Business Growth & Attraction

The good news continue to spread across the Valley.

Following last month's announcement that VXI Global Solutions will be bringing 500+ new jobs to downtown Youngstown, AT&T recently announced they will be adding 150 jobs to their Boardman South Avenue mobility call center starting early next year.

The jobs were added because AT&T's wireless business is growing, and they were added to the Boardman location because of excellent service and strong work force in the region, according to AT&T Ohio president Tom Pelto.

''One of the critical factors for Boardman was the customer survey satisfaction results were among the highest in the country,'' Pelto said.

Despite the recession, the Mahoning Valley continues to attract new business and support those that are growing (with support from organizations like the Youngstown Business Incubator).

The Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber honored 10 of these entrepreneurs and their growing companies with Growth Awards for their increase in sales and employment over the past year. Top honors went to Turning Technologies, Jet Stream International, and Bodine Perry.

Lt. Gov Lee Fisher, keynote speaker for the breakfast, applauded the Valley for exemplifying the work Northeast Ohio and the state are working towards: foster business growth in emerging industries.

Click here to read about the other growing companies honored.

The folks at Nortech have been traveling across Northeast Ohio a lot over the past week, holding a series of events to gain support and explain their new advanced energy initiative.

The new initiative, which will work to build connections to accelerate and strengthen the development of new commercial opportunities and support select advanced energy projects that have the potential to create more commercial activity, generate jobs and attract investments to the region, received positive support from the region. Attendees to the summit seem excited to take advantage of emerging opportunities in all areas of the advanced energy sector, including wind, fuel cells, biofuels, energy efficiency, and biogas.

Click on the links below to read detailed coverage of Nortech's visits to:

• Akron
• Youngstown
• Mansfield

As a region, Northeast Ohio knows how to take an economic hit; we have been down that road before, and know how to bounce back. During prosperous times in our nation's economy, however, is where we fall behind the rest of the country. Why is that, and how can we better leverage ourselves coming out of the latest recession?

Brad Whitehead, president of the Fund for Our Economic Future has an answer: attract and support fast-growth industries.

As Whitehead tells the Cleveland Jewish News, "The road to economic vibrancy requires innovation and commercialization as well as entrepreneurship, education and foreign investment."

Partners in Advance Northeast Ohio and the Fund are working hard to attract companies, support entrepreneurs, and train the region's talent in these fast-growth industries so we can emerge from this recession strong and growing stronger.

The Mahoning Valley continues to attract businesses and talent to Northeast Ohio. VXI Global Solutions, a Los Angeles-based call center company, announced they will be opening an office in downtown Youngstown. VXI Solutions is expected to hire 150 people by Oct. 1, with and an additional 50 a month after that, generating up to about 500 jobs.

“This is a home run for Youngstown,” U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan of Niles told the Youngstown Vindicator. “This is a perfect example of stimulus recovery funds that couldn’t be better spent.”

VXI chose Youngstown because the building they will occupy already has the electronic infrastructure in place that they need, and the ability to take advantage of Ohio’s Job Creation Tax Credit program.

Team NEO, the region’s business attraction organization, assisted Youngstown in landing  the VXI deal by referring the lead to the Youngstown-Warren Regional Chamber.

As Entrepreneur magazine already stated, Youngstown is a great place to start a business.

“We’re pushing location and quality of life. People are realizing this is a great place to do business,” Ryan said.

• 46 retention/expansion projects totaling $373.2 million and creating 1,789 jobs
• 4 new business projects to the area totaling $70 million and creating 460 jobs
• 9 startup projects totaling $2.9 million and creating 89 jobs (thanks in part to the work of the Youngstown Business Incubator)