Focus: Atlanta 2018

Atlanta

First Edition

An in-depth review of the key issues facing Metro Atlanta’s economy featuring the exclusive insights of prominent industry leaders

ISBN 978-0-9988966-0-1

90000

9 780998 896601

Contents: 42 Interview: John Portman IV, Chief Operating Officer, Portman Holdings 45 Interview: Matt Bronfman, CEO, Jamestown Properties 46 Perspective: Norman Radow, CEO, The Radco Companies 50 Market voices: Monetha Cobb, Managing Director, Franklin Street; Jenni Bonura, Managing Partner, Harry Norman Realtors; John Davidson, Southeast Regional President, Parmenter 52 Interview: David Lanier, Managing Director, CBRE Atlanta

57 Construction:

7 Economy: 8 Economy in numbers 10 Hidden gems: Metro Atlanta has a lot going for it - vibrant industries, a diverse population and engaged stakeholders. Now it is building on its success and branching out to become a serious international player 11 Interview: Nathan Deal, Governor State of Georgia 12 Interview: Kasim Reed, Mayor, City of Atlanta 14 Interview: Hala Moddelmog, President & CEO, Metro Atlanta Chamber 17 Perspective: Steven Justice, Executive Director, Georgia Centers of Innovation 18 Interview: Pat Wilson, Commissioner, Georgia Department of Economic Development 19 Interview: Doug Hooker, Executive Director, Atlanta Regional Commission 20 Interview: Klaus Zellmer, President & CEO North America, Porsche 22 Interview: Eloisa Klementich, President & CEO, Invest Atlanta

24 Interview: Chris Clark, President & CEO, Georgia Chamber 26 Perspective: Greg Hare, Managing Partner, Ogletree Deakins 28 Interview: Ernest LaMont Greer, President, Greenberg Traurig Atlanta 29 Perspective: Nick Masino, Chief Economic Development Officer, Partnership Gwinnett 30 Interview: Christian Fischer, President & CEO, Georgia-Pacific 32 Interview: Frank Patterson, President, Pinewood Atlanta Studios

35 Real Estate: 36 I ndustrial, office, hotel and multifamily real estate in numbers 38 Residential real estate in numbers 39 A place in the Sunbelt: Atlanta is still very much a “real estate town� as the growing amount of companies and workers look for great value properties to put down their roots 40 Interview: Mark Toro, Managing Partner, North American Properties - Atlanta Ltd.

58 C onstruction in numbers 60 S tructural strength: Developers and construction companies are making the most of the economy in the midst of massive expansion 61 P erspective: Jerome Russell, President, HJ Russell 62 Interview: Lamar Wakefield, Principal & CEO, Wakefield Beasley 63 Interview: Scott Cannon, Executive Vice President, Skanska 65 Perspective: Kevin Green, President & CEO, Midtown Alliance

67 Utilities & Infrastructure: 68 Utilities & Infrastructure in numbers 69 Sustainable supplies: Metro Atlanta is looking to alternative energy sources, green policy and innovation in planning to ensure that the area can maintain its growth momentum 70 Interview: Russell McMurry, Commissioner, Georgia Department of Transportation 71 Perspective: William Johnson, Commissioner, Department of Public Works 72 Interview: Paul Bowers, Chairman, President & CEO, Georgia Power 73 Perspective: Paul Morris, President & CEO, Atlanta BeltLine 74 Interview: Kevin Greiner, President & CEO, Gas South www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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CONTENTS

Contents: 105 Technology & Fintech: 106 The byte of success: Atlanta is becoming legitimate competition for established tech centers such as Silicon Valley and New York.

It offers a solid foundation in fintech and healthy innovation infrastructure 107 Interview: Barry McCarthy, Executive Vice President, Head of Network & Security Solutions, First Data 108 Interview: Asif Ramji, CEO, Paymetric 109 Interview: Lynne Laube, Chief Operating Officer & Co-Founder, Cardlytics 110 Perspective: Mark Carl, CEO, ControlScan

77 Transportation & Aviation:

78 Transportation & Aviation in numbers

80 P oint-to-point progress: Metro Atlanta has a world-leading airport and a well-developed public transport system. Investment and innovation is helping to improve its road system

91 Banking & Finance:

92 Banking & Finance in numbers

94 Recovery position: Banks in the state and metro area are showing encouraging fundamentals as they support and prosper from a vibrant economy

95 Interview: Palmer Proctor, President & CEO, Fidelity Bank

96 Perspective: Joe Brannen, CEO, Georgia Bankers Association

82 Perspective: Gerald McDowell, Executive Director, Aerotropolis Atlanta

97 Perspective: Alex McKenzie, President & CEO, IFS Securities

83 Interview: Roosevelt Council, Airport General Manager, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport

98 Interview: Cynthia Day, President & CEO, Citizens Trust Bank

99 Perspective: John Wright, Managing Partner, Northwestern Mutual

84 Perspective: Christopher Tomlinson, Executive Director, Georgia Regional Transportation Authority

100 Perspective: Eddie Meyers, Regional President Georgia, PNC Financial Services Group

81 Interview: Gregory Kelly, Executive Director, Savannah Hilton Head International Airport

85 Interview: Keith Parker, Former General Manager & CEO, Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority

102 Interview: Randy Kroporc, Executive Vice President, Georgia Regional President, Fifth Third Bank

88 Interview: Karl Von Hagel, Airport Manager, Cobb County International Airport

104 Perspective: Jenna Kelly, President & CEO Atlanta Division, SunTrust Bank

4 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | CONTENTS

113 Perspective: Jeremy Legg, Chief Technical Officer, Turner Broadcasting System

114 Interview: Allen Maines, Executive Partner, Holland & Knight LLP

115 Interview: Larry Williams, CEO, Technology Association of Georgia

117

Healthcare:

118 Peak condition: Atlanta is a welldeveloped healthcare center, with strong treatment facilities, research institutions and the CDC, making it regionally, nationally and globally significant

119 I nterview: Dr. Jonathan Lewin, President, CEO & Chairman of the Board, Emory Healthcare

120 I nterview: Dr. Walter Curran, Executive Director, Winship Cancer Institute

121 P erspective: Debra Tyler-Horton, State Director, AARP Georgia

122 P erspective: Anne Meisner, CEO, Cancer Treatment Centers of America

124 I nterview: Kevin Brown, President & CEO, Piedmont Healthcare

126 Interview: John Haupert, President & CEO, Grady Health Systems

Atlanta First Edition

129 Education:

143 Tourism, Arts & Culture:

130 Smart cities: Metro Atlanta’s skilled workforce remains a key component in attracting companies and developing homegrown talent

144 Southern hospitality: Atlanta’s historic significance and its many modern-day attractions have placed it among the top 10 mostvisited U.S. cities

131 Interview: Mark Becker, President, Georgia State University

145 Interview: William Pate, President & CEO, Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau

133 Interview: Samuel Olens, President, Kennesaw State University

146 Perspective: Bradley Koeneman, General Manager, Hilton Atlanta

134 Interview: Richard Phillips, Dean, J. Mack Robinson College of Business 135 Perspective: Thomas Hynes, President, Clayton State University 136 Perspective: William Underwood, President, Mercer University

147 Interview: Joseph Handy, President & Chief Operating Officer, Georgia Aquarium 150 Perspective: Frank Poe, Executive Director, Georgia World Congress Center Authority

155 Sports:

138 Interview: Harold Martin, Interim President, Morehouse College 139 Perspective: Lawrence Schall, President, Oglethorpe University 140 Perspective: Greg King, Associate Vice President for Economic Development, Georgia Institute of Technology

156 A head of the games: Metro Atlanta is dedicated to sports, with major teams and world-class tournaments as well as a new soccer team that is already gaining a strong fan base 157 Perspective: Scott Jenkins, General Manager, Mercedes-Benz Stadium 159 Interview: Derek Schiller, President, Business, Atlanta Braves 160 Interview: Steve Cannon, CEO, AMB Group 161 Interview: Rich McKay, President & CEO, Atlanta Falcons 162 Interview: Darren Eales, President, Atlanta United FC

ISBN 978-0-9988966-0-1 President: Abby Melone Chief Financial Officer: Albert E. Lindenberg Managing Editor: Alex Mazonowicz Art Director: Nuno Caldeira Editorial Assistant, Contributing Writer: Valerie Silva Production Assistant: Michael Gargula Accountant: Andrew Mellet Intern: Mackenna Smith Focus: Atlanta is published once a year by Capital Analytics Associates, LLC. For all editorial and advertising questions, please e-mail: contact@capitalaa.com To order a copy of Focus Atlanta 2017, please e-mail: contact@capitalaa.com All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means, without the express written consent of the publisher, Capital Analytics Associates, LLC. Whilst every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the information contained in this book, the authors and publisher accept no responsibility for any errors it may contain, or for any loss, financial or otherwise, sustained by any person using this publication.

Capital Analytics Associates, LLC accepts no responsibility for the return of unsolicited manuscripts and/or photographs, and assumes no liability for products and services advertised herein. Capital Analytics Associates, LLC reserves the right to edit, rewrite, or refuse material.

163 Interview: Steve Koonin, CEO, Atlanta Hawks

Photo Credits: Contents:

Real Estate:

Pg. 4 – Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport

Pg. 44 – MAC

Pg. 5 – AMB Group Economy: Pg. 16 – State of Georgia Pg. 23 – Metro Atlanta Chamber (MAC) Pg. 26 – Central Atlanta Progress (CAP) Pg. 28 - Fayette County Pg. 31 – Georgia-Pacific Pg. 33 – Pinewood Atlanta LLC

Pg. 54 – CAP Construction: Pg. 60 – AMB Group Infrastructure & Utilities: Pg. 67 – Large: MAC Small: Georgia Power pg . 69, 74 — Georgia Power Transportation & Aviation: Pg. 77 – Large: ATL Small: CAP Pg. 78 – ATL

Banking: Pg. 101 – Atlanta Braves Pg. 103 – Fifth Third Bank Technology & Fintech: Pg. 105 – Large: Midtown Alliance Small: Technology Association of Georgia (TAG) Pg. 106 – Midtown Alliance Pg. 111, 112 – TAG Healthcare: Pg. 117 – Large: Emory Healthcare Small: Piedmont Healthcare Pg. 118, 112, 128 – Jack Kearse, Emory University Pg. 124 – Piedmont Healthcare

Education: Pg. 129 – Large: Morehouse College Small: Emory Healthcare Pg. 134 – Sarah Loftus, Emory University Tourism, Arts & Culture: Pg 143 – Large: MAC Pg. 144 – CAP Pg. 150 – MAC Pg. 154 – Jamestown Sports: Pg. 155, 164 – AMB Group Pg. 156 – Atlanta Braves Pg. 158 – Atlanta Hawks

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Economy: A well-educated population, superior infrastructure and a sound business environment are making Metro Atlanta an area attracting national and international businesses. Homegrown innovation is adding to the robust economy, with synergies and partnerships creating opportunities. Financial technology and the film industry are two areas that are drawing considerable interest.

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Economy in numbers: 6.9

Metro Atlanta nonfarming employment change, June 2016-June 2017 (percent):

6

5.3

5.9

7

3.2

2.6

3.8 Financial activities

3.2

3.7 Information

4

3.5

5

3

-0.1

1

0.8

1.1

2

0

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

Metro Atlanta, employment by sector non-farming, April 2017, (‘000s):

122.4 Construction

162.4 Manufacturing

597.7

1.8

Trade, transport and utilities

Mining and logging

333.4 Government

2,745.7

98.6 Other services

99.8 Information

TOTAL 173

299.4

Financial activities

Leisure and hospitality

343.9 Education and health services Source: U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics

8 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | ECONOMY

513.3 Professional and business services

Overall

Government

Other services

Leisure and hospitality

Education and health services

Professional and business services

Mining and logging

Trade, transportation, and utilities

Manufacturing

Construction

-1

Metro Atlanta languages spoken at home: Languages spoken at home:

Metro Atlanta GDP by sector (non-agriculture), 2015 ($ billion):

Percent

Count

20.5

27.2

Spanish

4.9

19,900

Transport and utilities

Information

French

0.8

3,222

Chinese

0.7

2,908

Korean

0.6

2,293

Hindi

0.5

1,854

German

0.4

1,571

African

0.3

1,155

Other Asian

0.3

1,056

Arabic

0.2

970

Other

0.2

894

76.8 Finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing

50.8 Trade

322.9 TOTAL

Source: statisticalatlas.com

Metro Atlanta GDP 2005-2015 ($ billion):

26.9

400

339.2

305.3

294.1

282.7

274.9

271.1

279.5

280.3

266.3

200

253.7

300

322.1

Manufacturing

52.7

29.0 Government

6.4

100

Other services

0 ‘05

‘06

‘07

‘08

‘09

‘10

‘11

‘12

‘13

‘14

23.7

9.0 Accomodation and food service

Professional and business services

Education and health services

‘15 Source: U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis

Metro Atlanta and U.S. average per capita personal income, 2013-2015 ($):

Metro Atlanta unemployment rate, 2007-2017 (percent):

Atlanta

U.S.

12

49,827

Source: U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis

10

30,000

45,092

48,025

43,493

41,309

40,000

45,953

50,000

8

6 20,000 4 10,000

2

0 2013

2014

Source: U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis

2015

0 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

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Hidden gems: Metro Atlanta has a lot going for it – vibrant industries, a diverse population and engaged stakeholders. Now it is building on its success and branching out to become a serious international player “All of our fundamentals are heading in the right direction,” Kasim Reed, mayor of the City of Atlanta, told a captive audience at an event in Downtown on July 19, 2017. “When has this kind of activity, in terms of the number of businesses moving into the heart of this corridor, ever occurred?”

Mayor Reed was speaking in reference to the city of Atlanta, but he may as well have been talking about the whole of the metropolitan area. As of the end of 2016, 26 Fortune 1000 companies were headquartered in Metro Atlanta, with revenues of $373.9 billion, and 15 of these companies were from the Fortune 500 list.

The attractions of Metro Atlanta on the whole can be broken down into three major factors. One, the State of Georgia is a friendly place to do business, ranked number seven in the nation by Forbes in 2016.

Secondly, it is well connected with a transportation infrastructure centered around the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL), which is the busiest airport in the world. Three, it provides a solid workforce. Exceptional universities mean that there are skilled workers. Atlanta offers a high standard of living for a relatively low cost, which helps to retain talent.

10 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | ECONOMY

When tech giant Amazon announced it was looking for a site for its second headquarters in September 2017, it had Atlanta on the shortlist citing talent and the closeness to an international airport to be two main factors. Amazon will announce its chosen city later in 2017.

Olympic boost The City of Atlanta is the Georgia state capital. It is also the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell, GA Metropolitan Statistical Area, known as Metro Atlanta, which, with a population of 5.79 million, is the largest metropolitan area in the state and the ninth-largest in the U.S. It is made up of 9 counties, comprising more than 100 cities.

In part spurred by the 1996 Summer Olympics, the past two decades have seen a massive change in Atlanta’s demographics. In 1990, the population was 2.96 million, making it the 13th-largest metropolitan area in terms of population size. By 2016, it had broken the top-10 and was the fourth-fastest growing area, adding 90,650 people from 2015 to 2016.

This growth is economically healthy, spurred by employment. Some 71,000 jobs were added in 2016,( )

ECONOMY INTERVIEW

Major drive How sound governance can build a base for sustainable growth across Metro Atlanta and the State of Georgia

Nathan Deal Governor – State of Georgia What have been the main factors driving economic growth in Georgia?

For four consecutive years, Georgia’s been ranked the top state in the nation for business. Our pro-growth policies, talent pool and world-class infrastructure and logistics have bolstered Georgia’s reputation throughout the country and around the globe. Our 20th consecutive annual AAA bond rating, robust rainy day fund and fiscally conservative budgets help drive economic growth. Georgia’s unemployment rate now stands at just 4.8 percent, less than half of the figure we saw in January 2011.

Over the last six-and-a-half years alone, we have created more than 608,700 new, private sector jobs across the state, an increase of 19.3 percent from where we were in 2011 when I first took office. These jobs span a wide range of industries, from auto manufacturing to business agriculture to computer coding to film production. Major companies including Kia, Caterpillar, Porsche, Mercedes, Baxter Pharmaceuticals and Comcast have expanded around or relocated to the state. Metro Atlanta now ranks third in the nation among cities with the most Fortune 500 companies and a total of 17 call Georgia home.

How are educational challenges being addressed to ensure long-term growth?

Strong education leads to a strong economy. In order to ensure the workforce demands of today and tomorrow are met, I’ve prioritized K-12 education, increasing our state investment by more than $2 billion over the past four years. This investment translates into roughly 50 percent of all new state revenue growth going to K-12 public education.

As we continue to invest in a future workforce capable of meeting the demands of the 21st-century marketplace and as we work to turn failing schools

around, I look forward to seeing these numbers and percentages improve even further.

How can the state leverage its strength in technology to increase economic development?

Building on our efforts to maintain Georgia’s status as the No. 1 state in which to do business, we are continuing to work on providing the best possible foundation for innovative companies to grow.

The influx of high-tech jobs we have seen over the past few years allows for innovation and growth across all economic sectors. By continuing to invest in education, we are building a smarter Georgia, a stronger workforce and a state that will remain a top destination for new industries and jobs for many years to come. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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ECONOMY INTERVIEW

Better together How Atlanta has positioned itself to attract the best people and companies

Kasim Reed Mayor – City of Atlanta These factors, combined with the number of young skilled professionals, have attracted the Fortune 500 companies. In the metro region, we have the thirdlargest concentration of Fortune 500 businesses behind New York and Houston. We have 26 Fortune 1000 businesses. There are both large and small companies. There are not a lot of cities that provide the varied opportunities that Atlanta does.

What do you believe are the driving factors for companies relocating their headquarters to Atlanta?

We are having this level of success because of a unique convergence of strong fundamentals in the areas that matter. We are financially stronger than we have been before. Hartsfield-Jackson Airport is the biggest economic generator in the southeast. It has an annual economic impact of more than $34 billion. It allows people that live and work in the City of Atlanta to get to 75 percent of the U.S. population in two hours or less.

The level of education in Atlanta is a major positive.

We have 275,000 university students in Metro Atlanta and world leading universities. But what makes Atlanta special is a combination of historically black colleges and universities that produce black college graduates at a level that almost no U.S. city can match.

12 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | ECONOMY

What were the most successful strategies to battle unemployment and what is being done to reduce it further?

The key to cutting unemployment in half was the partnership between Atlanta and the State of Georgia with Governor Nathan Deal. He is a conservative Republican, and I am a progressive Democrat, but when it comes to job creation, we work together. That is how we managed to get the Porsche headquarters in North America, which is the largest investment for Porsche outside of Germany, and why we have MercedesBenz moving to Sandy Springs. By providing stability and strong fundamentals, people and companies are deciding on Atlanta.

What has been the impact of the infrastructure projects?

The impact has been the relocation of 17 regional headquarters of major firms to Atlanta. These include Honeywell’s technology hub, with 850 jobs, GE’s digital technology hub and one of four Microsoft Innovation Centers. When you make decisions that show that you care about today and the next 20 years, the business community shows their approval with their feet by relocating or expanding in your city.

The $300-million NCR campus being built, with 5,000 jobs moving into the city, is the single largest job move into Atlanta in 40 years. Average salaries will be in excess of $67,000 per year. The economic impact on the city will be more than $1 million per year.

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

( )which placed it at number 10 in terms of job growth for large metropolitan areas, according to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Estimates suggest that in 2017, Metro Atlanta will account for some 59 percent of all new jobs in Georgia.

As of July 2017, employment is down to 4.7 percent, a drop of 0.6 percentage points on the same time the previous year, and almost 5 percentage points less than the high in July 2009 of 10.3 percent.

Metro Atlanta is a diverse area, with 48.3 percent of its residents white, 33.1 percent black and 10.6 percent Hispanic. Other than English, the most common languages spoken are Spanish, African languages and Chinese. Some 18 percent of Metro Atlanta residents speak a language other than English. Metro Atlanta’s median native age is 34.4 years, more than 18 months younger than the national median of 36 years. Around a third of Metro Atlanta residents have a bachelor’s degree.

Despite its growth, Atlanta remains attractive as a city, striking a medium between opportunities and livability. It is only the 15th most expensive city among the 25 largest metropolitan areas, and just above average among all 270 metropolitan areas. According to a 2016 report from the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC), for a person earning $50,000 per annum in Metro Atlanta to have a comparable standard of living in New York, they would need to earn $114,000. For California, that figure would need to be $88,300.

In May 2017, personal finance website Wallethub rated Atlanta as the sixth-best U.S. city in which to start a career. For professional opportunities, such as salary, availability of employment and job satisfaction, it rated Atlanta eighth. For quality of life, Atlanta was rank at number 10.

Housing issues The median household income is $60,219, almost

Metro Atlanta GILMER

PICKENS

75

575

FORSYTH

CHEROKEE

BARTOW

HALL 985

480

FULTON

PAULDING

COBB

GWINNETT 285

75

85

ATLANTA

20

85

WALTON

DeKALB

DOUGLAS

20

FULTON

ROCKDALE 675

85

CLAYTON HENRY FAYETTE

75

$5,000 above the national value of $55,775, while the median property value is $186,300, some $8,000 less than the national $194,500. Property values are rising faster with 9.4 percent growth year-on-year, compared to 7.45 percent nationally. The poverty rate is 13.9 percent, lower than the national rate of 14.7 percent.

However, these statistics do not tell the whole story, and affordability is a key issue in Metro Atlanta.

Nationally, wage growth has not kept up with house prices. A report from Standard & Poor’s in May 2017 stated U.S. house prices were rising twice as fast as wages, and the typical homebuyer has left the 25-35 age bracket and is now 44 years old. ( )

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ECONOMY INTERVIEW

Big MAC How the Metro Atlanta Chamber is strengthening sectors at home and building connections overseas

Hala Moddlemog President & CEO – Metro Atlanta Chamber ties our work back to the local universities and the public sector.

How can the chamber support innovation and attract more venture capital?

One of the biggest things that the Metro Atlanta Chamber can do is expand our ecosystem. We need to get the entrepreneurs and the innovators connected to the Fortune 1000 companies based here. We have a whole program to connect young companies, entrepreneurs and innovators that need funding or help with technology patents.

The chamber meets with companies, nurtures them and introduces them to the right people at the right level. We connect them with the big companies and offer support with business issues they may be facing.

Which of Atlanta’s growing sectors holds the most potential?

Fintech is an important part of economic development in Atlanta, so we are working with the governor and the Board of Regents with the university system to help our educational establishments develop new curricula for the sector. We need talent in this area, as we want people to walk out of university and be able to start working in the field right away. Fintech goes way beyond payments. We have to make sure that people understand the other areas that the sector encompasses. We are also trying to attract more venture capital for fintech.

Smart cities and the internet of things are also important, thriving sectors. There are a number of players involved in Atlanta. This tech focus constantly 14 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | ECONOMY

How can Atlanta attract more foreign investment?

Atlanta has been chosen, along with other areas of the country, to work on the Global Cities Initiative 2.0. We worked on 1.0, and there were two big pushes. One was getting foreign direct investment here, and the other was increasing our exports.

We have two programs. One is called Metro Atlanta Export Challenge. In 2016, we gave out $300,000 in grants to companies in Atlanta to help them gain expertise in the export market. We also helped create the connections for export with 10 conferences held around the world.

There is a healthy global commerce scene here. I recently spent some time in Japan with Governor Deal talking to companies about investment in Atlanta. We already have a lot of Japanese companies here. We visited some new companies and encouraged them to expand in Atlanta. We also have delegations going to China and the U.K. In 2017, to date, we have recruited 16 foreign companies.

Artwork Hilton downtown

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

( ) Affordable housing is not an issue going unnoticed, however. The Atlanta BeltLine, in which a defunct railway corridor that circles the city is being converted into green space and a multiuse trail and development, includes a substantial affordable housing component. The project’s ultimate goal is to create 5,600 units of workforce housing. By the end of 2016, $12.5 million had gone toward housing initiatives, including down payment assistance, land acquisition and incentives for developers. However, an investigation in 2017 showed that only 785 units had received funding directly from the BeltLine. To compound the issue, the BeltLine has driven property values up in some neighborhoods, and along with that, property taxes have gone up, causing hardship for longtime residents of historical black neighborhoods, such as that where Martin Luther King Jr. grew up.

In June 2017, Mayor Reed announced that $9 million from the Eastside Tax Allocation District had been approved by the board of directors for Invest Atlanta, the city’s economic development authority, for a $90.5-million tower on Peachtree Center Avenue in Downtown Atlanta. The 302-unit residential tower will include a 60-unit workforce-housing component, which makes up 20 percent of the total units.

Outside of the City of Atlanta, the rest of the metro area offers a better value proposition for homebuyers and renters. In 2017, the Decatur Housing Authority celebrated the completion of phase II of the Trinity Walk project, which replaced an old public housing area with a new development consisting of affordable units for families, the disabled and the elderly. Decatur is well connected to Atlanta through the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) light rail system, creating more option for those working in the City of Atlanta that don’t want to pay the property prices.

A place in the Sunbelt Atlanta climate is designated ‘humid subtropical,’ and combined with heavy traffic and pollen, it has been called by the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America ‘the worst city for asthma suffers to live in.’

Despite that, the pleasant climate and ample green space add to the attraction of the area, which consists of 18 counties.

Atlanta is designated a Beta+ city by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network, which means it “links moderate economic regions into the world economy.” A.T. Kearney’s Global Cities Outlook placed Atlanta at number six on the Global Outlook in 2016, just behind Houston and London, and up from 16th place the year before. The list measures personal 16 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | ECONOMY

The State of Georgia has been given AAA ratings by all three major rating firms.

well-being, economics, innovation and governance and is used to measure a city’s international potential.

One of the key drivers of Metro Atlanta’s internationalist approach is the airport. The Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) holds the title of the busiest airport in the world, both by passenger traffic and by takeoffs and landings, mainly because of the number of connections. The airport averages 275,000 passengers per day, traveling to and from 75 international destinations from 50 countries and 150 domestic destinations, with 2,500 arrivals and departures. Some 80 percent of the U.S. population is reach reachable from the airport within a two-hour flight. The practicality of the airport is often a key factor for companies being located in the area.

Also a logistical advantage is proximity to the Port of

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

Savannah, which is the fourth-largest container port in the U.S. and the second-largest on the East Coast. A four-hour drive from Metro Atlanta, the Port of Savannah is a key contributor to Atlanta’s position as a trade and logistics hub with a warehousing industry.

Open for business Overall, the State of Georgia is considered to be good for doing business. It has AAA ratings from all three major agencies, Moody’s, Fitch and Standard & Poor’s, and is ranked highly on major surveys. In 2017, CNBC ranked Georgia second, after Washington State, in their ‘America’s Top States for Business 2017’ scorecard, ranking it first for economy, third for workforce and forth for infrastructure. The Area Development website has rated it number one for four years in a row.

Georgia has relatively low corporate taxes, around 6 percent, and also offers a range of financial incentives in the form of tax credits. The Job Tax Credit can save up to $4,000 per year, per employee for jobs created in areas where jobs are needed most, such as Clayton County. To qualify jobs must be created in tourism, processing, manufacturing, telecommunications, broadcasting, warehousing and distribution or research and development. Credits at a lower rate can be claimed throughout the rest of Metro Atlanta.

Other tax credit schemes target companies creating large numbers of quality jobs, companies increasing port imports and exports, and companies hiring individuals that face barriers to employment, such as criminal convictions. Companies can also earn tax credits for research, employment training and investment into telecommunications support.

The Metro Atlanta Chamber (MAC) works with the business community to encourage companies to relocate to the area, as well as develop sectors that are ( )

Steven Justice Executive Director – Georgia Centers of Innovation

Atlanta has a great innovation culture. There are incubators, co-working spaces and accelerators all tied into the startup environment. On the other hand, there is traditional economic development such as chambers of commerce and economic development, local authorities and of course large traditional economic generators like Georgia Power. We act as a bridge between these entities. We interact with the innovation culture, but we’re also part of the economic development culture.

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ECONOMY INTERVIEW

Solid state drive How the growth of the state’s economy is underpinned by stable leadership and a solid infrastructure

Pat Wilson Commissioner – Georgia Department of Economic Development How can good budgeting and financial planning help to spur growth in Georgia?

The fact that the State of Georgia has been a AAAbond-rated state for 20 consecutive years, even when the federal government has lost its AAA rating, is amazing. It comes down to prudent conservative leadership when it comes to budgeting. We now have more than $2 billion in our rainy day fund, and this leads to trust from the business community that the state is going to be well managed.

For example, companies have faith that incentives such as the film tax credit are not going to change because the state can’t balance its budget. As of 2017, the film industry has had an impact of $9.5 billion on the state. The amazing growth comes down to Georgia being consistent and fully supportive of not only the industry, but of the tax credit itself. We’ve seen other states try to compete, but when they couldn’t balance their budgets, they had to roll their tax credits back.

To what do you attribute to the job growth of more than 700,000 and unemployment reduced to 4.8 percent?

Georgia has been a well-managed state for some time.

It has been rated the number one state in the nation in which to do business for four consecutive years by the magazine Site Selection. We have the number one economy in the nation, and June 2017 growth numbers worked out at 7.1 percent.

Georgia’s success comes down to the leadership that has created an environment that is business-friendly and promotes growth over the long term. Companies know they are going to be supported when they come to Georgia, and that is has a great workforce with a highly educated population. The connectivity of the state, with the world’s busiest airport as well as the fastest growing port in the U.S., is also important.

18 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | ECONOMY

How important are international markets for Georgia?

Georgia has been very consistent in its international focus. We opened our first market internationally in 1973 in Japan, we have been in Korea for 30 years and China for 10 years. Once Georgia commits to a market, we stay in it because we are committed to growing relationships over the long term.

Georgia is continuing to invest in international marketing with activities such as trade missions.

Governor Deal has been committed to going overseas and continuing to spread our message.

We have divided our international sector into two focuses. One is trade, which of course is helping Georgia companies find new markets, so we look at countries where Georgia or the U.S. has a free trade agreements. Because of this, South America has been an emerging market for us.

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

( ) already active in Metro Atlanta. The Atlanta Committee for Progress (ACP) partners with the city, CEOs and heads of nonprofit and educational institutions to work together on key issues such as K-12 education, infrastructure development and creating opportunities for locals.

“Atlanta is extraordinary in the sense that corporate civic engagement is a deep-rooted part of the culture of the city. The way business leaders engage with the public sector and government leadership is truly unique. That makes our work really effective,” Duriya Farooqui, executive director for the ACP, told Focus: Atlanta.

Global initiative Metro Atlanta is home to 2,500 foreign-owned enterprises, according to MAC. International exports of goods reached $19.2 billion in 2015, making up 54 percent of Georgia’s total of $35.6 billion. Main exports included transportation equipment, nonelectrical machinery, computer and electronic products, chemicals and other electrical equipment. The main destinations were Canada, Mexico, Singapore, Germany and Japan. Altogether, 91 percent of goods exported shipped overseas, and 87 percent of all exporters were small and medium-sized enterprises.

Central to Atlanta’s international economy are organizations such as the World Trade Center (WTC) Atlanta, which is one of a global network of more than 300 centers. The WTC Atlanta works primarily to support overseas business expansion and offers international networking opportunities and personal corporate introductions. It also offers trade education and information services.

In May 2017, the WTC Atlanta organized its firstever World Trade Day, which took place at the Georgia International Conference Center. The event focused on the North American Free-Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with discussions on advanced manufacturing, energy markets and digital technologies.

The termination of NAFTA has been a regular theme of President Donald Trump, who claimed that it represented a bad deal for the U.S. before the 2016 presidential elections, although his stance on subject softened in early 2017. As of September 2017, there is little sign of the deal being terminated, nor suggestion of anything solid to replace it.

With $3.55 billion exported to Canada from Metro Atlanta and $3.07 billion exported to Mexico in 2015, any threat to trade with the U.S.’s nearest neighbors and Metro Atlanta’s two biggest international export markets could have a serious economic impact on the area.

Doug Hooker Executive Director, Atlanta Regional Commission

The thing that you hear most people in Atlanta complain about is the state of traffic. With the recent collapse of the I-85 bridge, road infrastructure is under the spotlight more. The reality is that traffic congestion is not out of proportion to our size and scale as a region by any measure.

Atlanta has always had aspirations to be a great international city. However, there have been difficulties, and the last recession hit Atlanta hard. As a city, we have managed to come through and discovered that diversity and collaboration are a critical part of our growth. That’s diversity in all forms – people have to start working together a lot better, and we need to be a lot more honest with ourselves about our major challenges.

The Metro Atlanta Chamber is now talking about inclusive economic development, and they’ve asked the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC), the United Way of Greater Atlanta and the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta to help them in an informal partnership.

Access to opportunity and education will only give a 4 percent or less chance of escaping the cycle of poverty in this region. This is something we need to consider, and we just can’t let this stand if we’re going to be a viable thriving community in 20, 30 years. Atlanta has this collective sense that we have to work together to do better.

Because we are in contact with so many people in different sectors all across our community, geographically, economically, socially and politically, it is the ARC’s responsibility to present the bigger picture. Students and professors from other universities in other parts of the country have access to capital to test their ideas, but we still have a long way to go.

If people trust us with their aspirations, challenges and hopes, then we have to try to bring together sectors of the community with similar interests and help drive aspirations toward reality. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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ECONOMY OVERVIEW

Klaus Zellmer President and CEO, Porsche Cars North America

What were the main factors that led to the North American headquarters being in Atlanta?

We’ve called Atlanta home since 1998. At that time, our headquarters relocated from Reno, Nevada to Sandy Springs. In 2010, we started looking for a new location, and after considering more than 70 options in a number of states, we decided to build our new home at One Porsche Drive. We are right next to HartsfieldJackson Atlanta International Airport and being so close to the airport allows 80 percent of the U.S. population to reach our Experience Center within two-and-a-half hours of flying time. Ultimately, Atlanta’s transportation infrastructure, skilled workforce and strong support from the city and the state were key reasons for us to stay.

What is Atlanta’s growth potential?

I see tremendous potential. The city continues to attract well-known investors and is already home to world-class companies such as Delta, Coca-Cola, UPS, Home Depot and many more. Every day, people are moving to Atlanta.

Overall, the city’s population has grown 7 percent since 2010. Georgia’s universities are strong. Unemployment is low. Construction is booming and services are thriving.

That and the airport’s continued expansion make for a vibrant city and a growing economy. The city is known for its pro-business environment, strong startup companies and Mayor Reed and his team are going the extra mile to attract new investors.

What will be the impact of the Porsche Experience Center for the brand and the city?

Our Experience Center is not only the first of its kind in North America, but is also the largest investment to date for Porsche outside Germany. The $100-million, 27acre complex has a 1.6-mile driver development track, a business center, a classic car gallery and a fine-dining restaurant. We built our new home with the customer experience in mind. As the name suggests, it is the place where customers, fans and car aficionados can experience everything Porsche stands for.

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Metro Atlanta’s and Georgia’s attraction for businesses also expands beyond borders. Good infrastructure and strong education and healthcare institutions create international links. With 547 Japanese-affiliated companies employing more than 36,000 workers, and with more than $10 billion invested in Georgia as of 2015, the state is considered by some to be the center of Japanese industry for the southeast U.S. Canada also has major direct investment in the state with 257 Canadian-owned businesses employing almost 10,000 people by 2105.

As part of Atlanta’s push for more global involvement, the first Atlanta International Economic Development Summit, was held in September 2017. The two-day forum was hosted by the Mayor’s Office of International Affairs, in partnership with the Brookings Institution and was attended by representatives from 12 of Atlanta’s partner cities, including Cape Town, Paris, London and Nuremberg. The summit discussed best practices for international investment and launched City 2 City, an online platform for cities to exchange leads on investment and trade.

Take on the world The Brookings Institution’s Global Cities Initiative was designed to help leaders in global metropolitan centers to better engage with the international market. Further goals are to encourage trade, partnerships, innovation and direct investment across borders. As part of the initiative, Metro Atlanta published a foreign direct investment (FDI) plan with four key objectives in 2106.

The first of these objectives is to add 190 new foreignowned enterprises to the area by 2021, which would represent an increase of some 36 percent on 2016 figures. The second is to increase FDI employment growth. The third is to monitor and increase the satisfaction of foreign-owned enterprises in the area, with the first CEO survey is taking place in 2017. The final goal set out in the plan is to help increase the number of regional partnerships between economic development organizations in the 29 counties that make up Metro Atlanta, in an effort to help foster international business and the success of the FDI plan.

Tech central The fintech industry plays a significant part in the way that Metro Atlanta, and the State of Georgia interact with the world economy. The moniker “Transaction Alley” refers to the oft-quoted statistic that 70 percent of all global electronic payments are handled in Atlanta. The industry is worth approximately $118 billion per year, according to the Technology Association of Georgia

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

(TAG). Central to the fintech industry is the American Transaction Processors Coalition (ATPC), which was launched in Atlanta in 2014 with the goal of promoting and lobbying for Georgia’s financial transactions industry.

The ATPC has partnered with the City of London, for the P20 transatlantic payments initiative. P20 was formed with a view to highlight the importance of the payments and fintech industry. It brings together leaders from governments, regulatory industries and the private sector to discuss the implications and actions needed to protect and improve cross-border electronic transactions, cybersecurity and compliance issues. The first P20 conference is being held in London October 2017 and will cover subjects such as cybersecurity, innovation and global financial inclusion.

Close economic relations with London is natural, given Atlanta’s rising status as a fintech hub and

London’s traditional position as a finance center.

However, the U.K.’s 2016 advisory referendum on E.U. membership and the subsequent parliamentary decision to leave the E.U. could mean that London no longer has access to important European markets.

This potential change in status is already creating new opportunities for Metro Atlanta.

One company, Payments and Cards Network, has already decided to move its U.K. office to a location near the BeltLine, and the ATPC is working to attract more payment companies from the U.K. and Europe.

Technology in Atlanta made headlines is less positive light at the beginning of September 2017, when details of a security breach at the locally based Equifax were made public. According to reports, the breach of the creditratings and collections agency in May 2017 could have compromised some 143 million customers in the U.S. The company faces criticism for its delay in informing ( )

The fintech industry is significant for the way Metro Atlanta interacts with the world economy.

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ECONOMY INTERVIEW

To the top tier How Metro Atlanta’s resources and talent are creating an environment for companies to thrive

Eloisa Klementich President & CEO – Invest Atlanta with more than 30 innovation centers and co-working facilities, is fertile ground for growth.

The Atlanta Technology Development Center (ATDC) is one of the oldest incubators in the nation.

Their goal is to help entrepreneurs launch and grow successful technology companies. Next to ATDC is Coda, the high-tech computing center that will house one of the fastest data centers in any urban core. This concentration of resources is attractive to businesses.

What are the challenges to incentivizing business in Atlanta?

There are more than 19,300 cities in the nation, all competing for good jobs and economic investments.

Atlanta has been successful, but to ensure that the city remains competitive in the 21st century, Invest Atlanta will continue to push forward with new, innovative programs and initiatives that drive job creation and retention, increase investment and improve the quality of life for Atlantans.

As innovation and creativity are crucial to Atlanta’s economic growth, Invest Atlanta is working to attract more capital for the city’s expanding innovation sector and searching for ways to cultivate the innovation ecosystem. Investors tell us that where there are ideas, there will be investments. Atlanta’s startup ecosystem, 22 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | ECONOMY

What role does Invest Atlanta have in fostering business?

We are the economic development arm of the city. This means that our number one objective is to increase investment, jobs and quality of life while building a city that is open and more equitable. Invest Atlanta’s strategies focus on creating an environment that is not only business-friendly, but also serves our residents.

Since 2010, Invest Atlanta has facilitated more than 33,000 jobs. That’s a higher rate of job growth than almost any other city in the country. But economic development is competitive, so we must continue attracting new companies while strengthening ones already here by providing affordable workforce housing, fostering our business environment and ensuring that transportation is efficient.

What are your expectations from Atlanta?

I see confidence and optimism in Atlanta right now to support continued economic growth in 2017 and beyond. Part of Invest Atlanta’s success comes from knowing what companies are looking for in cities where they choose to do business, such as access to top workforce talent, low cost of living and ease of doing business. If we can continue to focus our efforts in these key areas, Atlanta will become a “tier-one” city.

My goal is that one day, people will look at the U.S. and say “New York, Los Angeles and Atlanta.”

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

Developments like Ponce City Market are changing the way that Atlanta’s residents work and live.

( ) customers and the public of the data leak, with further controversy added by the fact that executives in the company had sold stock prior to details coming out. U.S. regulators plan on a full investigation, as of September 2017.

Good to talk The Atlanta Center for International Arbitration and Mediation (ACIAM) is another vehicle by which the metro area is increasing its international profile. The Atlanta International Arbitration Society was originally founded in 2011 with a view to build upon the area’s international connections and arbitration-friendly legal environment, and the center was launched in 2015 as a place for international commercial dispute resolution. Hearings and other activities take place in the $82.5-million Georgia State Law building situated in Downtown Atlanta.

According to ACIAM, Georgia’s courts follow a “predictable and non-interventionist policy” for arbitration and mediation. Atlanta is also home to the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, which is the U.S.’s most international arbitration-friendly court.

