A Toronto-headquartered firm that specializes in investor relations solutions has announced that it’s opening a new office in Hamilton in March with a hiring process for 140 new employees already underway.
Q4 Inc.’s new office, located at 59 King St. E, will initially occupy 9,500 square-feet of the second floor before expanding to an additional 7,500 sq. ft. on the fourth floor by the end of 2020.
This brings Q4’s total offices to five, with others located in Toronto, New York, London, and Copenhagen.
Darrell Heaps, the founder and chief executive officer for Q4, said that they initially considered an office closer to Toronto, such as Mississauga or Vaughan, but decided to step a little outside of the city to Hamilton for a couple of reasons. Chief among them, he said, was that Toronto and the surrounding areas are very competitive for technical jobs, something he said can be offset by putting down roots in Hamilton instead.
“When we really looked at what we wanted to do, it was something outside of Toronto because Toronto itself is very, very competitive for technical roles,” Heaps told IT World Canada. “As well, the talent pool that we’d be able to attract… we’ve got a lot of folks that are coming in from West of Toronto. And so being able to have something which will allow them to kind of reverse commute, so to speak, was something that we looked at.”
Heaps also expects the talent to come from the Niagara Region, Burlington, and even Kitchener and Waterloo.
When people think of Hamilton, he added, they don’t think of a tech hub, but he said he sees economic opportunity there as well as an area that is more in line with the company culture.
“It certainly isn’t known as a tech hub now,” admitted Heaps. “But when you look at the revitalization that’s happening downtown, we feel like we’re on the early part of the curve. We look at the economic benefits… For us being able to get in early, we’re able to put a business model or business case in place, which allows us to come in at on a lower cost basis in terms of the real estate but then essentially still attract a very similar, if not identical type of workforce into that space.”
Judy Lam, the City’s manager of commercial districts and small business, expressed a little more optimism about the current state of Hamilton as a tech hub while lauding Q4’s move into Hamilton.
“As our tech sector continues to grow, we’ve been working hard to cultivate and retain creative and skilled workers in our city,” said Lam in a press release. “Q4’s expansion into Hamilton is a testament to our city’s incredible quality of life, strong tech ecosystem, and unique, affordable office space not found elsewhere.”
This newest location is a continuation of the recent growth the company has experienced. Last week Q4 acquired the IR web hosting business of New York-based S&P Global Market Intelligence, which had an influence on the fact that the company nearly doubled its client base to 2,200 in just the last few months.
Interested applicants can find the full list of open positions at the company’s career page.
While much of the company’s business is conducted in the U.S., according to Heaps, he said the size of the investor relations market in Canada is comparable and will lead to many opportunities.
