TCS expands operations in Texas, hires over 200 people

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) on Thursday said it plans to invest more than $100 million in Austin and hire 1,000 new employees across Texas.

TCS has expanded its business operations in Austin, Texas with the construction of a new facility, doubling its presence to more than 400 professionals in the city and adding to its over 5,500 employees across the state, TCS said in a statement.

The new facility will officially open in late December 2020 and have space for 367 employees, it added.

The new Austin office adds to existing offices in Dallas, Houston, and Plano and more than 30 TCS locations around the US.

"By 2022, TCS will hire an additional 130 new employees in Austin, adding to the plans to hire 1,000 new employees across Texas. Over the next seven years, TCS will invest more than $100 million in Austin," TCS said.

The Mumbai-based company said it expects to hire an additional 10,000 local employees in the US by 2022, utilising its Secure Borderless Workspaces (SBWS) framework.

TCS added that it has hired more than 200 employees locally in Austin since 2019, of which more than 50 have been recent local graduates from the University of Texas at Austin, Houston and Dallas, and other US colleges and universities.

New employees are performing a range of digital business transformation roles in artificial intelligence, machine learning, enterprise software and technology operations, it noted.

"This investment is a testament to Texas' growing status as a booming technology hub, and we are proud that TCS continues to expand across our state.

“The Lone Star State is the premier economic destination in America thanks to our business-friendly environment, low-taxes, highly skilled workforce, and partnerships with innovative companies like TCS," Governor Greg Abbott said.

TCS chairman of North America Surya Kant said enterprises are partnering with TCS to accelerate their innovation, enhance their operational resilience and deliver superior customer experiences.

"To support our business growth, we are committed to recruiting, training, and developing the best local talent, as we continue to invest in Texas and across the US," he added.

Kant said the new facility in Austin is part of TCS' initiative to expand its local presence and drive customers' digital transformation journeys.

Texas currently has more than 38,050 open computing jobs, 3.6 times the average job demand rate in Texas.

However, only 506 schools in the state (27 per cent of Texas schools) offered an AP Computer Science course in 2018-2019.

As part of its ongoing investment in the region, TCS continues to expand its Ignite My Future in School (IMFIS) programme for K-12 education that is designed to embed computational thinking into core subjects such as math, science, arts, and social studies.

Created in partnership with Discovery Education, IMFIS has already empowered nearly 15,500 teachers and 900,000 students in the US.

In Texas, the programme has been utilised by more than 1,000 teachers, reaching upwards of 60,500 students. In Austin, it is being used by more than 400 teachers, potentially reaching 25,000 students.

Photograph: PTI Photo