State courts allow foreign lawyers on a pro hac vice basis, meaning companies can have their own lawyers represent them under conditions set by the court.

In fall 2017, the ACIAM launched an international promotional campaign through which it signed memoranda of understanding with the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Court of Arbitration in Paris and the International Center for Dispute Resolution in New York. In the fiscal year 20117, the center heard 35 cases, both domestic and international, which is more than double the number it heard in its first year of operation.

In good health Headquartered in Atlanta, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is one of the most recognizable names in international healthcare. A federal organization, the CDC works in various areas around the globe, concentrating on the developing world, where disease, poor health and shortfalls in health education are more common. It is a founding member of the International Association of National Public Health Institutes. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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ECONOMY OVERVIEW

Chris Clark President & CEO, Georgia Chamber

What are Georgia’s strengths, in comparison to other states?

The main thing that has changed over the past five to ten years is the talent. For example, Mercedes-Benz and State Farm both moved to Atlanta because this is a university town that has skilled graduates.

In 2005, we passed legislation creating tax credits for the film industry. One year later, there were 13 productions in the state. In 2016, there were over 300 productions and we’re number three in the country right now behind New York and California. For the first 10 years of that tax credit, it attracted a small amount of business, but then growth started to accelerate. The real boost came in when Screen Gems, Pinewood and a number of other companies built studios in Atlanta.

Having those studios has created a real impact. Now a lot of states that compete against us in the movie industry, such as Michigan and North Carolina, have dropped their tax incentives altogether because they can’t beat us. We have the infrastructure now.

However, in general, Georgia has never been a heavy-incentive state, because there are other things that make the place attractive. There are workforce training programs, it is a good location and there is excellent infrastructure. We still have to address K-12 education, to increase talent, as well as the transport and transit issues, healthcare and social inequality.

How can Georgia ensure a strong workforce?

There are a number of challenges around employment.

Around 1 million baby boomers will be retiring in Georgia over the next six years, which is going to create 1 million openings for young adults to take up. We need to attract young professionals. We need to create the cool factor, which is why things like the BeltLine are important.

However, we also need to lift people out of poverty and back into the workforce in neighborhoods where they might not be able to get transportation and access to good employment opportunities. This is an issue that we are currently looking at.

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According to MAC, the CDC employs more than 8,000 full-time workers in more than 170 different positions.

However, as of September 2017 the Trump administration had enforced budgetary restrictions that meant a number of positions in the organization were going unfilled. The CDC has a close affiliation with the Emory University System and Emory Healthcare. Together they have worked projects such as stopping the spread of the Zika virus. The CDC also partners with a number national, international and faith-based organization devoted to education, prevention and immunization programs.

Examples include the World Health Organization and the Global Health Security Agenda.

The prestige and knowledge that the CDC brings to the medical community in Atlanta create substantial opportunity and potential for healthcare in the area. There are more than 200 firms in the fields of bioscience and health IT employing more than 30,000 people in Georgia, according to TAG. Y’allywood One of Georgia’s, and particularly Atlanta’s, great successes in incentivizing business has been the growth of its film industry. The Georgia Film Commission was founded in 1973 following the filming of the 1972 hit “Deliverance,” which was set in rural Georgia. In 2005, the state rolled out the first film tax incentive as part of the Georgia Entertainment and Industry Investment Act, offering 9 percent tax credit on a minimum investment of $500,000 per year, with extra incentives for investing in certain counties and employing locals.

In 2008, it was changed to be worth up to 30 percent, 20 percent of which is for production or post-production of more than $500,000 undertaken in Georgia, and an extra 10 percent for displaying the state logo. Since 2007, the industry has grown from having an impact of $67.7 million in direct spending to $2.7 billion in fiscal year 2017, with the overall impact some $9.5 billion.

Other than the favorable tax environment, the physical features of Georgia make it an attractive place for movie companies. The climate is temperate, which allows companies to film outside year-round, and the landscape is varied, opening up the types of locations that can be shot.

The state’s film industry is the third-largest in the country, behind California and New York State. As of 2017, there are 3,000 motion picture and television companies, with 1,957 of them directly productionrelated. Some 25,000 people in the state are employed in the industry with an additional 30,000 jobs estimated to be indirectly related.

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

Pinewood Atlanta Studios, located in Fayette County, is the largest film production complex in the area, and is the only studio from the legendary U.K. film company, Pinewood, to be located in the U.S. It takes up 700 acres in the county and consists of 18 soundstages, as well as 400,000 square feet of workshop space, office and production support, production and post-production facilities and backlot areas with forest and river.

The studio has been utilized for many of the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, one of the most lucrative and popular franchises of recent years, starting with Ant Man in 2014. In March 2017, it was announced that Pinewood Atlanta was hosting the most expensive film ever, with a $1 billion budget. The film is rumored to be “Avengers: Infinity Wars,” again, for Marvel.

Pinewood Studio Atlanta is also home to the Georgia Film Academy, a partnership between the studio and the university system of Georgia to offer courses in film production.

The Tyler Perry Studios were opened in 2006 on Krog Street which connects to the BeltLine, before moving to southwest Atlanta in 2008. Since opening, the studio has made around 20 motion pictures and numerous TV shows, all produced by Tyler Perry. The studio has also been used for the popular TV series, “The Walking Dead,” which films in Metro Atlanta. In 2015, the studio received approval for the sale of the Fort McPherson site in Fulton County for a 330-acre

development projected to be finished in 2018. The sale is worth $26 million.

The industry is still gaining momentum with a 24acre, six-stage complex in the north of Fayetteville, Fayette County called Cinema South Studios slated to be complete in December 2019. CineDome Studios is a proposed $62-million studio in Chattahoochee Hills on a 100-acre site. Construction for the Three Rings Studio in Covington, Newton County, broke ground in May 2017. It is hoped that the studio will create 1,000 new jobs in the area. Other studios include Atlanta Metro Studios and Blackhall Studios.

There are a total of 45 sound stages covering more than 2 million square feet in the state.

Television productions include the award-winning series “Stranger Things.”

The FX-show “Atlanta” was nominated for five Emmys, with lead actor and director Donald Glover collecting the awards for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series and Outstanding Director of a Comedy Series. Glover grew up in DeKalb County and studied at the DeKalb School of the Arts.

Since 2007, the film industry has grown from having an impact of $67.7 million, to $2.7 billion in FY 2017.

Taking the lead The City of Atlanta’s success can in part be put down to strong leadership. Current Mayor Kasim Reed took office in 2010 and was subsequently voted in for a second term starting in 2014. Aligned with the democratic party, his tenure in the mayoral position

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ECONOMY OVERVIEW

The Daffodil Project has brightened up Atlanta’s Downtown district.

has been characterized by a focus on development, especially of public assets such as transportation. With Reed’s second term due to expire at the end of 2017, he will not be allowed to run again. Mayoral elections will be held in Atlanta November 7.

Throughout the city, as well as the metro area, a number of key organizations are in place to help to spur investment and drive growth. The Midtown Alliance was created in 1978 and is a group of businesses and local leaders focusing on improving and maintaining the Atlanta Midtown area. In 2000, the group, in conjunction with commercial property owners in the area, established the Midtown Improvement District. It is a self-taxing district that contributes to

public resources and encourages economic growth.

According to the Midtown Alliance, the district is developing at five-times the rate of Atlanta overall. As of mid-2017, there are 23 major development projects under construction, with 1.9 million square feet of office and institutional space. Since 2015, more than 12,000 jobs have been created in Midtown.

Since 1999, the Buckhead Community Improvement District (CID) has invested more than $60 million into projects and schemes in Buckhead. As of 2017, it is working on some 30 traffic and street projects including traffic modeling for traffic lights as part of the Smart Cities project, improvements to Peachtree Road and the widening of Piedmont.

Greg Hare Managing Partner – Ogletree Deakins

Previous city leaders had great vision in putting such heavy investment in Atlanta’s airport. There’s rarely any need to take a connecting flight, because you can go nonstop just about anywhere in the U.S. Of course, businesses consider things like ease of travel when they are looking for places to be based.

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ECONOMY OVERVIEW

The Atlanta Downtown Improvement District (ADID) was founded in 1995 by Central Atlanta Progress as a public-private partnership focusing on the improvement of the Downtown area of Atlanta.

The ADID has invested more than $73 million over the past 10 years. By 2016, there was $4 billion worth of projects planned or underway. One example is the ongoing Woodruff Park Master Plan, which is a scheme to improve a centrally located park in the district. The park will host a number of events, such as art installations, poetry and performances, and will feature sports amenities, such as table tennis and children’s play area.

“We have a big focus on housing. We look for longterm solutions. Our residential population is at 27,000, but we have the space and the infrastructure to support more residents. We partner with Invest Atlanta to highlight where markets are and then help incentivize investment,” Jennifer Ball, vice president of planning and economic development for Central Atlanta Progress, told Focus: Atlanta.

Outside the limits of the City of Atlanta, the activities of the various counties and cities have an equally important impact on the metropolitan region. The

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ECONOMY OVERVIEW

Ernest LaMont Greer President, Greenberg Traurig – Atlanta

What makes Atlanta’s economy unique?

One important distinction is that we have a number of people of color in middle management, and so a lot of African Americans enjoy a middle-class lifestyle in Atlanta. Second, Atlanta has numerous publically traded companies, in addition to Fortune 500 companies, so there’s a huge focus on civic responsibility in the City of Atlanta. Third, Atlanta has a vibrant airport, which allows us to participate in economic development like few other places, because Delta flies direct from here to many other cities across the country and the world.

Finally, Atlanta has easy access to the Port of Savannah, which is one of the largest and fastestgrowing container ports in the country.

How has the entrance of large multinational and Fortune 500 firms impacted Atlanta’s economy?

When large companies enter the marketplace, they bring jobs – and these are typically high-paying jobs that add to the tax base. Their arrival also adds to the consumption of real estate, brings more money for foundations and increases the general corporate support for the community. In many instances, when you bring in corporate jobs, you also add vendors that support these corporations and therefore feel the need to have a presence in the marketplace to create a competitive advantage. All of these things develop momentum for a community.

The entrance of large corporations also provides the Atlanta business community with a strong base from which to grow. You don’t become an international city without a number of Fortune 500 companies.

When it comes to attracting international companies, there are four major factors: the cost of living; tax credits and incentives; education; and safety. Mayor Reed is focused on all of those issues.

He has created a new affordable housing platform, is committed to investing in Atlanta’s Public Schools, and he has always been very focused on the need to lower the city’s crime rate.

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South of the City of Atlanta, Fayette County offers scenic rural environments for those looking to escape the urban center.

Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) is made up of representatives from the counties of Cherokee, Clayton, Cobb, DeKalb, Douglas, Fayette, Fulton, Gwinnett, Henry as well as the City of Atlanta.

The main aim of the ARC is to create crossgovernmental co-operation on issues to do with regional planning such as security, transportation, attracting business, providing facilities and services for the elderly and disabled and community development.

It oversees the implementation of the 25-year Atlanta Region’s Plan, which begin in 2015 and sets out a number of objectives under three main goals to create world-class infrastructure, livable communities and a competitive economy.

The commission also has a workforce department that runs WorkSource Atlanta Regional, which partners with companies across the area, offering on-the-job training and other human resources assistance, creating benefits for business owners and employees. The ARC also provided emergency health and accommodation services for elderly and disabled residents during Hurricane Irma, which struck the region in September 2017.

The Gwinnett Village CID has been working to improve

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

roads and green space in the Interstate 85 corridor of Gwinnett County. It is the largest CID in Georgia, made up of 550 businesses and accounting for $1 billion in commercial property. The area has 5,000 businesses employing more than 60,000 workers. The CID estimates that every $1 invested represents development worth $3.50 going back into the community.

Partnership Gwinnett is a public-private initiative that works with local and regional partners to bring jobs and capital investment to Gwinnett County. The organization

focuses on target industries which are health services and sciences, IT, professional and corporate headquarters, advanced manufacturing and supply chain management.

Established in 2007, Partnership Gwinnett’s economic development strategy and implementation plan sets out a number of recommendations and objectives surrounding business development and international investment as well as encouraging entrepreneurship and community development.

In September 2016, Partnership Gwinnett received an award of excellence for its economic development strategic plan by the International Economic Development Council.

The Cumberland CID covers 3,520 acres in the south of Cobb County. Since its founding in 1984, the Cumberland CID has collected some $130 million in tax revenue, which has been used to spur some $500 million in development through infrastructure projects. As of 2017, Cumberland CID is working on development and infrastructure projects collectively worth $4 billion. One of its biggest projects has been the Interstate 75 diamond interchange, which cost nearly $50 million to reconfigure.

The North Fulton CID was formed in 2003 and, as of 2015, has invested more than $18 million into the North Fulton area, creating $90 million worth of new infrastructure. Such projects have included improvements to hardscaping and landscaping of the GA 400 interchanges as well as other various roads and interchanges outside of the North Fulton CID area.

Future projects include the supporting of a northern extension to existing MARTA lines, to help reduce traffic in the area.

The East Metro DeKalb CID is made up of more than 200 property owners and has an estimated yearly revenue of more than $200,000. The CID’s first major project was the beautification of Wesley Chapel Road in Greater Decatur. The project was completed in August 2015. ( )

Nick Masino Chief Economic Development Officer – Partnership Gwinnett

The ethnic makeup of Gwinnett’s diverse population is what the rest of the U.S. will look like in the year 2040. Diversity and inclusion are integral pieces of what makes our county successful and a global incubator for talent and innovation. We are leading the way for communities to create sustained success in a global economy.

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ECONOMY INTERVIEW

Mutual benefits How Metro Atlanta has developed to become a home for major firms, which then give back to the community

Christian Fischer President & CEO – Georgia-Pacific an exciting new accelerator program called Engage Ventures, which helps entrepreneurial companies with their go-to-market strategies. Georgia-Pacific is one of the founding partners, along with several Fortune 1000 brands based in Atlanta who are contributing capital, expertise, time and resources. Georgia-Pacific has committed $1.5 million to the fund, which is worth a total of $15 million.

What can Atlanta do to encourage continued growth?

Georgia-Pacific employs approximately 3,000 people in Downtown, so we’re supportive of investments that make the city safer, cleaner, more modern and appealing. Specifically, improving public education and our public transportation system are areas we need to continue to tackle. These improvements are not only good for us as a major employer, but they help sustain local businesses and attract new business and investors.

How has Georgia-Pacific capitalized on partnerships within Atlanta?

As a member of the Metro Atlanta Chamber board for many years, we’ve been an active part of the issues and initiatives that have improved our city’s quality of life – from education to infrastructure. We also have collaborated with other businesses recently on 30 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | ECONOMY

How can the private sector best engage with the community in Atlanta?

Anything that we or other companies can do to give back and contribute to the well-being of our community is imperative – strong communities make life better for everyone. Georgia-Pacific has been a longtime supporter of initiatives that address critical areas such as affordable housing, community and public safety, arts and culture, and youth enrichment.

Just a few of the worthy organizations we support that work tirelessly in these endeavors include the Center for Civil and Human Rights, Atlanta Habitat for Humanity, Youth Entrepreneurs and United Way of Greater Atlanta.

In our 35 years in this city, we’ve seen many positive transformations right outside our windows at GeorgiaPacific Center. We’re proud to have been actively involved in Atlanta’s progress over the years. The city is experiencing a renaissance, with growth in areas such as the educational sector and the BeltLine, but progress will need to be supported and sustained.

As a company, we are also excited by positive growth in the business community and efforts to attract entrepreneurs and startups to the city. While we have a lot of work to do on areas like public transportation and more affordable housing options, we remain optimistic and committed to keeping Atlanta the top international city that it is.

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

Georgia-Pacific is involved in a number of local projects to increase community development.

Employment matters Since the Great Recession, Metro Atlanta has seen robust job growth. From a peak figure of 10.5 percent in 2009 to a July 2017 figure of 4.7 percent, the unemployment rate has more than halved. Much of this has to do with a regression to the norm following the harsh recession, but key industries have added jobs. Financial services, information technology, professional and business services, as well as leisure and hospitality have all seen considerable growth, above 3 percent each since 2016. On the flip side, retail and manufacturing are both either slowing or shrinking, representing a national trend.

The way people shop is changing, with commentators predicting the death of the American mall, as consumers favor web-based purchasing. In this area too, Metro Atlanta is reacting with “experiential retail” developments such as Ponce City Market, next to the BeltLine, or Avalon in Alpharetta.

Manufacturing is a more complex issue, with the drop in employment decreasing due to the lack of skilled workers in an industry that is holding less appeal to a new generation. From 1997 to 2016, Georgia saw a drop in the number of manufacturing jobs from 554,400 to

388,200, according to the Georgia Department of Labor.

The construction industry is also having problems recruiting, driving up costs and potentially slowing development.

Employment growth overall stagnated toward the middle of 2017. Consumer confidence was high at the beginning of the year as people anticipated tax cuts from the Trump Administration. However, in May, the proposed cuts had still not materialized. President Trump tweeted on May 28 “The massive TAX CUTS/ REFORM that I have submitted is moving along in the process very well, actually ahead of schedule. Big benefits to all!” By September, little progress had been made although Trump was still optimistic, tweeting “Will be going to North Dakota today to discuss tax reform and tax cuts. We are the highest taxed nation in the world – that will change.”

Looking ahead According to website MetroAtlantaCEO, business leaders in Georgia are optimistic. In their secondquarter 2017 survey, 43 percent of respondents thought hiring by their firm looked favorable, an increase from 36 percent in the first quarter. Overall, 47 percent ( ) www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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ECONOMY INTERVIEW

Studio dynamics How Metro Atlanta has become a major attraction for the film industry

Frank Patterson President – Pinewood Atlanta Studios embrace a culture of innovation. As a result, today we have in Georgia a community that values pioneers and supports innovation with capital investment and thought leadership.

How can the strength of the film industry help to develop other industries?

The film industry is strong but changing. Content has been and will always be king, but how value is created for companies that produce content is changing. My focus is on building growth opportunities for Pinewood that stem from this changing environment.

Our future is focused on creating a diverse community of technology and content companies that complement our existing assets and services – a type of ecosystem of companies, creatives and technologists that all benefit from density and co-location.

What is the significance of Pinewood being based in Atlanta?

Pinewood Atlanta Studios is rooted in Pinewood Group’s 80-year history of innovation in the movie business. Atlanta is the perfect city to build upon Pinewood’s pioneering legacy. Atlanta combines a history of success in the movie business with excellent and demonstrated strengths in technology innovation.

It’s a city where the worlds of Los Angeles and Silicon Valley come together in a unique way, creating real opportunity for innovation in the content and technology industries.

For example, Georgia Tech has long been a highly regarded name in tech innovation, with an excellent reputation that has enabled and encouraged investors, businesses and other Georgia demic institutions to 32 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | ECONOMY

How have incentives helped the development of the entertainment industry?

Georgia has created the most effective and businessfriendly tax incentive for film production in the history of the U.S. Most people know that Georgia’s program has incentivized major companies like Disney and Sony to make movies in our state. However, such an incentive only works if private investors have the confidence in public policy to invest billions of dollars of private capital in infrastructure facilities such as soundstages, production offices and purpose-built warehouses.

For example, at Pinewood Atlanta Studios, we invested more than $125 million in fixed assets alone, which has helped the tax incentive become so successful. Public policy, private dollars, and tax dollars have come together to create high-paying jobs. In the end, it was Georgia’s excellent pro-business policies and state leadership that made it all work.

ECONOMY OVERVIEW

Pinewood Atlanta Studios is the legendary British film company’s only studio located in the U.S.

( )thought that economic conditions were improving and 46 percent said they would stay the same.

From November 2015 to November 2016, Georgia’s economy grew at 2.4 percent, beating the national rate of 1.7 percent for the same period. Much of that growth is coming directly from Metro Atlanta, yet the area needs to be careful not to become a victim of its own success. Firstly, the population is growing, with the ARC estimating an additional 2.5 million people by 2040, bringing the number up past 8 million. If the current trend of employment continues, many people will be entering the region because they have been relocated or are studying, and this would not put undue pressure on the job market. The growing IT and business services sectors will need skilled workers, but job growth for all demographics should also keep up.

More people also means more strain on infrastructure, especially transportation. Metro Atlanta has some of the worst traffic in the world, and although county governments within the area have done much to improve roads, the real answer lies in weaning the population off private cars. More roads normally lead to more cars, rather than more space, and that means more pollution.

Ride-sharing services such as Lyft and Uber are thriving in the city, and the MARTA system is popular and undergoing expansion. The increase of mixed-use walkable developments with green space offer real long-term solutions to traffic woes.

Metro Atlanta’s strong university system is well regarded by the business community, but as with economic growth, efforts are still needed to ensure that everyone reaps the benefits: the K-12 public school systems in Atlanta and throughout the state still rank poorly. The poverty rate in Metro Atlanta is 13.9 percent. While it is lower than the U.S. average of 14.7 percent, is still unfitting of an area boasting such impressive economic development.

The other factor complicating economic growth is how prices increase across the board, but especially housing. One of the great attractions for young professionals, and companies looking to employ them, is Atlanta’s relatively low cost of living, compared to New York, San Francisco or even London. However, this could be lost if housing does not remain affordable.

As the political situation remains obscure in the U.S., and a massive shift of economic power in Europe seems increasingly likely, Metro Atlanta can remain confident that it has a solid business infrastructure.

It has managed to build up industries such as fintech, film production and tourism, all of which have spurred great entrepreneurship. Innovation is encouraged and supported, with one foot firmly in the sectors of tomorrow, such as big data or autonomous vehicles. It continues to attract major companies and ambitious students. With solid leadership, reliable planning and enthusiastic collaboration from all parts of the city, Metro Atlanta’s best days could be yet to come. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Real Estate: The industrial market in Atlanta has shown immense growth in 2017.

Due to the increased amount of startups and companies moving into the metro area, office markets are providing promise as well. The residential segment has shown increasing demand because of an increasing population, but has faced drawbacks in 2017 due to a lack of supply that is being addressed accordingly.

www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Real Estate in numbers: Industrial, office, hotel and multifamily market trends Industrial:

Deliveries (‘000s of square feet) Total vacancy rate Net absorption (‘000s of square feet)

Q2 2013

Q3 2013

Q4 2013

Q1 2014

Q2 2014

Q3 2014

Q4 2014

Q1 2015

Q2 2015

Q3 2015

Q4 2015

Q1 2016

Q2 2016

Q3 2016

Q4 2016

Q1 2017

Q2 2017

3,641

0

0

353

497

403

2,278

1,200

2,601

5,998

1,449

6,167

4,950

3,444

6,312

4,950

4,293

12.5

12.4

12.1

11.1

10.8

10.3

9.4

8.7

8.4

8.5

7.6

8.3

8

7.9

8.4

7.8

7.4

4,583

1,356

1,619

5,587

2,021

1,428

8,333

4,159

5,304

2,618

5,432

3,734

7,428

3,263

2,596

6,857

6,490

vacancy rate (percent)

Deliveries and net absorption (000’s of square feet) 10,000

13

12

8,000

11 6,000 10 4,000 9 2,000

8

0

7 Q2 2013 Q3 2013 Q4 2013 Q1 2014 Q2 2014 Q3 2014 Q4 2014 Q1 2015 Q2 2015 Q3 2015 Q4 2015 Q1 2016 Q2 2016 Q3 2016 Q4 2016 Q1 2017 Q2 2017

Source: CBRE

Office: Q2 2013

Q3 2013

Q4 2013

Q1 2014

Q2 2014

Q3 2014

Q4 2014

Q1 2015

Q2 2015

Q3 2015

Q4 2015

Q1 2016

Q2 2016

Q3 2016

Q4 2016

Q1 2017

Q2 2017

0

0

0

0

0

0

789

85

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

1,127

Total vacancy rate

21.7

21.4

21

20.1

19.3

19.1

18.9

18.7

18.1

17.8

17.3

17

16.9

16.8

16.6

16.9

17.6

Net absorption (‘000s of square feet)

502

872

442

787

729

376

773

677

645

592

688

174

365

160

421

-71

329

Deliveries (‘000s of square feet)

Deliveries and net absorption (000’s of square feet)

vacancy rate (percent)

1,200

22

1,000

21

800

20

600

19

400

18

200

17

0

16 Q2 2013 Q3 2013 Q4 2013 Q1 2014 Q2 2014 Q3 2014 Q4 2014 Q1 2015 Q2 2015 Q3 2015 Q4 2015 Q1 2016 Q2 2016 Q3 2016 Q4 2016 Q1 2017 Q2 2017

Source: CBRE

36 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | REAL ESTATE

Source:

Hotels: 2007 Supply (‘000s of rooms)

2008

90.6

2009

2010

91.4

92.8

2011

2012

94

93.7

2013

2014

2015

93.2

93.4

93.3

2016

2017

93.9

95.3

95.7

Demand (‘000s of rooms)

56.9

53.4

48.6

54

55.3

56.7

58.9

63.5

65.6

66.6

66.9

Occupancy rate (percent)

62.8

58.5

52.4

57.4

59

60.8

63.1

68.1

69.8

69.9

69.9

Supply and demand (‘000s of rooms)

occupancy rate (percent)

100

100

90

90

80

80

70

70

60

60

50

50

40

40

30

30

20

20

10

10

0

0 2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

2015

2016

2017

Source: CBRE

Multifamily: 2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

2015

2016

2017

Inventory (‘000s of units)

325

338

348

357

363

367

371

376

379

384

389

390

392

395

401

409

416

419

Total vacancy rate

4.4

5.7

8.2

8.5

7.9

7

6.3

7.3

8.8

10.4

9.3

8.9

8

6.9

6

5.5

5.5

5.6

Inventory (‘000s of units)

vacancy rate (percent)

450

11

400

10

350

9

300

8

250

7

200

6

150

5

100

4

50

3

0

2 2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

2015

2016

2017

Source: CBRE

www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Real Estate in numbers: Residential Active listings:

Median prices:

$258,000

Apr

May

$259,000

$254,000

Mar

$267,000

$250,000

8,000

$225,000

$200,000 10,000

$230,000

$250,000

$239,000

15,701

15,498

14,658

15,838

14,819

13,796

12,000

14,705

14,000

$300,000

14,738

16,000

$150,000

6,000 $100,000 4,000 $50,000 2,000

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Dec

Jan

Unit sales:

New listings:

6,000

6,000

5,656

5,223

5,000

Jun

Jul

4,105

4,023

4,000

Jan

Feb

2,000

2,000

1,000

1,000

0

2,824

3,000

3,165

2,927

3,000

4,610

4,086

4,000

4,896

5,000

Feb

5,974

Source: Atlanta Realtors

5,860

Source: Atlanta Realtors

5,165

Feb

5,731

Jan

5,568

0 Dec

5,043

0

0 Dec

Jan

Feb

Mar

Source: Atlanta Realtors

38 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | REAL ESTATE

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Dec

Source: Atlanta Realtors

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

A place in the Sunbelt: Atlanta is still very much a real estate town, as a growing number of companies and workers look for great properties for low prices where they can put down their roots The real estate sector in Metro Atlanta had a strong 2016. It is the fourth-fastest-growing metropolitan area in terms of population, with no signs of this rate decreasing. Meanwhile, demand for real estate is expected to rise. Metro Atlanta has continued to show strong recovery from the subprime crisis that led to the financial downturn and subsequent depression.

Mid-2017 saw a summer slump in sales on the previous year. Residential sales were at 5,223 in July, a 6.3 percent drop on the previous year’s 5,572. Yet the market remains optimistic, with the median sale price up 5.3 percent, from $305,000 to $321,000, according to figures released by Atlanta Realtors.

Upward trends Median sales have been pushed up by low inventory, which is down to some three months in Metro Atlanta, following national trends. Construction is steady, but not as rapid as some would hope, with restrictions on lending meaning national companies with access to Wall Street loans can build, but many smaller companies are feeling the pinch.

Many factors contribute to the positive trends in

this market, but geography has been a key driver of recent success. An international city, Atlanta attracts multitudes of residents from the state, the U.S. and abroad. It is home to the busiest airport in the world and hosts some of the country’s largest international conferences. Connectivity provides an incentive for large, globalized companies – Metro Atlanta is home to 26 Fortune Global 1000 headquarters. Robust economic activity has led to the real estate market’s significant gain in traction throughout the year.

“Not only is employment growing in Atlanta, but the types of jobs are also growing in quality. When jobs are at the core, developments can be more interesting.

We are seeing a lot of supply making up for what was missing in the previous cycle. These investments are different from those that are happening in the suburbs,” Chad Dubeau, senior managing director for Mill Creek, told Focus: Atlanta.

The family way Trends in the residential market show that multifamily housing units are becoming increasingly popular with new homebuyers. More residents are moving from ( ) www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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REAL ESTATE INTERVIEW

The melting pot How mixed-use developments are helping to drive the real estate sector

Mark Toro Managing Partner – North American Properties – Atlanta Ltd. best employees, so they have to locate where their talent wants to live and work. People nowadays are focusing on their lifestyle first, and then looking for a job where they live. Midtown, Old Fourth Ward and Downtown have emerged as places where people want to live in Atlanta.

We always need to look at how to attract people to our real estate developments. At Avalon, we have been able to create an urban experience in a suburban setting.

What do developers need to consider at this moment in the cycle?

Atlanta’s population has grown a lot over the past few years and is now at 6 million. The trend of urbanization since the recession is due to people seeking experiences as opposed to things. The next generation of Americans has different priorities when identifying where to live. We incubated the concepts of experiential commercial real estate when we acquired Atlantic Station in 2010. In 2011, we started exploring further experiential, retail-dominant, mixed-use properties and did research across the U.S. Avalon, in Alpharetta, was our first ground-up opportunity to put into practice what we had learned.

The model works for everyone. Office tenants are responding to their need to retain talent and attract the 40 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | REAL ESTATE

How is the issue of affordable and workforce housing being tackled?

What the workforce needs is affordability. Affordable housing is for people with low and mixed incomes, whereas workforce housing refers to many of our public servants such as police officers, firemen and teachers. Workforce housing is critical because people in this segment are typically employed in communities where they can’t afford to live. In Atlanta, some areas have undergone gentrification, such as Old Fourth Ward, and prices have been rising recently. Rising prices create obvious challenges. The demand for living space in urban environments is unlike anything we have ever seen before. The demand is concentrated in certain areas, because of this high-rises are more popular and prices are increasing.

How do you determine the right balance of residential, retail and office development?

It starts with retail because that creates the streetlevel energy that we are all seeking. The amenities, whether they are restaurants, entertainment facilities or spaces for public events, are what people consider first. We also consider market demand. Getting the right retail mix can be challenging in Atlanta. We are blessed to have the best demographics in Atlanta, but we have to create an experience that will attract people to the property.

REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

( ) the suburbs into the city, contributing to the loss in popularity of single-family homes. Vertical development is also more popular once the environmental advantages are taken into consideration.

“Our development patterns have been more environmentally sustainable than other residential units in the rest of the region. It is much more efficient to build multi-family than it is to build single-family, detached housing. If we take the average lot size for one unit of residential, we are 80 times more efficient here, which translates to water conservation and other efficiencies. We have successfully established in Midtown the southeast’s first EcoDistrict,” Kevin Green, president and CEO of the Midtown Alliance, told Focus: Atlanta.

Atlanta currently has its lowest rate of unemployment since the 2008 recession, with a July 2017 figure of 4.8 percent, according to estimates from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The growth in the aligns with a growth in Fortune 500 companies and a strong IT sector. With skilled graduates a common reason for companies moving to Atlanta, the median age of the population is some two years below the national median. Young professionals typically look for multifamily units as first-time buyers, and by the end of 2017, Atlanta is expected to have approximately 15,300 multifamily units.

Annual rent rose by 6.6 percent in 2016, compared to the national average of 3.8 percent, and occupancy in Atlanta was at 95.3 percent in the final quarter of the year. This high occupancy is a good sign, considering the average annual expansion in inventory of 1.6 percent.

The issue of supply While prices in Atlanta’s residential sector continue to increase, lack of supply is limiting the market’s potential growth. Meanwhile, demand is expanding at a healthy rate and total home closings have increased, as mixed-use and multifamily housing in particular have risen in popularity.

As of July 2017, Atlanta’s residential market has shown an overall trend of increasing prices and decreasing supply. The median residential sale price in July was $259,000, surpassing that of the same month in 2016 by 4.9 percent. The average sale price was $321,000, an increase of 5.3 percent from the previous year.

In terms of supply, the Atlanta housing inventory contained 15,701 units in July 2017, indicating a 4.9 percent decrease, compared to the previous year. In spite of this drop, new home closings totaled 5,795 units by the end of the second quarter of 2017, an increase of 13 percent from same period in 2016.( )

Annual rent rose by 6.6 percent in 2016, compared to the national average of 3.8 percent, and occupancy in Atlanta was at 95.3 percent in the final quarter of 2016.

www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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REAL ESTATE INTERVIEW

Tech housing How Metro Atlanta’s growing economic sectors are directing its real estate market

John Portman IV Chief Operating Officer – Portman Holdings The idea behind the Coda project is fascinating.

Georgia Tech deserves a lot of credit and has been a great partner. It’s a fusion, not just of what’s happening in real estate nationally, but also of what’s happening in Atlanta in terms of the investment and the excitement that is going into the technology sector. Coda is different from more traditional buildings because of the way it encourages collaboration and interaction.

Companies need to be able to attract the right talent coming from institutions such as Georgia Tech.

Destinations such as Coda attempt to create areas where people and companies can come together and work within the Georgia Tech innovation system.

What characteristics define Metro Atlanta when it comes to real estate?

Education, talent, jobs, transportation, technology and quality of life. Capital has been moving away from places such as New York and San Francisco and moving toward cities like Atlanta, where investors can get relatively better returns in a low-yield economic environment with slightly more perceived risk.

While we maintain exposure and interest in international markets, the U.S. offers a compelling risk-adjusted value proposition at this time and more particularly in cities like Atlanta, Denver and Seattle.

We’ve been able to capitalize on this shift and capital rotation toward Atlanta in the examples of the techincubator Coda in Midtown, 230 Peachtree and other projects that are in the works.

42 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | REAL ESTATE

Do you see a lot of foreign capital coming into Atlanta?

Yes, and the trend for foreign capital will accelerate.

Foreign investors are typically more selective with markets that aren’t New York or San Francisco because those markets, from an international viewpoint, are thought to be less risky and have more liquidity.

This has begun to change in a meaningful way. These groups view the U.S. as a relatively safe investment, but they also want to make money, which with all the competition is difficult in the more traditional international investment destinations.

Capitalization rates in cities like New York and San Francisco can be as low as 3 percent, which clearly does not produce a lot of current income for international investors. However, for a slightly larger perceived risk, they can earn significantly more on a current basis in markets like Atlanta, where the yield can range on average between 5 and 7 percent for prime properties.

International investors are becoming more willing to take that risk for a better return, with the focus on primary locations in these new markets. The trend is continuing, as global capital becomes more seamless.

The appetite continues to grow for Atlanta.

REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

Like these in Buckhead, single-family homes surround urban areas in Metro Atlanta.

( )Atlanta ranks third in the nation for single-family building permits. Between the second quarters of 2016 and 2017 there were 22,594 single-family homes built in Atlanta and 21,282 new homes sold. In the same period, single-family home closings increased by approximately 15 percent.

While single-family units remain the norm in the suburbs, intown housing is mainly geared toward multifamily and mixed-used developments.

Multifamily market trends in Atlanta show steady growth: Vacancy rates are decreasing, while rental rates and prices per unit are both on the rise. Atlanta’s thriving business environment and educated workforce have encouraged companies to relocate, bringing more young professionals to the area. Because of this, the apartment market has prospered. Annual rent prices increased by 6.6 percent from 2015 to 2016, surpassing the national rise of 3.8 percent. The 2017 inventory is expected to remain at 15,300 units, which will be concentrated in the Midtown and Buckhead submarkets. Inventory grew by an average annual rate of 1.6 percent, compared to the previous year.

“A lot of companies migrating to Atlanta are looking for

young talent. NCR is a good example. The combination of being able to attract talent and being close to Georgia Tech and the Tech Square project is the focus of a lot of the incubators. It makes sense that they would want to be near the epicenter of where a lot of technology is being developed,” Ed Allen, senior vice president of development for the Related Group, told Focus: Atlanta.

Empty nests The number of active adult communities, primarily appealing to the over-55 market, is increasing. Cities such as Canton, Cumming, John’s Creek, Kennesaw and Marietta have communities that offer pools, spas and sports. The median price for an active adult home in Metro Atlanta was $272,653 in 2016, up from $245,000 the previous year.

The luxury real estate market of the greater metro area is also thriving. In 2015, properties worth over $500,000 were sold at an increase of 11.4 percent, compared to 2014, while sales volume increased by 12.9 percent. Sales of residential property worth more than $1 million increased by 12.3 percent in 2015, up from and sales volume increased by 15.4 percent. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

Atlanta’s residents are looking for homes with convenient access to the MARTA system and the BeltLine.

Mortgage impact Despite rate increases from the Federal Reserve in 2017, 30-year, fixed-rate mortgages fell 4 percent in the second half of the year. With September 2017’s rate at 3.78 percent, higher than the previous September’s 3.42 percent, it is still lower than that of March 2017, at 4.21 percent. Analysts suggest that reduced inflation is preventing growth in fixed-rate mortgages.

Meanwhile, low housing inventory in the metro area is taking a toll on the residential market, as prices continue to rise. Between 2016 and 2017, home prices in Metro Atlanta increased by 6.8 percent, primarily because inventory supply rates were simply too low to meet the market’s growing demand. Limited inventory has undoubtedly clipped the potential for growth. The residential inventory in September 2016 included 16,222 units, a 1.8 percent decline from September of the previous year. In July 2017 the inventory totaled 15,701 units, indicating a 4.9 percent decrease from the same month in 2016. This steady decline has led to a hike in home prices, as well as a decrease in sales.

Always a first time Metro Atlanta still offers a good proposition for firsttime buyers, according to a survey from Zillow, which 44 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | REAL ESTATE

gave the area a score of 6.4 on its “First-Time Buyers Index” in spring 2017. According to the study, it takes one year and nine months to break even on buying rather than renting. The survey also mentioned Atlanta’s low median house values and good inventory.

Lowest scoring was San Francisco with 0.0 and the highest was Memphis with 9.1.

In addition to incentives from banks and mortgage brokers, the development agency, Invest Atlanta, offers a number of programs for home buyers, focusing on young families and first-time buyers. For example, HOME Atlanta 4.0 offers a 30-year fixed interest rate on a market-competitive rate with a 5 percent grant to help with the down payments and costs. The Vine City Renaissance Initiative offers homebuyers $10,000 towards the down payment and other costs, fully forgiven after five years for properties in the Vine City area.

Areas of demand Heightened demand and more move-ins have inevitably sparked growth throughout Metro Atlanta in cities such as Sandy Springs and Adair Park as well as central areas such as Midtown.

As of the second quarter of 2017, Gwinnett County is the region’s top market for new-home construction,

REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

Matt Bronfman CEO Jamestown Properties

while Alpharetta is the fastest-growing city in Georgia.

It is home to the headquarters of more than 900 tech companies, making it the “Technology City of the South.” Between July 1, 2015 and the same date in 2016, Alpharetta’s population grew by 3.1 percent.

Sandy Springs is the ninth most affluent area in the U.S. One of the more sought-after suburban neighborhoods in Metro Atlanta, Sandy Springs has a population of approximately 100,000. It is also the second-largest city in the area and added inventory has allowed for a 1.3 percent price decrease in the last three years, incentivizing more people to move in.

Adair Park is an up-and-coming neighborhood.

Because of its proximity to the BeltLine and pedestrianfriendly layout, the area has become extremely popular.

The median home sale price is $139,000 and homes are getting, on average, 94 percent of their list prices.

As of January 2017, Midtown had 45 residential real estate projects underway. This part of the metro area was one of five U.S. cities to be named a “Great Place to Live” by the American Planning Association in 2016. Based on recent activity, it seems that Midtown will only keep growing, with 25 percent of its land still untouched and ready to develop.

Apart from these well-known neighborhoods, other

How does retail feed into the office segment of Ponce City Market?

We are fortunate to have thriving retail that benefits from having 600,000 square feet of office and 260 apartments on top of it. A lot of our retail traffic comes from the BeltLine and the greater neighborhood. If you are an office tenant, Ponce City Market is attractive.

It’s nice to be able to sample from so many different restaurants and cuisines. We work to make retail an attractive substitute to online shopping. We try to make our environment surprising, challenging and exciting.

The Westside Provisions District laid the groundwork for Ponce because we had limited office space, but were pleasantly surprised at how popular that space was, which reinforced our belief that we could lease office space at Ponce. It seems obvious now, but a lot of people doubted that we would succeed. The Westside has some of the best restaurants and is close in proximity to Buckhead.

The Buckhead consumer likes that a lot.

In the retail space nowadays, you’re in a race to the bottom, competing with Amazon and Walmart, or you’re offering something that is experiential and surprises and delights people so much that they are willing to come back.

What challenges exist for development in Atlanta?

The zoning in Atlanta is getting more rigorous. As surface parking lots disappear, you start having more built-in barriers to development. Surface parking lots make it easy to put up new buildings. It keeps supply high and makes buildings harder to appreciate in value.

