< Previousand develop advanced engineering solutions. We are committed to effective and creative workforce development solutions that expand the workforce and make these careers accessible to all, particularly individuals in underrepresented and rural communities. Let’s start with the Chip Camps and Girls Going Tech events that we’re partnering with local schools to bring to different regions. These free camps give middle schoolers an opportunity to explore STEM and learn how it translates to different careers. Then take a step up to higher education — in the U.S., we’ve recently announced our Northeast and Northwest University Semiconductor Networks, which include a number of regional higher education institutions that will join together to drive research, modernize semiconductor curriculum and increase students’ opportunities for experiential learning, particularly those from underrepresented communities. All of these efforts create a pipeline not just of future Micron employees, but people who can work for suppliers and other businesses that are going to support our operations. These really are the kinds of seeds that you have to plant now so over time the solutions are blossoming as they’re needed. We frequently hear about the need for advanced manufacturing technicians with stackable credentials, not necessarily degrees. Scott Gatzemeier: Historically, the collective focus of industry, government and universities has been on training advanced graduates for jobs in design and R&D roles in the industry. But new investments in manufacturing require technicians that can be trained with only an associate degree and hands-on experience. Take the cleanroom technicians we’ll employ in New York and Idaho — that’s a job that you don’t need a master’s degree or a Ph.D. for. We have great partners in our local community colleges who are supporting our long-term plans, from modernizing their curricula to ensure they offer the skills needed to fill these roles to building a cleanroom training facility, like we will at Onondaga Community College, to giving students the hands-on training that enables them to hit the ground running the first day they step foot in our fab. Micron is also leveraging Registered Apprenticeships, a proven industry-driven training model, to assist and propel underrepresented individuals to “work-and-learn” and provide a pathway to well-paying careers. Last fall, Micron launched the Registered Apprenticeship Program, which will help create a pipeline of candidates trained for jobs in the semiconductor industry. There are also trades apprenticeship programs that are rapidly expanding to fill the need for skilled construction. Long term, those programs create a well-stocked pool of tradespeople who stack up those credentials they’ll use to help keep operations running. If we do the work now — which we are — we can build the programs that are going to graduate people with certifications and degrees they’ll use when we first launch and that are going to be a feeder as we continue to ramp up in the years to come. SITE SELECTION JULY 2023 45 S mart cities harness technology to improve their urban effi ciency. Compared to a traditional city, they are better prepared for sudden and rapid urbanization, power shortages, congestion and pollution. Ultimately, the intentional and creatively designed public resources improve the quality of services delivered to their citizens while reducing operational headaches — and therefore costs — for public administration. More often than not, new smart cities are built on a master plan. With . billion people expected to be living in cities by , particularly in the Global South, smart cities could be instrumental in accommodating them eff ectively. A corporate location decision-maker is tasked with evaluating and deciding on cities or regions to establish headquarters or facility investment. ere are numerous considerations that come into eff ect here but the most important is that the city fi ts the company’s specifi c business needs. ere are common factors that are inevitably considered in the decision-making process: • Features (city size, industrialization level, geographic position, proximity to capital and current headquarters) • Infrastructure and business climate (time to operational activity, access, services) • Labor force (educated population, university presence, quality of life for talent attraction and retention) • Financial returns (upfront cost hurdles, investment return) • Regulatory incentives (taxes, duties, one-stop shops, special economic zones) • Logistics (public transport, commute times) • Community fi t (population diversity, brand and image factor, local laws in sync with values) • Sustainability (carbon footprint, energy costs). by JAMES FORSTER Adrianople Group SMART CITIES How Corporate Location Decision-Makers Choose Smart Cities for Facility Investment Launched 15 years ago, Masdar City calls itself “a pioneer in sustainability and a hub for research and development, spearheading the innovations to realize greener, more sustainable urban living.” Image courtesy of Masdar City46 JULY 2023 SITE SELECTION The Decision-Making Process Ultimately, it comes down to a straightforward question: Does a city tick enough boxes, or at least, more boxes than its alternatives? e method to answering this is equally straightforward. First, an exploration into what the business needs are; second, defi ning a weighting for each factor; third, assessing and scoring the potential locations for each variable; lastly, selecting