Workers at a northwest Ohio auto parts plant that is slated to move to Huntington will vote on a new contract this weekend.
Local leaders hope a new agreement could save some of the 214 jobs at the Continental Structural Plastics plant in North Baltimore.
The company announced plans last month to shut down the plant and move into a closed factory in Huntington.
The company said it would spend about $9 million on upgrades to the Huntington factory and have up to 350 workers there by 2012.
Union and company officials haven’t said whether the contract vote could change any of those plans.
Officials in Ohio said they think the company still intends to move to Indiana, but they hold out hope the North Baltimore factory could be kept open.
Oracle to give Hurd $950,000 a year, bonus
Oracle Corp. plans to pay newly appointed co-President Mark Hurd a base salary of $950,000 annually and said the ousted Hewlett-Packard Co. CEO is eligible for a target bonus of $5 million in the current fiscal year.
Oracle released the details of Hurd’s pay package in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday.
Hurd’s pay package includes stock options totaling 10 million shares. The company said Hurd’s options will carry an exercise price equal to the market value of the shares on the date they are granted, which the filing did not specify.
If he stays with the company, Hurd will be awarded options to buy 5 million more shares each year for the next five years.
Oracle said Hurd’s bonus for fiscal 2011, which ends in May, is targeted at $5 million but could reach $10 million. The company did not specify the conditions under which the bonuses would be awarded.
600 Lockheed execs take retirement plan
Lockheed Martin Corp., the world’s largest defense company, said Wednesday that about 25 percent of its executives opted for a voluntary retirement program designed to cut costs as defense spending slows.
More than 600 vice presidents and directors applied for the program offered in July, Bethesda, Md.-based Lockheed said in a statement Wednesday.
Executives taking the retirement plan have begun leaving, and all will have gone by February, Jeffery Adams, a Lockheed spokesman, said in a telephone interview.
The severance program will yield “substantial savings” starting in 2011, Lockheed said. It also will provide “a leaner management structure at a time when our customers have an urgent need for more affordable solutions to the global security challenges they face,” Chief Executive Officer Bob Stevens said in the statement.
Consumer credit in U.S. fell $3.6 billion in July
Consumer borrowing in the U.S. declined for a sixth straight month in July, indicating Americans are reluctant to take on more debt without faster job growth.
The $3.6 billion decrease followed a revised $1 billion drop in June that was less than initially estimated, the Federal Reserve said Wednesday.
Economists projected a $4.7 billion decline in the July measure of credit card debt and non-revolving loans, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey.
