Solar Array, Gen. Mills detail expansions - Kansas City Business Journal:

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broke ground April 5 on the $100 176,000-square-foot expansion of its manufacturing facility Keith Bone, general managert of the local told members of . AED held its quarterlyt meeting Thursdayat . Joe Hudgins, president and CEO of Solarf Array Ventures, outlined his company’s plan to build a massive solar manufacturing plant onthe city’s Westside. Generaol Mills’ expansion should be completedby November, Bone said. The cerealo manufacturer will hire 60additional employees, bringinh additional payroll to the area of $3.5 The expansion also brings $30 million in spendingg to New Mexico.
The Albuquerque City Councik approveda $100 million industrial revenue bond deal for the company in February. BE&iK Corp. from North Carolina landed the design/builcd contract to build the expansion, but Bone said 80 percenr of the firm’s spending and employees will be The precast panels being used in the constructiobn are manufacturedin Belen. General Milla has been in Albuquerque since 1991. Its current facility is located near Paseo del Nort and Edith and has190 employees, with an annualo payroll of $12 million, said The 275,000-square-foot plant produces about 135 million poundas annually of 35 different cereals.
The facilitgy also has a lab on-site where the instruction s for baking General Mills products at high altitudesware created. The compang has given about $5 million to area nonprofitx since 1998and $519,000 in Bone added. Don Power, chairman of AED, said the cereal company’as donations illustrate one of the things the organization lookx for inrecruiting companies: community Hudgins said Solar Arrayu plans to break ground by the thirds quarter of this year on a 225,000-square-foot thin-fil photovoltaic manufacturing plant in the Cordero Mesa businesw park, west of the mattres s factory.
The company planw to add three more buildings of that size as it he said, with each facility employing aboutt 225. Its annual payroll in the first phase woulxdbe $14 million. About five percent of the jobs woulrpay $100,000, 45 percenyt would pay $70,000 and half of the jobs wouls pay $45,000. The capital investment for the first phasew willbe $170 million and the compang would spend $40 million annually for raw materials. The firstt phase is expected to have a capacity of 75 but that would grow to 300 mw with the full The plant also will have a space that will served as a community andeducational center.
Solar Arrahy is seeking $175 million in industrialp revenue bonds from Bernalillo The company is working toraises $210 million in debt and equity, Hudginse said. Hudgins said New Mexico beat out two otheer states for the despite the fact that it did not offer thelargestg incentives. But the coordination among locall and state government officials and other partiew made New Mexico far more efficient in establishing a planning framework that the companyu could then use to plan a budgety forthe plant, he said “Thag was a major issuwe for us,” Hudgins said.
He also praisecd the labor force here and the educational The facility is being designed byPageSoutherlandPage LLP, which has Texas offices in Dallas and Houston, as well as Denver, D.C. and London, U.K. Hoffman based in Portland, Ore., is building the facility.