Employee benefits industry newsmakers include Edelman Financial Engines, Financial Engines, SPARKInstitute, and more. (Photo: Shutterstock)

The employee benefits and retirement industryis changing daily. Awards, mergers & acquisitions,partnerships, and more are happening. Here's what we've seenlately:

The SPARK Institute announced its 2018 SPARKAdvisor Award winners at the 2018 SPARK Forum:

• 2018 SPARK Advisor Award: Plan Design & AdministrationInnovation — Bruce Lanser, Senior Retirement Plan Consultant,UBS.
• 2018 SPARK Advisor Award: Investment Innovation – JohnLudwig, Financial Advisor, LHD Retirement.

Following their merger in Q3 2018, the unified organization ofEdelman Financial Services  and Financial Engines haschanged its name to EdelmanFinancial Engines. The company will rebrand its retail presenceas Edelman Financial Engines. Financial Engines remains the brandin the company's workplace business.

MyKlovr hassigned a contract with Benefitfocus to offer the virtual collegecounseling platform powered by AI through BenefitfocusBenefitsPlace. Clients of Benefitfocus will now have access tomyKlovr's personalized college preparation services, among otherbenefit products.

RetirementClearinghouse announced it has completed consolidations formore than 155,000 retirement accounts with over $4 billion in totalassets as of October 26, 2018. RCH's total consolidations includeassisted rollovers into existing IRAs, numbering 82,700 accountswith $2.9 billion in total savings, as well as facilitated roll-insto a participant's current-employer 401(k) plan, with more than$980 million in assets from 46,700 accounts.

Zywave,  a provider of software-as-a-service(SaaS) solutions for the insurance industry, announced that it hascompleted the acquisition of Code SixFour, a provider of proposalautomation and advanced predictive analytics for employee benefitsadvisors. Code SixFour customers will become Zywave customers andCode SixFour products will become part of the Zywave productsuite.

RiskStrategies, a privately held national insurance brokerage andrisk management firm, announced the acquisition of Arkin YoungentobAssociates, a full-service employee and executive benefits firmheadquartered in Bethesda, Maryland. Terms of the deal were notdisclosed.This year Risk Strategies also acquired three employeebenefits specialty firms: Benefits Network Insurance Agency,Craford Benefit Consultants and Costello Benefits Group.

Olympian and celebrated distance runner Carrie Tollefson hasjoined Wellbeats as Run Lead & Coach. Tollefson will helpdevelop a new running channel at Wellbeats to complement itscurrent lineup of more than 24 fitness channels and approximately400 classes.

The HealthEnhancement Research Organization (HERO) recognized excellencein the field of workplace health and well-being with thepresentation of the 2018 HERO Health and Well-Being Awards duringthe recent HERO Forum:

• Shelly Wolff (Bill Whitmer Leadership award)
• Sara Johnson and Kerry Evers (Mark Dundon Research Award)
• Beth Bierbower (Jerry Noyce Executive Health ChampionAward)
• Sheri Snow (Heart of HERO Award)
• Amanda Potter (Healthy HERO Award)

GenomeMedical, a telegenomics technology and services company,announced that it has begun providing genetic counseling servicesfor Cigna customers and contracted health care providers. GenomeMedical offers on-demand genetic expertise and educational toolsvia telehealth consults for primary care, cancer, cardiovascularconditions, reproductive health, pediatrics andpharmacogenetics.

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