Market Newsdesk

NASHVILLE, Tenn., Dec. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Today, Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt announced the 2020 ‘Jingle Challenge’ to send uplifting messages to patients, families and staff. Global superstar Dolly Parton kicked off the virtual challenge on her Facebook and Instagram encouraging fans to spread messages of hope, with a goal of 10,000 holiday messages to children and staff at the Nashville children’s hospital. Artists Blake Shelton, Lauren Alaina, Jon Pardi, Sara Evans, Rascal Flatts, Lady A, Runaway June, Abby Anderson, Jillian Jacqueline, Travis Denning, and more will join Dolly this month to participate in the Jingle Challenge.  

Starting today, individuals nationwide can customize a photo with Dolly on Santa’s sleigh in the Hannah Dennison Butterfly Garden located inside the children’s hospital and send a message to patients, families and staff. The butterfly garden was renamed in 2018 in honor of and  dedicated to Dolly’s niece Hannah Dennison, a survivor of childhood cancer who received her care at Children’s Hospital. Participants can download and share their special photo with Dolly to their personal social media pages to help spread awareness and call on others to participate in the challenge. In addition to being featured on the Jingle Challenge landing page, fans around the world can also find the virtual postcard via Dolly’s own ‘Dolly Digital Sleigh’ campaign.

“Knowing that kids at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt will get to see how many people across the world are thinking of them this holiday season makes my heart happy,” said Dolly Parton. “You know, The Hannah Dennison Butterfly Garden is something we dedicated a few years back, so I know adding this picture of hope to our Dolly Digital Sleigh campaign will be a blessing to all the families.”

When individuals participate in the challenge by sending a message to the children’s hospital, they will receive a special image to post to their social channels to show that they’ve joined the challenge.

“We are so grateful to Dolly, all the participating artists and our larger community for virtually delivering messages of encouragement and support to our children, their families and our amazing staff,” said Meg Rush, MD, MMHC, President of Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt. “It is heartwarming to know that during this holiday season our hospital is wrapped in the caring spirit of our community, which serves as the foundation of the work we do every day as we provide hope and healing to children and families all year round.”  

For more information and to join the Jingle Challenge visit: www.jinglechallenge.com

 

About Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt

Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt is one of the nation’s leading children’s hospitals, treating and helping to prevent a full range of pediatric health issues from colds and broken bones to complex heart diseases and cancer. Achieving 10 out of 10 nationally ranked pediatric specialties in 2020, Children’s Hospital was again named among the nation’s “Best Children’s Hospitals” for the 14^th consecutive year by U.S. News & World Report.

Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt, a nonprofit organization, opened in 2004, expanded its physical space in 2012, and recently added four new floors encompassing 160,000 total sq. ft. The new expansion helps to advance the size and scope of the hospital’s mission. For more about Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt: ChildrensHospitalVanderbilt.org

 

 

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Media Contact:

Brittany Rashkin

[email protected]

 

Natalie Logan

[email protected]

Brittany Rashkin
Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt
[email protected]

SAN DIEGO, Dec. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Wrapify, the performance-driven ad tech platform for brands powered by out-of-home (OOH) and the gig economy, today announced a first-of-its-kind autonomous bot delivery campaign alongside partners Kiwibot, the robotics company providing affordable and accessible delivery service and Gong, the revenue intelligence platform leveraging artificial intelligence to transform revenue teams, kicking off in San Jose and coming soon to Denver and Los Angeles.

Robotic delivery services can promise contactless delivery, a highly sought-after service under mandates of social distancing. With autonomous bots on the rise, Wrapify’s Boost provides these delivery operators with a brand-new transit media revenue stream with the ability to provide brand and agency clients robust attribution reporting, data visualization and multi-channel retargeting capabilities.

Gong has launched a campaign with Kiwibot on the streets of San Jose leveraging Boost by Wrapify’s offline-to-online advertising for transit OOH. Complete with connecting the bot’s location data, Gong is able to create a targeted audience, extend the reach of their OOH ad placement and measure performance against custom conversion goals.

“We’re always looking for ways to cut through the noise,” explained Udi Ledergor, chief marketing officer at Gong. “We’ve partnered with the Wrapify team before to hijack conference traffic with innovative out-of-home advertising and we’re excited to pilot their latest initiative with Kiwibot to explore new frontiers of engaging advertising for this new economy.”

