Buffalo can expect to see 133 new jobs as a result of M&T Bank Corp.’s $351 million stock purchase of Delaware-based Wilmington Trust Corp., reports Jonathan D. Epstein of the Buffalo News:
Chairman and CEO Robert G. Wilmers said in an interview that M&T will create the new jobs in information technology, operations, finance, credit and customer service functions. That’s on top of the 5,000 jobs M&T already has in Western New York, up by 1,800 positions since 2000, he said. Wilmers said he couldn’t say for certain how many of the jobs are new to the company as opposed to being shifted from Delaware. The bank in February said it would cut 700 of Wilmington Trust’s 2,800 jobs as part of the merger.
Also from the Buffalo News, Matt Glynn reports that Niagara Transformer Corp.’s $8 million expansion plans will add 14 jobs over the next two years:
The Erie County Industrial Development Agency board Monday approved $1.44 million in property, sales and mortgage recording tax incentives to support the Cheektowaga company’s project. Niagara Transformer plans to build a 24,000-square-foot addition to allow for the production of transformers that are larger in scale and higher in voltage than is possible in its current facility, said Karen Fiala, ECIDA assistant treasurer. The company will outfit the expansion with two 75-ton cranes.
Open for Business
After nine months of construction and a $12 million price tag, Hill & Markes’ new Mohawk Valley distribution center is up and running in the Town of Florida, N.Y.
The wholesaler provides food service, janitorial, and office supplies. Eric Anderson of the Albany Times Union reports that the 130,000 square-foot facility was designed to be energy efficient:
The more-than-century-old Hill & Markes decided it would pursue leading-edge technologies, from rapid-charge batteries on its forklift trucks to computerized tracking systems that keep tabs on every item, when it moved from its old Amsterdam plant to the new building south of the city, Packer said.
Giant hunk of nickel heads to Louisiana
An enormous piece of nickel is headed from Western New York to Louisiana this week. Weighing 104,000 pounds and worth approximately $2.5 million, the steam chest is one of the largest ever produced by the Tonawanda based manufacturing firm, Schwabel Fabricating Co.
On Monday, the chest began a 1,300 mile journey to a Georgia Gulf Corp. plant along the Mississippi River. Jonathan D. Epstein reports at the Buffalo News that this shows Western New York companies are still building some really big stuff:
What makes the chest unusual is its size and the dominance of nickel. The company used 2,000 tubes of nickel in the making of the chest, which would have cost more than $2 million if Georgia Gulf hadn’t supplied the metal. The steam chest — 13 feet in diameter and just under 20 feet long—will be used in the third phase of a four-step process to concentrate sodium hydroxide by condensing water from it.
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