GSA Technology Council

The US Department of Agriculture’s Rural Development Telecommunications Program has accepted CommScope’s Flat Drop fiber cable designs, enabling service providers seeking funding from the Rural Utilities Service (RUS) to propose the use of the Flat Drop products in business plans and applications they submit for RUS grants and loans.

CommScope’s Flat Drop designs include an all-dielectric cable suitable for aerial self-supporting or burial applications and a toneable design which contains a wire used to locate the underground portion of the fiber run. Both cable types are small, lightweight constructions designed for ease of handling and installation, and are compatible with industry-standard hardware. Their dual ripcords also simplify access and installation. CommScope’s Flat Drop cable designs are suitable for all FTTH applications, including CommScope’s BrightPath® RF over Glass (RFoG) solution.

“Acceptance of our Flat Drop cable designs by the Rural Development Telecommunications Program greatly benefits our customers as they look to expand their networks into unserved areas,” said Carl Meyerhoefer, vice president of Marketing and Business Development for CommScope’s Broadband division. “CommScope is excited about adding these designs to our family of products currently accepted by the Rural Development Telecommunications Program. We continue to focus on expanding our product portfolio to serve this important market.”

via: CommScope

North Carolina Gov. Bev Perdue announced that Apple has selected North Carolina as the location for a new data center. The company is expected to invest more than $1 billion in the project over nine years.

“North Carolina continues to be a prime location for growing and expanding global technology companies,” said Perdue. “We welcome Apple to North Carolina and look forward to working with the company as it begins providing a significant economic boost to local communities and the state.”

The announcement comes after Gov. Perdue this morning signed Senate Bill 575, which modifies the method by which capital-intensive businesses calculate corporate income tax liability in North Carolina.

The facility is expected to employ at least 50 full-time employees. The legislation requires that the average wage exceed the wage standard of the county in which it’s located. A data center such as this will typically contract locally for services such as server maintenance and repair, building and HVAC maintenance, landscaping and security – expenditures that could range from $5 million to $6 million annually in the region and create up to 250 jobs. The North Carolina Department of Commerce projects that a data center investment of $1 billion would create more than 3,000 jobs in the regional economy, including hundreds of jobs related to construction and others created as a result of economic growth.

“We are very pleased the General Assembly has recognized the role capital-intensive industries play in the state’s economy and their relationship to small businesses in our communities. Technology-driven projects like this may bring fewer overall jobs than traditional industry, but they have a tremendous economic impact through locally purchased goods and services,” Commerce Secretary Keith Crisco said.

As part of the legislation, a capital-intensive industry must meet investment and wage standards and provide its employees with health insurance in order to utilize the modified formula for calculating the state corporate income tax. It also must locate in one of the state’s more economically distressed Tier 1 or Tier 2 areas.

“During these tough economic times, it’s important to make the investments that create jobs in areas that need them the most,” said Perdue.

via: NC Governor’s Office

North Carolina based Superlattice Power, Inc. has completed the acquisition of equipment from a major USA company to achieve final development of advanced lithium-ion batteries and its electrode materials.

The advanced equipment will be employed to optimize manufacturing process variables for commercial production. Superlattice Power, Inc. has previously announced that the company has developed and manufactured electrode materials which have the potential to deliver more energy in electronic devices and UPS systems. Advanced cathodes have been designed by the Superlattice Power scientists to be less expensive and comprised of environmentally friendly manganese.

New equipment will be performing electrochemical analysis and cell manufacturing. Because of the vast potential of new electrode materials developed for portable rechargeable systems, Superlattice Power has committed to deliver prototype cells to Fortune 500 companies. Portable Lithium-ion battery prototypes will be manufactured at Superlattice Power’s facility in Mooresville and will be supplied for their evaluation.

via: Superlattice Power

Real estate Web site Zillow.com today announced plans to launch co-branded real estate Web sites with 180 newspapers nationwide, powered by Zillow. The Tampa Tribune and 100 newspapers published by Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc. are among the first newspaper Web sites to be powered by Zillow’s search technology beginning today. Additional papers including the Richmond Times-Dispatch and Winston-Salem Journal will launch sites in the coming months.

