By Karen Brune Mathis, Daily Record
Deutsche Bank’s top executive in Jacksonville made a promise last month concerning the global financial services company’s potential decision about a site consolidation in Jacksonville.
“What we do is going to be good for Jacksonville,” said Michael Fleming, managing director of the bank’s Jacksonville operations.
He referred other questions to the bank’s public relations staff, whose U.S. offices are in New York. The company is based in Germany.
The Daily Record reported March 19 that Deutsche Bank is continuing its site search for a consolidated Jacksonville office campus, and one of the locations is 30 vacant acres owned by JEA on the Downtown Southbank.
Deutsche Bank has declined comment about its property decisions.
Deutsche Bank came to town in 2008 and has expanded to occupy almost 300,000 square feet of space among seven suburban office buildings. Its workforce is expected to reach at least 1,600-1,800 employees by the end of 2016, based on public documents and incentives requests.
Other than in those documents, Deutsche Bank hasn’t discussed its local employment numbers.
Jacksonville business leader and veteran develop Peter Rummell, who envisioned developing a project on the Southbank site, said he understands the Deutsche Bank operation could reach 4,000 to 5,000 jobs.
Fleming’s full title is managing director and head of public affairs and community relations for Technology and Services Centres for the Americas, Jacksonville, for Deutsche Bank.
Fleming spoke at the Community Wealth Building Roundtable organized by Mayor Alvin Brown, The Democracy Collaborative at the University of Maryland and the Interfaith Coalition for Action, Reconciliation and Empowerment.
Fleming served as a panelist about “Local Innovations and Possibilities” and shared information about Deutsche Bank’s hiring and support of military veterans and the city’s Jobs for Veterans program.
Fleming, who was born and raised in Jacksonville, is a retired brigadier general.
Deutsche Bank announced Sept. 1, 2010, that Fleming joined the firm as a managing director and head of the Global Business Services Center in Jacksonville, “responsible for providing strategic leadership and spearheading the development, communications and implementation of growth strategies, policies and financial objectives.”
It said Fleming served more than 30 years in the military and most recently as CEO of the Florida Army National Guard with responsibility for more than 10,000 soldiers.
Asked a second time about the site decision in Jacksonville, Fleming repeated: “It’ll be good for Jacksonville.”
That comment was forecast in a Wall Street Journal report Oct. 9.
The report said Deutsche Bank has been outsourcing back-office Wall Street jobs for years and is moving bankers and traders to “near-shore” locations like Jacksonville.
“We are moving out, and Jacksonville is the approach we’ve taken in the U.S.,” said Chief Financial Officer Stefan Krause to the Journal.
Krause said locations like Jacksonville and Birmingham, England, are 30 percent cheaper than in New York or London.
Even more telling: Krause said about 8,000 jobs will eventually be involved in such efforts.
Deutsche Bank seems to be laying the hiring groundwork for its centers as well. It reports in its 2013 annual review and online that international competition for future top talent has increased in recent years.
“Talent acquisition plays a key role in optimizing the bank’s locations, driving cultural change and thus contributing to Deutsche Bank’s business success,” it said.
In 2013, Deutsche Bank said it hired 1,196 “junior, highly qualified people” around the world. The company inducted 501 university graduates into the bank’s Graduate Training Program and additional young people were hired as part of the expansion of Deutsche Bank’s service centers.
“Furthermore, the bank set up or expanded technology centers in Moscow, Bucharest and Cary (North Carolina, USA) as well as integrated service centers in Jacksonville (Florida, USA), Birmingham (UK) and Manila (Philippines),” said the site.