By the advertising services factor of July/August 2020
Commercial services allowed the COVID-19 crisis to distort the effects in our annual rating report. Our ratings remain the highest credible and comprehensive geographic ratings.
The procedure of comparing the data we use to calculate our annual rating begins regularly in the spring. In the spring of 2020, when the calamity of the coronavirus pandemic replaced all of our lives, we had to face the impact, if any, of COVID-19 interruptions on the effects of our sixteenth annual rating report.
We review to set up our ratings as predictive signs that give you a transparent picture not only of the places in the most sensitive in our ranking, but also of those that received the Big Mo: the assets, methods and backgrounds that constitute the potential expansion.
In our 16th annual rating, we identify the unique cases of what we all expect to be an interruption of transience. We lowered our overall rating of the outlook for state and metropolitan economic expansion for this year’s report; We will not speculate on regional economies that will be temporarily maximized from this unprecedented crisis. We also reset the clock from our ratings data, adjusting it early enough to ensure that the turbulence in wind shear degrees that the pandemic has inflicted on economies, markets and employment statistics has not distorted our results. You can say that we quarantined COVID-19 and excluded it from our rating report.
We hope those changes will be seen through the fog of uncertainty that now obscures everyone’s efforts, allowing you to see the 16th annual BF rating report in the same context you consulted the 15th earlier: the full and credible maximum ratings in our industry. And so, without further ado, here is the best productive of the maximum productive.
It should come as no surprise that Texas, BF’s 2019 State of the Year, stands atop the leaderboard in our flagship Best Business Climate ranking.
The same factors that propelled TX to its record fourth SOTY award were in play when we tallied up the advantages of doing business in the Lone Star State. Texas has established its hegemony in an impressively diverse array of growth sectors. A rapidly expanding skilled workforce, solid infrastructure, readily available renewable energy and a vibrant innovation ecosystem are just a partial list of the must-haves TX puts on the table for corporate site selectors evaluating locations for their next project.
If that’s not enough to beat the competition, our friends in Texas will see your offer and raise it with lucrative incentives. When the governor reaches for the big chips in the Texas Enterprise Fund, it’s usually time for the other folks in the game to fold ‘em.
Just about all of the advantages cited above were in play this month when Austin, TX landed the most coveted project of the year to date: the gigafactory that will produce Tesla’s new Cybertruck, Semi truck and Models 3 and Y. What is expected to be a 5-million-square-foot assembly plant that will employ up to 5,000 workers will rise on a site on the southeastern edge of the Texas capital.
According to reports, this mega-site selection decision came down to two finalists, Austin and Tulsa, OK. When Travis County, TX (and the local school district) agreed to pony up more than $65 million in tax rebates over 10 years, the deal was sealed.
Rounding out the top five on our business climate leaderboard Virginia, Tennessee, Alabama and North Carolina, respectively.
Tennessee is a perennial contender for BF’s business climate crown, living up to the credo expressed on the TNECD website: “…high expectations, low debt and a pro-business regulatory environment.” The Volunteer State consistently sets a high bar in meeting all of the priorities of businesses evaluating locations in TN, whether it’s customized workforce training, precertified sites or lower industrial electricity costs.
Alabama, home to thriving automotive and aerospace sectors, continues to expand its reach. The state’s central Gulf Coast location makes it attractive to companies looking for regional distribution options.
ALDI U.S. recently announced it will build a new regional headquarters and distribution center in Loxley, AL to support the company’s growing footprint along the Gulf Coast. The grocery retailer purchased 160 acres in Loxley’s industrial and warehousing district, north of I-10 exit 44. The 564,000-square-foot facility will bring approximately $100 million in capital investment and create 200 jobs for Loxley and Baldwin County. Construction is scheduled to begin in early 2021.
“We are eager for ALDI to expand its presence in our state,” said Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey. “We’re proud to stand behind ALDI’s commitment to bringing value to the people of Alabama and the Gulf Coast region, and we welcome the company’s plans for a regional headquarters and distribution hub in Loxley that will create jobs for our hardworking citizens.”
North Carolina has a growing reputation as a leading high-tech hub, but the Tarheel State hasn’t forgotten its roots as a leader in traditional sectors like furniture-making.
GoldenHome International Inc. will invest $86 million to identify its U.S. headquarters in Concord, North Carolina. The manufacturer of traditional residential cabinet systems will create 257 jobs in Cabarrus County over the next five years.