According to eMarketer,
digital out-of-home ad spending will increase from $2.72 billion in 2020 to $3.84 billion in 2023. This campaign is a first-of-its-kind for autonomous bot delivery and of many other vehicle mediums for the Boost by Wrapify Platform.

“2020 became the year of identifying new opportunities for innovation and pushing boundaries,” said James Heller, CEO and co-founder of Wrapify. “No other ad tech company or platform encompasses all of the features that turn a fleet’s moving OOH ad placement into digital and physical retargeting with full attribution and measurement. We are creating a brand-new category of out-of-home, enabling bots to serve high-recall, street-level media that can be tracked and attributed.”

To learn more, please visit https://wrapify.com/boost/.

About Wrapify

With a powerful combination of OOH, digital and the gig economy, Wrapify empowers Fortune 500 brands to reach audiences in an omnichannel environment – while delivering measurable, actionable analytics to prove its effectiveness. This high-recall ad tech platform combines the impact of out of home advertising with the scalability, targeting and accountability of digital.

Brands including AT&T, Coca-Cola and Zoom reach and engage audiences that interact with Wrapified vehicles across channels and devices, driving awareness, attribution and conversion. Wrapify enables brands to target and scale ad campaigns nationwide, across screens and channels, as well as access to data in real time to measure performance.

280,000+ drivers in the U.S. use the Wrapify app to earn extra income simply by driving. Founded in 2015, Wrapify is headquartered in San Diego, California. Learn more at wrapify.com.

Media Contact

Alexis Roberts
Blast PR
[email protected]
805-886-8511

Wrapify Contact

Jenny Gensch
Marketing
[email protected]

HOUSTON, Dec. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) and ConocoPhillips today announced $1.3 million in grants that will conserve more than 58,000 acres of breeding, stopover and wintering bird habitat. These nine projects will protect and restore grasslands, wetlands and coastal habitats, track and monitor bird populations using innovative techniques, and facilitate conservation practices on working ranchlands. This year’s awards will support projects in Alaska, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Texas and Wyoming, and will leverage more than $3 million in matching contributions for a total conservation benefit of more than $4.3 million.

The grants were awarded through the ConocoPhillips SPIRIT of Conservation Program, a partnership between NFWF, ConocoPhillips and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. With a goal of conserving and recovering populations of imperiled birds, the partnership supports work to improve the quality and connectivity of important bird habitats and accelerate innovations for understanding bird conservation needs across their ranges.

“We continue to greatly value our involvement in the ConocoPhillips SPIRIT of Conservation program,” said Aurelia Skipwith, Director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “Through these landscape-level projects we are able to move the needle on our conservation efforts to protect and recover our nation’s imperiled bird populations and their habitats.”

“We congratulate this year’s SPIRIT of Conservation Program winners and their deep commitment to avian species and habitat conservation,” said Natalie Riley, director of Community Relations at ConocoPhillips. “With the number of grassland birds in steep decline and their habitat under significant threat, projects such as these are essential for saving these species and restoring the ecological balance.”

“The projects we announce today will provide valuable population information that will help guide future conservation investments, in addition to securing and enhancing vital habitat for many important bird species,” said Todd Hogrefe, director of NFWF’s Central Regional Office.  “With the strong support of ConocoPhillips and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, we are excited to fund these projects that will deliver significant conservation benefits not just for birds, but for many other species as well.”

The projects supported by the nine grants announced today will:

