Downtown lands Coca-Cola IT center, 2,000 jobs by Douglas Sams

The Coca-Cola Co. is launching an Atlanta IT center that will house almost 2,000 jobs to the heart of downtown.

Coca-Cola (NYSE: KO) will put its “Information Technology Center of Excellence” at SunTrust Plaza’s Garden Offices.The location emerged as the favorite earlier this year to land Coke’s operations. The six-story Garden Offices were completed at the end of the dot-com boom in 2000 and outfitted with wide-open floor plans and lots of natural light to draw high-tech workers.

By the middle of next year, the IT center “will bring together nearly 2,000 of our Atlanta-based information technology associates and contractors in one central location to further improve the efficiency of our operations,” Coca-Cola spokesman Kent Landers said in an email.

Coca-Cola has entered into 275,868-square-foot lease in the Garden Offices for the next 10 years. It’s a huge win for downtown, and expands Coke’s already significant presence there. With its move, the company will employ more than 6,500 people downtown, between its North Avenue headquarters and the new IT center.

Atlanta Business Chronicle reported in April that the beverage giant had entered final negotiations with the ownership of SunTrust Plaza.

The 60-story SunTrust Plaza has been a fixture on the skyline since the 1990s and was developed by internationally renowned architect John Portman Jr. It helps anchor a downtown business district bounded by Peachtree Center Avenue, and Peachtree, Baker and Courtland streets.