At the same time, it is too easy to develop in Atlanta. The current needs are in affordable housing and architectural standards. The BeltLine is like our beachfront property at this point. We need to make sure that the people developing on the BeltLine do things that are worthy in the long term. We need to get tougher on the development community to do interesting projects because that is how you get appreciation. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

areas of Atlanta have undergone key gentrification projects aimed to foster growth. College Park and Downtown in particular have been transformed over the past decade. Many buildings in Downtown are being renovated, while retail and mixed-use developments help to boost the revitalization.

Adair Park and other residential areas near the BeltLine are also popular with developers, particularly because of their geographical positioning. Becoming increasingly dependent on public transportation, Atlanta’s residents are looking for homes with convenient access to the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) system or the BeltLine. This is evidenced by the increasing popularity of Capitol View and West End, neighborhoods located near the Westside BeltLine, which is expected to open in the fall of 2017. In Capitol View and West End the median home sale prices are $130,000, and homes are selling at 100 percent of list prices.

“There’s a lot of positive traction in residential real estate. The year-on-year growth of unit sales is 8 to 10 percent. There are more buyers here and it’s a tight inventory market, so there is some stored demand. Atlanta is a city with no natural boundaries that is redeveloping itself. For example, Midtown is reimagining itself and going vertical. We are also getting out of the recession, prices have been reset and builders seem to be building. There is a lot of

demand for multifamily, however single-family is still an appealing destination,” Dan Forsman, president of Berkshire Hathaway, told Focus: Atlanta.

Generation rent Metro Atlanta is popular with renters, with a report from Apartment List naming the area as the third-most popular destination for people leaving other areas, after Washington D.C. and Los Angeles. However, it also stated that 72 percent of renters in Atlanta had plans to settle in another city, with the main reason being employed opportunities.

Metro Atlanta was the 19thmost expensive area to rent among the country’s top-100 rental markets in August 2017.

A one-bedroom apartment averaged $1,310 per month in August 2017, 0.8 percent up on the previous year, according to real estate blog Zumper, with two-bedroom apartments averaging at $1,660, up 0.6 percent year-on-year. While these figures might seem expensive, average rents are still less than half of those in areas that Atlanta is often said to be competing with. A two-bedroom flat in San Francisco, on average, costs $4,500, New York $3,300 and Boston $2,650. For July 2017, the most expensive city in the metro area was the City of Sandy Springs with average rent for a one-bedroom apartment at $1,340, followed by the City of Atlanta at $1,310 and Alpharetta, $1,290. At the other end of the scale were the cities of

Metro Atlanta was the 19th most expensive area to rent out among the country’s top-100 rental markets in August 2017.

Norman Radow CEO – The Radco Companies

Maintaining affordability is an issue we need to address as a city, and we try to do this as a company. The number of demolitions is a statistic that people need to pay more attention to and track more, because everybody focuses on how many units are added, but not how many disappear to make room for those apartments. The previous developments were affordable, and they get replaced by high-rent units. We have to provide some affordable options and create attractive neighborhoods by providing safe and clean housing that people can call home.

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REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

The greater metro area is third in the nation, in terms of job growth.

Marietta, with an average one-bedroom rent of $870, Nocros with $800 and Gainsville with $750.

“Now in Atlanta, there has been a resurgence of single-family homes. However, the ownership rate is now down to 54 percent. The prediction is that the millennial generation will drive this lower. High down payments will mean fewer young people will be able to buy and thus prefer to rent,” Bob Mathews, president and CEO for Atlanta, Colliers, told Focus: Atlanta.

High price to pay Affordable housing has been somewhat of a problem for residents of the greater Atlanta area over the past three years. Due to decreasing inventories and increasing demand, prices continue to rise throughout the region. Nevertheless, efforts are underway to provide more affordable options.

While construction is on the rise and a number of new developments are being built, local legislation and incentives are in place to keep housing prices affordable. The City of Atlanta passed an ordinance for more affordable housing in May 2016 stating that any new multifamily homes being developed and receiving public funds would have to include up to 15 percent affordable housing. Affordable housing has become a significant issue during the 2017 Atlanta mayoral race, with many of the main contenders pledging to work with the development community.

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In addition, Atlanta is increasing the availability of student loan mortgages, aimed at encouraging young professionals to buy their own homes.

Going commercial On the commercial side of the real estate market, Metro Atlanta is garnering interest. Trends for the metro area’s office market are also positive, with increased interest in mixeduse development and coworking spaces.

“There has been a continual absorption of commercial real estate for the past two years. The business community is doing a great job at bringing new firms to the city. That will lead to prices increasing on rental rates. Class A spaces will fill up, and there will be some flight from class A to B. However, our rates are still low, compared to other major cities,” Brett Hunsaker, regional managing director for the southeast and midAtlantic at Newmark Grubb Knight Frank, told Focus: Atlanta.

Atlanta’s office continues to be fueled by job growth.

The greater metro area is third in the nation with nonfarming employment increasing by approximately 87,000 jobs per year. In 2017, vacancy rates increased by 0.3 percent, but investment in the year’s second quarter came close to $800 million. This number is expected to rise as the year continues. Approximately 620,000 square feet of office space were leased in

REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

the second quarter of 2017, with Midtown and the Cumberland/Galleria area of northwest Atlanta as the leading submarkets.

In the Midtown area, high demand for office space is driven by the technology sector and startups, helmed by young professionals. Vacancies in Midtown are low, and those of Class A offices dropped by 3.2 percent in 2016.

“Atlanta cannot support any more new office space at this point. The Downtown area has the highest vacancy of the Metro Atlanta area.

Midtown and Buckhead are expensive in price, so I predict more companies will relocate to Downtown,” Marti Blackstock, vice president of Banyan Street Capital, told Focus: Atlanta.

The increasing popularity of mixed-use developments and co-working spaces is a significant trend in the metro area’s office market. Such developments, including the $25-million Buckhead Atlanta project, Krog Street Market, and the $27-million Ponce City Market, attract by offering a place to live, work and spend leisure time.

These properties are being developed, respectively, by the San Diego-based OliverMcMillan and Atlantabased firms Pace Properties and Jamestown. These properties offer varied dining and shopping options, and interest in residential space fuels interest in offices. Meanwhile, companies in the area competing for highly skilled staff can offer comfortable, wellconnected office space.

“If you look at the macro demographics for the next 20 or 30 years, the pool of skilled workers that companies like State Farm or NCR need in the areas of technology and insurance is getting smaller. There is much more competition for employees, so companies are using real estate as one of the tools to attract talent.

Real estate decisions driven by human resources decisions,” Alex Chambers, regional vice president of KDC Real Estate Development, told Focus: Atlanta.

Work together Atlanta Tech Village in Buckhead is the largest co-working space in the South. Founded in 2012, it is a five-story, 103,000-squarefoot facility that mainly hosts startups. Rents range from $300$2,600 per month. The Advanced Technology Development Center in Midtown is the oldest of Atlanta’s co-working spaces, having opened in 1980. It currently hosts 25 startups and rents start from $250.

Notable office sales and construction were concentrated in the Midtown and northwest Atlanta submarkets. In Midtown, the 542,000-square-foot property at 271 17th Street was sold for $336 per square foot, in a sale amounting to $182 million. The 773,000-square-foot Regions Plaza was sold for $228per square foot, in a transaction totaling $176 million. Equifax and Honeywell were the largest occupiers in the Midtown office market as while RaceTrac, Bennett Thrasher and Holder Construction

The increasing popularity of mixed-use developments and co-working spaces is a significant trend in the metro area’s office market.

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REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

Market voices:

Monetha Cobb

Managing Director Franklin Street

Many local property owners are of the belief that the current cycle is coming to an end. Some of the bigger institutional developers are saying that Atlanta is still poised for growth. The city is experiencing an influx of people and the number of employment opportunities continues to increase. Growth is even happening in neighboring cities outside of Atlanta. This growth positively impacts Atlanta because it is a central point for these developments. Atlanta residents are vested in making this a place of prosperity. This optimism is evident by the growing number of college graduates staying in Atlanta.

A lot of businesses are relocating to Atlanta. There is influence and wealth coming from the film industry, sports teams and definitely international business. The combination has made 2017 one of the most profitable years.

Atlanta has all of the key ingredients for significant growth. We have great finances and a great talent pool for companies. There are employment opportunities and job growth in Atlanta. We also have all of the big city amenities and plenty of communities to choose from.

John Davidson Southeast Regional President Parmenter

50 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | REAL ESTATE

Jenni Bonura

Managing Partner Harry Norman Realtors

A lot of foreign capital has been coming into Atlanta. That is putting pressure on Atlanta in terms of rents. Atlanta benefits from a lot of things that the rest of the Sunbelt doesn’t. The airport really makes Atlanta a port city, even if we’re landlocked. This is part of the reason why the corporate relocations continue to happen. There will be more foreign capital coming to Atlanta and one or two more relocations. I’m a big believer of Atlanta.

REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

Transit-based development is another area bringing new life to the real estate sector.

all made significant expansions in their northwest Atlanta offices. The most notable sale in the office submarket was the 471,000-square-foot Newmarket Business Park; at $110 per square foot, the sale totaled $52 million.

The construction of 1.2 million square feet of office space is expected to be completed in Atlanta by the end of 2017. Notable projects constructed by the end of the second quarter include the Three Alliance Center and the Riverwood 200 and 800 Avalon developments.

“The good news in office is that there is still demand.

Not much Class A office space has been built lately, so tenants are able to get the rents that they want. The office world is changing, with more companies using collaborative sharing spaces. However, this won’t impact the sector over the short term,” Dan Wirtz, president of the Windsor Realty Group, told Focus: Atlanta.

Industrial demand Experiencing exponential growth, Atlanta’s industrial market offers the greatest opportunity for investment, with an increased number of move-ins, more absorption and lower vacancy rates. While the bulk of development is in Midtown, focus is also extending to Downtown.

Atlanta’s industrial market absorbed 12.8 million

square feet by the end of 2017’s second quarter, making it the national leader in total net absorption.

Demand is strong, prompting an all-time low vacancy rate of 7.2 percent in the metro area. By the end of 2017, this rate is expected to fall below 7 percent.

As demand increases, so does rent. In 2016, industrial rent rose by 4.5 percent while warehouse rent rose by 5.6 percent. Atlanta’s industrial construction saw 22.5 million square feet of growth during the same year, and similar increases in construction are likely to prompt further hikes in rent.

Atlanta ranks number one in the national market for total net absorption of industrial space. In the second quarter of 2017, the city’s industrial market absorbed 6 million square feet, with a total of 12.8 million square feet absorbed in the first half of the year. Overall, this market has shown positive trends right across the board.

Adding to the vacancy rate, industrial rent per square foot increased from $4.22 to $4.35 between the second quarters of 2016 and 2017. Demand for economic development in the surrounding area is also on the rise, indicating a healthy industrial market.

This activity can be attributed to high rates of completion, leasing and move-ins. In the second www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

David Lanier Managing Director, CBRE Atlanta

Metro Atlanta has a population of close to 6 million.

When it comes to real estate, there are really no natural boundaries that limit where you can develop.

It’s a spread-out market, though a lot of people are now coming back to live in the city because they want to be close to amenities without having to commute.

There is opportunity for office development, both in town and in suburban markets. There is also a strong multifamily market with good absorption in those product types, even with the robust construction. However, prime retail space is scarce in Atlanta, which is becoming a real challenge for a lot of our customers. As the population becomes denser within the city limits, they’ll need services and access to retail, which is where the best opportunities lie.

Atlanta has business-friendly governance, a low cost of living and great educational institutions.

Those factors add up to a very talented workforce and an innovative culture. In comparison to other major cities, Atlanta is an attractive alternative – it’s hitting new levels, so all the major real estate markets are reaching new heights.

Zoning and permitting issues create a challenge.

The number of municipalities in Atlanta creates issues because they all have their own idiosyncrasies about how they view zoning and permitting. Still, Tim Keane, the commissioner of city planning for Atlanta, is trying to make things better within the city limits. He’s streamlining the permitting process and trying to get more structure around the zoning process, making it easier to understand.

There is also a lack of development opportunities in some markets. In terms of the availability of good development sites, Buckhead is more challenging than Midtown, so there is likely to be an increase in repurposing.

There is still a lot of interest in Atlanta. It has a great story to tell, with a growth rate that we haven’t seen before. The city may not continue to grow at the same pace, but it is sustainable at its own level. While we are seeing rate and price increases, Atlanta is still a good value proposition.

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The increasing popularity of mixed-use developments is a significant trend in the metro area’s office market.

quarter of 2017, 18.3 million square feet are still under construction, while 7.7 million square feet have been completed, compared to the 17.5 million square feet completed in 2016. In addition, leases covering 4.9 million square feet were signed by the second quarter of 2017. Among the most significant move-ins contributing to this figure were Variety Wholesalers and Shenandoah Industrial Park & Wayfair, which took over 1.4 million square feet and 846,000 square feet, respectively.

The market’s most significant move-in was Variety Wholesalers. With 1.4 million square feet on a distribution center from LRC Properties in Newnan, the company can boast the largest single occupancy in Atlanta since 2010. The lease is part of a 1.9-millionsquare-foot distribution center LRC purchased from Kmart in April 2016 for an undisclosed sum. It represents an investment into the area of more than $10 million from Variety Wholesalers.

Other notable industrial move-ins were Duracell, with 874,000 square feet, and Tory Burch, with 753,000 square feet. Some key industrial sales in the South Atlanta submarket include the 1 million-squarefoot property at 8095 McLarin Road, which sold at $52 per square foot, and the 874,000-square-foot Shugart Farms, sold at $71 per square foot. Strong occupancy gains such as these are the cause of Atlanta’s recent

REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

decline in vacancy rates. As the year progresses, approximately 10 million square feet of industrial space is expected to be constructed, in anticipation of increased demand.

“The demand in Atlanta right now is for big buildings ranging from 500,000 to 1 million square feet. The demand is driven by the e-commerce retail industry.

E-commerce is growing 18 to 20 percent a year, which is taking market share from traditional retail. Some 30 to 40 percent of all warehouse space demanded in the U.S. is driven by e-commerce retail,” Ferdinand Seefried, executive chairman of Seefried Industrial Properties, told Focus: Atlanta.

The growth of the IT and healthcare sectors in Metro Atlanta is also creating new opportunities for the real estate market. Leasing of data centers, which is is measured in watts as industry standard, increased from 4 megawatts of absorption in the first half of 2016 to 8 megawatts in the first half of 2017. In May, data center operator Switch announced plans for a $2.5-billion data center of more than 1 million square feet located in Douglas County.

“Technology has had a big effect on space needs because records are electronic now. Nobody really

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REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

Retail sales in Atlanta have grown by 5 percent since 2016, exceeding the national average and contradicting forecasts.

knows how technology will affect the sector further, but we are seeing concepts like telemedicine being used. That would certainly affect space use. Changes will happen, but it’s too soon to predict,” Thomas Tift, president and CEO of HealthAmerica Realty Group, told Focus: Atlanta.

Shop floors From 2016 to 2017, significant gains were made in retail, confounding predictions. The 2017 vacancy rate is 8 percent, the lowest since 2008. This has prompted a slight increase in rent, while demand is stronger than ever. Retail sales in Atlanta grew by 5 percent from 2016 to 2017, exceeding the national average and contradicting forecasts. The city’s volume of retail sales in mid-2017 was 66 percent higher than the previous year. Growth in demand has also spurred an increase in the construction of retail properties.

The retail market in Atlanta has been able to satisfy changing demands and keep the shopper’s experience alive. Consumer confidence measured 121.1 points as of July 2017, indicating an 8.5-percent increase over 54 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | REAL ESTATE

the start of the year, and a 25-percent annual jump.

This has allowed for a rise in retail investment. In the face of a threatened e-commerce revolution, Atlanta’s retail market is steadily progressing, with mid-year sales volume 66 percent higher than in the same period of the previous year.

The retail vacancy rate is 8 percent, the city’s lowest since 2005. Retail space in the metro area totals 169,737,024 square feet, while rental rates have hovered around $12 per square foot for the last three years.

Atlanta’s retail submarkets with the highest demand in 2017 are DeKalb County, Buckhead, West Metropolitan and Gwinnett County.

“The future of retail in Atlanta will mirror the nation’s trends. We will see more food and medical services and less goods. Assets need to be repositioned, and I have concerns that many property owners won’t understand the effect that this will have on their properties. Their ability to have the capital, experience and expertise to reposition their buildings will be critical to their success,” Matthew Shulman, CEO of Ardent Companies, told Focus: Atlanta.

REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

Experiential retail is a hot topic, and Atlanta has kept Gwinnett County, is the largest of its kind in the up to date with trends by reconceiving of the mall. southeast and will renovate its food court, converting Increased emphasis on the shopper’s experience is it into an “experiential” destination called the Dining giving brick-and-mortar retail a new direction. In Ponce Pavilion. The mall will also make changes to its City Market, popular retail stores are nestled among outdoor shopping village, adding a children’s play attractions like high-end restaurants and live concerts, area, synthetic turf and a fire pit. The full extent of in an effort to attract consumers who might otherwise these renovations is expected to be completed by the shop online. The mixed-use Avalon development end of 2017. Another major undertaking, the Peachtree in Alpharetta provides a similar experience. With Corners Town Center, will feature shops, restaurants 100,000 square feet of office and a luxury movie theater, space, 300 housing units and all aimed to enhance the retail 365,000 square feet of retail experience. The $103-million space, Avalon encourages development is scheduled to consumption by catering to a open in fall 2018. multitude of needs on a single The U.S. dollar has remained site. As local developments weak with poor legislative offer an experience that online progress is Washington and retailers cannot, Atlanta minor interest rate hikes. shoppers are choosing to come However, this creates a good to the mall. value proposition for a market “Class A buildings will that is already attractive to continue to dominate, but class overseas investors.

B and C buildings, if repurposed Metro Atlanta’s land prices are efficiently, can provide a lot of competitive, with the average opportunity. Some buildings land value per house, worked – T Dallas Smith, should be labeled class F, for out as the cost of a property President of T Dallas Smith Company funky, and an example of that minus its structure cost, at would be Ponce City Market, which is beating some $61,923 for the first quarter of 2016, in comparison to of the new buildings in pricing. It has made an old the Los Angeles metro area at $483,692, San Francisco building cool again,” Dallas Smith, president of T at $1,089,246 and New York at $250,187, according to a Dallas Smith and Company, told Focus: Atlanta. study by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.

Other new developments aimed to encourage “Real estate assets in Atlanta are still underpriced shopping are underway. The Mall of Georgia, in in comparison to that of other major markets in the

Class A buildings will continue to dominate, but class B and C buildings, if repurposed efficiently, can provide a lot of opportunity.

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REAL ESTATE OVERVIEW

U.S. We are continuing to see more capital coming in from outside Atlanta for that reason. The office market today is as strong as I have seen in many years due to stringent financing terms from lenders, which have held development in check, along with increased demand from tenants,” Mitchell Brannen, Chairman of NAI Brannen Goddard, told Focus: Atlanta.

Looking ahead Atlanta is advancing, both geographically and economically. The region’s elite universities and multitude of employment opportunities have led to growth in the educated workforce and the overall population, increasing the demand for real estate.

Atlanta’s business-friendly environment has also encouraged many small companies and technology startups to establish themselves in and around the city. The number of Fortune 500 companies with headquarters in the city has increased, and more corporations are recognizing the advantages of Atlanta’s geographical position and amenities.

Foreign investment is impacting other parts of the market. “We are seeing foreign capital enter Atlanta from the Middle East, Europe and Latin America. These

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investors seem to prefer plain vanilla investment opportunities that offer stable, predictable cash flow such as existing multifamily and class A office. We are not seeing much foreign capital deployed into opportunistic or speculative real estate ventures,” Paxton Griffin, principal of Satilla Capital Partners, told Focus: Atlanta.

The last and perhaps most imminent obstacle faced

by Atlanta’s market is the continuously declining housing inventory, spurred by excessive demand.

Prices of residential housing in the metro area rose by 5.8 percent between 2016 and 2017. If unchecked, this increase will deincentivize first-time buyers and ultimately prove fatal to the market.

A growing number of apartment buildings and mixed-use developments have provided increased movement and connectivity within the core of the city. Heavy investment in the industrial market has led to an overall progressive trend, as well as to an increased demand for office space. As companies flock to Atlanta, office space should continue to be in demand, with a growing trend in co-working spaces.

Overall, the city’s real estate sector is booming and ripe for investment.

Construction: Increasing population and government commitment to development have kept the construction industry busy. Demand is so high that suppliers are struggling to keep up, due to lack of labor. Construction of the brand-new Mercedes-Benz Stadium and SunTrust Park have been key developments in 2017. The I-85 collapse highlighted the need for road and infrastructure improvements, while the boom in the office segment created more growth.

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Construction in numbers: Metro Atlanta, office inventory, Q1 2017:

16,176,049 Buckhead

86,220,886

15,181,663

Suburbs

Downtown

15,857,077 Midtown

207,745 West Atlanta

133,435,675

21,863,826 Central Perimeter

TOTAL 17,175,279 North Fulton

9,518,304 Northlake

47,214,789 CBD

14,045,088 2,968,085 South Atlanta

Source: JLL Research

Northeast

20,442,559 Northwest

Metro Atlanta building permits issued – residential:

2016

2017 5,000

4,241

5,000

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3,150 JUL

3,295 JUN

2,536 MAY

2,247 APR

2,721

3,252 MAR

DEC

NOV

OCT

SEP

AUG

JUL

JUN

MAY

APR

MAR

0 FEB

0 JAN

1,000

FEB

2,000

1,000

Source: US Census Bureau

3,141

2,508

2,441

3,000

JAN

3,204 2,439

2,650

4,000

2,617

3,021

2,777

2,000

2,609

3,000

3,163

3,772

4,000

Metro Atlanta building permits issued, residential by type, 2016:

JUL

JAN

DEC

0 NOV

0 OCT

500

SEP

500

AUG

1,000

JUL

1,000

JUN

1,500

MAY

1,500

APR

2,000

MAR

2,000

FEB

2,500

JAN

2,500

JUN

2017

5 Units

MAY

3 & 4 Units

APR

2 Units

MAR

1 Unit

FEB

2016

Source: US Census Bureau

Metro Atlanta office construction Q1 2017 (square feet):

708,457 Buckhead

1,884,615

61,000 Downtown

Suburbs

1,902,500 Midtown

4,556,572 TOTAL 355,000 Central Perimeter

331,643

2,671,957

North Fulton

CBD

151,066 1,046,906 Source: JLL Research

Northlake

Northwest

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Structural strength: Developers and construction companies are making the most of the economy, which in the midst of massive expansion The beginning of 2017 saw a dip in residential construction spending in Metro Atlanta, from $1 billion in February 2016 to $755 million in the same month in 2017, a drop of 22 percent, according to a report from Dodge Data and Analytics. For the same periods, nonresidential construction spending almost quadrupled from $237 million to $947 million. However, by June 2017, residential starts were at $878 million, up 22 percent from June 2016, and nonresidential saw a year-on-year jump of 56 percent, from $546 million to $849 million.

As of June 2017, nonresidential starts for the year were at $3.74 billion, an increase of 57 percent on $2.38 billion from the same period in 2016. For residential, the growth was less, with $4.55 billion, up 7 percent from $4.23 billion. Total building is up 25 percent yearon-year at, $8.29 billion up from $6.61 billion.

The turn of the screws At the end of 2016, the construction industry was looking forward to a prosperous 2017, encouraged by the prospect of a president with a background in development. After turbulence caused by the Great Recession, Metro Atlanta is offering a lot of opportunities.

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The recession that began in 2007, and was brought on by the subprime mortgage crisis, hit Metro Atlanta hard. In 2007, before the economic decline, there were 220,700 full-time construction jobs in Georgia. By 2008, this figure had fallen by 7.3 percent to 204,600. In 2012, the number was 140,600, a fall of some 36 percent, according to the Associated General Contractors of America (AGCA). Although employment has not yet returned to its peak level, the 2016 figure of 178,700 indicates strong recovery.

Atlanta’s construction sector is buoyed by an economy that shows overall good health. Although the most recent July 2017 figures indicate a slight dip of 1 percent, Georgia has one of the top 10 fastest-growing construction sectors in the country. Job numbers are rising so fast that the ACGA reported in 2016 that more than two-thirds of surveyed construction companies in Georgia said they were having difficulty finding appropriate workers.

Waiting for GDOT Infrastructure projects are playing an essential part in the construction landscape. The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) spent $1.33 billion in the

CONSTRUCTION OVERVIEW

2016 fiscal year, awarding a total of 388 construction contracts. The largest share of that, 43 percent, went to road maintenance, while road construction was allotted 35 percent and the remaining 22 percent was dedicated to bridge safety projects. Total GDOT spending over the 2015 and 2016 financial years has been $2 billion, with a $900 million cash injection from the general assembly.

Transportation remains a significant concern for Metro Atlanta, with some of the worst congestion in the U.S. and population growth showing no signs of abating. The Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) predicts that the population of the Atlanta Metropolitan Area will top 8 million by 2040. At the beginning of 2016, the ARC announced a blueprint for a 24-year plan for $85.1 billion worth of investments. Of that total, some $62 million is being spent on transportation, which includes $38.7 billion shared between the maintenance of roads and bridges, operations and safety. Bridge upgrades and replacements that will be completed or under completion by 2020 include that on Courtland Street in Atlanta, the SR82 bridge over the Middle Oconee River and the Valley Hill Road bridge, which crosses the Flint River in Clayton County.

to reconstruct the portions of the bridge destroyed in the fire. The original target date was June 15 but, encouraged by a financial incentive, the work was finished by rush hour on May 15. The full cost of the work was $16.6 million, including $1.6 million for the demolition of the old bridge, $11.9 million for the new bridge and $3.1 million to incentivize early finish.

Price inflation In the 1990s, Christopher Leinberger, an expert on urban development, called Atlanta “the poster child for urban sprawl.” With no natural boundaries, Metro Atlanta has been one of the fastest-growing metro areas in the U.S., expanding by 632 square miles between 2000 and 2010. However, recently that outward expansion has slowed down in line with national trends, and a greater emphasis has been on infill, with walkable communities becoming more popular.

From January 2015 to January 2016, construction costs in Atlanta increased by 3.8 percent, 2 percentage points higher than the national average of 1.0 percent, and the highest in the U.S. Atlanta’s hike in costs beat that in Los Angeles, at 3.5 percent, and that in San Francisco, at 2.9 percent, according to a report from CBRE. Over a five-year period, Atlanta has seen an increase of nearly 13 percent.

The overarching reason for increasing costs is the shortage of labor, although the number of large-scale projects in Atlanta, such as sports stadiums, has also increased the price of construction materials such as

The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) spent $1.33 billion in the 2016 fiscal year, awarding a total of 388 construction contracts.

Contract bridge The importance of Atlanta’s road infrastructure was highlighted in March 2017, when a fire caused a bridge to collapse on the I-85, closing it to traffic over a length of two miles. Soon after the accident, Cobb County-based contractor, C.W. Matthews, was chosen

Jerome Russel President – HJ Russel

The biggest thing happening in Atlanta right now is urbanism.

Transit-oriented development is another trend that has picked up in Atlanta because it allows for more density and transit options.

This urban focus is unprecedented in the way it is driving real estate. Adaptive reuse has also become a growing segment on the construction and development side.

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CONSTRUCTION OVERVIEW

Lamar Wakefield Principal & CEO, Wakefield Beasley

How does the leadership in the area help to encourage growth?

We have incredible leadership in Atlanta, which is really important for successful growth and understanding how urban planning really needs to work. At the moment, we’re working the Turner Field redevelopment. Mayor Kasim Reed has lent his support and said that they will build Georgia state housing, run the sports complexes in that area and expand the light rail. This kind of leaderships is critical to what we do.

We do projects all over the country, and in some places we come across a lot of resistance, but in Metro Atlanta, we find that the cities, counties and the government are very accommodating. The city of Alpharetta has given us the density that we need here, because once the daytime shoppers and the office users leave the area, we still want it to be successful.

How are new experiential developments impacting development across Metro Atlanta?

There is a new development in Alpharetta, and Microsoft has taken two floors at $38 per square foot, which is $13 above the market average, just so they can be in there. These companies want to recruit the best young professionals who are less concerned about cars, and more about sustainability and walkability in their communities. Office costs are important, but not as important as getting the finest talent.

Avalon is a gigabit community, and we want to embrace the latest technology, because that’s what the young professionals coming here need to have. They also want to know if developments are sustainable and certified by the Green Building Council.

Construction costs are increasing, and getting projects underwritten is becoming tougher. We’re well underwritten across all our projects in the Atlanta region. We will not start a project until we are at 70 percent pre-leasing. There are still plenty of units being sold and plenty of growth, but construction costs clearly have hampered some projects from taking off.

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cement. At the end of 2016, the cost of a trophy office property in Buckhead was more than $400 per square foot, according to CBRE. This was an increase of 25 percent since 2009.

On the job The reasons given for labor shortages have been varied.

Only 3 percent of 18- to 25-year-olds were interested in a career in construction, according to a survey from the National Association of Home Builders, with information technology, management and business all beating the trade and 48 percent of respondents saying they wanted a less physically demanding job. In the same report, 80 percent of those who had suggested that they would consider a career in construction said high wages were the main reason.

Yet it seems that the perception of construction as a high-wage job might not be true. Wage growth has ground to a halt since 2000 in the U.S., with the average salary actually decreasing from $49,000 per year to $48,000 per year in 2015.

One way to tackle the shortfall of construction workers is the state’s High Demand Career Initiative (HDCI), which was founded in 2014 by Nathan Deal, governor of Georgia, with the goal of strengthening the future workforce in five key fields, namely film, logistics, aerospace, IT and construction. The initiative works with the University System of Georgia and the Technical College System of Georgia. Operated as part of the private sector, the initiative’s task forces develop strategies to increase participation in the targeted industries.

Loan rangers Although small banks remain shy when it comes to real estate lending, with increased regulation following the Great Recession, there has generally been an increase in construction lending over the past five years, as the market has recovered.

A total of $180 million in construction finance for the real estate company Jamestown to start the Ponce City Market in 2014 was the largest loan since the end of the recession in 2009. The loan was led by PNC Bank, with SunTrust Bank and JPMorgan also taking part in the financing. In 2016, a development group secured an $80-million loan for 725 Ponce, across the road from Ponce City Market, next to the BeltLine. The loan from the Bank of the Ozarks was for a mixed-use project featuring 360,000 square feet of spec office space.

With 98 percent of the office space leased, the extent of demand for space in Ponce City Market is one reason for the bank’s confidence in the 725 Ponce project.

CONSTRUCTION ECONOMY OVERVIEW

In mid-2017, The Loudermilk Companies secured a loan of $110 million for construction of a condo building next to Buckhead Village, with some $70 million coming from the Bank of the Ozarks. Set to be one of the largest buildings in the village, it will reach 18 stories and contain 57 condos in the $600$800 per square foot range, 17 of which are already under contract. There will also be 27,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space.

Office boom The vote of confidence in the office sector is reflected in recent figures. The second quarter of 2017 saw 1.3 million square feet delivered, the highest since 2010, just before a steep drop-off caused by the recession.

Three Alliance Center was the largest project, a 506,000-square-foot tower in Buckhead developed by Tishman Speyer with financing worth $175 million. The tower will house CBRE and Global Payments, among others.

The Avalon mixed-use project in Alpharetta saw the 8000 Avalon building completed in June 2017. The $73-million, 224,000-square-foot office building is a joint venture between Hines and Cousins, and as of May 2017, was already 65 percent leased, with tenants including Microsoft.

“The new trends in co-working environments mean that office development is taking elements from hospitality and residential. Offices are now closer to living-room style developments that are more comfortable, approachable and usable. Companies are using the new generation of offices as a way of attracting and retaining the best talent,” Kurt Hartman, Hines’ senior managing director for Atlanta, told Focus: Atlanta.

Home makers Residential construction is struggling to keep up with demand, with a population increase of 90,000 people in 2016 and no signs of that rate slowing down. In July 2017 there was a decrease in residential inventory to 15,701 units, a reduction of 4.9 percent, compared to the previous year. That’s not to say that developers in the area aren’t trying to keep up. From January to October 2016, Metro Atlanta was number three, behind Dallas and Houston, for single-family housing permits.

By December, the number of single-family permits had grown by 4.7 percent.

Midtown is seeing a large increase in the number of apartment and condo towers. The Ascent Midtown project from Greystar Real Estate Partners is currently under construction. Started in 2015, the $150-million development will be two towers, one of which will have

Scott Cannon Executive Vice President, Skanska

How does Atlanta fit into Skanska’s overall growth strategy?

Atlanta is a big growth market for Skanska, where we have a lot of commercial office, aviation, higher education and healthcare work. Currently, we are working at Hartsfield-Jackson Airport and building the new Mercedes-Benz U.S. headquarters, Georgia Tech’s Living Building, an Overton Park Class A office project and the new Women’s and Infants’ Center at Grady Hospital. We just finished two warehouse projects of more than a million-and-a-half square feet, renovations of the historical Olympia building and construction of a new Turner Broadcasting food hall.

How important is sustainability in the development of Atlanta as a market?

We work to include the most sustainable practices and programs in all our projects. Our Atlanta office was the first Leadership in Energy and Environment Design (LEED) gold-certified office space in Atlanta in 2007.

We have two unique and sustainable projects underway in Atlanta – the Georgia Tech Living Building Challenge and an urban farm shed along the BeltLine.

The Georgia Tech Living Building Challenge will be the most environmentally advanced education and research building ever constructed in the southeast. It requires adherence to rigorous building performance standards, with strict criteria for place, water, energy, health and happiness, materials, equity and beauty.

There are currently only 11 fully certified buildings under the Living Building Challenge in the U.S. The Atlanta BeltLine development is focused on getting people outdoors and being green. It’s about changing the way people live, work and play in the city.

Skanska has a unique project that we are working on with Lord Aeck Sargent: the Atlanta BeltLine Urban Farm Shed. It is a 500-square-foot off-grid storage and work shed featuring a photovoltaic energy and storage system, composting toilet and the use of salvaged and locally milled wood products. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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CONSTRUCTION OVERVIEW

Midtown is seeing a large increase in the number of apartment and condo towers.

328 residential units and is expected to be completed in early 2019. The other tower will be a 14-story, 176room hotel, with an expected completion date in summer 2018. Pollack Shores’ five-story residential development, designed by Lord Aeck Sargent, will add 256 apartments to the area. Known as 1270 Spring Street, the development will include 13,5000 square feet of retail in addition to the one-, two- and threebedroom apartments.

“Most of the cranes you see in Midtown and Buckhead are doing construction for the multifamily segment.

There are a lot of young professionals moving to the city and there is a lot of competition for talent. People with quality jobs demand quality housing,” Chris White, executive vice president and market leader for Savills Studley, told Focus: Atlanta.

Other cities in the metro area are also meeting the population boom with a range of single- and multifamily developments. In March 2017, a new phase of the Alpharetta City Center project was started. The $85-million development in the heart of Alpharetta includes 105,000 square feet of restaurant and retail space, 36,000 square feet of office space and 168 apartments, coming from Morris & Fellows, MidCity Real Estate Partners and South City Partners, with Hedgewood Homes building 42 single-family homes.

In February 2017, the City of Duluth approved the Home 64 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | CONSTRUCTION

South Communities plan to build some 100 new homes, including 59 townhouses and 39 single-family houses in the city, with an expected completion of fall 2018.

Mixed fortunes The success of both Ponce City Market and Avalon have pointed toward the growing popularity of mixed-use developments. As the active workforce changes, baby boomers are retiring and a new generation of young professionals are arriving with different tastes and requirements. With more active lifestyles and a greater sense of environmental responsibilities, many of those entering the housing market have walkability high on their list of requirements, spurring new communities based around entertainment and employment centers.

The Atlantic Station development in Midtown Atlanta is a 138-acre mixed-used development currently home to 1.5 million square feet of retail space, and more than 7,000 employees and 5,000 residents. One of the oldest mixed-used developments in the Atlanta area, it is a winner of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Phoenix Award. It was acquired by a joint venture between CB Richard Ellis Investors and North America Properties in 2011.

The Pinewood Forest in Fayette is adjacent to the Pinewood Atlanta Studios and includes 1,200 residences and 270,000 square feet of retail and office next to ample,

CONSTRUCTION OVERVIEW

North American Properties is investing $80 million into a mixed-use development named Edge on the BeltLine’s Eastside Trail. It will include 29,000 square feet of retail, restaurant and office space, along with 350 residential units, 30 percent of which will be affordable housing. The project broke ground in June 2017 and will be ready to open in spring 2019.

walkable green space. The $180-million Sandy Springs city center project includes office and retail space, with nearly 300 residences and again, plenty of green space.

One of the largest mixed-use projects, the BeltLine is also among the most ambitious development efforts in Atlanta’s history. It is slated to include a number of new developments, from small retail units to office blocks and housing, and the price tag of $4.8 billion does not include private development. The BeltLine is scheduled for final completion in 2030.

The sporting life The mixed-use concept has also been a major component of the two new sports stadiums in Metro Atlanta. The Mercedes-Benz Stadium, home of the Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United FC, and the SunTrust Park, home of the Atlanta Braves, both celebrate their inaugural games in 2017.

The $1.6-billion Mercedes-Benz Stadium replaced the Georgia Dome, which had been the Falcons’ home since 1992. The stadium was originally conceived in 2008 by the AMB Group. It envisioned an open-air stadium with enough capacity to host a Super Bowl and a better revenue-sharing agreement with the Georgia World Congress Center Authority, which owns the Georgia Dome on behalf of Georgia State University.

The three-year construction broke ground in March 2014, with the general contracting a joint venture between Hunt Construction Group, Holder Construction, H. J. Russell and C. D. Moody Construction. Funding included $600 million in bonds and tax revenue, $850 million in financing from banks and $200 million from the National Football League. The rest was covered by AMB and the pre-sale of “personal seat licenses.” The stadium is notable for an eight-panel aperture-style retractable roof. The first game was held in August 2017.

During the construction phase, developers started discussing potential new projects around the stadium

Kevin Green President & CEO – Midtown Alliance

We rezoned all of Midtown in 2000, and since then, this 1.2-square-mile district has welcomed more than 60 high-rise development projects. Right now, we have another 20 major development projects under construction within this area, and more than 20 additional projects have cleared the development review process and are in the pipeline. An incredible amount of development has happened in Midtown since the early 2000s and there has never been as much concurrent new development and investment as we have at the moment.

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CONSTRUCTION OVERVIEW

Construction in Metro Atlanta is being driven by population increase and the companies moving into the area.

with the Atlanta Housing Authority, choosing Hunt Companies to start work on a $150-million mixed-income development, which will include 700 new housing units. In the first half of 2017, the Friendship Baptist Church, which agreed to sell land to the Mercedes-Benz project, filed a rezoning request for a $300-million project consisting of 1.76 million square feet of residential, 134,700 square feet of commercial and 185,600 square feet of office development.

The Suntrust Park Stadium in Cobb County also includes a mixed-use project called the Battery. The whole projected is costing an estimated $1.1 billion, with $400 million coming from Cobb public funds in the form of bonds, tax revenue and contributions from local businesses, and the remaining $400 million contributed by the Braves. The Battery will include office and retail space, as well as 500 residential units, once complete.

The entire project is being constructed by a joint venture between Brasfield & Gorrie, Mortenson Construction, Barton Malow and New South Construction.

Groundbreaking for the stadium started in September 2014 and the first game was held in March 2017.

Looking ahead Metro Atlanta’s economic growth has a distinctly physical imprint. The increasing population offers obvious opportunities for residential construction.

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The commitment of local governments to improving transport infrastructure is creating lucrative contracts, while the early completion of the I-85 bridge reconstruction suggests that incentivizing bonuses could become more commonplace. Large companies entering Metro Atlanta and homegrown enterprises expanding operations are creating demand for new office space both large and small, while a growing IT sector will require purpose-built data centers to continue momentum. Even retail is finding a new lease on life in experiential developments. Across the board, demand does not seem to be drying up.

The issues lie in availability. The construction sector needs to attract more workers. Whether it be through economic chambers and educational establishments, or simply with increased wages and better conditions, more people need to be attracted to the trade.

Financing is still too tight. Loans are increasing, but still not to pre-recession levels, with smaller institutions restricted by the Dodd-Frank regulations and larger institutions cautious about the current development cycle. However, if the current presidential administration follows through on scrapping regulations and reducing higher levels of corporation tax, finances in the sector could flow more freely. For the moment though, there is still enough momentum to keep developers optimistic.

Utilities & Infrastructure: To maintain its overall growth pattern, Atlanta is looking toward alternative and innovative energy sources. Major projects and initiatives are underway to make the best use of space and resources while ensuring sustainability remains a key component of plans.

More infrastructure and increased greenspace are of key importance as the area advances economically.

