Grand opening ceremonies were held today at C3i’s new hardware services depot at 248 Armstrong Road, CenterPoint Commerce & Trade Park East, Jenkins Township.
C3i, a leading provider of technology enablement and Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) services for the life sciences industry, announced in October 2011 that it had leased approximately 41,000 square feet of space in the building from Mericle Commercial Real Estate Services.
The company is using the space to receive, repair, and distribute computers used by life sciences professionals.
State and local officials joined with leadership of the Greater Pittston Chamber of Commerce and Mericle to help C3i CEO Joel Morse cut the ribbon for the new operation.
Morse said, “After 10 months of hard work by C3i and Mericle, I’m excited and pleased to announce that C3i has fully completed the migration of our global hardware services depot from New Jersey to this facility in Jenkins Township, PA”
There are now about 100 employees at the facility. C3i also has 125 employees at its call center, which is housed in a Mericle building in Plains Township, Luzerne County. The firm also has 55 employees in Swiftwater, Pennsylvania based at a client campus.
Morse said the excellent operational results of the Plains Township call center was an important factor in C3i’s decision to bring the global hardware services depot to CenterPoint. “Luzerne County has an outstanding labor force,” he said. “Having the call center and hardware services depot in close proximity to each other will improve team interactions and will help us establish career paths for our employees.”
Greater Pittston Chamber of Commerce President Joseph Burke, Esq., welcomed C3i to the Pittston area and said the technology jobs the company has brought to CenterPoint are the types of jobs local economic development agencies strive to attract. “This facility is playing a key role in keeping life sciences companies running smoothly,” he said. “C3i is a great addition to the Greater Pittston business community.”
Morse said some of the services C3i’s global hardware services depot offers to the life sciences industry include software engineering, break/fix for PCs, laptops, iPhones and iPads, storage and asset management services, and deployment of new technology. C3i is also certified by major original equipment manufacturers to perform warranty repairs.
According to Mericle Chief Operating Officer Lew Sebia, the 92,400 square foot flex building partially occupied by C3i was constructed on speculation by Mericle as part of its Ready to Go Program.
“The goal of this program is to make sure we have a wide variety of existing space and building-ready sites available when companies like C3i contact us,” said Sebia. “Through the Ready to Go program, we are fully preparing more than 90 building pads on1700 acres in 10 local business parks, including CenterPoint East and West. We have plans to develop 15 million square feet of industrial, flex, and office space on those sites,” he said.
“We are very proud to have C3i as a tenant in two of our buildings,” said Sebia. C3i is a tremendous corporate citizen that has brought 280 jobs to our area and we wish them great success in the years ahead.
Sebia added that CenterPoint Commerce & Trade Park now houses 31 companies employing more than 3,400 workers.
Founded by Dave Hanaman, Joel Morse and Diana Kyser in 1993, C3i has grown into the leading provider of technology support services for the life sciences industry. Today, C3i serves over half of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies from global operations centers on three continents.
C3i is headquartered in Morristown, New Jersey and also has operations in Hyderabad, India; Sofia, Bulgaria; and Dalian, China.
The company provides multilingual service desk, hardware services and end user training for more than 300,000 pharmaceutical sales and clinical professionals in 140 countries.
Mericle Commercial Real Estate Services, founded by Robert Mericle, has provided commercial real estate solutions to companies in Northeastern and North Central Pennsylvania for more than 30 years. Mericle is a developer of investment grade industrial, office, flex, and medical space and ReadyToGo!™ Sites. More than 13,400 people work in the buildings Mericle has developed.