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Ohio's high-tech exports reach $3.3 billion
Dayton is doing its part to attract high-tech companies with projects like Tech Town, grants and incentives.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Ohio may not be Silicon Valley, but its exports of high-tech goods grew nearly twice as fast as the national average last year.
Led by strong growth in exports of industrial electronics — factory robots, production counters and meters and other electronic measuring equipment — Ohio's high-tech exports climbed by 19 percent to $3.3 billion last year, according to high-tech trade group AeA.
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Nationally, high-tech exports increased 10 percent to $220 billion. California is the leading exporter of tech goods, followed by Texas and Florida.
"The high-tech sector has become a vibrant component of Ohio's economy," Joseph Keithley, whose Cleveland-based Keithley Instruments Inc. makes semiconductor testing equipment and other high-tech goods, said in a statement.
The Cleveland area has traditionally taken the lead when it comes to high-tech economic development in Ohio, but the Dayton area is growing in importance.
Trying to build on the foundation laid by companies such as NCR Corp., the city is developing Tech Town, a nearly 40-acre project designed to attract high-tech companies and create new high-paying jobs.
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, meanwhile, is attracting high-tech companies that do work in areas such as aerodynamics and fuel cells.
UltraCell Corp., a Livermore, Calif. maker of fuel cells, for instance, has selected a site near the Dayton International Airport for a new factory that could eventually employ more than 200 people. Helping lure the company to Dayton were more than $5 million in state and local grants and tax incentives. UltraCell wants to sell its fuel cells to the Army and Air Force for portable power.
Currently, about 9 percent of all exports from Ohio are tech-related, and more than 13,000 Ohio jobs are directly supported by the trade of high-tech goods, according to the AeA.
Despite increased exports from Ohio and 37 of the nation's 50 states, the country still imports about $102 billion more in high-tech goods than it exports, according to the AeA. Besides oil and other energy products, high-tech goods are the nation's biggest import, it said.
Not surprisingly, the nation's biggest high-tech trade deficit is with China, which last year shipped about $88 billion more in electronics and related goods here than it received from U.S. companies. The next biggest sources were Mexico and the European Union.
Total high-tech exports from Ohio: $3.3 billion
Increase in high-tech exports 2005-2006: $531 million
Percentage of Ohio exports that are tech-related: 9
Biggest tech export destinations:
Canada: $852 million
China: $248 million
Germany: $236 million
Biggest exports:
Industrial electronics: $1.2 billion
Computers and peripherals: $560 million
Electromedical equipment: $416 million
Source: AeA
