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HAWAII
Servco buys marine insurance company

A division of Servco Pacific Inc. has purchased John Grosseto Marine Insurance Ltd. and will hire all three employees, including Grosseto.

The 20-year-old Grosseto company brings about $6 million worth of premiums to Servco Insurance Services.

"Running a business and being a broker gets to be overwhelming," Grosseto said yesterday. "I decided it'd be nice to just be a broker and take care of my clients better."

Grosseto declined to name his customers but said they include tug and barge companies, excursion boats, fishing boats, small cruise ships and ship builders and repair services.

"(Grosseto) cannot just sell his business to anybody, and for us, we want to grow," said Joseph Hu, senior vice president of Servco Insurance. Grosseto's client list includes companies outside of the United States and Servco has its eye on increased potential for international business.

Servco Insurance Services was founded in 1971 as American Insurance, but changed its name three years ago. It will hire at least one more person, Hu said.

Chamber appoints new board

Harry Saunders, president of Castle & Cooke Hawaii, has been elected chairman of the Chamber of Commerce of Hawaii for 2005-2006. He replaces Christine Camp Friedman, the owner and founder of Avalon Development Co.

Nine new chamber board members were elected for the 2005-2006 year. They are Stan Brown, vice president, Pacific Islands & Japan, Marriott Hotel Services Inc.; Craig Carapelho, president, Team Vision; Bennette Evangelista, senior vice president and senior manager, financial services, Central Pacific Bank; Linda Frank, senior vice president -- sales, Hawaiian Telcom; Ruth Limtiaco, president of the Limtiaco Co.; Tayne Sekimura, financial vice president, Hawaiian Electric Co.; Dave Thomas, vice chairman, retail banking, Bank of Hawaii; Marc Tilker, senior vice president and chief financial officer, BEI Hawaii; and Shelley Wilson, administrator, Wilson HomeCare.

NATION
CD burning big threat to industry

Music copied onto blank recordable CDs is becoming a bigger threat to the bottom line of record stores and music labels than online file-sharing, the head of the recording industry's trade group said yesterday.

"Burned" CDs accounted for 29 percent of all recorded music obtained by fans in 2004, compared to 16 percent attributed to downloads from online file-sharing networks, said Mitch Bainwol, chief executive for the Recording Industry Association of America.

The data, compiled by the market research firm NPD Group, suggested that about half of all recordings obtained by music fans in 2004 were due to authorized CD sales and about 4 percent from paid music downloads.