Jacksonville Business Journal
18th Jan 2008by Rachel Witkowski
Merrill Lynch & Company Inc. is opening its first global command center in Jacksonville.
The center will be the main operations monitoring and response site for the company and among only two being built in the world. The second one is under construction in Singapore.
The department, called integrated Operations Command Center, or iOCC, will launch Feb. 29.
The center, located in a newly rebuilt building at Merrill Lynch's campus on the Southside, will be hiring about 300 employees.
About 100 of the hires will be Merrill Lynch employees who are moving from New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
Merrill is looking for entry level positions such as college graduates or someone with help desk experience who can assess and react quickly to emergencies, said Tony Lotito, first vice president of Global Technologies Infrastructure Operations.
Since iOCC is monitoring the global network that includes about 1,000 Merrill Lynch applications, servers, software roll outs and client trade, Lotito said employees will work 12-hour shifts in order to keep iOCC running 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
There is also management and upper level position opportunities, Merrill Lynch executives said.
The upper level positions average $60,000 annually, said William Bridy, first vice president, managing director for Merrill Lynch's Financial Data Services Inc.
Lotito said Merrill Lynch invested about $6.5 million just in rebuilding and creating the space for iOCC.
Merrill Lynch expects to have the center filled by the summer.
"When it's done, I think it's going to be a real star for Jacksonville, not just Merrill Lynch," Lotito said.
http://washington.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/stories/2008/01/14/daily41.html