Among the state’s metro areas, Kokomo has the second-highest unemployment rate. And among those unemployed workers, two California tech entrepreneurs sees opportunity.

Jim Harter and Anju Bajaj, founding partners of Zuna Infotech, plan to use the region’s available work force and its expertise to boost their eight-month-old start-up. They are taking aim at the overseas tech support market, hoping companies that use third-party IT work will choose Indiana instead of India.

“Outsourcing doesn’t have to mean you take jobs and ship them to another country,” said Harter, following an announcement Wednesday that Zuna plans to put its headquarters in Kokomo’s Inventrek Technology Park.

The first 50 workers will be on board by the end of 2010, with plans for 400 workers by 2012. Average wages at Zuna will be $24 per hour, and the jobs will range from inbound customer service call-takers to software engineers.

The Zuna announcement was one of two regarding jobs for Northern Indiana made by the Indiana Economic Development Corp. on Wednesday.

Onward Manufacturing Co. of Waterloo, Ontario, will locate its first U.S. grill production center in Huntington, creating more than 300 new jobs by 2011.

The company manufactures barbecue gas grills for retail sale. It will invest several million dollars to improve and equip an existing 400,000-square-foot building that formerly housed a fireplace manufacturer.

The IEDC offered Onward Manufacturing up to $1.6 million in performance-based tax credits based on its job creation plans. Zuna was offered up to $1.16 million in tax credits for its growth in Kokomo.

“If ever a community deserved good economic news, Kokomo does,” Gov. Mitch Daniels said in a statement.

Kokomo had an 11.6 percent jobless rate in September, second in the state’s metro areas behind the 15 percent rate of Elkhart-Goshen.

Zuna had looked at multiple locations for its headquarters.

Chris Rivers, an associate director of computer services at the Indiana University-Kokomo campus Office of Information Technology, said Kokomo has been sagging in terms of IT work, the result of fallout from the layoffs at Delphi and Chrysler.

The new jobs should bring a needed boost as graduates “are looking for these kinds of jobs,” along with seasoned professionals.