARIOS: CALL DELIVERY

TIA-41.324-E [E] Mobile Application Part (MAP) - VOICE FEATURE SCENARIOS: CALLING NUMBER IDENTIFICATION PRESENTATION, CALLING NUMBER IDENTIFICATION RESTRICTION

TIA-41.325-E Mobile Application Part: Voice Feature Scenarios: Conference Calling

TIA-41.326-E Mobile Application Part (MAP) - Voice Feature Scenarios: Do Not Disturb

TIA-41.327-E Mobile Application Part: Voice Feature Scenarios: Flexible Alerting

TIA-41.328-E Mobile Application Part (MAP) Voice Feature Scenarios: Mobile Access Hunting

TIA-41.328-E-1[E] Mobile Application Part (MAP) Voice Feature Scenarios: Mobile Access Hunting

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TIA Invites Commentary on New Mobile Phone Roaming Standards

LOCAL authorities should make ownership of the five-year national development plan as a country aspiration and translate it into their annual plans, a national conference heard yesterday.

The deputy minister for finance and economic affairs, Ms Saada Salum, while addressing a national conference organized by Economic and Social Research Bureau with the theme, "Unleashing growth potentials in Tanzania," said there is need for local ownership and appreciation of the development plan.

"It is everyone's role to own the national development agenda and execute responsibilities even at a personal level," she said. She went on to say that there is a comprehensive programme that has been put together to scale down the challenges facing wananchi, in the 2012/2013 budget.

The deputy minister added that there is need to increase productivity, chart out ways of translating the celebrated economic growth figure into peoples' lives.

Echoing the same sentiments, the Executive Director for REPOA, Dr Sammuel Wangwe said that every region or district should translate the national five-year plan into their plans.

The government early last year launched a five-year development plan (2011/12 to 2015/16) that is aimed at boosting the economy to grow from 8 per cent to 10 per cent annually, with priority areas being generation of adequate electricity and water supply, among other social services; boosting agriculture and agro-processing; infrastructure improvement such as railways, roads network, ports, aviation and marine transportation; tourism and ICT.

It took into account overall national development goals and policy objectives; sectoral initiatives, the National Strategy for Growth and Reduction of Poverty, MKUKUTA II, the key benchmarks of Long Term Perspective Plan (2011/12-2025/26), as well as findings of the Review of Vision 2025.

Sharing experiences on how China managed to cut absolute poverty through policies that promote inclusive growth and development, the Director General of International Poverty Reduction Centre in China, Dr Huang Chengwe, said all policies should be aimed at achieving the wellbeing of the people.

Dr Chengwe said there was need to attract investments to the currently weaker industries, raise tax threshold and formulate revitalization plans. He also pointed at the need to expand coverage of public finance in agriculture sector and increase the supply of goods to rural areas.

The Director of Economic Research and Policy at Bank of Tanzania, Dr Joseph Masawe said that despite the socio-economic progress recorded so far in the country, it is estimated that 700,000 Tanzanians join the labour market each year, out of which the public sector only absorbs 40,000 to 50,000.

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Tanzania: Engross National Development Plan, Local Authorities Urged

PERSONAL bests will again be on the radar of athletes when Mount Isa and Cloncurry Athletics Clubs hold their next competition days tomorrow.

During the last club meeting, seventeen dedicated athletes from Cloncurry travelled to Mount Isa to compete.

Mount Isa Athletics Club vice president David Scott said the visiting club attend the Mount Isa competition day at an opportune time.

"They picked a great time to come down as we were running hurdles this week, which is something they don't get to experience in Cloncurry as of yet," he said.

"As an added bonus, the older athletes we also try triple jump and hammer throw."

While the viability of the Cloncurry club is being assessed, its members are recognised at Mount Isa athletes and are vying for the same end-of-year trophies.

Club records are being kept separately so when Cloncurry does branch out on its own it will have its own set of local records.

Sergeant Mick Hughes from Cloncurry PCYC, who facilitates the fledgling club, said visiting athletes enjoyed the day.

"A few of the kids have already asked when we are coming back," he said.

