US Airways Magazine - City of Syracuse
US Airways Magazine - City of Syracuse
US Airways Magazine - City of Syracuse
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PROFILE<br />
<strong>Syracuse</strong><br />
A nurturing environment: Start-up<br />
firms find homes at the <strong>Syracuse</strong><br />
Technology Garden, a business<br />
incubator.<br />
usairwaysmag.com September 2007<br />
172<br />
The Warehouse, new home <strong>of</strong> <strong>Syracuse</strong> University’s<br />
School <strong>of</strong> Architecture; entrepreneur Joseph Kummer<br />
(below, right), president <strong>of</strong> Propulsive Wing, with his<br />
mentor, J.B. Allred <strong>of</strong> Allred and Associates<br />
usairwaysmag.com September 2007<br />
173<br />
Fertile Ground<br />
for New Growth<br />
The city, business community, and academic institutions are working<br />
together to help entrepreneurs and innovators take root and grow here.<br />
by Virginia Citrano<br />
For years, large companies such as air conditioner maker Carrier Corporation<br />
defined the business climate in <strong>Syracuse</strong>. Now a new breeze is blowing,<br />
ushering in entrepreneurs like CollabWorx, which could turn the<br />
climate-control business on its head.<br />
CollabWorx’s principal business is collaboration and communication s<strong>of</strong>tware.<br />
But the company has also applied its tech skills to program an indoor climatecontrol<br />
system that could let workers manage the environment in their cubicles,<br />
from their cubicles. The <strong>Syracuse</strong> Center <strong>of</strong> Excellence in Environmental and<br />
Energy Systems, a partnership <strong>of</strong> business and academia for environmental<br />
technology, gave CollabWorx $350,000 to develop a three-cubicle prototype <strong>of</strong><br />
the technology, which will soon get a real-world test. The <strong>Syracuse</strong> Technology<br />
Garden, a high-tech business incubator, put a ro<strong>of</strong> over its head.<br />
Why is <strong>Syracuse</strong> working so hard to help entrepreneurs grow here? The city is<br />
hoping for a bountiful harvest <strong>of</strong> sustainable jobs down the road, jobs that draw<br />
on its skills <strong>of</strong> the past, such as engineering,<br />
and its ideas about the future,<br />
such as environmental responsibility.<br />
Entrepreneurs aren’t yet carrying<br />
the weight <strong>of</strong> the city’s job rolls on<br />
their shoulders. <strong>Syracuse</strong>’s largest employers<br />
are <strong>Syracuse</strong> University and the<br />
State University <strong>of</strong> New York Upstate<br />
Medical University, which together account<br />
for more than 10,000 <strong>of</strong> the city’s<br />
jobs. And though Carrier no longer<br />
makes its air conditioners in <strong>Syracuse</strong>,<br />
it has retained its research and development<br />
efforts here and is sponsoring
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