With this relationship, newspaper Web sites will now include Zillow’s powerful search functionality, whereby users can enter any home address, neighborhood or locality and find Zestimate(R) home values, recently sold homes, homes for sale, open house listings and local market data, on a co-branded version of Zillow.com. Visitors to the co-branded sites can also access all of Zillow’s real estate community content via Zillow Advice, and mortgage rates and information from Zillow(R) Mortgage Marketplace.

The launch of co-branded Web sites powered by Zillow extends the scope of the Zillow Newspaper Consortium formed in November 2007 with 11 major newspaper publishers, whereby newspaper sales teams sell featured listings and premiere advertising inventory on Zillow.com to local real estate advertisers.

“This next step of the Zillow Newspaper Consortium brings Zillow’s unique local content and data to millions of online newspaper visitors searching for real estate information,” said Lloyd Frink, Zillow president. “As our newspaper partners evolve and build out online content, we’re excited to be a key part of the process.”

“Together with Zillow, we are able to give our consumers a wealth of local real estate data, information and news about the city and neighborhoods in which they live or are interested in living,” said Kirk Read, President of Interactive for Media General, Inc.

“The combination of Zillow’s cutting-edge real estate technology with CNHI’s deep community relationships will help us serve local readers and businesses in exciting new ways,” said Donna Barrett, CEO of Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc. “This relationship with Zillow will help cement our status as the deepest, richest source of local information in our markets.”

The Zillow Newspaper Consortium is made up of 11 major publishing companies, including Hearst Newspapers; Media General, Inc.; The E.W. Scripps Company; MediaNews Group; Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc; Morris Communications Company; and Philadelphia Media Holdings. The first round of 101 co-branded sites are launching today, with additional sites launching throughout 2009.

Zillow’s popular real estate content includes data and Zestimate values on more than 88 million U.S. homes, 3.3 million listed homes for sale, and updated mortgage information and quotes from the Zillow Mortgage Marketplace. Zillow is one of the largest and fastest-growing real estate Web sites, with 8.8 million unique visitors in March 2009, representing 70 percent traffic growth year-over-year.

via: Zillow

According to a story in the Triangle Business Journal, Google has stopped further development of it’s data center in Lenoir, North Carolina. The company was to receive a $4.7M state grant for the eventual creation of 210 jobs in the area, but has formally opted out of receipt of the grant. So far, 50 hires have been made and only one of the two planned buildings is built and in use.

Read: Google opts out of $4.7M grant from North Carolina

Duke Energy today announced further expansion to its wind energy production with the completed purchase of Catamount Energy Corporation based in Rutland, VT.  The Catamount  acquisition will add approximately 500 megawatts to Dukes wind energy portfolio.  Earlier this month Duke also purchased a wind farm in Wyoming, and hastwo wind farm projects in Texas scheduled for completion later this year.  The power company has an addition 5,000 megawatts of wind energy under development in twelve more states. 

for more information on Duke Energy’s wind power production and projects visit http://www.duke-energy.com/ 

Hosted Solutions, an East Coast managed services and data center, announced today that it has signed a deal with EQmentor, Inc., a ground-breaking organization focused on professional development.
 
The three year contract allows Hosted Solutions to provide hardware and software management services from its Charlotte Data Center to EQmentor.
 
“We evaluated a number of hosting providers and quickly identified Hosted Solutions as the best partner for us.  We needed to supplement our staff with an outside team of experts who we could trust would keep our mission-critical hardware and software up and running and secure at all times,” Dr. Izzy Justice, Founder and CEO of EQmentor.  “Hosted Solutions is hands down the most reputable and trustworthy hosting and managed services provider on the East Coast and we are proud to partner with them.”
 
“EQmentor has developed an innovative professional development program that is transforming the human capital space.  The EQmentor solution leverages the power of the internet and allows today’s professional to learn at the point of need. In addition to the custom matched mentoring relationship, EQmentor has created the first online peer collaboration community that is truly cross industry and cross vocation which further enhances the learning experience,” said Josh Wolff, General Manager of Hosted Solutions.  “Critical to EQmentor and its members is that this service is available 24×7, and that the content remains safe and secure.”

via Hosted Solutions

AdvantageWest Economic Development Group and The Blue Ridge Entrepreneurial Council have announced the 6th Annual Carolina Connect Conference on September 11th at The Grove Park Inn in Asheville, NC.

