AUSTIN | Waterloo Park Central (HealthSouth site) | 37 Floors x2 | Cancelled

[We vs us]

So, only sort of a Brackenridge story, but . . .

Merck walks away from $7M in incentives for Austin tech hub

Merck & Co. is walking away from nearly $7 million in taxpayer-funded state and local incentives aimed at luring to Austin a major technology innovation center operated by the pharmaceutical giant, a project once heralded as the private-sector anchor of a developing medical district around the University of Texas Dell Medical School.

Merck spokeswoman Pamela Eisele on Tuesday attributed the move to “internal priorities and events” that have slowed the New Jersey-based company’s hiring in Austin since the incentive deals were announced in July 2017. Eisele said Merck intends to maintain a presence in Austin but declined to say if the company has permanently scaled back plans for its operations here.

The city of Austin had agreed to provide Merck with an $856,000 incentive package, on top of a $6 million grant from the Texas Enterprise Fund pledged by Gov. Greg Abbott. But neither the city nor the state have paid any money to Merck under the deals, because the company hasn’t hit its investment and hiring targets.

The original agreement with the city required Merck to ramp up its spending and hiring in stages, for a total $28.7 million investment and 600 full-time employees by the end of 2023. By the close of this year, the deal called for Merck to have invested $7.2 million and have 290 employees.

Last summer, however, Merck amended the city deal to push out its various investment and hiring targets by two years. Recently, it quietly moved to terminate the incentive agreements altogether with both the city and the state.

https://www.statesman.com/news/20190...ustin-tech-hub

Mysterious!