Microsoft to hire in Lehi

LEHI — If you're in the market for a software development job, you might want to head to Utah County. Microsoft Corp. is hiring.

The software giant, based in Redmond, Wash., announced Wednesday that the company will occupy space at Thanksgiving Park in Lehi beginning in August and will eventually hire about 100 information technology professionals.

"We're looking for product developers, software engineers, program managers, software test engineers," said Paul Mayfield, Microsoft director of engineering, at an open house announcing a five-year lease agreement on the property. "This is the core to Microsoft business. This is what produces the products that we sell."

He said the company would lease about 24,000 square feet of Class A office space on the third floor of a building at 3400 N. Ashton Blvd. near Thanksgiving Point. The new building is the first of a five-building complex, all of which will be energy-efficient, John Petersen, commercial associate with Coldwell Banker Commercial, said.

Other Thanksgiving Park tenants are Sorenson Capital, Agel Enterprises, ProPay Inc., Vucci Technology Solutions and Private Capital Group.

Microsoft has a Southwest district sales office at 123 Wright Brothers Drive in Salt Lake City, with fewer than 50 employees as well as research and development operations in Draper with approximately 50 employees.

Wednesday's announcement follows 15 months of negotiations to bring the operations to Utah, according to Jason Perry, who has served as executive director of the Governor's Office of Economic Development but on Wednesday was named the transition director for Lt. Gov. Gary Herbert.

"Microsoft tested the waters (in Utah) for a while. ... They loved what they saw in this place — the talent and the opportunity," he said. "We didn't even offer incentives from the state for Microsoft to come here."

Perry said the state's low cost of doing business and well-educated work force compared to other nearby states attracted the company to Utah.

"It's really hard to do business in places like California now," he said. "As taxes start increasing, as red tape starts increasing because of it, they start looking for other locations."

Perry added that his agency has six or seven other projects that they are working on that could bring even more jobs to Utah. Announcements about those projects could be given during the next couple of months, he said.

Herbert said the prime objective right now is to grow the state's economy.

"I'm going to do everything to work with our business community, to provide opportunities for the new entrepreneur, protect the jobs that are here and grow the economy," Herbert said.

E-MAIL: jlee@desnews.com