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Marriott's isle unit to have Japan role

Starting in January, the Hawaii arm of Marriott International will take on oversight of sales, marketing and operations for Marriott's eight hotels in Japan.

That comes in addition to the 13 Marriott properties in Hawaii, and one in Guam.

"It's a credit to our management team here that we've been given this added responsibility," said Stan Brown, whose title will become vice president of Pacific Islands and Japan.

ERS weighs fund replacements

The Hawaii Employees' Retirement System yesterday heard presentations from four national investment management firms, but did not select replacements for two recently fired managers.

Instead, the board of trustees ranked the four from most favored to least favored and ERS staff will now negotiate with them to finalize the choices, officials said.

ERS intends to hire two firms to replace Putnam Investments, fired Nov. 7 because of a national scandal involving its investment practices, and Alliance Bernstein, dropped earlier for lower-than-expected investment performance.

At one time, Putnam had more than $400 million of ERS funds under its management and Alliance Bernstein had about $300 million. The Putnam money has since been shifted temporarily to another fund and the Alliance money has been cut to less than $400,000 pending a replacement.

Rick Humphreys, ERS investment committee chairman, said the amounts of money to be handled by the new managers have not been decided.

Pitches were heard yesterday from Ark Asset Management; Goldman Sachs Asset Management; Grantham, Mayo, Van Otterloo & Co.; and Turner Investment Partners.