It's still true today, although the opportunities go beyond the ubiquitous fast food icons that have dominated the realm of franchises since the 1970s.
David Jackson, 59, of Moonville, S.C., found his niche in the packing and shipping business, as owner of a Goin' Postal franchise.
Grandson of a sharecropper, Jackson retired early from his job of 36 years as a supervisor at a Michelin Tire plant because he wanted to interact with the public and serve his community.
"I wanted to do something different with my life," he says. "I've been living in this community for 30-plus years and had seen a need for something like this."
Best Defense Companies To Watch In Right Now: Iridium Communications Inc(IRDM)
Iridium Communications Inc. provides mobile voice and data communications services through satellites to businesses, the U.S. and foreign governments, non-governmental organizations, and consumers worldwide. It offers post-paid mobile voice and data satellite communications services; prepaid mobile voice satellite communications services; high-speed data services; machine-to-machine services for sending and receiving data from one location to other; and ancillary services, including inbound connections from the public switched telephone networks, SMS, SIM, activation, customer reactivation, and other peripheral services to commercial customers. The company also offers traditional voice, netted voice, data, messaging, and paging services, as well as maintenance services for the DoD?s dedicated gateway; and offers voice and data solutions, including personnel tracking devices; over-the-horizon aircraft communications applications; submarine communications applications; spec ialized communications solutions for high-value individuals; asset tracking devices for equipment, vehicles, and aircraft; and secure mobile communications and data devices for the military and intelligence community, such as secure satellite handsets to U.S. government customers. In addition, it manufactures and sells satellite handsets, voice and data modems, high-speed data devices, and machine-to-machine data devices. Further, the company offers accessories for its devices, including holsters, earbuds, portable auxiliary antennas, antenna adaptors, USB data cables, and charging units. Additionally, it provides engineering and support services to commercial and government customers. The company sells products and services to commercial end-users through service providers, value-added resellers, and value-added manufacturers. As of March 31, 2011, it had approximately 447,000 billable subscribers. The company was founded in 2000 and is headquartered in McLean, Virginia.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Jake L'Ecuyer]
Iridium Communications (NASDAQ: IRDM) was also up, gaining 10.72 percent to $7.54 after the company caught an upgrade to Outperform from Neutral at Macquarie Monday morning.
- [By Jake L'Ecuyer]
Telecommunications services sector gained 0.12 percent in the US market today. Among the sector stocks,Iridium Communications (NASDAQ: IRDM) was down more than 4.5 percent, while America Movil S.A.B. de C.V. (NYSE: AMX) tumbled around 2.3 percent.
Top 5 Shipping Companies To Watch In Right Now: ING US Inc (VOYA)
ING U.S., Inc., incorporated on April 7, 1999, is a retirement, investment and insurance company serving the financial needs of approximately 13 million individual and institutional customers in the United States. The Company offers its products and services through a group of financial intermediaries, independent producers, affiliated advisors and dedicated sales specialists throughout the United States. The Company operates its principal businesses through three business lines: Retirement Solutions, Investment Management and Insurance Solutions. In addition, it also has closed Blocks and corporate reporting segments. Closed Blocks consists of three businesses where it has placed its portfolios in run-off-Closed Block Variable Annuity, Closed Block Institutional Spread Products and Closed Block Other. The Company�� corporate segment includes its corporate activities and corporate-level assets and financial obligations.
Retirement Solutions
The Company is a provider of retirement services and products in the United States. The Company provides a product range addressing both the accumulation and income distribution needs of customers, through a distribution footprint of nearly 2,500 affiliated representatives and thousands of non-affiliated agents and third party administrators (TPAs). The Company�� Retirement Solutions business consists of two financial segments: Retirement and Annuities.
Retirement provides tax-deferred, employer-sponsored retirement savings plans and administrative services to more than 49,000 plan sponsors covering approximately 5.3 million plan participants in corporate, education, healthcare and government markets. Retirement also provides rollover IRAs, and other retail financial products as well as comprehensive financial advisory services to individual customers. Annuities provide fixed and indexed annuities, tax-qualified mutual fund custodial products and payout annuities for pre-retirement wealth accumulation and post-retirement i! ncome management sold through multiple channels.
Investment Management
The Company is a service asset manager delivering client-oriented investment solutions and advisory services. The Company serves both individual and institutional customers, offering them domestic and international fixed income, equity, multi-asset and alternative investment products and solutions across a range of geographies, investment styles and capitalization spectrums.
Insurance Solutions
The Company is a provider of life insurance in the United States. The Company�� Insurance Solutions business consists of two financial segments: Individual Life and Employee Benefits. Individual Life provides wealth protection and transfer opportunities through universal, variable, and term products, distributed through independent channels to meet the needs of a range of customers from the middle-market through affluent market segments. Employee Benefits provides stop loss, group life, voluntary employee-paid and disability products to mid-sized and large businesses.
Closed Blocks
The Company separated its Closed Block Variable Annuity and Closed Block Institutional Spread Products segments from its other operations, placing them in run-off, and made a strategic decision to stop actively writing new retail variable annuity products with substantial guarantee features and to run-off the institutional spread products portfolio over time. The Company�� focus in managing its Closed Block Variable Annuity segment is on protecting regulatory reserves.