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Utilities & Infrastructure in numbers: Georgia energy consumption per sector, May 2015 (trillion Btu):

Georgia electricity generation by source, May 2017 (terawatt-hours):

0.6 0.3 Hydro-electric

827.5

767

Non-hydro renewables

4.3

Transportation

Industrial

Natural Gas

3.0 Nuclear

2,851.2

11.3

TOTAL

TOTAL

553

703.7

Commercial

Residential

3.1 Coal

Source: EIA

Source: EIA

commercial

Electricity consumption, 2005-2015 (terrawatt-hours):

residential industrial other

160

140

132.3

134.8

137.5

135.2

140.7 130.8

136.4

131.0

130.5

2012

2013

135.8

135.9

2014

2015

120

100

45,55 54,52

80

60

23,005 11,71

40

20

0

2005

2006

2007

2008

Source: EIA

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2009

2010

2011

UTILITIES & INFRASTRUCTURE OVERVIEW

Sustainable supplies: Metro Atlanta is looking to alternative energy sources, green policy and innovation in planning to ensure that the area can maintain its growth momentum Greater Atlanta’s economy is growing, and so is its population. The metropolitan area saw an increase of 1.6 percent between 2015 and 2016, from 5.70 million residents to 5.79 million. Atlanta has the ninth-mostpopulous metropolitan area in the U.S., and the fourthfastest-growing population.

However, with such impressive figures comes a responsibility for both the private and public sectors to supply the infrastructure and utilities needed to sustain growth, and it is a responsibility that the area is taking seriously.

Atlanta’s administration takes pride in being responsive to the needs of its residents, spending money on projects concerning issues such as water supply, road usage and green space. Meanwhile, the private sector that supplies the area’s energy and internet continues to provide the local economy with cutting-edge innovation.

Power to the people Uftility provision in Atlanta is dominated by Southern Company, which counts among its subsidiaries:

Georgia Power, natural gas provider Southern Company Gas, wholesale fiber optic communications provider Southern Telecom, cellphone provider Southern Linc and Southern Power, which offers wholesale electricity generation. These subsidiaries are based in Atlanta, although Southern Company has other arms throughout the southeast.

As of December 2016, Georgia Power solely owned and operated 46 power plants, with another seven jointly owned. Joint owners include power cooperative Oglethorpe Power, MEAG Power, Dalton Power and the Southern Company-owned Gulf Power.

The generation mix is 29-percent coal, 20-percent nuclear, 47-percent oil and natural gas, and 4-percent hydroelectric and other renewables, contributing almost 25 gigawatts of power. Georgia Power owns and operates 12,507 miles of transmission lines.

The company retains a monopoly on electricity provision in Georgia. According to statistics from the U.S. Bureau of Labor, households paid an average of $0.14 per kilowatt-hour, exactly on par with the national average, as of August 2017. The U.S. Energy Information( ) www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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UTILITIES & INFRASTRUCTURE INTERVIEW

Network opportunities How institutions within the Atlanta area are coming together to create superior public infrastructure

Russel McMurry Commissioner – Georgia Department of Transportation Georgia. This funding offers GDOT the opportunity to address critical infrastructure needs in routine and capital maintenance and has helped to keep the state’s roadways, roadsides and bridges in a state of good repair. Without the visionary leadership, which ensured passage of this important legislation, the outlook for our future transportation needs would be dire.

How is the leadership of Georgia improving transportation infrastructure throughout the state?

Georgia is an amazing state with a booming population and a prosperous business environment.

Our transportation network is now the 10th-largest in the nation, and with millions of motorists, travelers and commercial vehicles on the go every single day, the Metro Atlanta area plays a critically important role in our system. Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) has a responsibility to keep our infrastructure safe and efficient while working to foster relationships with essential partners.

Fortunately, there is exceptional leadership at both the state and local level. Two years ago, the state legislature passed the Transportation Funding Act of 2015, which provided for an additional $1 billion dedicated to transportation investment in 70 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | UTILITIES & INFRASTRUCTURE

What made the I-85 bridge rebuild so successful?

Success is all about teamwork, and this was certainly the case with the I-85 rebuild in spring 2017. It began with the coordination of the first responders – the Atlanta Fire and Rescue Department, the Atlanta Police Department and Georgia State Patrol, as well as our own highway emergency response operator units. They were able to keep the area clear and were responsible for preventing any injuries or loss of life during the fire and ultimate collapse of the structure.

The evening of the incident, I was communicating with key partners including officials in the mayor’s and governor’s offices, MARTA, the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority, the Georgia State Patrol, Georgia Emergency Management Authority, GDOT employees and more, to discuss how we were going to move forward. Without hesitation, each one of these key partners offered solutions to keep Georgians moving until the bridge was replaced.

Governor Nathan Deal’s declaration of a state of emergency allowed GDOT to employ Federal Aid Highway Emergency Relief guidelines, which allow for a streamlined emergency relief process that doesn’t require a lengthy federal review. The U.S. Department of Transportation’s approval of quick-release emergency relief funds provided a commitment of $10 million within 24 hours of the collapse. These were key determining factors, which contributed to the speed of the project’s completion.

UTILITIES & INFRASTRUCTURE OVERVIEW

( ) Administration reported that in 2015, Georgia was eighth in the nation for electricity generation and sales.

Alternative options In 2016, Georgia Power filed a long-term plan with state regulators to increase electricity generation from solar, wind, biomass and hydro so that they contribute up to 10 percent of the fuel mix. The 2016 Integrated Resources Plan (IRP) was approved by a vote of four to one, and the plan, which has been praised for its emphasis on reduced reliance on carbon resources, proposes the addition of 1.6 GW of renewable and nuclear power by 2020. Georgia Power was number five in the U.S. for solar connectedness to the grid in 2016, with some 900 MW of solar capacity in operation.

Georgia Power carries out a number of research and community-based projects. In 2016, Georgia Power installed 4,000 PV solar panels at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium, enough for the 16 gigawatt-hours needed to power the Atlanta Falcons home schedule. The Home Energy Improvement Program (HEIP) is designed to help residential electricity users conserve energy. Under HEIP, a series of recommendations are made on a living facility, which could then qualify occupants to cash rebates.

natural gas marketers vying for customers in Atlanta and state, offering both fixed- and variable-rate plans.

Gas South and Georgia Natural Gas are two largest marketers by customer numbers. The main supplier of natural gas in the state is the Atlanta Gas Light Company (AGL). In July 2017, piped natural gas in Atlanta costs $1.581 per therm, which is 53 percent higher than the national average in July 2017.

AGL has run a number of natural gas infrastructure programs over the past two decades to ensure the integrity of the system. These projects include the Pipeline Replacement Program, which is a 15-year project to replace more than 2,700 miles of outdated steel and cast iron pipelines with more modern steel and plastic, the Georgia Strategic Infrastructure Development and Enhancement Program, also known as STRIDE, which is a 10year program that commenced in 2009 that aims to upgrade and expand the transmission pipeline system in North Atlanta, and the Northwest Georgia Expansion Pipeline project that began in the first half of 2017, and travels through Paulding County and Cobb County.

Georgia Power was number five in the U.S. for solar connectedness to the grid in 2016, with some 900 MW of solar capacity in operation.

Natural sources Natural gas in Georgia is deregulated with 15 certified

Rehydration therapy In May 2017, Georgia made an official statement asking residents in Metro Atlanta to observe water conservation efforts. Atlanta is no stranger to drought; its warm climate and high elevation make it a ( )

William Johnson Commissioner – Department of Public Works

Every investment that we make ties into the broader community and improves the overall quality of life by bringing additional investment in housing, businesses and job creation and providing opportunities for people in the community to receive training. One of the big projects that the mayor pushed is the Smart City initiative. We are working on a smart street-lighting system that will be able us to collect data, analyze trends and benefit investors seeking to strategize.

This is a very exciting project, and we have many partners from the private sector working with us as we develop this project.

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UTILITIES & INFRASTRUCTURE INTERVIEW

Development driver How a primary economic engine for the area and the state is looking to the future to ensure that success is sustainable

Paul Bowers Chairman, President & CEO –Georgia Power

How important is community and economic development for Georgia Power?

Georgia is our home and that’s why we’re committed to improving the quality of life in every community we serve, and we’ve been doing it for more than 130 years. We invest across communities because economic development creates jobs and brings industry to the state, which also helps grow our business.

At Georgia Power, we want to make sure Georgia remains the best state to do business. We are committed to working with businesses to meet their sustainability needs, and a good example of that is our partnership with the Mercedes-Benz Stadium. They expect to be the first sports arena in the nation with Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Platinum status, and we are helping them reach that certification through a unique solar partnership.

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How can planning and sustainability be used to keep energy costs low?

How electricity is generated and consumed is evolving.

Changes in energy consumption and usage patterns are driving decisions we make for our business. Our generation portfolio has evolved significantly over the past decade.

With one of the largest voluntary renewable portfolios in the nation, Georgia Power’s natural gas capacity nearly doubled from 27 percent to 51 percent, and we’ve cut our coal-fired generation capacity to half of what it was in 2005, from 52 percent to 28 percent.

Georgia Power customers pay rates below the national average because of our long-term planning. We were number five in the U.S. for solar connected to the grid in 2016. Fuel diversity provides a great deal of value to customers, because as fuel prices go up and down, we can make use of whichever generation source is best for the customer.

We waited to add solar energy to our portfolio in large amounts until the technology became cost-effective for our customers. Now, we have approximately 900 MW of solar capacity in operation, with accelerating growth year over year since 2013 and we expect to add up to 1.6 GW of additional renewable capacity by 2021.

How is Georgia Power leveraging new technologies to help energy consumers?

Our customers’ needs are changing, and so is the way they interact with us. We know they want sustainability, but they also want to be connected. For example, our new Georgia Power Marketplace is a direct-to-consumer website. From smart thermostats to LED bulbs and other energy-saving products, we are connecting our customers directly to these latest products for their home and business. The site launched in 2016, and since then more than 35,000 products have been sold.

UTILITIES & INFRASTRUCTURE OVERVIEW

( ) constant risk. Water management is overseen by the Metropolitan North Georgia Water Planning District (MNGWPD), which was created in 2001 by the Georgia General Assembly and works with various counties to oversee planning a delivery to residents.

The MNGWPD’s Water Supply and Water Conservation Management Plan was started in 2001, with 19 conservation measures laid out for both residential and business customers. The plan has seen an overall drop in water usage by 10 percent for the region, according to 2016 report from the MNGWPD, and when combined with a population increase of some 1 million, has led to a per capita decrease of 30 percent. The plan included conservation pricing, infrastructure replacement, residential water audits, education and public awareness programs and new water waste policy to reduce outdoor waste. An updated 2017 plan aims to decrease per capita usage by an additional 25 percent by 2050.

The City of Atlanta Department of Watershed Management is responsible for the water supply of the City of Atlanta. In April 2017, the department started work on a $280-million project to extend the city’s current water backup level of three days to more than 30 days. The project consists of a 5-mile, 10-foot diameter tunnel that will link the Chattahoochee River and the Hemphill and Chattahoochee Water Treatment Plants. The project will link up to the Bellwood Quarry,

which is being converted in a 2.4-billion gallon water storage facility. The project, originally announced by Mayor Kasim Reed, is designed to serve the city for at least the next 100 years.

Stay connected With a thriving technology sector and growing number of young professionals in the area, it is natural that Atlanta is on the front line when it comes to internet infrastructure.

In August 2016, Mayor Reed opened the Google Fiber space in Ponce City Market as the company started their largest ever service roll out across Metro Atlanta. The gigabit service is 100-times faster than basic package broadband, offering speeds of up to 1,000 Mbps.

The Google Fiber service started in Midtown East and Piedmont Heights, with rollouts across the rest of the metro area planned over 2017 and 2018. However, at the beginning of 2017, doubts were expressed by Atlanta leadership about the completion of the project when in February, a number of employees at Google Fiber were moved to other divisions within Alphabet, the conglomerate holding all the Google companies, and CEO Craig Barratt resigned. A spokesperson announced that they were still “committed to the success of Google Fiber,” although in September 2017, it was unclear when the Google Fiber project would be finished.

In August 2016, Mayor Reed opened the Google Fiber space in Ponce City Market as Google Fiber started their largest ever service roll out across Metro Atlanta.

Paul Morris President & CEO – Atlanta BeltLine

The goal of the BeltLine was to unite a city and use transportation infrastructure to bring people together. The Atlanta BeltLine addresses all three challenges. We are a private redevelopment corporation put together by the State of Georgia.

The BeltLine was created for the purpose of capturing a lot of aging, largely abandoned and underutilized industrial lands along four historic rail corridors, connecting them all into a continuous loop and redeveloping them. It is about 6,000 acres over a 15,000acre planning area.

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UTILITIES & INFRASTRUCTURE OVERVIEW

Kevin Greiner President & CEO, Gas South

How can Atlanta’s energy feedstock be diversified, and what is Gas South’s role?

Metro Atlanta and Georgia are both well served by the current utility infrastructure. We have a strong natural gas pipeline network that serves all of the metro area, as well as reaching ex-urban and rural areas to ensure that natural gas is available for all customers − whether they are industrial, commercial or residential.

During the last five years, there has been a big push to extend the pipeline system into areas that have not been served in the past. For the economics of natural gas to work, you need a large group of potential customers to extend the pipeline to those regions.

We work very closely with Atlanta Gas Light (AGL), the utility company in Georgia, to look at different opportunities and ensure that these investments will be fully utilized by prospective customers.

Is there need for further investment into natural gas infrastructure?

For decades, Georgia has been extremely forwardthinking in terms of natural gas infrastructure. A pipeline replacement program has been in place for a long time so we are fortunate that the infrastructure is well-maintained in Atlanta and throughout Georgia.

Our public service commission has also had a great deal of foresight for future needs of Georgia to ensure that the money and focus will be available to meet demand. As we’ve grown as a state, we’ve made investments to guarantee that there aren’t shortages of capacity, equipment is updated and pipelines are modernized.

The area is served by two large interstate pipelines, Southern Natural and Transco which allow the state to be in remarkably good shape when it comes to access and reliability of natural gas supply.

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Atlanta’s Smart City initiative is being rolled out across over the next five to six years.

Despite these setback, the Atlanta area is well served by existing fiber broadband from providers such as AT&T, which as of 2016, has 1 gigabit per second fiber optic installed throughout Metro Atlanta.

21st-century city The Atlanta Smart Cities program is one of the most ambitious infrastructure programs currently being undertaken in the City of Atlanta. Encompassing a number of different innovations and initiatives, the municipality is working with a Smart Cities Alliance, made up of AT&T Smart Cities, Georgia Power, Current, General Electric and the Georgia Institute of Technology, among others, to stay on the cutting edge of a global market some analysts are predicting could be worth $1.6 trillion.

Atlanta’s Smart City initiative will roll out over the next five to six years, with funds coming from federal grants, sales tax and city bonds. The initial areas, known as smart zones, will include the Buckhead Loop, Midtown, areas on the west side and the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. The first projects were planned

UTILITIES & INFRASTRUCTURE OVERVIEW

and send out alerts to motorists and pedestrians as preventative measures. Data will also be made available to universities and private companies for analysis and innovation.

in 2015 after former President Obama announced $80 million in funding for smart cities.

Utilizing the internet of things concept, the initiative will have hundreds of connected sensors, traffic lights, smart lights, LEDs and security nodes connected over a 300-mile municipal fiber-optic network. Different departments and companies throughout the city will be able to collect data and put it to various uses.

Example applications include measuring air quality levels to send out pollution and pollen warnings and data measuring pedestrian and traffic movements to create safer traffic flows and crossing signals. There will also be commercial applications such a sales campaigns in crowded areas. The city is investing $80 million into transportation infrastructure.

Other sensor nodes will measure the conditions of bridges during bad weather, monitor pipelines for structural integrity issues, track sanitation movements and adjust LED street lighting. Data analytic applications and machine learning will also be utilized to predict issues such as traffic crashes

Targeting infrastructure The Renew Atlanta Bond was approved overwhelming by voters in March 2015 with eight out of 10 agreeing to the $250-million cash injection. The bond was proposed in order to start addressing a backlog of infrastructure issues estimated at nearly $1 billion.

The largest allocation of the funds, 28 percent or some $71 million, is going to roadways improvement, with resurfacing and replacing on existing roads leading the commercial districts and common use areas. Traffic signals are taking a 16 percent share, with $40 million going to optimization and the Atlanta Traffic Control Center. The bond will also go to ensuring sidewalks comply with the American Disabilities Act, a complete streets program, parks and recreation, public facilities, bridges, public safety and an arts program. Projects are ongoing with no set completion date as of September 2017. “Renew Atlanta’s projects will be some of the most transformational transportation investments in the country,” Faye Di Massimo, the general manager of Renew Atlanta, told Focus: Atlanta.

The Greenway Acquisition Project is a $25-million program that acquires and protects properties throughout Metro Atlanta. Run by the Bureau of Watershed Protection, part of the Department of Watershed Management, the ongoing scheme started in 2007. The scheme targets lands around waterways in 14 counties, protecting it from development and creating areas of vegetation to stop erosion. The City of Atlanta also has 3,200 acres of parkland, which is also maintained by the Bureau of Watershed Protection.

Green circles Originally proposed as part of a master thesis from a Georgia Tech student, the Atlanta BeltLine is a key step in the city’s efforts to improve transportation, spur development and add green space. The BeltLine is built on a disused 22-mile rail corridor that runs around central Atlanta. The first groundbreaking was done in 2008, and the whole project is estimated to cost $4.8 billion, completing in 2030.

Funding sources for the BeltLine are diverse, with money coming from the Atlanta BeltLine Tax Allocation District and a mix of private investment, local and federal grants and public-private partnerships. As of 2015, a total of $450 million public and private investment had been made which had spurred nearly www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Around $71 million of the $250 million Renew Atlanta Bond will be spent on roadway improvement.

$3 billion in private development. In 2016, the program had created some 7,200 permanent jobs and 26,600 temporary jobs for development.

So far, the BeltLine has trails and parks open, creating a walkable loop around the city which has given rise to a number of small restaurants, bars and shops. However, one of the original goals of the project was to use new transport infrastructure to create better connections within the city between communities, especially strengthening the transport connections between affordable housing and areas of commerce.

A streetcar system around the BeltLine has been in the planning stages since inception, with the Atlanta BeltLine/Atlanta Streetcar System Plan (SSP) given initial approval in 2015. The transit system, which is slated to be completed during the second period of development, 2019-2023, will connect to the MARTA system at four points.

Looking ahead With the Smart Cities project, the Atlanta BeltLine and a commitment to increasing the renewable energy mix, Atlanta’s leadership has proved itself to be innovative and forward looking when it comes to 76 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | UTILITIES & INFRASTRUCTURE

infrastructure development. However, the metro area still faces challenges. Those in development have long known that a rapidly increasing population can create strain on utilities and transportation networks. With an industry increasingly focused on technology, an emphasis also needs to be placed on ensuring the areas internet, both cabled and wireless, remains one that can compete with the most high-tech international cities.

As young professionals start to prioritize environmental issues over the convenience of private transport, the city has to ensure that its green commitments are in line with expectations, and that they are taken seriously. Greenspace needs to be both developed and protected, even as Metro Atlanta undergoes economic development.

The Smart Cities projects and BeltLine are ambitious projects befitting of a global city, but with leadership changes on the horizon, both public and private institutions need to work together to make projects as successful in reality as they seem on paper. If all goes to plan, however, Metro Atlanta could leverage the ambition, ideas and skilled leadership of its population into an area that will attract the best and brightest.

Transportation & Aviation: Home to the busiest airport in the world and an ever-increasing population, at the core of Metro Atlanta is movement. Although the city has faced many obstacles in combatting traffic issues in recent years, upgrades to public transportation, road improvements and smart city technology may be the future solutions. The increasing popularity of the rapid transit system and ride-sharing applications is proving that the shift from cars to public transportation is feasible.

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Transport & Aviation in numbers: Airport arrivals 2016-2017 by month: Domestic

2016 JAN

3,423,058

473,239

FEB

3,308,149

407,979

3,857,981

MAR

485,421

APR

481,804

MAY

492,655

JUN

International

3,882,429 4,193,717 4,105,417

538,477

JUL

601,317

AUG

555,088

SEP

434,441

OCT

441,222

NOV

4,144,547 3,868,584 3,831,953 4,104,449 3,917,749

389,322

DEC

3,734,194

453,600 0

500,000

1,000,000

1,500,000

2,000,000

2,500,000

3,000,000

3,500,000

4,000,000

4,500,000

2017 JAN

3,428,155

489,649

FEB

3,296,950

413,780

MAR

4,014,677

514,962

APR

3,666,589

522,474

MAY

4,120,268

523,073

JUN

4,116,852

576,837

JUL

4,182,749

638,816 0

500,000

1,000,000

1,500,000

2,000,000

2,500,000

3,000,000

3,500,000

4,000,000

4,500,000

Source: ATL

Washington, DC; DCA

Dallas/Fort Worth, TX; DFW

847

Chicago, IL; ORD

600

849

Tampa, FL; TPA

913

Los Angeles, CA; LAX

800

914

963

New York, NY; LGA

1,058

Ft.lauderdale, FL; FLL

1,096

1,000

1,174

1,200

1,175

1,400

1,394

Top-10 ATL destination airports, March 2016-February 2017 by number of travellers (‘000s):

Philadelphia, PA; PHL

Miami, FL; MIA

400 200 0 Orlando, FL; MCO

Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics

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ATL passengers by carrier, June 2016 (000’s):

64,905

9,945

Delta

Southwest

89,273 TOTAL

4,963 Express Jet

2,871 American

1,818 Spirit

4,771 Other Source: ATL

MARTA annual passengers and revenue, 2007-2016 Passengers (millions)

ATL total passengers, U.S. flights (millions):

Fare revenue ($ millions)

160

90

88

83

90

100

80

81

133

135

129

129

134

139

120

146

156

150

147

140

100

2016

2017

60

80 40

60 40

20 20 0

0 2007

2008

2009

Source: MARTA Annual report

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

2015

2016

2013 2014

2015

Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics

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Point-to-point progress: Metro Atlanta has a world-leading airport and a well-developed public transport system. Investment and innovation are helping to improve its roadways After seeing the 2017 hit film “Baby Driver,” in which an unwilling getaway driver flies through the streets of Atlanta, you could be forgiven for thinking that its traffic is fast-paced. Yet, as in any major city, traffic jams and troublesome roadblocks are not uncommon. Thankfully, public transportation, road improvements and smart city initiatives are helping to lighten the load.

The transportation sector plays a key role in the Atlanta metropolitan area’s economic landscape. The sector is rich and complex, featuring the world’s busiest airport, 459.8 arterial road miles, with 513 arterial lane miles and several public transit networks. These include that of the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA), the Atlanta Streetcar and the Georgia rail system.

The heaviest hitter in transportation is undoubtedly the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL). A two-hour flight from 80 percent of the U.S. market, it serves as a prime gateway for domestic and international travelers.

The Georgia rail system is the most expansive form of public transit in the southeast, while the Atlanta 80 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | TRANSPORTATION & AVIATION

Streetcar runs along a 2.7-mile loop, making 12 stops throughout the downtown area. MARTA is an extensive network of trains and buses, with a key role in making the city accessible to the area’s residents.

Traffic woes Due to the city’s growing population, improving transportation has been a popular topic of discussion among industry leaders. “The biggest area in need of improvement is our transportation infrastructure.

Transportation, in general, is the second most important issue for people in the region, and we are working on a lot of progressive projects. However, people who live outside the city commute in and have to sit in traffic jams. We are focused on a complete street strategy, to accommodate bike lanes, or widen the sidewalks and make the city more walkable,” William Johnson, commissioner for the Department of Public Works, told Focus: Atlanta.

In 2017, traffic analytics company INTRIX ranked Atlanta the U.S. city with the fourth-worst congestion, after Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco. It was

also ranked eighth worst in the world, just behind London. Luckily, efforts to revamp and refine the transportation landscape are underway.

Smart solutions Atlanta has recently completed projects and proposed others designed to tackle specific problems and address wider challenges within the transportation sector.

First implemented in 2015, the Atlanta Reimagined project is a major step toward becoming a smart city. By incorporating the latest technology, smart cities feature improved communication among transportation systems and ensure a safer, more efficient rider experience. To this end, Atlanta Reimagined aims to upgrade existing infrastructure in the metro area, rather than build new systems. Voters approved $250 million in bonds after the project was first proposed, but much of this funding has already been used to modernize the area’s traffic lights. Nevertheless, the bulk of the plan includes three main components: a technology platform, a Smart City Command Center (SCCC) and Connected Transportation Centers (CTCs).

The technology platform is central to the Atlanta Reimagined project. It will utilize data and video analytics, machine learning and approximately 1,000 smart signals spread throughout Georgia to improve traffic flow and systems communication.

The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) is providing local agencies with these signals to install at approximately 9,000 intersections across the state. The signals will communicate with sensors and cameras throughout the city, connected to a fully responsive data center. This signal system is already being implemented and should be complete by fall 2017.

Data collected using this platform and other mediums will be managed by the project’s SCCC, in partnership with the Georgia Institute of Technology.

The command center will manage the data in real time, in order to support an efficient logistics system and facilitate smart urban traffic.

The Atlanta Reimagined project’s most vital components are the CTCs. Many of these centers will be constructed around the city to create a network of efficient transportation data. Each CTC will adapt to its location and address transportation obstacles specific to that area. For example, a center located in a business hub will focus on freight transport and distribution, while a CTC located in a residential neighborhood will focus on conditions for walking and biking.

The project’s overarching goal is to connect the people of Atlanta, resulting in vibrant, active communities.

The new technology will be implemented in an effort

Gregory Kelly Executive Director, Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport

How does the Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport interact with the local business community?

The airport serves Savannah and Hilton Head, plus the surrounding counties and communities. Almost half of our traffic here is associated with Hilton Head and the Lowcountry, and almost 70 percent of our traffic is leisurebased. The better those areas attract people, the better we do as an airport.

Recognizing that dynamic, in 2013 we formed strong partnerships with Visit Savannah, the Savannah Chamber, the Savannah Economic Development Authority, the Golden Isles CVB and the Hilton Head Chamber, with the objective to work collectively to attract additional air service. This regional partnership paid off in a big way with JetBlue deciding to start service in 2014. We also started focusing on attracting additional carriers, especially low-cost carriers.

Shortly thereafter, Allegiant Airlines announced it would begin service from three Ohio cities, which further served to stimulate our market. Again, our business partners were able to produce strong data to demonstrate to Allegiant the strong leisure connections between our region and Ohio, which helped convince Allegiant to give us a try.

What is the economic impact of the airport?

The Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport will process almost 2.5 million passengers in 2017. Almost 70 percent of those passengers are leisure travelers.

Therefore, the airport plays a key role in supporting the largest economic driver in our region, the tourism leisure industry. Additionally, there are over 13,000 jobs on airport property. Gulfstream Aerospace is the largest tenant of the airport and they account for over 10,000 of those jobs.

Lastly, the airport works with the Savannah Economic Development Authority to try to convince other aeronautical companies to move to our airport. We always work to have land readily available, with access to the taxiways and runways, for this purpose. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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TRANSPORTATION & AVIATION OVERVIEW

to ensure that transportation data is handled with efficiency and precision, facilitating all types of transit.

“Transit is probably one of the top two challenges that we have as a region. If we can expand our existing transit system to 100 miles and it connects the region, that could be a huge driver of economic development activity in Atlanta,” Michael Sullivan, president and CEO of the American Council of Engineering Companies of Georgia, told Focus: Atlanta.

The issue of smooth transport is also important because of Atlanta’s role as a logisitics center. “The Fulton industrial area is well positioned to be a logistics hub, and it is only going to grow. A one-day truck drive connects it with Chicago, New Orleans, Miami and Washington D.C. I have had more phone calls over the past 12 months about companies relocating to Atlanta than ever before,” Gil Prado, executive director of the Fulton Industrial Boulevard Community Improvement District, told Focus: Atlanta.

338 rail cars carry passengers to 38 stations. From these figures, MARTA’s strong impact on Atlanta’s transport sector is clear.

MARTA connections improve access to education, healthcare and employment throughout Metro Atlanta.

For example, many of the city’s recreation centers and Centers of Hope, a youth-engagement initiative launched

by Mayor Reed, are located near MARTA stops, in order to facilitate access for Atlanta’s youth. The system was also designed to connect the airport to business centers, making the city easier to navigate for business travelers. In 2017, MARTA was ranked the numberone airport transit provider in the nation.

The network saw a rise in demand after the I-85 freeway collapse on March 30, 2017: Overall MARTA ridership rates increased at an average of 11.5 percent. In a comparison of rates between March 24 and March 31, and rates between March 31 and April 29, ridership was found to increase by 67 percent at Brookhaven / Oglethorpe Station, by 57 percent at Dome / GWCC / Philips Arena / CNN Center Station, by 43 percent at Sandy Springs Station and by 33 percent at Chamblee Station.

MARTA responded in various ways: A website was immediately created to alert riders about which stations were full, rail services were increased and the number of available representatives was boosted.

The transit system’s popularity has led to plans for expansion. While MARTA’s rapid transit contract ( )

MARTA significantly contributes to Atlanta’s economy, generating $1.4 billion in revenues and $2.6 billion in economic activity every year.

Public offering MARTA is funded by sales tax in Fulton, Clayton and DeKalb counties, with limited federal funds, though this is proving insufficient, given the number of riders.

MARTA significantly contributes to Atlanta’s economy, generating $1.4 billion in revenues and $2.6 billion in economic activity every year. The system has provided more than 5 billion trips by bus and rail since it opened in 1979, and it supports 24,846 jobs throughout the area.

MARTA’s 550 buses cover 1,439 miles of road and its

Gerald McDowell Executive Director – Aerotropolis Alliance

The land around the airport is ripe for redevelopment, but we have to do more to get the market ready. One of our first initiatives was the Workforce Development Collective. The region already had uncoordinated workforce boards, so we brought them together, in an effort to link all the workforce boards, support organizations and others in the area. We also wanted to connect the growth industries in the airport area. The immediate airport area alone provides 175,000 jobs.

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TRANSPORTATION & AVIATION INTERVIEW

Plane sailing How Metro Atlanta is committed to constant improvement

Roosevelt Council Airport General Manager – Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport How has the Hartsfield-Jackson Airport performed so far in 2017?

Our numbers are continuing to grow, and we should surpass the 104 million passengers we had in 2016.

We have been seeing a year-on-year increase in our international traffic, which is a large share of our total passenger traffic. We’ve been adding airlines with destinations to places like Turkey and Qatar, and that is driving numbers.

The airport is always looking at new markets, but we also need to be careful to hold on to the destinations and carriers that we already manage. Part of our strategy is building new gates to increase capacity.

We’re trying to expand the Asian market, as well as the African continent and Latin America.

The amount of cargo is also increasing. One of Mayor Reed’s major initiatives is the growth of cargo throughout Atlanta. He wants us to be within the top five or six in the country when it comes to cargo capacity. We’re trying to triple the capacity that we currently have over the next three to four years. This year the airport is adding some 75,000 square feet of additional cargo space, with more expansion planned in the future.

To what extent does the airport impact tourism and job creation?

The airport is the region’s economic engine. There are 63,000 people that work on the main airport campus, but we have an additional regional reach that impacts about 440,000 people. We have an impact of some $35 billion in Metro Atlanta and close to 70 billion in the State of Georgia. We clearly do more than just move people from one destination to the other. We are totally involved in this community, and it has wrapped itself around us, and so we take our role as a transportation and economic leader very seriously.

What are some challenges to growth that need to be overcome?

We have a number of plans for growth, but at the same time we have to keep our operations and efficiency going at a very high level. In 2017, we have been selected the most efficient airport by the Air Transport Research Society for the 14th year running.

We have about 2,700 landings and takeoffs per day, so that’s one flight every 32 seconds. To expedite those flights and grow as an airport at the same time takes coordination, but that’s what we do. The airport takes up some 147 acres, as opposed to other larger airports, but we have five parallel runways, which aids in our efficiency and also allows for the construction of another runway without interruption of traffic. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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( ) includes the City of Atlanta, Fulton County, Clayton County and DeKalb County, many areas of Metro Atlanta remain without service. An expansion bill for DeKalb County was recently rejected, but extension of service to Cobb and Gwinnett counties may be in the works, and expansion in Fulton County is being planned. Meanwhile, projects designed to increase ridership and enhance service are underway.

MARTA-sponsored development continues in areas close to Avondale and Edgewood/Candler Park stations, while similar construction is planned for King Memorial Station. Across from Chamblee Station, MARTA is behind a project to build 70,000 square feet of office space, 10,000 square feet of retail space and 4,300 square feet of green space. This will create 150 construction jobs and 320 permanent positions. The aim of these projects is to promote local businesses and increase movement in the areas.

On the road again Over the past few years, Atlanta has continued to make significant progress in road improvements. The first half of 2017 saw a number of unfortunate incidents, with the I-20 gas leak and I-85 bridge collapse leaving only two usable interstates in Metro Atlanta. From March 20 to May 15, traffic was diverted to I-285, I-75 and SR 400.

Faced with these setbacks, Atlanta took quick, efficient action. MARTA was prepared for additional riders, as were ride-sharing companies like Uber and Lyft. I-85 was rebuilt and reopened May 13 – just over a month ahead of schedule. This was facilitated

by GDOT, which offered attractive incentives to contractors, in an attempt to have the reconstruction finished ahead of the scheduled June 15 completion date. Incentives included a $1.5-million bonus to the contractor who could finish on or before May 25, and

As in any major city, traffic jams and troublesome roadblocks are not uncommon.

if the project could be completed before May 21, GDOT offered a $2-million bonus plus $200,000 for every day the project was completed before that date, with a cutoff of $3.1 million.

Having reached completion well ahead of these benchmarks, C.W. Matthews Contracting was eligible to receive the full incentives. Following the freeway’s reopening an extension was approved, consisting of 10 miles of new toll lanes, which will run north from existing express lanes at Old Peachtree Road and end at Hamilton Mill Road.

While improvements to I-85 were a response to the catastrophe, scheduled renovations in other areas continue. GDOT’s $800-million Transform 285/400 project broke ground in early 2017 and is expected to be

Christopher Tomlinson Executive Director – Georgia Regional Transportation Authority

Ride-sharing is complementary to public transit. The question is how to tie all of this in. Our future plans include how to better coordinate our bus service with potential last-mile solutions such as ride shares and neighborhood circulators. Ride share companies and employer-backed shuttles could help us do the neighborhood circulations so that buses don’t have to do them. This can create consistent running times. They would be part of the last-mile solutions.

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TRANSPORTATION & AVIATION OVERVIEW

completed by 2020. It involves upgrades to 4.3 miles of I-285 and 6.2 miles of SR 400, with the aim of reducing congestion. Improvements to railroad crossings at Candler and North McDonough streets in Decatur are set to begin in fall 2017, with a budget of $2.7 million.

In Sandy Springs, the intersection of Abernathy and Roswell roads will be turned into an overpass, while Riverside Drive is being widened. GDOT is also in the process of evaluating whether a proposed Northside Drive corridor improvement would reduce traffic congestion. A final decision is expected in fall 2017.

The Central Atlanta Progress (CAP) organization and its subsidiary, the Atlanta Downtown Improvement District (ADID), also have projects underway. Over $42 million has been invested in revamping the Ivan Allen Jr. Boulevard corridor, the streetscape at Marietta Street and Centennial Olympic Park Drive, sections of Simpson and West Peachtree streetscapes and the

West Peachtree Place two-way conversion, among similar efforts.

The city hopes to encourage more pedestrian and bicycle transit, and CAP and ADID have already made strides. The Peachtree Center Avenue Cycle Track, a distinct, buffered series of cycle lanes, opened in summer 2015. The Midtown Alliance has also developed a plan to add cycle lanes and improve roads in the area.

It proposes to open up certain streets to two-way use and implement new traffic signals at intersections, in an effort to improve timing and efficiency.

These endeavors show that Metro Atlanta is working to rejuvenate its transportation landscape. As public transportation and ride-sharing become increasingly accessible, as more efficient systems for directing traffic are implemented and as streets become more bike- and pedestrian-friendly, congestion is improving. With fewer cars on the road, and increased investment in public transportation, bike lanes and pedestrian mobility, Atlanta’s Transportation Plan is a framework with sustainability at its core. This is designed to appeal to younger generations more accurately attuned to environmental issues.

The city circle The Atlanta BeltLine is among the largest transportation redevelopment efforts in the city’s history. Originally conceived in 1999 by a Georgia Tech graduate student, the project involves reconstructing 22 miles of out-ofuse railroad corridors. The end result will include a 22mile looped extension of the Atlanta Streetcar route, 33 miles of multiuse trails and 2,000 acres of parks.

The BeltLine is scheduled for completion in 2030.

The project spurred the creation of 7,200 permanent jobs and 26,600 temporary construction jobs in 2016.

As of 2016, the BeltLine includes seven parks, four trails, an arboretum and two rails under construction.

The overall projected impact of the BeltLine is $3 billion in private economic redevelopment, throughout ( )

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Modern transit How MARTA is thinking outside the box to improve the city’s transport system

Keith Parker Former General Manager & CEO – Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority referendum. Half the money was for a bus service, and the other half for a high-capacity transit option. Now we’re building a commuter rail, but in such a way that the track and the systems that go along with all the communication components are expandable. If Cobb or Gwinnett or other counties ever want to join us, it will be easy to link up.

How are you working to improve the existing MARTA services?

We want to make MARTA cool and we want to attract new investments. We have a new phone app that will be a combination of a payment system and a guide to the MARTA. You will be able to get an annual or a daily pass on it, but also it will inform you of when the next bus or train is coming. We are considering the advent of automated vehicles and Uber-style services, and integrating that with our system. Lastly, we have an ongoing initiative where we have been working with local farmers to create farmers’ markets at our train stations A lot of densification is happening in the urban centers.

What are your areas of priority for transportation?

One of the things we have to consider is the funding for the system. We receive money from Fulton, Dekalb and Clayton counties as well as the City of Atlanta.

The primary focus is to deliver the best possible mode of transportation that can be delivered in those areas.

However, because the Atlanta region goes far beyond those three counties, we also have to be aware of our impact for those surrounding areas. We recognize that there’s a lot of people who, for a variety reasons, don’t live within that area, but still take advantage of our service. We want to make sure that as we build services within those three counties, we grow in capacity to go beyond.

A prime example of that is in Clayton County.

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How is MARTA looking to capitalize on real estate development?

We are working on a development proposal at the Arts Center station. The development will be on top of the station, because there isn’t much land around. It will be a game-changer for the whole landscape of that area, and it is part of our move toward mixed-use development.

What is being done to increase the safety of MARTA? We have taken a zero-tolerance approach to unacceptable behavior and have suspended more than 10,000 people from the system over the past three years. Crime statistics from the FBI show that MARTA is actually one of the safest transit systems in the country. We’ve got cameras on every bus, train and platform, so it’s the worst place to commit a crime in the entire region.

TRANSPORTATION & AVIATION OVERVIEW

( ) the project’s lifetime. Private and public investment have amounted to $447 million, while $18 million in grants were supplied by GDOT. Still, more funding is needed to complete the project on schedule.

The project’s bike trails will serve as means of transportation as well as recreation, and events are already scheduled in its parks. These include the Old Fourth Ward Fall Festival and Washington Park Jamboree, as well as free fitness classes and the Run. Walk.Go! annual series of races.

Crown jewels The Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport is an economic powerhouse. Since 1998 it has consistently ranked as the busiest airport in the world. With 80 percent of the U.S. population a mere two-hour flight away, ATL serves 150 U.S. destinations and more than 75 locations in 50 countries. The airport hosts more than 2,500 arrivals and departures daily, resulting in an average of 275,000 passengers traveling per day. Over the past six years, ATL has received various honors, including World’s Most Efficient Airport, Best Airport in North America, the Best Airport Dining Award and the World Air Cargo Award.

The airport is one of the most important players

in Atlanta’s economic landscape and the largest employer in the state. ATL employs more than 63,000 people and generates $34.8 billion in economic impact for the greater metro area.

Expansion is underway to meet increased demand and attract new markets. Qatar Airways, Turkish Airlines and AeroMexico recently began operations in ATL, extending the airport’s international reach, and JetBlue resumed operations in 2017.

Delta Airlines was the second-largest carrier in the U.S. at the beginning of 2016, according to Bloomberg.

Its primary operations are based at ATL, where it also has the largest presence. Headquartered in Atlanta, Delta was also the city’s largest employer as of 2016, with 31,699 members of staff.

In response to passenger growth, ATL is undergoing a multibillion dollar expansion that will modernize the airport, increase efficiency and improve the customer experience. Called ATLNext, this capital improvement program includes massive canopies extending from the domestic terminal over the inbound roadways, new gates, airfield improvements, a new parking deck, electric car charging units and a new hotel. The project is expected to be completed in the next 20

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Karl Von Hagel Airpot Manager, Cobb County International Airport

It is important to have a system of airports in Atlanta and Georgia so that aircraft owners can locate their aircraft wherever it is the most beneficial to them. With Atlanta being such a large metropolitan area, there is a need to have multiple corporate airports, to make travel times beneficial to the corporate aircraft user.

Cobb County International Airport is located in northwest Atlanta and provides service to many large corporations based in Cobb County.

Being able to accommodate corporate customers is important because it feeds directly into the economic development opportunities for the area.

At Cobb County International Airport, there have been a number of improvements and upgrades over the past 20 years to support and encourage corporate and private aircraft use of the facility.

There has been more than $50 million in public funds spent over the past 20 years on improving the airport, including a new air traffic control tower, runway expansions, parallel taxiways and an instrument landing system. Cobb County International Airport now has the longest general aviation runway in Metro Atlanta at 6,295 feet.

