High Tech Comes to the Coalfields
Visionary Thinking in the 1990s Has Led the Southwest Corner of Virginia Successfully Into the Economy of the Information Age
CGI, Russell County
The year 2006 marked a turning point for the town of Lebanon, for Russell County, and for the Southwest corner of Virginia: CGI, a Canadian company with a strong presence in tech-heavy Northern Virginia, located its first U.S. onshore delivery center in Lebanon. Within its first 10 years, CGI’s Southwest Virginia Information Technology Center of Excellence had created more than 400 jobs and generated $68.5 million in annual economic impact. In the same year, Northrop Grumman announced the opening of its Southwest Enterprise Solutions Center, also in Lebanon.
The long-game plan that brought CGI to the region goes back at least a couple of decades before the company’s arrival. That plan began with a loose confederation of regional visionaries in the 1990s. The effort, a vision to attract technology companies, was led by local economic development organizations, the regional economic development group, the Virginia Coalfield Economic Development Authority (VCEDA), and the area’s higher education institutions. The region’s leaders saw an opportunity to replace coal mining jobs with high-tech jobs, an acceptable trade in a region that would take an economic hit with coal’s decline.
On the occasion of CGI’s 10th anniversary, Tim Hurlebus, President of CGI Federal, said: “Nowhere has the cooperation between leaders and the IT sector been more successful than in the cause of bringing our Center of Excellence to Southwest Virginia. The coalition responsible for making CGI’s Lebanon facility a reality serves as a model for what communities can do when they share a commitment to innovation and economic growth.”
Finding a workforce was the first big obstacle to attracting technology companies. Training programs were established at the University of Virginia’s College at Wise and at Mountain Empire Community College in Big Stone Gap, which have been at the center of workforce development efforts for years. A six-month, fast-track program developed to provide a ready workforce for CGI led the way. Today, UVa-Wise has the only undergraduate software engineering program in the Commonwealth. Its comprehensive curriculum offers bachelor’s degrees in computer science, math, software engineering, and management information systems.
Southwest Virginia is a region of mountains, rolling hills, and wide-open valleys, and for many, that is a major attraction. The environment is among Virginia’s most lavish, offering a wealth of outdoor activities. The area is surrounded by an abundance of scenic natural beauty, and residents and visitors enjoy hiking and picnicking at Jefferson National Forest and Breaks Interstate Park, referred to as the “Grand Canyon of the South.” Two of the nation’s best historical driving trails go through the region: The Crooked Road: Virginia’s Heritage Music Trail and The Wilderness Road: Virginia’s Heritage Migration Route.
Birch Knob, Dickenson County
The region’s highway system and broadband infrastructure enhance accessibility and add to its appeal as a quality business location. Bordering Kentucky, West Virginia, and Tennessee, Southwest Virginia has the advantage of a regional multi-state workforce and offers proximity to the Johnson City-Kingsport-Bristol, TN-VA Combined Statistical Area, with a population of nearly 500,000 that provides a wide labor draw for local employers.
VCEDA has branded this region of Southwest Virginia as the e-Region, one of the East Coast’s new centers for electronic information technology, energy, education, and emerging specialty manufacturing that is strategically located at the geographical center of commerce in the eastern U.S.
SYKES Enterprises, Wise
The e-Region’s focus on technology has had ripple effects throughout the Southwest Virginia economy. Notable employers include SYKES Enterprises, which employs 750 in Wise, concentrating on back-office operations, a skill heavily linked to technology. “A lot of the success we’ve had over the last six years at our facility in Wise is due to the graduates of UVa-Wise,” said Todd McReynolds, operations manager for the SYKES facility, upon signing an agreement with the University in 2007 to create student internships and job opportunities for graduates. That strategic partnership continues today.
Recent success has been found in the data center sector, including the OnePartner Advanced Technology & Applications Center (ATAC) in Duffield in Scott County. The Center was the nation’s first commercial data center to achieve Tier III certification by the Uptime Institute. According to OnePartner, since opening the doors, the Center has not had one single outage.
In 2017, DP Facilities opened its 65,000-square-foot Mineral Gap data center in Wise County, referred to by the company as “The Safest Place on Earth,” a $65 million project employing 40 people. Future development of the campus will accommodate more than 200,000 square feet of data center space and administrative support buildings.
DP Facilities, Mineral Gap Data Center
The technology concentration in the region continues to show that Southwest Virginia’s coal fields have room for the 21st century’s dependence on information as a source of jobs and economic development.
