General Motors To Add 500 New IT Jobs In Austin, Texas

General Motors will 500 hire Information Technology (IT) professionals, including software developers, project managers, database experts, business analysts, and other IT professionals to staff the first of several new IT Innovation Centers in the United States. The move is part of the automaker’s larger strategy to bring IT functions in-house in an effort to increase innovation, decrease costs, and increase the speed at which it brings new products and services to its customers.

Currently, approximately 90 percent of GM’s IT functions are carried out by those who do not work for the automaker. Out of the 10 percent that carry out GM’s IT functions internally, 75 percent support the business but only 25 percent work to add new capability. GM’s IT chief, Randy Mott, is looking to inverse those statistics over the next three years by internalizing most IT work.

“We anticipate hiring as many as 500 new GM employees in Austin,” Mott said. “We look to the Innovation Centers to design and deliver IT that drives down the cost of ongoing operations while continuously increasing the level and speed at which innovative products and services are available to GM customers.

GM chose Austin for its first Innovation Center due to the city’s already-abundant amount of people with the skills it is seeking. The amount, according to the May 2011 Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment Report, is 46,000.

The General already employes over 4,500 people in Texas, including 1,800 at GM Financial and nearly 2,500 at Arlington Assembly, where a third shift was recently announced. In addition, two Customer Call Centers are based in the state and the automaker is building a new $200 million stamping plant that will create or retain 180 jobs.