At the age of 17, Jakobi Blue-Smith of Raleigh, NC, already had an idea what she wanted to study in college. After she told her internship counselor at Wake Young Women’s Leadership Academy about her interests, it wasn’t long before she applied for an internship through OpenDoors Summer Internship (ODSI) program.

“I told my counselor the field I was interested in was biotechnology incorporated with research, and she found exactly what I was looking for,” said Blue-Smith. “I immediately applied for it.”

A combination of economic development projects in multiple sectors – life sciences, electric vehicles, semiconductors, and even retail – helped land North Carolina the sole top spot in the latest issue of Area Development, a quarterly publication covering site selection, facility planning and economic development.

For the second consecutive year, North Carolina has been named by CNBC as “America’s Top State for Business.” 

“At a time when companies are clamoring for workers while trying to navigate a treacherous economy, no state is meeting their needs more effectively than North Carolina,” writes CNBC Special Correspondent Scott Cohn, who created the business news network’s annual competitiveness study of states in 2007.

“Business and the economy in the state have been on a tear since the pandemic, and the state has scarcely looked back,” he adds.