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Jobs coming in Utica with potential impact on Lewis County [Watertown Daily Times, N.Y.]
[October 23, 2014]

Jobs coming in Utica with potential impact on Lewis County [Watertown Daily Times, N.Y.]


(Watertown Daily Times (NY) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Oct. 23--LOWVILLE -- Once Nano Utica is completed, it holds the potential of having a large economic impact not just in Utica, but in Lewis County.

Alicia Fernandez Dicks, president of Fort Schuyler Management Corp., spoke at the Lewis County Economic Development Conference on Thursday about Nano Utica and the Computer Chip Hybrid Integration Partnership between SUNY Polytechnic Institute and the SUNY College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering in Albany.



Fort Schuyler Management Corp. is in charge of constructing, maintaining and operating the Computer Chip Commercialization Center or Quad C at SUNY Polytechnic, formerly the SUNY Institute of Technology, in Utica.

Nano Utica was announced last year as a $1.5 billion public-private initiative to create a nanotechnology hub. The first building, part of phase one of the project, is set to open the first quarter of next year, with 500 jobs waiting. Once all three phases are complete, Nano Utica is expected to produce 1,500 jobs.


"They are making these investments so we have quality jobs in our regions and so that we can start to turn around the stigma that there are no jobs in upstate New York and that there is no quality work," Ms. Dicks said. She said these are not just jobs for people with doctorates or master's degrees. To work in the facility, a person can have a two-year degree in engineering and technology, she said.

She said tech degrees are going to fuel the new workforce, and the majority of globally competitive jobs are in technology. Forty percent of the jobs at Quad C are going to require two-year degrees, which potentially can yield a salary of $60,000 to $85,000 a year, Ms. Dicks said.

The facility will have cleanrooms, or controlled environments for nanotechnology. Ms. Dicks said the facility will have more plumbers than people with doctorates, the reason being that it cannot have one leak or momentary power outage, because it costs tens of millions of dollars an hour when something goes wrong.

Jobs will come not just in the facilities, but externally.

"Every job in our facility creates two to three outside," Ms. Dicks said. "Two to three directly feeding into the cleanroom. The tool companies, the vendors, the supplier network, a very big ecosystem around the cleanroom. These guys are not in the cleanroom working; they have to set up shop outside the region. Their region is not right in Utica; their region is a 300-mile epicenter of activity and investments. Keep that in mind, because you are right there in it." She said these companies are coming in to sustain Nano Utica, and then there will be additional jobs created in restaurants, hotels and retail.

"Huge impact for a local economy," Ms. Dicks said. "The vernacular has to change from 'well, that's Oneida County or that county...' There is no more divide. We are in one mega-region. We need to start working cooperatively, because this industry and all the industries coming behind it don't care. They need to set up shop. They need our talent, they need our resources and are going to want to invest in our community. Isn't this what we have been waiting for?" Ms. Dicks said nano science is driving technology into a whole new revolutionary pathway for how people live, work, play and learn. She said the new facility will prototype and commercialize the next generation of technology or the devices being designed.

Such a building is an expensive piece of real estate. The cleanrooms are typically $3,100 to $5,000 a square foot to construct, Ms. Dicks said. In comparison, an office building is about $100 a square foot. Each facility is worth $125 million with no equipment inside. Once all of the equipment is inside, just one facility is worth about $500 million.

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