Columbus Region Economy is in a Time of Transformation, Even Beyond the Intel Development

At the groundbreaking for Intel’s new microchip factories in New Albany, leaders at the state and national level, from Gov. Mike DeWine to President Joe Biden, praised the project and the positive effects it would have on Ohio’s economy and workforce.

Biden called it a “field of dreams where America’s future will be built.” DeWine said, “We celebrate a great victory for Ohio, but an even greater victory for our country.” U.S. Sens. Rob Portman and Sherrod Brown—who are often on opposite sides politically—both applauded Intel’s choice of Ohio.

But it was Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger who had the most memorable soundbite. “The Rust Belt is dead and the Silicon Heartland begins,” he told the crowd at the Sept. 9 event.

Since announcing in January 2022 that Licking County would be the home of two semiconductor plants, Intel has been the talk of the town, and rightly so. The company is investing $20 billion in the project, and the plants will employ 3,000 workers, plus 7,000 construction workers who will build them.

But Intel isn’t the only company making waves in the region.

In 2021, Zenni Optical Inc. opened a manufacturing facility in Obetz—its second overall and first in the U.S. The same year, Jacob Block founded American Nitrile, a personal protective equipment manufacturer, in Grove City. Chicago-based Invenergy plans to build a solar panel production plant in Pataskala that will employ 850 people. On the international front, the French company Forsee Power chose Hilliard for its North American headquarters. And the New Albany International Business Park, where Intel will be based, is attracting a burgeoning cluster of life sciences businesses. Biologic medicine manufacturer Amgen Inc., AmplifyBio (a Battelle spinoff) and vitamin manufacturer Pharmavite all have sites under development.

Then there are game-changing projects from regional heavy hitters like Honda, which is creating a new $700 million electric vehicles hub, and Ohio State University, which recently opened the first building at Carmenton, its 270-acre research and innovation district.

All of these developments play an important part in Ohio’s ongoing economic transition and are helping to make the state a leader in manufacturing, technology and life sciences. As Kenny McDonald, president and CEO of The Columbus Partnership, explains, this transition from Rust Belt to Silicon Heartland was an “aggressive, intentional effort” to diversify the state’s economy.

McDonald says economic development organization One Columbus has three strategies for creating jobs and attracting new investments: providing existing companies with the resources they need to succeed; going after “the best companies in the world” and bringing them to Ohio; and connecting entrepreneurs to venture capital partners in the region.

“The world is a vast and changing place, and it’s changing very, very rapidly,” McDonald says. “And it’s never been more important to have a diverse economy and a strategy to bring new employers, job creators and investors to the market.”

Ohio’s economy has been on a steady rise for several years, but McDonald points to Columbus’ 2017 bid to be the home of Amazon’s second headquarters as a turning point. Out of more than 200 cities that applied for the opportunity, Columbus made it to a list of 20 finalists. And although the city wasn’t chosen—HQ2 ultimately landed in Arlington, Virginia—McDonald says the process was a chance to sell a large audience on Columbus.

“It was a national exercise that forced us to make a very, very clear case for why someone would invest a massive amount and bring those kinds of jobs to our community,” he says.

Zenni Invests “Heavily” in Columbus

When the founders of Novato, California-based Zenni Optical realized 66 percent of the company’s customers live in the eastern two-thirds of the United States, they decided to open a second, more proximate distribution center. At the time, the eyewear retailer’s distribution was handled at its headquarters, and products were manufactured in China. When competitors began offering 24-hour turnaround services, Zenni decided to open a finishing lab, as well. After looking at several cities, including Dallas and Louisville, Kentucky, Zenni chose Obetz for its new manufacturing/shipping center and finishing lab, which opened in 2021. A full-service lab opened in April.

Rob Tate, Zenni’s director of U.S. manufacturing, says the company chose Central Ohio because “this area is very rich with optical-experienced people,” referring to “optical village,” an unofficial swath of land in the Groveport-Obetz area that is home to companies including VSP Optics, Walmart Optical, Restoring Vision and EssilorLuxottica.

Zenni’s Obetz facility currently employs 77 people, and Tate expects to add 70 more by year’s end. Because Zenni’s largest cost is labor, Tate says they’ve invested heavily in automation to reduce the overall number of full-time employees needed and prioritize certain types of jobs. “It allows us to focus on hiring the more skilled labor that we need in the facility, versus paying 25 people just to push carts around the facility,” Tate explains. “That affords me the opportunity to pay more per person for the skilled positions in our industry.”

High labor costs and a competitive market aside, Tate says the benefits of reshoring outweigh the challenges. The Obetz facility offers a fast-frame service, which includes expedited manufacturing and shipping. This allows customers to receive their eyewear in three to five days versus 14 to 21 for standard orders manufactured in China.

