Telect Inc., the Liberty Lake-based developer and manufacturer of telecommunications-connectivity equipment, moved its headquarters April 1 to a larger leased space about a half-mile away from its previous location.

The move to a 27,000-square-foot structure at 23321 E. Knox follows a year in which Telect experienced a double-digit increase in revenues and comes at a time when the company is looking to add staff, says Telect CEO Wayne Williams.

Meanwhile, Center Partners, the Fort Collins, Colo.-based call-center operator with facilities in Post Falls and Coeur d'Alene, is in the early stages of applying for a building permit with the city of Liberty Lake to make improvements to Telect's former headquarters, located at 1730 N. Madson Lane. That building had housed Telect's administrative, sales and support, and product-development teams since 2005.

Williams says that Telect was using only about 16,000 square feet of the total 52,500-square-foot building on Madson, so the new space has about 11,000 square feet of additional space.

The extra space at the Knox building will allow the company to expand its engineering and product-development operations, he says.

"We felt that it was a prudent thing for us to do, to make a move into a facility more aligned with our advanced development and our corporate management team," Williams says. "The current building allows us to refine our brand a bit."

He says that the company currently is looking to hire eight people to fill new positions in its engineering department. Right now, Telect employs about 80 people at its Liberty Lake headquarters, he says.

Williams says that last year the company saw growth both in employment and revenue. He says revenues grew by about 28 percent, but he declines to disclose Telect's total sales for 2010. He says he anticipates the company to continue experiencing growth in both employment and sales this year as well.

"Overall, the telecom market is beginning its reinvestment after a 10-year drought, mostly because of global devices and needs for entertainment and video conferencing and increased mobile use," Williams says.

He says the company so far has invested a total of about $500,000 into its new space, including the purchase of new Apple computer workstations for all of its employees. According to the building permit issued by the city of Liberty Lake, Telect spent about $40,000 on interior improvements in the building.

"A significant amount was spent on other investments into the space besides the building itself," he says. "Most of that could be moved to another facility, such as the computer upgrades."

While not all of the interior improvements to the space are complete yet, Williams says the company had completely moved into the building as of April 1.

Telect Inc. manufactures connectivity equipment, wiring components, and other related products for use in the telecommunications industries. It operates manufacturing plants in Plano, Texas, and in Guadalajara, Mexico. Williams says the company employs a total of about 515 people.

At Telect's recently vacated building on Madson, Center Partners is looking to make some improvements to Telect's former headquarters, according to documents from Liberty Lake's building and planning services department.

Amanda Tainio, the city's planning and building services manager, says the department has received some rough ideas for a parking lot and other improvements that Center Partners wants to make to the facility.

She says the improvements it's seeking still are in the pre-application stage, and because of that she can't comment on what the company's other plans are at this point. She says she expects Center Partners to submit a building permit application to the city in coming weeks.

Attempts to reach a spokesman at Center Partner's Fort Collins headquarters were unsuccessful.

A story published in the Journal last year said that Center Partners employed more than 1,100 people in Kootenai County at its operations in Post Falls and Coeur d'Alene. That story also said that the call-center operator had at that time recently leased a 26,000-square-foot facility in Hayden, at the intersection of Prairie Avenue and U.S. 95.