Friday, April 15, 2011

MassDevelopment to loan $3M for South Boston site to house Fraunhofer unit

By Rodney H. Brown

Article updated as of 12:50 p.m., April 19, 2011.
 

The Massachusetts Development Finance Agency has given approval to a $3 million loan to a yet-to-be created LLC entity that plans to rehabilitate 5 Channel Center in South Boston and have Fraunhofer USA lease it. 

The new LLC was called the Fraunhofer Center Investment Fund LLC in documents on the MassDevelopment website, but does not yet have an official name, according to a later statement by an agency spokesperson. The MassDevelopment money will be put together with various grants and loans from other sources, according to MassDevelopment, and, after a few more intervening entities and subsidiaries, a group known as 5 CC LLC will buy and renovate 5 Channel Center. Fraunhofer USA will then lease the space.

When reached by phone, Nolan Browne, managing director for the Cambridge-based Fraunhofer Center for Sustainable Energy Systems, said he was not at liberty to talk about Fraunhofer’s plans for the space at this time. Browne did confirm that the nonprofit has plans for 5 Channel Center that were consistent with its mission of innovation, specifically in the areas of energy and sustainability.

The Fraunhofer Center for Sustainable Energy Systems is also one of the four administrating operations behind the new U-Launch program along with the New England Clean Energy Foundation (NECEF), the Association of CleanTech Incubators of New England (ACTION) and the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (MassCEC). U-Launch kicked off in November 2010 as a program intended to aid the transition of clean energy technology in university labs to startups with commercialized technology.

In March, U-Launch awarded grants to two area clean technology startups, Cambridge-based N12 Technologies and Waltham-based iBLogix. While dollar values for the grants were not disclosed, U-Launch originally stated that entrepreneurs could receive up to $100,000.

Fraunhofer also operates the Fraunhofer Center for Manufacturing Innovation based in Brookline.