Report: GE Makes Relocation Decision

The wait is over.

After months of speculating will they stay or will they go, the Boston Globe reports that Fairfield, CT-based GE will make a formal announcement on Thursday that it has selected Boston as the home of its new headquarters.

Fairfield—along with Somers, Armonk, Yonkers and White Plains in Westchester County in New York—has been anxiously awaiting GE’s decision ever since it announced last June that it would be exploring relocation options.

Recent signs pointed to the company’s exit from Fairfield, and Boston emerged as the leader. New York was also a finalist, according to reports.

The Boston Globe reports that GE’s executives called Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker and Boston Mayor Martin Walsh separately on Wednesday morning to inform them of their decision.

GE has about 800 employees at the Fairfield headquarters, where it has called home for the last 42 years. GE has been Fairfield’s largest taxpayer for years and its property was valued at $76,541,780 in 2014, according to the Connecticut Post.

GE has been weighing its options about relocating from its Fairfield headquarters ever since CEO Jeff Immelt expressed frustration over Connecticut’s new business tax increases in June and notified employees that he assembled an “exploratory team to look into the company’s options to relocate corporate HQ to another state with a more pro-business environment.”

Connecticut’s General Assembly passed a bill in a special session that rolled back some of the changes that alarmed businesses.

There were reports that the decision wouldn’t be based solely on taxes and incentives.

Boston emerged as a favorite as the city’s Seaport District is becoming defined by its “innovation economy” and would be ideal for GE as it transforms its portfolio into a premier digital industrial company.

Also, Bloomberg Business recently named Massachusetts as the most innovative in the country. Connecticut was fifth on the list and another reported finalist New York was No. 17.

Immelt recently said in Stamford after receiving a business leadership award that GE is a company that “doesn’t look for special deals, but we need an ecosystem that’s forward-looking, that’s future-looking; that’s willing to fight hard to be competitive and enduring for the future,” according to the Connecticut Post.

Immelt also said that’s “why we’re looking not just here but other places for where the eventual headquarters of the company will be. We will always have a big presence in Connecticut, but we think the power of an ecosystem is important.”