LUTZ, Fla. — With Pasco County still one of the fastest-growing areas in the country, it is also attracting more international businesses to set up shop.
Reinhard Seipp could not find the right space for his photonics company in Tampa, so he moved north to Trinity.
“We had no idea that Pasco County even existed,” Seipp said.
WATCH: Pasco County’s growth draws wave of international businesses
He has been there ever since.
“Pasco used to be a place where you would go to live and then you would go to work in either Pinellas or Hillsborough. And that is now changing,” Seipp said.
UK-based G&H Photonics recently took over a building in Trinity, and Seipp serves as general manager. The company manufactures optics for the United States military.
“Companies, including tech companies, understand that the labor base here is as good or better as it is anywhere else, so they are settling their companies here and so are we,” Seipp said.
G&H Photonics is one of about a dozen international companies Pasco’s Economic Development Council has helped bring to the area.
Bill Cronin, president of the EDC, said Pasco County is one of the few places in the region with both the necessary land and workforce to attract new companies.
“We are all about not just recirculating money in our community. We are about getting other people’s money to come into our community and make that pie bigger so we aren’t just trading money amongst ourselves,” Cronin said.
The EDC’s SMARTLandings program recently helped Smytec Inc. open an office in Wesley Chapel. The program offers support, incentives, and local connections that make moving to the area easier.
Smytec, headquartered in England, produces high-tech tools to search for and capture forensic evidence. The company plans to add employees to its Pasco office in the months ahead.
“There’s a lot of development. It seems very family-friendly. Very safe. So, if I was to move over there, I have a 19-month-old and another one on the way. If it meant that I was moving over there, it felt quite homey,” said CEO Alexander Smyth.
Looking ahead, the EDC says more companies in health care and life sciences are expected to move to Pasco County to be near the Moffitt Cancer Center’s new Speros Campus.
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