By Michelle Lang
After the Providence Journal first reported that retired Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling may move his video gaming startup 38 Studios to Rhode Island, we at Mass High Tech were all a-flutter in pursuing confirmation of the news.
In case you missed it, Schilling will not be moving the startup to the Ocean State … at least not yet. And maybe not to Rhode Island. Maybe to some other state. But his goal is “to remain in Massachusetts.”
Okay, so what then are we reporting? Schilling’s wishy-washy loyalty to the Bay State? The indication that 38 Studios could bring a slew of new jobs — potentially up to 400 or so new ones — that would prompt the need for more space to grow?
Something tells me we may have fallen for the oldest PR trick in the book (maybe not the oldest, but a good one) — any news is better than none. Sure, 38 Studios is an important and promising startup to Massachusetts’ innovation economy and its budding gaming cluster, but really, what companies don’t talk theoretically about growing their number of employees? And what companies don’t weigh their options of moving for the sake of saving a few bucks?
Terrafugia, the Woburn maker of the ‘flying car’, did that just last month. And we chased that talk just as fervently, as did nearly every other local media outlet.
In that case, Terrafugia CEO Carl Dietrich told us that he had six to eight weeks to decide if the company would accept an offer of $4.4 million to move into a facility in Dayton, Ohio. His frustration by the lack of interest from local investors ultimately attracted attention from U.S. Sen. John Kerry, who paid a visit to the company; a couple of state senators who also made the trip to see the flying car and talk with Dietrich; and a group of investors who offered to provide larger headquarters.
No word yet if Terrafugia will fly west for good or if its recent attention garnered the investments it was seeking to stay in Greater Boston.
In the end, the news has thus far succeeded in bringing attention to both companies, which they, no doubt, hope will translate to money and a feasible reason to stay in Massachusetts.
As for us, maybe translating the inconclusive musings of Schilling isn’t so bad…if it means we played a role in keep businesses and jobs in New England.
There are those people who walk into a room and enter into a discussion and you know right away, there’s something special about them. They are bright, well-informed, focused and energetic. They’re leaders. Put 10 of them in the room, and you have something dynamic.
You had a room full of people like Cambridge Nanocomp’s 
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