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• PabMainer

  Wow!! A customer service operation coming from India to the U.S…….maybe there is some light at the end of this very dark economic tunnel….way to go Carbonite!

• Anonymous

  That is good news that they left over there to come back here.

• Anonymous

  we need jobs that pay more than $9hr

• Anonymous

  I’m very glad that this is happening but the statment that “ this is the goverment and private sector working together” and I know that is the way it has to be kind of erks me because If the goverment had stayed out of it in the first place our state would be flurshing with textile mills and shoe shops and all the support business that follow along and our inner cities would have their clothing industries and wholesale houses which was the lifeblood of the cities and they would not be reduced to gangs and drugs and violence.

• Anonymous

  Perhaps we are begining to wake up!!! Thank you carbonite for bringing our jobs back to the USA…now we can only hope and pray the rest of these companies follow suit….

• http://www.facebook.com/people/Trent-McGlasson/813657341 Trent McGlasson

  I agree with PabMainer.  WOW!  Hats off to Carbonite and Governor Lepage for bringing these jobs to Maine.  Let’s hope that this is the first of many companies to consider moving back to the USA.

• Anonymous

  wow now if EMC  located in boston would follow it would be great for maine

• Anonymous

  How about the real news? What regulations were “eased”. How much will these jobs pay? Will food stamps and welfare be picking up the tab for more low wage jobs like Mardens and Walmart? How much will Maine taxpayers put up in tax relief to get them to come here?

  Jobs are good but good jobs are better.

• Anonymous

  Good thing Lepage put them open for business signs up.

• Anonymous

  The private sector and govt. need to cooperate in order for most business models to work well. Do you think a shoe company or textile mill wants to move someplace if it has trouble transporting raw goods in or finished product out? Thus we need to have interstate and rail systems. We need to ensure our transportation infrastructure remains functioning.

  The business spoken of in the article found our lack of bureaucracy helpful but, they would not have come to our state if we didn’t also have adequate utilities. “If the goverment had stayed out of it in the first place,” we would not have support services necessary to allow this. Public and private interests need to be balanced. That is more difficult than just saying govt. stay out.

• yowsayowsa1

  And way to Gov Lepage.

  Keep up the good work and re-election will be assured.

• Anonymous

  This Guv is getting it done…..

• http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Q4AP5EYCYRCGZGIJGWI6TLIUEA Tom

  Great. Now we’re going to have to send even MORE foreign aid to India because 150 people there are soon to be unemployed…

• Anonymous

  Good news for Lewiston, now if we could move some north and east (maybe?).

• TeaParty_aka_AmericanTaliban

  What regulations, exactly, has LePage changed that specifically made operations for this business easier or better?  Sorry, but this is not a factory type of business that impacts the environment in any way.  I’m glad the jobs are coming to Maine from India…that’s good…but I’m not seeing where regulations prevented them from doing so before.

• Anonymous

  I doubt the customers will notice, operators still won’t have a firm grasp on the english language.

• http://twitter.com/Gordie207 Gordie Raynes

  Your a LITTLE LATE w/ this Story Cabonite has been up & running in Lewiston for 2 MONTHS already!!!

• ChuckGG

  I have to agree.  The bigger question I have is does Maine have the trained people to fill the jobs of today and tomorrow?  When I heard some years back that Cianbro’s operation in Brewer had to open a school to train welders, I knew something was out of kilter.  Right now, in this country, there is a lack of people trained in high-tech manufacturing jobs such as precision lathe and milling machines.  The current staff are getting gray and retiring and more than one factory has lots of openings for these jobs.

  The complaint of textile and shoe companies going offshore misses a critical point – those jobs were doomed.  It is impossible for us to sew on a button or make a toaster in the USA when labor costs offshore are a small fraction of even our minimum wage.  Now, I do not propose cutting our workers off at the knees and having them work for a bowl of rice just to attempt to resurrect long past their prime businesses.  The world needs only a certain number of buggy-whip manufacturers.  Leave those offshore.

  Emphasis now needs to be on the skills needed for today and tomorrow, not yesterday.  Our education system should include a focus on vocational activities as it did in the 1970′s.  I attended KVVTI and learned all about COBOL programming and information processing systems.  I had a marketable skill when I left Waterville High School.  Others learned carpentry, machining, automobile repair, and other useful, marketable skills.

  I do not agree with LePage on many issues, especially those social issues driven by the religious-right of the Tea Party crowd, but on this point of providing a good, useable education, I am all for it.  As much as it must pain the Tea Party crowd, this effort is a “government sponsored investment” in its young people.   They are our future.  We owe them the best and most useful education possible.

  Let’s hope Carbonite can find trained people who understand the nuances of offsite data backup and recovery.  Or, are they, too, planning to hold classes to teach its staff computer basics?
   

• Anonymous

   
  Yeh Carbonite is a great company, how long before Maine gets the shaft?
   
  http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/carbonite-stacks-the-deck-on-amazon/
   
  http://www.onlinebackupsreview.com/blog/news/carbonites-privacy-breach.html
   
  http://weblogs.sqlteam.com/joew/archive/2009/03/25/60881.aspx
   
  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204485304576643433842326332.html

  No wonder they’re in bed with gov caustic.

