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Central Florida, Space Coast Business Briefs - Aug. 2009
BREVARD COUNTY —
» Technology company Modus Operandi, which has offices in Melbourne as well as Maryland and New Jersey, is working with Lockheed Martin to compete for a U.S. Army contract worth as much as $777 million for communications, reconnaissance and command and control support.
» Harris Corp. (NYSE-HRS) has cut more than 100 jobs from its 7,000-strong workforce in Melbourne and Palm Bay. The company says it also plans to take charges of $352 million in its fourth quarter because of the recession.
» NASA and Florida Power & Light have partnered to bring a solar photovoltaic power facility to Kennedy Space Center. The Space Coast Next Generation Solar Energy Center will produce enough clean, emissions-free power to serve about 1,100 homes, and a separate smaller facility will provide power for KSC.
LAKE COUNTY —
» Headquarter Honda under construction in Clermont with a target opening date of early 2010, is set to become the first auto dealership in the Southeast with a LEED Platinum designation. The facility is expected to create as many as 60 jobs and eventually add up to 50 more.
» Center Lake Properties is developing Black East, a 114-lot subdivision near Clermont adjacent to Bella Collina, a planned upscale golf community.
ORLANDO —
» Delta Air Lines subsidiary Comair, based near Cincinnati, is closing its maintenance facility at Orlando International Airport next month, cutting 81 local jobs, citing tough economic times.
» Walt Disney Co., parent of Walt Disney World, has purchased property along the Potomac River in Washington, D.C., reportedly to open a resort. The company is building another resort in Oahu, Hawaii, its first not tied to the company’s Florida and California theme parks.
» Orlando tourism hit its second-highest number on record in 2008, with 48.9 million visitors, compared with the record of 49.3 million set in 2005. Foreign travelers, whose numbers increased 18.9% last year, helped set the pace, officials with the Orlando/Orange County Convention & Visitors Bureau say.
» CNL Lifestyle Properties is developing a CoCo Key Water Resort, one of 10 nationally, on International Drive on the site of a hotel that had been a Hilton and a Ramada.
» E. Lance McCarthy resigned as head of the Metropolitan Orlando Urban League in May to return to Los Angeles, citing personal and professional reasons and saying he planned to return to the Black Sports Agents Association, where he previously served as vice president, the Orlando Sentinel reported.
» With a $400,000 grant from the National Institutes of Health, University of Central Florida professor Mubarak Shah is studying ways to use magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI scans, to measure the potential threat of brain tumors.
» UCF’s Center for Emerging Media in downtown Orlando used high-tech body sensors to work on the choreography for a new “Hannah Montana: The Movie” video game for local company n-Space and Disney Interactive Studios. Students at the university’s motion-capture facilities have also worked with sports stars Tiger Woods, Derek Jeter and Roger Federer to produce advertising videos for Gillette.
» The Professional Culinary Institute in downtown Orlando has announced it’s closing. It opened earlier this year.
OSCEOLA COUNTY —
» St. Cloud-based boat parts maker Mercury EPM plans to rehire 30 laid-off workers and create a dozen or more jobs this year.
WINTER PARK —
» Digital media company Fiction has started a $2.5-million project to renovate a 45-year-old facility on West Welbourne Avenue in the downtown district to use as its headquarters.
