Orlando - new businesses? (University: school, university, to live)

[pianogal]

Some of the comments below are interesting - especially in light of all the negativity on this board:
A year ago, Louis Poisson was commuting two hours each way -- via car, train and subway -- to his biotech-research job in Boston.

Lured a few months later to a similar job in Orlando, the 48-year-old flow-cytometry scientist now has a simple, 10-minute drive to his lab at VaxDesign Corp. in Central Florida Research Park.

Eight-plus years in the Northeastern cold was enough, said Poisson, a self-described warm-weather person who likes "everything" about Central Florida.

"I hope to live here forever, and I'm sure my wife seconds that," Poisson said. "I think Orlando will attract a lot of people. Once Burnham and the med school are up and running, it will attract a lot more."

Plenty of close observers of the $60 billion-a-year biomedical industry agree with Poisson, and not all of them live in Central Florida. Twin announcements in 2006 -- that the University of Central Florida would start a medical school, and the Burnham Institute for Medical Research would open an East Coast laboratory in Orlando -- have created a buzz heard across the country.

Since Burnham's Aug. 23 announcement that it was expanding to Central Florida, the Metro Orlando Economic Development Commission has received eight inquiries from biotech companies interested in setting up shop, reports John Fremstad, the EDC's vice president of technology business development.

Orlando already has much to offer, he said. It has a nationally recognized cluster for simulation technology and computer science -- both increasingly important components of biomedicine -- and it has two of the country's largest hospital systems in Florida Hospital and Orlando Regional Healthcare.