• Restore the quality and connectivity on 25,800 acres of habitat to benefit greater sage grouse, Baird’s sparrow, chestnut-collared longspur and thick-billed longspur.
• Restore 525 acres of coastal prairie in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, Texas to provide improved habitat for Gulf Coast grassland-dependent birds, including aplomado falcon, black rail, Botteri’s sparrow and white-tailed hawk.
• Restore 3,500 acres of wintering habitat for priority migratory grassland bird species, including Baird’s sparrow, Sprague’s pipit, chestnut-collared longspur and thick-billed longspur in the Marfa and Marathon grasslands of Texas.
• Provide technical assistance through the Grassland Restoration Incentives Program to improve habitat on 9,000 acres of priority grassland and shrubland to benefit birds in the Edwards Plateau ecoregion of Texas.
• Secure 1,432 acres of habitat for more than 160 bird species by acquiring a permanent conservation easement on a working family ranch in Carbon County, Wyoming.
• Purchase a permanent conservation easement on 309 acres along the Kasilof River on the western Kenai Peninsula to protect migratory, breeding and overwintering bird habitat.
• Provide conservation technical assistance to producers throughout the Northern Great Plains in order to create 18,000 acres of habitat for declining grassland birds.
• Identify stopover locations of birds passing through the Gulf Coastal Plain of Texas to document habitat use and threats and to develop a species distribution model.
• Upgrade a network of 15 radio telemetry stations to better support monitoring of migratory birds along the Texas coast.

Since 2005, ConocoPhillips, NFWF, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have invested more than $13.9 million in projects through the SPIRIT of Conservation Program. Grantees have provided an additional $30.5 million in matching contributions for a total conservation impact of $44.4 million. As results of these investments, more than 503,000 acres of important fish and wildlife habitat in 13 states have been conserved or restored. 

A complete list of the 2020 grants made through the ConocoPhillips SPIRIT of Conservation Program is available here.     

About the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation



Chartered by Congress in 1984, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) protects and restores the nation’s fish, wildlife, plants and habitats. Working with federal, corporate, and individual partners, NFWF has funded more than 5,000 organizations and generated a total conservation impact of $6.1 billion. Learn more at www.nfwf.org.

About the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

The mission of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is working with others to conserve, protect, and enhance fish, wildlife, plants, and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people. We are both a leader and trusted partner in fish and wildlife conservation, known for our scientific excellence, stewardship of lands and natural resources, dedicated professionals, and commitment to public service. For more information on our work and the people who make it happen, visit www.fws.gov.

About ConocoPhillips

Headquartered in Houston, Texas, ConocoPhillips had operations and activities in 15 countries, $63 billion of total assets, and approximately 9,800 employees at Sept. 30, 2020. Production excluding Libya averaged 1,108 MBOED for the nine months ended Sept. 30, 2020, and proved reserves were 5.3 BBOE as of Dec. 31, 2019. For more information, go to www.conocophillips.com.

###

Rob Blumenthal
National Fish and Wildlife Foundation
(202) 857-0166
[email protected]

LOS ANGELES, Dec. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Imperial Capital Group, LLC (“Imperial Capital”) announced today the hiring of Amer Tiwana who will be charged with leading its sales & trading desk analysis strategy in distressed and special situations. Mr. Tiwana, an investment analyst with nearly 20 years on Wall Street, is based in Stamford, CT and reports to Tim Sullivan, President of Imperial Capital. This new hire is part of Imperial Capital’s efforts to expand and deepen its alternative credit strategy which provides distressed and esoteric asset solutions to institutional investors in the U.S. and the EEA.

“With distressed and special situations becoming an important focus for us and the institutional investor community, we hired Amer Tiwana to lead our sales and trading desk analysis efforts in this area,” said Tim Sullivan, President of Imperial Capital. “Amer joins Imperial with extensive credit analysis experience and an established track record within both the US and European markets, further distinguishing Imperial as a global leader in distressed and special situations analysis.”

Amer Tiwana joins Imperial Capital as a Managing Director, Head of Distressed & Special Situations Strategy in the Credit Sales & Trading Group based in Stamford, CT. Prior to joining Imperial Capital, Mr. Tiwana was a Managing Director with Cowen/CRT for nearly 15 years where he focused on stressed/distressed opportunities across the entire capital structure, event-driven/special situations including M&A and Spin-offs, and post reorganized equities. Mr. Tiwana began his career as an Equity Analyst at the Hedge Fund Morgens, Waterfall and Vintiadis & Co. in New York. He earned a Bachelor of Arts from Bowdoin College.

