SYRACUSE — Working on a college campus has been a longtime ambition for Terry Brown, the new executive director at the Syracuse University (SU) Falcone Center for Entrepreneurship.

While he was CEO of the engineering firm O’Brien & Gere, Brown says he developed close relationships with a number of university leaders in the region. And, he says he has maintained close ties to his alma mater, Clarkson University in Potsdam, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in civil and environmental engineering.

The ties have shown him firsthand the economic value of the Central New York region’s educational institutions.

“As a region, we have just a tremendous asset in the college students that come here,” he says. “How do we retain them and that talent to help drive our economy?”

The Falcone Center is an ideal place to help answer that question, Brown says. The center is the outreach arm of the Department of Entrepreneurship and Emerging Enterprises at SU’s Martin J. Whitman School of Management.

It aims to foster entrepreneurial activity on campus, and in the local and regional community.

Brown will oversee and develop the Falcone Center’s strategic plan, manage its budget and development initiatives, advise student entrepreneurs, and work to strategically develop the entrepreneurial community both on and off campus, according to SU.

Brown started his new position in May. He was with O’Brien & Gere from 1975 to 2011 and held various senior-level positions in addition to chairman, president, and CEO. He was most recently president and CEO at Warner Energy Solutions, LLC, a startup focused on renewable energy and environmental projects.

At the Falcone Center, Brown succeeds Thomas Kruczek, who is now dean of the College of Business and Management at Lynn University in Boca Raton, Fla.

Connecting the community and the university around entrepreneurial activity is a focus for the Falcone Center, Brown notes. That means getting students into internships and working on projects for local companies, but also bringing businesses to campus to take advantage of SU’s resources.

Brown says his motives are at least partially personal. He wants his children and grandchildren to see the same opportunities in the Central New York region that he did while growing up here.

“If we’re going to retain our talent and have opportunities for our children and grandchildren, we have to create a robust economy,” he says. “Syracuse has a lot to offer.”

Efforts like the Syracuse Technology Garden, SU’s Student Sandbox business startup program, the Syracuse Center of Excellence, and the Central New York Biotech Accelerator can make big contributions in the years ahead, Brown adds.

“There’s a lot of entrepreneurship programs going on,” he says. “They all have to be linked together. We all have to be talking as one.”

Already, Brown says he’s been impressed by the passion and enthusiasm of students for entrepreneurship. Even though it’s summer, he says he’s already been approached by a handful of students with ideas and well-written business plans.

He hopes to use his connections in the business community to find solid mentors for any students with ambitions to start companies. The Falcone Center, Brown says, can help ensure that the ideas are relevant to the marketplace and have a reasonable chance of succeeding.

“I think that’s a huge thing we can bring to the students,” he says. 

BALDWINSVILLE — Produc-tivity Leadership Systems, LLC (PLS), a leadership training and coaching firm, has more than doubled its revenue in the past six years by sharpening its focus.

Back in 2006, the firm was expanding its services to new markets, including Buffalo, Albany, and Philadelphia. A new focus on Central New York has allowed PLS to grow, Ralph Simone, company president, says.

The firm’s revenue is now “well into the seven figures,” he says. PLS works with 16 different organizations coaching and training 300 people.

Simone says the narrower focus on the local market emerged from a desire to take part in the region’s revitalization. Good clients are also abundant in the area, he notes.

“It’s exciting,” Simone says of the focus on Central New York. “It seems to be paying off.”

PLS has also concentrated on building its own employee base in the past few years. The firm employs six people now, including three partners, up from three total employees in 2006 at its offices located at 410 Oswego St., Suite 130. 

With more employees of its own, the firm uses fewer contractors than it has in the past, Simone says. PLS still works with some long-term contractors for certain projects, but its own staff members are now providing more of its training.

“That seems to have strengthened our brand and our ability to help transform and develop leadership within organizations,” Simone says.

PLS’ growth has also been aided by some new programs. The company designed and implemented a yearlong leadership development program known as LeadForward, which is aimed at senior- level leaders.

Simone says the program takes a holistic approach.

“We’re looking at the whole person in this process,” he says.

The company has also spun off a new firm that is set to formally launch in 2013. LIIO (Leadership Integrated Intelligence Online) is now a tenant of the Tech Garden in downtown Syracuse.

The company is run by a current PLS employee, who will probably transition to working on LIIO full time by the end of 2012, Simone says. LIIO is an online service that provides leadership coaching support.

It’s initially targeted at colleges and universities to help students with tasks like goal setting, taking the right steps to get internships, and simply finding their passions, Simone says. The service could apply in many sectors though, he adds.

The company grew from PLS’ ongoing work with colleges and universities in the region, Simone says. Other clients in the area include defense contractor SRC and its manufacturing subsidiary SRCTec, computer manufacturer Seneca Data, and Carrier.

A traditional strength for PLS has been the technology sector, Simone notes. As employees with technical backgrounds get moved into leadership positions, they often need help developing new skills and dealing with the emotional aspects of their new jobs.

