Winston-Salem and Forsyth County won the high-stakes bidding war yesterday for a Dell Inc. computer-assembly plant, landing a $115 million project in southeast Forsyth County that is expected to create 1,500 jobs in the next five years and act as a catalyst for thousands of other jobs in the region.

It was the most hotly pursued project in Triad economic-development history. Elected officials here offered Dell $37.2 million in local incentives, far more than the packages put forward by Greensboro, Guilford County, Davidson County and High Point.

Dell said that Forsyth's site - at the Alliance Science and Technology Park between U.S. 311 and Interstate 40 - will need less grading work than other sites. The computer company is on a fast timetable. It wants the 500,000-square-foot plant open by next fall and plans to begin construction in January.

Winston-Salem and Forsyth officials expressed relief and elation with Dell's decision, especially since months of negotiations ended only 11/2 hours before the company made its announcement at 3 p.m. Dell said that it still has to complete final due diligence on the incentives package.

Allen Joines, the mayor of Winston-Salem, described the Dell plant as a "once-in-a-lifetime" project that pushed the community to be "very aggressive from the very beginning."

"We are delighted and proud to be able to say that Dell is a part of our community," Joines said. "More importantly, Dell is a part of the Piedmont Triad and will have a positive impact on the entire region.

"The jobs that Dell brings to our area are sorely needed. Winston-Salem has taken a lot of hits economically and a lot of workers have been displaced, which had an effect on the mood of the community," Joines said.

"Not only will this plant bring jobs, but it also brings hope of a better economic future and will enable us to look forward and not backward," he said.

Winston-Salem and Forsyth County's offer includes the value of 200 acres at the park off Union Cross Road. Dell will also receivebetween $242 million and$267 million in incentives and tax relief from the General Assembly.

Dell's planned computer-assembly plant is among the largest economic projects in North Carolina history and one of the biggest in the country in the past three years.

Gov. Mike Easley said that the entire Triad would benefit from the decision.

"Workers across the region are the winners today and for decades to come," Easley said.

Dell, based in Round Rock, Texas, said it received "quality proposals that were responsive to our needs" from all the Triad communities, but it chose the Alliance park site because it was the best fit for meeting all of its long-term goals for the plant.

"Winston-Salem's Alliance park location is best suited to bringing our new operation online in time to meet growing customer needs, providing good proximity to an available work force and supporting our logistics objectives," said Ro Parra, a senior vice president and the general manager of Dell Americas.

Michele Blood, a Dell spokeswoman, said, "The Winston-Salem and Forsyth packages helped us to make a good business decision for the company and our shareholders."

Dell plans to begin hiring in April and to have 700 employees trained within the first year of operation. Blood said that Dell has received thousands of inquiries on its www.workatdell.com Web site about applying for work at the plant.

Don Flow is the chairman of Winston-Salem Business Inc., the group that has been at the forefront of the county's effort to land Dell, and it was his personal relationship with John Medica, a senior vice president at Dell, that started the ball rolling many months ago.

"I'm extremely excited," Flow said at an afternoon news conference.

Winston-Salem Business was the first economic-development group to go public with its recruitment of the Dell plant, filing an application for job-training assistance with the Golden LEAF Foundation in late May.

Blood said that Dell's human-resources department plans to meet in early January with Triad educational institutions to begin preparing job-training programs.

The Triad's economy has been gaining momentum in recent months, picking up a net 3,400 jobs, mostly in the service sector, since October 2003, according to the N.C. Employment Security Commission. But the region has lost 2,800 manufacturing jobs over the same period.

Pete Brunstetter, who until recently was chairman of the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners, said that Dell's decision would help the county make a smoother transition from its traditional manufacturing base of tobacco, furniture and textiles.

"Forsyth County absolutely needed this," Brunstetter said. "This sews up the final leg of the re-creation of the local economy," which consists of technology, health care and financial services.

He said that the final selection of a contractor to grade the site would be made shortly.

Economic officials said that, despite the intense competition, Dell's decision to build a plant in the Triad represented a win for regionalism on one level. Lobbying by more than 100 Triad officials that the region needed the Dell jobs persuaded the General Assembly to provide more than $200,000 in incentives for each job created at the plant.

But the project also highlighted the limitations of regionalism. Each community ultimately chose to make a separate incentive and land offer to Dell rather than make one offer at a multicounty site.

Don Kirkman, the president of the Piedmont Triad Partnership, said that Winston-Salem and Forsyth County deserve credit for landing the plant. He said that the region would benefit significantly because the site is centrally positioned for Triad residents wanting to work for Dell. Officials have estimated that Dell would attract most of its plant employees from within a radius of 60 miles.

"Given the sheer magnitude of the project, it's hard to be disappointed in the big picture of having Dell in the Triad," said Dan Lynch, the senior vice president of the Greensboro Economic Development Partnership.

"We felt we had a very aggressive package and a great site and were very competitive until the end," Lynch said.

He said that there may have been "more of a sense of urgency" in Winston-Salem and Forsyth's offer compared with the combined $12.4 million offer from Greensboro and Guilford.

"There was a perception by some economic officials that Winston-Salem and Forsyth felt they had to have the plant and that they were willing to do whatever it took," Lynch said. "There never was a sense of urgency in the Greensboro package that we had to go out and get this at all cost."

Lynch said that the preferred plant site in Greensboro, on land owned by the Piedmont Triad Airport Authority east of the airport and near N.C. 68, was never offered for free to Dell.

"I still believe we had the best site for the plant," Lynch said. "But was the land $24 million better than the Forsyth site? Probably not."

High Point economic officials said they believe that their residents will benefit significantly from the Alliance park site since it is five miles from the city limits. High Point had submitted an incentive offer to Dell, but unlike the other communities it never made it public.

"Positive economic-development news in Winston-Salem or anywhere else in the 12-county Piedmont Triad region is great news for High Point, too, benefiting us all," said Loren Hill, the president of the High Point Economic Development Corp.

Dell's site decision was made in the context of growing unease and anger about the state's willingness to establish long-term partnerships with some companies, not least among their competitors already doing business in the state. Some small-business owners have also grumbled about the lack of incentives for their job-creation efforts.

Economic studies have found that the Dell plant could spawn more than 6,000 indirect jobs for the Triad as suppliers, logistics operations, retail and restaurants open around the site. "Every Dell job has led to another 11/2 to two jobs for the local economy," said Amy King, a Dell spokeswoman.

State Rep. Paul Luebke, D-Durham, and a frequent critic of economic incentives, cited recent reports that Virginia offered far less for the Dell plant.

"I think North Carolina dramatically overpaid Dell to come here," Luebke said.

The biggest benefit for Forsyth and Winston-Salem is that the plant will have a local address to present to global businesses, said John H. Boyd, the president of The Boyd Co. Inc., a site-selection company in Princeton, N.J.

"The community has landed a trophy project that will, over time, prove to be a very wise investment in terms of the use of public funds," Boyd said.

• Richard Craver can be reached at 727-7376 or at rcraver@wsjournal.com

• Journal reporters Victoria Cherrie, Michael Hewlett and David Rice contributed to this article.