Member Article

HP outlines North Tyneside recruitment plans and work with neighbouring SMEs

Hewlett Packard are looking to grow their North Tyneside workforce thanks to a global strategy to consolidate the firm’s regional delivery centres.

Staff numbers at the IT multinational’s Cobalt Business Park base are set to increase, HP director Lindsay Phillips told Bdaily.

The managing director of UK Applications Delivery Centre said 2014 was a “turnaround year” for HP and strengthening its North East operations in a competitive environment was at the centre of the firm’s plans.

A further 250 positions are likely to be recruited for, dependent on HP’s success in the marketplace. The growth will double the size of the Cobalt operation.

Lindsay, who recently spoke at the region’s Dynamo conference, also outlined to Bdaily the business’ plans to work with IT applications SMEs in the region

He said: “One of the major plans for us is to ramp up our engagement with some of the innovative SMEs that are on our doorstep.

“So far we’ve only had limited interaction with firms in the region, and as we build on our delivery centre, it’s really important that we have a model that can offer a variety of services.

“Developing relationships with SMEs is a really good way of achieving that, and gives us a degree of flexibility that we might not be able to achieve on our own.”

HP’s Cobalt base services clients across the private and public sectors, covering functions such as monitoring, type services, system maintenance, incident management and development.

The centre works closely with HP’s network of other delivery centres in the Philippines, India, Egypt and China.

Lindsay added: “There’s two sides to this plan for engagement with SMEs. We can improve our prowess in very new technology and deliver better products for our customers, and through supporting the SME community, we help to create a more sustainable workforce, not just for HP, but the whole technology sector in the region.

“Our North East centre is particularly good at things like systems analysis, software design, and project and program management. It’s a combination of disciplines that gives us our strength.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .