The San Francisco-based company made the announcement Wednesday. Square was founded in 2009 by two St. Louis natives, Jim McKelvey and Jack Dorsey. Dorsey co-founded Twitter.

Square offers a register service that accepts credit cards, tracks inventory and performs real-time analytics and invoicing. Company officials plan to hire 40 full-time workers in St. Louis immediately.

Square says St. Louis is a prime location for expansion in part because of a rich pool of talent from top universities, research centers and training programs.