Newell & Budge to hire 200 more

UK-based IT company Newell & Budge on Tuesday announced the acquisition of Momentum Technologies for an undisclosed amount and said over the next six months it planned to hire 100 professionals to make India its offshore dedicated centre.

Industry sources, however, said the deal could be in the range of £2-3 million and is a fair valuation keeping in line with Momentum's revenue of about $3 million.

One of the fastest growing IT services company in UK offering end-to-end solutions including consultancy, Newell & Budge has clients like Orange and Lafarge, among others.

Momentum is an SEI CMM level 5 company with ISO 9001 certification and is privately-owned. CitiCorp is its startegic investor.

Based in Canada, it's main development centre is in Noida.

"Momentum will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Newell & Budge group and will be the company's first dedicated offshore development centre. We will have 30 per cent of our business to be done from the India center," Ann Budge, CEO of Newell & Budge said, adding she expected the regulatory approvals for the acquisition to be over by next week.

Detailing the expansion plans, Budge said Newell & Budge would hire 100 professionals over the next six months and is also looking at building up its own facility in Noida where it would integrate all operations in India. Hiring could be in the range of 100 in every six months, she said.

Momemtum at present has 120 people at its Noida centre and has a capacity to have upto 200 professionals there.

In all, we will hire about 200 people in the foreseeable future, she said.

"Acquiring Momentum is part of our long term strategy to build on offshore capabilities and go for aggressive expansion plans for the company in both UK and India. It will give the company's clients direct access to India's high quality skills, faster response times and economic advantage of a low-cost economy," she said.    

With the starting of India operations, the company will snap its partnership with Mastek Technolgies but will continue with RS Software, she said.