CHICAGO | Economic & Business Development

[jpIllInoIs]

Rivian Automotive is looking to significantly expand its footprint at its plant in west Normal, while adding hundreds of workers to produce electric vehicles.

The new development includes adding up to 10.6 million square feet of building space and 1.5 million square feet for logistics and parking on a 380 acre parcel.

The current site is 503 acres, with 9.6 million square feet of building space and 7.7 million square feet for logistics and parking....

...According to Dietmeier, there are 890 full-time employees at Rivian's plant in Normal, with plans for a workforce of about 2,700 people by next year.

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by jpIllInoIs

Rivian Automotive is looking to significantly expand its footprint at its plant in west Normal, while adding hundreds of workers to produce electric vehicles.

The new development includes adding up to 10.6 million square feet of building space and 1.5 million square feet for logistics and parking on a 380 acre parcel.

The current site is 503 acres, with 9.6 million square feet of building space and 7.7 million square feet for logistics and parking....

...According to Dietmeier, there are 890 full-time employees at Rivian's plant in Normal, with plans for a workforce of about 2,700 people by next year.

That's great for downstate and the state overall. Increasing the work force by 1810 for that..

[marothisu]

A company that makes DevOps software on top of Salesforce is opening a US HQ in Chicago. The company is based in Cambridge, England. They'll open at 515 N State and look to hire 80 people over the next year mainly in sales and "customer success" roles (whatever that truly means).

At a high level, this is similar to Copado which moved to Chicago from Madrid a few years ago, and raised about $100M this year. DevOps software for Salesforce as well.

[marothisu]

Relativity lands Silver Lake investment in deal that reportedly values the legal tech company at $3.6B

https://www.bizjournals.com/chicago/...t-in-deal.html

Chicago legal tech company Relativity has taken a strategic growth investment from a private equity firm as it looks to accelerate global growth and differentiate its technology offerings.

California-based Silver Lake, which specializes in tech investing, is investing an undisclosed amount into Relativity, a deal that makes the company now valued at about $3.6 billion, according to The Wall Street Journal. Silver Lake, which has also invested in tech giants like Airbnb, Dell and Expedia, is now Relativity’s largest shareholder and representatives are joining Relativity’s board of directors.

..

RelativityOne, the firm’s cloud platform, has led the company’s growth as the number of customers and the amount of data being managed on the platform has doubled in the past 12 months, the company said.

..

In 2015, Relativity raised $125 million from Iconiq Capital, the only outside investment the firm has taken. Relativity said on Thursday that ICONIQ will remain a key investor.

Outside of the United States, the company has offices in London, Hong Kong, Australia and Poland. The company employs 1,200 people worldwide, about 900 of whom are in Chicago.

[bnk]

https://www.bizjournals.com/chicago/...nvest-25m.html

Google to invest $25M in Chicago office growth


By Jim Dallke
– Senior Editor, Chicago Business Journal

Mar 18, 2021


Google announced plans to invest millions in its Illinois operations, including upgrades to its two Chicago offices in Fulton Market.

Google said Thursday that it is making a $25 million investment in the state of Illinois and plans to hire locally as Chicago's economy prepares for recovery post-Covid. Google plans to add two additional floors, totaling 58,000 square feet, at its 210 N. Carpenter st. office, which houses Google's growing Cloud team. Google opened that office in 2019, its second in the Fulton Market neighborhood.




The two new floors will each have access to an outdoor balcony, with views looking east toward the city and west toward the United Center, Google said.

Google said it will make additional space upgrades at 210 N. Carpenter, as well as improvements to its other Chicago office building at 320 N. Morgan St. Google currently occupies 525,000 square feet across both buildings. It has more than 1,400 employees statewide.

Google also plans to add additional jobs in Chicago as part of a previously announced plan


...

[marothisu]

Codal Moves Its HQ to Old Post Office Building, Plans to Double Headcount

https://www.builtinchicago.org/2021/...-office-hiring

On Monday, Codal announced that it will be moving its headquarters from 11 E. Hubbard Street in River North to 433 W. Van Buren Street — the address of Chicago’s historic Old Post Office building.

