Bay Area consumer management firm adding Phoenix office

By Andrew Knochel         

Cronkite News

Social consumer management company Gigya will hire 200 people for a new north Phoenix office, Gov. Jan Brewer and others announced Tuesday.

Brewer said the Mountain View, Calif.-based company is looking for workers to provide technical and sales support for the corporate clients, including Nike Inc., airlines and  media companies. Gigya’s products help corporate brands sign up users to their websites, take and manage customer data and use the data to refine marketing.

“I’m told it was Arizona’s many technology companies, highly skilled workforce, available technical talent and competitive business cost that led Gigya to choose Arizona,” Brewer said at a news conference held at the Arizona Commerce Authority.

The announcement came a day after Apple Inc. announced plans to buy a newly completed factory in Mesa and bring 700 high-tech manufacturing jobs to the state.

Gigya CEO Patrick Salyer said his company, which also has offices in Tel Aviv and London, began looking to expand after doubling its workforce in in the past eight months.

“We realized we didn’t think Silicon Valley alone could help us grow and invest enough,” he said. “We thought we’d have to look and grow elsewhere to maintain that level of growth.”

Salyer said Gigya based its decision on proximity to Silicon Valley, business climate and a workforce with both educated young workers and well-trained experienced workers. The company plans to hire more than 50 people here by the end of 2013 and will continue filling jobs for two or three years.

“I speculate that this will become a trend,” Salyer said. “You have a lot of other companies that are in very similar situations as us. Extremely high growth, often located in Silicon Valley or the Bay Area, and it’s tough to maintain the levels of growth they want to maintain there.”

Salyer called the jobs Gigya is currently filling high-end sales jobs. Gigya’s staff works with customers on sales that might take months, requiring lots of training and education.

“It’s very hard to find and hire these people, so I know how high-skilled it is,” Salyer said.

Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton said that city policies helped encourage Gigya’s decision, including its 24-hour turnaround on permits.

“Today’s announcement is the result of leadership by the state, by the city and by the Arizona Commerce Authority,” Stanton said. “We are all on the same team.”

Gigya will qualify for $445,100 in worker training grants from the Arizona Commerce Authority.

Jim Waring, the city councilman whose district includes the site, said Gigya will add to the area’s technology credentials. CityNorth, where Gigya’s office will be located, is near Mayo Clinic and acres of open land owned by the Arizona State Land Department.

“With Mayo Clinic right across the street, we’re really excited about the potential impact,” he said. “Mayor Stanton and I have had numerous meetings with ASU, with Mayo, with the State Land Department about what’s going to go in there. It’s the most prime piece of real estate, according to our economists, between Dallas and the Pacific Ocean.”