HCL expands global network with Swedish delivery centre

Indian IT services giant HCL has expanded its global delivery network by opening another delivery centre in the Nordic region.

The centre in Gothenburg, Sweden, becomes HCL’s 36th in Europe and its 12th in the Nordic region. With 150 staff initially, the Gothenburg centre will deliver IT services to more than 50 business customers in the region, and will be HCL’s headquarters for mainframe services.

The centre has grown out of HCL’s 2015 acquisition of the IT department of Sweden’s Volvo Group, which was a customer. The $200m deal saw more than 2,500 of the truck maker’s IT staff, including much sought-after mainframe expertise, transfer to HCL. At the time of the acquisition, HCL said the mainframe skills were a major attraction.

Volvo’s tech team delivered IT services across the Volvo Group and to external customers.

Providers of IT services can make good use of the IT departments of their customers as they take over services. This allows customers to focus on their core business and ensures that important skills are not lost through the outsourcing. The IT suppliers can then use the acquired skills to continue to serve that customer, as well as new customers.

“The Nordics is a strong growth market for HCL and we have been continuously investing in local delivery centres to give more value to our customers,” said Pankaj Tagra, head of the Nordic region at HCL Technologies.

“Our new Gothenburg delivery centre supports this growth and enables us to get closer to many of our customers in the Nordics. At the same time, the new site allows us to further increase our global shared services capabilities and provide customers with high-quality, industrialised mainframes, open systems and digital services through our new centres of excellence,” added Tagra.

The Gothenburg centre will use its automotive expertise to specialise on IT in the sector. The automotive sector is going through digital transformation with the introduction of connected and autonomous vehicles. For example, Volvo Cars has partnered with tech giant Google to develop and build an Android-based in-vehicle infotainment and connectivity system.