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Codal says the move will give it access to approximately 17,000 additional square feet. It also gives the company access to some major corporate brands as neighbors, including PepsiCo, Uber and Walgreens.

..

Codal is expecting to complete the move some time this summer. And in order to fill out its new space, the company plans to go on a hiring spree. Codal says it plans to double its employee headcount, which currently sits at 50+ people. This hiring will take place over the next few years in order to help Codal meet growing customer demand. The company currently has over a dozen open Chicago-based job listings in roles across design, engineering, product and more.

..

Codal is a UX design firm that teams up with brands in order to help them perfect their online presence. This involves services like web and mobile development, e-commerce development, establishing a digital strategy, identifying emerging technology and website maintenance. Over 160 companies both large and small have partnered with Codal as customers.

[marothisu]

At this rate, Chicago could be in for a recording setting VC year. We'll see.

Chicago logistics software maker gets $100 million to expand beyond trucks and warehouses

https://www.chicagobusiness.com/john...ond-trucks-and

Logistics software company FourKites has raised $100 million from investors that include private-equity giant Thomas H. Lee Partners, as well as chip maker Qualcomm and Lincolnshire-based Zebra Technologies.

The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted supply chains involved in everything from health care to auto manufacturing, causing increased demand for technology that could give manufacturers and customers better information about where products are at any given time.

Chicago, long the nation’s freight hub, is also home to two of the largest supply-chain software startups, FourKites and Project44. Project44 raised $100 million in December. Each company has raised more than $200 million.

"Issues from tariffs to the pandemic are leading many companies to desperately need integrated end-to-end visibility across their supply chain, including all modes of transportation," says Susan Beardslee, an analyst at ABI Research. "Everything from large queues of container ships off the California coast to growing driver shortages and cold (supply) chains prioritizing vaccines are pushing companies to adopt cloud solutions that provide transparency and flexibility like P44 and FourKites offer."

FourKites says more than half the Fortune 500 are customers, including consumer product giants Coca-Cola, AB InBev, Meijer, Walmart Canada and 3M. The company has 525 employees, about one-third of whom are in Chicago.

..

In addition to new products, Elenjickal says he’s on the lookout for more acquisitions. “We’ve made a couple,” he said. “We plan to make more.”

Elenjickal declined to disclose the company’s revenue but says it aims to have $100 million in sales within two years, with the goal of going public.

[marothisu]

And more...

After Covid brought its business to a halt, Snapsheet prepares for growth again with $30M raise

https://www.bizjournals.com/chicago/...aises-30m.html

Snapsheet, one of Chicago's growing insuretech startups, has raised a new round of funding for its cloud-native insurance claims platform.

The company announced Thursday that it raised $30 million in Series E2 financing from the Ping An Global Voyager Fund and Pivot Investment Partners. Other investors, such as Nationwide, Liberty Mutual, Intact Ventures, Tola Capital, Commerce Ventures, also participated.

To date, Snapsheet has raised more than $100 million, said founder and CEO Brad Weisberg. The startup last raised $29 million in 2019.

..

Founded in 2010, Snapsheet works with 110 clients, including Zurich and Hertz, providing them with technology that allows their customers to virtually file insurance claims. Snapsheet's platform allows users to upload accident photos with their smartphone camera and easily communicate with repair shops.

“Over the last year because of Covid, carriers have really been forced to adopt digital capabilities and they’ve had to offer their clients digital solutions and give them the best experience possible without doing things in person,” Weisberg said.

At the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, Snapsheet’s business suffered as many people were sheltering in place and not driving. As a result, claims volume plummeted.

“People stopped driving,” Weisberg said. “When everyone was forced to stay home, there were no claims. We weren’t making any money.”

To help cut costs, Snapsheet furloughed 100 employees, Weisberg said. So far, the company has brought back 24 employees and will continue to bring back more over the coming weeks.

