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How Hauppauge grew, and then declined

Reuters has been associated with Hauppauge on Long Island, home of its technical centre now earmarked for closure possibly as soon as the end of 2016, since the original agreement was signed for a 10.6-acre site in January 1982.

Irving Levine recalls how, in 1975, Reuters America operations were housed at 1212 Avenue of the Americas in Manhattan alongside the early technical development function. There were major problems with locating a main operations function in New York City. Apart from the cost there was the inability to install backup power systems in a skyscraper and the difficulty of installing satellite and microwave dishes on the roofs of buildings.

Glen Renfrew, then manager of North America, asked David Mitchell, technical manager of the day, to find a space on Long Island which could accommodate a satellite dish farm in addition to a development centre. The Hauppauge Industrial Park presented itself as a possibility. It was new, with much undeveloped land and cheap. Mitchell led the design of 90 Davids Drive in terms of computer room space, office space, power and communications. Landscaping had to accommodate the large satellite dishes in a huge pit to make them invisible from public highways and thereby satisfy local planning regulations. The other advantage was that Hauppauge was not that far from the IDR facility at Farmingdale, just over the border in Nassau County.

The development group (some 20 strong) moved out to 90 Davids Drive just after operations, and the two groups were co-located. As the development group expanded an adjacent building was taken at 80 Davids Drive for an interim period.

A further space crisis soon occurred when a series of new development projects (IDN, Dealing 2000/2 and GLOBEX) required a sizeable increment in development staff numbers, and so in 1988 another large building was acquired. This new development building at 88 Parkway Drive South was accessed via a completely different road but staff could easily walk through between the buildings.

In 1995 a further building was acquired in the same area for development staff. This was located at 140 Adams Avenue and these two buildings represented the peak of development staffing at the location. Other buildings in the area came and went  including a new IDR production facility in the 1980s as well as field group and stores locations nearby.

The IDR facility closed in the mid-1980s. 140 Adams had closed by 2000 as development staffing started to decline. 88 Parkway Drive and the original 90 Davids Drive facility are still open for business but apparently not for much longer. ■