Iona College Teams Up with Syncsort Inc. on START-UP NY Initiative

Iona College is teaming up with the software firm Syncsort Inc. in an ambitious START-UP NY initiative at the New Rochelle school’s Rockland campus location which could help create 144 new jobs, Iona announced.

The effort will be the largest single project at a private college within the network of the START-UP NY consortium, Iona states, which will include an investment of $2,895,000 from Syncsort. The plan calls for increasing professional and academic opportunities for Iona students and the local community.

“We are pleased to build on the long history of achievement and partnership of the Hagan School of Business by expanding our positive community impact by facilitating the creation of jobs and educational opportunities in the region,” said Iona President Joseph E. Nyre, Ph.D. in a statement. “The partnership with Syncsort will have a positive impact on our students and faculty, creating resources of business expertise and internship possibilities for our students, both at Rockland and at our main campus in New Rochelle. This is a partnership that we believe will be a model for others in New York and the nation.”

The College’s new START-UP NY partner, Syncsort, will be located in 50,000 square feet of space adjacent to Iona’s graduate center at 2 Blue Hill Plaza in Pearl River. Currently headquartered in New Jersey, Syncsort is expected to be operational in Rockland by spring 2016.

Iona College, a highly accredited, private Catholic college, offers more than 60 degree programs of study. While its main campus is in New Rochelle, the school also has been providing graduate education in Rockland County for more than 35 years.

Offerings at the Graduate Center in Pearl River include the first MBA program in Rockland with the prestigious AACSB (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business) International accreditation. Six MBA concentration areas are offered, in addition to MS programs and several professional certificates. The College recently announced the largest gift in its history from alumnus Robert LaPenta to build a new business school at the New Rochelle campus.

Syncsort is a global software company that provides powerful, secure, enterprise-grade software that spans “Big Iron to Big Data,” including fast-growing analytical platforms such as Apache Hadoop, Splunk, Apache Spark, and the cloud, as well as mature, business critical platforms such as the IBM z Systems mainframe. Syncsort’s products are deployed in top Fortune 500 companies across industries such as financial services, healthcare, telecommunications and other data intensive domains.

“It is a tremendous privilege for Syncsort to have been selected for the START-UP NY program, and we are looking forward to the exciting partnership with Iona College that we expect to both inspire the next generation of computer scientists and provide our team with the world-class talent it needs to continue our ambitious growth strategy,” said Lonne Jaffe, CEO of Syncsort. “As a long-time New Yorker, I couldn’t be more proud to have Syncsort become part of New York’s Big Data technology ecosystem, which, thanks in part to extraordinary economic development programs such as START-UP NY, has become one of the most important in the world.”