Foster announces multi-million pound expansion by French firm

Enterprise Minister Arlene Foster today announced a major expansion by Teleperformance, which will deliver £10million annually into the local economy, creating 610 new jobs.

Invest Northern Ireland has offered over £3million of support towards the investment at the company’s Newry base.

The French owned firm operates two customer contact centres in Newry and Bangor. It is a global leader in the provision of outsourced business services to an international client base which includes the retail, telecommunications, banking, travel and health sectors. The new positions will range from customer service advisor level to operations management.

The Minister said: “This is a significant investment by an established company which will provide a welcome boost to the local economy.

“By the time all positions are filled, Teleperformance will have almost 2,000 people based at its Newry and Bangor sites, making the firm one of this region’s largest employers. The number and variety of positions being created will offer career development opportunities in the business services sector, competitive rates of pay, and facilitate the development of valuable, transferable skills.

“At a time when many companies are deferring investment plans, it is encouraging to see the confidence placed in Northern Ireland by international companies, which see this region as the most competitive location from which to grow their business in global markets. It is a resounding endorsement of the quality of our local skills base and our business environment, which Invest NI continues to actively market in order to secure investment, and reinvestment across Northern Ireland.”

Jeff Smith, Chairman and Chief Executive of Teleperformance added: “With the demand for outsourcing increasing as companies look for more cost effective methods of managing key business activities, we identified a need for a major expansion at one of our UK sites which would support the development of new business opportunities across Europe.

“Invest NI worked closely with us. Their offer of support, combined with the availability of suitable property and our positive experiences in Northern Ireland over the past 11 years, resulted in our decision to invest further in the Newry site.

“As a customer service focused business, the people we employ are the key to our success. Newry and Bangor have rapidly become a vital part of our UK network and I am confident that moving forward with this latest expansion, we will be able to attract a similar calibre of people to support our strategic growth plans, with Newry becoming our flagship centre in the UK.”

Notes to Editors:

1. Invest NI has offered £3,050,000 of support towards the expansion. The resulting 610 new positions will bring total employment at the Newry site to 1060 by 2011.
2. Teleperformance (formally known as MM Group) originally established a contact centre in Bangor, Co. Down in May 1997. Since that time employment at the Bangor centre has grown to the current level of 900.
3. The company opened a second centre in Newry in April 2007 and has already achieved the original job target of 450 employees.
4. Teleperformance is a subsidiary of Bristol based MM Teleperformance Holdings Limited. The ultimate parent company is Paris based Teleperformance SA (TSA).
5. Teleperformance is the third largest telemarketing company in the UK. It is an outsourced business solution provider with a network of multi-channel contact centres in Bristol, Birmingham, Ashby, Bangor, Newry and Newcastle. These centres handle email, web, telephone and postal enquiries, 24 hours per day 365 days a year.
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