Worcester Business Journal

wbjournal.com | September 28, 2020 | Worcester Business Journal 5 B R I E FS Waters Corp. expanding into Kendall Square Milford life sciences company Waters Corp. will open a research laboratory in Cambridge's Kendall Square. e laboratory will be called Immerse Cambridge, and is aimed at helping Waters partner with academia, research and industry. Cambridge, home to Harvard University and MIT, is known for its robust scientific research community. e announcement comes just three weeks aer the company's new CEO, Udit Batra, assumed his role at the helm of Waters Corp. Before he joined Waters, Batra was CEO of Boston life sciences company MillporeSigma, a subsidiary of Merck KGaA of Germany. Work begins on 90-unit Worcester complex A ceremonial groundbreaking took place in September for a 90-unit housing development slated to remake a longtime industrial site in Worcester about a block from the Auburn border. Botany Bay Construction of Worcester plans to build a mix of one- and two-bedroom market-rate townhouse-style apartments at the five-acre site. e site is the former site of Creative Paper & Packaging, facing South Ludlow Street in a large residential neighborhood. e firm bought the land from the city in March for $52,500. e city seized the property, which uses the addresses of 175 James St. and 261 Clover St., by tax title in 2014. e site, long dominated by a 125,000-square- foot building that fell into disrepair, was last assessed at nearly $1.9 million. New $10M Hopkinton biotech creating 125 jobs e ribbon has been cut at a new manufacturing facility in Hopkinton where Lykan Bioscience is anticipated to create 125 new jobs. e unveiling of the new SMART Manufacturing facility took place with dignitaries such as Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito. According to the Town of Hopkinton Twitter account, the facility underwent a $10-million renovation and will create 125 new jobs by 2023. e 64,000-square-foot SMART Manufacturing facility will feature integrated data management systems,. Formed in early 2019, Lykan Bioscience is a privately held cell-based therapies contract manufacturing services organization located in Hopkinton. Marlborough firm buys Southborough offices Ferris Development, a Marlborough real estate investment firm, has paid nearly $3.5 million for a pair of office buildings on Route 9 in Southborough. Ferris bought 118 and 120 Turnpike Road, which make up a site rebranded in the past year as e Lookout @ Southborough, for its location across from the Sudbury Reservoir. Ferris bought the site from Curo Enterprises, a New York property investment and management firm. e deal closed Aug. 24. e site, which spans more than 20 acres, includes more than 155,000 square feet of office space between two three-story buildings constructed in the 1980s. It was last assessed by the Town of Southborough at more than $16 million. Curaleaf adding 50 new jobs in Webster Cannabis company Curaleaf, headquartered in Wakefield, will add more than 50 new jobs at its recently expanded cultivation-and- manufacturing facility in Webster. At the same time, the company announced it will partner with two local veterans organizations to help recruit applicants for the newly added positions. ose groups are Mass Fallen Heroes of Boston and Project New Hope Inc. in Worcester. Curaleaf operates in 23 states, where it runs 92 dispensaries, 22 cultivation sites, and more than 30 processing sites. Worcester restaurateur sentenced to six months home confinement Stacey Gala, wife of convicted drug dealer and former Worcester restaurateur Kevin Perry, has been sentenced to six months of home confinement and three years of supervised release for conspiring with her restaurant manager to use drug money to rebrand and run e Chameleon, her former Shrewsbury Street restaurant, the Department of Justice announced. Gala, 29, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering in November 2019. Her husband, Perry, was sentenced to 14 years in prison aer pleading guilty to money laundering, cash structuring, lying on a loan application and distributing fentanyl. Aer Perry was convicted and the couple's 166 Shrewsbury St. restaurant, e Usual, was seized by federal authorities in March 2017. U.S. News & World Report remains gold standard in college rankings F L AS H P O L L Are the U.S. News and World Report rankings reflective of a college's quality or competitive standing? College of the Holy Cross, Worcester Polytechnic Institute and Clark University dropped in their respective U.S. News & World Report rankings this year: WPI from 62nd to 66th and Clark from 91st to 103rd in the national college ranking; and Holy Cross from 27th to 36th among liberal arts colleges. The publication's rankings have been considered the gold standard in college quality rankings, particularly in enticing prospective students, although they are still based on factors including standardized test scores, which are becoming de-emphasized in college admissions. When polled online, just over half of WBJ readers said this ranking is reflective of a college's quality. Yes, although they are only one piece of the puzzle. 49% 13% T H E T I C K E R 312 Apartments proposed for a renovation of Worcester's Commerce Building at 340 Main St. Source: City of Worcester Countries the Trappist monks at The Spencer Brewery export their beer to: Belgium, Netherlands, France, Spain, and China. 5 9,508 Source: Worcester Red Sox Seats planned for Polar Park, a reduction of the originally planned 10,000 and a nod to the city's 508 area code. Length, in years, of the renewed lease Reliant Medical Group entered for its Mercantile Center offices in Worcester 10 Source: The Spencer Brewery Sources: Franklin Realty Advisers Yes, they are the best measure of how colleges compare to their peers. No, they do not adequately consider other important parts of college life. No, the quality of individual educational programs at a college is more important than overall ranking. 34% W 4%

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