As the airport has grown, so has the county, and the number of companies that are operating at an international level has also increased. The airport’s based corporate aircraft fleet has been getting larger and our corporate clients are flying regularly overseas. The airport used to not have a customs facility, so the corporate aircrafts could not come home directly. They had to stop somewhere and clear customs first.

The reason an owner has a multimillion dollar jet is because the owner wants the convenience and time savings provided by air transportation, which is negated if you have to stop at another airport first before flying to a destination. In order to accommodate our businesses, Cobb County constructed a customs facility that allows our customers to fly internationally and still come home directly. Cobb County has a history of being proactive and providing what businesses need.

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years, though construction worth $4 billion should take place within the next eight years. In fact, many projects began in 2017, including canopies, new gates on Concourse T, parking deck construction and planning for additional concourse expansion. A fifth runway, a new international terminal and a rental car complex are already complete.

ATLNext strengthens the airport’s position as a global competitor and industry leader. Development plans also involve expanding airport cargo facilities and optimizing storage, with the goal of tripling cargo capacity. In 2017, 575,000 square feet of cargo space became part of the airport’s expansion efforts. Based in Atlanta, UPS, the world’s largest package delivery company, announced in 2016 that it will add 14 cargo jets to its fleet, to meet heightened demand for air shipping.

These jets should arrive between 2017 and 2020.

Atlanta is also served by Cobb County International Airport and the Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport.

Flight center Aerotropolis Atlanta Alliance, a coalition of business and community leaders, is slowly transforming the area around the airport into a destination for diverse development. With various projects planned and land still undeveloped, the location is ripe for investment.

The alliance aims to stimulate economic development by capitalizing on the 250,000 people who pass through the airport daily.

Construction is well underway on the 500 acres around Hartsfield-Jackson. The Pad on Harvard is a $41-million development that houses a 109-unit apartment complex and 50,000 square feet of retail space, as well as a 136room Aloft hotel, which has yet to be completed. The alliance was also behind the $230-million Gateway Center, which houses Class A office space and hotels.

In 2015, Porsche Cars North America opened a 28-acre Experience Center near the airport’s northeast corner.

The $100-million facility offers technical training, classic car restoration and a 1.6-mile test track. A luxury Solis hotel overlooking the track will open in November 2017.

Large-scale projects still in the planning stage include the 1,168-acre Gillem Logistics Center, the mixeduse Airport City compound and the Fort McPherson redevelopment, among others.

Port of call Though it is located outside the metropolitan area, the Port of Savannah has a considerable economic impact on Atlanta. Employing 1,100 professionals and supporting more than 369,000 people statewide,

TRANSPORTATION & AVIATION OVERVIEW

the port is one of the state’s largest employers. The economic significance of Georgia’s ports is clear. They contribute $33.2 billion in state GDP, 7.2 percent of the state’s total and bring in $20.4 billion in income, which is 5.3 percent of Georgia’s total personal income. The 369,000 employed by Georgia’s ports account for 8.4 percent of Georgia’s total employment.

As the fourth-largest container port in the U.S. and boasting the largest single container terminal in North America, the Port of Savannah sees a lot of annual traffic. In 2015 it handled 8.2 percent of the country’s containerized cargo and 10.3 percent of its containerized exports. The port broke a record in May 2017 after handling 350,104 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs).

This represented an 11.7 percent increase over the 313,485 TEUs it handled in May of the previous year.

Annually, the port manages over 3 million TEUs for more than 21,000 U.S. businesses. The Savannah Harbor Expansion project is underway, in an effort to keep up with changing demand, foster job growth and support national commerce. The project involves deepening the 18.5-mile outer harbor to 49 feet and the Savannah River channel to 47 feet.

The port is well served by rail and road connections, allowing for fluid transportation between land and sea. The Norfolk Southern and CSX railroads connect to the port, as do the I-16 and I-95 freeways.

throughout April, May and June. This discount resulted in 8,000 new uberPOOL riders during the six-week period in which the interstate was closed for repairs.

Lyft also plays a significant role in Atlanta’s transportation sector. The ride-sharing company generated $41.3 million for the city’s economy in 2016.

New apps are also facilitating transportation throughout Metro Atlanta. MARTA On the Go, the network’s app, provides users with real-time updates and transit schedules. It also helps riders to fully plan trips by connecting them with Uber. In addition, Mayor Kasim Reed recently launched the SP Plus parking app, in collaboration with the city’s ATLPlus parking program. Drivers can pay for on-street parking using the app and receive notifications when their meters are running out.

As Atlanta looks to the future, the presence of self-driving, autonomous vehicles is being considered at the legislative level. In March 2017, a legal framework that permits driverless vehicles on Georgia roads was unanimously passed by the state senate. Although they won’t have the same licensing requirements as traditional vehicles, autonomous cars will need to be registered with the state and meet strict insurance preconditions. The first trials of such vehicles will take place on Atlanta’s major North Avenue in September 2017, as part of the Safer Roads Challenge, a global corporate initiative designed to address potential hazards.

As Atlanta looks to the future, the presence of self-driving, autonomous vehicles is being considered at the legislative level.

Ride the new tide While traditional options for public transportation are expanding, ride-sharing and related technologies are making it increasingly easy to get around Atlanta. The growing popularity of Uber and Lyft has been apparent for some time in the greater metro area, and after such services were officially permitted at the airport on January 1, 2017, the number of users spiked. In the first two months of the year, Uber and Lyft collectively picked up 250,283 passengers, while taxis picked up about half as many: 114,864.

Uber in particular stepped up to the plate after the I-85 collapse, helping to ease the added congestion on Atlanta’s roads. Following the collapse on March 30, uberPOOL trips to and from MARTA doubled. Uber also cut the costs of uberPOOL rides to and from MARTA stations and Xpress park-and-ride lots by 50 percent

Looking ahead With a number of improvements to Atlanta’s transportation landscape underway, the city strives to offer drivers and users of public transportation a better experience. In an effort to reduce roadway congestion, infrastructure is being revamped and technology upgraded throughout the metropolitan area.

The shifting focus from driving private vehicles to ridesharing, biking and taking public transit is reflected in continued investment in the city’s transportation system. Expansions to the airport, MARTA and the Port of Savannah are ongoing, but these are only a few of the large-scale efforts to facilitate movement throughout Atlanta, as it continues to experience an influx in population. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Banking & Finance: The growing economy and young population of Atlanta give its banking sector a lot to look forward to with the mortgage and small business loans markets offering opportunities to institutions of all sizes. Fintech is also a growing sector that is expected to contribute positively to the economic landscape.

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Banking & Finance in numbers: Georgia banks, large(more than $5 billion in deposits in Georgia): SunTrust Bank

49.48

Wells Fargo Bank N.A.

35.24

Bank of America N.A.

32.88

Synchrony Bank

22.71

Synovus Bank

13.79

Branch Banking & Trust Co. (BB&T)

12.37

Regions Bank

5.87

United Community Bank

5.35 0

Institution

10

Total depostits

20

30

Market share

40

Total assets

SunTrust Bank

$49.48 billion

19.94%

$194.68 billion

Wells Fargo Bank N.A.

$35.24 billion

14.21%

$1.7 trillion

Bank of America N.A.Â

$32.88 billion

13.25%

$1.66 trillion

Synchrony Bank

$22.71 billion

9.15%

$64.62 billion

Synovus BankÂ

$13.79 billion

5.56%

$29.22 billion

Branch Banking & Trust Co. (BB&T)

$12.37 billion

4.99%

$217.15 billion

Regions Bank

$5.87 billion

2.37%

$125.26 billion

United Community Bank

$5.35 billion

2.16%

$9.9 billion

Source: Bizjournals and BauerFinancial

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50

Star rating

Georgia banks, midsize($1 billion – 5 billion in deposits in Georgia): 3.35

PNC Bank N.A.

3.32

RBC Bank (Georgia) N.A.

3.28

Bank of the Ozarks

3.18

Chase

2.97

Fidelity Bank

2.94

State Bank & Trust Co.

2.54

Ameris Bank

1.95

Brand Bank

1.74

Renasant Bank

1.58

Atlantic Capital Bank N.A.

1.51

Hamilton State Bank Georgia Bank & Trust Co. of Augusta

1.42

South State Bank

1.36

FirstCitizens Bank & Trust Co.

1.12

Fifth Third Bank

1.06

United Bank

1.06 0

Institution

0.5

1

Total Depostits

1.5

2

Market Share

2.5

3

Total Assets

Star Rating

PNC Bank N.A.

$3.35 billion

1.35%

$350.22 billion

RBC Bank (Georgia) N.A.

$3.32 billion

1.34%

$3.62 billion

Bank of the Ozarks

$3.28 billion

1.32%

$3.95 billion

Chase

$3.18 billion

1.28%

$2.05 trillion

Fidelity Bank

$2.97 billion

1.20%

$4.28 billion

State Bank & Trust Co.

$2.94 billion

1.18%

$3.57 billion

Ameris Bank

$2.54 billion

1.03%

$6.22 billion

Brand Bank

$1.95 billion

0.79%

$2.38 billion

Renasant Bank

$1.74 billion

0.70%

$8.5 billion

Atlantic Capital Bank N.A.

$1.58 billion

0.64%

$2.81 billion

Hamilton State Bank

$1.51 billion

0.61%

$1.76 billion

Georgia Bank & Trust Co. of Augusta

$1.42 billion

0.57%

$1.9 billion

South State Bank

$1.36 billion

0.55%

$8.72 billion

FirstCitizens Bank & Trust Co.

$1.12 billion

0.45%

$32.05 billion

Fifth Third Bank

$1.06 billion

0.43%

$141.11 billion

United Bank

$1.06 billion

0.43%

$1.19 billion

Source: Bizjournals and Bauer Financial

3.5

*

*Citizens Trust Bank

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Recovery position: Banks in the state and metro area are showing encouraging fundamentals as they support and prosper from a vibrant economy As the largest city, as well as the capital and administrative center of the state, Atlanta makes the most of Georgia’s strength in banking. The state has the most banks in the southeast region of the U.S., a total of 227, with 182 chartered banks, according to the Georgia Bankers Association. The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta is the Federal Reserve bank for the sixth district, overseeing Alabama, Florida and Georgia, as well as parts of Mississippi, Tennessee and Louisiana.

The state’s financial services sector has high levels of job growth, adding 4,300 jobs in January 2017, and Atlanta’s financial technology, or fintech, sector is abuzz with startups forming partnerships with large firms.

Opportunity knocks Atlanta offers plenty of opportunities for financial institutions. On a consumer side, the Atlanta metropolitan area saw the fourth largest growth in the region in 2016, adding 90,650 residents, increasing the population to more than 5.7 million. This growth is primarily driven by the job market as Metro Atlanta added 77,000 jobs were added in 2016, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC).

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On the business side, Atlanta hosts the headquarters of 26 Fortune 1000 companies, including SunTrust Bank, the 18th largest bank in the U.S. by assets in 2016.

This ranks Atlanta fourth behind New York, Houston and Dallas, according to the Metro Atlanta Chamber (MAC). The main growth driver in Atlanta remains real estate, with manufacturing, technology, education and healthcare all playing important parts within the non-farming economy. In 2016, Georgia’s GDP was 525 billion, according to U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, with finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing taking up 106 billion of that total.

Bank performance Bank performance has been robust, and Georgia has shown a healthy recovery since the financial downturn of 2007 to 2008.

According to figures from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC), a total of 181 banks insured by the FDIC reported earnings of $854 million during the second quarter of 2017. This was an increase of 12 percent on the first quarter’s total of $762 million, bringing earnings up to $1.6 billion for the first half of 2017. This encouraging first half figure represents ( )

BANKING & FINANCE INTERVIEW

High Fidelity How growth and changes in interest rates are impacting the finance industry

Palmer Proctor President & CEO – Fidelity Bank How do you assess the banking regulations in the U.S? All banks are affected primarily through the complexity of regulations. There has been a tremendous amount of effort from the current administration to alleviate regulatory burden, but at this point, we have seen minimal relief. The largest impact falls on the smaller community banks that don’t have the economies of scale to offset the additional regulatory cost.

There are 237 banks operating in Georgia, ranging from very small banks to fairly large regional banks.

Increased regulations could force more consolidation in our industry, which would not have a positive impact on Georgia’s communities in the long term.

What are your expectations for the mortgage lending segment in Atlanta?

We are still very bullish on mortgages. As long as there is good absorption and the current balance between inventory levels and people moving into the city and buying homes continues, Atlanta will be a healthy environment for mortgages.

What will be the impact of the rise in interest rates?

We have been operating in an artificially low-rate environment. Over the past seven years, there has been an increase of 100 basis points. As long as we don’t have a rapid rise in rates, the market will be fine. The Fed is being cautious, as it doesn’t want to startle the markets.

Borrowing costs for consumer and business-related activities remain low and very attractive.

How is the wealth management segment in Atlanta performing?

It is currently a growing segment and opportunity for us. Fidelity Bank has been around for more than 40 years and our wealth management team now provides additional capabilities and expertise to our clients. We

have hired several client advisors that are providing our clients financial planning to provide direction in meeting their goals. We are seeing improved performance in 2017 in investment management, trust and specialty lending.

What is the customer profile in Georgia? What kind of growth have you seen in Atlanta?

Atlanta is a top-20 growth market for the U.S. The average age in Atlanta is 33, and the city continues to attract a younger demographic to fulfill growing employment opportunities. A lot of banks are moving to Atlanta due to the pace of the city’s growth. Banks headquartered in 21 states outside Georgia have opened operations here in just the past two decades. This growth gives businesses and consumers lots of choices. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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BANKING & FINANCE OVERVIEW

Atlanta hosts the headquarters of 26 Fortune 1000 companies, including SunTrust Bank, the 18th largest bank in the U.S. by assets in 2016.

an increase of 6.2 percent on the earnings for the first half of the previous year, $1.5 billion – an impressive turnaround from the same time in 2010 when FDIC reported losses of 1.24 billion. In June 2017, deposits were $252.9 billion.

As of June 2017, total assets for the 181 banks were $308.8 billion, up 2.6 percent on the previous year’s June total of $300.5 billion and up 12.4 percent on the 2010 total of $274.7 billion according to the FDIC.

Small wonders The 2016 financial year (FY) saw an increase in small business lending in Metro Atlanta with 1,227 loans, compared to 1,198 the previous period, an increase of 2.5 percent. The total value of loans was $814.6 million, up from $703.3 million in FY 2015, working out as a FY 2016 average of $663,896. During the same period, the Small Business Administration (SBA)-backed loans, through the SBA 7a and SBA 504 loan programs, saw a

Joe Brannen CEO – Georgia Bankers Association As we are now well past the recession, banks have more capital strength than ever, and there are more safety valves in place to protect the system. It is a good time to take a hard look at the Dodd-Frank Act and see where common-sense improvements can be made. It’s encouraging that President Trump and Congress have said they want to reduce the regulatory burden for banks and other businesses, and we welcome that.

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BANKING & FINANCE OVERVIEW

peak in Georgia with 2,023 loans issued, the most since 2005, setting a record total of $1.4 billion. In June, FY 2017 had seen some $956 billion in SBA-backed loans.

Georgia banks’ total lending in the first six months of 2017 grew 1.8 percent year-on-year, around half the national rate of 3.7 percent. This is a considerable

slowdown on the 2016 year-on-year increase of 6.7 percent for Georgia.

There have been three main reasons suggested for the slowdown. One is the that the Federal Reserve has raised interest rates three times since 2015.

Another reason is that the economic recovery is now slowing down, having had eight years of considerable growth. A third reason is the reaction to the current Trump administration, which has made a number of promises relating to the business world with little solid action. Delays in tax reform might be making businesses reluctant to make investments. Even though loan growth has slowed in Georgia, it is still slightly ahead of the national growth rate for the same period. Banks throughout the state have ample ability to fund loans.

Although unlikely to have impacted the amount of loans being taken from banks, companies such as Atlanta-based Kabbage and other new person-toperson (P2P) loans are becoming more popular. Kabbage is a financial technology firm founded in Atlanta in 2011 that offers lines of credit up to $150,000 to small business in the U.S., with partnerships in the U.K., Canada and Mexico. It utilizes data analytics to judge a company’s success, potential and creditworthiness.

Users link PayPal, Amazon and eBay accounts to a loan application so that the app can measure metrics such as average monthly income and the number of years in business to make a credit decision.

Living standards The diversity in the population of Atlanta creates opportunities for loans, high street banking and insurance. As the area grows in population banking ( )

Alex McKenzie President & CEO – IFS Securities We moved to Atlanta because we were looking for a change.

Atlanta has all the amenities that New York has, with a great airport and a great quality of life. The weather is better, and it is more economical to build a company in Atlanta. It’s a small enough city where you can build a brand and a reputation through networking, but it’s big enough to feel comfortable that there’s enough opportunity. Atlanta is a growing city. It has a lot of talent, which fuels the growth of strong industries, such as technology or film. We will continue to see growth in those areas as well as innovation as big companies relocate to Atlanta.

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BANKING & FINANCE INTERVIEW

Big small city How a diverse finance sector helps meets the various banking needs of Metro Atlanta and the different sections of its community

Cynthia Day President & CEO – Citizens Trust Bank

How has the banking sector in Metro Atlanta changed?

Atlanta has a lot of large national brands, large regional brands and, of course, community banks. This reflects the multifaceted nature of our city and allows for a thriving banking sector. There are a range of niches and focuses to serve a diverse population.

There is a strong workforce in Atlanta, but it’s also very competitive. The population is educated, unemployment is low and job growth is good. Atlanta attracts international and Fortune 500 companies here for many different reasons, one being the workforce.

This means that banks are competing to attract talent. It is important to engage with the future workforce because they can bring technological proficiency, ideas and innovation both to the banking sector and the economy in general. We are involved in a lot of collaboration with the youth in Atlanta.

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How important are small businesses for the economy?

Small businesses are an important focus for us. We are a community bank, and we believe that they are the catalysts for a healthy economy for our city and its communities. Citizens Trust Bank works with the Georgia Department of Community Affairs on a State Small Business Credit Initiative, and the U.S. Small Business Administration lending to expand our ability to deliver capital to businesses of all industry types including small or growing family-owned businesses to well-established multimillion dollar companies.

Taking a holistic view of how the community works is not just purely economics, it is also about the overall well-being of the community. I always say that our team is not just in the community, we’re a part of the community. By understanding the challenges and opportunities of our city and its communities, we are able to engage in a way that can impact families for many generations in a very meaningful way.

With rapid changes in technology, there are opportunities to explore valuable partnerships with fintech companies. We are keenly aware of how our local and global economies are becoming increasingly driven by rapid decisions and efficient delivery of services. Atlanta is a big, small town that is supportive of innovation and very amenable to partnerships. Whether it is from the arrival of large companies, or from a healthy small business presence, there is an understanding that growth will benefit everyone.

What is your outlook for Metro Atlanta?

Atlanta’s banking sector saw a good 2016, and I’m expecting the results of 2017 to be positive as well.

The city is dynamic and has a demographic varied in age, ethnicity and nationality. Atlanta is a big city, but there are also lots of well-connected suburban areas that make it an ideal place to raise a family.

BANKING & FINANCE OVERVIEW

( ) and finance institutions are vying for a larger customer base. “The change in demographics provides more opportunities for us. We are focused on cultural diversity as a strength of our business. With Atlanta being the ninth-largest metropolitan area in the country, we believe we will see exponential growth,” Puneet Seth, managing partner for New York Life, told Focus: Atlanta.

In the house When it comes to home buying, Atlanta is the 12thcheapest metropolitan area in the country, with the median house price of $259,000 in July 2017. In comparison, Pittsburgh was the cheapest, with a median house price of $145,000 in the first quarter of 2016. As of August 2017, the U.S. 30-year fixed mortgage rate is 4.11 percent, down 0.18 percentage points on the same figure in the first quarter of 2017. In August 2017, the five largest U.S. banks, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan, Bank of America, U.S. Bancorp and Citigroup taking a 30.7-percent share of mortgage lending nationwide.

Atlanta was hit hard by the subprime mortgage crisis, with house prices falling some 40 percent. Dodd-Frank regulations enacted during the presidency of Barack Obama have been designed to avoid a repeat of the crash. The subprime crisis and resulting regulations have created strict capital requirements and difficulty for banks to approve anything but perfect mortgages.

This has led to an increase in the share of the overall

mortgage market for nonbank lenders, which now have less stringent requirements when issuing loans.

In 2016, six of the top 10 mortgage lenders were nonbanks. Although Wells Fargo and JPMorgan Chase took the top two spots with 12.55 percent and 5.95 percent, respectively, Quicken Loans took third place with 4.9 percent. PennyMac Financial Services, Freedom Mortgage, PHH Mortgage, Caliber Home Loans and LoanDepot all made the top 10.

Easier mortgages are also making a comeback, with Atlanta’s Angel Oak and similar companies working with “nonprime” products.

Although the requirements for nonprime lending still more stringent than subprime, which often required no paperwork and offered artificially low teaser rates, nonprime still offers options for borrowers with low wages and less secure incomes. The mortgages are classed as “nonqualified” by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, meaning that they cannot be purchased by government entities Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac or Ginnie Mae. In mid-2017, Angel Oak announced a $210.45-million securitization of its nonprime residential mortgages, marking a total securitization of $630 million since 2015. The number of nonprime mortgages increased to $1.08 billion in the second quarter of 2017.

The average age of people living in Metro Atlanta is 36.1, almost two years younger than the national average of 37.8, according to DataUSA’s 2015 estimates.

Metro Atlanta’s IT sector is growing, with the

Homeownership rates for under 35 year-olds have reduced from just over 40 percent in 1980 to less than 35 percent as of 2016, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

John Wright Managing Partner – Northwestern Mutual

Atlanta has so much happening right now. Every sector, from sports to transportation, has something going on. Fortune 500 companies coming here and building headquarters is very symbolic, and I believe we are only just beginning to scratch the surface. When you have a great city with opportunities, people will want to live here. This is a city that offers a market you would want to be in.

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BANKING & FINANCE OVERVIEW

availability of a qualified workforce from a highly developed university system being a primary driver.

However, the costs for a higher education are among the fastest-rising costs in the U.S. College tuition costs for public universities have risen 344 percent since 1980, from $2,119 to $9,410 per year, with private tuition showing a similar jump of 241 percent, from $9,500 to $32,410 in 2017. This is saddling those coming into the working market with record levels of student debt, making the prospect of taking on further debt in the form of mortgages an unattractive prospect.

“There are many variables that affect a person’s business or wealth.

The accumulation of wealth is something that requires constant vigilance. Younger people now enter the workforce later than previous generations and with more debt. They are also buying houses and buying insurance much later.

However, their mentality is more entrepreneurial,” Corky Dawe, CEO of Peachtree Planning Corporation, told Focus: Atlanta.

In recognition of the increased debt burden, the Federal National Mortgage Association in July 2017 raised the debt-to-income ratio required for loan approvals to 50 percent from 45 percent. Student loans account for the largest source of debt in the U.S., after mortgages. Homeownership rates for under 35 yearolds have reduced from just over 40 percent in 1980 to less than 35 percent as of 2016, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Standardized testing As of August 2017, the Dodd-Frank Act has not yet been repealed by the Republican Party, despite promises made by Donald Trump during his election campaign.

Shares in the major banks in the U.S. picked up at the end of 2016 following Trump’s election. However, since then, in 2017, share of the six biggest banks by assets have shown net sales, with most of them coming from those working within the banks, suggesting lower confidence.

All the major banks, including Atlanta’s SunTrust Bank, passed the 2017 Dodd-Frank Act Stress Test signaling a healthy and responsible banking sector, for large banks at least.

However, with 22,000 pages of regulations, Dodd-Frank has caused difficulty for community banks. Since the passing of the act in 2010 to 2014, the number of U.S. community banks shrank by 14 percent. The State of Georgia has seen the number of state-based banks reduce from some 350 in 2007 to 181 at the beginning of 2017, the reduction being a combination of consolidation and failures.

Of the 180 community banks in Georgia, 20 percent saw revenue growth in the third quarter of 2017, with 10 percent seeing a growth in the value of loans and 7 percent seeing a growth in the amount of deposits.

There were six major bank mergers and acquisitions in Georgia in 2016. In August 2016, the National Commerce Corp, holding company for the National Bank of Commerce (NBC) of Birmingham, Alabama,

There were six major bank mergers and acquisitions in Georgia in 2016.

Eddie Meyers Regional President, Georgia – PNC Financial Services Group

Atlanta is differentiated by the diversity of both its people and its industries. Atlanta is home to many Fortune 500 companies as well as startups and everything in between. Our goal in Atlanta is to gain market share year-on-year by creating a consistently exceptional client experience and by reflecting the diversity of the communities we serve. The recent Fed rate increases certainly signifies more confidence in the employment market. We are likely to see this reflected in consumer purchasing and lending.

As the job market improves, more consumers and companies gain confidence, which we expect will lead to greater demand for consumer, commercial and corporate loans.

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BANKING & FINANCE OVERVIEW

SunTrust brought the naming rights to the Atlanta Braves stadium in 2014, on a 25-year term. The naming deal is said to be worth more than $10 million per year.

announced the acquisition of Private Bancshares.

Atlanta-based Private Bancshares, the holding company for Private Bank of Buckhead, merged with NBC to create an institution with assets worth $2 billion. The deal finalized on January 1, 2017. Private Bancshares’ entities will continue to operate under their own names, which include Private Bank of Buckhead, Private Bank of Decatur and PrivatePlus Mortgage.

Atlanta-based State Bank and Trust Company announced in May 2016 it would be acquiring S Bankshares for approximately $11 million, increasing its Georgia footprint to include Savannah, Glennville, Reidsville and Hinesville. The deal completed at the end of December 2016. State Bank and Trust also acquired NBG Bancorp, holding company for The National Bank of Georgia, in a cash and stock deal worth $68 million, adding branches in Athens and Gainesville.

The Independence Bank of Georgia was acquired

by Pinnacle Bank in November 2016 in a transaction of around $32.8 million for 100-percent cash. This increased total assets to $869 million with $545 million in loans and $757 million in deposits for Pinnacle.

First National Bank and Citizens Bank Cairo in June 2016 announced that they would be merging and operating under the name of First National Bank. The

transaction was finished that following October with combined assets of some $151 million.

Group dynamic Atlanta’s banking community, like the rest of the city, takes pride in being integrated with the economic community as well as banks having close connections with each other. The Georgia Bankers Association provides professional development and continuing education support, sector comment, media relations and lobbying for the state’s banks.

With Joseph Brannen as the president, its board has a number of Atlanta bank heads and local market executives including Cynthia Day of Citizens Trust Bank and H. Palmer Proctor Jr. of Fidelity Bank, Ken Barber of ServisFirst Bank and Chad Gregory of Wells Fargo.

“The collaborative business environment in Atlanta has really stood out to me. People are willing to meet you and they welcome you with open doors.

In addition, the market is very diverse. We find clients from different walks of life, different backgrounds and different industries, which enables us maintain a balanced portfolio,” Carolina Klint, the South Zone president for AIG, told Focus: Atlanta. ( ) www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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BANKING & FINANCE INTERVIEW

Stable sectors How banks are making the most of the opportunities offered in Atlanta and Georgia to strengthen customer bases

Randy Koporc Executive Vice President & Georgia Regional President – Fifth Third Bank For our commercial clients, mergers and acquisition activity has been relatively vigorous, and we are committed to helping see companies through these transitions.

Georgia, particularly Atlanta, has been identified as a key growth market for Fifth Third Bank. We are members of the Georgia Bankers Association and are active in the communities where we live and work. Recently, the bank announced the impact of the first year of our five-year $30 billion community commitment. In 2016, which is the first year of the program, Fifth Third invested $7.88 billion, or 26.3 percent, of the total lending and investment commitment. The results put the company on pace to exceed the goals of its community commitment by its conclusion in 2020.

How has the local banking environment been impacted by changes in Washington?

Loan demand in the banking sector is a challenge. A lot of people are waiting to see what will happen with the current administration in Washington in terms of healthcare and tax reform. These uncertainties can cause our commercial borrowers to be hesitant about making bold new capital expenditures.

However, from a consumer standpoint, the housing market remains fairly strong, although there are supply challenges, with not much being built in the $100,000 to $250,000 range. The mortgage market has not been impacted by the Federal rate change, although refinancing has slowed down. For everyone in the banking industry, finding good quality loan growth and new client acquisition remain top priorities.

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How has Fifth Third Bank responded to the growth of the fintech sector?

Fifth Third has always embraced technology and we intend to be a leader in enabling it to improve customer experience and reduce costs. Some parties in banking try to keep fintech firms on the outside of the industry, but we have been looking at how to integrate fintech firms to deliver an integrated customer experience as we adapt to evolving customer preferences.

If we can leverage the technologies and customer experience expertise of fintech firms, then it is something we are interested in. For example in Atlanta, we have invested in a company called GreenSky. It’s a partnership that is designed to add significant strategic value to both organizations and their customers.

The partnership allows us to originate loans through GreenSky’s existing merchant network and Fifth Third can offer GreenSky’s financing solutions to merchants with whom it does business today, improving credit access to those customers.

BANKING & FINANCE OVERVIEW

Fifth Third Bank has identified Georgia as a key growth market.

Big players SunTrust is the biggest bank in Georgia, with total deposits of $49.48 billion in 2016 and a market share of 19.94 percent. It operates 1,400 bank branches across the southeast U.S. and Washington D.C. It is also one of the top 20 employers in Atlanta, coming in at number 16, with 7,128 employees, according to the Metro Atlanta Chamber (MAC), and the 17th-largest bank in the U.S. by assets with $205 billion as of March 2017.

In August 2017, SunTrust announced it would be opening branches in Cleveland, Cincinnati, Dallas and Dallas-Fort Worth. In December 2016, the bank closed a deal to purchase Pillar Financial, a multifamily and healthcare properties lender. The deal, for an undisclosed sum, expanded SunTrust’s real estate lending capabilities.

SunTrust bought the naming rights to the Atlanta Braves stadium in 2014, on a 25-year term, solidifying the bank’s commitment to the community of Atlanta.

The SunTrust Park naming deal is said to be worth more than $10 million per year.

Wells Fargo and Bank of America are the second and third largest banks in Georgia, with $35.24 billion and $32.88 billion, taking up 14.21 percent and 13.25 percent market shares respectively.

Headquartered in Atlanta, Citizens Trust Bank is the fifth-largest African-American bank in the U.S. and the

largest in the southeast region. It had net loan growth of 13 percent, mortgage loan originations growth of 241 percent and a 2 percent growth in assets to $396 million in 2016.

In July 2017, Citizens Trust Bank saw an increase of nearly $1 million and 8,000 new customers over a five-day period when the hashtag #bankblack trended on Twitter in response to the high-profile killings of African-Americans by police officers.

In August 2017, the bank announced an agreement with First Citizens Bank, of North Carolina to buy “certain assets and the consumer and business deposit relationships of the First Citizens Bank location at 562 Lee Street, Atlanta.” The agreement did not include the physical location, but brought a further 5,000 customers to Citizens Trust Bank.

BB&T has $12.37 billion in deposits and a market share of 4.99 percent. It is the sixth largest bank in Atlanta and entered metro region in 2005 with the acquisition of Main Street Banks for $622 million. It is the fifth largest insurance broker in the world. The bank sponsored the Atlanta Open tennis tournament in July 2017.

PNC Financial, the ninth-largest bank in Georgia, with deposits of $3.35 billion and a market share of 1.35 percent, has been expanding operations into the southeast since 2010, and in 2011 acquired 27 branches in Metro Atlanta from Flagstar for $42 million. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Fidelity Bank was the 13th-largest financial institution in 2016, with deposits of $2.97 billion and a market share of 1.2 percent. When The Bank of Georgia shut down at the end of 2015 by order of the Georgia Department of Banking and Finance, Fidelity took on the bank’s $280.7 million of deposits as well as $255.3 million of its failed assets.

In addition to major and community banks, Atlanta is also home to a number to other financial services firms, with fintech, payment processing and other financial institutions playing a large part in the ecosystem. (For more about fintech and payments in Atlanta, read our chapter on Technology & Innovation on page 105) IFS Securities is an Atlantabased independent brokerdealer, with 32 offices in 17 states and Puerto Rico, it opened an office on Wall Street, New York in October 2014.

Northwestern Mutual is an insurance and financial advisory firm that offers integrated financial planning and investment counseling to clients in Atlanta’s private and public sector.

The second quarter of 2017 saw a drop in investment from venture capital firms into Metro Atlanta from $364.4 million the previous year to $278.1 million, a 23.6-percent reduction, according to a report from PwC. “All of our business lines have doubled in the last five years. A lot of that is due to the vibrancy of the

economy in Atlanta. We have been able to change the culture of our office into a growth-oriented culture. It seems as though growth begets growth and Atlanta has enabled that,” Bob Pearlman, managing director of BDO USA, told Focus: Atlanta.

Looking ahead With a growing economy and population, Atlanta’s banks have a lot to look forward to, but the financial industry has not been without problems over the past decade and still faces challenges today.

However, Atlanta’s banking sector remains robust, diverse and well situated to provide family and business financing over a variety of services. The sector mirrors Metro Atlanta’s dynamic, diverse and growing economy. The city is home to banks that finance the largest, most complex national and international transactions.

There are also ample mid-size and community banks available for customers with a variety of financial services requirements.

The growth of the fintech sector in Atlanta is creating new horizons for finance in Atlanta, creating plenty of opportunity for investment, innovation and synergies. With a diverse population and corporate landscape, the banking sector can leverage the dynamism of the young, growing economy of Atlanta to its advantage.

Metro Atlanta’s growth is offering real opportunities for both national and community banks.

Jenna Kelly President & CEO of Atlanta Division – SunTrust Bank

There is strong demand for capital to help support long-term growth. We recently conducted an annual business pulse survey of more than 500 companies to get their view of the economy from a local and national perspective. We found that two-thirds of the businesses are bullish on the economy and 75 percent of them are even more bullish on their own company. The optimism is encouraging for us. Atlanta has a great economy. It is diverse and growing, which is good for the banking sector. When we can help our clients, both companies and consumers, and spur market growth, it helps our performance as well. I have a lot of confidence in our results and our future here.

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Technology & Fintech: The numerous research advances in Atlanta’s higher education platform have established the metropolitan area as a competitive and growing technology hub, with a considerable emphasis on financial technologies. As the strong education sector bolsters innovation and a skilled workforce, new tech centers have moved to Atlanta. The industry has a growing impact on the economy of the metro area and shows promising avenues for future growth.

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The byte of success: Atlanta is becoming legitimate competition for established tech centers such as Silicon Valley and New York. It offers a solid foundation in fintech and healthy innovation infrastructure As of 2016, the technology sector in Metro Atlanta accounts for 10.5 percent of the overall economy, an impact of some $36 billion, according to figures compiled by the Computing Technology Industry Association. Since 2010, the number of technology jobs have grown 46.7 percent, according to Forbes, which is some 20 percentage points above the national average, with the total number of positions in 2016 standing at 155,600, around 4.4 percent of the total workforce, making it the largest technology employer in the southeast. In March 2017, Forbes placed Atlanta as number three in its list of tech meccas of tomorrow.

The growth of technology in Atlanta has been underpinned by a robust education sector, consisting of the Georgia Institute of Technology, one of the premier research universities in the U.S. The university includes the Georgia Tech Research Institute, a nonprofit applied-research arm of the university, and the Center for Robotics and Intelligent Machines, which offers one of the first multidisciplinary robotics doctoral programs in the country.

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technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) curriculums. Georgia State University (GSU) offers a range of courses, including computer science and engineering, at its Perimeter College as well as various business and technology courses at the J. Mack Robinson College of Business.

Central to Atlanta’s technology industry is the niche area of financial technology. More commonly known as fintech, the sector encompasses a range of technologies including payments, cryptocurrencies, risk managements, automated banking, insurance and trading. Medical technologies are also vying for a place in the spotlight, with automated vehicles and smart city technology also becoming areas of focus.

Mercer University’s Atlanta Campus, Emory University and the Atlanta University Center, made up of Clark Atlanta University, Morehouse School of Medicine, Morehouse College and Spelman College, also make important contributions to the sector.

Hip to be square In the Midtown area of Atlanta is the multiblock neighborhood dubbed Tech Square. First opened ( )

TECHNOLOGY & FINTECH INTERVIEW

New horizons How Metro Atlanta is becoming a world leader in the area of financial technology

Barry McCarthy Executive Vice President, Head of Network and Security Solutions – First Data What are Atlanta’s strengths in the fintech sector?

Very quietly over the past several years, Atlanta has become the global fintech capital. To be clear, Atlanta isn’t the financial services global capital – London and New York share that recognition. However, for fintech specifically, there is nowhere else like Atlanta.

We believe Atlanta has the highest concentration of deeply skilled fintech workers and companies. That base attracts startups, venture capital and corporate investment.

All of that investment creates more highly skilled, highly paid jobs, attracting more startups, companies and investment. This virtuous cycle growth is unique and exclusively present in Atlanta for fintech. Already more than 70 percent of global credit card payments are processed by Atlanta-headquartered companies.

What are the main things the sector needs to focus on, to maximize potential in the fintech sector?

FinTech Atlanta is a unique public-private partnership that was sponsored by Governor Nathan Deal, and organized by the Technology Association of Georgia, American Transaction Processors Coalition, the Metro Chamber and companies from across the state.

Members are from a number of different sectors beyond core fintech – transportation, logistics, food and beverages and more. Each of these organizations recognizes the important role fintech plays in their business. I am honored to currently serve as chairman.

FinTech Atlanta has four objectives. First, we exist to promote Atlanta and fintech on the global stage.

People are only beginning to realize the critical and extensive role Atlanta plays in the global economy.

Second, we want to ensure that we maintain and grow the fintech-friendly business environment. Third, we want to have abundant fintech-ready talent. Finally,

we want to continue strong fintech investment in Atlanta for both young and mature companies.

On talent development, we are working with the University of Georgia, Georgia Tech and all of our state colleges to ensure some that students are fintechready when they graduate. It’s helpful for companies like First Data to have young talent. It helps us grow.

We have a study group working on fintech legislation to support the major technology companies here.

There are always opportunities to improve regulation, and Georgia has been very receptive.

Fintech in Atlanta has thrived because people in this community work together like nowhere else.

We believe in a common purpose and a common achievement. What we have in Atlanta is something special and it shows. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Asif Ramji CEO, Paymetric

Paymetric was originally founded in Houston, Texas.

In 2009, Paymetric transformed its business model to offer cloud-based payments and realized that the epicenter of fintech was Atlanta. We wanted access to this ecosystem, so we moved Paymetric headquarters to the area. Here, we have been able to connect with all of the major payment companies and get access to world-class talent. There is great talent coming out of schools like Georgia Tech. We offer internship programs to graduates from local tech schools, so we are both adding to and realizing the advantages of the talent pool.

There have been a lot of challenges along the way, but Atlanta really helps to cultivate a great business environment. In addition to talent, Atlanta has great national and international connectivity with its airport. The Atlanta business community offers a lot of support through organizations such as the Metro Atlanta Chamber and the Atlanta Financial Technology Taskforce. People are starting to understand that a lot of payment and transaction processors are based here in Atlanta. Some 70 percent of the transactions in the U.S. come through Atlanta.

Traditional manual applications of accepting payments in the enterprise are moving and changing dynamically, which is why we shifted to a cloud-based platform, to offer a managed payment service. Paymetric is a market leader for enterprise payment security and integration. We secure enterprise payments and integrate them into ERP, CRM and eCommerce systems.

Many Fortune 500 companies use Paymetric to manage their enterprise payments, including online transactions. We help them secure the payment transaction and integrate it with their back-end systems. Paymetric helps speed up the order to cash payment cycle and reduce the cost of accepting payments. We elegantly integrate the paper-pushing that used to happen. The business environment in Atlanta has been instrumental to our success. We’ve got a great business model and thrive on innovation.

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( ) in 2003 as part of the Midtown revitalization effort, the square is made of up of a number of Georgia Tech buildings, technology companies, small business incubators and research labs, as well as restaurants, hotels and shops catering to the technology community.

The area began when Georgia Tech purchased 8 acres of land south of Fifth Street for $11.9 million in the 1990s. It then spent $150 million developing the land.

Georgia Tech’s footprint in the area is now at 13 acres.

The $25-million, 200,000-square-foot Technology Square Research Building (TSRB) was finished in 2003, and during its 15-year history, has become one the central pieces of the Tech Square puzzle. The building houses a number of busy research centers affiliated with Georgia Tech, including a digital media center, the Georgia Electronic Design Center, the Georgia Tech Research Network Operations Center, the Graphics, Visualization and Usability Center, the Interactive Media Technology Center and the School of Interactive Computing.

TSRB is integral to the Georgia Tech economic connections, offering support to both technology startups and research divisions of larger companies based in Atlanta. It also promotes research commercialization, technology transfer and technical assistance, utilizing private partnerships with the university.

Based in Tech Square’s Centergy building, but with nine regional offices, the Enterprise Innovation Institute has helped create or secure an estimated 11,850 jobs in Georgia by offering multiple programs to support innovation and industry. Part of the institute, the Advanced Technology Development Center is an incubator that has helped more than 100 companies such as voice over internet protocol developer TransNexus.

