GE set to announce location of new corporate headquarters

Companies from all sectors including G.

“We’ve got to make an environment here where more companies want to come here”, he said.

Boston is home to some 250,000 students at more than 55 colleges and universities, including world-class research hubs like Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University. “We are excited to bring our headquarters to this dynamic and creative city”.

“Governor Malloy even thought it was a good idea”, Fasano said.

It’s hard not to see the appeal of GE for Boston. GE Healthcare said it would move its corporate headquarters and an unspecified number of jobs to Chicago, from the United Kingdom.

“He left this state because the unpredictable nature of our budgeting, the amount of deficits we have year-in and year-out and we don’t have control”, Fasano said.

Connecticut’s corporate income tax rate is nominally 7.5 percent, but GE likely pays an effective rate of 9 percent due to surcharges on growth income, versus 8 percent in MA, said Jared Walczak, a policy analyst at the Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan think tank. GE announced in June it was considering a move because CT lawmakers passed controversial business tax increases. To that end, the city offered incentives that include property-tax breaks of up to $25 million over two decades.

Now, the company is also trying to remake its public image and itself by moving homes to Boston’s high-tech environs leaving its old headquarters in Fairfield, Connecticut. To offset the cost of the move, the company said it will sell its offices in Fairfield and at Rockefeller Plaza in New York City. It is expected to complete by 2018.

GE said the financial incentives from state and city governments vying for its headquarters were competitive.

It also helps that GE will be getting a package of incentives from Boston that carries a value of as high as $145 million. However many are concerned about the potential consequences of this move for the residents of CT.

With 800 employees, the Boston headquarters will be the same size as Fairfield, but its makeup will change, GE said.

BOSTON—General Electric officially announced Wednesday afternoon that it will be shifting its headquarters operations from Fairfield, CT to the Seaport District here.

“This is a tremendous loss at all sorts of levels”, said Republican Senate Minority Leader Len Fasano.

Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy said in an afternoon press conference that he was “disappointed” that GE made a decision to leave. “Businesses large and small are making investment decisions every day and they are paying close attention to what’s happening in Hartford”.

Judging from the Boston-area reaction to GE’s announcement, Boston is now poised to become the next Silicon Valley. GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt fanned the flames when he wrote a memo earlier in 2015 complaining about tax changes enacted by the state legislature previous year. Little information is available on that, according to the International Business Times.

Brennan said that’s why his Connecticut Business and Industry Association has supported the state’s efforts to upgrade the University of Connecticut and other higher education institutions, which he said can be “a game-changer” for firms.