Icagen' s major collaboration with pharmaceutical giant Pfizer has been extended for another year.

Under the terms of the extension, Pfizer will continue to pay all the costs of the two companies' work to discover and develop new painkillers. That will include about $5 million in funding for Icagen through Sept. 30, 2010.

Pfizer retains the exclusive worldwide rights to commercialize three drugs. As outlined in the original 2007 collaboration agreement, Icagen can receive up to $359 million in milestone payments for each drug, as well as royalties based on sales for any medicines that win regulatory approval.

"We feel quite good about the progress and the way the research is going," said Richard Katz, Icagen's chief financial officer.
Icagen, which also is working on experimental drugs to treat asthma and epilepsy, has no products on the market.

The economy giveth and the economy taketh away.

Gov. Bev Perdue today announced the opening of a manufacturing plant in Mount Airy, using her gubernatorial bully pulpit to praise the resilience of the state's manufacturing sector.

But as this plant opens about 2 1/2 hours northwest of Raleigh, another plant nearby will wind down operations.

Drug maker GlaxoSmithKline and health insurer Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina are among the top employers on Working Mother magazine's 100 Best Companies list this year.

The magazine ranks companies with benefits and programs that support families, including flextime, telecommuting, job sharing and strong child care.

Keeping those perks during tough times will help employers attract top talent, and retain key workers as the economy recovers, said Carol Evans, CEO of Working Mother Media.

Less than a week after ConAgra Foods told about 300 of workers at its Garner Slim Jim they will be let go, the company reported this morning that quarterly profit jumped 34 percent.

The Omaha, Neb., company is selling more Healthy Choice and Marie Callender's dinners and other prepared foods as consumers cook meals at home during the recession. Lower commodity costs also boosted profit.

Operating profit rose to $250 million during the quarter ended Aug. 30, up 34 percent from the same period last year. The company also raised its profit projection for the full year.

But total revenue during the latest quarter fell 3 percent to $2.96 billion, hurt by weaker Slim Jim sales and a decline in its commercial foods division.

Slim Jim production was disrupted by the June explosion at the Garner plant, which killed three workers.

Micell Technologies announced it has obtained $15 million in new financing, the second major infusion of cash in the Raleigh-based medical devices company in two months.

Micell, which is in the early stages of developing a new type of drug-coated stent for treating heart disease, said St. Jude Medical made the latest investment. St. Jude is a publicly traded medical devices company based in St. Paul, Minn., that posted $4.6 billion in sales last year.

"We are excited to have a company of St. Jude Medical's stature make an investment in Micell," CEO Arthur Benvenuto said in a prepared statement. "We look forward to collaborating with them to expand the use of our coating technology into potentially new applications for medical device products."

Progress Energy was forced to shut down its two reactors the Brunswick Nuclear plant near Wilmington on Sunday after an emergency backup generator failed to start.
Federal nuclear regulators require that each nuclear power plant have two diesel generators for each nuclear reactor at the site. The generators are used to create electricity to run emergency equipment in the event if the plant lacks power.
A nuclear plant with two reactors is allowed to operate with just three generators for up to one week.
The Raleigh-based power company was repairing one of the generators at the Brunswick plant and had hoped to have it fixed by Sunday, when the week-long grace period ran out. But the generator failed to start, forcing a shutdown.

More than a half dozen local entities are joining forces to launch the Triangle Global Health Consortium.

The consortium, announced today, is made up of Family Health International, IntraHealth International, the N.C. Biotechnolgy Center, UNC-Chapel Hill, N.C. State, RTI International and Duke University.

As befits an organization with members from academia, business and research, the consortium will promote collaborative research and integrating scientific programs to improve the world's health and
establish joint projects.

Last week, the Internal Revenue Service released data on the number of homeowners who have taken advantage of the first-time homebuyer tax credit that has been available since 2008. A total of 1.42 million U.S. taxpayers have taken advantage of the credit, including nearly 45,000 homebuyers in North Carolina. The numbers were not broken out by year.

Those still hoping to qualify for the tax credit need to act soon, as an eligible home purchase must close no later than
Nov. 30. A single taxpayer or married couple can get a maximum tax credit of $8,000 under the current program. Those who take advantage of the credit must remain in the home for three years after the purchase or repay the credit. The 2008 version of the first-time homebuyer tax credit allowed for a maximum tax credit of $7,500 to be paid back over 15 years.

There's still a chance the government could extend the credit in some form, though no decision has been made.  

RBC Bank has named Glenn D. McCoy chief financial officer, the second time this month that the Raleigh-based financial institution has tapped a Wachovia veteran for a top  management position.

McCoy was with Wachovia and predecessor bank First Union for 28 years. Most recently he was the chief financial officer of the mortgage and retail credit division at Wachovia, which was acquired last year by San Francisco-based Wells Fargo.

McCoy, who will be based at RBC's corporate headquarters in Raleigh, succeeds Terry Early, who recently retired. The bank has been revamping its senior management as part of its restructuring, which has included an undisclosed number of job cuts, as it strives to return to profitability.

A Winston-Salem company that manages and stores business records has moved into a new facility in Morrisville.

DataChambers Records Management has taken over 24,000-square-feet of space at Keystone Business Park. It will employ five people to start, including Adam Morgan, who moved from the Winston headquarters to be the operations manager.

DataChambers handles document imaging, shredding, file management and record storage for more than 1,000 clients.

The move into Raleigh-Durham was prompted by demand from the company's clients who have offices in the Triangle, Chris Kelley, the chief operations officer, said in a statement.

Those clients include the law firm Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice.

Last year, DataChambers expanded into Charlotte, moving into a new 85,000-square-foot facility at Ridge Creek Business Park.