General Motors Anounces Fourth IT Center In U.S.


By: Talha Bhatti  |   March 7th, 2013   |   Business, Cars, News
GM

The tough economic downturn that has hit the global marketplace has left many people out of a job. The United States has been working on job creation for quite some time and major industries have been struggling to become a part of the solution rather than the problem. The US automotive industry was hit hard by the recession and is now starting to revive its self. A behemoth of American car manufacturers, General Motors Co., has announced that it is creating a 1000 new jobs in the US and helping the US recovery. Interestingly, the jobs will not stem from the direct manufacturing of cars but will instead be from information technology centers. The latest Information Technology Innovation Center is making its home in Arizona, in a Phoenix suburb named Chandler. This is not the first IT center that GM has announced and the company has three previous plans for setups in Austin, Roswell, and Warren.

 

General Motors will be using an old building for the center as it invests $21 million to get the venue ready for launch. According to the auto makers plans, it will help create approximately 4,000 jobs form its four IT centers. The idea behind the massive centers is to create a team of high-level IT professionals that will support the company in its business transformation.

 

The Detroit-based automaker has so far hired 1,000 employees for the centers and is looking to add many more soon.

 

On Wednesday, March 6 GM’s Chief Information Officer, Randy Mot, stated to the media that, “These are top IT talent-rich areas on the cutting-edge of innovation.” Mott is leading a major change at General Motors which had previously had 90 percent of its IT matters taken care of by 10,000 people that were not direct GM employees. With Mott taking a leadership role with GM in February 2012 he has instituted a plan that will change this ratio in five years to have 90% of the IT operations handled by GM employees. It is expected that this will mean 9000 employees of which 3,000 will be from Hewlett-Packard.

 

Mott explained how GM had chosen the locations for the centers by stating that the company had looked at areas that had a strong base of IT employees plus “strong community, lower cost of living, prestigious higher-level schools and a high-tech industry presence.”

 

Mott also added that, “I believe having the right mix of professionals and students working on innovative solutions is a powerful combination. Having the right combination really puts you in a position of the right kind of energy.”

 

Mott also made clear that about 35% of the work force in the centers would be recent college graduates thanks to GM’s partnership with 40 universities for the centers. Mott claims that, “These are the best jobs in the IT industry today.”

Source: MLive

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