Greater Worcester

Assumption College laid off 15 staff members this week as the Worcester school tries to respond to growing cost pressures it says the entire higher education industry is facing.

Five top executive officers of the Hanover Insurance Group are being paid bonuses for last year that total nearly $3.7 million, according to a report the Worcester-based company filed last week with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

The federal government is committing to the installation of an upgraded landing and navigation system that will improve visibility for pilots who land aircraft at Worcester Regional Airport, according to U.S. Rep. James McGovern.

The Massachusetts Housing Finance Agency (MassHousing) has awarded $290,000 to support sober housing programs in Worcester, Boston, Dartmouth and Norton, the quasi-public affordable housing agency announced Wednesday.

Germany-based life sciences company Eppendorf has agreed to donate equipment to Worcester Polytechnic Institute's Biomanufacturing Education and Training Center (BETC).

United Way of Central Massachusetts has received one of its largest-ever single donations, the organization said.

Worcester's economy is expected to grow at about 1.5 percent on an annualized basis for the first three to six months of 2014, according to a report by an Assumption College economics professor.

Antigen Express, the Worcester-based subsidiary of Toronto's Generex Biotechnology Corp., said a Phase II clinical trial of a cancer vaccine corroborates earlier tests.

AbbVie has announced plans to build a $320 million manufacturing plant in Singapore, its first in Asia.

A federal audit found errors in more than two-thirds of UMass Memorial Medical Center's (UMMMC) sampled Medicare claims from 2010 and 2011, resulting in nearly $1.65 million in overpayments to the health care system.