the highest scoring location. e diffi culty is accounting for the countless unpredictable variables that are involved in the city’s growth, stability and opportunity costs of not being elsewhere. Upfront costs are expensive and so too are exit costs, making it vital to make the correct decision at the fi rst attempt. When Amazon began searching for a second headquarters in , they reviewed city proposals. It took three months to decide on a -city shortlist, and another months to make the fi nal decision. Deciding where to establish is a process of elimination. e number of variables at play has made location decisions data-driven. However, these data have often been qualitative instead of quantitative and are severely lacking. To address this issue, the New Cities Map (newcitiesmap.com/map) was created by the Charter Cities Institute (CCI). is powerful tool provides quantitative insights into fi nances, governance, history and city development in new cities (master-planned cities built after ) from over countries. Capitalizing on Smart Cities and Their Sustainability for Growth Naturally, smart cities become attractive when their core structure and additional perks are geared toward operational effi ciency and future-proofi ng. However, additional thought should be given as to how a smart city’s assets can be leveraged as a growth accelerator. Having access to improved digital infrastructure, smart mobility and an innovative ecosystem only makes sense if it is used in daily operations. Businesses needn’t be set up in a smart city if all the benefi ts are not going to be capitalized on. With the growing severity of climate change, corporate sustainable responsibility has become a core focus in many multinationals’ long-term vision. Failure to “go green” can risk losing conscious customers or facing administrative barriers down the line. Smart cities focusing on sustainability have been successful in acquiring such conglomerates. Masdar City in the United Arab Emirates has free zone benefi ts specifi cally tailored to sustainable projects and companies. Furthermore, Catalyst is an in-house startup accelerator focused on sustainability and clean technology which invests in relevant projects inside the city. e plan proved eff ective as Siemens and Honeywell opted to establish sites there. Saint- Gobain, based in countries, decided in that Masdar City was to be their fi rst location in the Middle East for an energy-effi cient “Multi-Comfort House.” New Clark City is a ,-hectare (,-acre) development project in the Philippines. It is the country’s fi rst smart and green metropolis with % of the developable area being preserved for eco-tourism ventures. Were a disaster to happen in Manila, the nation’s capital, the country would be crippled as all its government agencies operate there. As such, a new National Government Administrative Center is being built in the city with extreme disaster-resilient measures against earthquakes, typhoons, fl ooding and tsunamis. Smooth Operators How can a city’s regulatory approach incentivize multinationals to set up there? “Multinationals, defi nitionally, have a high degree of choice when selecting locations for investment,” explains Jeff rey Mason, research manager at the Charter Cities Institute. “A city must off er some advantage that makes it more attractive than competitors. One area in which cities can compete for investment that does not require substantial physical investment like infrastructure is the regulatory environment. Easy business setup, regulatory compliance, interfacing with government, dispute resolution and paying taxes can make an investment destination particularly attractive, even if alternatives could potentially off er slightly lower costs or slightly better infrastructure. A city where interactions between the investor and the government are quick, painless and low-cost will be very attractive to a wide variety of domestic and international investors.” James Forster, Adrianople Group SITE SELECTION JULY 2023 47 Could the New Cities Map help corporate location decision- makers to fi nd cities to establish new facilities? “Many new cities are built specifi cally to support investment in new facilities, with better infrastructure connectivity, and often lower land prices/rents, than already built-up areas,” says Mason. “To that end, the map includes fi lters to show the city’s proximity to airports, seaports and capital cities. e governance data included in the New Cities Map provide prospective investors with information on which policies and regulatory issues the city does or does not have its own authority over, as well as the existence of a special economic zone within the city, all of which can be useful in assessing the fi t of the city for the prospective investor from a regulatory standpoint.” A Collaborative Approach Just as corporate location decision-makers are tasked with fi nding the right city for their needs, smart cities also need to work on attracting the right type of businesses for their own success. A “one city fi ts all” approach will lead to failure. Tailored tenant attraction needs to be thoroughly conducted in the planning phase. Two cities that have performed this very well are DLF Cyber City in Gurugram, India, and Konza Technopolis in Kenya. eir visions were clear, simple, and eff ective. ey targeted large multinational technology companies seeking to enter countries experiencing rapid technological and economic growth, eff ectively positioning themselves as ICT powerhouses in their respective