A second business has signed a purchase agreement for acreage in the Berry Hill Industrial Park, the Regional Industrial Facility Authority announced at a meeting Monday.

Enviva Development Holdings LLC has signed an agreement to buy a 168-acre tract along Berry Hill Road. The company will conduct due diligence on the site — investigations into the suitability of the site for the project — over the next year, with the right to extend the agreement or terminate it without penalty.

It is expected the company, founded in 2004, will invest more than $100 million in the project and create indirect and direct above-average paying jobs, according to Jesse Barksdale, vice chairman of RIFA.

The Danville Community College “Cyber Team” was honored Wednesday at the National Cyber Security Summit in Huntsville, Alabama.

DCC’s cyber security and cyber crime programs were recognized for earning the Center of Academic Excellence in Two-Year Education (CAE2Y) designation from the National Security Agency and Department of Homeland Security earlier this year.

The Noblis Center for Applied High Performance Computing — a high-tech supercomputer company at 527 Bridge St. — announced Monday it has signed a second five-year lease to continue doing business in Danville.

The company plans to install the next generation of big data processors to work alongside the Cray MXT 2 that was activated at the site in 2012.

Brent Gulick — who represented Cray Computers and helped when Noblis brought the supercomputer to Danville — said Cray and Noblis knew they needed partners to help with the project, the brainchild of Dr. H. Gilbert Miller, Noblis’s chief information officer at the time.

Danville’s Institute for Advanced Learning and Research unveiled a new mobile lab Thursday morning, which Don Merricks, chairman of the Institute’s board of trustees, hopes will be a “game changer for the whole region.”

The mobile lab serves eight localities in the Dan River Region encompassing more than 4,000 square miles.

The Inspiration Lab will replace the old mobile lab, which will be used by Patrick Henry Community College, according to Julie Brown, director of advanced learning at the Institute. The mobile lab has travelled more than 60,000 miles over the last seven years, according to Merricks, and served more than 52,000 people.

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe applauded a Dan River Region solar energy project and said Virginia needs to get serious about alternative energy if it wants to attract large tech companies and other employers during an energy roundtable discussion Tuesday in Danville.

“We’ve got to get our heads out of the sand on this issue,” McAuliffe said.

At the roundtable meeting — which included leaders from Danville Utilities, the city of Danville, Pittsylvania County and others — McAuliffe announced the Kentuck Solar project solar farm will begin construction in August.

BLAIRS — Work has officially begun on a rural internet project in Pittsylvania County after a groundbreaking ceremony Friday morning at the base of White Oak Mountain.

Pittsylvania County Economic Development Director Matt Rowe hosted the groundbreaking next to Bojangles on U.S. 29 in Blairs.

“Rural internet availability is a priority for Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors,” Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors Chairman Bob Warren said. “Today’s groundbreaking is not only the beginning of fiber construction, it’s for the new jobs and investments that will be made in the rural areas of the county due to improved internet services.”

The president of the company praises the hub’s access to a plethora of local advanced manufacturing and research organizations near Danville.

One year after the acquisition of SGS Tool Co. by Kyocera Corp., Kyocera SGS Precision Tools has broken ground in Danville, Virginia, beginning work on the Kyocera SGS Tech Hub. Representing a $9.5 million investment and partnership with The City of Danville and The State of Virginia, the Tech Hub is projected to create over three dozen jobs supporting next-generation engineering and manufacturing of cutting tools serving the automotive, aerospace, medical and power generation industries, among others.

MARTINSVILLE — For the fourth consecutive year, the entire industrial electronic technology cohort at Patrick Henry Community College passed the Level 1 Siemens Mechatronic Systems Certification Program exam — a critical credential for job placement in that field. Together, the average score of the class was 82.9 percent.

“A 100 percent passing rate, especially with these high scores, is very impressive. This is an especially challenging certification exam that nationally only 85 percent of students pass,” said PHCC’s industrial electronic technology faculty member Daniel Edwards.

The Virginia-based seed fund adds a new company to its investment portfolio: a startup making significant headway in the home automation industry.

The Launch Place, a nonprofit organization in Danville, Virginia, that provides support and funding for startups in the Dan River Region, recently announced it would be adding a new company to its portfolio. TiO, a home automation startup that has expanded to Raleigh from its headquarters in Florida, became The Launch Place’s thirteenth investment.

This $250,000 seed investment is the fund’s first partnership with a startup within the home automation industry, and it provides enough backing for TiO to expand operations in the Dan River Region (one requirement of The Launch Place investment) and bring at least five employees to the new office.

TiO, short for “Turn it On,” creates hardware and software products that allow for wireless control of the home through a single app on a homeowner’s phone or tablet.

Local officials and Kyocera SGS Tech Hub LLC — which announced in September it was bringing 35 jobs and $9.5 million in investment to the Dan River Region — broke ground Monday morning for its planned facility at the Cyber Park.

Company President Jason Wells — speaking to attendees at the event — called the groundbreaking a “monumental milestone” and a representation of progress and opportunity for the region.

Business leaders, Kyocera representatives and elected officials from Danville and Pittsylvania County attended the ceremony across from the Institute for Advanced Learning and Research.