GoldenHome International Inc. is the U.S. subsidiary of Xiamen, China, Xiamen GoldenHome Co., Ltd.La public company supplies high-end built-in kitchen cabinets and traditional furnishings, adding cabinet systems, sink furniture and interior doors. With a total of more than 4,000 people worldwide, GoldenHome products are distributed and sold in 2,000 retail outlets worldwide. Corporate plans to base production, business operations, studies and development, distribution, marketing and education on their new North American outpost at Concord.
Centene Corporation, a Fortune 50 provider of controlled physical care for public and personal fitness plans, will identify a regional headquarters and generation center on the east coast of Charlotte, North Carolina. The resolution will create 3,237 new jobs in North Carolina and an overall investment of more than $1 billion through 2032.
“We chose Charlotte as our headquarters on the East Coast because it will allow us to continue our strong expansion and project to serve the most vulnerable populations,” said Michael F. Neidorff, President and CEO of Centene. “We take a look at our long career in Charlotte and pretend to be an integral component of the community as we are everywhere we do business.”
Centene’s commitment to 3,237 tasks makes the new Mecklenburg County campus the largest task creation task in the 18-year history of the JDIG (Employment Development Investment Grant) program. “Centene’s investment here is fair to Charlotte’s dominance and our entire state,” Gov. Roy Cooper said. “Centene knows that North Carolina has a resilient economy, a workforce in position, livable communities, and a host of other assets that make our state a premier destination for forward-thinking businesses.
Since Dorothy hit her red shoes, the wind has only been the most important news in Kansas: The state of Sunflower is our state ranked for the percentage of electricity generated from wind power, snatching the crown of this year’s Champion from Iowa, The No. 2.
Kansas is also the ladder of installed capacity, beating California by fourth place in BF’s installed wind capacity classification.
The most surprising thing about the relentless rise of wind power in Kansas is that it didn’t happen years ago. KS had to overcome a rather unique homegrown obstacle: Koch Industries, the oil and gas titan based in Wichita. For years, the Koch brothers waged an aggressive lobbying campaign that tried to undercut incentives aimed at expanding installed wind power in KS.
But even Koch Industries couldn’t stop the winds of change sweeping across the U.S. energy landscape: the exponential expansion of wind energy. Today, there are more than 60,000 wind turbines spinning across 41 states, powering the equivalent of more than 35 million homes in the U.S.
The U.S. added 9,143 MW of wind power capacity to the grid in 2019; another 44,000 MW of wind projects, representing more than $62 billion in investment, are either under construction or in advanced development.
BF has been telling you for years about the potential of offshore wind power to become a major source of energy for the United States. In 2019, the offshore wind energy sector finally arrived, so we created a new renewable energy category in our 2020 state rankings: Offshore Wind Power. Our ranking is based on announced state commitments to install offshore wind capacity by 2035.
East Coast states are leading the way in the creation of this new renewable power source, which has unlimited potential if related investments are made to connect power grids to new offshore wind farms. No. 1, New York, is aiming for more than 9,000 MW of offshore wind power; second-place NJ has announced it will build its capacity up to 7,500 MW.
In June, Gov. Phil Murphy announced his goal of expanding New Jersey’s wind harbor, a first investment in the country’s infrastructure that will provide a location for critical offshore wind projects.
The $400 million Garden State has allocated to the New Jersey wind harbor will be the largest investment in Salem County in a generation. The wind port has the possibility to create up to 1,500 manufacturing, assembly and operation jobs, as well as many construction work in New Jersey.
Manufacturing and marshalling projects supported by the Wind Port will drive economic growth in South Jersey, and throughout the state, Murphy said. NJ is committed to using union labor to construct the Wind Port and intends to set a new standard for inclusion of minority and women workers and business owners. Construction is targeted to begin in 2021.
“Offshore wind energy is an exclusive opportunity not only to protect our environment, but also to particularly expand our national economy in a way that has rapid effects and paves the way for long-term growth,” Murphy said. “The New Jersey Wind Harbor will create thousands of high-quality jobs, bring millions of dollars of investment to our state, and make New Jersey the nation’s offshore wind capital. This is a key step towards achieving our goal of achieving 7,500 megawatts of offshore wind energy up to 2035 and one hundred percent of blank energy by 2050. »
Construction is planned in two phases, beginning in 2021. Phase 1 will develop a 30-acre site to accommodate marshalling activities and a 25-acre component manufacturing site. Phase 2 adds another 150+ acres to accommodate expanded marshalling activities and extensive manufacturing facilities for turbine components like blades and nacelles. The state currently estimates the Wind Port will cost between $300-400 million at full build. The New Jersey Economic Development Authority (NJEDA) is leading development and is currently considering a range of public, private and public-private partnership (P3) financing options.
