Partners HealthCare posts 39% increase in profit

Partners HealthCare, the parent of Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's Hospital, saw a 39 percent increase in profit to $324 million for fiscal year 2005, the company said. The gain gave Partners a profit margin of 6.1 percent, compared to 4.7 percent last year. The biggest portion of the profit was $247 million in nonoperating gains, mostly from investment income. Profit growth from operations grew 111 percent to $76 million. These figures reflect an accounting change Partners made this year that moved all investment income under nonoperating gains. Peter Markell, Partners' vice president for finance, said operating revenue grew because of a 1 percent increase in patient discharges, increased complexity and severity of inpatient cases, and more outpatient visits. (Christopher Rowland)

P&G reaches decision about 1,000 managers

Procter & Gamble said it completed staffing decisions for the top 1,000 Gillette managers and is on track to complete the rest of these decisions by the end of March. P&G bought the Boston company last fall for $54 billion and is expected to eliminate about 5,000 jobs from a combined workforce of about 140,000. A P&G spokeswoman declined to provide details on the number of layoffs, but said acceptance rates are about 75 percent among those who have been offered jobs. (Jenn Abelson)

Genzyme Pompe drug gets favorable EU action

Genzyme Corp. said an advisory committee to the European Commission has unanimously recommended approval of the company's experimental drug Myozyme for Pompe disease, a rare but often fatal condition characterized by muscle weakness and breathing difficulty. The Cambridge biotechnology company said it expects to win approval to market Myozyme within two to three months. (Reuters)

Hackers steal credit card numbers from R.I. website

Hackers who broke into Rhode Island's state website claim to have stolen as many as 53,000 credit card numbers. Thomas Viall, the site's manager, confirmed the break-in Thursday but said far fewer credit card numbers were stolen. He works for New England Interactive, a private company that runs Rhode Island's site, as well as government sites in Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont. (AP)

State Street trust unit faces suspension in Japan

State Street Corp., the world's third-largest custody bank, will have to close part of its trust banking business in Japan for one month, that nation's financial regulator said. The unit will be suspended from providing trustee services to new customers from Feb. 6 to March 5, Japan's Financial Services Agency said. ''Managerial and monitoring functions did not work properly and no audits were conducted" the agency said. The unit violated banking laws by sharing confidential information on customers with group companies, it added. (Bloomberg)

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Etc.

Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Christopher Cox will have surgery Monday to remove a chest tumor and is expected to recover fully, the agency said . . . Applied Materials, the world's largest maker of semiconductor manufacturing equipment, will close five plants and offices at a cost of $212 million. One of the properties is in Danvers. . . . Lockheed Martin won a $2 billion contract to build ground stations that will manage a new constellation of high-speed military communications satellites. A team led by Lockheed's Integrated Systems and Solutions unit beat teams led by Raytheon and Northrop Grumman . . . 3Com named R. Scott Murray to replace Bruce Claflin as chief executive. Murray becomes president and CEO immediately, the Marlborough company said. (Globe wire services)