"On that note alone I am guessing that they had a good time."

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PBs in the sights of Isa-Curry athletes

LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM--(Marketwire -05/24/12)- In the UK we're set for a summer of sport. Whilst many of the world's top athletes will be gracing our TV screens throughout July and August, what will you be doing to further your fitness goals?

If you're already big on fitness, but feel like you'd to take this even further now could be the time to seek personal trainer or fitness instructor qualifications. Once qualified you can kick start your new career in the fitness industry.

Choosing from the personal trainer courses from the Training Room you'll be in the perfect position to do just that.

Training Room Personal Trainer Courses

The following gym instructor and personal training courses are available at the Training Room:

With the range of courses available you'll be able to select the best method of study to work around your current schedule. Who knows you could be well on your way to your own personal sporting career before the world's top athletes even touch down in the country.

Notes to Editors

- Students at the Training Room stand a great chance of securing their dream career in the health and fitness industry - the extensive training programmes providing students with all the necessary skills to thrive in the industry.

- Support doesn't finish even after graduation from the personal trainer course as all graduates are given access to an exclusive job board, full of vacancies with some of the biggest organisations in the UK.

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Kick Start Your New Career

Sky Blues in the Community are set to start a new football and personal development project with homeless adults and people living in sheltered accommodation.

The seven week programme is being delivered in partnership with the Salvation Army, who moved to their new 9million residential centre in Harnall Lane West in the centre of Coventry earlier this year.

Sky Blues coaches will be providing free football sessions every Monday evening at Coventry Sports and Leisure Centre, and will also be delivering a series of informal workshops to create an awareness of healthy eating, the importance of physical activity and hydration; with the aim of promoting a more active and physical lifestyle.

The Salvation Army sessions are being delivered as part of Sky Blues in the Community's 'InForm' project, which provides free weekly football for adult men at venues across the city.

Tony Higham who is responsible for managing meaningful activities and client development programmes at the Harnall Lifehouse Hostel in Coventry said; "We are delighted to be involved in this brand new initiative and grateful to Sky Blues in the Community for providing our clients this opportunity.

"Having constructive and enjoyable ways to spend leisure time is part of reaching your full potential, something we strive for our clients to achieve all the time, add to that being conscious of your health and fitness is a winning combination, our clients are looking forward to this programme and can't wait for it to begin".

InForm is funded by the Pfizer UK Foundation from September 2011 for 12 months. The Sky Blues in the Community team will also be launching a similar seven week programme with Coventry MIND and other similar organisations, targeting adult men with mental health challenges.

Guy Rippon, Business Development Manager for Sky Blues in the Community said "We are really pleased to be working with the Salvation Army on this programme.

Click here to find out more about Sky Blues in the Community!

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SBITC: Football programme for the homeless

BALTIMORE, MD--(Marketwire -05/22/12)- Pursuing a franchise concept can be attractive for a variety of reasons: proven business model, layers of support and resources in place to achieve success. Entrepreneurs were once after a consistent formula -- the cookie cutter franchise. However, today's franchisees want the satisfaction of integrating their personal opinion or style into the development and future of their business.

Flexibility in franchising isn't new, says Sue Hilger, vice president of franchise development for Kiddie Academy, an educational child care franchise organization. "Flexibility used to mean the opportunity to own a business and have a better work-life balance. That idea still exists, but now, the concept has expanded to mean that a franchisor is flexible in the structure of the business."

According to Hilger, this flexibility could mean anything from input on the layout of a building to what vendors to use for marketing implementation. And sometimes a franchisor's flexibility over a competitor is the decision maker.

Look for flexibility in the following areas:

- Real Estate: Can they adapt to a variety of buildings, including free-standing, two-story, office and retail to meet the demand of your core customers? The franchisor may offer the franchisee the flexibility to lease or purchase the real estate for their business. In this industry, flexibility with real estate can go a long way to helping the franchisee enjoy financial success. - Multi-unit Franchising: Some franchisors limit to just one location, but look for a franchisor that is flexible with multi-units and fees associated with multiple locations. - Hours: Most companies require franchisees to spend a certain amount of time in their business, but look for a franchisor that encourages their franchisees to determine what schedule best suits their lifestyle and business. - Background Requirements: Franchisees come from all walks of life with different expertise. Some franchisors, such as Kiddie Academy, don't require franchisees to have a background in any specific area -- education, child care, business, finance, etc. The drive to be an entrepreneur and an active member of the community are sure keys to prosperity. - Training: Support visits, staff trainings, and annual reviews can be coordinated with the franchisee's schedule. These are conducted with the goal of ensuring that your start-up becomes an efficient and profitable business.