Also part of the Enterprise Innovation Institute is VentureLab, a startup incubator that works with Georgia Tech researchers to commercialize inventions, innovations and discoveries. The incubator is partnered with the Georgia Research Alliance, which provides grants for startups. Successes from VentureLab include CardioMEMS, a medical technology company, and Suniva, a solar power innovator. In 2016, the National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded a $3.4-million Innovation Corps grant to VentureLab. In 2015, Georgia Tech announced a second phase of development at Tech Square, backed by $15 million in tax incentives from the City of Atlanta. Known as Coda, the development will be a $400-million, mixed-use, 21-story office tower that will house activities for both Georgia Tech and the private sector. The development will have a projected total of 2,400 personnel over

TECHNOLOGY & FINTECH OVERVIEW

645,000 square feet. In July 2017, Dallas-based IT company DataBank announced it will build a 94,000-square-foot, high-performance computing data center in the Coda building.

The data center will boost the IT infrastructure offered in the area, with business and research institutes gaining fiber access to Georgia Tech supercomputers and a growing number of datasets. The new oil, the venture represents a solid commitment on the part of Georgia Tech and the City of Atlanta to ensure a future stake in the growing digital economy.

than 35,000 individual members, the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG) plays an essential part in bringing together the state’s technology community. TAG’s activities include events and publications to promote technology and encourage communication between members. It advocates for Georgia’s technology industry at a state, national and international levels.

“TAG works closely with universities on innovation, systems and workforce development. Our partnership with the Atlanta Technology Development Center is phenomenal, and we also work with the Technical College System of Georgia, the University System of Georgia and the Department of Education to make sure we have the best pipeline of technology-related talent for STEM-related career paths in the country,” Larry Williams, the CEO of TAG, told Focus: Atlanta.

According to TAG’s 2017 legislative report, it has influenced policies to increase access to venture capital funds through the Invest Georgia program. Current legislative interest for the association includes tax incentives to encourage the growth of the data center industry and opposing legislative barriers to the development of autonomous vehicles.

TAG also helped to create the Innovate Georgia 2025 program, in conjunction with the State Department, Georgia Tech and the Metro Atlanta Chamber (MAC),

Started in 2013, the Atlanta Tech Village is a 103,000-foot co-working space based in Buckhead that houses a number of small companies and startups.

Village people Started in 2013, the Atlanta Tech Village is a 103,000foot co-working space based in Buckhead that houses a number of small companies and startups. With more than 1,000 members and some 300 companies, the building claims to be the fourth-largest tech startup hub in the U.S. by size, with resident startups raising more than $325 million in its first four years. More than 20 percent of them have revenue or investment of more than $100,000.

Downtown Atlanta also has important innovation areas, with the Microsoft Innovation Center, Women’s Entrepreneurial Initiative, Switchyards and GSU all playing important parts in the sector.

TAG, you’re IT With more than 2,000 member companies and more

Lynne Laube Chief Operating Officer & Co-Founder – Cardlytics Atlanta is a growing, diverse and vibrant city with a lot of untapped potential, and there is a good business community that offers support. When we started the company in 2008, we needed to be based somewhere inexpensive. We had raised $1.75 million in venture funding, but in San Francisco, that doesn’t even get you a building. Atlanta is inexpensive compared to other cities of a similar size. Its airport has connections to the rest of the world, and there is a lot of good technological talent. There isn’t as much competition in the startup world, so employee retention is good.

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among others. The program, also known as Georgia’s Science & Technology Strategic Plan, was devised in 2012 and sets the goal of positioning Georgia as an international leading tech ecosystem by 2025. The plan sets out a number of recommendations related to STEM education and training, strengthening the relationship between industry and educational establishments, and increasing the amount of in-state seed funding.

The City of Alpharetta also draws considerable attention for its technology offerings, as it is home to around 600 technology-based companies. In 2012, the city created the Alpharetta Technology Commission to focus on the policy and investment needed to grow the city’s technology sector.

telecommunications company CenturyLink and George Mina, security strategist for IBM Security in Atlanta. In addition to the discussions regarding security issues and innovations, the event provided demonstrations from local, national and international IT firms of the latest in security technology.

Finance driver For those working in the finance industry, the name Transaction Alley refers to only one place: Atlanta, Georgia. With an estimated 70 percent of all global financial transactions going through Georgia, according to Forbes magazine, and the largest share going through the state’s capital, it’s not hard to understand why.

A range of different segments fall under the banner of fintech.

Card processing is one of the most prominent segments and an estimated $118 billion worth of card payments pass through Georgia every year, according to a 2016 report from TAG. Some 15 million merchants worldwide rely on the state for card processing services. Other important aspects of fintech include retail banking, prepaid and loyalty card solutions, big data and risk analytics, capital markets and cash-flow analytics.

Atlanta’s fintech ecosystem is a thriving economic powerhouse, with more than 100 fintech firms headquartered in the metropolitan area. With the city

Atlanta’s fintech ecosystem is a thriving economic powerhouse, with more than 100 fintech firms headquartered in the metropolitan area.

Event horizon Atlanta plays host to a number of events centered around technology. The 2017 Atlanta Conference on Science and Innovation Policy will be held in October and will cover a range of issues including the use of technology in environmental sustainability, smart cities and big data analytics. The yearly conference regularly attracts around 300 researchers and students with various educational backgrounds from more than 35 countries.

In April, the 2017 Cyber Security Summit took place in Buckhead. The speakers included Adam Hickley from the U.S. Department of Justice, David Mahon of U.S.

Mark Carl CEO – ControlScan

When it comes to security, the biggest threat for small and medium-sized businesses is access to the right talent. Small companies just don’t have the money for highly qualified IT staff or don’t know how to recruit the right IT security talent. There simply isn’t enough IT security talent available. Not enough people are getting into it as a career, and a recent study suggests that there more than 1 million open IT security positions. Because smaller companies are unable to find the right talent, they don’t get access to the right knowledge about what to expect, in terms of security threats.

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TECHNOLOGY & FINTECH OVERVIEW

at the epicenter, fintech companies in Georgia employ more than 30,000 fintech professionals within the metro area and some 130,000 employees worldwide.

The top 50 companies in the segment reported revenue of $72 billion in 2014.

The success of fintech in Atlanta lies in the city’s reputation for both financial services and technological innovation. The roots took hold in 1987 when Georgia lawmakers lifted the cap on credit card fees. At the time, credit card companies could charge either $12 or 18 percent of the total debt per year. With a number of financial services firms moving to Atlanta, it soon gained a reputation for being the Silicon Valley of transactions and took on the name Payment Ally.

From 2000 to 2012, the number of checks processed in the U.S. dropped by half from just over 40 billion per year to less than 20 billion, while at the same time, the number of transactions increased from some 15 million to 27 million for credit cards, and from 7 million to nearly 50 million for debit cards. Although cash is still used in 40 percent of all U.S. transactions, prepaid cards and cell-phone payments like Apple Pay are also growing in popularity.

The American Transaction Processors Coalition (ATPC) was launched in Atlanta in 2014, to promote and protect the interests of Georgia’s financial transactions industry. The organization works with governments and industry to promote corporate growth, as well as work on issues such as compliance, security and workforce development. In February 2017, the ATPC announced that it had partnered with the City of London to create the P20 initiative, which aims to bring together the most important 20 people in the payment sphere. The first P20 conference will be held in London in October 2017, with the first Atlanta event the following year.

“Atlanta is the largest center for payments in the North America, and maybe even the world. The P20 conference is our international platform that will bring together regulatory thought leaders from the U.K. and the U.S. with industry thought leaders, the 20 most influential companies and the 20 most influential people in those companies together with financial industry regulators to talk about issues like financial inclusion, the future of the payments industry, cybersecurity, innovation and education,” West Richards, executive director of the ATPC, told Focus: Atlanta.

Once a critical mass of payment services companies had built up in the Atlanta area, it is only natural that a wider variety of companies would follow, such as the Atlanta-based online trading platform FxBridge,

Larry Williams and Jeffery Sprecher of Intercontinental Exchange both took part in the Georgia Technology Summit.

which was founded in 1999, or Cardlytics, which was founded in 2008 and specializes in loyalty cards and purchase intelligence.

Data matters The past two decades have seen an explosion of online activities that directly impact the financial sphere.

In addition to online marketplaces such as Amazon, information has also ushered in the era of big data. In 2017, the Economist declared data to be a more valuable commodity than oil, and the fintech sector is ideally positioned to mine information such as purchases, debt positioning and consumer habits.

In March 2017, TAG released its Data Analytics/Big Data Research Report. The survey of fintech firms in Georgia revealed that more than half of new analytics projects underway were revenue-generating, and that 58 percent of respondents felt that their organization was more datacentric than in 2014.

The drive to monetize data is enabled by cloud technology advances and the increased processing speeds companies can utilize. Atlanta has a competitive advantage because of its superior information technology infrastructure and well-skilled workforce graduating from universities such as Georgia Tech.

Blockchain technology is another important part of the fintech puzzle. The most famous application being Bitcoin, blockchains are incorruptible complex algorithms with myriad applications, such as tracking transactions and creating secure records of personal data. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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The Atlanta Startup Battle is an example of the city’s involvement in the growth and development of its tech sector.

Atlanta currently has the second-highest concentration of Bitcoin ATMs in the U.S. with 84, compared to 162 in New York City. In June 2017, Atlanta hosted the IBM Blockchain Summit, a half-day event that brought together information technology experts and executives to discuss the application of this new concept.

Shift in demographics With a median age of 36.1 in 2015, almost two years below the U.S. figure of 37.8, Atlanta not only offers the economic infrastructure for fintech development, but also a customer base that trusts online interfaces.

According to a 2016 survey from the U.S. Federal Reserve, 71 percent of respondents used online banking. In the same survey, 43 percent of smartphone users had utilized a mobile banking app over the previous 12 months, while this number rose to 67 percent for the 18-29 age range.

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was also halted with the 2007 to 2008 subprime mortgage scandal and subsequent recession. Since then, the investment has gone back into tech. As disruptors like Amazon, Airbnb and Uber have become household names, investors have been eager to find the next big name.

The value proposition offered by Atlanta is clear: the business model of the average fintech firm has low overheads and strong profit potential. Whereas many traditional internet startups have shown difficulty in monetizing offerings, payment processors, for example, will levy a small fee for each transaction or process from the start with little or no increase in overheads. According to TAG’s State of Georgia’s Fintech Ecosystem 2016 report, recurring revenue for many payment companies is 80 percent or more, with yearly earnings per share growth of 10 to 15 percent, and operating margins as low as 20 percent.

The geographical advantages for investors, such as the concentration of companies in one area and the ease of getting to that area also make for a compelling argument to invest in Atlanta. The global fintech industry saw investment triple from $4 billion in 2013 to $12.2 billion in 2014.

TECHNOLOGY & FINTECH OVERVIEW

With more than 6 million client businesses spread over more than 100 countries worldwide, First Data is the largest payment processor in the world. Founded in 1971 in Colorado, the company was the first thirdparty processor of Visa and Mastercard cards. It moved headquarters to Atlanta in 2009, a vital vote of confidence for the area and, in 2015, made its first IPO. In 2016, the company performed 2,800 transactions per second and had a total payment volume of some $1.9 trillion.

Founded in 1991, and previously called Nova, Elavon is the fourth-largest payments processor in the U.S. The company processes more than 3 billion transactions every year in more than 10 countries, with some 1 million business customers.

“A lot of people are switching over to electronic forms of payment. There are still a lot of people in the U.S. paying with cash and checks, so there is opportunity for the market to grow. One area that has exploded is how payments are being accepted, such as mobile, card-not-present and online payments. That shift has accelerated the need for fintech solutions and opened up opportunities for companies to find their niches from a software perspective,” Jamie Walker, CEO of Elavon, told Focus: Atlanta.

House of cards In an April 2017 survey conducted for ING Bank, 38 percent of respondents from the U.S. said that they would like to “go completely cashless.” According to the Federal Reserve Payment Study of 2016, between 2012 to 2015, check payments by number fell at a rate of 4.4 percent per year, while credit card payments by number rose at a rate of 8 percent in the same period and debit cards at 7.1 percent.

Commercial appeal The commercial sector is increasingly turning to third-party solutions for payment processing. Cardbased, business-to-business electronic payment processing is a fast-growing sector, yet 70 percent of U.S. companies do not have the sufficient setup to process cards, according to a press release from Vantiv.

While Elavon and First Data specialize in card processing, Paymetric offers cloud-based payment systems that companies can integrate with their existing infrastructure. The company was originally

Jeremy Legg Chief Technical Officer – Turner Broadcasting System Atlanta is on a roll when it comes to attracting top talent and tech companies. Over the past 18 to 24 months, our own tech economy and tech community have emerged. People are starting to communicate more, gather more and share common interests in technologies and business models. In the past, there were a number of larger, older companies that weren’t really interacting, but that has changed with the influx of startups as well as Silicon Valley- and New York-based tech companies.

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Allen Maines Executive Partner, Holland & Knight

If you’re in the fintech business and you want talented people to run your company, you need to go where the talented people live. Atlanta is home to the largest payment processors in the world and also some of the largest data aggregators. There is a healthy pool of trained people working directly in these industries, but there is also a great deal of related activity. Startups, early-stage and private equity companies are being supported in Atlanta for their creativity and imaginative development of new products.

Holland & Knight has been investing heavily in Atlanta and in Atlanta’s future. We are the only large firm in town that has been growing significantly since the Great Recession because of our confidence in the city’s future. That’s why we are so proud to be a global sponsor of the annual P20 conference, which is an annual meeting of the 20 most important people in the world of payments, plus the political and regulatory leaders of the U.S. and the U.K. The P20 conference is going to be held in London in October of 2017, and then it will be coming to Atlanta in the fall of 2018. This recognizes Atlanta as a tier-one financial services city on par with New York and London. We are very happy to help make this happen.

The global potential for Metro Atlanta is massive.

Less than 2 billion people have access to some form of electronic payment today, all in the developed world, but we are preparing for the day when all 7 billion people on the planet have access. The work of the P20 is in part to ensure that access is guided by reliable policies – laws, rules and regulations – such as those found in the U.S. and the U.K. The economic benefits of the electronic payments industry for Atlanta and London are huge, but so are the benefits for the rest of the world. By making safe, secure and reliable electronic payments available to the developing world, we will be providing them with vital tools to help lift themselves out of poverty. We are especially proud to be helping Atlanta lead in this endeavor.

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based in Houston, Texas but moved to Atlanta to gain access to the fintech ecosystem. It was included in Deloitte’s 2016 Technology Fast 500 list of the most rapidly growing companies in North America.

Founded in 2011, Kabbage is one of Atlanta’s leading technology firms and was named among the top 500 fastest growing companies by Inc. magazine. The firm uses financial data analytics to offer lines of credits up worth up to $150,000 to small and medium-sized businesses. As of August 2017, the company has loaned more than $3.5 billion to more than 115,000 small businesses across the U.S. The company has partnerships in the U.K., Canada and Mexico.

“Getting capital and investment into Atlanta remains a challenge, though one shared by companies that are not located in major business centers such as New York, Silicon Valley or Boston. It’s not unusual, and there are ways to solve it. In Atlanta, you have a community that’s willing to listen and act,” Rob Frohwein, president of Kabbage, told Focus: Atlanta.

Beyond the fintech zone In addition to the ever-growing roster of fintech companies, a host of big and small names are present in Metro Atlanta. Connectivity is cited a major factor, with the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport offering direct connections to 80 percent of the U.S. and an equally impressive international destination list. The low cost, but high standard of living, in comparison to places such a Silicon Valley and New York, is also a major factor for companies that are already in a competitive market when looking for skilled staff. Google Fiber, Invesco, Zyrobotics, AT&T, Mailchimp and Honeywell all have offices in the metro area.

A number of non-fintech startups in Atlanta have been drawing interest from the investment community and technology world. Ionic Security is a data security firm that has attracted $122.44 million in funding since its founding in May 2011. The company offers cloudbased data encryption services for businesses.

Rubicon Global has managed to attract $145 million in backing for its waste management business.

Customers use a cloud-based app to coordinate refuse and recycling collection, increasing sustainability and saving money.

Choose your own venture Since 2013, Mosley Ventures invested some $31 million in 20 early-stage technology startups in Metro Atlanta and the surrounding area. In January 2017, Invest Georgia allocated $3.5 million for the Mosley ( )

TECHNOLOGY & FINTECH INTERVIEW

Better together How different institutions throughout Atlanta are collaborating in the tech sector

Larry Williams CEO – Technology Association of Georgia How does Atlanta help to drive innovation and development in the technology sector?

The unique thing about our tech ecosystem in Atlanta is that this city is the place where technology meets the real world.

We have companies utilizing technology and creating innovations but with a laserlike focus on leveraging technology to drive revenue; increase the customer-user experience; create greater operational efficiencies; and decrease expenses. In Atlanta, we are not only using technology for business, but we are also using technology to affect and improve the day-to-day lives of residents across Georgia.

With companies looking to technology to drive revenue, Atlanta is well positioned, with a strong history of technological innovation. Companies such as First Data, Fiserv and Global Payments are processing more than 70 percent of the country’s debit and credit card transactions.

How does the educational environment contribute to the success of the technology sector?

We have a unique ecosystem with large companies that are constantly looking to acquire new technologies and innovations. That is combined with our academic institutions, such as the Georgia Institute of Technology, Kennesaw State University, Clark Atlanta University and Emory University, as well as the availability of capital. That means we have innovation, capital and the workforce. We have smart people and a lot of visionary investments. This ecosystem has been critical to our success.

Georgia is a leader in areas such as logistics, film and digital media. There is also a history of cybersecurity driven by Georgia Tech, grants from the Department of Defense and investment from large corporations that help spawn companies like Scientific Atlanta. Other

companies and institutions, such as VMware AirWatch and Pindrop, have created a base of knowledge and innovation to bring about the next generation of mobile security.

How can the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG) leverage partnerships in order to create a solid future for the sector?

TAG works closely with universities on innovation, systems and workforce development. Innovation in Atlanta has given us the world’s most iconic beverage, the first 24-hour news network, one of the largest email service providers and so much more. TAG is proud to be the voice of our technology industry, and we look forward to continuing our mission to help fuel innovation in Atlanta, across the state and beyond. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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( ) Ventures in a vote of confidence for the company, which has a primary focus on big data, e-commerce and cybersecurity.

Invest Georgia was created in 2013 by the Georgia Assembly to give cash boosts for seeding early-stage technology companies in the technology arena.

As of 2017, the fund has allocated $20 million of a designated $100 million, including $1 million to TechSquare Lab funds, which itself has made 12 major investments totaling $12 million. In 2015, it also invested $4 million into the TTV Capital fintech-focused venture capital firm, with a portfolio that includes BitPay, Bluepoint and Cardlytics.

BIP Capital, which has raised $200 million from four funds over 10 years, merged with Accelerant Venture Capital in the first half of 2017. The move brought a $25 million early-stage fund under the helm of BIP Capital.

The company works closely with MAC and is active in technology startups across Atlanta and the southeast U.S. Its portfolio includes QA Symphony and UserIQ. “The key to bringing money to any sector is having companies and entrepreneurs that are attractive to investors.

Money will travel to wherever there are innovative entrepreneurs. In Atlanta, there are venture capital firms, angel investors and seed investors, but they are limited in number compared to other regions. We have the entrepreneurial demand for capital – we just need the investor supply to match it,” John Yates, partner for Morris, Manning & Martin, told Focus: Atlanta.

to shape the future of industry and transport. The 725-square-foot Robotarium at Georgia Tech houses a swarm robotics project designed to tackle a number of questions regarding the use of remotely operated aerial drones and land-operated vehicles.

Car360 raised $3.55 million in June 2017 to develop its virtual and augmented-reality automotive applications, which allow for interactive visualization of vehicles and vehicle-related data for designers, engineers and customers.

Even Coca-Cola, one of Atlanta’s largest, albeit more traditional, companies is looking to advanced technology for their latest innovations. In July 2017, global director of digital innovation Greg Chambers announced that the company would be using artificial intelligence to power new vending machines, allowing for two-way communication with the consumer and even machine personalities that match its surroundings.

Looking ahead Atlanta has a robust and growing technology ecosystem made up of startups that enjoy multiple avenues of support, enthusiastic associations and international success stories.

The entrance of new data centers and Google Fiber have created a solid infrastructure that makes investment decisions easy although, as of September 2017, Google Fiber is slowing down its rollout across the U.S. Finally, the educational sector, led by Georgia Tech, not only guarantees a skilled workforce, but is also creating an environment of innovation sure to drive the ideas of tomorrow. What remains to be discovered is whether Atlanta can take on the digital behemoth of Silicon Valley or the creative hub of New York.

It also remains to be seen if there is enough knowledge and skills transfer to capitalize on the new era of data analytics. Although the university system is capable of creating developers and tech wizards, the buzz around big data demands skilled data scientists, which companies have complained are few and far between.

What is clear is that the sheer enthusiasm for success, and Atlanta’s unique business culture of competition and coordination, mean that as the technology industry matures into areas such as nanobots and artificial intelligence, Atlanta will be ready to take on new challenges.

The Microsoft Innovation Center is offering training and resources to new technology communities and and K-12 schools.

Innovation is key Although the innovation sector in Atlanta is dominated by the educational sector, commercial startup hubs and other for- and not-for-profit institutions offer opportunities upcoming talent and ideas. In 2015, Microsoft opened an innovation center in the Flatiron Building on Peachtree Street, only the second based in the U.S. The Microsoft Innovation Center is part of the company’s CityNext initiative, which is bringing training and resources to burgeoning technology communities, with an emphasis on K-12 education and developing entrepreneurship.

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Healthcare: Although recent legislation issues in Washington D.C. have left healthcare officials impatient and wary, Metro Atlanta is showing resilience. The mature healthcare sector is made up of leading hospitals, research centers and the CDC. Providers are shifting towards new technology and a growing health IT industry as the sector embraces medical innovation.

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Peak condition: Atlanta is a well-developed healthcare center, with strong treatment facilities, research institutions and the CDC, making it regionally, nationally and globally significant A high concentration of hospitals, clinics and independent providers makes Atlanta the central healthcare destination in Georgia. Also home to the headquarters of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as well as other leading research institutions, Atlanta is an important focal point of the international healthcare industry.

Major institutions The city’s healthcare network includes a number of systems with national recognition for patient care and research, as well as the Atlanta Center for Medical Research, the CDC and the nonprofit Carter Center. With 156 hospitals and more than 120,000 healthcare practitioners, the Atlanta metropolitan area is the largest healthcare destination in the southeast.

The Emory Healthcare Network, a system of hospitals and clinics associated with Emory University, dominates the healthcare landscape in Metro Atlanta.

Meanwhile, the WellStar Health network has hospitals, educational facilities and clinics throughout the state.

Grady and Piedmont are also major healthcare systems, and there are a number of smaller independent institutions in the area.

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At the same time, Atlanta is a growing hub for health information technology (HIT). More than 30,000 Georgia residents work in the sector, the majority of whom are located in or near the city, according to the Metro Atlanta Chamber.

Demographics Atlanta is one of the fastest-growing metropolitan areas in the U.S., mainly because of its expanding workforce.

Many new arrivals are young professionals, who are joining, or relocating with, the ever-increasing number of large companies in the area. In addition, the city’s wellrespected educational sector draws students from inside and outside the state, as well as from other countries.

According to the government’s DataUSA website, the median age of residents in Metro Atlanta was 36.1 years in 2015, almost two years younger than the national median of 37.8 years. Residents younger than 18 years totaled 1.43 million, making up 25 percent of the area’s population of 5.71 million, compared with a nation share of 22.9 percent. Those older than 75 years make up 4 percent of the area’s population, compared with the national share of 6.3 percent.

The clinician-to-patient ratio in Georgia is currently ( )

HEALTHCARE INTERVIEW

Wellness centers How Atlanta is becoming a regional and national hub for healthcare

Dr. Jonathan Lewin President, CEO & Chairman of the Board – Emory Healthcare How can Atlanta further solidify its position as a center for the healthcare sector?

We’ve worked hard at Emory Healthcare and Emory’s Woodruff Health Sciences Center to enhance Atlanta’s already strong standing as a health hub by being a nationally recognized academic health center. We have helped strengthen Atlanta’s recognition throughout the world with our research, educational programs and clinical care. Our collaborations and partnerships also have helped in this regard. We have a shared Biomedical Engineering Department with Georgia Tech, and the work we do with the University of Georgia, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Grady Memorial Hospital and the Veteran’s Administration Hospital serves as a model for many health systems throughout the nation.

How does Emory position Atlanta as a healthcare center at an international level?

With one of the world’s busiest airports in the region, we served patients from more than 30 countries in 2016.

People from all over the world come here to receive the most innovative treatments for infectious diseases, heart disease, neurology, cancer, immunology and transplants. These are just some of the disciplines in which our faculty members are internationally recognized as clinical and research experts.

Emory’s relationships with prominent public health organizations and agencies such as the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), The Carter Center, and the Task Force for Global Health, along with other Atlanta-based health-related organizations, has enhanced Atlanta’s growing reputation as the public health capital of the world.

The Emory Global Health Institute helps Emory and its global partners improve health around the world by supporting faculty and students working on critical global health challenges. These programs involve 200

faculty members across Emory and have provided 1,500 students with global health learning experiences in dozens of countries across the world.

What research is being conducted in Atlanta?

At Emory’s Woodruff Health Sciences Center, we are conducting more than $540 million of externally funded research in 2017. The Emory Vaccine Center is performing clinical trials for Zika virus vaccines, we have made groundbreaking progress on HIV vaccines and antibiotic resistance.

We are leading the largest clinical trial ever in Atlanta, the Emory Health Aging Study. It will enroll aging people across the city, looking at brain health development and dementia. It’s will be one of the biggest trials conducted in the U.S. for brain health. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Dr. Walter Curran Executive Director, Winship Cancer Institute

What is Atlanta’s significance as a healthcare hub?

Atlanta has become a world hub for expertise in international health. This is in part because the city has the American Cancer Society, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Emory University, in particular, the Rollins School of Public Health and the Winship Cancer Institute (Winship). These are all organizations that deal with health issues on a global basis.

The scale of operations for the healthcare sector in Atlanta is significant. The Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta sees more children than any other pediatric healthcare system in the country. Atlanta has seen a growth in the number of key opinion leaders as well as important research. Every time there is a new infectious disease crisis, such as the Ebola epidemic a few years ago, the CDC and their partners within Emory take the lead in the research aspect of combating the issue. WCI is also able to partner with the American Cancer Society, which is also based in Atlanta.

What does it mean for the institute to be designated a Comprehensive Cancer Center (CCC)?

The National Cancer Institute considers several features of an institution when it designates CCCs. It looks at the quality of laboratory cancer research, the quality of clinical trials, the efforts to understand cancer in the community, including cancer prevention or early detection methods, educational training programs and the positive impacts of research on the local community.

Our mission is to lessen the burden of cancer in Georgia.

We do that by aligning our research and educational programs with our cancer care and prevention. We do this through our relationships with cancer care providers in small towns. We also achieve this by working with Georgia Tech, where they are developing tools that can be used to better diagnose or treat cancer.

We are a resource for the doctors around the state who care for cancer patients. We have relationships with any organization in the state that positively influences the cancer problem in the state.

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( ) 1 to 66, and as of August 2016, the state was home to 238,000 healthcare practitioners working in diverse fields such as researchers, technicians and surgeons.

Atlanta has a reputation for a being a city that welcomes young families. It offers a great quality of life and affordable prices, compared to cities in New York or California, and there are plenty of job opportunities. These factors impact the industry in two ways. First, there is an emphasis on pediatric care. Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta is one of the top children’s hospitals in the country. It ranks nationally in 10 pediatric specialties, including number six in nephrology and number 15 in neonatology. Second, the city’s increasing population of young professionals is changing the way users interact with their healthcare providers with mobile apps and other IT innovations playing a much larger role.

Center of excellence With a growing population and booming economy, there is an array of new projects in Atlanta’s healthcare sector, including new hospitals, modern therapy centers and expansions of established institutions.

To keep up with an increase in projected demand and alleviate strain on its Downtown Hughes Spalding Hospital, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta announced plans to build a new pediatric hospital with an eightstory ambulatory care tower. The cost estimated in early 2017 was $1 billion to $1.3 billion, and the plans for new 46-acre site on North Druid Hills Road in the city of Brookhaven will be developed by mid-2018, while the building phase will last from 2020 to 2025.

Once completed, the project will be the most costly project of its type in the Georgia.

In December 2016, the Georgia Department of Community Health issued approval for a $603-million proposal by Piedmont Atlanta Hospital to add a 16-story bed tower and renovated its main campus on Peachtree Road. The new construction, named the Marcus Tower because of the $75-million grant from the local Marcus Foundation, will contain a heart and vascular center, 408 new patient beds, 10 operating rooms and a 12 new labs for cardiac catheterization and electrophysiology.

Phase one of the new construction is expected to be complete in 2020, with total construction and renovation running through to 2026, though facilities will be ready for use as early as 2020. The renovation phase will include mainly cosmetic improvements to the women’s services department worth $4.5 million.

This phase will also include the $7.5 million renovation of the inpatients rooms and the general operating room at Piedmont’s main surgical site. The work will

HEALTHCARE OVERVIEW

include new walls and floors as well as extra space for audio-visual equipment.

Grady Memorial Hospital announced that Camp Creek Parkway was to be the site of a new ambulatory care center in April 2017. The clinic will be based next to 700,000-square-foot Camp Creek Retail complex and will cost an estimated $8.5 million to build. The neighborhood clinic, scheduled to open in early 2017, will offer specialty services such as cardiology and endocrinology.

Scheduled to open in 2018, the Emory Proton Center at the Winship Cancer Institute promises to be a game-changer in cancer treatment. The facility is backed up by $275 million in bonds from Atlanta’s economic development agency, Invest Atlanta. Measuring 108,000 square feet, it will be located on Peachtree Street and will offer modern proton radiotherapies. These therapies represent a leap forward in the treatment of cancer. They are more precise than standard treatment and can target tumors directly, minimizing damage to surrounding tissue.

They are currently used in adult and child patients to target tumors in the brain, eye, head and neck, lung, spine, breast or prostate. The center will be the first of its kind in Georgia and will create 128 permanent jobs. It represents a total investment of $350 million.

Obama-era Affordable Care Act (ACA) show no sign of going in any clear direction. The dominant attitude of healthcare providers and insurance specialists is understandably, “wait and see.”

As of October 2017, these efforts of the Republican party have been unsuccessful. A number of political pressure groups have held protests against specific bills or the whole attempt to replace and repeal.

In April 2017, a march in protest of the American Health Care Act, which was later rejected by the Senate, was held by groups such as the Georgia Alliance for Social Justice, Planned Parenthood Southeast and Georgians for a Healthy Future, throughout central Atlanta.

In 2015, 13.9 percent of people in Georgia were uninsured, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau. This gives Georgia the third-highest rate of uninsurance in the country. In Metro Atlanta, 15.4 percent were uninsured, working out at 855,498 people.

Scheduled to open in 2018, the Emory Proton Center at the Winship Cancer Institute promises to be a gamechanger in cancer treatment.

Legislative woes As of September 2017, the efforts of the administration of President Donald Trump to repeal and replace the

Better value In April 2017, Mayor Kasim Reed met with key members of Atlanta’s healthcare industry to start a new program of valuebased healthcare led by the World Economic Forum. Pilot programs in the Netherlands, China and Singapore are in the works and Atlanta is base for the first of what is hoped will become a global system.

The idea of the three-year study is to test the idea of basing payment for drugs and services on patient outcomes, rather than the amount of care given. It will

Debra Tyler-Horton State Director – AARP Georgia With more than 1 million members across the state, AARP Georgia is committed to helping communities address infrastructure challenges in a way that promotes livability. One of the primary concerns of our members is the ability to age in place.

People want to be able to stay in their own homes and communities as they age, and we need to ensure that the necessary supports are in place for that to happen. That means supporting adequate transportation and housing options, as well as promoting better access to healthcare and community services.

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HEALTHCARE OVERVIEW

focus on treating heart failure, and the southeast was chosen because of the prevalence of cardiovascular disease and Atlanta in particular because of its developed health system.

Key stakeholders involved in the project include Novartis AG, which produces the heart-failure treatment Entresto, the medical tech company Medtronic, Takeda Pharmaceutical Company, Kaiser Permanente and the data company Qualcomm, as well as health officials from the Netherlands and the U.K. The Atlanta pilot will focus on some key issues such as the full impact cost of the care lifecycle, health outcomes and associated costs of different population segments and the possibility of customizing segment-specific interventions.

If successful, the program could potentially overhaul the private healthcare industry. One of the main issues that drug and medical device manufacturers face is that insurance companies are often hesitant to cover the price of a new offering without real-world data as to effectiveness. Under the suggested program, drugs and devices would only be paid for if they are effective.

Big health Metro Atlanta’s robust and varied healthcare sector is made up of some key local and national organizations.

WellStar WellStar took the title of largest hospital system in Georgia when in April 2016, six hospitals joined the WellStar system, bringing the total number of hospitals up to 11, along with 250 healthcare sites. It is Atlanta’s sixth-largest employer with 14,500 employees as of December 2015.

In August 2017, WellStar Health System raised

Atlanta’s international reputation means that hospitals and other institutions can attract the best and brightest.

$875 million in a bond issuance to finance facility expansion, refinance a loan used to buy five Tenet Healthcare hospitals and refinance debt gained from acquisition of West Georgia Health. WellStar’s current plans include a $170-million renovation project at its facility in Marietta. As part of the project, WellStar will complete a 170,000-square-foot facility to alleviate overcrowding and house new equipment.

Anne Meisner CEO – Cancer Treatment Centers of America

The CTCA has done some work with the Georgia Institute of Technology looking at applications of data science. On the technology side, we’re one of the first hospitals to connect a number of different databases through various software applications. These new technological applications might not be something that creates the big eureka moment over the next year.

Rather, it is about foundation building and creating partnerships with the right institutions. Over the next five to ten years, I’m excited to see how we can much more effectively can help patients to manage both the length and the quality of life.

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HEALTHCARE OVERVIEW

Other plans include $7 million in community programs, new facilities such as the Vinings Health Park, and the continued rollout of advanced electronic health record technology.

Emory Healthcare With seven hospitals and 107 primary care locations, Emory Healthcare is the largest healthcare provider in Metro Atlanta. Connected to Emory University through the Woodruff Health Sciences Center, the system includes The Emory Clinic, the Emory University Hospital, the Emory University Hospital Midtown and the Emory Wesley Woods Geriatric Hospital.

In 2016, the Emory University Hospital, including Emory Wesley Woods Hospital and Emory Orthopedics & Spine Hospital, served 25,686 admissions, 9,424 inpatients and 3,741 outpatient surgeries. It was ranked as the best hospital in the state for six years running by U.S. News & World Report, ranking nationally for five adult specialties, including ophthalmology and geriatrics.

As a healthcare network, Emory employs more than 1,800 physicians across the state, which includes 70 different subspecialties. Main specialties include oncology, cardiology and heart surgery, diabetes and endocrinology, geriatrics, neurology and neurosurgery and orthopedics. Around 63 percent of the system’s

patients were on Medicare or Medicaid plans in 2016.

In 2015, it provided charity care totaling $67.4 million.

In May 2017, it was announced that Emory Healthcare would be partnering with Atlanta Sports City, a 200acre facility in Stonecrest, to anchor a sports medicine facility, the Sports Medicine Pavilion, and create a Medical Office Health Park.

Through its associated university, Emory Healthcare partners with a number of different institutions throughout Atlanta. Its partnership with the Georgia Institute of Technology represents $1.35 billion on research spent annually, and their joint bioengineering program ranks number three in the U.S. The Pediatric Research Alliance is a partnership between Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Emory University and the Emory Department of Pediatrics, Georgia Tech, Morehouse School of Medicine and the Georgia Research Alliance among others. The multilocation institution focuses on a variety of different areas associated with children’s health including gene therapies and cutting-edge cardiovascular imaging.

Emory also has close associations with the CDC. During the 2014 Ebola outbreak in Africa, Emory University Hospital became the first institution to treat the disease, when two workers from the U.S. Agency for International Development returned showing symptoms of the disease. In 2016, Emory University received a $2.2 million grant to research infectious diseases including Ebola.

Located on the Emory Saint Joseph campus and working in close affiliation with Emory Healthcare Systems, the Winship Cancer Institute is the only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center in the state. In 2016, the institute opened up a $6-million expansion, doubling the daily capacity of the facility to 400 patients. The 28,000-square-foot facility has undergone around 12-months of improvements, mainly funded with a $6-million grant from the Robert W. Woodruff Foundation. The upgrade also included a range of new technologies to keep Atlanta at the forefront of cancer treatment.

The Emory eICU, is a telehealth program started in 2014 with a $10.7-million grant from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The program was created to see if telemedicine was a viable alternative to providing critical care over greater geographical areas in specializations where physicians were in short demand. Telemedicine has a number of advantages, including cost savings and reduced travel times for patients. Over a period of 15 months, 8,019 patients www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Kevin Brown President & CEO, Piedmont Healthcare

What are the organization’s plans for improving healthcare services in Atlanta?

Piedmont was founded by two physicians, so we are a physician-centric organization that has attracted a high caliber of talent because great physicians want to work with great physicians. In less than a year, we will be a 10-hospital system, with some 20,000 employees.

We take care of about 2 million people in the Greater Atlanta area, and have grown to serve lots of different communities in lots of different ways.

The flagship facility here in Buckhead, Piedmont Atlanta Hospital, is building a new 16-story tower that will house up to 408 beds and 13 new operating rooms, for a 22-percent increase in Piedmont Atlanta’s capacity to care for patients. This will help us better serve our community and achieve our vision of becoming a destination for healthcare services. Atlanta has the world’s busiest airport and a large and growing population, so there’s no reason people shouldn’t fly here for healthcare services. In 2016, we took care of someone from all 50 states. This is potential we can build upon.

How does Piedmont leverage new partnerships to improve services?

Piedmont has partnered with MD Anderson and bought their care model to Georgia, this means our oncologist has become certified by MD Anderson we have access to their physicians for consultation. We also have relationships with the Cleveland Clinic and other large systems across the country in order to participate in clinical dialog and discussing best practices.

From a service quality perspective, we want to break down obstacles that patients come across when getting healthcare. For example, if you want to see a primary care physician, you make an appointment. Then if you want to see a specialist, you get their card, and you make another appointment. And if there is an imaging study, you make a third appointment. This creates a lot of waiting and inefficiencies. We’re getting close to creating a system that is centered around the patient so that they don’t have to navigate such a complex system.

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Piedmont hospital is home to a range of medical specializations, including cardiovascular, oncology, transplant medicine, orthopedic care and neurology.

were treated in the scheme, which utilized audiovisual technology, predictive analytics and advanced reporting capabilities. According to a report by Abt Associates, Emory saved $4.6 million representing $1,486 in Medicare spending per patient.

Piedmont Piedmont Hospital in Buckhead has been one of Atlanta’s main hospitals for more than 100 years. It currently employs 4,700 healthcare professionals, including 1,000 physicians, over a range of specializations, including cardiovascular, oncology, transplant medicine, orthopedic care and neurology. In addition to its ambulatory services, in 2017 it launched 27 retail clinical services centers in Walgreen locations around Metro Atlanta.

In September 2017, Piedmont Healthcare announced that it was purchasing the Rockdale Medical Center in Conyers, located in Rockdale County, Metro Atlanta.

The 138-bed hospital has a range of specialized services, including a organ transplant unit and brain tumor treatment. Piedmont is also in talks with Columbus Regional Health.

HEALTHCARE OVERVIEW

Piedmont Healthcare also runs a grant program focused on improving community health. The program, which accepts applications from nonprofit, communitybased organizations, is specifically to provide healthrelated schemes for underserved populations. In 2017, the grants supported 23 organizations covering issues such as reducing preventable hospital readmissions, increasing access to care and preventing heart disease, high blood pressure, strokes and obesity.

Grady Health System In addition to running Atlanta’s 911 ambulance service, Grady Health System is made up of the Grady Memorial Hospital, Crestview Health & Rehabilitation Center, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta and six neighborhood health centers. It is home to the Marcus Stroke and Neuroscience Center, which was opened in 2010 with a $20-million grant from the Marcus Foundation. The center was recognized for its work in 2016 with the Target: Stroke Honor Role Elite Plus award, from the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association. In 2014, Grady received a further cash injection of $30 million from the Marcus

Foundation to fund the expansion of the Grady Emergency Department.

In July 2017, Grady Memorial Hospital was recognized as a level 1 trauma center on a national level by the American College of Surgeons (ACS). The title means that the hospital is able to provide trauma care at national guidelines set out by the ACS and has all the necessary resources available 24-hours per day, seven days per week. It also recognizes the hospital training and research on trauma. In 2016, the hospital treated over 7,100 trauma patients, making it one of the busiest in the country.

Northside Hospital Healthcare System The largest single hospital in Atlanta by employees is the Northside Hospital, with 8,000 medical staff.

It is part of the Northside Hospital Healthcare System, which also includes hospitals in Cumming and Canton. In August 2017, the system submitted a merger agreement with Gwinnett Health System to the State of Georgia Office of Attorney General. At the beginning of September 2017, the agreement hasn’t been ratified, negotiations have been ongoing since ( ) www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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HEALTHCARE INTERVIEW

Mission possible How Grady Health system works to improve healthcare in Metro Atlanta

John Haupert President & CEO – Grady Health System code a record, get it billed and get it paid was not good.

