Economic Development September Recap

Wake County Economic Development and the Cary Chamber of Commerce announced that Align Technology, Inc. has established its first U.S. East Coast operation in Cary, with plans to invest $4 million and create more than 100 jobs in Wake County over the next five years. The Cary facility is one of only two locations in the U.S. Headquartered in San Jose, Calif.,  Align Technology is a global medical device company engaged in the design, manufacturing, and marketing of the Invisalign ® system, the world's leading invisible orthodontic product, as well as 3D digital scanning products and services for orthodontic and restorative dentistry. Read more about the announcement via The News & Observer and the Triangle Business Journal. 

DB Global Technology, Inc. will undertake a 250-job expansion over the next two years at its software application development center in Wake County. The company plans to invest $9 million there through the end of 2016. DB Global Technology is a unit of Deutsche Bank AG, the Germany-based global financial services provider. The company's expansion will accommodate a sharpened focus on developing strategic applications and enterprise-wide technology solutions. The company currently employs more than 600 people in Wake County.

Delta Air Lines announced a new daily non-stop flight between Raleigh-Durham International Airport (RDU) and Paris-Charles De Gaulle Airport (CDG). The flight will become  RDU's second daily nonstop flight to an intercontinental destination when it begins service in May 2016. Non-stop service between RDU and CDG will provide improved connections to more than 40 new foreign destinations, increasing the Triangle region's global business opportunities and ability to attract highly-skilled talent. Wake County Economic Development Executive Director Adrienne Cole sits on the Raleigh-Durham Airport Authority Board, the board that governs the Raleigh-Durham International Airport. Read more about the announcement via Triangle Business Journal. 

CoFounders Capital has opened their offices and lab in downtown Cary. Cofounders Capital is an early-stage seed fund focused on software ventures in the Triangle. Created in 2015, Cofounders partnered with the Town of Cary to provide free lab space to entrepreneurs who receive expert help modeling and vetting their startup ideas. The most promising of these ventures are then funded through Cofounders Capital's $12 million seed fund. The organization is managed by serially-successful entrepreneur David Gardner with a team of more than 70 advisers and volunteer mentors who are all investors in the fund, eager to support entrepreneurship in the Triangle and help portfolio companies and entrepreneurs succeed. 

Six years after buying then-Morrisville-based FarPoint Technologies only to move the main operation to Pittsburgh three years later, Japanese tech firm GrapeCity is returning to the Triangle. The company's Pittsburgh office will work on studio products, while the Raleigh operation will focus on spreadsheets and reporting technology. The company develops enterprise-level development tools for Microsoft, iPhone, and other platforms.

Since 2006, Great BIG Canvas has been leading the industry in art and photography reprints and customizable art products. Based in Raleigh at World Trade Blvd, Great BIG Canvas employs more than 200 professionals who specialize in creating high quality artwork. With sister companies, Canvas On Demand and Imagekind, they have sold more than 1.7 million custom prints. The company recently expanded, adding an extra 25,000 square feet to its existing footprint which now totals 80,277 square feet.

Personify, a fast-growing, executive recruiting firm, has signed a commitment to move its headquarters and staff of 70 people from Cary to the newly-renovated historic warehouse known as the Dr. Pepper Complex in downtown Raleigh. The company will initially occupy 10,134 square feet in the building and also has an option on another 4,000 square feet of vacant space. The new downtown space will allow the company to grow to about 100 employees before it has to consider moving again.

RoviSys will be moving operations from Apex to the Holly Springs Business Park after outgrowing its current facility. The company located to Apex in 2005 and currently has 115 employees at its Apex location. The company's primary function is automation for medium and large sized companies with many customers in the life sciences sector, including Novartis and Pfizer. Currently, RoviSys is seeing 5 --  15 percent annual growth, adding 10 --  25 employees each year. It expects to reach 250 employees at the Holly Springs site over the next 5 --  10 years.

SVN Hotels, a new company started by Raleigh real estate veterans Don Walston and Sanjay Mundra, will have its headquarters in Raleigh. The company will be targeting the more than $45 billion-a-year niche hotel brokerage market that only a handful of brokerage firms have focused on in recent years. The goal, they say, is to capture between 5 and 7 percent of that market share within the next five years, which would rank SVN Hotels among the top five hotel brokerage firms in the country along with Eastdil Secured, JLL, CBRE, and Hodges Ward Elliott.

Wake County Economic Development had the privilege of attending and sponsoring the 2015 Innovate Raleigh Summit. It was a wonderful showcase of all the talent and innovation Raleigh has to offer and just another example of how this region is #RaleighWakeSmart. "The fourth annual summit broke all previous ticket sales and attendance records of past Innovate Raleigh events. We believe this is due not only to the strong lineup of guest speakers, but to our exploration of inclusivity. There is a strong current, a mounting energy if you will, around this topic across all industries and having a composed, thoughtful conversation roused our business community to convene in larger numbers. Another exciting new component this year was hosting more than 45 students from Digital Connectors, The Queen's Foundation, Girl Develop It RDU, Wake Technical Community College, and Shaw University on scholarship. The participants brought dynamism to the Sept. 10 event that positively impacted all attendees. Moreover, we consider it essential for our organization to interface and connect with future business and community leaders who will benefit from our programming at this pivotal time in their education process," said Jenny Hwa, executive director, Innovate Raleigh. To read the full recap on the Innovate Raleigh Summit, click here. 

Wake County Economic Development participated in the CED Tech Venture Conference.  The Council for Entrepreneurial Development annual Tech Venture Conference is one of the premier entrepreneurial events in the southeast United States.  The event brings together top industry leaders as speakers and panelists and showcases the most promising emerging local companies and facilitates key connections with a diverse group of investors. "This event is a great example of the strength, diversity, and vibrancy of Wake County and the region's entrepreneurial community and a serves as a means to increase the flow of capital to those growing companies," noted Michael Haley, director of Business Recruitment and Expansion. This year saw hundreds of entrepreneurs, investors, and innovators brought together for the two-day conference.