"When looking into a franchise opportunity, determine how much input you want to have on the development and find out how flexible the franchisor is to implementing your suggestions," Hilger suggests.

For more information on franchising with Kiddie Academy or exploring how they are flexible, please visit http://www.kiddieacademyfranchising.com.

About Kiddie Academy For more than 30 years, Kiddie Academy has been a leader in education-based child care. The company serves families and their children ages 6 weeks to 12 years old, offering full time care, before- and after-school care and summer camp programs. Kiddie Academy's proprietary Life Essentials curriculum, supporting programs, methods, activities and techniques help prepare children for school and for life. Kiddie Academy is using the globally recognized AdvancED accreditation system, signifying its commitment to quality education and the highest standards in child care. Kiddie Academy is an official partner of the nonprofit organization, First Book, and is dedicated to supporting children's literacy. For more information, visit http://www.kiddieacademy.com.

About Kiddie Academy FranchisingKiddie Academy Domestic Franchising is based in Maryland and has over 100 academies located in 24 states, including two company-owned locations. Approximately 70 additional academies are in development, with 15 to 20 new locations slated to open each year. For more information, visit http://www.kiddieacademyfranchising.com.

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New Trend in Franchising -- Flexibility, According to Kiddie Academy Domestic Franchising

By Meena Krishnamsetty - May 21, 2012 | Tickers: JEF, MCY, SHLD, WFC | 0 Comments

Meena is a member of The Motley Fool Blog Network -- entries represent the personal opinions of our bloggers and are not formally edited.

Bruce Berkowitz, who runs Fairholme, initiated a position in Mercury General(NYSE: MCY) and added to his holdings in Sears (NASDAQ: SHLD), Jefferies (NYSE: JEF), and Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC). Below we examine his picks.

Mercury General: MCY writes risk classifications for automobile insurance. We view MCY as a turnaround story given a tough last few years. In December 2011, the company implemented a change in its personal auto rating plan in California (its biggest market) and changed its business mix, resulting in a 16% y-o-y bump in new California personal auto business, which reflects better pricing and cost trends in the CA personal auto market. That type of growth number is not bad at all.

Further good news came from the cost side of the business. If MCY is able to continue to tightly control expenses, the combined ratio should improve and yield more profitable underwriting results. MCYs expense ratio improved 26.8% y-o-y, and management has noted that it expects a long-term 27% expense ratio. Effective expense management and thecompany's ~5.4% dividend yield are bright spots, but we remain wary of a decline in future rate increases and continued adverse reserve development (last quarter was MCY's seventh straight quarter of adversedevelopment). In our opinion the risk-reward skew is in the investors favor, but only slightly so.

Sears: SHLD is a troubling stock, namely because you need to factor in all of the corporate restructuring activities led by Eddie Lampert. Ostensibly, quarterly earnings indicated impressive improvements, but dig a little deeper and youll note that the performance was driven by favorable weather and store closings. The weather helped the apparel and home improvement sales, though non-apparel comps were still negative, and margins were up due to store clearouts, which we point out is non-recurring. Since we identify these two items as the main source of the quarters outperformance, we think that sustaining this will be a challenge moving forward.

That being said, we think that when looking at SHLD the focus should be on cash flow and asset value as opposed to quarter to quarter operating performance. The company is selling assetsSHLDs partial Canada spinoff occurred last quarter and a liquidity event for the Lands End brand seems on the horizon. However, in spite of these sales/spinoffs, we believe that cash flow will stay negative in the next couple of years. The question for investors is whether or not they believe that the fundamental asset values (i.e., liquidation value) warrants a higher stock price. We are not of that opinion.

