Barclays to Build Technology Center in the Ukraine
Barclays Capital, the investment banking division of Barclays Bank, announced today it has chosen Kiev as the location for its third global technology center, adding to those already established in Singapore and Prague. EPAM Systems, a software engineering services provider in Eastern Europe, has been selected as a partner to build and operate the IT facility, with a team of up to 500 IT professionals in Kiev by the end of 2012.
Ukraine was chosen because of the local technical talent and strong analytical skills available. This investment in Kiev allows Barclays Capital to further diversify its workforce locations and the firm will grow globally by 800 IT professionals in 2010 with continued growth anticipated over the coming years.
“Kiev is a key strategic center within our technology growth plans going forward," said Sarah Grave, head of IT EMEA, Prague and Kiev at Barclays Capital, in a statement. "Utilizing the most advanced hardware, software tools and security infrastructure available, the Kiev center will be at the leading edge of global competitiveness for quality and for innovation. We are exceedingly impressed with the 50 plus engineers that have already started.”
The teams will focus on application development for in-house projects in C++, Java or C# for a wide range of business applications across the bank, ranging from electronic trading applications to risk management systems. The Kiev facility has been built by EPAM to operate within the bank’s highly secure continuous service environment, providing 24/7 services to maintain business applications and provide support to the firm’s business users for many mission critical applications.
Barclays Capital and EPAM are investing in Kiev for the long term, with clear long-term career paths for the team members in development, management, operation and support of the software developed. Team members will be supported in their professional growth through financial services training in London, Singapore and Johannesburg.
“The Kiev center will provide the essential front-line services necessary for the operation of Barclays Capital’s global banking business,” said Karl Robb, president EPAM Europe. “This reflects our client’s strong faith in Ukrainian IT talent and in EPAM Systems proven track record of establishing large software engineering teams operating in highly secure environments to the world’s top technology firms and financial institutions.”
Through EPAM, Barclays Capital will make an initial capital investment of more than $2 million in technology from from Hewlett Packard, Cisco and Microsoft among others, within EPAM’s premises. The latest workstation and network equipment will be deployed, the two companies say.
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