On a Tuesday morning at 235 Harrison Street, a team of engineers is testing a drone sensor in a prototyping lab that, three years ago, was a vacant retail floor in a building nobody had a reason to enter. Two floors up, a startup founder is pitching investors over a video call from a rooftop terrace overlooking downtown Syracuse.
The INSPYRE Innovation Hub, operated by CenterState CEO in the former Tech Garden building, now occupies more than 90,000 square feet of co-working space, private offices, prototyping labs, and conference rooms in the heart of downtown. A $32 million renovation — roughly half funded by a $16.6 million contribution from Empire State Development — turned the aging commercial building into one of the largest technology incubators in New York State.
The facility held its grand opening celebration in September 2025 after years of construction.
Where Drones Meet Downtown
The anchor tenant is GENIUS NY, the world’s largest business accelerator focused on uncrewed aerial systems. The program, funded by Empire State Development, has invested more than $24 million in over 42 companies since it launched in 2017.
Those companies work on drone technology, sensor systems, and autonomous platforms — the kind of hardware that needs room to build and test. INSPYRE’s expanded fabrication and prototyping space gives tenants the square footage that a typical co-working setup on East Genesee or over near Hanover Square simply cannot offer.
More than 35 tenant offices now fill the building, housing a mix of tech startups, drone companies, and emerging technology firms at various stages of growth.
The Building
The former Tech Garden sits on South Salina between Armory Square and the Onondaga County government center — a block that, five years ago, did not give anyone a reason to stop walking.
That has changed. The renovation preserved the building’s street-level presence while adding a 5,000-square-foot rooftop terrace overlooking downtown. Inside, the layout runs from open co-working floors to private office suites to dedicated hardware labs where companies can prototype physical products.
Conference rooms and shared meeting spaces are scattered throughout the facility, designed for the kind of cross-company interaction that a spreadsheet of tenants cannot manufacture on its own.
The Money Behind It
The roughly $32 million price tag makes INSPYRE one of the more significant single-building investments in downtown Syracuse in recent years. Empire State Development’s $16.6 million covered the largest share.
CenterState CEO, Central New York’s regional economic development organization, manages the facility and its programming. The organization has positioned INSPYRE as the physical center of its startup support work, consolidating programs that were previously spread across multiple locations.
GENIUS NY’s $24 million in investments across its portfolio since 2017 represents a separate funding stream — money that flows through the building to its tenants, not into the walls themselves. That distinction matters: INSPYRE is both a real estate project and a pipeline that channels state dollars into early-stage companies working in uncrewed systems.
What It Means for South Salina
Downtown Syracuse has seen a string of renovation projects over the past decade, from the Salt City Market on South Clinton to the ongoing work around the Interstate 81 corridor. INSPYRE fits into that pattern but stands apart in scale — 90,000 square feet dedicated to technology companies is not a small bet on a neighborhood.
The building sits within walking distance of Armory Square restaurants and shops, Clinton Square, and the county and city government offices on South State Street. For the startups and drone companies inside, that proximity to both downtown foot traffic and government decision-makers is part of the pitch. Just blocks away, the $134 million redevelopment on Tipperary Hill and the historic synagogue conversion near campus show that the investment pressure on Syracuse’s building stock isn’t limited to one corridor.
At 235 Harrison Street, the doors are open, the prototyping labs are running, and the tenants are building. For a block that nobody stopped on five years ago, that’s a pretty good turn.
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