Baystate Advantages Overview

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts (official nickname Bay State) is a dynamic and innovative economic engine in the United States. Because it is home to some of the world’s finest institutions of higher education, the state generates an immense concentration of science and technology related research and development. From its early manufacturing roots of the 1940’s, via the 70’s and 80’s explosive computer innovations, to today’s cutting-edge biotechnology industry, Massachusetts has demonstrated time over its craftiness and ability to foster industrial and commercial resilience and adaptation.

Choosing to establish footing in the United States could be as easy as choosing Massachusetts as the natural seat of your operations. By land, sea or air, Massachusetts has an extensive shipping, distribution and transportation infrastructure to support your business needs.

The Future of the Commonwealth

A large pool of educated people, a fortuitous economic atmosphere, and perhaps some of the old Yankee entrepreneurial spirit fueled an economic boom in Massachusetts in the mid-1980s, mostly in the high-tech industries. Unemployment rates were among the lowest in the nation; many ambitious social and environmental programs were begun; and Route 128, a road encircling Boston, earned its title as “America’s Technology Highway” as high-technology companies continued to cluster there. However, in the late 1980s, an economic decline struck Massachusetts and the rest of the Northeast, forcing a retrenching and reappraisal of the government and economy of the state. This cycle is a phenomenon that Massachusetts has encountered often in its long history.

Fortunately, Massachusetts is not standing still. Logan International Airport and improvements in the Port of Boston have made Boston one of America’s premier transport centers. The Export Program takes advantage of the Commonwealth’s trading potential with Canada, which signed a treaty fully opening trade with the U.S. in 1988, with Europe, whose economic borders now have disappeared within the European Economic Community created in 1992, and with other nations as well.

Newer industries such as biotechnology, biomedicine, artificial intelligence, marine sciences, and polymer technology are being strengthened, many in conjunction with the Centers of Excellence program, an ambitious mutual support network of government, business, and academia. Indeed, the Commonwealth’s more than eighty colleges and universities, its still impressive industrial capacity, its environmental study institutions, and its world-renowned medical centers are reasons for Massachusetts to be optimistic about its future in a changing world.

[Source: Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Department of Economic Development’s Toward A New Prosperity: Building Regional Competitiveness Across the Commonwealth, 2002.]