World-class airport, low cost of living attract businesses large and small to the Peach City

By Louis Mayeux

Atlanta’s Coca-Cola Company became an American icon with its secret formula. But there’s no mystery about the ingredients of the metro area’s remarkable rise as an international business center.

With a roster of 10 Fortune 500 companies, including the famous soft drink giant, Atlanta boasts a wealth of attributes that draw new businesses and keeps them growing once they’re here. The fastest-growing metro area in population from 2000 to 2006, metro Atlanta, with its peach symbol serving as a new South answer to New York’s Big Apple, sizzles with a significant number of young, creative types.

“Metro Atlanta is a magnet for attracting talented people and fast-growing companies,” says Hans Gant, the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce’s senior vice president for economic development. “In the last 20 years alone, the population has doubled, and Atlanta has become one of the top job producers in the nation.”

According to a recent survey by Forbes magazine, Atlanta ranks sixth in the country of best places for businesses and careers. In the study of 200 metro areas with populations of over 240,000, Atlanta was recognized for its pro-business environment, strong job and income growth.

Located just south of the city of Atlanta, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport is the world’s busiest. A vibrant rail center from its beginning, Atlanta remains a crossroads for major highways and railroads. Along with its outstanding infrastructure, including quality office buildings and manufacturing facilities, the metro area is rich in human capital, including top research universities, technological institutions and a quality workforce. Gant also cites the metro area’s involved corporate culture and influential leadership.

Ranked fifth in the nation among cities with the most Fortune 500 companies, Atlanta is the least costly large U.S. city for business, according to a study released by KPMG LLP. Atlanta’s Fortune 500 roster includes the city’s traditional powerhouses, Coca-Cola Company, Delta Air Lines and the Southern Co., along with relatively recent corporate citizens such as UPS and The Home Depot. Coca-Cola Enterprises, Genuine Parts and SunTrust Banks are the city’s other members on the list. Outside of the city, AGCO is based in Duluth, in the northeast suburb of Gwinnett County; Mohawk Industries in Calhoun, about 100 miles north of Atlanta; and AFLAC, of squawking duck fame in Columbus.

The metro area’s northern arc, cutting a swath across the suburban Cobb, Gwinnett, Forsyth and north Fulton counties, courts new businesses with strong incentive packages. The counties provide workers with a vibrant choice of lifestyles, with strong neighborhoods, standout schools and vital recreation.

Gwinnett County is known as a metro leader in business and residential growth. “The recipe is pretty easy,” says Nick Masino, vice president of economic development for the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce. “We have an incredible quality of life, with incredible schools and great parks. We have an abundant amount of jobs and also for the companies, an incredibly strong workforce.”

The county encompasses 13,000 acres of parkland with an extensive trail network. Of its 15 cities, more than any other county in Georgia, more than half have definable downtowns, with charming restaurants, galleries and other businesses. Out of 15 county high schools, six were ranked in the top 2 percent in the country by Newsweek magazine.

Masino also said that Gwinnett is a key driver in the Innovation Crescent Regional Partnership, which encompasses 13 counties. The partnership seeks to develop life science businesses “to combat the Research Triangle (N.C.) in our area,” he says.

Among the city of Atlanta’s nine Fortune 500 companies, Newell Rubbermaid moved its corporate headquarters to the city in 2003. The manufacturer of a variety of consumer products is building a 350,000-square-foot, 14-floor headquarters building in the northern sector of the city, increasing its number of employees to 350. The headquarters building will open this summer.

“Atlanta has a world-class global airport—we’re a global company, and we can fly just about anywhere we need to in the world from Atlanta, with direct flights in many cases,” says company spokesperson David Doolittle.

Like other corporate leaders, Doolittle cited the metro area’s human talent pool as a key asset. “We are building a company of employees who are as diverse as the diverse consumers who use our products,” he says. “So certainly, we find a very talented and diverse talent base here in Atlanta.”

