Google has broken ground on its $600 million data center in New Albany, joining fellow tech giants Amazon and Facebook with centers in the Columbus suburb…Read full article at dispatch.com

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Stack Infrastructure, the Infomart Data Centers and Digital Realty alumni-led wholesale data center provider launched early this year, is expanding into the quickly emerging hyperscale market in New Albany, Ohio.

The company announced this week acquisition of an existing data center and 17 acres of dirt for future construction there. It didn’t say how much it paid for the assets or who the seller was…Read full article at datacenterknowledge.com

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Dozens of businesses have decided to call New Albany home, happily. Read more.

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VeloScience Bike Works, a destination for cycling equipment, accessories and service, currently occupies the space that will become Whit’s Frozen Custard. The popular merchant opened at Market Square in October 2012 and quickly became the go-to destination for top brands of road bikes, apparel and community building around the sport of cycling. Cycling has grown in New Albany and in central Ohio and VeloScience, through its knowledgeable customer service and product offerings, has drawn legions of fans which has driven the need for more space. VeloScience will move to 2,800 square feet of space at 29 High Street at the corner of E. Dublin Granville Road and Route 605. Construction is already underway with a goal of opening in mid-May.

“It’s very gratifying to see the growth of our sport and to have VeloScience be a part of helping people of all ages discover cycling,” said Geoff Clark, owner of VeloScience Bike Works. “With the new space we’ll be able to broaden our offerings of not only additional bike categories and brands but also an even deeper selection of accessories and apparel. Additionally, we’ll have substantially more space to service bikes and for customers to come together and socialize before and after rides. This is a really exciting time for our business and we’re looking forward to launching this next chapter.

Follow VeloScience Bike Works on Facebook and Instagram at @veloscience.

“Our goal at Market Square from the beginning has been to curate a mix of shops, restaurants and service providers that complement the important civic uses in the center of town such as the library, The Heit Center, McCoy Center and soon, Rose Run Park,” said Bill Ebbing, President of New Albany Company. “The addition of Whit’s will give our community members yet another reason to enjoy all that is available to them in the heart of New Albany.”

“The growth of VeloScience, which was one of our early tenants at Market Square, is also something to celebrate. Geoff Clark has been a great community partner, supporting many cycling efforts and events in our community. His new location will be a hub of cycling activity and help further develop the sport in New Albany and beyond,” concluded Ebbing.

New Albany’s Market Square is located in the heart of New Albany, Ohio at Market Street and Main Street. The development is anchored by the New Albany Branch of the Columbus Metropolitan Library and the Philip Heit Center for Healthy New Albany. It is a popular daily hub of activity with shops, eateries, service providers, civic uses and residences developed by the New Albany Company.

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[New Albany, Ohio] May 6, 2019 – New Albany’s town center continues to evolve as a destination for shopping, dining and leisure activities. Recent additions like Fox in the Snow, 3 Minute Fitness, Truluck PetPeople and Freshii are drawing residents and visitors to the heart of the community, creating an environment that enables existing businesses to grow and draws new businesses to New Albany.

Bourbon Praline Pecan, Waffle Caramel Crunch and Toffee Pretzel Chip will be just three of the delectable frozen custard flavors of the week to enjoy when Whit’s Frozen Custard Made Fresh Daily opens this summer at Market Square adjacent to Starbucks at 220 Market Street, Suite B. Ohio’s 33rd Whit’s Frozen Custard, this location will be the only one that also offers the award-winning Just Pies, with flavors ranging from Lemon Raspberry to Apple Crumb, Cherry, Triple Berry, French Silk, Coconut Creme and many more. Whit’s shop will be a warm and lively environment with a touch of vintage styling, perfect for stopping in after the little league game or topping off a dinner date.

“Opening a Whit’s in New Albany has been our goal for a number of years but we wanted to be in the exact right location where the community naturally gathers,” said Wil and Jason Hollands, Owners of the New Albany Whit’s. “The Market Square area is such a hub of activity for all ages with the library, Heit Center, soon-to-be Rose Run Park and unique shops all located here. We knew this is where we had to be and we’re thrilled that it will all come together in time for a summer opening.”

Customers should follow Whit’s Frozen Custard on Facebook @Whitsnewalbany to stay informed about the opening date of the New Albany location.

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When Facebook turned down New Albany the first time for an investment, Jennifer Chrysler took it like a breakup.

“I ate more ice cream that weekend than I have ever eaten in my life,” the city’s director of community development said. “I was crying on the phone and they were going, ‘It’s not you, it’s us.’