Currently, the company manufactures 2,000 to 4,000 pairs of glasses per day in Obetz but expects that to increase to 14,000 pairs by the fourth quarter. “By the end of this year, we’ll have the capacity to be the largest ophthalmic lens manufacturing facility in North America,” Tate says. “So we’re investing heavily in the Columbus area. The performance of the facility, be it small right now compared to our larger manufacturing facility in China, we’re hitting all of our key metrics.”

Local Manufacturing

American Nitrile is also investing in the Columbus region. Founded by Bexley native Jacob Block, the company manufactures disposable gloves for the health care, food service and automotive and manufacturing industries. The idea for the business was born during the COVID-19 pandemic, when Block realized two things: The United States imports nearly 100 percent of its PPE from Asia, and the largest market for nitrile gloves is in the U.S.

“We felt that the time to bring back this manufacturing, given where automation is, is now,” Block says. “The mission is to build and manufacture the highest-quality nitrile glove in the world, and do it as the most sustainable manufacturer of the product, as well.”

When American Nitrile began looking at potential sites, Block says, he initially considered Central Ohio because he’s from the region. But soon, the benefits of launching here became clear. He cites the incentives and funding offered by JobsOhio, the state’s private economic development corporation, as a major asset, as well as the affordability of natural gas and water. “​​If you look around the country, I’ve never seen a coordinated effort like Columbus has put together and executed, I think, really tactically,” Block says. American Nitrile received a $500,000 grant from JobsOhio for training and recruiting, which allowed the company to hire a recruiter to staff up the operation.

As with Zenni Optical, automation is essential to American Nitrile’s reshoring efforts, especially if it wants to compete with manufacturers in Asia. Advances in technology make those efforts easier, Block says. “I think, prior to the past several years, even decades, if you wanted to compete with Asia, you really had to build automation in house,” he says. “Where now, there’s a lot of robotics and AI off the shelf.

“Now if you’re building a company, you have resources where you don’t have to invest substantial capital to get automation in the facility. … If you can make the product for as good or better quality at near parity in the United States, you’re going to have a really compelling message or product that you’re selling into the market, and that’s been the experience for us.”

Once it reaches full scale, American Nitrile’s 530,000-square-foot facility will be capable of producing around 3.5 billion gloves a year. Once that happens, Block says the average annual salary for employees will be north of $60,000.

“I think there’s a tremendous opportunity to scale up nitrile. We’ve got a laundry list of items that we’ve identified that are mainly manufactured in Asia, and the market is in the United States,” he says. “We hope that not only for ourselves, but for others, we’re building a blueprint to bring back manufacturing profitably and sustainably to the United States.”

Collaboration at Carmenton

As the Columbus region strives to attract new companies and diversify its business base, it’s essential to create an innovation hub that fosters and supports new ideas and talent. One such initiative is Carmenton, Ohio State’s new innovation district. Located on the west side of campus, the 270-acre space aims to foster collaboration between academia and the public and private sectors.

Peter Mohler, Carmenton’s interim executive vice president for research, innovation and knowledge, says the goal is to create an ecosystem that brings together all the partners invested in Ohio’s growth, from Ohio State to Nationwide Children’s Hospital to One Columbus.

“Having this sit at the interface between industry and academia, I think, gives us a leg up in being able to move faster,” Mohler says. “If we’re getting into areas like batteries, semiconductors, innovation in the life sciences around cell and gene therapy—the first to market is going to win. … Having these teams working together is going to allow this to move much more efficiently.”

Carmenton’s first building, the Pelotonia Research Center, opened in May. It’s part of a strategy to expand the region’s portfolio in the life sciences and biotech area, Mohler says. The center will focus on areas including cancer, gene- and cell-based therapies, cardiovascular and pulmonary medicine, and neurological disease. Two more Carmenton buildings will open this year: the Energy Advancement and Innovation Center, specializing in renewable energy and sustainability, and The James Outpatient Care for cancer patients.

Looking ahead, Mohler stresses the ongoing importance of collaboration. “I don’t know that people understand how tight these relationships are between the leaders across Columbus and the Central Ohio region, and how fortunate we really are to be able to have everybody paddling in the right direction at the same cadence and how well that’s going to serve us over the next few years,” he says.

That type of collaboration—involving all levels of government, economic development organizations and the private sector—is key to Ohio’s future. It keeps the economic machine moving and growing, and The Partnership’s McDonald says that momentum is vital to the state’s success.

“As hard as it is to meet the demand that we have in infrastructure and workforce and housing and official transit needs, those are all welcome challenges. We’re happy warriors in that fight to make all that work,” McDonald says. “Because we know the other side of the coin is just much, much, much harder, when you don’t have growth. … We’re excited to come here every day and really start chipping away at this, and honestly, I have a lot of confidence in us achieving all of this.”

Brittany Moseley is a freelance writer.

This story is part of the Columbus Partnership feature package in the Summer 2023 issue of Columbus CEO.