Marisa Ring, the Greater Omaha Economic Development Partnership's international business development expert, went recruiting in France, Spain, Denmark and Germany this fall to lay groundwork for attracting more European investment in the Greater Omaha area. The point of Ring’s trip was to open doors and make European companies aware of the benefits of locating in Greater Omaha or doing business here, she said.
She met with executives of an automobile manufacturer and two bio-science firms in the Auvergne region of France. One of the bio-science companies produces nutraceuticals and the other organic cosmetics. She also met with regional trade and business development organizations to explore possible partnerships with them. In Spain she talked with transportation and software companies. One of the selling points Omaha recruiters use in luring transportation companies is the city's central U.S. location, which allows for one- to three-day truck and rail delivery to most of the country. Earlier this year, Ring played a major role in bringing Easyway, a Chinese transportation company, to the Omaha area. Easyway has established a freight-forwarding center in La Vista, the results of a recruiting trip Ring made to Asia.
Danish firms she visited included two in the alternative energy sector — wind generation of electric power. She also met with executives of Novozymes, a company that has built a $200 million, 100-job enzymes-producing plant at Cargill Inc.'s biotech complex at Blair. The enzymes are used for, among other things, producing corn-based ethanol. Ring and other Omaha recruiters make a point of visiting the headquarters of firms that, while based elsewhere, have operations in the Omaha area. "It shows we are serious about facilities investment in the Greater Omaha area," Ring said.
Paula Hazlewood, director of Washington County's Gateway Development Corp., is credited with winning the Novozymes plant for Blair after the Danish company had said the Omaha area was out of the running. Gateway and the economic development organizations in three other counties, Douglas, Sarpy and Cass, make up the Greater Omaha Economic Development Partnership. In Germany, Ring went to Braunschweig to explore possibilities of adding a business element to that city's sister-city relationship with Omaha.
Several German companies have operations in the Omaha area. Omaha's attraction to businesses that export and import is Foreign Trade Zone No. 19, which is licensed to the Greater Omaha Chamber. Located in northeast Omaha near Eppley Airfield, the zone is a place where businesses can ship and receive goods in international trade. Imported products can be stored, repackaged and modified there, for example, with payment of customs duties delayed until the goods are delivered to customers.