About Imperial Capital, LLC

Imperial Capital, LLC is a full-service investment bank offering a uniquely integrated platform of comprehensive services to institutional investors and middle market companies. We offer sophisticated sales and trading services to institutional investors and a wide range of investment banking advisory, capital markets and restructuring services to middle market corporate clients. Paired with our proprietary research and sales & trading desk analysis, we provide investment analysis across an issuer’s capital structure, including bank loans, debt securities, the hybrid/bank capital marketplace (through our ELP Framework), post-reorganization equities, special situations claims and listed and unlisted equities. Our comprehensive and integrated service platform, expertise across the global capital structure, and deep industry sector knowledge enable us to provide clients with research driven ideas, superior advisory services, and trade execution. We are quick to identify opportunities under any market conditions and we have a proven track record of offering creative, proprietary solutions to our clients. Imperial Capital, LLC has three principal businesses: Investment Banking, Institutional Sales & Trading and Institutional Research. More information about Imperial Capital, LLC can be found at www.imperialcapital.com.

For more information regarding Imperial Capital, please contact:
Mark Martis
+1 310 246 3674
[email protected]

About Imperial Capital (International), LLP

Imperial Capital International, founded in 2011, is an affiliate of Imperial Capital, LLC with an office in central London. Complementing Imperial Capital’s existing corporate credit sales and trading franchise, Imperial Capital International expanded the Imperial Capital franchise into the EEA. The company focuses on the entire credit spectrum and takes a full capital structure research approach to supplement sales and trading services to its European institutional clients.

For more information regarding Imperial Capital (International), LLP, please contact:
Emma McClintock
+ 44 (0) 207 650 5429
[email protected]

Flexible and Modular Design
Inspired by
L
.
A
.
Mex
Identity
—SoCal Style
and
Mexican Heritage

COSTA MESA, Calif., Dec. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — El Pollo Loco, Inc. (“El Pollo Loco” or “Company) (Nasdaq: LOCO), the nation’s leading fire-grilled chicken restaurant chain, today unveiled its new restaurant of the future designed to enhance off-premise convenience powered by a more robust and frictionless digital experience.

The re-imagined El Pollo Loco restaurants have been inspired by the changing habits of consumers to enjoy a more digital-forward and contactless off-premise experience that was inevitably sped up by the COVID-19 pandemic. The new concept will also feature a modern interpretation of the brand’s heritage and strengths, including iconography distinct to Los Angeles and the El Pollo Loco L.A. Mex brand.

There are two versions of this new restaurant design. One version is fully focused on driving business off-premise and has a take-out window, a dual drive-thru, dedicated curbside pick-up parking spaces, and patio seating but no indoor dining room. The second version includes a dual drive-thru, dedicated curbside pick-up parking spaces, and a smaller than typical dining room that opens up to an expansive patio through the use of flexible garage style doors. When open these garage doors seamlessly blend the indoor and outdoor experience and increase the comfort level of customers dining inside by enabling them to enjoy their meal in an airy, well ventilated environment.

The restaurant designs share an enhanced digitized experience – including cubbies for mobile to-go orders, a double drive-thru with digital menu boards, and GPS-enabled curbside pick-up, all integrated with the company’s dynamic and versatile mobile app.

To honor the brand’s heritage and highlight what makes El Pollo Loco so unique, subtle brand cues permeate throughout the entire restaurant, from the cleaver door handles (which is a nod to the fact that all chicken is cut to order) to the turning fork chandeliers (which repurposes a tool of trade used by the brand’s skilled Grill Masters). Similarly, murals, imagery and city maps evoking the brand’s 40-year Los Angeles hometown roots on the interior and exterior walls.

“Where you will see our commitment to design manifest itself in the most dramatic of ways is with our new restaurant of the future,” said Brian Carmichall, Chief Development Officer at El Pollo Loco. “To compete in a COVID world, we knew we needed to create a unique concept that is anchored in technology, accessibility, and modern design elements infusing our brand history to make it easier and more rewarding to be a customer.”

EL Pollo Loco’s new L.A. Mex restaurants, the first of which are being built this quarter and in 2021, will come to life with innovative features for the most seamless customer experience possible:

• D
  ouble
  Drive-Thru
  s: Select restaurants will feature two drive-thru lanes and digital menu boards to expedite the experience.

• Retail-
  A
  s-
  Theater: The back-of house where the chicken is grilled will be fully exposed through an enlarged window in the drive-thru lane, showcasing the artisanal and culinary skills of El Pollo Loco’s Grill Masters while customers wait for their food.

