Consulting firm Watson Wyatt Worldwide gained conditional European Union regulatory approval today to merge with rival Towers Perrin Forster & Crosby in an all-stock deal valued at about $3.5 billion, but the firms must sell Watson Wyatt’s life insurance actuarial software business as a condition, The Wall Street Journal reported. The firms offered to sell the business, VIPitech, to ease the European Commission’s concerns that the merger would reduce the number of actuarial software providers for life insurance in Europe to two from three. The deal, announced in June, will make the combined group the biggest human resources consultancy in the world.

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. has set a Jan. 20 shareholder vote on a stock split related to the company’s planned $26.4 billion takeover of Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp., Reuters reported. Berkshire is asking shareholders to approve a 50-for-1 split of its Class B shares, which closed Thursday at $3,291. Buffett has said a split would make it easier for shareholders of Burlington Northern, the second-largest U.S. railroad operator, to swap their shares for Berkshire stock when the merger closes, which is expected in the first quarter of 2010.

Iowa Orthopaedic Center’s new medical building will open for its first clinical and surgical patients on Monday. The two-story, 60,000-square-foot facility is located at 450 Laurel St., on the southern edge of Mercy Medical Center’s central campus. The building will house an orthopaedic clinic, open MRI medical imaging and physical therapy services. In addition, Mercy’s Terrace Hill Surgery Center, currently located on the Des Moines University campus, will relocate to the new facility and will assume a new name, Mercy River Hills Surgery Center. The Iowa Orthopaedic Center is among the largest orthopaedic groups in the Midwest. Approximately 200 people will work in the new facility.

Pioneer Hi-Bred International Inc. updated its commercialization timelines today for corn hybrids and soybean varieties with the Optimum GAT trait. Pioneer will not have controlled releases of the corn hybrids in 2010 and 2011 in North America, officials said, because the current version does not meet the company’s high yield standards. Also, Optimum GAT soybeans are expected to be commercialized about two to three years later than the anticipated 2011 introduction due to changes in regulatory policy in key import markets. Pioneer’s parent company, E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., reaffirmed its outlook for greater than 15 percent compounded annual earnings growth rate of the DuPont Agriculture & Nutrition business segment, of which Pioneer is a part, through 2013.

Dice Holdings Inc., a professional career Web sites provider with operations in Urbandale, has donated $40,000 to high-needs schools in Chicago, New York City, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. to support math and science education. The donations will fund more than 100 classroom projects reaching over 3,000 students through DonorsChoose.org, a nonprofit Web site connecting donors with specific classroom needs in public schools.