McDonnell, Albemarle officials celebrate MicroAire expansion

Dignitaries from Albemarle County supervisors to Gov. Bob McDonnell sat down with MicroAire employees Friday to celebrate the company’s $8 million expansion and the creation of 51 new jobs.

With finger cakes, sweet iced tea and specially monogrammed M&M candies, the celebrants mulled and mingled in the former U.S. Postal Service processing plant off Airport Road that MicroAire plans to turn into a production facility and office space.

On Tuesday MicroAire took ownership of the 72,000-square-foot facility for an estimated $6 million. The company plans to spend $2 million to remodel the building, which was assessed at $9 million by the county.

“You don’t grow a business or expand a business or do well in a business unless you have people who believe in the business,” McDonnell told the gathering. “There’s no more important goal in Virginia than to create jobs for our citizens.”

MicroAire manufactures several lines of high-tech medical equipment. It builds from billet a variety of drills and tools used to surgically repair broken bones, medical equipment used for liposuction, devices to help remedy carpal tunnel syndrome sans surgery and sterile, disposable surgical devices such as scalpels.

George Saiz, company president, said the expansion will allow the company to move manufacturing of its latest product from California to Albemarle. The product, called Endotine, is a bio-absorbant device that connects skin to bone without the use of stitches. The product is used in reconstructive surgery and plastic surgery.

Officials also plan to create a physician training facility in the building to help doctors learn how to use the company’s devices. The company currently employs 132 people in positions that range from sales to engineering to manufacturing to design.

“MicroAire is just the kind of business we want to encourage in Albemarle County,” said Ann H. Mallek, chairwoman of the county’s Board of Supervisors. “Our goal is to maintain our pictoral beauty and surroundings while encouraging economic development. We appreciate the quality jobs, the range of employment opportunity and the good salaries [MicroAire] brings.”

McDonnell presented Saiz with a facsimilie representation of a $100,000 check the state gave the company to offset the cost of recruiting and training employees. The company also received $50,000 from a state job creation opportunity fund. Albemarle officials gave the company $150,000 from the county’s Economic Opportunity Fund, created in 2007, as a match to the state money.

“We’re very excited about it because it’s the first time we’ve had a project that met the very strict criteria we have for the funds,” said Lee Catlin, county spokeswoman.

MicroAire is currently headquartered in the University of Virginia Research Park near the Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport, about a mile away from its new facility. The company has not decided yet if it will leave the research park facility or maintain offices there and at the new facility.

The company, created in 1977, designs and markets miniaturized bone saws, drills and other orthopedic equipment that provides surgeons with better accuracy and control. It moved to Charlottesville in 1995.

The postal facility, which had employed more than 180 people, closed in July, with mail now being processed at a newer facility near Sandston. The closure was part of nationwide cost-cutting measures.