• Pick-Up
  Cubbies: Customers will have the option to go fully contactless and pick up their mobile to-go orders from designated cubbies inside the restaurant.

• GPS-Enabled
  Curbside: As part of the recently launched loyalty experience, Loco Rewards™ customers will have expanded access to GPS-enabled curbside pickup on the mobile app – allowing the opportunity to automatically alert the restaurant team that they have arrived from the dedicated pickup parking spots for the fastest possible service.

• Outdoor
  Seating: A new extension to the traditional dining room, giving customers the option to enjoy dining outdoors under a covered patio.

“The future is now. We’re excited to roll out our evolved restaurant concept, which brings us to the culmination of the company’s three-year transformation agenda and sets us up for geographical expansion in the years ahead,” said Bernard Acoca, President & Chief Executive Officer at El Pollo Loco. “This will be the catalyst to eventually get us back to 5% annual new unit growth across the U.S.”

A version of the L.A. Mex restaurant formats will open in the Los Angeles market in the form of remodels this month. To preview the design, please visit El Pollo Loco’s YouTube here.

About El Pollo Loco

El Pollo Loco (Nasdaq:LOCO) is the nation’s leading fire-grilled chicken restaurant with a mission to bring people together around food, family, and culture in the communities it serves. El Pollo Loco is renowned for its handcrafted L.A. Mex food, an innovative blend of traditional Mexican cuisine and better-for-you eating, that Los Angeles is known for. Since 1980, El Pollo Loco has successfully opened and maintained more than 465 company-owned and franchised restaurants in Arizona, California, Nevada, Texas, Utah, and Louisiana while remaining true to its Mexican-American heritage. El Pollo Loco continues to grow and evolve, nourishing connections to tradition, culture, and one another through fire-grilled goodness that makes us feel like familia. For more information, visit us at www.elpolloloco.com.

Like: 
www.facebook.com/ElPolloLoco



Follow on Twitter: 
@ElPolloLoco
 

Follow on Instagram: 
@ElPolloLoco

Subscribe: 
www.youtube.com/OfficialElPolloLoco

Join Loco Rewards: www.elpolloloco.com/rewards
Join our Team: www.elpolloloco.com/careers

MEDIA CONTACT:

Hannah Gray
Edible
323-206-0800
[email protected]

Photos accompanying this announcement are available at:

https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/6086458d-d1bf-4f26-b396-beef22663186

https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/c3c7fe24-3ffe-4cd5-a455-e30f84272803

CHICAGO and LOMBARD, Ill., Dec. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Granite Creek Capital Partners, L.L.C., a private investment firm based in Chicago, today announced its investment in Auto Driveaway Systems, LLC, the leading professional vehicle relocation service in North America. Auto Driveaway, a portfolio company of Evanston Partners LLC, primarily serves large corporate fleets, upfitters, vehicle manufacturers and dealer groups as well as leasing and fleet management companies with fast, safe and reliable door-to-door service nationwide. Rush Street Capital of Chicago arranged the transaction.

Granite Creek’s investment in Auto Driveaway was made from its $200 million fund, Granite Creek FlexCap II, L.P. (“FlexCap II”). Within FlexCap II, Granite Creek is investing in a total of 15-20 companies engaged in manufacturing, business services, healthcare and agribusiness. Granite Creek plays an active role with the leadership of its portfolio companies and serves as a trusted advisor and partner.

“We are truly excited to partner with Rodney Ruth and the impressive management team at Auto Driveaway along with the experienced investment group at Evanston Partners. Under Rod’s steady leadership, the company has achieved exceptional growth along with an industry-leading commitment to customer service and operational excellence,” said Mark Radzik, Partner at Granite Creek Capital Partners, L.L.C. “Auto Driveaway has a distinctive business model that delivers a high-touch, cost-effective service to its entire customer base. That unique combination and its excellent, long-tenured management team position the company well for continued expansion.”

“As we explored capital partners, Granite Creek’s flexible financing mandate and focus on providing value-added advice for growth companies like ours made them an ideal partner for us,” said Rodney Ruth, CEO of Auto Driveaway.