“I didn’t know what to do,” she said. “We’d been working through the project for nine months.”

However, as Chrysler recounted at a recent economic incentives conference hosted by Vorys Sater Seymour and Pease LLP, that “rejection” paved the way for Facebook to come back and commit to building a $750 million data center in New Albany.

And that, in turn, led to two other Silicon Valley wins: An expanded data center complex from Amazon and, most recently, a $600 million data center from Google.

“Over the course of that loss, we stated in touch with (Facebook),” Chrysler said. “We never want to hear that, but we had a tough conversation about what made us losers, and some of it was how our team functions, some off it was just beyond our control.”

New Albany officials even paid Facebook a visit during a California trip and, a few months after that, the phone rang. Facebook had a new set of requirements and the consultant team thought New Albany could make the cut if it tried again. The city did, and the company quickly settled on an investment.

Building those relationships was key, Chrysler said, because consultants move from company to company, project to project. In fact, the same consultant she had worked with to land Facebook was the person she had worked with on the Amazon deal and the Google investment.

“Site selection teams bounce around from company to company,” she said. “It’s a very small world in Silicon Valley and building the relationship got us on the shortlist.”

Aaron Berke, a Vorys partner, said that has become more typical in economic development deals.

“The bottom line often isn’t the incentive,” he said. “It’s how the economic development team delivers on other things.”

Silicon Valley’s economic development process is by now well known. As has been the case with Amazon’s HQ2 and other deals, New Albany worked with consultants using fake names and keeping their employers a secret.

By Tristan Navera
Columbus Business First

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A real-estate company is planning to build a 300,000-square-foot facility in the New Albany International Business Park to attract companies in the manufacturing, production and logistics industries, according to a Feb. 19 New Albany City Council legislative report.

The building will be within Licking Heights Local School District boundaries, and it will be north of state Route 161, on the north side of Innovation Campus Way between Harrison and Mink roads, said Jennifer Chrysler, New Albany’s community-development director.

VanTrust Real Estate plans to close on the property, owned by the New Albany Co., in early March and break ground in May, said Bill Baumgardner, VanTrust vice president, development.

The building will be finished in October or November and could take about a year from completion to fill with tenants, he said.

The investment for the shell building construction, site acquisition and site work is estimated to be $10.5 million, Baumgardner said.

The building will be designed to accommodate as many as four tenants and would create a minimum of 150 full-time jobs, with an aggregate annual payroll of at least $5 million to $9 million within three years of completion of the project, according to the legislative report.

The project is estimated to generate a base amount of $100,000 to $180,000 in annual income-tax revenue and a minimum of $32,250 in New Albany East Community Authority charges for the community, according to the report.

The New Albany East Community Authority is a community authority district that charges a special assessment for municipal infrastructure projects that have a public purpose, Chrysler said.

Approximately $30,000 to $54,000 annually would be directed toward infrastructure, approximately $26,000 to $46,000 annually would be paid to Columbus, approximately $22,000 to $40,000 annually would paid to the Licking Heights and approximately $22,000 to $40,000 would be deposited into the city’s general fund, according to the legislative report.

In this portion of the business park the city utilizes the first 30 percent of the income-tax revenue collected to repay infrastructure debt; 26 percent is paid to Columbus per the cities’ revenue-sharing agreement for the extension of water and sewer services in this area; and the remaining income-tax revenue is divided evenly between the city and Licking Heights, according to the report.

City Council on Feb. 19 approved a 100 percent real-property-tax abatement for 15 years at the site.

Because VanTrust still is in the design stage for the building and the building doesn’t have tenants the, city doesn’t have a value for how much the incentive ultimately would be worth, Chrysler said.

Baumgardner said New Albany’s tax incentives and the city’s ability to move quickly through the project-approval process made moving to New Albany attractive.

Similarly, the city’s master-planned business park and the tenants there also made the city a smart place to locate, he said.

New Albany leaders are excited for the opportunity to expand the city’s manufacturing base, Chrysler said.

“It’s a manufacturing opportunity to increase that industry cluster with speculative space, which will allow us to respond to unique needs in the market,” she said.

By Sarah Sole
From This Week News

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NEW ALBANY, Ohio (AP) — Google says it plans to build a $600 million data center in an Ohio city, part of $13 billion in planned investments this year.

Last December, Google affiliate Montauk Innovations said it was considering New Albany for a data center project in the New Albany International Business Park. The Columbus Dispatch reports Google did not elaborate further on its plans for the site in its announcement Wednesday.

