The owner of an ethanol plant being built in Hoke County says it should open next June as scheduled.

The Fayetteville Observer reported Monday that Clean Burn Fuels plant owner Jack Carlisle said 75 percent of the equipment for the $100 million plant is on the site south of Raeford.

Carlisle said he expects to employ about 100 people at the plant and produce about 60 million gallons of ethanol its first year.

The company is expected to invest $90 million, including a carbon dioxide plant and a trucking company.

Hoke County gave the company 500 acres for the facility and it received $35 million in federal loan guarantees to develop renewable energy sources.

Carlisle said other funding is from private investors.

Two companies have secured grants from the state to increase their operations and create hundreds of new jobs.

Gov. Mike Easley’s office announced Monday that a subsidiary of HCL Technologies Ltd., an Indian-based information technologies services company, has been given a state grant to help it open a facility in Wake County. The company must create more than 500 permanent jobs in the coming five years to qualify for the millions in tax breaks and incentives.

Time Warner Entertainment, a cable operations company, also received a grant to expand its existing Charlotte facility and add about 200 jobs.

Easley said that the weak national economy has prompted North Carolina officials to be more aggressive in their efforts to draw businesses to the state.

Time Warner Entertainment Company L.P. plans to expand its Charlotte operations over the next four years, adding 200 jobs and investing more than $3 million, the company announced Monday.

The plans are part of a Job Development Investment Grant, a performance-based grant created in 2002. If Time Warner Entertainment meets its new employment goals and retains the jobs for nine years, the grant will allot the company $3.18 million over that time. The grant does not provide money up front, said a state Department of Commerce spokeswoman.

A similar grant was awarded to the company in 2004, which allowed expansion of its Charlotte corporate offices in 2005. The company said that expansion exceeded its goals by creating more than 400 jobs and $31 million in investment.

Time Warner Entertainment is a majority-owned subsidiary of Time Warner Cable Inc. Time Warner Cable is the second largest cable operator in the country. It provides services to 14.7 million customers, including more than 1.5 million in North Carolina.

A spokeswoman for Freightliner said about 650 workers who were laid off in June will be asked to return to work at the company’s truck manufacturing plant in Rowan County.

Daimler Trucks North America spokeswoman Amy Sills told The Salisbury Post on Monday that the company will establish a “partial” second shift at the plant. She says workers will report Aug. 18 for orientation and training, with the shift starting Sept. 2.

Sills said the second shift is necessary because of orders for Freightliner’s new Class 8 Cascadia truck.

The recall brings total employment at the Cleveland plant to 1,985.

Freightliner laid off about 1,500 workers and eliminated the second shift in June.

A drug maker says it laid off 22 more employees at its North Carolina research facility following an earlier summer dismissal of scientific workers.

The Herald-Sun of Durham reported Tuesday that GlaxoSmithKline said the layoffs of chemists occurred last week at its Medicinal Chemistry and Oncology Department in Research Triangle Park.

The company laid off 100 researchers in June. department in June and two weeks ago laid off 90 people at its manufacturing plant in Zebulon, a Raleigh suburb.

The company said in June it was cutting 350 jobs around the world in its research staff.