We were able to correct that and increase net revenue by more than $100 million in one year.

How do your healthcare centers enable you to better serve communities?

Our community centers allow us to get healthcare services to the areas where our patients live. For us, that is usually in underserviced communities. Our goal is to make sure that healthcare is available where they live so that they can actually access it and don’t wait to the point where they are sick and need to go into the hospital. Getting healthcare into the community and deemphasizing medical center campuses is cost effective and people are more likely to access healthcare earlier, so therefore, better manage chronic health conditions.

What makes Atlanta’s healthcare market unique?

Atlanta is one of the primary healthcare markets in the U.S. due to the presence of Emory University School of Medicine and the 100-year relationship Grady has with it. A lot of the medical education in the southeast happens in Atlanta – 25 percent of the doctors that practice in Georgia were trained here at Grady. A lot of the advances in higher-level care have occurred either through Emory or Grady and there is also a robust network of community hospitals and health systems here that provide exceptional healthcare.

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What investment projects are you currently working on, and what have been Grady’s biggest successes?

The Marcus Stroke and Neuroscience Center came online in 2010 and has become one of the leading stroke centers in the country. It is the largest in Georgia and a leading research facility. The Marcus Trauma Center has given us the capacity to manage larger numbers of trauma patients. Additional investments have been made in cardiology that allow Grady to be a 24-7 cardiac center and allow a 24-7 catheterization lab available to respond to ST-Elevation Myocardial Infarction, a serious type of heart attack. We have undergone a significant expansion of our emergency department.

We have created the state’s first psychiatric ER as we see a significant number of psychiatric patients.

Currently, we are looking at expanding women’s and children’s services. Down the road, we are looking at the creation of an advanced surgery center, which is not only an ambulatory surgery center, but also a research center, for short stay and ambulatory surgeries.

HEALTHCARE OVERVIEW

( ) 2015. The merger should be complete by 2018 and will create a system with 1,479 beds and 3,500 physicians.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention One of the world’s most recognized names in healthcare, the CDC is headquartered in Atlanta. The organization monitors global health with an emphasis on infectious disease and works proactively to prevent spread as well as having a number of emergency protocols to tackle the threat of epidemics and pandemics.

It also monitors foodborne pathogens, environmental health issues, occupational safety and health and injury prevention as well as having global educational programs that focus on hygiene, women’s health and nutrition. A government institution, it is one of the founding members of International Association of National Public Health Institutes.

The CDC maintains close relationships with local educational establishments, and plays a significant part in syllabus design for healthcare, medicine and bio programs.

This is in part in recognition of the CDC’s responsibility in the progression of medical sciences, and in part to ensure a steady flow of skilled workers.

In a May 2017 Washington Post article, senior CDC officials told reporters that almost 700 positions at the institution remained unfilled due to budgetary restrictions imposed by President Trump’s

administration in Washington. Government agencies were told to produce plans to shrink civilian workforces and a de facto hiring freeze was imposed by executive order. The supposed cost-saving measures impacted programs that support emergency readiness, infectious disease control and chronic disease prevention.

Other institutions Other respected health institutions in Atlanta include the Task Force for Global Health, an international, nonprofit organization that works in the developing world on issues such as tropical diseases, vaccines and education. In 2015, it began partnering with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation on the Child Health and Mortality Prevention Surveillance Program.

According to the Metro Atlanta Chamber, Georgia has more than 225 companies focused on health technologies, employing some 30,000 people, making it the largest HIT sector in the nation.

It’s a HIT The Health IT (HIT) sector in Atlanta is heating up.

With a mature healthcare sector featuring institutions with both national and global significance, along with one of the healthiest IT sectors outside of New York and California, it seems natural that HIT should be an exciting frontier. According to the Metro Atlanta Chamber, Georgia has more than 225 companies focused on health technologies, employing some 30,000 people, making it the largest HIT sector in the nation.

The Healthcare Informatics 100, a list of global healthcare technology companies, currently ranks five Atlanta area companies, including Ciox Health,

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A healthcare network, Emory employs more than 1,800 physicians across the state, which includes 70 different subspecialties.

a medical data company based in Alpharetta, Cotiviti and nThrive, two healthcare payment solutions providers, ShareCare, Brightree, an information platform and LexisNexis Risk Solutions, which offers services preventing fraud in health insurance.

Looking ahead Atlanta’s healthcare industry is robust and mature.

With leading healthcare hospitals, the CDC and the potential for an explosion of HIT, Atlanta’s reputation goes beyond state and even national borders. Local educational establishments such as Emory University and Georgia Tech run extensive, well-respected health and bioscience courses that ensure a pool of local, well-trained healthcare professionals. The area’s international reputation also means that hospitals and other institutions can attract the best and brightest. Business relationships in Atlanta are well developed, with partnerships and healthy competition playing in equal measure to spur development and innovation. To top this off, a growing economy and local culture of philanthropy provide financial ballast for the sector.

However, a positive local ecosystem does not shelter Atlanta from other pressurizing factors.

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most skilled analysts are having difficulty predicting what will happen, and few companies want to make long-term commitments. They are so risk-averse that the insurance exchange in Atlanta has nearly been stripped clean. With rates of uninsurance already high in Atlanta, further premium increases could spell disaster.

The consolidation of hospital systems in the Metro Area has been seen, at least by some, as an ongoing symptom of the financial concerns that healthcare providers are seeing throughout the city. Even the respected CDC is experiencing shortfalls of cash as after President Trump’s gave an executive order in May setting out a hire-freeze. Announced budget cuts mean a 17 percent drop in funding. John Auerbach, president and CEO of Trust for America’s Health, was quoted as saying the cuts “would be perilous for the health of the American people.” Natural disasters have occurred across the south, with flooding in Houston and Hurricane Irma. These will likely create conditions that often lead to increases in infectious disease and other situations that require a fully functioning CDC. That said, Atlanta is known for its economic resilience. Institutions take their local, national and global responsibilities seriously, and with the coming of age of many medical technologies, Atlanta has plenty of opportunities to star on the global healthcare stage.

Education: A more educated workforce facilitates a more prosperous region.

Highly ranked institutions of higher education in Atlanta are good news for the metropolitan area’s overall economy. Organizational and educational partnerships are advancing Atlanta as a research and technology innovation center allowing for not only economic growth, but also increased globalization.

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Smart cities: Metro Atlanta’s skilled workforce, the result of a developed university system, remains a key component in attracting companies and developing homegrown talent Metro Atlanta is well-known for its higher education institutions. Within its 57 distinct colleges and universities, there are approximately 1,800 different programs of study. More than 250,000 students enroll in these programs each year, making Metro Atlanta seventh in the nation in student enrollment compared to the largest metropolitan areas of the U.S. Metro Atlanta also ranks sixth in the nation for number of college graduates with a bachelor’s degree or higher.

High retention and graduation rates are good news for Atlanta’s overall economy, with the educated population resulting in a more diverse and better-skilled workforce. Higher education in Atlanta generates $108 billion for the State of Georgia, which accounts for 3.2 percent of the state’s annual gross domestic product.

The education sector employs 130,000 workers and yields $3 billion in state taxes.

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higher and only 10 percent of the population does not have a high school diploma. About 22 percent has at least some college education or an associate degree.

Despite Atlanta’s rank as the seventh best in the nation for student enrollment, low literacy has been a problem among Georgia residents. In the state, 17 percent or some 1 million adults, have low literacy skills according to the most recent U.S. Census Bureau estimates. The national average is estimated at 12 percent. Around 65 percent of the third-grade population of Georgia are not able to read proficiently.

Adults with low literacy in Georgia cost the state approximately $1.26 billion in social services and lost tax revenue annually.

World of learning More than 250,000 students attend colleges or universities in Metro Atlanta. The internationalist nature of the area is reflected in this student population. In 2015, 42 percent of the students at Georgia Institute of Technology Graduate Studies program were international students, with 10.7 of undergraduates originating from outside of the U.S. ( )

EDUCATION INTERVIEW

Learning systems How big data and commercial partnerships are improving education standards

Mark Becker President – Georgia State University How does education contribute to Atlanta’s economy?

The City of Atlanta and the State of Georgia are very fortunate to have a robust set of higher education institutions both public and private, small and large.

The presence of so many strong institutions in the city, such as Georgia Tech, Emory and Georgia State, with more than 85,000 students combined, creates a highly educated workforce. You have opportunities for businesses to partner constructively with higher education institutions and you see that in a variety of ways. There are partnerships between corporations and universities, as well as non-profit institutions.

In general, Atlanta is an ecosystem with a strong higher education presence that feeds a very dynamic and growing business presence. Atlanta is a city of business and continues to be in a strong period of economic growth. The higher education system is integral in terms of workforce and quality of life.

What are Georgia State’s strongest partnerships?

The strongest partnerships and synergies start with internships. As a university in the heart of a city that has so many Fortune 500 companies, as well as headquarters for worldwide non-profits such as the American Cancer Society and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the opportunities for student internships and employment after graduation are almost unparalleled.

How are you utilizing new concepts in big data to further develop the institution?

We built the data warehouse and started mining the data looking for places where students weren’t progressing. It became evident that student advising was an area where we were underperforming. We built a model to track whether students were making progress. Our program checks 800 variables every

night for every student. We are using technology to produce the most effective interactions. We are members of the University Innovation Alliance, which is an 11-institution partnership across the U.S. The alliance picks out one big project per year. The first was predictive analytics and an examination of technology and how to use it, and now every university is adopting a big data strategy similar to ours. Year two was to look at advising.

The alliance applied for a grant from the U.S. Department of Education and got $9.8 million. All 11 institutions are now conducting an experiment on the different advising models. We are at the table in national conferences with the U.S. government and big foundations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Big data was an early part of that. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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( ) Most of these come from China, India, South Korea and Brazil. Emory University houses 2,783 international students and 1,210 international scholars from over 100 countries, mainly from China, India and South Korea. Georgia State University (GSU) had 3,076 international student arriving for fall 2016, which made up 6 percent of the total enrollment.

In addition to international students, domestic students also contribute to the diverse environment of Metro Atlanta’s education establishments. The internal makeup of Atlanta’s schools is becoming increasingly ethnically diverse. In Georgia State for example, 37.4 percent of students are African-American, 8.4 percent are Hispanic, and 11 percent are Asian. At Georgia Tech, 5.6 percent are African-American, 5.6 percent are Hispanic, and 16.1 percent are Asian. Emory’s student body is 10.2 percent African-American, 6.3 percent Hispanic and 14.3 percent Asian.

Head masters There are a number of important figures in Atlanta and Georgia’s education industry. One of these figures is Georgia State Governor, Nathan Deal, who has consistently voiced his agenda’s emphasis on education.

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He has most recently committed to the HB 338 turnaround plan, which focuses on improving the state’s low-performing schools. The bill will be beneficial to students by not limiting them to schools by ZIP code and giving them more opportunities with regards to testing standards and funding of charter schools.

Meria Carstarphen plays another key role in the education sector of Atlanta as the superintendent of Atlanta Public Schools. She is dedicated to improving the Atlanta Public Schools and giving the system’s 50,000 students a better educational experience. In doing so, she has shut down some institutes and has hired charter school groups to run others.

Her plan to fix the school system cost $17 million in the first half of 2017 to improve 21 of the district’s lowest-performing schools. The school board has also shut down eight pre-existing schools and opened three new ones under her leadership, saving $8.5 million. This charter school growth is projected to increase in the coming years and promote surrounding community redevelopment that could attract more than $100 million by 2019.

Mayor Kasim Reed partnered with Invest Atlanta, the official economic development authority for the City of

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Atlanta, in order to enable the unfolding of plans such as Coda, a $375-million research, information technology and data center in Tech Square for Georgia Tech students to work on innovation with the business world, and the redevelopment of GSU’s Turner Field.

Reed has also shown commitment to the area’s youth through the Centers of Hope initiative. Under his leadership, 33 recreation centers around Atlanta were reopened with 16 of these becoming Centers of Hope that provide educational and recreational programs for young people ages 5-18. Also, as of February 2017, Reed’s wife, Sarah Elizabeth Langford Reed, sits on the Board of Regents, which oversees Georgia’s higher education system.

Since becoming president of GSU in 2009, Mark Becker has triggered substantial growth for the institution. He initiated a 10-year plan in order to improve the university. Since then, Becker was named one of the U.S.’ top-10 innovative university presidents.

Specifically, Becker has pushed to expand the campus, especially its international reach. Additionally, Becker has increased graduation rates by 22 percentage points.

These improved graduation rates are a result of big data tracking, a method that according to the school, closely monitors the progress of the students.

The president of Georgia Tech, G.P ‘Bud’ Peterson, has played a key role in the university’s success.

He oversees research expenditures of more than $730 million. Under his leadership, the university has partnered with many organizations such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. Enrollment in the university had increased by 7.2 percent in 2016.

Claire Sterk, President of Emory University, has led Emory to become a recognized name in academia and the healthcare sector. In 2016, Emory-trained physicians made up 25 percent of the total physician workforce in the State of Georgia.

Workforce building Educational establishments are greatly assisting the development of the workforce in Atlanta. A number of companies have attributed Atlanta’s excellent educational platform as their main reason to be headquartered in the area. “Atlanta is one of the best cities in the country for technology and entrepreneurship. It has become a center for highquality education with many great universities creating a great workforce. Atlanta is richer in diversity than many people expect and this is reflected in the education sphere,” Dean Collins, president of Point University, told Focus: Atlanta.

Samuel Olens President, Kennesaw State University

What makes Atlanta’s education sector so successful in comparison to other places in the U.S? Atlanta has many outstanding institutions of higher learning. Georgia State, Georgia Tech, Emory, Spelman, Morehouse, the University of Georgia and of course Kennesaw State provide a great mix of quality options.

In addition to the variety of four-year institutions, the metro area also offers outstanding technical and community colleges, which are great assets. While each individual institution is very good, the combination creates great value for the city and region.

Few cities have been as successful in promoting the opportunities that its institutions of higher education can provide to Fortune 500 companies, startups and other small businesses. Companies benefit from a highly-skilled, educated and nimble workforce to cutting-edge research and innovation – all as a result of Atlanta’s universities and colleges.

What is the role of Kennesaw State University within Atlanta’s education sector and economy?

Kennesaw State fills a unique and important niche within Metro Atlanta’s higher education sector, primarily because of its relative “youth’ compared to most of the region’s public and private institutions.

The university’s rapid growth over the past 30 years has fostered an entrepreneurial mindset that has led to the development of academic programs reflecting the needs of critical industries, as well as those of our students.

Allowing innovation to guide curriculum design and leveraging partnerships to benefit the institution, its students, as well as the regional economy, have helped make Kennesaw State an attractive college option.

The university, which contributed more than $1.4 billion to the region’s economy in 2016, continues to add undergraduate and graduate degrees that meet market demands – programs in cybersecurity, digital animation and other emerging fields such as analytics and data science. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Richard Phillips Dean, J. Mack Robinson College of Business

The Robinson College of Business at Georgia State University is the sixth-largest business school in the country, and our community of students, educators, and professionals specialize in discovering insights that help businesses drive smarter decisions.

At Robinson, we seek to be closer to business than anyone. One way we make this happen is by housing a faculty with specialty interests relevant to business in addition to those with expertise in mainstream disciplines such as finance, accounting, management and marketing. We have infused analytics, experiential learning, innovation and business communications into all our programs, preparing students for the global business environment and offering experiences that bridge the gap between business education and the business world.

The current era, characterized by disruptive technologies being deployed globally across all industries, creates a wonderful opportunity for Robinson to be a resource for business. The Department of Computer Information Systems employs faculty with research expertise in managing information technology, and it produces graduates in high demand by business.

To be a resource for business in this environment, we must emphasize the development of new analytical methods and tools while continuing to excel at fundamental business research. For this reason, in fall 2015, we launched a new academic unit, the Institute for Insight, which is hiring nonbusiness PhDs, trained in the latest technologies.

The institute will have more than 10 faculty members where the majority are junior faculty who have non-business PhDs, including those from biostatistics, computer science and machine learning and several engineering disciplines.

Today, we are working side-by-side with those who have expertise in business domains conducting research, developing curriculum, teaching students and working with strategic partners.

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Within Metro Atlanta’s 57 distinct colleges and universities, there are approximately 1,800 different programs of study.

Companies such as NCR and the Georgia Film Academy are partnering with local educational institutions to have access to a well-educated pool of workers. NCR decided to locate its $300-million headquarters next to Georgia Tech in order to attract talent and create a presence Midtown Atlanta.

The Georgia Film Academy recently partnered with Georgia State in May 2017 to train students in production and give them future career opportunities.

First Data is also partnering with colleges and universities to create a curriculum to prepare students for the financial technology industry.

The Metro Atlanta Chamber (MAC) plays a part in the development of the workforce as well by working within the education sector of Atlanta and partnering with heads of the industry. The MAC Educated Workforce Council partners with Atlanta Public Schools through the Atlanta Partnership for Education program. The program has been running for 30 years and brings Atlanta-based companies into the school system to create opportunities for students.

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increasing amount of companies moving into the metro area.

With the education sector’s close connections to the corporate world, students can take advantage of the large professional network in Greater Atlanta and land internships with Fortune 500 companies. In 2017, more than 70 of the Georgia Tech student-athletes were confirmed to be participating in internships with large companies for the summer.

Educational players As a concentrated hub of research institutions, many innovations and economic developments are emerging from the education sector of the Atlanta region.

Internships are playing a larger role in preparing students for the workforce. Atlanta was ranked the seventh best U.S. city for summer jobs by website WalletHub in 2017.

It was also ranked number one, tied with Miami, Florida, for the highest availability of internships due to the

Georgia Institute of Technology Georgia Tech is the 34th-best school in the U.S., according to U.S. News and World Report higher education rankings, and has the fourth-best undergraduate engineering program. Under the program, the university’s industrial engineering and biomedical engineering specializations are some of the most respected in the country. Georgia Tech has a well respected educational and research environment in Metro Atlanta and is one of the largest industrial and engineering research agencies in the south.

In 2016, Georgia Tech conducted $791 million in research, issued 72 patents and had 657 industry research contracts. It plays an important role in the Atlanta’s Smart City Initiative, as part of a collaborative effort to ease traffic in the city, using street-level sensor nodes and analytics to gather and process real-time data. Apart from their smart city research, the university covers 11 major research programs: bioengineering and bioscience, data engineering and science, electronics and nanotechnology, energy and

Thomas Hynes President – Clayton State University

Atlanta’s $9.5-billion film industry, coupled with the rapid development in sports and entertainment, is creating a robust job market. To meet this market, our master of business administration program in sports and entertainment and our film offerings fulfill employer needs. Clayton State University is the only public institution offering a bachelor’s degree in film production in the state that includes Georgia Film Academy Certification, in addition to our associate and certificate programs.

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sustainability, manufacturing trade and logistics, materials, national security, people and technology, public service and policy, renewable bioproducts and robotics and systems.

Georgia Tech is an important driver of economic development Downtown. The $180-million, 1.1-millionsquare-foot Technology Square complex was started as an initiative by Georgia Tech in the late 1990s, and since then has spurred development by adding office, retail, medical and residential space. The area has attracted a number of companies and serves as a hub for firms based around technology and innovation.

As the anchor tenant of the anticipated 770,000-square-foot Coda building within Tech Square, Georgia Tech will take up half of the total space. It will utilize the facility as the backbone for university research. The $400-million Coda project will rent 338,771 square feet of office and retail space to corporations and Georgia Tech research partners that will mainly focus on big data technologies and information gathering. The Coda project is under construction and is expected to be completed in 2019.

Georgia Tech partners with a number of different institutions locally, nationally and internationally such as The Pediatric Research Alliance, Emory Healthcare, with which it spends $1.35 million on research annually, and VentureLab, which is a startup incubator that commercializes and works on patents for innovations and discoveries.

Emory University Emory University is well-known for both its academic programs and its medical institutions. As the 20th-best school in the country, Emory encompasses the Emory

A concentrated hub of research institutions, many innovations and economic developments are emerging from the education sector.

University School of Medicine and the Goizueta School of Business, which are ranked 23rd- and 19th-best in the country, respectively. Its main campus is 630 acres campus and in 2016 had 6,867 undergraduates enrolled.

Emory University currently has various expansion projects underway. In February 2017, it completed

William Underwood President – Mercer University

There is a rich, diverse higher education infrastructure in Atlanta, with everything from public and elite state research universities to cutting-edge private research institutions. Mercer is regularly in communication with business leaders around the state on issues surrounding workforce requirements. It is critical that the university is meeting the needs of industry. For example, there can be issues surrounding healthcare in rural areas of our state, and we have responded to this by starting a medical school that focused on providing primary care doctors for rural and medically underserved areas of our state.

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the new Emory University Hospital pedestrian bridge. A new employee tower was also built in May 2017. Currently, a 450,000-square-foot, $400-million hospital tower development is underway and is expected to be completed by fall 2017. This expansion will add 128 new beds to the medical facility. Finally, a Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority rail expansion is in the works for the Clifton Corridor. The project is still pending for funding and approval, and would be constructed in the next six to ten years if approved.

As both an educational and medical system, Emory University has various partnerships in Atlanta and Georgia. Its Center for Science education works with the Atlanta Public School, Dekalb County Schools, Fulton County Schools among others to advance the teaching of science, technology, engineering and mathematics curricula in high schools. It also works closely with the CDC on research initiatives.

Georgia State University Just over 25,000 undergraduates were attending GSU in 2016, creating a major impact on Metro Atlanta and its education sector. The total student body of 32,080

is one of the larger in the country. GSU has over 200 majors and minors to choose from.

GSU is best known for the J. Mack Robinson College of Business. The college fosters various partnerships between science and business faculties to encourage innovation. The college has 70,000 alumni, some 45,000 of which are in Metro Atlanta. More Georgia executives hold advanced degrees from Robinson and GSU than from any other school in the nation.

GSU is growing as a university, physically and academically. Physically, the university is undergoing redevelopment efforts, specifically the Turner Field project. The $53-million redevelopment converted Turner Field into the new football stadium for the Georgia State Panthers. The new stadium opened August 18, 2017.

Academically, GSU has a program that ranks at number 108 in highest research activity among the nation’s top private and public universities. In 2016, the university was awarded $121.8 million for research, making it the second year in a row that department university received more than $100 million. Federal sponsorship grew by 21 percent in 2016 and accounts for 70 percent of the institution’s research funding.

This has allowed more research opportunities at GSU, www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Harold Martin Interim President, Morehouse College

Atlanta is home to three of the country’s top historically black colleges and universities. When you combine that with the city’s large major research institutions, particularly focused on science, technology, engineering and mathematics, we have a mix of educational institutions that enable Atlanta to be a powerhouse in the educational realm.

There is a substantial network of community colleges in Atlanta. As more students are looking at different pathways to graduation, these options create a lot of flexibility. The synergy between different educational institutions is important and something that we as a city should think about leveraging in a more integrated way.

Also important are partnerships with the private sector. Many of Morehouse’s corporate partners invest in scholarships. Our partners also engage in our academic programs, either through direct investment, or in the programming of co-curricular activities.

We are getting to a point where it is harder for large companies to recruit young people. The idea of being an entrepreneur, social or private, is alluring to young people. There’s a lot more excitement around what smaller institutions are doing and what it means to start an institution whether it’s a business or nonprofit. As that evolves, it’s harder for large companies to recruit.

As an institution, it is important to recognize the barriers some experience when it comes to costs.

The institution is also aggressively growing its endowment. We have $130-million endowment at the moment, but I believe it should be more than $500 million.

Having stability in leadership is important for institutions like Morehouse, both at the board and the administrative level. Throughout our university, our faculty and our staff work together. We also get good engagement from our alumni. Atlanta is going through an exciting time at the moment. It is great to see the developments going on, as well as those on the horizon. I feel optimistic for both the area and the institution.

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and for the institution to continue playing a role in advancing the educational climate and healthcare services of Atlanta. In April 2017, GSU announced a partnership with Atlanta-based insurance company State Farm on the Learning, Income and Family Transformation (LIFT) program. State Farm pledged $1.5 million to support the program, which is designed to help disadvantaged students attain educational success, as well as $5.5 million going to nonprofits and local schools to for additional support.

Atlanta University Center Consortium The Atlanta University Center Consortium includes Clark Atlanta University, Morehouse College, Morehouse School of Medicine and Spelman College.

Clark Atlanta University has a total undergraduate enrollment of 2,741 and offers almost 40 areas of study. Morehouse College is ranked 159th in the nation and has a total undergraduate enrollment of 2,167. The Morehouse School of Medicine has just over 400 students enrolled as of 2015.

Spelman College is ranked 72 in National Liberal Arts Colleges and has a total undergraduate enrollment of 2,144. It is an all-female college, and was the first black college campus to create a women’s studies curriculum. Together as an association of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), Atlanta University Consortiums is the largest consortium of African-Americans in higher education.

As a nonprofit organization, the consortium focuses on providing high-quality education to AfricanAmerican students. Specifically, the group focuses on maintaining economic and financial support and stability for families. They are sponsored by organizations such as Boeing, General Motors, General Electric and Xerox and partner with organizations such as the Atlanta Housing Authority, Westside Education Collaborative and Atlanta University Center Neighborhood Association in order to educate their members. The consortium provides community outreach through five main programs: Community Leadership Development, Common Cents, HomeBuying 101, Know Your Rights and Small Business Development ARC. Other institutions Apart from the four major educational institutions of Metro Atlanta, other significant institutions include Kennesaw State University, Morris Brown College and Mercer University. Kennesaw State is Georgia’s third-largest university and is comprised of 30,480 undergraduate students. It offers 150 degree options

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and has a growing doctoral program. Morris Brown College is a HBCU that offers liberal arts courses and has a strong tie to the history of civil rights in Atlanta.

It is currently working with local institutions to secure support and become reaccredited.

“Three decades ago, Morris Brown produced one of the highest percentage of teachers in the local area, as well as in the State of Georgia. The teachers were some of our best recruiters. We are redeveloping a strong teacher education program, in particular for the area of science and technology,” Stanley Pritchett, President of Morris Brown College, told Focus: Atlanta.

Mercer University is ranked 135th out of the nation’s best colleges. It has 4,667 undergraduate students and is currently undergoing a complete transformation project within its Macon campus. Their new baseball stadium, the 1,500-seat OrthoGeorgia Park at Claude Smith Field, was completed in summer 2017. The new Spearman C. Godsey Science Center is under construction and will accommodate the growing enrollment in the school and the recently increased activity in research in chemistry, biology and neurosciences by adding 32 research labs, 28 teaching labs, and additional classrooms and offices. The project is anticipated to cost $44 million and be completed in December 2017.

Clayton State University ranked number eight among Top Public Schools and Regional Colleges in 2014 and has more than 7,000 students enrolled. It currently partners with Pinewood Atlanta Studios to offer a film-production course.

“In Atlanta, film has also grown to be an industry worth more than $7 billion. Our certificate program emerged nearly three years ago and has developed into a varied curriculum in conjunction with the Georgia Film Academy,” Thomas Hines, President of Clayton State University, told Focus: Atlanta.

Across the ages At the K-12 level, Atlanta has a total of 98 schools within the metro area. Of these 98 schools, two are single gender and 17 are charter schools. In Georgia, there are a total of 2,291 K-12 schools; 1,320 of these are elementary, 488 are middle schools, and 470 are high schools. Statewide enrollment for the 2016-2017 academic year was ethnically diverse. In Georgia, 268,279 of enrolled students were Hispanic, 3,437 were Indian, 70,132 were Asian, 646,327 were AfricanAmerican, 1,868 were Pacific, 705,686 were white and 61,814 were multiracial.

Although Georgia is spending $11.6 billion – or 51 percent – of the state’s budget on education, the state ranks number 38 in the nation for per-student funding.

Georgia has the fifth- most student poverty and spends $1,800 less per student compared to the U.S. national average. For the education budget, $8.9 billion of the $11.6 billion is going toward public K-12 education.

Since 2003, funding for the public school system has decreased annually, amounting to a $9-billion cut from the state’s education funding, which in 2017 is 2.3 percent lower than it was in 2002, adjusted for inflation.

Atlanta’s public education system is facing challenges.

Public high school graduation rate fell by 0.4 percent from 2015 to 2016, resulting in a 71.5 percent graduation rate. The graduation rate for public high school in Georgia was 79 percent in 2016. With this drop in education standards in the city, families are moving to the suburbs to improve educational chanced for their children. The city is working on better funding and better-run charter school systems.

The community feel To accommodate the growing number of students who failed to graduate from high-school, Atlanta

Lawrence Schall President – Oglethorpe University

The diversity of the educational institutions in Atlanta is important for the area. With economic pressures, it’s difficult to be a small liberal arts college. Big public institutions such as Georgia Tech and the University of Georgia are growing, while small liberal arts colleges are shrinking. However, our enrollment has gone up 40 percent over the past decade, and much of that can be attributed to the fact we are based in Atlanta.

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provides adult-based education. The Atlanta Adult Public School Education Program runs free classes held throughout Fulton County. The program works with more than 1,600 students per year and allows less advantaged adults to receive equal access to an education.

These educational programs provide life-long learning opportunities for those who want to go back to school and allows for adults of all ages to develop new skills and learn new things in order to advance their professional careers. It also allows for less advantaged adults to access education by providing free classes. By providing these classes, the Atlanta Adult Public School Education Program creates educational opportunities for less-advantaged citizens who would have otherwise not gone to school, such as single parents and low-income adults.

The Atlanta Public School Education Program works with groups such as Worksource Atlanta, Leadership Atlanta and Emory ECE in order to maximize the opportunities they provide to these adults. The partnership with Worksource Atlanta focuses on providing GED graduates with job opportunities by connecting business leaders with potential organizational candidates. It will facilitate the job hunting process for recent GED earners and allow them to develop professional careers.

The partnership with Leadership Atlanta focuses on providing community leadership programs. Through an extensive alumni network, they connect young

professionals with executives that help to prepare them to enter the professional workforce. Leadership Atlanta offers forums, dialogues and social gatherings to help develop professional skills. The program is sponsored by Delta and UPS, as well as Chick-fil-A, LeapFrog, Georgia Power, MailChimp and The Coca-Cola Company.

By working with the Atlanta Public School Education Program, Emory Continuing Education (ECE) provides educational programs to thousands of nontraditional students. ECE offers a variety of certificate programs and open enrollment courses for those wanting to broaden their skills base or learn about new subjects.

For 50 years, the Atlanta Technical College has served the area offering a range of associate degrees, diplomas and technical certificates and GED opportunities for students across all ages, races and socio-economic backgrounds. Part of the larger Technical College System of Georgia, the institution had 3,718 students enrolled in the 2016-17 academic year. The largest age group was 21-25 at 22.5 percent, the largest racial group was black at 90.5 percent and female students made up 67.7 percent of the total enrollment.

Atlanta offers opportunities for those who want to go back to school or develop new skills.

Research center Although both Georgia Tech and Emory ranked among the top 50 U.S. universities in development spending, a significant amount of research comes from outside of the university system, although often connected directly to major educational institutions.

Greg King Associate Vice President for Economic Development – Georgia Institute of Technology Atlanta has all of the ingredients to help companies grow.

One thing that is unique about Atlanta is how close the public sector, the private sector and higher education work together to support economic growth. Georgia Tech’s Technology Square is a great example of this. It’s a vibrant community with startup innovators and corporate innovators all learning from each other.

It’s a place where experienced entrepreneurs are mentoring new startups and a place where all of these companies can easily access Tech’s talent and technologies.

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Tech Square Labs is a 25,000-square foot facility that attracts technology companies and talented Georgia Tech students. The Tech Square Labs Fund received a $1-million investment from Invest Georgia, the longterm investment program, backed by the State of Georgia, totaling in a $25-million fund as of July 2017.

Tech Square Labs Fund has made 12 investments that total $4 million with the goal of creating a research and innovation hub of information security, marketing automation and business-to-consumer companies.

The Georgia Climate Project is an effort initiated by a university consortium – Emory University, University of Georgia and Georgia Tech – to improve the understanding of climate impact in Georgia and create potential solutions. The project seeks to create a solution agenda and has already began to create a research roadmap for their cause.

Georgia Tech recently launched Engage, a program targeting high-tech startups. The university has partnered with many companies, some of which are Fortune 500. These companies are AT&T, Chik-fil-A, Cox Enterprises, Delta Air Lines, Georgia-Pacific, Georgia Power Foundation, Intercontinental Exchange, Invesco, The Home Depot and UPS. Engage will allow executives from these companies to mentor fellow students at Georgia Tech and foster a healthy tech startup climate in the area. The program is supported through a venture fund and has received $15 million from the participating companies. Up to 48 startups are expected to join over the next three years.

In terms of innovation, many new technologies are taking over the way students are engaging in the classroom. High schools and universities are utilizing new technology to better student performance, with online math and language programs improving grades.

Gwinnett County Schools teachers are utilizing virtual classrooms and online learning tools to help students with coursework.

Remote schooling is also offered in Atlanta, but faces an uncertain future. Three of Georgia’s largest online charter schools – Georgia Connections Academy, Georgia Cyber Academy and Graduation Achievement Chart High School – face losing state funding because of poor student performance. This makes the future of approximately 18,300 students uncertain.

Despite these setbacks, internet-based summer schools and e-learning are becoming increasingly popular for students in Atlanta. Compared to traditional summer schools , which enroll around 900 students in Fulton County, online schools in the county enrolled some 2,400 students in summer 2015.

Educational establishments are greatly assisting the development of the workforce in Metro Atlanta.

Looking ahead Education will continue to play an important role for the economic future of greater Atlanta. Organizational partnerships facilitated by institutions of higher education are advancing Atlanta as a city and a region, especially with regards to technology and health. The enrichment brought about by research conducted by the various institutions of higher education in Atlanta allows for a more educated workforce and a more prosperous region.

With a growing population and a high poverty rate, Atlanta faces many obstacles in improving its K-12 platform. However, despite these challenges, the K-12 system of Atlanta is in the process of undergoing an internal transformation. The revitalization of old schools coupled with the opening of new ones under new management hopes to ensure a better future for the youth of Atlanta. In addition, the switch from public schools to charter schools is expected to improve the public school educational climate. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Tourism, Arts & Culture: Atlanta has plenty to boast about when it comes to cultural offerings, with important civil rights heritage attractions and a world-leading aquarium. The ongoing expansion of the Georgia World Congress Center is expected to bring an influx of visitors coming to the area for business. To accommodate this growth, the hotel industry is preparing various new projects.

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Southern hospitality: Atlanta’s historic significance and its many modern-day attractions have placed it among the top 10 most-visited U.S. cities

Tourism in Atlanta is on the rise. With the seventhmost-visited metropolitan area in the U.S., according to World Atlas, Atlanta attracted a record-breaking 52 million visitors in 2016, approximately 1.2 million of whom were from other countries, according to Tourism Economics and the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau. This boom in tourism has had a favorable economic impact on Greater Atlanta. In 2016, tourism generated $15 billion in visitor spending and accounted for more than 280,000 jobs. In the same year, a total of 1.7 million hotel room nights were booked for dates in future years. The City of Atlanta had a 73 percent hotel occupancy rate in 2016, a rise of 6 percentage points, compared to 2012’s rate of 66 percent.

This increase in visitors, most from the domestic market, was complemented by a boost in money spent.

In 2016, domestic visitor expenditures amounted to $14 billion, 37 percent of which went toward transportation, 22 percent toward lodging, 20 percent toward dining, 12 percent toward retail and 7 percent toward entertainment.

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Rooms for visitors According to CBRE Hotels, Atlanta is currently ranked seventh in the U.S., in terms of best-forecasted growth in revenue per available room for 2017 and 2018. Perroom revenue steadily increased between 2012 and 2016, from $55.38 to $72.39. Having reached 73 percent in 2016, hotel occupancy levels are projected to remain at an average of 70.1 percent in 2017, compared to the long-term average occupancy rate of 62.9 percent the City of Atlanta has had since 1995.

As of June 2017, Metro Atlanta has 96,000 hotel rooms. In order to accommodate the projected increase in visitors, 28 new hotels are under construction in the area, while an additional 35 hotels are in their final planning stages. This will add more than 2,000 new hotel rooms to the metro area by the end of 2017.

One planned hotel is the Hard Rock, with 200 rooms, which will be developed by Bolton Atlanta LP as part of Castleberry Park and will cost more than $70 million.

The Hard Rock is slated for completion in 2019. The Swiss company Acron and the Capella Hotel Group of Atlanta have partnered to create the 214-room Solis ( )

TOURISM, ARTS & CULTURE INTERVIEW

Center of attraction How Atlanta’s tourism hotspots are boosting the economy

William Pate President & CEO – Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau How healthy is Atlanta’s tourism industry?

Visitation numbers increased as we expected, and 2016 was the best year in the history of the city’s hospitality industry. The interesting thing about the hospitality industry is that it builds on itself. I came to Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau in 2008, during the peak of the recession. The first thing we did was generate some quick sales wins. Those were followed by a series of new attractions, which in turn spurred more sales activity.

The Georgia Aquarium and World of Coca-Cola were followed by the Center for Civil and Human Rights, the College Football Hall of Fame and the Chick-fil-A Fan Experience. Planners and developers are attracted by new growth. They like dynamic cities that have a lot of change, and Atlanta is one of those cities.

Atlanta is listed third in the U.S. for the number of exhibitions. How does it plan to maintain or improve this ranking?

The development in our city has a cadence. It began in 2014 with the opening of the Center for Civil and Human Rights, the College Football Hall of Fame and the Chick-fil-A Fan Experience. This year we open two new stadium projects: the Mercedes-Benz Stadium and SunTrust Park. By 2020, new renovations to our convention campus will be completed in three phases.

A renovated Centennial Olympic Park will enhance its multiuse event capability and make it more pedestrian-friendly. A brand-new space at Baker Street and Park Place will feature a restaurant and further expand the array of events the park can host.

Secondly, we will add a connector between buildings B and C at the Georgia World Congress Center, which will provide 1 million square feet of continuous space.

Groups that require this space will now have the opportunity to hold their conventions in Atlanta.

What does the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau do to attract international visitors?

Nearly 1.2 million international travelers choose Atlanta each year. We are home to the world’s busiest airport, making it easy for them to get here. Our sales team also attends numerous trade missions, to attract visitors from around the world. We are at all the international shows and travel markets.

The biggest incremental opportunity for the city is to boost visitation from China. Today, only about 3 percent of Chinese tourists come to the U.S. and that number is going to grow substantially. By 2021, there will be more Chinese tourists coming to the U.S. than tourists from Germany, Australia and France combined. If we can capture a piece of that growth, it will be very powerful for Atlanta. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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( ) Hotel, situated next to the Porsche Experience Center on Porsche Drive in the Aerotropolis Atlanta mixed-use development. The hotel features a rooftop bar overlooking the Porsche track, and it will be open in November 2017.

Other luxury hotels are also being constructed by the airport, as a way to encourage day trips for international travelers and thus increase international tourism in Metro Atlanta. A key example is the $250-million InterContinental Hotel at the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL). The 11-story, 440-room hotel will be developed by Majestic Realty and Carter, with construction expected to begin in 2018. A second phase of the project will add two self-service hotels on 13 acres and an extra $100 million to project costs.

average stay is seven days or less, it is then considered a business and income should be taxed. There are no plans to follow other areas in the U.S., such as Broward County in Florida, which have applied a special “Airbnb tax” to properties.

Flights of fancy One of the key drivers of tourism in Atlanta is the airport. In 2016, ATL had a total of some 104 million passengers, a 16 percent increase from the 81 million passengers in 2013. From 2014 to 2015, the number of arrivals from the Middle East increased by 46.2 percent, arrivals from the Americas by 11.7 percent, those from Africa by 7.3 percent and those from Europe by 6.9 percent, while the number of arrivals from the East Asia/ Pacific region decreased by 9.5 percent. The higher number of passengers from the Middle East is mainly down to the increasing availability of flights — a result of Qatar Airways beginning to operate at the airport.

In terms of domestic travel, Atlanta’s top three destination airports are Orlando, FL, Fort Lauderdale, FL and New York, NY, with 1,394,000, 1,174,000 and 1,174,000 travelers, respectively. The busiest airport in the world, and one of the largest, ATL has millions of international and domestic passengers passing through, in addition to those whose final destination is Atlanta. These transfer visitors offer opportunities, in terms of economic impact. Hoping to tap into the ( )

The vacation rental industry is also experiencing a boom with one of its main players: Airbnb.

Modern hospitality The vacation rental industry is also experiencing a boom with one of its main players: Airbnb.

The online hospitality service has been extremely successful in Atlanta, with a survey by the website Rented.com declaring Atlanta to be among the top three most profitable places for Airbnb rentals.

As of 2016, the most desired Airbnb property in the world was a treehouse hidden in the heart of Buckhead.

