NC economic development pipeline "strong"

RALEIGH – The passage and signing of the CHIPS Act could well result in more interest from semiconductor firms and other firms looking at investing in new or existing facilities in North Carolina, a business development executive with the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina (EDPNC) tells WRAL TechWire.

In fact, the state may well be primed for more big investment, not just from semiconductor firms. The potential pipeline of economic development projects is led by more than 40 potential projects in the automotive sector and 244 total overall.

That’s according to Melissa Smith, the vice president of business recruitment and development for EDPNC, who already has called the economic development activity in North Carolina in 2021 a “blockbuster” year in the organization’s most recent annual report.

She calls the pipeline “the strongest it has ever been.”

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Investment continues to pour into the state with the North Carolina Department of Commerce website noting that through August 10, 2022, economic development projects coming to the state are anticipated to bring in $8.7 billion in investment with 20,851 jobs planned by those firms.

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Strong economic development pipeline

Here are the numbers: 244 projects in the pipeline. For those projects, if they were to come to fruition, they’d represent more than 108,000 jobs and $124 billion in capital investments. (Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this story stated 180,000 potential jobs, based on a written statement from EDPNC. That was a typo; the correct figure is 108,000.)

And more than 20 of those 244 projects could be announced with at least $1 billion in planned investment and at least 1,000 planned jobs, said Smith.

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Economic development following VinFast, Toyota, others

The pipeline is led by the automotive sector, said Smith.

“After the recent announcements from Toyota, VinFast, and Forza X1, the state is becoming a hub for the electric vehicle industry, which will only bolster the state’s positioning in the semiconductor industry,” said Smith.

And these 43 potential automotive sector projects represents about 20% of the total pipeline, with the “majority” of projects related to the electric vehicle supply chain.

Overall the project list has grown by 15% since the beginning of the year, said Smith.

“We’ve seen an increase in manufacturing projects and additional company locations,” she said. “As far as a slowdown, we aren’t seeing one yet.”

The pipeline is very robust, said Smith. And the recent rankings by CNBC and Business Facilities are affirmations that the state’s value proposition is appealing to businesses, said Smith, and also to the talented workers that businesses will need to thrive.

Ranking first in the nation, especially in the CNBC report, “carries a tremendous amount of marketing value,” said Smith. “More businesses will set their sights on the state.”

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Pipeline full of life science projects, too

The state continues to attract interest from life science and biopharmaceutical companies, as well. Nationally, job openings in the sector have increased in the second quarter, a recent report found, and a Raleigh-based executive and author of the report told WRAL TechWire this week that there are reasons to believe that North Carolina is actually out-performing the nation in the life science sector.

Smith told WRAL TechWire that there are 25 potential life science projects in the piepline.

Why?

Well, said Smith, the strength of the state is the economy and the workforce.

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“North Carolina’s economy grew 6.7% last year with job growth at 3.6%, one of the strongest in the nation,” said Smith. “The state also has a world-class workforce, made possible by its robust education system, which creates a pipeline of talent through workforce development and training programs, including technical and professional training programs specific to the semiconductor industry.”

Institutions including North Carolina State University and North Carolina A&T offer training, internships, and job opportunities for the life science and semiconductor industries.

And those industries are related, too.

“North Carolina has a great depth of experience in building out a supply chain ecosystem for the biotech industry,” said Smith. “We can draw upon that knowledge to help the growing semiconductor industry here.”