Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
400 TECH JOBS TO BOAST £35K AVERAGE WAGE
Global consultancy firm expanding into Belfast
A TECH firm is to create 400 jobs over the next five years, it was announced yesterday.
PA Consulting, who are described as a “global innovation and transformation consultancy”, are expanding their operation into Northern Ireland.
The jobs come with an average salary of more than £35,000 a year. They will be subsidised by around £4million by Invest NI, who will help train up some of the recruits.
PA Consulting has 2,600 staff worldwide. The firm has already employed a team of nearly 40 here, including 25 digital specialists.
Global head Anita Chandraker said: “Our digital team helps our clients to use digital technologies to adapt and transform their operations in an era of disruptive change.
“We thought long and hard about where was the best place for our next phase of expansion and considered factors such as the talent pool, the current technology sector, salaries, education and universities and infrastructure.
“Northern Ireland ticked all the boxes.”
Also present at the announcement at the firm’s Belfast base, Secretary of State Karen Bradley said: “Northern Ireland continues to punch well above its weight in terms of proving itself as a top destination to invest and do business.
“Once the project is fully established it will generate more than £14.5million in wages annually and be a significant boost to the economy.”
Invest NI chief Alastair Hamilton added: “As well as our support to help create the new roles, the Department for the Economy will also be running a series of Assured Skills academies to provide pre-employment training for 155 of the 400 jobs.
“The initial focus for PA will be on digital engineering.
“With roles from graduate-level developers through to senior engineering available there are opportunities to work on projects involving Devops, software development, data analytics, security and automated intelligence.”