But the firm has seen that trend in many industries, Simone says, and its client base has broadened as a result.

PLS was previously known as Simone & Associates, which Simone founded in 1999. He started his first training and coaching company in 1991.

Prior to running his own business, Simone worked for companies including Carrier and Coopers & Lybrand in management development. He is a graduate of Siena College, located near Albany.   

Contact Tampone at 

ktampone@cnybj.com

GENEVA — Guardian Industries’ glass plant in Geneva is sensitive to swings in the housing market, so to survive the past five years without a single layoff is a point of pride, says Joel Daoust, plant manager.

The facility produces glass used mainly as windows in commercial and residential buildings.

“This group up here has done a good job adapting to different manufacturing principles,” Daoust says. “We haven’t had one layoff in this plant’s history. That’s something we’re very proud of.”

The plant has employed lean-manufacturing techniques to help cut costs during the economic downturn. Daoust says employees have been open to more flexible scheduling and other moves to help the facility save money.

The site is well positioned for growth as the economy recovers, he adds.

The plant first came online in 1998, expanding Auburn Hills, Mich.–based Guardian into the Northeast. Having a plant in the region allowed the company to boost its market share in the Northeast, Daoust notes.

Guardian employs 300 people at the 800,000-square-foot plant, located at 50 Forge Ave. That’s up 20 percent from when the site opened.

The plant includes a “floater” that measures more than the length of a football field and is used in manufacturing the glass. The process begins when a mixture of powdered, dry ingredients is added to a massive, 710-ton furnace that heats the materials to 3,000 degrees and melts them into molten glass.

The liquid is then poured into the floater over a bed of liquid tin. Because of the substances’ differing viscosities, the glass “floats” atop the tin, Daoust explains.

Workers can then control the thickness and size of the glass sheets by controlling how it is stretched across the floater.

The plant also includes warehouse space and in 2002, Guardian added equipment that can lend specialized coatings to its glass products. The move was made in response to the changing market for glass, Daoust says.

Customers now are looking for value-added products, he notes. The coatings allow buildings to meet demanding new energy-efficiency standards and gain valuable points in programs like Energy Star.

The coating equipment has also allowed the Geneva plant to produce glass used for shower doors, according to Guardian. The coating in that case makes the glass easier to clean.

Glass like that produced in Geneva is rapidly becoming a commodity product so manufacturers must seek ways to help themselves stand out from the pack, Daoust says. The future of the plant will be focused on working with Guardian research and development to develop new coatings that can help the company get its products into even more markets.

“The more we do that, the more we can differentiate ourselves,” Daoust says.

Guardian Industries, which is privately held, employs 18,000 people in 25 countries. In addition to glass like it produces in Geneva, the company manufactures fabricated glass products, fiberglass insulation, and other building materials for commercial, residential and automotive applications.

Guardian was founded in Detroit in 1932.

LANSING — Transonic Systems held a grand opening for its 30,000-square-foot expansion on July 9.

The company broke ground on the addition to its world headquarters and manufacturing facility in March 2011. The expansion, which houses manufacturing operations, doubled the size of Transonic’s existing space.

Transonic Systems manufactures flow-measurement devices with applications in medicine and research. The company’s products are used in everything from heart surgery to dialysis and in research labs around the world.

The company’s facility in Lansing houses manufacturing, sales, engineering, and everything else. The firm ran out of room for additional manufacturing or expansion in the old building, so began planning for the addition.

Other operations remain in Transonic’s pre-existing building. The company employs 130 people.

As of 2011, Transonic Systems had been growing at a pace of 6 percent to 10 percent a year for the past 14 years, company leaders say. The firm’s annual sales expanded in that period from $7 million to $20 million.

Its sales have been boosted by an expanding worldwide presence. The company’s international divisions all opened in the past five years with Japan launching in 2006 and Taiwan in 2007. Transonic expanded into the Netherlands last year.

In addition, Transonic’s holding company, Measurement Innovation Corp. (MIC) closed an acquisition of Scisense, Inc. of London, Ontario in July 2011. Scisense produces advanced products for assessing cardiac-pressure volume and blood pressure.

The deal allowed the companies to offer complete cardiovascular solutions by providing products to measure blood flow and pressure, according to the firms.

Transonic CEO and Chief Technology Officer Cornelis Drost founded the company in 1983. It’s based on work he was involved with originally at Cornell University. Drost was the main researcher on a project at Cornell to adapt what became some of Transonic’s core technology for medical use.

Tompkins County Area Development (TCAD) facilitated the Transonic expansion project with the town of Lansing, the village of Lansing, businesses in the Warren Road Business & Technology Park, Tompkins County Planning, and Cornell University Real Estate. It took more than three years of effort to launch the expansion.

Empire State Development awarded a $400,000 grant to construct a new municipal sewer line along Warren Road that made the project possible. The line serves seven businesses in the area that employ more than 300 people.