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Recent Articles from Sandy John
New dockworker strike threat looms for Port of Virginia
Shippers in Hampton Roads are bracing for a renewed dockworker strike in mid-January after contract negotiations between the International Longshoremen’s Association and the United States Maritime Alliance stalled in November. More than 45,000 dockworkers walked off their jobs for three days starting Oct. 1 at ports from Maine through Texas, including at the Port of […]
George Mason’s Fuse tech hub opens to public
On the third floor of George Mason University’s new state-of-the-art Fuse tech hub, robots jumped, begged, rolled over and offered a mechanical paw to shake Friday while a small drone hovered above. The endearing welcome by George Mason’s RobotiXX Lab robots offered a brief glimpse into the future for the group of academics and students […]
100 People to Meet in 2025
In our sixth annual list of 100 Virginians you’ll want to meet in the new year, you’ll encounter interesting people of many ages and occupations — from a doctor in his 80s who built the Chesapeake Care Clinic to a 10-year-old CEO who started his own popcorn business and whose parents are his employees. In […]
Mind the gap
Margaret Abrams was studying engineering at Liberty University when she came across an online job advertisement from Newport News-based Huntington Ingalls Industries. HII, Virginia’s largest industrial employer, was offering a $2,500 signing bonus to job candidates who successfully completed a 16-week computer numerical control training at the Navy’s Advanced Training in Defense Manufacturing [...]
Amazon, Dominion agree to explore nuclear development
With power consumption by data centers and AI projected to more than quadruple in Virginia in the next 15 years, Amazon.com and Dominion Energy Virginia have entered into an agreement to explore potential development of small modular nuclear reactors at North Anna Power Station in Louisa County, the two companies announced during an Oct. 16 […]
Energy storage projects slated for Greensville, Pittsylvania
Two energy storage projects proposed for Southern Virginia would help augment the area’s power capacity, diversify the region’s tax base and boost the regional economy, industry representatives say. Dominion Energy Virginia wants to build a liquified natural gas storage facility on more than 20 acres that the Richmond-based Fortune 500 utility owns next to its […]
As data centers grow, Amazon and Dominion explore small nuclear reactors
With power consumption by data centers and AI projected to more than quadruple in Virginia in the next 15 years, Amazon.com and Dominion Energy Virginia have entered into an agreement to explore potential development of small modular nuclear reactors at North Anna Power Plant in Louisa County, the two companies announced at an event Wednesday […]
A smart defense
In late 2020, the Air Force made headlines when it announced that an artificial intelligence co-pilot, named ARTUµ, helped command and control a U.S. military spy plane for the first time in history. If the name, pronounced R-2, sounds familiar, it is. Think R2-D2, or “Artoo,” Luke Skywalker’s lovable droid and X-Wing copilot from the […]
Dropping anchor
LS GreenLink USA spent two years on site selection, scouring much of the East Coast for the right location to build a 750,000-square-foot factory to manufacture subsea cables for offshore wind farms. Then it landed on Chesapeake. Patrick Shim, LS GreenLink’s managing director, cited several reasons for the company’s decision: access to the Port of […]
Growth spurts
Virginia Beach-based law firm Melone Hatley hired its first employee in spring 2021. Three years later, it now has a staff of 50 people and could reach as many as 60 by the end of this year, says Rebecca Melone, the firm’s managing partner. That growth is part of a strategy that Melone and her […]
CAV Angels hits $20 million+ milestone
When Greg and Marion Werkheiser connected with CAV Angels during their search for seed investors for their augmented reality software startup in 2018, the couple reaped benefits beyond an initial $300,000 infusion. “The investment itself gave us credibility to other investors,” says ARtGlass CEO Greg Werkheiser, a 2000 graduate of the University of Virginia School […]
Inn at Little Washington plans five-star upgrades
After more than 40 years of growing his three-Michelin-star restaurant, Inn at Little Washington chef and owner Patrick O’Connell is nearing his wish of offering guests “all the amenities of great hotels in Europe with the warmth of visiting a private home.” Expansion plans include adding a reception building, two new buildings with 10 guest […]
King George exploring second industrial park
King George County officials are negotiating with two landowners where the county wants to build a new industrial and technology park as it looks for a spot to lure more businesses. The existing 149-acre King George County Industrial Park is full, and there’s nothing to offer economic development prospects there. During the past two years, […]
Love at first site
Home to eight Fortune 500 companies and three Fortune 1000 companies, metro Richmond is “punching above our weight” for a region of 1.3 million residents, says Jennifer Wakefield, president and CEO of the Greater Richmond Partnership. For the third year in a row, the Richmond region was named by Business Facilities magazine as a top […]
Revivicor’s $100 million pig-organ facility moves forward
By early next year, Blacksburg-based Revivicor will be raising genetically modified pigs in Montgomery County, with plans to harvest their hearts and kidneys for xenotransplantation into human patients. Founded in 2003 as a spinoff company of PPL Therapeutics (the company that cloned Dolly the sheep seven years earlier), Revivicor provided the genetically modified pig heart […]
Son’s cancer fight inspires startup
The sight of Neal Piper’s then-3-year-old son, Noah, stuck on the couch all day, tethered to an IV pole with a feeding tube after the boy’s cancer diagnosis in 2019 put his father on a new mission. Piper, who had 15 years of experience in commercializing health care products, including 10 years in sales, marketing […]
Bedford firing up tech training
After Winoa USA closed its Bedford steel abrasives plant in 2020, town economic officials came up with the idea of renovating the empty facility into a regional technical training center for the metalworking industry that could include a commercial foundry. In August, the Bedford Economic Development Authority expects to be closer to that goal, with […]
U.Va. biolab seeks to catalyze region’s growth
Thomas Barker says his seed-stage startup wants to find “modern, modular, functional lab space” to allow the company he co-founded, Vasarya Therapeutics, to be “very efficient and optimal on our research enterprise.” But good lab space is hard to come by in Charlottesville, and what exists is spread around, “so you don’t necessarily get the […]
