2. GFMEDC sales tax resolution - Laserfiche WebLink

Part II: Growth Sectors The same economic experts that projected the challenges above also predict that technology-based industries will create the majority of high-paying jobs in the U.S. for the foreseeable future. There are a number of potential sectors to pursue, and the GFMEDC examined seven potential industries by performing a flow-chart analysis that asked the following questions: .:. Is this target industry growing and creating new jobs in the U.S. economy? .:. Does this target industry pay high wages relative to the average? .:. Is Fargo Moorhead a competitive place to conduct business in this target industry? If not, can we become competitive? The three target industries that answered "yes" to these qualifications were information technology (IT), life sciences and physical sciences. All are technology industries. Fargo Moorhead has a small base of companies in technology, but in general has not had much success in this area. In most categories that technology companies consider when selecting locations, Fargo Moorhead does not compare favorably to other MSAs in the U.S. Our traditional model of site selection has been focused on the primary sectors mentioned above - manufacturing, agriculture, and back office, for example - and is cost-driven. Site selection for technology companies in IT, life sciences and physical sciences are not driven by cost. These companies are driven by access to nationally-renowned core knowledge infrastructure and talent, research institutions, and an entrepreneurial and innovative environment. Through our research we have also learned that communities successful in technology-led economic development have made focused investments in specialized technologies rather than whole industry sectors. In other words, rather than focusing on life sciences in general, they have focused on a particular specialty within the life sciences, such as pharmaceuticals or stem cell research. Within the three target industries, teams comprised of members from the Tri- College University educational institutions (North Dakota State University, Minnesota State University Moorhead, and Concordia College), local industry leaders, and public sector individuals (for a list of participants, see Appendix A) met to discuss specialized, or target, technologies. Based on the capabilities and interest of the universities and local industry, the teams settled on three target technologies within the broader target industries: embedded systems, vaccine development and biomedical device technologies. 6