The United States installed 13.3 gigawatts of photovoltaic solar power capacity in 2019 to succeed at 77.7 GW. Solar energy accounted for 40% of all new power generation capacity added to the grid in 2019, more than any other source of force (including herbal gas) and the percentage achieved to date through solar force.
California remains the eternal sun king: the Golden State has 4 times more photovoltaic solar capacity than the NC moment position. Georgia enters the 10 most sensitive solar energy installed at number 9.
Steel, concrete, low-cost electricity from fossil fuels and wide-open spaces ripe for development were critical commodities required for growth in the 20th century, but data is the currency of the realm in the 21st. So this year we’re introducing a new category that we’ll call a flagship ranking from its inception: Digital Infrastructure.
These are the states that are wired for success, having laid the foundation—okay we’ll call it the ultimate database architecture—needed to support the growth sectors that have a voracious appetite for data in the emerging age of digital transformation.
Virginia is the highest-ranked state in our first virtual infrastructure ranking, a simplified selection through the impressive assets Commonwealth has deployed to create a gigabit path for high-tech data-driven businesses.
Virginia is home to the world’s largest pool of knowledge media, with Northern Virginia representing more than one hundred (of the 504 known hyperscale knowledge media worldwide) totaling more than 13.5 million square feet of average knowledge space. Synergy Research Group estimates that 25% of U.S. hyperscale knowledge media. They are found in Virginia.
In Northern Virginia, network connectivity is rooted in U.S. government reports. With extended fiber optic networks in the 1960s. Today, a mission-critical fiber crest intersection connects Virginia with all primary U.S. markets as well as the density of black fibers in the world. It is estimated that 70% of Internet IP traffic is created or transited through the “Data Center Alley” in Loudoun County, making Ashburn the epicenter of global interconnection.
Virginia has taken a leading position in cloud computing and cybersecurity, this year ahead of Texas in BF’s most sensible cybersecurity ranking. Virginia is at the forefront of the progression of skill in this developing sector. VA is perfectly equipped to succeed in this sector, with close proximity to the federal government, unmatched assets in data generation, and higher education establishments that are the next generation of cybersecurity professionals.
The cybersecurity development industry in Texas focuses on San Antonio, which is spent as the U.S. Cyber City. The alignment of education, industry and government in cybersecurity and the ability to collaborate in these spaces are the ultimate life opportunity for the development of the city’s industry. What began in 1948 when the Air Force established its security service operations in San Antonio has a major national cybersecurity center.
San Antonio has the highest concentration of cyberspace and outdoor intelligence professionals in the National Capital Region. Proximity to the Department of Defense and highly complex army operations, adding the Texas Air Force and NSA Cyber Command, in combination with major cyber education programs, and a competitive position of San Antonio’s business position in a position that other cities cannot replicate.
“To further expand San Antonio’s cybersecurity dominance, our goal is to increase industry-specific skill capacity in the cybersecurity sector,” said Tom Long, director of progression at the San Antonio Economic Development Foundation. “This is a strategy that attracts the attention and investment of cybersecurity operations, giant and small, as giant corporations with giant operations of internal cybersecurity centers.”
The industry plays a key role in shaping San Antonio’s cybersecurity through the san Antonio Economic Development Foundation progression team, SA Works.
Georgia won the crown in our new category Film Production Leaders, rating the states that are the most productive positions for film and television production.
According to the Georgia Department for Economic Development, peach’s burgeoning film production in the state grossed a record $2.9 billion in fiscal 2019, with 399 productions filmed in Georgia.
“The state of Peach remains South Hollywood, and corporations around the world have Georgia in mind as a wonderful position to invest, grow and relocate,” Gov. Brian Kemp said, setting the film production record. The 399 productions filmed in Georgia included 26 feature films, 31 independent films, 214 television series, 91 commercials and 29 music videos.
“The entertainment industry has discovered its position in Georgia,” said Lee Thomas, GDEcD’s Deputy Deputy Commissioner for Film, Music and Digital Entertainment. “While the highlight is in our competitive incentive, it is the qualified team based in Georgia, the varied topography, infrastructure and the many small businesses that our productions keep us among the most productive filming stations in the world.”
