250 jobs to be created in Belfast

Business trends were turned on their head today when an Indian IT company announced it was creating 250 call centre jobs in Northern Ireland.

The major jobs boost for Belfast will come as part of a £1.9m (€2.8m) investment by HCL BPO, one of India’s leading global IT companies.

HLC currently employs 1,000 people in its call centre at Apollo Road in the south of the city – an operation it took over from BT in 2001.

Announcing the new jobs, Northern Ireland Economy Minister Barry Gardiner said the investment was “especially significant as it reverses the trend”.

He said: “Many similar call centres have relocated outside Northern Ireland. Here we have a leading company from India investing in Northern Ireland.”

HCL’s global strategy was to increase its business in Europe and the US and the expansion in Belfast would further consolidate the city as its key European base, he said.

“It will provide good quality, knowledge-based jobs in a New Targeting Social Need area. It will offer recruits and existing employees extensive training opportunities,” added Mr Gardiner.

The investment has been heavily backed by the North’s business agency, Invest NI, which is providing £625,000 in selective financial assistance and £295,000 (€917,300) for further training through the Company Development Programme.

Ranjit Narasimhan, HCL chief operating officer in Belfast, said the company was expanding operations in the city to enable it to develop opportunities that had been identified in European markets, especially Great Britain.

They were for a “quality provider of contact services to major clients in retail, banking and commercial sectors”, he said.

He said as well as providing scope for expansion, the recruitment was required to service a series of recent business contracts for a number of new clients.

“Belfast is an integral part of our business development strategy which now offers clients a blended and particularly cost-effective delivery of contact services.

“This strategy enables clients to access higher value added services from Belfast together with those from lower cost centres in India.”

HCL currently employs 13,000 people worldwide, including a software development operation in England, and has sales in excess of $1bn (€823m/£571m).