“We have enjoyed a 30-year relationship with Brian Boorstein, one of Granite Creek’s co-founders, and are thrilled to partner with them on Auto Driveaway to continue the company’s rapid growth,” said William V. Glastris, Chairman of Auto Driveaway and Managing Member of Evanston Partners.

About
Auto Driveaway

Auto Driveaway, based in Lombard, Illinois, is the leading professional vehicle relocation service in North America. Auto Driveaway primarily serves large corporate fleets, upfitters, vehicle manufacturers and dealer groups as well as leasing and fleet management companies with fast, safe and reliable door-to-door service nationwide through over 40 offices throughout the United States.

About
Evanston Partners
LLC

Based in Evanston, Illinois, Evanston Partners is a private equity investment firm which partners with management teams to recapitalize, acquire and build small growth companies. Evanston Partners seeks to work with partners who demonstrate passion, integrity and strong work ethic to build and grow already profitable companies with a long-term focus on value creation. (www.evanstonpartners.com)

About Rush Street Capital

Based in Chicago, Illinois, Rush Street Capital provides debt and equity capital markets, mergers and acquisition, financial restructuring, and valuation services to world-class, industry-leading companies. With over 100 years of combined investment and commercial banking experience Rush Street has developed significant industry expertise, deep relationships, and a keen understanding of how to address a company’s corporate finance and investment banking needs. Our clients include private equity firms, private business owners, and some of the largest corporations in the United States. (www.rushstreetcapital.com)

About Granite Creek Capital Partners, L.L.C.

Founded in 2005, Granite Creek Capital Partners, L.L.C. is a Chicago-based private investment firm focused on providing capital and operational resources to lower middle market companies engaged in manufacturing, business services, healthcare, and agribusiness. With an experienced team of investment professionals bringing expertise in private equity, banking, operations, and business development, Granite Creek has a successful track record of investing in and supporting its portfolio companies. In addition to providing funding to lower middle market companies, in 2011 Granite Creek co-founded Renovo Financial, one of the largest regional private lenders serving real estate entrepreneurs. Granite Creek was recently named to Inc.’s 2020 Private Equity 50 list. For more information on Granite Creek, visit www.granitecreek.com or call 312-895-4500.

For more media information, contact:
Lisa Hendrickson, LCH Communications
516-767-8390
[email protected]

LONDON, Dec. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Informa Pharma Intelligence, the global business intelligence provider for the biopharma industry, and Quantitative Life Sciences(QLS) Advisors today announced a partnership to further enhance the predictive level insights currently available in Informa Pharma Intelligence’s Biomedtracker. This partnership will allow Biomedtracker to not only have an industry leading Likelihood of Approval (LOA) score to support risk management and investment decisions, but will also enhance the tool further with QLS’s machine learning driven forecasts of clinical outcomes. These program-level probability of approval (POA) scores will provide biopharma portfolio managers and licensing teams even more robust tools for managing the risk of their drug development pipelines.

The industry has often relied on historical success rates in making drug development decisions. This partnership will give Biomedtracker users access to forward-looking drug-specific machine-learning forecasts that can be explained through intuitive “key features” underlying each prediction. These features include sponsor track record, clinical trial design parameters, the availability and type of biomarkers, drug and disease characteristics, and over 200 other inputs from Informa Pharma Intelligence’s industry leading Pharmaprojects™, Trialtrove™ and Biomedtracker™ databases. The QLS machine-learning algorithms are commercial-grade implementations of peer-reviewed academic research published by one of its founders in 2019 in the Harvard Data Science Review.

“Our partners at QLS have worked hard—largely in stealth mode—to get both transparency and correlation risk right, and we’re excited to partner with them to bring these new predictive analytic tools to the biopharma industry through Biomedtracker,” said Nicola Marlin, Chief Product Officer, Informa Pharma Intelligence. “Andrew Lo and his QLS colleagues have taken the next step of advancing drug-program and portfolio-wide risk assessment to complement the work we began with our own colleague, Michael Hay, in his pathbreaking 2014 nature publication on Biomedtracker’s Likelihood of Approval tool which used expert evaluation metrics to streamline decision making.”

