July 25, 2012
The flagship universities of Kansas and Missouri are no longer in the same athletic conference, but the two states continue to slug it out on the economic development battlefield. One of the latest examples is Teva North America’s plans to move its Teva Neuroscience headquarters from Kansas City, Mo., to Overland Park, Kan., a Kansas City suburb just across the border.
July 25, 2012
While our economy struggles to recover from a severe recession and ongoing investor uncertainty, the bioscience industry is garnering attention globally and at home. In Kansas,where our economy is traditionally based on agriculture, aviation and the services industry, the significant growth in our bioscience sector has caught the eye of other states who are now working to duplicate economic development programs like the Kansas Economic Growth Act of 2004 and the Angel Tax Credit program.
July 24, 2012
In late May, Intel announced the launch of the Intel Collaborative Research Institute for Sustainable Connected Cities in partnership with Imperial College London, University College London and the emerging Tech City cluster of East London.
July 23, 2012
Health-conscious pet owners drive a trend that spurs expansion for a niche manufacturer. Americans are projected to shell out nearly US$21 billion on pet food in 2012, according to the American Pet Products Association. One of the fastest growing categories is pet treats, especially in the “healthy” category.
July 18, 2012
Entrepreneurs looking to fast track their enterprise to the commercialization and expansion levels will find the resources they need in abundance in eastern Tennessee — in the Knoxville-Oak Ridge Innovation Valley, specifically. The Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), managed by (UT)-Battelle LLC (a joint venture of the University of Tennessee and Battelle Memorial Institute).
July 18, 2012
Manufacturing is on the way back in the U.S. Increasingly, it involves advanced techniques, equipment and processes, says a noted researcher of industrial issues in North America. But there is a catch to manufacturing’s comeback - an acute shortage of skilled workers poses a significant threat.
July 17, 2012
Commerce between the United States and Mexico is one of the great — yet underappreciated — success stories of the global economy. In 2011 U.S.-Mexico goods and services trade reached the major milestone of one-half trillion dollars with virtually no recognition. The United States is Mexico’s top trading partner, and Mexico — which has gained macroeconomic stability and expanded its middle class over the last two decades — is the United States’ second largest export market and third largest trading partner.
July 17, 2012
Before the international banking crisis, the European Union represented a promised land for European outsiders looking in. Balkan countries, seeing a path to prosperity, scrambled to join. The lure was particularly strong for sovereign states emerging from war-torn Yugoslavia.
July 17, 2012
Buenos Aires embarked a few years ago on the creation of specialized business and industry districts, and they have been quite successful. Now this doesn’t sound like anything new, but there is an important difference. With far less going for them, as compared to other regions that have launched these types of projects, the Argentine capital has been able to do far more with far less.
July 17, 2012
Is social engineering good for business? Across the world’s markets, “economic empowerment” initiatives are emerging to help disenfranchised locals in the community contribute. Each market is different, but any business looking to establish in one of these markets needs to understand the impact on their business. In the United Arab Emirates, this is “Emiratisation,” and other markets in the region have similar mechanisms.
July 17, 2012
Thailand can’t seem to catch a break. To outsiders recently, it appears to be in a state of constant turmoil, with violent political protests and natural disasters making the news with regularity. Consider the most recent flooding, in late 2011, which was one of the worst in the past 50 years. The main river, the Chaophraya, literally was overwhelmed and changed its course to submerge much of the northern Bangkok metropolis.
July 17, 2012
And companies adore the state’s infrastructure for talent, R&D and expertise. Overlay a map of the Empire State’s vast reserves of higher education and institutional firepower with a map of corporate and industrial R&D, and chances are you’ll see two things: a legacy of innovation, and an interwoven network ripe with opportunities for more.
July 17, 2012
It’s a time of great hope and great uncertainty in Egypt. Hope springs from the broadly successful arrival of democratic politics delivering a credible result in the presidential elections held at the end of May. President-elect Mohamed Morsi has called for unity after winning 51.7% of the vote. The next few months may see renewed tension between the President’s Muslim Brotherhood, the Army, which has decades of political, military and economic power under its command and the countless thousands of “Arab Spring” democrats whose protests brought down Hosni Mubarak, amid events that sparked protest in many Arab lands.
July 12, 2012
Openness to the climate and to new ways of thinking are among key data center location drivers. The unique climates and business climates of western North Carolina, central Oregon and Washington, Northern Virginia and Iceland are providing the most bang for the buck for major data center projects.
July 12, 2012
How Oregon is winning the competition for the next generation of secure data facilities.Silicon Valley has seen the future of data centers, and it resides in Oregon. That’s the conclusion of John Sheputis, CEO of Fortune Data Centers, a San Jose, Calif.-based company that’s opening a 240,000-sq.-ft. (22,296-sq.-m.) data center on a 15-acre (6-hectare) site in Hillsboro near Portland.
July 12, 2012
Asheville, N.C., knows its hops and grains. The city has been voted Beer City USA four years running in an unofficial national poll, this year tying with Grand Rapids, Mich., for first place. An annual beer festival in the city quickly sells out. The area is home to more than a dozen craft breweries and brew pubs. And beer aficionados held the city’s first-ever Asheville Beer Week across 11 days in late May and early June this year because seven days apparently aren’t enough to celebrate the city’s culture of cold ones.
July 12, 2012
Some are forward-leaning. Some are futuristic or visionary. Some are private, others public. Some exist and thrive already. Others look pretty on paper so far. A few are outright mind-bogglers.
What a sampling of science park activity reveals most of all is a hunger for environments conducive to innovation.
July 10, 2012
Columbus is changing from a steady performer to one of the country’s most dynamic metro areas. The Columbus Region has been called the test market of the United States because of its diverse economic profile — part university town, a national logistics hub, a center of retail brands such as the Limited Brands and Wendy’s, and the second home of Chase bank, which happens to be the region’s largest employer.
July 10, 2012
The U.S. wind industry supply chain anxiously awaits political resolution to the production tax credit issue. Acciona, a Spanish energy specialist, opened its first North American facility in the heart of U.S. wind country in West Branch, Iowa, in December 2007 with the plan of providing turbines to wind farms in North America, primarily those operated by Acciona Energy.
July 2, 2012
Q & A with John Gardner, Novelis’ chief sustainability officer
July 2, 2012
Site Selection Online, the May 2012 edition of Site Selection – the magazine of corporate real estate strategy and area economic development. Cover story: The Global Best to Invest Rankings
July 2, 2012
For the third year in a row, the Golden State leads the field in our annual index of sustainability. How territories and companies work together to manage resources and reduce their footprints while still remaining economically productive will determine whether that finding is prophetic or a catalyst for some very quick changes.
July 2, 2012
On the very same day in March, Texas announced a huge new Apple Inc. campus in Austin (notably without a quote from Apple), and Apple submitted revised plans for a new headquarters campus in its hometown of Cupertino, Calif., that would boast a Texas-sized capacity of 13,000 employees.
June 29, 2012
The BIO International Convention held in Boston June 18-21 — at least the exhibition part of it — seemed to be about economic development pitches by states and nations as much as it was about science. The 34 country and 26 state pavilions all served as recruiting beachheads, manned by personnel trying to lure companies to their respective areas.