Swiss bank UBS has a lot more room for employees in India after opening a new center in Pune. The search for qualified staff, however, remains intense.
Zurich-based UBS opened a new tech center in Pune last week, the «Times of India» reported. The site, UBS's second in Pune and fourth in India overall, gives the Swiss bank space to hire another 1,300 staff in India.
The bank moved its chief cost-cutter to India earlier this year to oversee a reversal of previous offshore efforts in favor of so-called insourcing: today, 11,000 staff work at UBS in India; just 8,000 of them are employed through external providers – the remainder are UBS employees.
While UBS' is still outsourcing roughly $1 billion worth of services, it is increasingly upgrading its in-house capabilities, in a bid to wean itself off outside providers, as finews.com reported earlier this month.
Fierce Competition
The bank's headcount in India has more than tripled since last year, India boss Harald Egger told the outlet. However, the search for talent in India remains fiercely contested, according to Egger: UBS competes directly with its suppliers and vendors in recruiting.
The bank is looking for mathematicians, statisticians, physicists, and other highly-qualified science and technology graduates for jobs in tech, risk management, finance, audit and human relations. By year-end, UBS will employ 3,300 people, compared to 3,000 currently.
