ADT to add 120 jobs at Florida HQ

The ADT Corp. won praise from Florida Gov. Rick Scott at an event this week at which ADT announced it will add 120 jobs at its Boca Raton headquarters, according to a newspaper report.

Florida state, county and local governments have pledged $1.6 million in a public funding incentive package to persuade ADT to stay in Florida and create the jobs, according to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. It said the jobs would be created over the next couple of years and be in “human resources, information technology, finance, legal and other positions needed at a corporate headquarters and public company.”

The paper quoted ADT CEO Naren Gursahaney as saying at the event that ADT already has added 600 new employees this year in its offices throughout the state, and that ADT has “committed to continue to grow our workforce here."

Here's more from the Sun-Sentinel report:

The security company was offered a $1.6 million incentive package to remain in Boca Raton and create at least 120 jobs. Palm Beach County approved a $184,000 job growth incentive grant as part of the package.

Gov. Scott [who attended the event] said the incentive package is based on a formula to provide a "five times" return on taxpayer dollars. Enterprise Florida has given economic incentives to about 140 companies this year that have made commitments to create 22,000 to 23,000 jobs, he said. 

Scott said he was pleased ADT chose Florida for its headquarters instead of Texas, his rival in job-creation efforts. ADT has a large office in Dallas.

Palm Beach County Commission Chairman Steven Abrams pointed out that of the 46 corporate headquarters in Palm Beach County, nearly half of them are in Boca Raton.

"You have to have a plan. The City of Boca Raton has a plan backed up by dollars and that's making a difference," Abrams said.

In 2010, ADT was offered $1.3 million in incentives to invest in its new North American corporate headquarters at 1501 Yamato Road. At that time, the company committed to creating 20 jobs over five years.

ADT has 16,000 employees worldwide, 700 of whom work in South Florida.

Sarah Cohn, ADT director of media relations, has told me that it is “normal practice” for a lot of companies to seek such public incentives. “Many state and local governments seek to incentivize companies to stay in their areas," she said.

In fact, ADT, which began trading on the New York Stock Exchange on Oct. 1, was just one of three companies that Palm Beach County commissioners recently unanimously approved to receive such incentives, according to the Sun-Sentinel. Aerospace company Pratt & Whitney and Digital Risk, a financial services company, each was approved for $300,000 in county grants and millions more in state and city funding to create jobs, the newspaper said.