US: Bayer CropScience eyes more expansion at RTP
The agribusiness giant currently has 500 employees at its Research Triangle Park campus and another 100 in three locations scattered across the Triangle. It plans to consolidate all of those workers in RTP as well as adding 100 new hires over the next three years, which would swell its RTP workforce to 700, CEO Jim Blome said in an interview.
Meanwhile, a small enclave of employees at another location, in Clayton, will remain in place.
Bayer CropScience is enamored with the access to first-rate scientists and other workers locally and “a great family-friendly environment, great schools ... and the things that make it easier for employees to have a full life,” Blome said.
Bayer CropScience produces seeds and crop-protection products such as insecticides. RTP has long been its North American headquarters, and last year the company also relocated the global headquarters of its seed business from Lyon, France, to RTP.
Last year, Bayer CropScience’s revenue rose 12.4 percent to $10.8 billion.
The company, a subsidiary of German conglomerate Bayer, set the stage for future RTP expansion in December by acquiring 70 acres at the intersection of T.W. Alexander Drive and N.C. 147, north of its existing 57-acre campus.
To accommodate its expansion plans, the company is considering constructing a second high-tech greenhouse and two office buildings at RTP but has made no firm plans, Blome said. That’s on top of a $20 million, 60,000-square-foot greenhouse that opened on its RTP campus last year and a recently completed $16.1 million renovation and expansion of laboratory facilities.
The company also is looking at remodeling the 160,000-square-foot building that houses the bulk of its employees at RTP.
The 6,000-square-foot Bee Care Center, which the company expects to begin operating before the end of the year, will include space for research and 10 beehives with up to 60,000 bees in each hive. It also will have room for graduate students to conduct research as well as meeting and training facilities.
“The public will be invited in to talk about issues surrounding bees and to pique interest and get people to plant bee-friendly crops and flowers,” Blome said.
Research will focus on rooting out what’s behind the alarming decline in the bee population worldwide. Some critics contend certain Bayer pesticides contribute to that problem.
“We don’t have any data that reflects that our pesticides, when used properly according to label, have any effect on bees,” Blome said.
In addition to the bee center in RTP, the company also has 15 hives in Clayton, where it is investing $300,000 to expand the research capabilities there.
Having two different bee research sites, Blome said, “is important in diversifying your data.”
Bayer CropScience is one of several giant agribusinesses that have a major presence in the Triangle. Syngenta, which just completed a $72 million greenhouse in RTP, BASF and Monsanto also have operations here.
“Proximity to our competition is not seen as a negative but rather as a positive,” Blome said. “Building the area as a biotech center for the world is something we’re glad to be a part of.”
Source: www.newsobserver.com