Edwards Vacuum Co. on Tuesday hosted government leaders at the proposed site of its newest facility at the Genesee County Science, Technology and Advanced Manufacturing Park for a groundbreaking ceremony on the construction project that began in April.
Edwards’ parent company, Atlas Copco Group, said it expects to start production by the end of next year and will hire 280 new employees as part of the first phase.
“Today we are not just breaking new ground – we are building the future,” said Geert Forens, president of the Atlas Copco Group’s Vacuum Technologies business unit.
U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said he personally called the company after the passage of the CHIPS/Science Act to ask it to build the nation’s first dry pump factory in upstate New York. Edwards is taking advantage of investment tax credits created by the act, as well as federal incentives also created to spur research, development, manufacturing and job creation in the burgeoning semiconductor industry.
“I knew that the Genesee Valley could compete with Silicon Valley because of the great workforce we have here, the cheap water, the good electricity and the great local government,” Schumer said.
The technology Edwards produces is critical to semiconductor manufacturing, and the company expects large manufacturing companies such as Micron in central New York and GlobalFoundries in the Capital Region to become its customers.
“There are a lot of different gases and stuff that go into making chips, and to keep the rooms perfectly clean, you have to remove those gases, and vacuum technology does that,” Schumer said.
“These are our customers and obviously this facility wouldn’t make sense without the growth of the U.S.-based manufacturing market,” said Kent Stobart, vice president of operations for Edwards’ vacuum semiconductor division.
Last year, the federal government designated the I-90 corridor between Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse as one of 12 federal technology hubs, and Governor Schumer announced last month that he would spend $40 million to implement a plan to make the area a national semiconductor leader.
“In 10 years, 255 percent of semiconductors made in America will be made within a few miles of this great I-90 corridor,” Schumer said.
Edwards said that by the time all phases of the Genesee County project are complete, approximately $320 million will be invested in the construction of the facility, creating more than 600 new jobs in addition to hundreds of construction-related jobs and featuring the most sophisticated, state-of-the-art equipment in the industry.
Edwards said the new plant will be emission-free and all-electric, with most of its power generated by hydroelectricity. The company is working with Monroe Community College, Erie Community College and Buffalo’s Northland Workforce Training Center to train future employees.
The facility will eventually have the capacity to produce 20,000 dry pumps per year, according to the company.