The Company competes with Fidelity, Vanguard, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, TIAA-CREF and Ameriprise.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Mike Deane]
On Friday, Dutch company ING Groep announced that it will be selling off shares in the American arm of its firm, ING US Inc (VOYA).
VOYA went public in May of this year, and its Dutch parent company currently holds a stake in 71% of the company. ING US will rebrand as Voya Financial, according to the Associated Press. ING Groerp did not disclose the timing or size of the sale.
VOYA shares were down 48 cents, or 1.62%, at market close on Monday. YTD the company’s stock is up over 44%.
- [By Jay Jenkins]
In the video below, Motley Fool contributor Jay Jenkins highlights three banks that are ahead of the curve:�Citigroup (NYSE: C ) , Bank of America (NYSE: BAC ) , and Capital One's (NYSE: COF ) 360 product (originally developed by ING U.S. (NYSE: VOYA ) ).
Top 5 Shipping Companies To Watch In Right Now: CA Inc.(CA)
CA Technologies, together with its subsidiaries, designs, develops, markets, delivers, licenses, and supports information technology (IT) management software products that operate on a range of hardware platforms and operating systems. It offers enterprise IT management software for organizations that addresses components of the computing environment, including people, information, processes, systems, networks, applications, and databases. The company provides a portfolio of mainframe and distributed software products with a focus on mainframe, service assurance, security (identity and access management), project and portfolio management, service management, virtualization and service automation, and cloud computing. It serves banks, insurance companies, other financial services providers, government agencies, manufacturers, technology companies, retailers, educational organizations, and health care institutions worldwide. CA Technologies offers its solutions through its d irect sales force and indirectly through global systems integrators, technology partners, managed service providers, solution providers, distributors and volume partners, and exclusive representatives. The company was formerly known as CA, Inc. and changed its name to CA Technologies in May 2010. CA Technologies was founded in 1974 and is based in Islandia, New York.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By James E. Brumley]
It's certainly not on par with International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE:IBM) and Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL), at least in terms of size. But, shares of CA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CA) do offer something that ORCL and IBM shares may not offer at this point... a lot of upside opportunity. In fact, if history is any indication, CA may be on the cusp of 40% pop, and maybe even more.
- [By Traders Reserve]
CA Technologies (CA) is involved in a rapidly growing and necessary part of IT. It�� called Data Center Infrastructure Management or DCIM. All you really need to know about it from an investors��point-of-view is its staggering market potential. Fewer than 10% of mid- to large-sized data centers utilize it, and 451 Research says DCIM supplier revenue will reach $1.8 billion by 2016, representing a 44% compound annual growth rate. While migrating away from mainframe services, the DCIM provider is also focusing on growing its cloud market share.
Top 5 Shipping Companies To Watch In Right Now: Textron Inc.(TXT)
Textron Inc. operates in the aircraft, defense, automobile, industrial, and finance businesses worldwide. It operates in five segments: Cessna, Bell, Textron Systems, Industrial, and Finance. The Cessna segment manufactures business jets, single engine turboprops, and single engine piston aircraft, as well as provides aftermarket services. The Bell segment manufactures and supplies military and commercial helicopters, tiltrotor aircraft, and related spare parts and services. The Textron Systems segment produces armored security vehicles, marine craft, precision weapons, airborne and ground-based surveillance systems and services, the unmanned aircraft system, training and simulation systems and countersniper devices, and intelligence and situational awareness software. The Industrial segment offers blow-molded plastic fuel systems, windshield and headlamp washer systems, engine camshafts, plastic bottles, and containers; powered equipment, electrical test and measurement i nstruments, hand and hydraulic powered tools, and electrical and fiber optic assemblies principally used in the electrical construction and maintenance, plumbing, wiring, telecommunications, and data communications industries; and golf cars, professional turf-maintenance equipment, and off-road, multipurpose utility, and specialized turf-care vehicles that are marketed to golf courses, resort communities, municipalities, sporting venues, and commercial and industrial users. The Finance segment provides finance for aircraft, helicopters, and golf and turf-care equipment. The company sells its products through a network of sales representatives, distributors, and authorized independent sales representatives, as well as directly to end users, home improvement retailers, and original equipment manufacturers. Textron Inc. was founded in 1923 and is headquartered in Providence, the Rhode Island.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Eric Hugel]
We see Textron (TXT) as a business with solid long-term growth. Recently, sales and earnings disappointments at the Cessna and Bell units have resulted in the stock currently trading at a significant discount to its peers.
- [By Rich Smith]
To put that number in context, that's about 60% of the revenues coming into Boeing's Military Aircraft division annually. But as important as these revenues are to Boeing stock, the quality of these revenues may be more so. Boeing's Military Aircraft division may not be as profitable as United Technologies' (NYSE: UTX ) Sikorsky unit (at 10.5% operating profit margins), or Textron's (NYSE: TXT ) Bell Helicopter (15%), but with a 9.6% operating margin, it's still the second most profitable manufacturing unit Boeing has.
- [By Jake L'Ecuyer]
Shares of Textron (NYSE: TXT) got a boost, shooting up 7.51 percent to $38.81 after the company reported a 13% rise in its fourth-quarter income.
Nuance Communications (NASDAQ: NUAN) was also up, gaining 6.55 percent to $15.86 after the company lifted its first-quarter forecast.
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