Connecture to move headquarters to Waukesha [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]

Feb. 07--Health insurance software provider Connecture Inc. will move its headquarters from Atlanta to Waukesha County and, bolstered by a grant of state financial assistance, will add more than 100 jobs here, Gov. Scott Walker said Monday.

With Walker visiting Connecture's offices in the city of Pewaukee, the governor's office said in a statement that Connecture will receive up to $1.2 million in state credits over three years. In exchange, Connecture will create "over 100 high-paying professional technology jobs within the state" during that period, the statement said.

Broadly speaking, the agreement forgives Connecture $12,000 of its state corporate income tax bill for each of up to 100 jobs it adds here through 2014.

Connecture said last week that it is currently hiring to fill 25 positions and expects to add another 75 this year but didn't mention plans to move its headquarters.

The company started in Atlanta in the 1990s, and in 2004 purchased a Waukesha County firm, Riverwood Solutions. Since then the firm has maintained offices in both places and has a third office in Farmington, Conn.

Appearing Monday with Walker, company President Dan Maynard said he started Riverwood Solutions in 1997 with a home-equity loan, a charge card and four employees who are still with him.

"Though we live in turbulent times, today's meeting is about optimism," he said.

A Connecture spokeswoman said last week that the jobs for which the company is currently hiring average $85,000 a year.

The firm now employs 115 people in Pewaukee. Demand for its services has increased as insurers and others react to the federal health care reform act approved in March 2010.

To begin filling its new jobs, Connecture will hold a recruiting open house from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Thursday at the Iron Horse Hotel, 500 W. Florida St. Registration information is at www.connecture.com/jobs.

Connecture isn't the only software-related business growing in Waukesha County.

Swiss-based SoftwareOne, which resells the licenses to use the software of Microsoft and other companies, employs about 70 people at its U.S. headquarters in New Berlin and is moving to new offices in Waukesha to accommodate employee growth, a spokeswoman said.

Essentially a licensing wholesaler, SoftwareOne added 60 employees nationwide last year and is "aggressively working" to hire another 60 across the country in 2012, she said. She said 25 to 30 of those would be in Waukesha.

Laurel Walker of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.

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