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Friday, November 6, 2009
Cigna will keep its PBM business

Cigna Corp. confirmed Thursday that it will keep its pharmacy-benefits management business, after considering a possible sale earlier this year.

Responding to a question from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. analyst Matthew Borsh, Cigna president David M. Cordani said the firm decided its PBM was “important strategically to us as we go forward.”

PBMs administer prescription-drug benefits for health-plan operators and often run mail-order pharmacies.

Many big health insurers began looking at selling their PBM units after WellPoint Inc. struck a deal with Express Scripts Inc. to unload its PBM for $4.68 billion.

Solution Saturday

April 15 is months away, but that’s not keeping the IRS from holding “Solution Saturday” tomorrow to help individuals and small-business owners with tax problems.

People can go to the IRS office at Sixth and Arch Streets, Philadelphia, between 9 a.m. and 2 p.m., and meet face-to-face with tax experts to address their specific issues, said spokesman David D. Stewart.

I can’t imagine someone who hasn’t paid his or her taxes in a few years strolling into the IRS to try to make it right, but that’s what the IRS is hoping will happen.

The goal is to get those who’ve dropped out of the system back in and help those in danger of falling behind because of financial challenges, he said.

Testing, testing

Rosetta Genomics Ltd. , based in Israel with a big lab in West Philadelphia, named a former Johnson & Johnson executive as its new president and chief executive officer this week.

Kenneth A. Berlin, 45, succeeds Amir Avniel, who’d announced in September that he would step down.

Berlin had been general manager of Veridex L.L.C., a J&J unit in Raritan, N.J., that employs about 100 people. Veridex bought the assets of Immunicon Corp., a cancer-diagnostics firm in Huntingdon Valley that went bankrupt in summer 2008.

The Nasdaq-listed Rosetta Genomics is developing medical diagnostic tools based on microRNA technology. Its Philadelphia lab is in the University City Science Center.

Posted by Mike Armstrong @ 10:43 AM  Permalink | File Under: Financial Services | | Pharma, Biotech | | Politics, Taxes | Post a comment
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About Mike Armstrong
Mike Armstrong, a business editor and writer for nearly two decades, is the Inquirer's business columnist and PhillyInc blog editor.
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