Atlanta, he says, “is a very attractive city, with attractive weather and cultural amenities. We’re excited to be here—it’s definitely exceeded our expectations.”

Another part of the company’s metro Atlanta growth is a new 800,000-square-foot distribution center to be built south of Atlanta near the airport. The distribution center will employ 300, for a net gain of 100 jobs with the closure of the company’s distribution center in Columbus, Ga., about 100 miles south of Atlanta.

Such corporate growth is part of a rushing tide—Census Bureau figures for 2000-’06 showed Atlanta led the nation with 856,266 new residents, a 20 percent growth rate for a total population of 5.1 million. According to Gant, metro Atlanta created more than 70,000 jobs in 2007 and 60,000 in 2006, making the region No. 2 in the country for job creation.

The diversity of the region’s economy is reflected in the rapid growth of companies like North Carolina-based Quintiles Transnational Corp., which provides medical research and testing of new drugs. The company recently expanded and consolidated its Global Central Laboratories and Clinical Development Services into a single structure in Marietta, located northwest of Atlanta in the vibrant suburban community of Cobb County. Quintiles’ lab operations had been based in Cobb County since 1991.The 201,366-square-foot, three-story structure will more than double the combined space of the two consolidated divisions, allowing for about 400 new jobs through 2011.

Quintiles Transnational Corp. a global leader in pharmaceutical services and health care, with nearly 18,000 employees and offices in more than 50 countries, chose to locate one of its laboratories in Marietta to tap into Atlanta’s large labor pool of qualified employees.

“It’s extremely beneficial,” says Dan Brown, vice president and general manager of Quintiles Laboratories North America, adding to the “diversity of the talent base that we find in the state of Georgia and also in the Atlanta region specifically. For a very complex and wide-ranging business, this is very significant.” He said Atlanta’s Emory University and Georgia Tech, along with the University of Georgia, located near Atlanta in Athens, and the area’s community college system, were key in providing qualified workers, including lab technicians.

The company considered moving its operations out of the state, but an $11 million incentive package led to the company deciding to stay in Georgia. This includes training and collaboration with the Georgia Research Alliance Technology Fund and access to the Georgia Cancer Coalition, which has a network of more than 100 oncologists ready to work with Quintiles on new clinical trials. Brown said the Development Authority of Cobb County, led by Don Beaver and Cobb County Board of Commissioners Chairman Sam Olens, played key roles in arranging the incentives.

Another company in the medical field that has found metro Atlanta an incubator for growth is Belgium-based UCB Pharma, which has its U.S. headquarters in Smryna. The company is currently retooling its current structures to accommodate growth in research and development and other positions. The pharmaceutical company’s U.S. operations have been based in Smyrna since 1995.

“We have to add more people to manage this growth we’re experiencing,” says UCB spokesman Eric Miller. “It’s a very exciting time for us, and a very exciting time for Georgia. We’re one of the leading biopharma companies in the state.” Miller says Georgia’s main value for his company is “the skilled workforce, and just the environment within Georgia in this area of biotechnology. It’s a very large sector—there are a lot of other companies that are here or coming to Georgia.”

Other recent additions to Atlanta include WiPro Technologies, which will open a new global software development center in Atlanta with 500 jobs, and Petco Pet Products company, which will have 217 jobs at a new $19 million distributions center in Braselton, located about 100 miles north of Atlanta.

In Gwinnett, Mega Training Systems will add 400 new jobs over the next 10 years. In the fourth quarter of 2007, Cisco announced it is adding 500 new jobs at its Lawrenceville campus, and Xicom, a startup tech company, is adding 80 jobs.

Companies big and small, from long established legendary companies to the newest startup, find Atlanta the right place for business. And, when the day is done, the metro area’s highly educated workers find an incredible mix of restaurants, taverns, parks, theaters, sports and musical venues. For work and play, commerce and pleasure, metro Atlanta really is the Big Peach.