Pillar Tech moves downtown to accommodate growing staff

Pillar Technology Group is on the move in Ann Arbor and is hiring about as many people as it can find.

The Columbus-based technology firm specializes in software and consulting services. It customer base is spread across the Great Lakes region and features companies in a broad range of industries, such as automotive, financial, and telecommunications, among many others.

About a third of its workforce (45 people) is based in Ann Arbor. For a long time, the Ann Arbor office called Tech Brewery home but a recent spate of hires (15 software developers over last year) meant it had to find a bigger home quickly.

"It was a nice space but it was just too small," says Charles Fry, regional vice president of Pillar Technology Group. Tech Brewery has made a name for itself as a entrepreneurial collective for tech startups. Think a large collective of startup teams of six people or less.

Pillar Technology Group has just signed a lease to take the entire seventh floor (10,000 square feet) of the office building at 301 E Liberty St. The company expects to move into the space by this fall, at which point it should have filled a number of the 20 open positions it has right now.

"We will probably be at 50 or 60 people by the time we move in," Fry says. "As long as the economy doesn't do something stupid on us we could see being at 100 people over the next couple of years."

Pillar Technology Group also considered a number of other different locations for its new home. Some of them include offices outside of Ann Arbor, including Detroit.

"Our team really like Ann Arbor," Fry says. "Most of the people have made their life decisions to live in or near Ann Arbor."

Source: Charles Fry, regional vice president of Pillar Technology Group
Writer: Jon Zemke

Read more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
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