Binghamton, Cornell to use $1.6M federal grant to attract international businesses to Southern Tier

VESTAL, N.Y. — Binghamton University will use a federal grant of $1.6 million to help attract international companies to the Southern Tier and upstate New York.

Binghamton is partnering with Cornell University’s SC Johnson College of Business on the effort, Binghamton University said in a Tuesday news release.

The U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) awarded the funding and U.S. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D–N.Y.) announced the award, the university said.

Schumer said the program is estimated to create 365 jobs and generate $2.7 million in private investment.

With the money, Binghamton will develop the Koffman Southern Tier Incubator’s Soft Landing program to attract interested overseas firms.

“The Southern Tier Soft Landing Program at the Koffman Southern Tier Incubator will build on the momentum of the Southern Tier of New York as a hotspot for the development and manufacturing of clean energy technologies by attracting and assisting international companies providing products and services that can help the U.S. meet the administration’s climate goals as well as create jobs,” Per Stromhaug, associate VP of innovation and economic development at Binghamton University, said.

“We, at Cornell, jumped at the opportunity to collaborate on the Southern Tier Soft Landing Program with our partners at Binghamton University and its Center for International Business Advancement,” said Andrew Karolyi, Cornell’s principal investigator on the grant and dean of the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business. “It’s about forging real-life, engaged learning opportunities for our students in which they roll up their sleeves and get to work with the foreign companies attracted to the region to help build out their clean energy technologies.”

It’s not the only time that the U.S. Department of Commerce has recognized the Binghamton area.

Schumer had previously announced that the EDA had selected the Binghamton University-led New Energy New York battery-manufacturing project as a phase 1 awardee and finalist for investment through the American Rescue Plan’s Build Back Better Regional Challenge.

As a phase 1 awardee, the project will receive $500,000 in technical-assistance funds to develop its proposal to compete for a phase 2 implementation grant, worth up to $100 million, to expand research, development, testing, and workforce assets to meet the demand of the emerging battery-manufacturing industry in the Southern Tier and upstate New York, the university said.