regions. Cyber City houses over Fortune companies including Google, Oracle, IBM, Facebook, Mercer, KPMG and Microsoft. When the Konza Technopolis city project with its favorable ICT regulatory benefi ts was announced, international fi rms immediately lined up to express their interest. e activities of tenant attraction and location decision-making are heavily interlinked. Smart cities should actively target and tailor their tenant attraction strategies by making data open and accessible to the key people making location decisions for corporate multinationals. Cities opting for a collaborative approach are paving the way for success. ADRIANOPLE GROUP (WWW.ADRIANOPLEGROUP.COM) IS a business intelligence firm that works closely with Special Economic Zones and master-planned cities, including new city and economic zone projects in Latin America, the Caribbean, East Africa, West Africa and Southeast Asia. The Charter Cities Institute (CCI at www.chartercitiesinstitute.org) is a non-profit organization dedicated to empowering new cities with better governance to lift tens of millions of people out of poverty. The New Cities Map created by the Charter Cities Institute provides quantitative insights into fi nances, governance, history and city development in 350 master-planned cities from more than 130 countries. e New Cities Map Here’s why folks are fl eeing the bright lights of the big city and loving it. I f you want to gain a competitive edge in the race to hire talent, you may want to consider doing what many American workers have already done: Move out of the big city. What many thought was just a blip during the COVID- pandemic — people fl eeing big cities for the open space of suburbs, exurbs and rural small towns — has turned into a long-term trend. Recent data from the federal government back this up. According to a report by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service, the overall rate of non-metro-area population growth during - (.%) exceeded the national rate (.%) for the fi rst time since the mid-s. at trend continued in as the counties in outlying areas, including suburbs, exurbs and rural counties, saw their populations grow the fastest. Exurban counties grew by .% while suburban counties grew by .%. In fact, the only areas that did not experience populations gains across the country last year were the urban cores. ese high-population counties saw domestic migration outfl ows of more than . million people, according to Census data. What’s happening? More in-depth research using Internal Revenue Service data reveals that the trend of people moving outward from large central cities actually began a few years before the pandemic and is continuing well after the peak COVID- years of and . Aaron Renn, a former senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Public Research, tells Site Selection that record infl ation, remote working, rising big-city crime and lifestyle changes are prompting Americans to relocate from large urban cores to the hinterlands. “Urban real estate prices are going up,” says Renn. “ e price-to-income ratio in Columbus, Ohio, has increased by %. It is not as cheap as it used to be to live in big cities, even when those cities are in the Midwest. e same is true in Detroit. ere have been tremendous increases in real estate by RON STARNER ron.starner@siteselection.com RURAL ADVANTAGE 48 JULY 2023 SITE SELECTION When Being Small Is a Advantage Photo: Getty Images50 JULY 2023 SITE SELECTION prices in even the so-called aff ordable metros.” USDA research shows that places once considered far-fl ung now rank among the most attractive magnets for in-migration. ese include outlying counties in rural locations like the southern Appalachians, the Ozarks, the upper Great Lakes and the intermountain West. Others can be found adjacent to large metro areas, such as Nashville, Minneapolis-St. Paul and Dallas-Fort Worth, according to this same report. One notable standout is the swath known as the Great Plains. Reversing historic trends, higher- than-average growth was experienced in non-metro counties in every state in this region. Betting Big on Small Towns As a result, many outlying counties across the country are now reaping record industrial investment windfalls. From the $ billion Intel semiconductor factory by Intel in New Albany, Ohio, to the $-billion commitment by Micron in Upstate New York, corporate America is betting big on the fortunes of small-town economies. International investors are riding this wave too. Finnish housing manufacturer ADMARES announced May that it will invest $ million to build its fi rst U.S. factory in Waycross, Georgia, where the company from Turku in Scandinavia will employ , workers in the making of aff ordable homes in a place known more for alligators and the Okefenokee Swamp than heavy industry. With , people, Waycross ranks No. in population in Georgia. It’s located in Ware County, which has , people and ranks No. in Georgia. Just how rural is Waycross? e town is miles from Atlanta and miles from Savannah. In fact, the nearest big city is Jacksonville, Florida, and it’s still miles and a -minute drive away. None of that mattered to ADMARES, which found everything it needed, including a skilled and available labor pool, in the heartland of rural southern Georgia. “In addition to exploring opportunities in other states, Waycross is an ideal DON’T FALL PREY TO ‘GOD’S LITTLE ACRE’ SYNDROME R obert Pittman, founder of the Janus Forum and Institute and co-author (along with Amanda Sutt and Rhonda Phillips) of “Rebooting Local Economies: How to Build Prosperous Communities,” was asked what advice he would give to small towns in America. A longtime site selection consultant and current advisor to Rabun County in the mountains of Northeast Georgia, here is what he had to say: The more that elected offi cials, board members and all citizens understand economic development, the more likely the town will succeed in economic development. Once people understand that they can’t wait for economic development to drop on them like manna from heaven, and that they need to be proactive, they can get to work. An expression I’ve used often to describe what can prevent economic development success is the “God’s Little Acre” syndrome. It goes like this: “Our town is a great place to live, raise a family and grow a business; why wouldn’t anyone want to move their business here?” People often see their town from the inside out, not from the outside in, like an executive or a site consultant who sees the weaknesses as well as the strengths. Understanding the competitive nature of business location decisions and how they are made, and that there are thousands of “God’s Little Acres” out there, helps instill in communities the will to create a good economic development program including becoming more development-ready and marketing to the right industries. Related to the above, understand your community’s strengths and weaknesses, and what your real economic situation is. Unemployment may be low now, but is your economy based on industries and companies that are growing or declining nationally? In our world of rapid economic change, adjust your philosophy from “If it ain’t broke, don’t fi x it” to “If it ain’t broke now, it will be, so we better have a plan to fi x it.” The above implies that communities should have a strategic plan complete with situation assessment (where we are now), a vision for the future (where we want to be), and a plan to get there. Finally, look at other communities and how they have succeeded and be open to new ideas. All the above implies that communities, especially rural ones that may have modest budgets, should have an economic development awareness and an economic development program (staff and budget). They should look at this not as a sunk cost but as an investment that will more than pay for itself. Robert Pittman is founder of the Janus Forum and the Janus Institute at Lake Rabun, Georgia.Rank City State Population Final Score 1 Cheyenne Wyoming 65,051 86 2 Missoula Montana 74,822 78 3 Ames Iowa 66,424 72 4 Shawnee Kansas 67,511 71 5 Lafayette Indiana 70,835 71 6 Ankeny Iowa 70,287 70 7 Tamarac Florida 71,541 70 8 Bismarck North Dakota 74,138 69 9 Novi Michigan 66,560 68 10 Eagan Minnesota 68,642 68 11 Daytona Beach Florida 74,437 67 12 Victoria Texas 65,377 67 13 Lakeville Minnesota 72,812 67 14 Muncie Indiana 65,292 67 15 West Des Moines Iowa 69,792 66 16 Weston Florida 67,312 66 17 North Richland Hills Texas 70,209 65 18 St. Joseph Missouri 71,602 65 19 Conway Arkansas 65,121 65 20 Janesville Wisconsin 65,942 65 21 Casper Wyoming 58,656 65 22 Jacksonville North Carolina 72,876 65 23 Rock Hill South Carolina 74,102 65 24 Johnson City Tennessee 71,278 65 25 Malden Massachusetts 65,074 64 Rank City State Population Final Score 26 Waukesha Wisconsin 71,256 64 27 Eau Claire Wisconsin 69,441 63 28 Albany Georgia 69,048 63 29 Rogers Arkansas 71,112 63 30 Alpharetta Georgia 66,127 62 31 Jupiter Florida 60,802 61 32 Kenner Louisiana 65,364 61 33 Skokie Illinois 66,422 61 34 Jackson Tennessee 68,114 61 35 Noblesville Indiana 70,926 61 36 Lauderhill Florida 73,458 61 37 Pinellas Park Florida 53,202 61 38 Sarasota Florida 54,764 60 39 Blaine Minnesota 70,935 60 40 Bozeman Montana 54,539 60 41 Redondo Beach California 69,781 60 42 Margate Florida 58,001 60 43 Harlingen Texas 71,925 60 44 Great Falls Montana 60,403 60 45 Waterloo Iowa 66,941 60 46 Grand Junction Colorado 66,964 60 47 Bradenton Florida 55,905 59 48 Maple Grove Minnesota 70,726 59 49 Corvallis Oregon 59,864 59 50 Dublin California 71,674 59 The topcities to start a small business: 50 Source: VerizonSpecials.com 52 JULY 2023 SITE SELECTION Photo: Getty Images SITE SELECTION JULY 2023 53 location for a transportation hub with easy access to major highways and extensive rail connections,” says Mikael Hedberg, founder and CEO of ADMARES. “Its proximity to the Port of Brunswick, one of the busiest ports on the Eastern Seaboard, offers a competitive advantage for global trade.” ADMARES picked a greenfield site to build a 2.5-million-sq.-ft. plant on Highway 23 in Waycross. The new facility is expected to begin production of manufactured housing in late 2025. Kristi Brigman, deputy commissioner of global commerce at the Georgia Department of Economic Development, said the Peach State beat out a number of competitors to land the project. “ADMARES is a textbook example of how Georgia and our communities build long-term relationships that create future opportunities,” says Brigman. “ADMARES was referred to Waycross and Ware County by an industry partner who was familiar with the community. From there, Georgia entered ADMARES’ nationwide search, working the competitive project with state and local partners over the next eight months.” Digging Into Rural Growth Factors While many components go into producing a top-performing small town, ADMARES’ floating villa is an example of the manufactured housing that will be produced at the Finnish company’s 2.5-million-sq.- ft. plant in Waycross, Georgia. Photo Courtesy of ADMARESNext >