Sandia Labs’ economic impact edged higher in 2016
Small local firms again received greatest benefit
Sandia National Laboratories spent more than $3 billion on goods and services, contracts, payroll and more in fiscal year 2016, according to the lab’s annual economic impact report, released Thursday morning.
That’s about $200 million more than in FY 2015, when the lab spent about $2.8 billion.
Fiscal years run from Oct. 1 to Sept. 30. The lab publishes a detailed annual account of spending to show where the dollars are going.
“It provides an overall picture of the lab’s impact in New Mexico and nationally,” said Delfinia Salazar, manager of Sandia’s Supply Chain Management and Supplier Diversity Department.
The overall impact is huge in New Mexico, where the lab employs more than 10,000 of its total 12,000 employes.
Sandia spent about $1.8 billion on labor and non-contract-related payments last year. It paid about $80 million in state gross-receipts and corporate taxes. Employees also spent about $83 million through procurement card purchases.
In addition, the lab paid more than $1 billion to local and national businesses for goods, services and contract-related payments, up about $56 million from FY 2015. New Mexico firms captured about $381 million, or 37 percent of that total, about the same as in the previous year.
Small businesses benefited the most. Local small-sized suppliers earned about $240 million, or 63 percent of total payments last year to New Mexico businesses.
Still, in hard cash, that represented a $19 million drop for small local firms compared with FY 2015, when New Mexico’s small-sized suppliers received about $259 million. The decline largely reflects the ebb and flow of Sandia’s nuclear weapons-related work, which often requires that it procure goods and services from labs in other states.
“Overall, as a nuclear laboratory, the nature of the work dictates at times the need to use other labs, and that might account for the shifts last year,” Salazar said.
This year, the lab is aggressively working to pull more businesses into supplier relations with Sandia.
A new pilot project, launched last October, allows interested firms to meet oneon-one with Sandia representatives and subcontractors who procure goods and services in “open houses” three times a month. The events are held at Sandia Science and Technology Park, just outside the gates of Kirtland Air Force Base where the lab is housed.
Participants can learn about supply opportunities and how to access them, while getting direct help to qualify for bidding on contracts from specialists at government agencies. More than 100 businesses have participated to date, Salazar said.
Victor Delgado, local franchisee for Dale Carnegie Training, attended an open house Wednesday to offer training services to Sandia for the first time.
“It was great,” Delgado said. “They gave me a lot of information. I hope to get some business.”
Ralph Trimnel of the Kennedy Trimnel Model Shop in Albuquerque discussed modeling services with Sandia representatives on Wednesday.
“I did a lot with Sandia years ago, and now I’m trying to renew my relationship,” Trimnel said. “They’re helping me get back into it.”