[video width="426" height="240" mp4="http://sunypoly.edu/apps/blogs/news/files/2015/07/WGRZ_07-27-2015_06.33.03.mp4"][/video]

A huge industrial core, which used to be known as Kodak Park will be transformed into a new age technological hub. This new project is a team-effort between the federal government, the state and private investors. The Eastman Business Park has been a major focus of Albany, similar to the medical campus in Buffalo. The state will be kicking in $250 million toward the project and it would be owned by the SUNY Polytechnic Institute's Colleges of Nanoscale Science and Engineering.

The other big funding source is a $110 million startup grant from the Defense Department. The Integrated Photonics Institute will be the sixth of nine manufacturing institutes the Obama Administration is planning. The Department of Defense grant represents the largest initial federal commitment to any of the institutes so far. The $610 million in combined federal, state and private funding is the largest initial investment to date.

The Vice President and Governor Cuomo are also expected to make a major announcement about federal infrastructure work, including major upgrades to New York City airports, particularly LaGuardia. In February, Biden said LaGuardia felt like it belonged "in some third world country."

The big news from a local perspective is the thousands of jobs expected to be generated by this new public-private project that will bring a photonics hub just down the thruway in the former home of Kodak Park