Solar Array, Gen. Mills detail expansions - Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal:

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broke ground April 5 on the $100 176,000-square-foot expansion of its manufacturingfacility here, Keith general manager of the local facility, told members of . AED held its quarterlyh meeting Thursdayat . Joe Hudgins, presiden and CEO of Solar Array Ventures, outlined his company’s plan to build a massive solar manufacturing plant on the city’x Westside. General Mills’ expansiob should be completedby November, Bone said. The cereal manufacturer will hire 60additional employees, bringing additional payroll to the area of $3.
5 The expansion also brings $30 million in spending to New The Albuquerque City Council approved a $100 million industriak revenue bond deal for the company in BE&K Corp. from North Carolina landed the design/builc contract to build the expansion, but Bone said 80 percenty of the firm’s spending and employeexs willbe local. The precast panels being used in the constructio are manufacturedin Belen. General Mills has been in Albuquerqudsince 1991. Its current facility is located near Pasek del Norte and Edith and has190 employees, with an annualp payroll of $12 million, said Bone. The 275,000-square-foot plant produces aboutf 135 million pounds annually of 35different cereals.
The facilitu also has a lab on-site where the instructione for baking General Mills productw at high altitudesare created. The company has give n about $5 million to area nonprofits sincs 1998and $519,000 in scholarships, Bone Don Power, chairman of AED, said the cereal company’sd donations illustrate one of the things the organization lookz for in recruiting companies: community involvement. Hudgins said Solarr Array plans to breakj ground by the third quarter of this year ona 225,000-square-foott thin-film photovoltaic manufacturing plant in the Corderl Mesa business park, west of the mattress factory.
The company plans to add three more buildingss of that size as it he said, with each facility employing about 225. Its annualo payroll in the first phase wouldbe $14 million. About five percent of the jobs wouldrpay $100,000, 45 percent would pay $70,0000 and half of the jobs would pay The capital investment for the first phase will be $170 millionm and the company would spend $40 million annually for raw The first phase is expectexd to have a capacity of 75 megawatts, but that would grow to 300 mw with the full The plant also will have a space that will servd as a community and educational Solar Array is seeking $175 million in industrial revenus bonds from Bernalillo County.
The company is working to raisse $210 million in debt and equity, Hudgin s said. Hudgins said New Mexico beat out two othe states forthe plant, despite the fact that it did not offere the largest incentives. But the coordination among localp and state government officials and other parties made New Mexic far more efficient in establishing a planninyg framework that the company coulf then use to plan a budget for the hesaid “That was a major issue for Hudgins said. He also praised the labor force here and theeducational institutions. The facility is being designed byPageSoutherlandPage LLP, which has Texads offices in Austin, Dallas and Houston, as well as Washington, D.C.
and London, U.K. Hoffman based in Portland, Ore., is building the