Jefferies: JEF has been aggressively expanding the company. Last quarter, JEF acquired Hoare Govett, the U.K. corporate brokerage house, and bulked up its Bache platform. Management has its eyes on Europe for near-term expansion opportunities as new regulatory schemes in the US (e.g., Dodd-Frank) have propelled banks to turn their efforts toward home markets.

JEF has made significant strides in gaining market share in new product groups. Fixed income trading saw a nice rebound with increased customer order flow and favorable spreads. Importantly, leverage has been managed effectively, down from 9.9x in FY 2011 to 9.5x. We note that JEFs average total assets were 22% higher q-o-q; we think that it is reasonable to assume that management will continue to be aggressive in acquiring companies. At 13.5x forward earnings, JEF already trades at a premium to bulge bracket competitors like Goldman Sachs (consensus estimates of 9.5x) and Morgan Stanley (consensus estimates of 8.6x). Therefore, we think upside potential is limited.

Wells Fargo: We took away many positives from the quarterly results. For one, WFC is in a position to make strategic asset acquisitions. It acquired between $5 to $6 billion in loans in Q1 and the latter half of last year. WFC boats high liquidity and a strong balance sheet (credit metrics include an improving FICO score mix and the loan to value (LTV) mix), leaving it with what we think is ample capacity to buy more loans.

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Bruce Berkowitz's Top Stock Picks

I am not a very old-school Rubyist. My involvement dates from 2005 when I, along with many of my Extreme Programming (XP) colleagues, joined the Great Rails Bandwagon. It is telling that so many of the people who became involved around that time were from the Agile/XP community. We were sick of the mountains of glue code and XML configuration that stood in the way of us getting things done in Enterprise Java.

Those were heady days. The Metaprogrammability dynamic typing, and introduction of patterns such as Convention Over Configuration that was provided by the combination of Ruby and Rails gave us speedy, concise code. The test-driven discipline that was built into the language, framework, and the community gave us disciplined and verified code. Behaviour Driven Development, which had been struggling to survive in Java (JBehave anyone?) emerged and thrived in Ruby: Rspec was an early hit followed by Cucumber. To this day, the best Ruby Shops are also Agile/XP shops, while the others aspire to be so.

Fast forward to 2012 and the revolution is over. Ruby development has grown up and entered the mainstream, or at least the mainstream has shifted. While penetration of traditional enterprises such as banks is not great, Ruby startups such as LivingSocial and Groupon have grown into large corporations. The key moment that showed that Ruby had become mainstream was when Salesforce.com acquired Heroku in December 2010, and the message was reinforced the following July, when Ruby's designer, Matz (Yukihiro Matsumoto) was hired as Heroku's chief architect, Ruby.

Anecdotally, Rails has become the de-facto web technology for web startups. This growing success has not changed the community a great deal: it is still one that cares about craftsmanship, loves trying different languages such as Clojure and Erlang, and is grass-roots driven with a wide number of regional conferences.

Most Ruby development these days is still Rails, but we are entering an era of Rails backlash. The simple opinionated Model View Controller architecture that was so attractive in 2005, is now criticised for its lack of a layered architecture with proper separation of concerns. Yehuda Katz, the driving force behind Rails 3, quipped on Twitter:

My hope and belief is that the Ruby on Rails community is mature and reflective enough to introduce just the right amount of architecture back into web development, without reinventing Enterprise Java Beans. The signs for this are good with the upcoming Hexagonal Rails talk at the Scottish Ruby Conference; Avdi Grimm's Objects on Rails and Steven Baker's Solid Rails.

While most Ruby programmers do the bulk of their work on Rails, it's important to remember that Rails is just a web framework. The language ecosystem has changed a lot too, in the last seven years. In 2005 there was effectively only one Ruby interpreter Matz's C-based implementation. In 2012 we have a wide choice:

Seventeen years since its first appearance, and eight years from the Rails revolution, the Ruby community is still an exciting place to be. With all the current activity, and innovations coming to fruition, I don't see that changing any time soon.

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The future of Ruby