Michigan, Ohio and Indiana have our 3 most sensitive states, respectively, because of the strength of auto manufacturing. In January, BF announced that Michigan Economic Development Corp. he had won the 2019 2019 Agreement Gold Award for the Fiat Chrysler Automobiles Expansion (FCA), an assignment that includes a new $4.5 billion Jeep meeting facility in Detroit and production extensions. Six other Michigan plants, which will create more than 15,000 new direct and oblique jobs in the region over the next 3 decades.
Ohio’s already formidable network of automotive suppliers continues to grow.
Alcorta Forging Group recently announced that it will identify its first production operations in the United States and its regional headquarters in Marysville, OH. The Spanish 100-year-old automaker will invest $15 million and create 50 new jobs in the Columbus area, with an expansion that will double in five years, pending state and local approvals.
Alcorta plans to build its new 150,000-square-foot forging and manufacturing facility on 12 acres of land in the Marysville 33 Innovation Park, selecting Dublin Building Systems as its design-build partner. The project will be completed in three phases.
Texas, which ranks seventh in our most sensible 10th annual automotive force, is on track to consolidate its leading position in American truck production. truck and bus production plant in San Antonio Array creating six hundred jobs in the region. Vehicle production will begin in early 2022.
This year, we changed the name of our flagship education category to better reflect the multitasking that is now required of state progression programs: from now on, this rating will be called Workforce Development/Talent Attraction.
As has been the case over the past decade, Louisiana Economic Development’s FastStart program remains the benchmark for personalized progression and skill attraction. LED FastStart pioneered the use of iPad and other virtual platforms to provide educational tools in real time.
Virginia ranked 3rd in our annual education and recruitment competition, marking its goal of competing as opposed to progression leaders in Louisiana and Alabama. Earlier this year, VA introduced the Virginia Talent Accelerator program, presented through the Virginia Economic Development Association in partnership with the Virginia Community College System.
Virginia Talent Accelerator provides education and recruitment responses that are fully tailored to a company’s unique operations, equipment, criteria, and culture. All programs are offered for free to new or expanding professional companies to inspire job creation.
Personalized and work-specific educational facilities are designed and delivered using methodologies and fabrics that are considered to be of maximum effectiveness to accelerate learning in each subject. These can come with hands-on education, simulations, streaming quality videos, illustrated paint instructions, instructor-led classroom sessions, animations, and online learning modules. All company-specific documents evolved and the assignment became consumer assets and all exclusive data is protected by a confidentiality agreement.
Recruitment presented through the Virginia program would likely come with localized, company-specific recruitment and employment websites, candidate tracking, video job descriptions, quality-of-life videos, highly prospective candidate identity, and social media awareness. Va’s recruitment effort goes to extra length to establish certain smart connections between employers and prospective employees, with pre-employment education for candidates.
Since California’s population and economy can eclipse the maximum of other states, Golden State does not receive enough respect in the ratings formulated with a maximum dose of location quotients, artificially leveling the playing field.
In the BF ranking, the population is a demographic organization that must be taken into account in the perspective of expansion and the progression of the workforce. States that achieve the most sensible rating are measured through their performance.
It’s easy to dazzle through emerging stars in emerging expansion sectors, but constant, high-level functionality is never overlooked. And when this excellence spans two centuries, you have to be careful.
In the 21st century, thriving biotechnology hubs have been established in more than a dozen states. But if you took a time machine back to the second half of the last century looking for biotech leaders, you’d be directed to three: California, New Jersey and Massachusetts.
What hasn’t changed in more than 50 years is this: CA, NJ and MA are the top three, respectively, in Biotechnology Strength.
California is the birthplace of the U.S. biotechnology industry and home to a large share of the industry. At its zenith as a biotech powerhouse in the first decade of this century, nearly half of national R&D spending on biotechnology was in CA and the Golden State generated more than half of the nation’s biotech revenues.
According to the annual report of the 2019 California Life Science Association, there were 3,418 life science corporations in the state in 2018, 169 more than last year; more than 1,570 are pharmaceutical and biotechnological corporations, 117 more than in 2017. The other 1,848 corporations produce medical devices, diagnostic tests, biofuels, equipment and other biotech products and services.
The price of grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to California increased in 2018 to $3.9 billion; venture capital investment in life sciences $7.6 billion. The LCS report indicates that California’s biotechnology and life sciences sector directly employs 311,226 people, with biotechnology innovators covering the state of San Francisco in San Diego.