Snapsheet currently employs about 220 people, 100 of which are in Chicago. Snapsheet said it plans to hire about 170 new employees over the next two years across its engineering and sales teams.

As the pandemic winds down, Weisberg said Snapsheet will be keeping its Loop office. While the startup will operate on a hybrid model, allowing employees to work in the office and remotely as they wish, Weisberg said the office remains a vital piece of the company’s culture.

--

Startup developing treatments for Tourette syndrome and stuttering raises $35M

https://www.bizjournals.com/chicago/...tuttering.html

A Chicago biotech startup that's developing treatments for central nervous system movement disorders raised a round of funding to bring its therapies to market.

Emalex Biosciences, a biopharmaceutical startup founded in 2018, raised $35 million this week in a round led by Paragon Biosciences, a Chicago-based life sciences incubator and fund.

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The startup says there are currently three Phase 2 clinical trials underway for its medicine, which will evaluate the efficacy and safety of its drug.

The startup says that there are 70 million people worldwide who suffer from stuttering, which currently has no FDA-approved treatment.

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Why These Chicago Tech Companies Anticipate Serious Growth in 2021

https://www.builtinchicago.org/2021/...growth-success

ClearCut Analytics Founder and Chief Strategy Officer Amin Harari, for example, said his team has spent the last several years building a strong foundation for scale with proven products and services in the retail analytics space, and now they are ready to double the company’s headcount in the coming year.

Meanwhile, Abby Hunt, VP of marketing at research platform dscout, said her employer is hiring across the board as they anticipate human-centric data will continue playing a key role in driving innovation across industries.

[marothisu]

Jobless claims fall to pandemic-era low

https://www.chicagobusiness.com/empl...ndemic-era-low

Applications for U.S. unemployment benefits fell to the lowest in a year, signaling improvement for the labor market as more Americans get Covid-19 vaccinations and business restrictions ease in many states.

Initial claims in regular state programs fell by 97,000 to 684,000 in the week ended March 20, Labor Department data showed Thursday. On an unadjusted basis, the claims decreased by 100,412 to 656,789 last week, led by sharp drops in Illinois and Ohio. The median estimate in a Bloomberg survey had called for 730,000 initial claims.

Here is the report:
https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf

Illinois went from 71,175 jobless claims a week before to 14,828 jobless claims in the most recent (3/20). This was the highest drop of any state. Virginia, Nevada, and Massachusetts had the largest increases. Indiana had a small increase and its jobless claims for the week were nearly identical to Illinois.

[left of center]

Wow, thats interesting. Checking back an additional 4 weeks, it appears that jobless claims in IL hovered between 60k-70k, so going down to 14k is HUGE. Hope that progress sticks, and its not just some blip in the radar.

Source files: https://search.usa.gov/search/news?a...port&sort_by=r

[OrdoSeclorum]

This is pretty interesting. Of the 10 largest states, Illinois fared the best economically during the pandemic.



Data from here: https://www.bea.gov/data/gdp/gdp-state

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by OrdoSeclorum

This is pretty interesting. Of the 10 largest states, Illinois fared the best economically during the pandemic.



Data from here: https://www.bea.gov/data/gdp/gdp-state

Unfortunately, this didn't translate with unemployment though. Illinois' is staying stubbornly high.

[sentinel]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

Unfortunately, this didn't translate with unemployment though. Illinois' is staying stubbornly high.

Based on what? See marothisu’s post right above yours that references actual data.

[the urban politician]

Will the downtown apartment market come back?

https://www.chicagobusiness.com/comm...rket-come-back

[jpIllInoIs]

^ Its annoying to see these link posts from Crains without a snipet or summary. Lazy post. And wrong thread judging by title belongs in Chicago economy or general.

[the urban politician]

^ As a a God-lovin ‘Murkin, I reserve the right to be LAZY!!

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

Unfortunately, this didn't translate with unemployment though. Illinois' is staying stubbornly high.

Originally Posted by sentinel

Based on what? See marothisu’s post right above yours that references actual data.