• TeaParty_aka_AmericanTaliban

  New Hampshire still has a lot of manufacturing.  I know because I have worked at several of the businesses there.  They have tons of very young people running CNC machines as well as setting them up.  They give tests to measure aptitude for different jobs in the factories and then train people to do the work.  It really doesn’t take that long.  I have run many different machines before…and done a lot of different manufacturing with absolutely ZERO previous experience.  I was trained and there was never any task I could not learn to do independently in less than 30 minutes of first being shown how to do that task.  Maine companies NEED to get off their duffs and train the workers they need and stop waiting for miracles to fall into their laps.

• ChuckGG

  I hear you but wouldn’t it be attractive to new businesses coming to the State if they knew they had a reliable source of skilled workers, already trained?  We could be pumping out precision turnings and having a reputation for high-quality and reliability and also a proven commitment to manufacturing.   This would demand a premium dollar return.

  While it may not take long to train people, it does cost a lot in personnel costs and training materials.  I highly doubt a company would entrust a block of titanium on a CNC to some kid with “30 minutes of training.”  How about handing off an aluminum welding job on a yacht to another kid with “introductory level” welding skills.

  My point is to aim high and set oneself apart from the “masses in NH.”  We could and should do that and take the long-view approach.

• Anonymous

  Outstanding letter.  With regard to employee skill sets, Germany’s business sector has always had a very robust apprenticeship program that trains entry level employees.  For whatever the reason, the U.S. has not adopted that model.  It would be wonderful if Maine could lead the way in encouraging industry to adopt the apprenticiship model.

• Anonymous

  The opening of a business other than a paper mill?  No way!!  Congratulations, this is the type of businesses we need coming to the state.. 

• ChuckGG

  Thanks.  I agree with the ideal of the German model.   And, this is not much different than what was done in the past here in the USA.  The OJT (on-the-job-training) model was used for years.

  However, today, with costs being so tight on companies, it appears the companies expect to find trained workers on the open market and are less willing to spend the money to train them.  We have kids coming out of college who are poor writers, have limited MS/Office skills, and cannot give a good presentation.   We have to train them as we have no choice.

  I think the bottom line is this – we need people who are trained in the skill-sets of today and tomorrow.  The question is who is going to pay for this training.  If we are competing with other States and countries for business, I think the least we could do is adjust our high-school curriculum to match the needs of business.  We have some constraints here in Maine for which there is little we can do, such as our end-of-the-line location, high energy costs, poor rail, and limited transportation.  What we can fix is education, business regulations and business taxes.  Let’s at least do that so as to perhaps tip the scales in our favor.

• Anonymous

  I’m suspcious of a company that buys lobster rolls for the staff lunches and fires competent people suddenly,without explaination (you don’t need one in Maine) and is keeping on staff that seem pretty clueless or really have no employment alternatives. That’s whats been happening in Lewiston for the last 2 months. Fishy…

• Anonymous

  We need some people with wicked down east accents to be working the phones.

• Anonymous

  I took the time to follow everyone of your links and what I see are minor transgressions regarding reviews which is a widespread issue; problems arising from a third party vendor misusing proprietary data, a systems failure and an issue related to dotting all the i’s and crossing the t’s during an IPO.   Nothing here rises to anywhere close to the level of suggesting that Carbonite and the jobs they provide should not be welcomed in Maine. 

• Anonymous

  Its a pattern of deceptive practices that makes me highly skeptical of this firm.  They may not have been caught doing anything serious to date (well, we may have to wait on the last one, are you familiar with securities law?) but they seem to push the boundaries of ethical business practices.  Certainly not buying any of their stock.

• Anonymous

  We can fix the transportation issues but it will take a while.Shame that the east-west highway probably won’t happen.Great analysis above of the job market. and problems.
  One thing to add.Germany has strong unions who work as partners in the boardrooms.
  We probably will not see unions go back up much but we need to stop the slide.

• ChuckGG

  Thanks.  I am a big fan of the East-West highway plan by Peter Vigue and Cianbro.  That route approximates the train line that used to provide passenger service from Montreal to the Maritime provinces.  I’d like to see that operational once again.  That would get Maine more into the international arena.

  As far as the unions go, I would like to see the unions and management work together for a common goal.  We are starting to see some of that but there seems to be an undertone of “us vs. them” in the country with almost no sense of history from today’s players.  If people could simply step back and see the current state of affairs, how we got here, and look at 150 years of history, I think they would see many lessons to be learned.  This is for both economic and social issues.  The current social climate is appalling.  To hear people speak of others, you would think this was the South in the 1950′s.  The rise of religious fundamentalism is nothing but troubling with their “my way or the highway” attitude with little quarter for those who have different views.  There are few scarier groups in the world than those who feel they have God on their side.  To me, it seems as if the masses have “dumbed down” since the 1970′s.  Our heroes were scientists and astronauts.  Today, they are entertainment celebrities who are little more than 21st century court jesters.

• Anonymous

  They won’t last long in Maine once they get their utility bills and taxes.  Maine is the worst state for cost of living, climate,  lack of an educated young workforce and taxes.

• Anonymous

  To that point.In 2008 more votes were cast for the American Idol winner than were cast for President.A truly appalling thought.Great posts-hope you post again.