Talent pool key to Celigo expansion into Indy
INDIANAPOLIS (Inside INdiana Business) — The director of human resources for California-based Celigo says the tech company was looking for a developing tech community in which it could locate its third North American location. The company on Wednesday announced it is investing nearly $1.2 million to open an office in Indianapolis and create up to 150 jobs by the end of 2024. Heena Mistry says central Indiana met its need for an ecosystem that could support high-growth talent acquisition.
In an interview with Inside INdiana Business, Mistry said Indiana created a starting point for Celigo to achieve its goals.
“(The state) provided the ability for us to reach out to resources such as Orr Fellowship (and) TechPoint,” said Mistry. “Indiana also has a robust university environment such as Purdue, IU, Notre Dame and…the IEDC made it very easy for us to access talent from the local schools.”
Celigo bills itself as an Integration Platform-as-a-Service provider. The company’s platform allows businesses to connect all of the applications they use, such as Salesforce, Slack, ADP and others.
“All these applications don’t talk to each other, so you have to download information and upload it on a spreadsheet,” said Mistry. “The platform allows all these different applications to integrate. Only in the past, large companies like Apple and Google have these massive systems that talk to each other. Now, you have these smaller companies, midsize companies have the same technology but with minimal cost.”
Mistry says the company was not a stranger to Indiana. Celigo currently employs 17 people who work remotely from the Hoosier State.
“Our business is such that we don’t need to hire for a specific location; people could work from home in any region,” she said. “We have folks all over the U.S., but we focused on Indiana. Five years ago, we had hired one leader there and she ended up growing her team there and we were able to find talent with minimal effort there and we still don’t have as much of a problem hiring there.”
Mistry says the environment in the Bay Area tech sector is very competitive. She says in talking to representatives from Indiana, she was surprised by how welcoming the tech community is.
“They want to see Indiana succeed and that is such a breath of fresh air for us and for me and I’m thinking, ‘Wow, I wish I had that in the Bay Area,’ which is not the case. In Indiana, I’ve noticed that warm welcome from just about everybody that I’ve been introduced to and I really appreciate that.”
While a specific site has not yet been identified, Mistry says Celigo is looking to open the office in or near downtown Indianapolis.