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WEEK OF NOV. 11 - 17, 1985 VOLUME 1 0 NO. 41
New venture funds seek $60 million
City eases up on proposed wastewater metal limits BY VANESSA WATERS CRAIN'S DETROIT BUSINESS
Detroit city officials have backed down from their proposal to lower severely the amounts of some metals that businesses can dump into the city's sewer system. The state may decide this week whether the limit can remain the same or must be lowered. The Greater Detroit Chamber of Commerce and the city are haggling over proposed changes in the city's ordinance governing wastewater treatment. The changes are aimed at putting the city in line with new regulations of the U .S. Environmental Protection Agency. The city's huge sewage treatment plant serves about 3 million customers in Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties. More than 750 industrial and commercial businesses in the tricounty area could be affected by new wastewater standards, according to Dennis Koons, vice president of government affairs for the chamber. Those businesses include metal finishers that discharge cadmium and photo processors that discharge silver into the sewage system.Silver and cadmium are both classified as metals that could be toxic if ingested at high levels, according to Darrel Suhre, assistant director of wastewater operations for the city. City regulations allow businesses to discharge up to 2 milligrams of cadmium and silver per See METAL, PAGE 30
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BY BRADFORD WERNLE CRAIN'S DETROIT BUSINESS
DWIGHT CENDROWSKI
Clothing designer Marianne Slick displays her works outside a Hamtramck building where she plans to open a small clothing manufacturing plant. Story, Page 3 ~
Two newly created venture capital funds in Michigan hope to add $60 million to the pool of money available for emerging growth companies. Accel Telecom Limited Partnership, with an office in Ann Arbor, is gathering capital for a $40 million fund for investment in telecommunications networking and software companies throughout the United States. Michigan Department of Treasury's Venture Capital Fund has committed $5 million in Accell Telecom's fund, according to Michael Finn, director of the state fund. Another fund with offices in Michigan hopes to raise $20 million to invest in startup companies. Growth Capital Corp. of Troy plans
to raise the money through the sale of limited partnerships to wealthy individuals and corporations. Accel Telecom will be "the premier source of venture capital for the telecommunications industry in the United States," said Dickson Doll, chairman of the board of DMW Group Inc., an Ann Arbor telecommunications consulting and software company, and one of three managing partners of the fund. "The activity marks the first real commitment by a leading national venture capital organization to establish here in Michigan," said Doll. The other partners are Arthur Patterson of San Francisco and James Swartz of Princeton, N.J., where the fund is being adminisSee VENTURE, PAGE 31
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Bechtel picks area for new facility BY JANE WHITE CRAIN'S DETROIT BUSINESS
Bechtel Group Inc. of San Francisco will set up in Rochester Hills its first division to integrate factory equipment with computers. The construction giant said it picked Michigan as the site for its computer-integrated manufacturing (CIM) division because automakers are leaders in advanced manufacturing techniques. The unit will initially employ 25 people in a 25,000-square-foot building it is leasing in the Avon Tech Park. It is called the industrial man-
ufacturing line of business of the Bechtel National Inc. subsidiary in Oak Ridge, Tenn. The unit could employ up to 400 people within three years, and construct another 30,OOO-square-foot building on 1.7 acres it is leasing from General Development Co. of Southfield. "It depends on how we grow the business," said Bechtel National Vice President Bob Lindner, who heads up the Rochester Hills operation, located at 2868 Bond. John Hogle, a liaison between Bechtel headquarters and the Rochester Hills office, said
BY VANESSA WATERS CRAIN'S DETROIT BUSINESS
MICHAEL E. SAMOJEDEN
Mayor Coleman Young celebrates victory on election night. Though he was initially viewed with suspicion by business leaders, Young's pragmatism and development skills have gained him respect.
Twelve years ago, business leaders in Detroit had serious reservations about the outspoken state senator and former union organizer who was about to become the city's first black mayor. But now, as Coleman Young prepares for an unprecedented fourth term as mayor, Detroit's business elite is toasting him. The warm feelings of the leaders of big business toward the Young administration are not always shared by smaller business people. Young, who won last Tuesday's election against accountant Tom Barrow with 61 percent of the vote, is particularly popular with officials from local companies that are venturing into downtown development.
Michigan was selected as a site for the office because "certainly the major leaders in technological advances are in automotive systems. We had to go outside the company to get the (specialized machine tool) expertise in greater Detroit." Lindner said Bechtel may be the first company in the nation to offer one-stop shopping for manufacturers building automated factories or computer-integrated manufacturing, as it is commonly called. See BECHTEL, PAGE 29 ~
Alfred Glancy III, chairman and chief executive officer of Michigan Consolidated Gas Co., has high hopes for the next four years. MichCon, along with American Natural Resources Co., is building Harbortown, a 48-acre waterfront residential/retail development. "The mayor had to learn to work and trust the business community, and a little bit of that had to work vice versa. It took a couple of years for that to happen," said Glancy. Glancy said Young's commitment to economic development is orte of his stronger points. He said Young's role in encouraging General Motors Corp. to build the $600-million Detroit/Hamtramck Assembly Center in the old Poletown district on the Hamtramck borSee MAYOR, PAGE 32
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