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Veeco plans to keep its company headquarters in Plainview. (Credit: newsday / Thomas A. Ferrara)

Veeco Instruments Inc., which makes tools to manufacture light-emitting diodes, hard drives and chips for wireless devices, is relocating about 65 New York State manufacturing jobs, including 18 on Long Island, to a facility in Somerset, New Jersey, the company announced.

A spokesman said Monday that Veeco’s headquarters and nonmanufacturing jobs related to marketing, engineering, finance and sales in its advanced deposition and etch (AD&E) unit would remain in Plainview. The company plans to move most of the 18 AD&E manufacturing jobs from Plainview to Somerset by the end of the first quarter of 2017, he said.

The company currently employs about 700 people overall, including roughly 150 at the company-owned site in Plainview. The company also has manufacturing facilities in St. Paul, Minnesota, and Horsham, Pennsylvania.

Veeco is realigning its manufacturing to save money and to meet increased demand for customized tools, the spokesman said.

“By combining these manufacturing teams under one roof, we have the agility to better balance our resources across those businesses and maintain our ability to ramp up if we need to,” he said.
Shares of Veeco rose 12 cents to close at $17.54 on Monday. They are down 14.7 percent year to date.
About 33 manufacturing jobs will be moved from the Kingston site, which is scheduled to be closed in the first quarter of 2017, and 15 from the Poughkeepsie site, which is expected to be shuttered in the fourth quarter of 2016.

Veeco has said that revenue declines in several recent quarters stem from slack demand for tools to make LEDs among Asian manufacturers.

Syosset-based Blumenfeld Development Group has closed on its purchase of a 140,000-square-foot industrial
building in Hauppauge for $12.6 million.

The building at 1516 Motor Parkway was sold by Rechler Equity Partners and is the first of three properties that no longer fit within its portfolio profile that are slated to be sold in 2016, according to a company statement.
Blumenfeld, which partnered on the acquisition with a private investor, has entered into a long-term lease with
Entourage Commerce for the entire Motor Parkway warehouse/distribution facility.

The company, a distributor of health and beauty products, is relocating from Queens with the help of tax breaks from the Suffolk County Industrial Development Agency.

The site will receive a $2 million capital improvement as part of the complex’s repositioning. The facility will serve as Entourage’s new headquarters where it will employ more than 300 people.
“Entourage has a dynamic, growing business model which grew out of their current space in the boroughs,” David Blumenfeld, a Blumenfeld Development Group vice president, said in a statement. “We are thrilled to have them in our tenant mix and provide them the footprint to successfully expand their business.”

Blumenfeld also announced its $31.2 million purchase of a three-story mixed-use building at 99-01 Queens Blvd. in Rego Park, Queens.

The 56,916-square-foot building is currently home to Bank of America, New York Sports Club and DeVry College of New York. Blumenfeld will redevelop the remaining vacant space in the building for Mount Sinai Hospital, which has entered into a long-term lease bringing the building to full occupancy. Blumenfeld expects to have all work completed for Mount Sinai by early spring 2017.

As for the Hauppauge sale, Mitchell Rechler, managing partner of Rechler Equity Partners, said the deal
“demonstrates the strength of the sales market for warehouse and distribution facilities” on Long Island.

“This property offered 23-foot ceilings and immediate access to the Long Island Expressway service road, making it a winning combination for any owner/user,” Rechler said in the statement.

The company next plans to market its building at 19 Nicholas Drive in Yaphank. The 232,000 square-foot warehouse and distribution facility is currently leased short-term.

Keystone Electronics is buying the former W.W. Grainger building at 2040 Jericho Tpke. as it relocates from Queens to New Hyde Park. (Credit: Johnny Milano) Keystone Electronics Corp., a Queens-based maker of electronic components for original equipment manufacturers and computer hardware, is moving from Astoria to New Hyde Park as part of an $8.6 million project.

The company, which has 128 full-time employees, was approved this week by the Nassau County Industrial Development Agency for tax benefits. The company had said it was also considering a move to South Carolina.
Keystone is buying a 21,800-square-foot warehouse building at 2040 Jericho Tpke. from W.W. Grainger Inc., an industrial supply company, and plans to lease a 48,750-square-foot building at 55 Denton Ave.

The Denton Avenue building is “essentially around the corner,” Peter Curry, an attorney with Farrell Fritz representing Keystone, said Tuesday. The company intends to relocate all of its employees to the new sites within its first year on Long Island. Keystone did not say how many new employees it was planning to add after completing the move, but said that it expects to grow its workforce, and that estimated average wages for employees would be $58,600 annually.

“New York City is not working with businesses in manufacturing,” Troy David, president of Keystone, said of his decision to move east. After “aggressively” looking at South Carolina, David said he was lucky to find suitable buildings in Nassau, and that the IDA benefits will help “with my cost certainty for the next 10 to 15 years.”
The IDA approved the project for a sales tax exemption of up to $41,562; $30,240 off the mortgage recording tax; and a 10-year deal on property taxes with a 5-year extension option. Property taxes will be frozen for the first seven years, and will increase by 1.56 percent a year after that.
“I’m delighted the IDA was able to bring this company to Nassau County,” IDA executive director Joseph J. Kearney said.