ONE OF THE COUNTRY’S LARGEST CLEAN ENERGY AND TECH INCUBATORS TO CALL SOMERVILLE HOME

SOMERVILLE – An innovative idea incubator
at the forefront of the next-generation industries of clean energy and
clean tech is moving from Boston’s innovation district to the Innovation
City: Somerville.

Greentown
Labs will bring 24 start-up companies that call it home to 28 Dane St.,
along with 92 jobs and plans for expanding to over 140 jobs in the next
five years inside 33,000 square feet of space, a substantial increase
from their current space in Boston’s innovation district.

Gov.
Deval Patrick will join Mayor Joseph A. Curtatone, Secretary of Energy
and Environmental Affairs Richard K. Sullivan, Jr. and Secretary of
Housing and Economic Development Greg Bialecki on Thursday, July 18 on a
tour of Somerville to meet local entrepreneurs, ending with a joint
press event at noon at 28 Dane St. about Somerville’s rise as the
Innovation City and welcoming Greentown Labs to its new home.

The
City of Somerville facilitated Greentown Labs’ move in part through a working capital loan that utilizes Community Development Block
Grant Funds, part of a new initiative by the City to support innovative
business activities and new employment opportunities. The loan contains
requirements for new job creation and that not less than 51 percent of
new job hires go to those who meet moderate- and low-income standards.
Greentown Labs also agrees to use it best efforts to hire Somerville
residents in all available job opportunities.

“People
are figuring out that this isn’t the innovation district or the
innovation center—Somerville is the Innovation City. We are a city that
prides itself on innovation, creativity and originality,” Mayor Joseph
A. Curtatone said. “We have made it a priority as part of our
comprehensive 20-year SomerVision plan to attract and bring in companies
like Greentown Labs. This move is a result of our own Future Economies
Commission, launched to ensure that Somerville is at the forefront of
the next generation of economic opportunities.

“We
are providing the vision, planning, zoning, infrastructure improvements
and business and economic development policy to attract these types of
21st century industries,” Mayor Curtatone continued.
“Greentown Labs coming here to Somerville is an endorsement of all those
efforts and a testament to the economic strength of this community.”

The
Commonwealth of Massachusetts is also contributing to Greentown’s
expansion into Somerville through a $300,000 grant, provided by the
Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, a division of the Commonwealth’s
Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs. In addition,
Rockland Trust Company is also supporting the expansion of Greentown
Labs by providing construction financing.

Greentown
Labs’ mission since its inception in 2011 is to provide low-cost
prototyping space to clean energy and clean tech start-ups. Those firms
range from those in the very early conceptual stage of product
development and prior to receiving venture capital to those that are
already receiving venture capital support and are now moving into the
more advanced stages of product development.

“The
types of jobs we envision for the future are the exact type of jobs
that Greentown Labs offers,” Mayor Curtatone said. “Those job
opportunities, in the type of industries that will fuel part of
Somerville’s renaissance and we will attract here, are industries like
Greentown Labs and what they offer.”

Greentown
Labs is settling in a burgeoning area already home to several
innovative companies that fuel Somerville’s industrial renaissance. The
facility at 28 Dane St. that Greentown Labs will call home formerly
housed the Ames Envelope facility, a legacy industry for almost a
century in Somerville, until 2010 when Ames sold their operations to a
Wisconsin-based firm resulting in the loss of nearly 150 jobs.

Since
then, what has organically grown in the area is a campus of small
start-up industries and enclaves, including the shared spaces of
Artisan’s Asylum, Inc. and Fringe, along with creative start-up
manufacturers like Cuppow and Recovery Green Roofs. It’s not only
happening in this area of Somerville—the City recently welcomed
e-commerce innovator The Grommet to Davis Square. Somerville not only
provides the space needed for these industries to flourish, but the
active, walkable, bikeable and transit-oriented neighborhoods that
attract workers in those industries who want to live near where they
work.

“A building of yesterday will now be housing the ideas of
tomorrow with Greentown Labs’ arrival in Somerville,” Ward 2 Alderman Maryann
Heuston said. “These kind of innovative and cutting-edge industries are part of
the ongoing revitalization of Ward 2 and Union Square. I am proud of the work
already done by the Board of Alderman and the City in cultivating a healthy,
business friendly environment where these 21^st century jobs can take
root and grow in our community, and I am fully committed to Somerville striving
to do even more to become an incubator itself for next-generation industries.
Combined with infrastructure improvements in Union Square, Ward 2’s reputation
as a center for visionary commerce continues to flourish.”

“These
organizations and companies recognize how a concentrated universe of
thought, intelligence, skill and value working together can create the
industries of the future and economic opportunity for Somerville and the
region,” Mayor Curtatone said. “What was created through one industrial
revolution and faded away to another economic transformation has
spurred another new tech revolution here in Somerville. Both current
industries thinking about expansion and start-ups looking for a place
where their concepts can thrive are looking to Somerville because it’s a
city that supports originality, creativity and innovation. We’re going
out and getting those companies. We’re bringing them here.”