Stocks

Star 40

Cerner tops Star 40; others in economic ‘sweet spots’ also doing well

It was a safe bet that Cerner Corp. would once again lead the The Star’s rankings as the region’s top-performing public company. Cerner, the nation’s second-largest company that helps hospitals and doctors’ offices convert paper files into computerized medical records, is in a sweet spot. Other top-ranked companies here do business in areas that have an edge: energy, rail transit and online government services.

Star 40: Wealth soared in 2012 for KC companies' executives

The already-hefty pay packages of many public-company executives bulged last year, thanks to higher values of their company stocks. Million-dollar base salaries – as paid to Cerner Corp. CEO Neal Patterson (pictured) and Waddell & Reed Financial CEO Hank Herrmann – are only the beginning. For most of the bigger-company CEOs, stock awards, options and “non-equity incentive” compensation dwarf their base pay.

Cityscape

Dollars & Sense

Technology

Microsoft touts Xbox One as all-in-1 entertainment

Microsoft thinks it has the one. The company unveiled the Xbox One, a next-generation entertainment console that promises to be the one system households will need for games, television, movies and other entertainment. It will go on sale later this year.

Workplace

Development

Talking Business

Debate over KCI flies fast and hard

Reaction to my last column allowing that the advocates of a new single terminal at Kansas City International Airport might have a decent case was certainly bracing. Most of the more than 100 callers, emailers and kansascity.com commenters batted me roundly about. But many others allied themselves with the single-terminal advocates.

With KCI, breaking up is hard to do

After fully hashing out pros and cons, Kansas Citians may want to stick with the old flame. To carry the day, new-airport advocates will have to heavily restack the deck of arguments in their favor. That’s what’s going to be required to toss over a 40-year love affair.

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