With $2.9 million in tax incentives and proximity to the banking industry, Charlotte beat out Austin, Texas, and Florida’s Tampa Bay area for a new Spectra Group Inc. delivery center.
Spectra CEO and founder Aditya Narra told reporters Tuesday he decided on Charlotte for his company’s big expansion because it provided a deep talent pool of IT pros with financial-services experience, easy access to New York and a business-friendly climate with tax rebates for the 250 jobs he plans to deliver.
“We looked at a lot of up-and-coming markets before choosing Charlotte,” he said.
Narra, a 42-year-old immigrant, founded the company in Princeton, N.J., in 2009. It specializes in helping large banks and other financial-services firms with compliance and audit projects.
Tire work in Charlotte will focus on assisting clients with work related to the Federal Reserve’s annual Comprehensive Capital Analysis & Review examinations and compliance with the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform legislation.
Spectra Group has 500 employees and will add 200 jobs in Charlotte over the next few years.
Tire jobs will pay average annual salaries of $84,996. Fifty positions will be relocated here beginning Aug. 1.
Tire firm has leased 12,864 square feet in the BB&T Center uptown. Trip Guin with TRIPP Commercial and Jim Barber with M3 Millennium Cos. represented Spectra in the real estate transaction, and Ted Lee with Spectrum Properties represented the landlord.
Narra says Spectra Group hopes to win Charlotte-based Bank of America Corp. or Wells Fargo & Co. as new clients. Wells has 22,000 employees here.
Narra says recent trends have seen large firms outsourcing jobs and project work to sites in other countries with low’er costs.
Fie says he plans to offer clients the ability’ to save 20% while keeping the jobs in “mid-cost” U.S. cities such as Charlotte.
“We see Charlotte as a nearshore location,” he said. “It’s in the same time zone as New York, and we hope this experiment will work.”
Tire remarks about bringing IT jobs back to the U.S., and specifically Charlotte, drew applause from a gathered crowd at Tuesday’s announcement at the Charlotte Chamber uptown.
Gov. Pat McCrory w’as on hand to w’eleonre Spectra Group to the Queen City’, joking after his prepared remarks that he w’ould talk to Narra about relocating Iris headquarters here.
