A familiar feeling.

• Position: Triad

In December, Herbalife Ltd. announced it would invest $130 million to turn the former Dell Inc. computer plant in Winston-Salem into its largest manufacturing and distribution hub, creating about 500 jobs by 2015. The Los Angeles-based maker of nutrition and weight-loss products is eligible for $3.5 million in local incentives and up to $6.5 million from the state. But the same day Herbalife released its plans, influential hedge-fund manager Bill Ackman called the company a pyramid scheme--alleging its 2 million independent distributors make more from recruiting other distributors than selling products--and made a $1 billion short bet against it. Herbalife claimed Ackman was attempting "market manipulation," but some believe its troubles could thwart the expansion into the Triad--a possibility eerily reminiscent of the building's former tenant.

Dell announced in 2004 it would invest $115 million to build a 750,000-square-foot desktop-computer factory in the Triad that would employ 1,400 people within five years of its opening. Regional leaders, who competed against each other for the project, saw technology as a replacement for the fading textile, tobacco and furniture industries and made the Round Rock, Texas-based company eligible for record local and state incentives of up to $306 million. But in 2009, as consumers moved from desktops to laptops and mobile devices, it closed the plant and laid off all 900 workers. Most of the incentives were never disbursed, and clawback provisions meant Dell repaid almost everything it received.

Bob Leak, president of Winston-Salem Business Inc., says the economic-development organization has...