The unemployment figures which are commonly used in the media,, from from BLS, are always a few months behind. The latest is from January while the numbers posted before are from the Department of Labor from less than 10 days ago. Probably in 2 or 3 months, based on this data you'll say "wow, what a sharp decline in March or April!" when the BLS releases March or April figures. I think all of this coincides pretty well with opening back up more leisure/hospitality like restaurants, bars, etc and hotels, along with a little bit of traveling as well as people getting the vaccine and not being weird about travel any longer once they have it.

By the way, and it's pretty obvious to anyone who has thought about this, but some of hardest hit places have been ones with a lot of leisure/hospitality and tourism no matter the state. Miami doesn't have as high of a rate as LA, NYC, or Chicago but considering Miami didn't really institute much of the type of shut downs the other cities did, it's still pretty high.

January 2021 Unemployment rates - from the BLS - by city
NYC: 13.1%
Los Angeles: 12.5%
Philadelphia: 11.2%
Chicago: 10.4%
Las Vegas: 9.8%
Honolulu: 8.8%
Miami: 8.3%
Houston: 8%
San Diego: 8%
Boston: 7.4%
Dallas: 7.3%
San Jose: 6.4%
Atlanta: 6.3%
San Francisco: 6.3%
Orlando: 6%

Some places in Florida and Texas with a lot of hospitality has lower obviously because they mostly stayed open, but Houston and Miami for example aren't exactly low. They're even higher than San Francisco, San Jose and San Diego who all completely locked down. Even Dallas is higher than those.

[jpIllInoIs]

Originally Posted by marothisu

The unemployment figures which are commonly used in the media,, from from BLS, are always a few months behind. The latest is from January while the numbers posted before are from the Department of Labor from less than 10 days ago.

Probably in 2 or 3 months, based on this data you'll say "wow, what a sharp decline in March!" when the BLS releases March or April figures.

By the way, and it's pretty obvious to anyone who has thought about this, but the hardest hit places have been ones with a lot of hospitality and tourism no matter the state.

Yeah, Chicago's diverse economy definitely helped is survive 2020; logistics, healthcare, research, transportation, construction, B2B technology--but definitely need to get McMK rolling again and summer events.

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by jpIllInoIs

Yeah, Chicago's diverse economy definitely helped is survive 2020; logistics, healthcare, research, transportation, construction, B2B technology--but definitely need to get McMK rolling again and summer events.

Totally, and I think you can say that about a lot of places. There were definitely decreases in other sectors but leisure/hospitality everywhere took a hit. The latest jobless claim report is interesting though since Illinois had such a sharp decline from the previous week. Will be curious to see this summer, when the data come out, what the differences in unemployment rate will be in March, April, etc.

There were definite layoffs and stoppages in other industries too - so that will be interesting to see. One of the funding articles I posted the other day said they had furloughed a bunch of workers, but are now bringing them back. I wonder how widespread that will be or if that's not common at all.

[marothisu]

The article doesn't mention anything that hasn't already been discussed here. Downtown got hit hard by the pandemic and also rioting/looting. There was a sizable outflow to suburbs or other areas of the city from there. Some buildings are seeing an uptick in leasing again (talked about this the other day - there's an article from Crains 2-4 weeks ago talking about it). There's some unanswered questions about how many companies will return to the office downtown and all that, but some developers are betting big on a recovery. They even talk about how some young people moved back with their parents, but are getting tired of them and we'll probably see them move back. Young couples/families they say are gone, but at least the family aspect for a lot of people is kind of the normal case any year. Unless you are rolling in a sizable amount of money, it's not cost effective to raise a few children in a luxury downtown condo. A lot of people can afford it, but a lot of people who lived downtown, get married, and have kids cannot afford it (or don't want to afford it). Not really different than at any other time in downtown's relatively expensive gentrified history though.

My own bet is you'll see an uptick in activity this summer/early fall especially as a large percentage of the population gets a vaccine, and companies return to the office (hybrid or full on).