In spite of the service’s popularity in Atlanta, the current state of Airbnb’s taxation is complicated. As of November 2017, if a home is rented for fewer than 15 days per year, the income is tax-free. However, if it is rented for more than 15 days per year and renters’

Bradley Koeneman General Manager – Hilton Atlanta

Atlanta has great educational anchors. Between Morehouse, Emory, Georgia State and Georgia Tech, the number of universities that we have and the work that all those universities do creates a true incubator. There is also great community involvement, such as Bernie Marcus building the aquarium, or Arthur Blank investing more than $1 billion in a new stadium. Atlanta is currently addressing the need for larger expo space. The Georgia World Congress Center is the third-largest convention center in the U.S. We need to, and soon will, provide 1.2 million square feet under one roof.

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TOURISM, ARTS & CULTURE INTERVIEW

Water world How the Georgia Aquarium is having a great impact on the city and its communities

Joseph Handy President & Chief Operating Officer – Georgia Aquarium What is the Georgia Aquarium’s impact on a local scale, and how does it work with the government and communities?

The Georgia Aquarium has had a major economic impact on Downtown Atlanta, bringing in billions of dollars of new development. We are the number one tourist attraction in Atlanta, both for local residents and for out-of-town visitors.

Prior to the aquarium being opened, this area wasn’t viewed as a great place for attractions. It was one of the first initiatives that turned this neighborhood into an entertainment district. When we first built the aquarium we had great support from the city, because it wanted to generate tourism and an economy in an area that wasn’t flourishing like it is now. Since its opening, the aquarium has generated about $1.9 billion for Georgia’s GDP. The City of Atlanta has a good partnership with the aquarium. It has helped us expand by assisting with additional land space and often with road access to the facility. In turn, we have participated in a number of promotional ventures focusing on economic development. The aquarium also has a large ballroom that can accommodate 1,200 people, so we host city and state banquets, as well as nonprofit banquets for the local community.

What is the aquarium’s potential for growth?

We want what is best for the area and the community, so we continuously listen to what people want from the aquarium. We have built a dolphin habitat and have just renovated our sea lion gallery, in partnership with SunTrust. So far we have been looking at smaller projects and smaller renovations, to get income and reinvest it back into the building. In this way, we have continued to stimulate interest and increase visitor numbers.

We are not just a tourist attraction. The money that we generate through admissions goes into research. We have participated in, sponsored or funded more than 120 different research projects. For example, we have treated cancer in dolphins, and that research directly relates to cancer research for humans. We are also looking at how to remove waste from water areas. It is important for people to know that when they visit, they are also helping these programs.

I’m optimistic about Atlanta’s future, but traffic and infrastructure can be problematic. Atlanta has unlimited potential, but it depends on how the government handles an increased amount of people.

The will of the Atlanta community has been so supportive of growth and the city is sure to be able to address any of the issues future growth may present. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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( ) cash potential of these transient visitors, day trips are being encouraged. In addition, the wide array of retail and dining amenities at the airport are being improved in order to boost sales. Many attractions surround ATL, making it easy for visitors on layovers to enjoy Atlanta for at least a few hours, with places such as the Porsche Experience Center and the Delta Flight Museum just minutes away from the airport.

An initiative under the Georgia Department of Economic Development, Explore Georgia plays a substantial role in fostering Atlanta’s tourism industry.

It serves as the official website where potential visitors can learn about the state and what there is to do in its various regions. The site offers free travel guides, newsletters, interactive maps and flexible schedules, which help visitors to plan trips and access information about the hottest attractions. The Atlanta-specific section of Explore Georgia focuses on promoting the retail, dining and entertainment offerings of the area.

Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau (ACVB) is the marketing organization for the city’s tourism and conventions. It partners with a number of organizations across the City of Atlanta and is financed by a combination of public and private funds. In 2016 it ran or participated in 12 trade shows and 11 international sales missions, as well as promoted conventions in Atlanta at 15 major customer events. In September 2017, ACVB hosted the 11th Annual U.S.China Tourism Leadership Summit, in conjunction with Brand USA. The summit attracts multitudes of international leaders in tourism, bringing together 250 high-ranking industry and government representatives. At the summit in September, particular emphasis was placed on strengthening ties between Atlanta and China.

ACVB has won the Meeting & Conventions Gold Service Award for 24 years running.

Atlanta’s hospitality community will welcome $3 billion in new development by the end of the decade.

Georgia World Congress Center is the fourth-largest of its kind in the U.S. It has millions of visitors each year and 1.4 million square feet of exhibition space. It has been home to popular annual events, such as the International Production and Processing Expo.

In order to improve efficiency, the center is scheduled to undergo a $55-million project to connect two major halls and an additional $25-million project to make the center energy-efficient. The expansion will increase the exhibition space by approximately 100,000 square feet, attracting even larger conventions in years to come. Since this will result in more visitors to the center, Georgia World Congress Authority plans to construct a new hotel on its campus, which will also help to accommodate an increased number of events.

The Georgia International Convention Center also houses many of Atlanta’s major conventions and events. Less than 1 mile away from ATL, the center is perfectly located for attendees coming from outside of the state.

The ACVB has won the Meeting & Conventions Gold Service Award for 24 years running.

Meetings place Atlanta hosts approximately 700 conventions, meetings and events, both professional and recreational, per year. In 2016 it hosted 18 major citywide conventions, including the International Production & Processing Expo and the International Woodworking Machinery & Supply Fair. ACVB hopes to increase these numbers, and has set a goal to visit 55 industry and trade shows in 2017, in an effort to attract new events to the city. Metro

Global trotting One of Atlanta’s main tourism challenges is promoting the city to international visitors.

Atlanta has made various attempts to increase interest, and officials are primarily targeting visitors from the U.K. and from prominent developing countries, such as China and those in Latin America.

In an effort to boost Latin American traveler numbers, the airport has recently added more signs in Spanish and increased its multilingual staff. Retail centers in Atlanta have also boosted their multilingual staff numbers, and have upgraded their websites. City officials hope that by placing more emphasis on retail they will lure more Latin American tourists to the area.

In 2014 China became Atlanta’s second-largest international market, in terms of visitors. With the goal of making China the largest by 2024, the U.S.China Tourism Leadership Summit plans to boost existing numbers. Studies have shown that Chinese tourists spend on average $7,500’ per trip, making them number one for tourism spending.

Displays of pride LGBTQA-specific tourism is gaining momentum in Atlanta. Key events such as Black Pride Weekend www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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attract visitors from all over the U.S. and amplify the voices of African-American LGBTQA communities in the area. This event is one of the three largest black gay pride festivals in the country. Taking place every year in the first week of September, the event attracts approximately 10,000 people.

Southern Fried Queer Pride, or SFQP, advocates for Atlanta’s LGBTQA communities. The organization is dedicated to creating safe spaces in Atlanta, with its event center, resource center, dining space and art gallery.

SFQP also promotes art and acceptance throughout the city. Atlanta is known for its transparent LGBTQA community, and is trying to capitalize on this with visitor numbers.

Civil rights significance Because of Atlanta’s rich history in the civil rights movement, it has served as a hub for the growing related tourism industry. Many of the city’s attractions pay tribute to the cultural and political history of Georgia, and attempt to further its legacy.

Sites such as the International Civil Rights Walk of Fame, the Martin Luther King, Jr. Birth Home, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference headquarters, the King Center for Nonviolent Social Change, the Ebenezer Baptist Church and the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site all contribute to this cause.

Paschal’s Restaurant serves Southern cooking while customers can enjoy sitting in the midst of history, at a site where prominent black and white figures met to eat and discuss integration. At the APEX Museum, visitors learn about the civil rights movement and black history. Not only do these attractions increase

Little Five Points is Atlanta’s Downtown location for everything trendy, including music, art, food and clothing that are unique to the Atlanta area.

Frank Poe Executive Director – Georgia World Congress Center Authority

We are just finishing a $25-million project to make the convention center energy-efficient. A lot of our central plant systems have been modified to reduce our energy consumption.

We are also updating our flooring systems throughout the complex.

That represents an investment of $6 million. In addition, we have support from the governor’s office to receive $55 million for a project to connect our two major halls, giving us the capability to have more than 1 million square feet in one building. Our last project in the pipeline is to develop our campus and connect it to our building and a new hotel.

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social awareness, they also have an immense economic impact on the tourism industry of Atlanta. The King Center for Nonviolent Social Change attracts approximately 1 million visitors each year and generates annual revenues of approximately $5.5 million.

Opened in 2014, the Center for Civil and Human Rights cost an estimated $80 million and attracted 200,000 visitors in 2015. It is projected to generate $1.3 billion in economic impact over the course of its first 10 years.

While the center promotes economic development by attracting visitors, it also works in the surrounding area through community outreach programs, and is in partnership with the local police sensitivity training program. A growing industry, civil rights tourism is likely to continue to make a positive impact on Atlanta in the years to come.

City in the forest The City of Atlanta Department of Parks and Recreation has one main focus: community-building.

This primarily includes the promotion of youth development, economic growth and cultural diversity within Metro Atlanta.

Mayor Kasim Reed has worked hand-in-hand with the department, in an effort to provide safe spaces for the youth of the city. As part of the 2013-2017 strategic plan, the department was able to reopen 33 recreation centers across the Atlanta area. All recreation centers are, on average, no more than 2.5 miles away from 90 percent of Atlanta’s youth population, making them easily accessible. With the aid of more than $5 million in corporate investment, 10 of these recreation centers were reinvented as Centers of Hope.

Under the 2013-2017 plan, the Centers of Hope project, was aimed at improving existing recreation centers by adding upgraded facilities, highly trained staff and in-depth programming. The 10 centers provide educational and developmental programs to more than 1,000 children per week, and four of these centers partner with the Boys and Girls Club of Metro Atlanta, in an effort to further expand the range of programs offered.

The addition of parks and amenities, overseen by the Department of Parks and Recreation, will continue to bring revenue to the city. Just recently, the $45-million Rodney Cook, Sr. Park was opened near the Mercedes-Benz Stadium, as a way of attracting more visitors to the area.

Meanwhile, plans are underway for Westside Park, which will be Atlanta’s largest. Built on the site of a former granite quarry, it will take approximately $38 million to develop the area over the next 15 years. Nevertheless, parks revitalize worn-down neighborhoods, attract visitors and promote economic development.

Piedmont Park is situated at the heart of the City of Atlanta, and its conservancy organization is dedicated to both preservation and development, raising some $3 million per year for related events, education and upkeep.

Stadium rocks The Mercedes-Benz Stadium is a state-of-the-art arena that serves not only as a place for sports, but also an entertainment and convention venue. As the home of the Atlanta Falcons football team and the Atlanta United soccer team, this $1.5-billion project is expected to have an immense economic impact and attract many more visitors to the city. The project was www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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World of Coca-Cola is a leading attraction in Downtown Atlanta, where visitors can try over 100 varieties of coke.

completed in August 2017, and the first nonsporting event will be a concert by country-music legend Garth Brooks in October.

Cultural center As a cultural melting pot, Atlanta has some unique offerings. Home to museums, halls of fame and performing arts centers, a good mixture of attractions adds to the charm of the city, as well as the Downtown and Midtown economies.

Georgia Aquarium Housing approximately 700 species and over 100,000 animals within 10 million gallons of water, the Georgia Aquarium is the largest aquarium in the Western Hemisphere and the biggest tourist destination in Atlanta. In 2016, the aquarium had 2.5 million admissions. Impressively, the economic impact on the state totaled $1.9 billion between the aquarium’s grand opening in 2005 and 2015.

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encourages its patrons to visit nearby attractions such as the World of Coca-Cola and the College Football Hall of Fame and Chick-fil-A Fan Experience. The aquarium’s banquet center holds 1,200 people and has served as a venue for many prominent events.

The aquarium works with the city to promote community service by employing 400-1,000 volunteers. It carries out a number of important research projects, such as studies of cancer in dolphins, which have important implications for human biology.

Centennial Olympic Park Built for the Summer Olympics in 1996, Centennial Olympic Park has a legacy in Atlanta and continues to be one of the most popular tourist destinations in the city. The park hosts several events every year, such as the Shaky Knees Music Festival and the Independence Day fireworks display. Its construction in 1996 and expansion in 1998 cost Atlanta $28 million and $15 million, respectively. The Centennial Olympic Park

TOURISM, ARTS & CULTURE OVERVIEW

projected annual economic impact of $12.7 million for Georgia and $1.7 million in sales tax to the City of Atlanta. The hall works closely with the surrounding community by providing a platform for character development initiatives and community education throughout the city. It partners with the National Football Foundation and Football Matters, to promote sportsmanship and leadership among Atlanta’s youth.

CNN Center As the headquarters of the leading international news and media organization, the CNN Center attracts approximately 300,000 visitors a year and offers exclusive studio tours.

Atlanta History Center Opened in 1990, the Atlanta History Center provides interesting exhibitions on American life between the 1860s and 1920s. The museum promotes the importance of history to Atlanta’s youth, with programs held throughout the year, including lectures and festivals such as Sheep to Shawl. The educational programs offered include Characters in the Classroom and Traveling Trunks, which is designed to assist teachers in covering various eras and incidents in American history.

has attracted more than $2.4 billion in investment since its grand opening, earning it the Downtown Economic Impact Award in 2016.

World of Coca-Cola Opened in 2007, this 92,000-square-foot attraction brings in more than 1 million visitors per year. As the city’s seventh-most-popular attraction, it contributes an annual economic impact of $28.9 million to the city and a combined $35.8 million to the state. Visitors come to learn about the history of the Coca-Cola Company and can enjoy a number of exhibits, including a 1930s soda fountain replica.

College Football Hall of Fame and Chick-fil-A Fan Experience The College Football Hall of Fame and Chick-fil-A Fan Experience was opened in Atlanta in 2014, after its predecessor in South Bend, Indiana was closed. The hall of fame has had a much more profound economic impact on Atlanta than it had on South Bend, with a

Music festivals Atlanta hosts several music festivals throughout the year. Music Midtown is one of the largest in the state and has featured a diverse range of artists, such as Ludacris, Sam Smith, Billy Idol and the Arctic Monkeys. Because of its expansive cultural and artistic appeal, Music Midtown generated an economic impact of nearly $20 million for the greater Atlanta area, according to a 2014 report by the Research Center at the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce.

Festival Peachtree Latino is the largest multicultural event in Georgia. With more than 75,000 people attending in previous years, in 2017 its 16th iteration will be celebrated in Piedmont Park, to accommodate even more festivalgoers. The event expands the local economy by giving exposure to various businesses that strive to work with the Hispanic market.

Visual art and film festivals Home to the third-largest film industry in the U.S., Atlanta hosts some of the country’s best visual art and film festivals. The Atlanta Film Festival, running since 1976, is linked to the Academy Awards, in the sense that films shown at the festival are eligible to enter the Oscars. The 2015 festival attracted a recordbreaking 23,000 viewers, 30 percent of whom were www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Atlanta’s lively nightlife keeps residents and visitors alike entertained.

from outside either the greater metro area or the state.

Also popular is the National Black Arts Festival.

Founded in 1987, this festival has kept various forms of art — from music, to film, to dance — alive in Atlanta by promoting them through various events and educational programs. In the past, the festival has featured appearances by the acclaimed poet Maya Angelou and the seminal R&B vocal combo The O’Jays. The 2017 season features a screening of of the documentary “The Pan-African Festival of Algiers,” and an arts and music event at the ZuCot Gallery.

hotel bookings. Events such as the College Football Playoff National Championship in 2018, the Super Bowl in 2019 and the Final Four in 2020, will also bring an exponential amount of visitors to the area.

In spite of all these developments and opportunities, there are a number of areas in which positive change can still be made. To take advantage of the large number of international transfers at the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, more could be done to boost tourism. Additional and improved infrastructure is needed in the Downtown area, to comfortably accommodate the growing number of people coming to the city. The is also the issue of ensuring that companies such as Airbnb pay a fair amount of tax, while traditional rental and hotel accommodation remains competitive.

Nevertheless, many of the concerns are being addressed with viable proposals. Metro Atlanta has a lot to offer visitors if the past 10 years are anything to go by, the next decade will see more growth.

Atlanta has a lot to offer visitors with good weather, historic landmarks and cultural events.

Looking ahead The tourism sector in Atlanta looks sure to grow. Atlanta has many favorable factors that attract visitors: a good climate, a centralized metropolitan area and a variety of attractions that appeal to all interests. Over the next five years, 107 additional conventions will be held in the greater Atlanta area, 47 of which have never been held there before. These will add to tourism expenditures and 154 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | TOURISM, ARTS & CULTURE

Sports: Atlanta prides itself on its sports, and its five major teams all have substantial followings. With two new stadiums and a new promising soccer team, not only are home events well catered for, but international events are also more likely. The Mercedes-Benz Stadium will be hosting Super Bowl LIII in 2019, and the area is eyeing the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

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Ahead of the games: Metro Atlanta is dedicated to sports, with major teams and worldclass tournaments as well as a new soccer team that is already gaining a strong fan base When the Mercedes-Benz stadium opened in summer 2017, it did so proclaiming that the 360-degree, 58 feet tall, 1,075-feet circumference video board was the largest board in a sports stadium in the world. Metro Atlanta loves sports and is prepared to prove it with investment.

Professional football team, the Atlanta Falcons were in a Super Bowl game that made history in 2017. The team is worth $2.13 billion and are ranked 19 out of 32 in the NFL. In March, soccer team Atlanta United FC played their inaugural game with record-breaking attendance. With 55,297 attendees, they had the fourth-largest crowd at a soccer game in the world, selling out the Bobby Dodd Stadium. A new professional team to Atlanta, their economic impact on the city is uncertain. However, the excitement demonstrated by the metro area’s soccer fans predicts that the impact will be a significantly beneficial one.

The new Mercedes-Benz Stadium serves as the home for these two teams. Completed in summer 2017, the $1.6-billion dollar project has a capacity of 83,000. Not only will it host Falcons and Atlanta United games, but also college football games and will end the 2017 college football season by hosting the College Football Playoff National Championship.

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In addition to the Falcons and Atlanta United, a number of other teams make up the sporting environment, with baseball, basketball and hockey teams all finding a following in the Metro Atlanta area, and like football, is find this following worthy of investment. The newly built $1.1-billion SunTrust Park, home of Major League Baseball team the Atlanta Braves, first broke ground in 2014 and held its first game in March 2017. It is hoped the new stadium will spell good fortune for a team that had a difficult 2016 season.

Basketball team the Atlanta Hawks have secured $192.5 million in funding for the renovation of their home stadium, the Philips Arena. The team enjoyed a good 2016-2017 season, making it to the NBA Playoffs.

Perhaps hoping the Atlanta name will also bring them success minor league ice the Gwinnett Gladiators changed their name to the Atlanta Gladiators in 2015.

The Atlanta Sports Council serves as the recruiter for major regional, national and international sporting events in Atlanta. In doing so, they work hand in hand with the Metro Atlanta Chamber (MAC) to facilitate development and growth for the metro area. Dan Corso became President in 1999 after serving as ViceChair for the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl. The Council has

SPORTS OVERVIEW

succeeded in securing various future sporting events for Atlanta including Super Bowl LIII, the 2018 CFP National Championship and the 2020 NCAA Men’s Final Four.

Atlanta Sports City is the newest project for Metro Atlanta. It is a 190-acre site and entertainment venue planned in Stonecrest in DeKalb County. The location will include athletic training facilities, a 15,000-seat professional stadium an extreme sports area, retail, dining and entertainment. It is expected to be a 190 acre-site and will cost $200 million to complete. Once complete, it is expected to support 1,937 jobs in the county, bringing in 3 million visitors per year with an economic impact of some $180 million. It will host a new men’s soccer team for the North American Soccer League and a women’s soccer team for the North American Soccer League.

ranking them first in the NFC South. In February 2017, the Falcons made it to Super Bowl LI, marking their second ever appearance in the match. They initially led the game by 25 points, but the New England Patriots swept the Falcons with a 31 point comeback, the largest comeback in Super Bowl history. The Patriots ultimately won the game – the only Super Bowl to ever go into overtime in history with a 34-28 lead.

The disappointment of the dramatic Super Bowl loss aside, the Falcons are going into the 2017 season with a strong team. Six of the team’s players made it to the NFL’s best 100 players for 2017 list, four of those in the top 50. Wide receiver Julio Jones, center Alex Mack, linebacker Vic Beasley and quarterback Matt Ryan were all recognized with Ryan winning the NFL’s Most Valuable Player for leading the Falcons to the NFL’s top scoring offense. Robert Schraeder, resigned with the Falcons for a five-season deal and Robert Alford resigned for four years.

Starting in the 2017 season, the Mercedes-Benz stadium will officially be the new home of the Atlanta Falcons.

The $1.5-billion project was finished in August 2017 and is projected to have an ongoing economic impact on Metro Atlanta of between $80 million and $100 million annually.

The Sports Council has succeeded in securing various future sporting events for Atlanta including Super Bowl LIII, the 2018 CFP National Championship and the 2020 NCAA Men’s Final Four.

Millennium Falcons Atlanta’s professional football team, the Atlanta Falcons, is owned by billionaire Arthur Blank and valued at $2.13 billion, according to a September 2016 Forbes estimate. The team was originally purchased in 2002 for $545 million. Having a yearly operating income of $69 million and revenue of $336 million, the Falcons currently rank 19th out of the 32 in the NFL. Additionally, Falcon’s tickets are priced at an average of $79 per game, making them one of the cheapest tickets in the NFL. The 2016 season ended with 11 wins and 5 losses,

Brave Hearts Ranked third in the National League East, the Atlanta

Scott Jenkins General Manager – Mercedes-Benz Stadium

The Mercedes-Benz stadium is iconic and complex, so building something that’s the first of its kind is a real challenge that takes a huge commitment. The operable roof with six triangular shaped “petals” creates an outdoor stadium with the world’s largest scoreboard hanging from the opening. The video board is 58 feet high and runs 1,100 lineal feet around the opening of the operable roof.

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the National League East. SunTrust Park is expected to continue fueling the amount of fans that come to games and in turn create an economic advantage for the region. For the opening night of April 14, revenue was the most ever in Braves history, with ticket sales and retail and concessions spending at a highest-ever level, in part due to the new stadium.

The Hawks finished with a 43-39 record, ranking fifth in the Eastern Conference.

Braves have faced a few obstacles that have impeded chances of success in 2017. Their 2017 standings are at 60 wins and 77 losses. With a better lineup in place, the team may make a comeback in the months to come.

With Dansby Swanson, Nick Markakis and R.A. Dickey, fans are expecting a better 2017 and 2018 season.

Despite their ranking, the Atlanta Braves continue to have a positive economic impact on the metro area with an estimated $120 million throughout Cobb County and the surrounding area. On top of that, they create 5,200 jobs and generate $275 million in revenue per year. For the 2017 January-March quarter, the Braves had an operating loss of $33 million, which was $10 million better than the first quarter of 2016. Revenue for the quarter was up $1 million to $5 million.

The Braves’ official venue is the brand-new SunTrust Park, managed by Liberty-owned Live Nation. This $1-billion dollar project generated $235 million for the region in construction alone. In total, the Braves spent an estimated $4 billion on planning and construction of the stadium. As of March 31, approximately $653 million had been spent on the new ballpark, according to Liberty, of which approximately $378 million of funding was provided by Cobb County and related entities and $275 million provided by the Braves.

The $120 million that the Braves typically generate in economic impact for the Cobb County region is projected to increase 40 percent to $200 million because of the new stadium.

This project serves as leverage after a not-so-great 2016 season, where the Braves came in last place in 158 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | SPORTS

Hawk eyes The Atlanta Hawks played well in the 2016-2017 season.

The team finished with a 43-39 record, ranking fifth in the Eastern Conference. They advanced to the Eastern Conference playoffs, but lost to the Washington Wizards in game six. Dwight Howard, Dennis Schroder and Paul Millsap are among their best players, ending the 2016 season with an average of 13.5, 17.1 and 18.1 points scored per game respectively. In addition to these players, the team had an excellent defense in terms of blocks, steals and rebounds.

After Paul Millsap’s opting for free agency and his eventual move to the Denver Nuggets, the outlook for the Hawk’s 2017-2018 season is unpredictable. The team also lost Tim Hardaway Jr. to the New York Knicks, Dwight Howard to the Charlotte Hornets and Thabo Sefolosha to the Utah Jazz. The 2017-2018 season for the Hawks will mostly be made up of new, young players who hope to provide a potential future for the team.

In terms of economic impact, the Atlanta Hawks have been the only Eastern Conference team to be in the playoffs for seven consecutive seasons. As of 2017, team revenue is $169 million.

The Hawks recently agreed to a deal with the City of Atlanta concerning their home venue, the Philips Arena. The team secured funding for a $192.5-million renovation of the arena with the city contributing $142.5 million of that funding. Taxpayer-backed funding for the refurbishing of the venue will amount to approximately $700 million. This number is likely to double over the next 30 years as interest, maintenance and other costs increase. In exchange, the Hawks will continue to play at the Philips Arena until 2046. The Philips overhaul, with aid of the city funding, could help fuel revitalization of the moribund stretch of downtown parking lots and rail beds known as The Gulch. This deal is estimated to result in a $1.5 billion economic impact for the city.

United force As a new team initiated in early 2017, Atlanta United is one of the biggest spenders in Major League Soccer (MLS) is ambitious in its goals as a new team for the 2017 season. The popularity of soccer in Atlanta is ( )

SPORTS INTERVIEW

Stadium houses How a new sports venue is spurring economic development

Derek Schiller President, Business – Atlanta Braves How healthy do you think the sports environment is in Atlanta?

Atlanta is one of the most vibrant and successful sports towns perhaps in the U.S. maybe even in the world, given the diversity of sports and entertainment that come here. We have a range of professional sports teams headquartered here, but we also have big annual events such as the Peachtree Road Race, the PGA Tour Championship, the NASCAR Races and then of course college football. We have got a terrific legacy of attracting large-scale sporting events because of what Atlanta has to offer.

What have been the main impacts of transitioning into the new stadium?

There’s a huge economic impact as a result of having that regional fan base. When we started formulating our plans for the SunTrust Park, we decided that we wanted to have more than just the baseball experience. We wanted to have a well-rounded overall social experience, and that includes not only game base, but also non-game base.

We decided to construct a real estate development at the same time as the ballpark, which in the world of sports this is really a new concept. When we acquired real estate here, we acquired not only enough to accommodate the 41,000-seat ballpark, but also to build 1.5 million square feet of mixed-use development.

It is now ready under the name The Battery Atlanta.

The Battery Atlanta is constantly growing, and we have people living in the 550 plus apartments.

How much of an economic impact will this have on the community?

We opened the doors to SunTrust Park on April 14, and so far, we’ve had an enormous economic impact on this entire region, this entire community as well as the value of the Braves franchise.

There’s been an increase to the tax base here. This was undeveloped real estate, but it is now creating millions of dollars in tax revenue. The valuation of the immediate area around here has gone up at least 15 percent yearon-year, which is a more than $600 million increase in the value of property. There is also a huge increase in investment in the form of other developments that have occurred as a result of our project.

We’ve become a catalyst for this part of Atlanta, which sits within the Cumberland Community Improvement District. It has certainly benefited as a result of the Braves coming to SunTrust Park as well as our Battery Atlanta development. It took a project like this to bring the entire sub-market together and create a destination offering not only for the Cumberland sub-market, but for Atlanta as well as the southeast. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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Steven Cannon CEO, AMB Group

How does the sports industry in Atlanta shape the city?

If you look at the level of sports investment that’s happened in 2017 in the City of Atlanta, it’s unparalleled.

Nowhere else in the country are there two major stadium projects underway – SunTrust Park together with the Mercedes-Benz Stadium – not to mention the commencement of a major upgrade of Phillips Arena.

The level of investment is in the billions. AMB Group is a major piece of that, but it’s not just us.

That kind of commitment to investment makes Atlanta a more attractive place to live and to work. For example, the decision for Mercedes-Benz to move to the city was based on talent, the dynamic growth that’s going on in the city and the quality of life. All these items add up to corporations making the decision to relocate.

What will the economic impact of the stadium and the city’s sports teams be?

First, is the addition of Atlanta United. It is the poster child expansion franchise for Major League Soccer.

It is setting every record when it comes to per-game attendance, merchandise sales and season ticket sales.

It has exceeded every single expectation. Beyond that, we’ve got the best soccer infrastructure in all of North America and arguably in the world.

There are very few cities on the planet that can offer what Atlanta has. It has the busiest airport in the world, where you can pretty much fly direct from anywhere.

There are Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) stations on both sides of the stadium, which allows a huge portion of our fan base to attend a game or match using public transportation. In 2016, approximately 25 percent of our fans went to a Falcons game via MARTA. There are 10,000 hotel rooms within a half a mile of the stadium. All combined, it makes a unique offering and has attracted the biggest events and the biggest sponsors.

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( ) following national trends. Metro Atlanta is home to a relatively high number of citizens with Latino origins and a growing number of Europeans are coming to the city to work. Soccer is also becoming more popular with the young professional demographic, who favor the more rapid pace and more predictable game lengths. Atlanta United drew more than 100,000 fans to its first two home games.

The team roster is where this big spending shows. As technical director, Carlos Bocanegra has been able to recruit sought-after players. These include Paraguayan international Miguel Almiron and San Lorenzo’s Hector Villalba and Josef Martinez. Almiron’s transfer fee was $8 million, while Villalba cost another $2.5 million. Former Argentina and Barcelona manager, Gerardo Martino has taken the up the coach’s position for an undisclosed salary. This team is also owned by Arthur Blank’s AMB group.

The team started playing in early 2017 as a part of the Eastern Conference MLS. Their first games were at the Georgia Tech’s Bobby Dodd Stadium before officially calling Mercedes-Benz stadium home. In addition to the stadium, the team recently opened its $60 million training facility in Marietta County in April 2017. This spending is expected to produce a favorable economic impact for Atlanta from the team’s base, especially considering the strong fan base that Atlanta United already has had from its initial inception.

American Gladiators The Atlanta Gladiators are a professional minor league ice hockey team that plays in the South Division of the ECHL Eastern Conference. Previously known as the Gwinnett Gladiators, in 2015, this team only recently changed its name and became affiliated with Metro Atlanta. Their home arena is the Infinite Energy Arena in the Metro Atlanta area outside of Duluth.

The team’s 2016-2017 season was made up of 27 wins and 37 losses. The team has not made it to the Kelly Cup playoffs since the 2013 NHL season. Attendance at home games for the most recent season averaged at 4,738. Their first game will be against the Florida Everblades in October 2017.

The main events Atlanta plays host to a number of important national and international sporting events.

Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game The Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game which has been played every year since 2008 in the Georgia Dome, will now be played at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium. Through a ( )

SPORTS INTERVIEW

Sports city How sports teams like the Falcons are strengthening their connections to Atlanta

Rich McKay President & CEO – Atlanta Falcons How does the sports environment in Atlanta compare to other cities?

Atlanta has a national reputation for being an average to above-average sports town, but I can assure you that it is way better than that. The cool part of Atlanta is we play every major sport at the highest level. We also have other major sporting events, such as the PGA Tour and NASCAR Cups Series on the Atlanta Motor Speedway.

We have 6.5 million people in the metro area ranging in age and cultural backgrounds, so it’s a unique melting pot. This is something the sports industry can take advantage of; there are lots of opportunities for marketing to different parts of the population in the Atlanta sports sector.

How are the Falcons strengthening the brand?

We are always focusing on our brand, who we are and what we stand for, as opposed to trying to change marketing strategies every year based on the fan base. Making sure that we are staying true to our brand has helped us to become more successful a franchise. If people believe in who we are and what we do, we will do well.

We are always optimistic going into a season. We have to focus on what we can control and not get caught up in what we can’t control. We can control our preparation and how much we practice. Coach Quinn has done a really good job of getting us through the offseason and has improved the roster season over season.

In our league, the margin of victory between winning and losing is tiny – our division is getting much better, but it’s also tougher.

What impact is the stadium having on the local economy?

Stadiums do not, on their own, create economic impact beyond the construction aspect. The construction of the stadium brought jobs, but we also wanted to make

sure that it kept on having an impact on the Westside even after the project finished.

For Arthur Blank, the stadium is not a five- or tenyear commitment, it’s a lifetime commitment, and we can use the stadium as a catalyst to try to bring a lot of other people along with us, such as corporate sponsors to help the local community.

We are living up to that commitment. At one point in time, the Westside had 65,000 plus people living there, and now there’s less than 10,000. The community has faced massive challenges. We want to create a better Westside, but without gentrification. It has been great to watch the Westside Works initiative, set up by Arthur Blank. It provides training to people in the area, and then finds employment opportunities. This is creating real and sustainable progress in the community. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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A game of two halves How Atlanta United is capitalizing on the growing popularity of soccer in the U.S.

Darren Eales President – Atlanta United FC there was encouraging initial interest, with more than 10,000 people buying tickets for the opening game in the first week of sales. Now, we have sold around 27,000 season tickets, and we’re halfway through a season and averaging around 47,000 tickets per match, which is the most ever in the history of the MLS. Reports have suggested we would be the 24th team in Europe with our average attendance, and for our first game of the season, we had an attendance of 55,000, which put us at the fourth most attended game in the world.

How is Atlanta United finding its fan base in an already dedicated sports environment?

Atlanta United complements the other sports teams in Atlanta. Being owned by Arthur Blank, who also owns the Atlanta Falcons, offers an excellent advantage. We would not have been able to start the club from scratch.

Whether it’s the Braves or the Blaze, there’s a camaraderie about Atlanta and a willingness to share for the greater good, because we all want to put Atlanta on the map.

How does the sports environment, specifically soccer, in Atlanta compare to other domestic and international locations?

In the rest of the world, soccer is the only game that matters. However, in the U.S., a much more competitive environment exists. The sport is competing with basketball, football, baseball and ice hockey.

Major League Soccer (MLS) is a growing sport in the U.S. The average attendance for an MLS game is 21,500, which puts it seventh in the global leagues. The U.S. offers a lot of commercial potential for soccer, because of the demographics. Atlanta is an unbelievable sports market, and because soccer is a young sport in the U.S. - now is when people will be picking their team allegiances.

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How has Atlanta United attracted a new demographic?

Atlanta has a lot of young professionals as well as a strong diverse, international demographic. Both groups gravitate toward soccer. It is an international game, so we are able to garner international interest.

A soccer match is 90 minutes, which is 45 minutes of action, a halftime break and then 45 minutes of action. You know how long a soccer game is going to be. In an age of shrinking attention spans, it’s a game that fits in. It’s also a game where the fans are part of the entertainment. To feel that constant energy from soccer fans in the stadium for over 90 minutes is like nothing else in any other sport. There are a lot of reasons why soccer is becoming more popular, and for Atlanta United, we were very fortunate that we came in at the right time.

SPORTS OVERVIEW

( ) partnership with ESPN, the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Games will be played on the opening weekend of the NCAA Division I Football Season in order to commemorate the start of college football. It is the nation’s longest running kickoff game. The event has an annual attendance of approximately 68,000 people and has distributed $51.95 million in total team payout since its inception. In this years anticipated match-up, the Florida State Seminoles and the Alabama Crimson Tide will play September 2. Georgia Tech will play Tennessee shortly afterward, which makes for a muchanticipated start of the season.

In 2016, the Kickoff Game and the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl resulted in a combined $70.6 million economic impact for Metro Atlanta. The Peach Bowl is the organization that owns and operates the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game. In 2017, the event featured two games.

In the first game the Alabama Crimson Tide beat the Florida State Seminoles 24-7, and in the second, the Tennessee Volunteers beat the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets 42-41.

Atlanta Motor Speedway The Atlanta Motor Speedway, based in Hampton, Henry County is home to major national racing events such as the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series, the NASCAR Qualifying Day, the Rinnai 250, the Active Pest Control 200, the Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 and the Summit Racing Equipment Atlanta Motorama. The Speedway generates an annual $455 million for Metro Atlanta. Also an important motor racing venue, Road Atlanta in Hall County, is a road facility that plays host to IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, Petite Le Mans and the AMA Superbike.

PGA: The TOUR Championship East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta has been the permanent venue for the PGA Tour Championship since 2004.

This annual event, typically the final match of the season, has successfully improved the East Lake neighborhood by creating job opportunities for the families living in the area. One of the most notable aspects of the event is the strong ties it has with the community. In 2015, the championship donated $2.4 million to the East Lake Foundation and The First Tee with the goal of revitalizing the area.

Peachtree Road Race Held every year on Independence Day, the Peachtree Road Race is the world’s largest 10-kilometer running race. The Road Race is part of a collective group of events created by the Atlanta Track Club. This group

Steve Koonin CEO, Atlanta Hawks

How does the diversity of the population of Metro Atlanta influence the fan base for sports teams?

Atlanta is a melting pot of sports. The population is made up of people that have moved here from all over the country, and some generations have brought their sports preferences. We have people from places like Boston, New York and Chicago, which all have strong sports cultures. The Hawks’ mission is connect with next generation of homegrown fans. We have a young city with 2.1 million 18-44 year-olds, and that is our market.”

Of all the sports in Atlanta, the NBA is the youngest, so tapping into the diverse population is key for us. We push hard to bring in varied audiences and create an environment that really celebrates the essence of the city. Our average ticket buyers are 46 percent AfricanAmerican, and our city is 50 percent African-American, so it aligns very well. The Atlanta Hawks are becoming a team for the new generation, and that is good for business.

How impact does the Philips Arena, have on your local environment?

We have an emphasis on sports, but Philips Arena is a town hall for Atlanta. It holds nearly 200 events per year, and was the sixth-busiest arena in the first half of 2017 for the U.S. It is the 20th-busiest in the world.

The continuing diversity of entertainment options that take place in our building really are the cornerstone for entertainment in the city. We are well underway with an extensive $192.5-million arena transformation that will catapult the level of our fan experience, creating an even more engaging and connected environment for today’s fan.

We are very excited about what’s happening Downtown, and we see a growing enthusiasm for the area. Our presence in Downtown Atlanta is a catalyst for creating more excitement, more business and even more real estate opportunities in the area. www.capitalanalyticsassociates.com

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$28-million impact for Atlanta. The average visitor spend was $750. This annual women’s softball tournament held in July is a showcase for colleges, attracting recruiters and high school softball players from across the U.S. It takes place in various parks within the metro area including Adams Park, Al Bishop Park and Hobgood Park over a one-day period. With the increasingly competitive climate of high school students wanting to pursue college, the Atlanta Legacy Showcase has experienced 25 percent year-over-year growth.

Six of the Falcon’s players made it to the NFL’s best 100 players for 2017 list, four of those in the top 50.

promotes running in all individuals of Metro Atlanta regardless of skill.

BB&T Atlanta Open The Atlanta Open is an outdoor men’s professional tennis tournament that is part of the U.S. Open series.

The tournament is typically held during the summer months of Atlanta. It has been held in Midtown’s Atlantic Station since 2010, and has brought 280,000 visitors to Atlanta over a seven-year period. Approximately 40,000 fans attend the tournament every year, resulting in an economic impact of $10.3 million for metro Atlanta.

“The U.S. Open is the greatest annual sporting event in the U.S. because of what it brings in terms of economic activity. Our vision is to become a mini U.S. Open. We have been able to grow every year. We would like to be able to expand our stadium to attract bigger players and continue to expand the women’s side of the tournament,” Eddie Gonzalez, tournament director for the BB&T Open, told Focus: Atlanta.

Super Bowl LIII The Super Bowl LIII is set by the NFL to be played in Atlanta’s new Mercedes-Benz Stadium in February 2019. This will be the third year that the city hosts a Super Bowl; the last time it was held in Atlanta was in 2000 when the St. Louis Rams beat the Tennessee Titans. According to the MAC hosting the prestigious event will be extremely economically beneficial to the city. Not only will it attract thousands of visitors, but also the event is expected to generate a $400 million economic impact for Metro Atlanta.

Atlanta Legacy Showcase The Atlanta Legacy Showcase won the 2016 Champions of Economic Impact in Sports Tourism award after attracting 10,325 spectators and resulting in a 164 | Focus: Atlanta 2017 | SPORTS

Looking ahead Metro Atlanta is lucky enough to be hosting a number of noteworthy sporting events over the next few years. The area’s increasingly global prominence and infrastructure development is showing that the region is well-equipped for major events. Specifically, the addition of the Mercedes-Benz stadium is set to become a key player in attracting major events. In January 2018, the College Football Playoff National Championship will be played at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

The 2016 College Football Playoff National Championship in Arizona generated $273.6 million in economic impact; thus, this event of such magnitude will no doubt be a benefit to Atlanta. Atlanta was also selected to host the Super Bowl LIII at the MercedesBenz Stadium. This will be the third Super Bowl ever held in Atlanta – the last one was in 2000. The 2020 NCAA Men’s Final Four will take place in the Mercedes-Benz stadium, as well.

Professional cricket will also make its way to Metro Atlanta soon. Global Sports Ventures announced its partnership with the USA Cricket Association in light of its goal to create a professional franchise made up of eight teams. The City of Atlanta was scouted as one of the cricket team sites and should have an established team by 2020.

Atlanta is also a potential site for the 2026 FIFA World Cup. There are 34 other U.S. cities and 37 other U.S. stadiums that are on the bid list for the event. Bid evaluations will be conducted from January 2019 with a final decision in May 2020. Atlanta claims to be the most well-equipped site because of the connectivity of Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, the new Mercedes-Benz stadium, numerous Fortune 500 companies and a community of soccer fans. With a ready infrastructure and a sports-mad population, Atlanta is a perfect choice for this event, and many other international and national sporting events.