Carolina Connect is a regional conference fostering entrepreneurial growth of businesses of all sizes and stages.

Leading our morning discussion this year will be Ryan Allis, Founder and CEO of iContact which is a Durham NC based company who currently leads market in providing email marketing tools for small business. Ryan built iContact from its start in 2003 to its current size of over 100 employees, 25,000 customers and $15 million in annual sales. In 2005, Ryan was named by BusinessWeek as one of the top 25 Entrepreneurs under age 25. He is the author of “Zero to One Million”.

Every truly successful business started around an idea; the age old question . . . what differentiates a good idea from a great idea? Building on the electricity created by last year’s keynote, Guy Kawasaki and upon his recommendation, we are pleased to announce the lunch keynote, Dan Heath, co-author of “Made to Stick”. Dan will describe the traits that link sticky ideas of all kinds from urban legends to corporate mission statements to successful advertisements. Dan has taught and consulted on the topic of making ideas stick with audiences from organizations including Nissan, Microsoft, Home Depot, Fannie Mae and West Point. Dan is a consultant with Duke Corporate Education in Durham NC.

In addition to these two dynamic speakers, we will be offering the Kaufman Foundation’s widely-acclaimed “Power of Angel Investing” seminar as a separate track of the conference. This track is resereved for those individuals who are existing angels or those interested in learning more about angel investing. Space is limited so please register early for this session.

Three exciting educational tracks for entrepreneurs include; Startup Survival, High Growth Gear and Fund Me which will cover everything from strategic business planning, sales and marketing, cash flow management to sources of funding for your venture.

Finally we will close the day with a dynamic PowerPoint free series of theme-focused roundtables in our Critical Conversation Networking Cafe where you will hear from industry experts on topics such as; Startup Management, Social Marketing, Fundraising Facts of Life, When Your Partner is Your Partner, Putting the WOW in website Design and Function, and more . . .

We will close the day with networking at its best amid the magnificient Blue Ridge Mountains on the Vanderbilt Terrace and recap the day’s events and who know’s you might even win some cool new tech gadget.

Registration is affordable at $50.00 and covers the cost of breakfast, lunch, closing reception and access to all educational sessions. Register online at www.brecnc.com or contact Pam Lewis at plewis@awnc.org – 828-687-7234

via: BRECNC

Charlotte, NC — Duke Energy today announced that they have acquired Catamount Energy Corporation from Diamond Castle Holdings, LLC.  The goal of this new acquisition is to significantly expand Duke’s wind energy operations.

Catamount Energy, which was formed in 1992, has been focusing heavily on developing wind power projects in the U.S. and U.K. since 2001.  Currently Catamount has approximately 300 megawatts of renewable wind energy in operation.  The company further has intentions of developing approximately 1,750 megawatts through projects in several states and in the United Kingdom.

The acquisition of Catamount Energy, valued at about $240 million and assumed debt, coincides closely with Duke Energy’s goals of greater renewable energy development.  This past May Duke acquired another wind power development company, Tierra Energy, which is headquartered in Austin, Texas.  The combined entity will have more than 5,000 megawatts of wind energy under development in 12 states and approximately 500 megawatts of operating assets by the end of 2008.

via Duke Energy 

Charlotte, NC — Duke Energy Carolinas has announced plans to invest $100 million in the installation of solar panal electric generators at up to 850 sites in North Carolina.  Duke Energy intends for the solar panals to be installed on homes, schools, stores and factories.  Pending state apporval Duke Energy will spend two years installing the solar panal which would eventually produce 20 megawatts of energy in the comapany’s North Carolina area of service. 

Duke is also pursuing other “green” energy production processes including the purchase of 16 megawatts of power from the SunEdison solar farm in Davidson County, NC and by supplying up to 100 megawatts of power with wind farms in Indiana.  Duke currently is currently working on  wind powered projects with the projected goal of producing 1000 megawatts of energy throughout eight states.

via Duke Energy