The QLS scores are computed using several AI and natural language processing techniques and are applied to Informa Pharma Intelligence’s 30+ years of clinical development history to “learn” which attributes are most important for determining a drug program’s POA, and by how much. This added level of artificial intelligence coupled with the tools LOA offers allows for Biomedtracker users to have the most comprehensive information base to support decision-making and understand the overall direction an asset is headed.

“You can’t manage what you don’t measure, so the starting point of any decision in the biopharma industry is getting the most accurate estimates of POA available—this is what motivated our partnership with Informa Pharma Intelligence,” said Andrew Lo, co-founder and chairman of QLS Advisors and director of the MIT Laboratory for Financial Engineering. “In discussions with our longtime collaborator Informa Pharma Intelligence, we agreed that, by making our POA score available to all Biomedtracker users, we can set an even higher industry standard that will ultimately help attract greater and smarter investment capital to the biopharma industry.”

POA scores will be rolled out to users throughout the end of the year. To learn more or gain access to Biomedtracker, please reach out to [email protected].

About Informa
Pharma Intelligence

Informa Pharma Intelligence powers a full suite of analysis products – Datamonitor Healthcare™, Sitetrove™, Trialtrove™, Pharmaprojects™, Medtrack™, Biomedtracker™, Scrip™, Pink Sheet™ and In Vivo™ – to deliver the data needed by the pharmaceutical and biomedical industry to make decisions and create real-world opportunities for growth.

With more than 500 analysts keeping their fingers on the pulse of the industry, no key disease, clinical trial, drug approval or R&D project isn’t covered through the breadth and depth of data available to customers. For more information visit pharmaintelligence.informa.com.

About QLS Advisors

QLS Advisors LLC is a technology and advisory company based in Cambridge, MA, dedicated to fostering innovation in the life sciences. QLS employs a unique blend of fundamental and quantitative tools to help clients manage risk, assess reward, and develop investment and financing strategies for portfolios of healthcare-related assets. For more information visit www.qlsadvisors.com.

Media Contacts:
Diffusion PR for Informa Pharma Intelligence
[email protected]
646.571.0120

SALISBURY, N.C., Dec. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Whether you’re having a small gathering or celebrating with the people in your household this holiday season, Food Lion understands that saving money is important to all our customers. That’s why the grocer is highlighting ways to bundle up your savings to get the most for your holiday grocery dollars.

“We know that our customers are looking for ways to make every dollar count this holiday season,” said Neil Norman, director of customer loyalty for Food Lion. “We are committed to ensuring our neighbors can nourish their families this holiday season while maximizing savings.”

Customers can bundle their savings by:

• Signing up for an MVP Rewards Card, which allows customers to save on items they already buy. Scanning this card every shopping trip allows them to receive personalized coupons and discounts.
• Taking advantage of the “Priced Low Everyday Items.” Just look for the signs on some of the most popular items and get ready to save!
• Looking for weekly “Hot Sale!” items. These extra savings can help customers save on anything from meat to produce to household products.
• Creating a digital MVP account then visiting the MVP Coupon Hub to load coupons directly to their MVP card.
• Tracking their Shop & Earn Rewards progress, where customers earn rewards each month on products they buy the most.
• Looking for specials in our weekly ad flyer and pairing them with manufacturer’s coupons and in-store kiosk coupons.

Customers can also visit www.foodlion.com to see additional ways to save and a holiday meal shopping guide.

About Food Lion

Food Lion, based in Salisbury, N.C., since 1957, has more than 1,000 stores in 10 Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic states and employs more than 77,000 associates. By leveraging its longstanding heritage of low prices and convenient locations, Food Lion is working to own the easiest full shop grocery experience in the Southeast, anchored by a strong commitment to affordability, freshness, and the communities it serves. Through Food Lion Feeds, the company has donated more than 500 million meals to individuals and families since 2014, and has committed to donate 1 billion more meals by 2025. Food Lion is a company of Ahold Delhaize USA, the U.S. division of Zaandam-based Ahold Delhaize. For more information, visit www.foodlion.com or job applicants may visit www.foodlion.com/careers.

CONTACTS:
Kelly Powell
704-310-3886
[email protected]

An Infographic accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/90acf660-e84e-4bf3-9ce7-2895aff17e33