Information Technology

The University of Illinois broke ground on the $72.5 million Petascale Computing Facility at the National Center for Super Computing Applications in Urbana-Champaign in November of 2008. The 95,000-sf Blue Waters Data Processing Center will include a command center, offices, loading docks, and a system administration center. A 20,000-sf water-cooled machine room with a six-foot raised floor will hold the IBM Blue Waters supercomputer and other systems.

Hewlett-Packard will build a 150,000-sf technical support center in Conway, Ark. Site work will begin for the $30 million project in August of 2008. The general contractor is Conway Development Corp. LEED certification for sustainable design will be sought for the facility.

The University of Melbourne is planning to construct the $100 million Victorian Life Sciences Computation Initiative Centre in the University’s Parkville Precinct in Melbourne, Australia. The facility will support high performance computing for life sciences research on diseases including cancer, influenza, and brain disorders by using large databases of genetic information. The facility will partner on research initiatives with the San Diego Supercomputer Center of the University of California, San Diego.

IBM is creating a sustainable business consultancy program called Green Sigma. Based on the Six Sigma management methodologies, the service will help companies reduce the carbon footprint of their business processes. Part of IBM's Big Green Innovations division, Green Sigma has formulated best practices guidelines that will be implemented in IBM’s internal pilot program and eventually by external clients. IBM is entering the carbon management services arena as part of an effort to become a green technologies and services provider.

The Canadian federal government has announced the recipients of its 2007 research budget allocations. Science and technology growth will be supported by $1.3 billion in funding, including:

• $510 million to the Canada Foundation for Innovation 
• $350 million to Centres of Excellence in Commercialization and Research 
• $120 million to CANARIE to develop a next-generation research broadband network 
• $100 million to Genome Canada 
• $10 million to the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research

Cadence Design Systems broke ground in February 2007 on a five-story, 208,000-sf R&D center in San Jose, Calif. Housing engineering research in integrated circuits and electrical systems for the electronics industry, Building 10 will enable the consolidation of Cadence’s research and development operations in a single collaboration-enhancing technology center.

Northrop Grumman Corp. broke ground on the 185,000-sf Commonwealth Enterprise Solutions Center in Chesterfield County, Va., in May of 2006. Housing 185,000 sf of offices, the building is sited on 28 acres. It will serve as Virginia's primary data center and will house the Virginia Information Technologies Agency, as well as containing a technology lab, a security operations center, a video broadcast studio, a training room, and a fitness center. Completion is slated for fall of 2007.

Santa Clara, Calif.-based Intel Corp. is beginning construction in early spring of 2006 on a $300-million semiconductor assembly and test facility in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Production at the plant is slated to begin in the second half of 2007. The facility will eventually employ 1,200 workers.

Cornell University is planning to construct the $50-million William H. Gates Hall on its campus in Ithaca, N.Y. Funded in part by a $25-million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the facility will accommodate education in computing and information science with a lecture hall, conference rooms, classrooms, laboratories, faculty offices, and student project spaces.

Stony Brook University is planning to develop a 246-acre research and development park on a site straddling Stony Brook and St. James, N.Y. Groundbreaking for a 100,000-sf Center of Excellence for Wireless and Information Technology (CEWIT) is expected in spring of 2006.

China-based Lenovo, the world's third largest maker of personal computers, will invest $84 million to construct a campus in Morrisville, N.C. The three-building, 500,000-sf Innovation Center will be located in the Perimeter Park corporate development. Building One will be a 179,000-sf, five-story research center. Building Two, mirroring the footprint of Building One, will begin construction in March 2006 and reach completion in early 2007. The 143,000-sf, four-story Building Three will begin construction in January 2008 and reach completion in January 2009.

Cisco Systems is developing the 37,000-sf Education and Development Center in Research Triangle Park, N.C. Located in Cisco's Building 11, the employee training center will cost between $1 million and $2 million to construct. Featuring classrooms, video rooms, laboratory space, and lounges, the facility will train approximately 2,000 Cisco employees annually.

Hewlett Packard Co. has expanded its presence in Memphis, Tenn., with the lease of the 789,000-sf Summit Distribution Center II. The facility will accommodate distribution operations for HP's imaging and printing businesses. Operations at the Memphis facility will be filled by Menlo Worldwide, a third-party supplier. The facility is expected to become operational in fall 2005.

Dell will celebrated the ground-breaking of its new 500,000-sf manufacturing plant in southeast Winston-Salem on February 23, 2005. The $115 million facility will be sited in the Alliance Science & Technology Park.

Texas-based Dell Inc. has awarded the site grading contract for its new 500,000-sf computer manufacturing plant in Winston-Salem, N.C., to Blythe Development.  Construction is expected to begin by the end of January 2005.