New Albany spokesman Scott McAfee says the city is excited about Google’s investment in central Ohio.

Google’s project is the latest in what has been a string of data centers for central Ohio.

Information from The Columbus Dispatch.

Google to spend $13B on U.S. expansion, with growth focused outside Silicon Valley, including in Central Ohio

(Columbus Business First) — Google will spend more than $13 billion on U.S. data centers and offices in 2019, CEO Sundar Pichai said Wednesday, marking “the second year in a row we’ll be growing faster outside of the Bay Area than in it.”

“These new investments will give us the capacity to hire tens of thousands of employees, and enable the creation of more than 10,000 new construction jobs in Nebraska, Nevada, Ohio, Texas, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Virginia,” Pichai wrote in a blog post.

The company on Wednesday confirmed earlier reporting by Columbus Business First that it is building a data center in New Albany.

With the new investment, Google will be in 24 out of 50 states, Pichai said. The company’s workforce in Virginia and Georgia will double, he said, with new data center and office development there.

Google is also growing in New York, Southern California, Chicago, Nevada, Wisconsin and elsewhere, he said, detailing the company’s developments in those areas.

While Pichai emphasized that the company, a division of Alphabet Inc., is accelerating outside Silicon Valley, the search giant is also growing rapidly in the Bay Area, including with new campus developments around its Mountain View headquarters and nearby Sunnyvale, a planned urban campus near downtown San Jose and big leases in downtown San Francisco.

Pichai wrote:

“One year ago this week, I was in Montgomery County, Tennessee to break ground for a new data center in Clarksville. It was clear from the excitement at the event that the jobs and economic investment meant a great deal to the community. I’ve seen that same optimism in communities around the country that are helping to power our digital economy. And I’m proud to say that our U.S. footprint is growing rapidly: In the last year, we’ve hired more than 10,000 people in the U.S. and made over $9 billion in investments. Our expansion across the U.S. has been crucial to finding great new talent, improving the services that people use every day, and investing in our business.

Today we’re announcing over $13 billion in investments throughout 2019 in data centers and offices across the U.S., with major expansions in 14 states. These new investments will give us the capacity to hire tens of thousands of employees, and enable the creation of more than 10,000 new construction jobs in Nebraska, Nevada, Ohio, Texas, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Virginia. With this new investment, Google will now have a home in 24 total states, including data centers in 13 communities. 2019 marks the second year in a row we’ll be growing faster outside of the Bay Area than in it.

This growth will allow us to invest in the communities where we operate, while we improve the products and services that help billions of people and businesses globally. Our new data center investments, in particular, will enhance our ability to provide the fastest and most reliable services for all our users and customers. As part of our commitment to our 100 percent renewable energy purchasing, we’re also making significant renewable energy investments in the U.S. as we grow. Our data centers make a significant economic contribution to local communities, as do the associated $5 billion in energy investments that our energy purchasing supports.”

By Marlize van Romburgh
From Columbus Business First

Google to go ahead with $600 million data center in New Albany

NEW ALBANY, Ohio (Columbus Dispatch) — Google confirmed Wednesday that it plans to develop a $600-million data center in New Albany this year.

The project is among $13 billion in investments in data centers and offices that Google plans this year, the company said.

Last December, Google affiliate Montauk Innovations said it was considering New Albany for the project in the New Albany International Business Park. Property records show the company has bought 447 acres in Franklin and Licking counties for $54.5 million.

Google would not elaborate Wednesday on its plans for the site beyond the blog post released by Google CEO Sundar Pichai that notes an Ohio investment.

New Albany spokesman Scott McAfee confirmed that the Ohio location is the data center proposed for the west side of Beech Road, south of the state Route 161 interchange.

“We’re very excited about their investment in New Albany, in the central Ohio region and the state of Ohio,” McAfee said.

By Mark Williams
From The Columbus Dispatch

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Dear Friends and Neighbors:
As 2018 comes to a close there’s certainly a lot to celebrate. This year brought several new accolades for New Albany, including being named a Best Hometown by Ohio Magazine and landing at #8 on USA Today’s Best Cities to Live list, the highest ranking of any city in Ohio. This is an affirmation not only of the quality of community all of you have built but of the sense of community that exists in New Albany.

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Dear Friends and Neighbors:
While spring may have taken its time arriving this year, nothing has slowed New Albany’s momentum in 2018. From the business park to the town center, and from our neighborhoods to our parks, New Albany continues to thrive thanks to the passionate involvement of those who live and work here.

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