Columbus : Buzz

When Columbus Area Technician School opened with 67 students in the basement of Central High School in 1963, no one had any idea what it would become because it was an experiment.

With 25,000 students today, the school, now known as Columbus State Community College, will celebrate its 50th birthday at the end of this month. It is the front door to a college education for more central Ohioans than any other local school, officials say.

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The digital design and marketing company, Dynamit Technologies LLC, has added six of the 30 new jobs it pledged over three years in an income tax incentive deal the city of Columbus approved this spring.

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Get a list of the projects approved here.

G-Tekt North America Corp. has chosen a site in Dublin for a proposed research-and-development facility it's pairing with a new manufacturing plant going up in West Jefferson. It's expected to lead to 77 new jobs in the city by the end of next year.

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America's Natural Gas Alliance will host the "Think About Energy Summit" at the Columbus Convention Center on September 16-17. This free event will feature national and local experts discussing how natural gas is changing our nation’s energy landscape.

Register and get all the details here.

On Tuesday, Sept. 17 from 5:30 to 8 p.m. at the Fawcett Center, 2400 Olentangy River Road in Columbus, the Project Management Institute Central Ohio Chapter (PMICOC) will host a job fair.

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On Thursday, Aug. 29 from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. at the Hocking Job Services Center, 389 W. Front Street in Logan, Ohio Means Jobs will offer a free workshop designed to help attendees write a powerful and effective resume and create an account on OhioMeansJobs.com.

Click here to register and get more details.

Honda Motor Co. is upping its recent Ohio investments by another $215 million.

The automaker recently announced another round of upgrades and new construction at facilities in the state, including the addition of new powertrain technology and a technical training center at the Anna Engine Plant and a new 160,000-square-foot building in Marysville that will be home to new office space for Honda North America Services LLC, a new entity housing some jobs and functions relocating from California. It will have about 500 employees, Honda said.

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A pair of tax incentive deals could lead to nearly 50 new jobs in Dublin at Decillion Healthcare LLC and ProspeX LLC.
The proposed deals went before Dublin City Council on Monday evening for a first reading, putting them on track to be voted on Aug. 26.

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Columbus has begun offering free classes to small-business owners and their employees as part of an effort to help bolster work-force development in the city. Columbus City Council earmarked $10,000 for the pilot program this spring.

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Venture capital investing in Ohio was up in the second quarter, even as numbers dipped nationally, according to a new report.

Nationally, $6.7 billion went to 913 deals. That’s down from $7.3 billion and 970 deals in the same quarter a year ago, according to the PwC/NVCA MoneyTree Report, which is based on data from Thomson Reuters. In Ohio, 20 deals accounted for $94 million of investment, up from 17 deals and $52 million a year earlier.

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As if launching a new product line and re-trademarking the phrase “The ball don’t lie!” weren’t enough, InfoMotion Sports Technologies Inc. has closed a $3.5 Series A investment round, all from individuals.

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The market for buying and selling small businesses in Columbus picked up during the second quarter, with the value of companies changing hands also increasing, says a new report from BizBuySell.com.

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Privately held real estate investment firms Hackman Capital Partners, LLC, of Los Angeles announced today the successful acquisition of a 28-building industrial real estate portfolio totaling 2,593,602 square feet. The transaction closed for the multi-tenant Ohio buildings on Friday, June 14.

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