The strength of California studies, as well as its significant percentage in the U.S. biotechnology industry, will continue to make it one of the most active countries to shape biotechnology companies. Strong government study capabilities, a long culture of venture capital investment, and high-quality labor provide all the elements of a developing economy.
The so-called “brain belt” in central New Jersey is the center of the pharmaceutical industry and a thriving biotechnology center.
NJ’s biotech/pharmaceutical sector recovered impressively after the dark days of the Great Recession, when it suffered several disre adaptations (especially Swiss pharmaceutical giant Hoffman-Laroche, which transferred the peak of its operations to California in 2009).
Since mid-2017, NJ has expanded its ecosystem of biotechnology innovation with the status quo of a network of biotechnology incubators that works largely with the most productive universities in the Garden States. A smart example is the North Brunswick incubator, one of the nation’s largest incubation facilities for life sciences and biotechnology companies, a 46,000-square-foot facility at a 50-acre study park in Northern Brunswick in the center of the NJ Research Corridor.
NJ is home to 13 of the world’s 20 largest pharmaceutical, medical technology and diagnostics companies, including Bristol-Myers Squibb, Johnson and Johnson, Merck, Novartis, Pfizer, Sanofi, Novo Nordisk, Bayer Healthcare, Daiichi Sankyo and more. There are more than 400 biotechnology companies in NJ, including Amicus Therapeutics, Celgene Corporation, Chromocell, ContraVir Pharmaceuticals, Genmab and PTC Therapeutics. According to Choose New Jersey, the Garden State has the highest concentration of scientists and engineers in the U.S.
NJ also is home to some of the world’s largest clinical research organizations, including Covance, PharmaTrials, InVentiv Health Clinical and Frontage Clinical Services, and major healthcare foundations, including the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation, Henry H. Kessler Foundation and The Healthcare Foundation of New Jersey.
World-renowned biotech research institutions in NJ include the Advanced Research at Cancer Institute of NJ, Stem Cell Institute of New Jersey, W.M. Keck Center for Collaborative Neuroscience, Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Medicine (CABM), Biotechnology Center for Agriculture and the Environment, Waksman Institute and the Center for Advanced Food Technology.
We’ve said it before and it bears repeating: Texas is the heavyweight king of exports. Actually, we’ve been repeating that for every one of the past 15 years.
The Lone Star State shipped $330.5 billion worth of goods around the world in 2019. That dollar amount represents a 4.6 percent increase from 2018 to 2019 and a 42.7 percent increase since 2016.
The value of exports from Texas is estimated to equal 20.1 percent of the U.S. total for exports in 2019.
According to statistics from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Office of Economic Analysis (BEA), Texas exports account for 18.3% of the state’s GDP in 2019.
When we think of population growth, the SunBelt usually comes to mind, states like Texas, which is now home to nearly 30 million folks (second only in population to California, which is about to top 40 million) and Florida (number three in population at 23 million and counting, blowing past NY’s 19.4 million). We also think about demographics in states like Utah, which has the largest contingent of people under the age of 30.
Well, it’s time to think about Idaho. Population expansion is measured in% of ages, and Idaho’s expansion rate of more than 4% exceeds the other 49 states. For many others for a new position to live, the state of the gem is a shiny object they cannot resist.
Why do other people flock to Idaho?
An explanation of why they are leaving more densely populated states (index: there is an exodus from a West Coast state with 40 million inhabitants) in search of open spaces.
Here’s a statistic that says it all: Idaho’s population of 1.75 million is less than a dozen U.S. cities, yet its land mass of about 200,000 square miles is part of California. So, yes, Idaho is crowding, but there’s still plenty of area for newcomers who need palm industries for potato fields.
But since we oppose hateful comparisons, let’s avoid talking about other people leaving other states and say a few words about the incredible quality of life and the opportunities that await you if you follow the same path lewis and Clark have taken and avoid. (ended in Oregon) in Idaho.
Idaho’s herb-based splendor is known to all, however, you may be surprised to learn that Boise is becoming a millennial magnet with a low load of life and a high-tech center. Millennials fall temporarily in love with the colorful city of Boise in the city, the thriving coffee scene and the friendly and friendly atmosphere. Idaho’s capital is a trendy city with a small convenience (229,000 inhabitants) just miles away from a scenic splendor and all kinds of recreation you can imagine.
It is not unexpected that Boise has seen its population grow to 18.2% between 2010 and 2018.
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