Graphic Controls, which manufactures and markets a variety of disposable medical products and industrial recording supplies, is currently located on Van Rensselaer Street in Buffalo. In November, the corporation announced its plan to stay in the Buffalo area after being heavily sought after by other communities.

Graphic Controls will renovate the 75,000-square-foot former IBM office building on La Riviere Drive along the waterfront for its corporate headquarters. A new 240,000-square-foot facility to house the manufacturing operation will be built on Exchange Street between Louisiana and Alabama streets.

The relocation and transition to a single-story configuration, as well as a proposed cellular design for the plant layout, will allow for more efficient manufacturing. UB faculty members, students and technically trained personnel in UB's engineering school conducted a facility-design computer simulation study to validate and improve the initial layout to establish the most efficient arrangement for the Exchange Street facility.

Western New York retained more than 1,000 manufacturing jobs and created more than 800 new ones during the 1996-97 fiscal year as a result of SPIR's efforts.