January 2011

Cover Story

The following pages highlight recent corporate facility projects, new laws and incentives policies, wages, employment, demographics and infrastructure facts in one easy-to-digest compendium.

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Features

Modes and Nodes

Shipping and location data offer distinct vantage points on what’s hot and what’s next.

Digital Derby

North Carolina is one of several states carving out a share of the US$5-billion U.S. computer and video game sector.

How does a company that has set the environmental benchmark so high with the products they sell ensure that their own massive and far-flung operations conform with the sustainability standards they are helping other companies meet? This was the challenge for Siemens Corp., the world’s largest provider of environmental technologies, a multinational conglomerate that generates […]

Dream Catchers

In one corner of the Pee Dee region of South Carolina, where unemployment figures are among the highest in the nation, the heart of the community is both at stake and on display

Strength in Numbers

When your company has spent the past two decades establishing global dominance by rolling out the largest inventory of state-of-the-art industrial distribution facilities in the world, what do you do for an encore?

Changing Tax Climate Affects Plant Movement

The November elections weren’t the only topic of conversation at the Mid-America Economic Development Council (MAEDC) 2010 Competitiveness Conference in Chicago last month, but they continued to reverberate through many of the subjects discussed by a panel of site selection consultants.

Investment Profiles

Dynamic Destination

Only five years after accession to the European Union, Poland was the only EU nation to show GDP growth in 2009, as the rest of the EU and most of the world faltered.

International

Flight Plan

Look past the Canadian Rockies and their travel and tourism draw, and even past Alberta’s booming bituminous sands region, and you’ll find Western Canada’s next signature industry — aerospace.

Two Leaders

Government, business, academic and NGO officials from the 34 nations of the Western Hemisphere and beyond came to Atlanta in November for the fourth Americas Competitiveness Forum.

Borderline

Investors in Mexico’s industrial market no longer brush aside concerns of escalating violence. Nor are they dissuaded from new investment, given the bigger picture.

Chemical Giants Expand in China

Four of the world’s leading chemical companies recently began production at major new facilities in China.

Departments

Editor’s View: Find Your ‘First-Mover Advantage’ in 2011

The post-election, lame duck 111th Congress got lots of things done as this issue came together in December, one of which was actually good for the U.S. as a location for business and industry.

Area Spotlights

Taking Care of Business

Meeting customer needs is job one for expanding companies in Maine.

Resources Repel Recession

In the nation’s center, a solid work ethic is one of them.

People Pleasers

“We are a people business,” says Alicia Laszewski, spokesperson for C3, a Florida-based company that’s investing in a whole bunch of people in Twin Falls, Idaho.

Pine Power

The seemingly ubiquitous southern yellow pine is creating quite a stir in Ware County these days as the U.S. subsidiary of a major German energy company readies to turn the plentiful feedstock into wood pellets to help fire its power plants in Europe.