By Scott Miller
smiller@scbiznews.com
Published Oct. 29, 2009

The Upstate’s expertise in advanced materials could serve Boeing Co. well as the aviation giant locates a plant in North Charleston.

Boeing’s announcement presents a slew of new opportunities for manufacturers already located here and could allow the Upstate to snag a few more, said Ed McCallum of Greenville-based McCallum Sweeney Consulting, which assisted Boeing when the company decided to locate its first 787 plant in Washington state in 2003.

“The competitive advantage up here will be in advanced materials,” McCallum said.

New Boeing suppliers could emerge from research at Clemson University as well.

Research at the university’s Advanced Materials Center in Anderson could find ties with the advanced composites that will be used in Boeing fuselages, said Christian Przirembel, vice president of research and economic development at the university.

As many others have done, Przirembel also compared the Boeing announcement to BMW. Since locating here 15 years ago, BMW has invested millions in endowed chairs and research at the Clemson University International Center for Automotive Research, Przirembel said.

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The advanced materials sector was already a target of Upstate economic development officials before Boeing made its announcement. The sector is a part of a targeted-industry study that McCallum is conducting for the Upstate Alliance.

McCallum rattled off names like Michelin North America, which supplies aircraft tires, General Electric, which builds turbines in Greenville and aircraft engines at other facilities, and Cytec Industries, which makes carbon fibers, as potential beneficiaries of the Boeing announcement in the short term.

He also mentioned American Titanium Works, which plans to build a $450 million facility in Laurens County. Originally, the company didn’t plan to supply titanium to the aviation industry. That could change, McCallum said, and if it does, ATW could attract even more suppliers to the Upstate.

“Maybe BMW suppliers can branch out and take advantage of this,” he added. “This is all speculation.”

And in the long term, South Carolina will get a lot more looks from businesses looking to locate operations, McCallum said.

“This is national news. South Carolina is back on the map again,” McCallum said, noting that South Carolina has lost its share of economic development projects recently.

“Nobody knows those stories and nobody can really talk about them,” he said. “People can say ‘South Carolina is off its game.’ South Carolina is not off its game. You don’t win something like this if you’re not on your game.”

“Rolls Royce looked at Greenville a while ago and went to Virginia,” McCallum said. “I bet they wish they had changed their mind.”