In mid-June, GlobalLogic opened a new office in Gdańsk, where more than one hundred and twenty engineers with a narrow specialisation will soon find work. The organisation plans to be actively involved in the life of the local IT community, to work closely with universities, and at the same time to strengthen relationships with the customers for whom it creates and develops software. What exactly the work of GlobalLogic’s specialists will consist in and how the company wants to change the IT landscape of the Tri-City – this is what we talk about with Kamil Świadek, Director of GlobalLogic’s branch in Gdańsk.
Many IT companies talk about Gdańsk as the IT hub of the future. What makes this description of the city not just a buzzword?
Kamil Świadek: Tri-City provides great conditions for the further development of companies in the technology industry, which have access to a large pool of educated specialists and excellent facilities in the form of prestigious scientific institutions. It is also a great place to live, which attracts new, talented programmers and engineers from Poland and abroad who happen to want to build their careers in the Tri-City. In addition, the business is supported by the local authorities, which ensures excellent synergy.
All these elements allow IT companies to develop and more easily implement complex projects for customers from all over the world.
Does anything distinguish Gdańsk today from other Polish cities that are equally focused on developing the IT sector?
KŚ: I would say it is a high level of specialisation. We need to remember that a variety of competencies and different levels of experience are required to create complex IT solutions. At GlobalLogic, we see this diversity perfectly – in our nine offices in Poland, products specific to different sectors are created to meet the very specific needs of the organisation.
In Gdańsk, DevOps engineers, embedded systems developers and automated test engineers will collaborate in our teams. In addition, there will be project managers and requirements engineers. In this case, we are talking about people with extensive industry experience, but also knowledge that is not widespread. We are talking about experts with the right certifications and training to create and develop solutions that meet very specific security and stability requirements. This is an essential requirement for customers in the embedded systems, automotive, medical, financial or IoT industries.
This kind of specialisation in providing specific services will certainly set Gdańsk apart.
You mentioned the role of research units in the development of the Tri-City IT sector. What is the reason for this?
KŚ: We are well aware that there is a noticeable shortage of specialists in the IT sector. The ongoing digital transformation is fuelling a huge demand for programmers that the labour market is unable to meet. In this situation, close cooperation between business and universities is gaining importance in order to train engineers equipped with the right knowledge and skills. By opening our branch in Gdańsk, we emphasise that it will be made up of experts with a narrow specialisation. At the same time, we are not closing ourselves off to people who are just beginning their careers in IT.
We can already proudly say that we have entered into a partnership with the WSB University in Gdańsk to jointly educate and deliver apprenticeship programmes. It will result in a programme offer tailored to future professions. This is a distinctive feature of our activity – in the cities where GlobalLogic branches are located, we support scientific units through the implementation of educational activities, as well as in terms of equipment and maintenance of specialised laboratories. This is also our plan for the Tri-City.
The meetings and trainings we organise for IT specialists and people who want to change their profession are also very important. It is for them that we are launching QA or DevOps academies, as well as webinars, such as the training on C/C++ languages planned for September.
What stands behind the term ‘advanced IT projects’? Do the solutions developed by engineers in Gdańsk have an impact on the everyday life of the city’s residents?
KŚ: Definitely! We can confidently say that our everyday life is cared for by programmers, because the results of their work affect dozens of aspects of life. Applications, solutions, products and services using software – all of these have been designed, tested, sometimes improved by teams of IT specialists.
At GlobalLogic, our teams are involved in software projects for customers in a variety of industries. Starting from the development of embedded software for IoT ecosystem products, which we find in increasingly popular smart homes and modern offices, to solutions that enable us to buy tickets and operate e-prescriptions, to navigation systems for cars and advanced platforms that allow logistics companies to manage their fleets. These solutions vary in size and complexity, but have one thing in common – they are indispensable. Today, functioning without them seems impossible, and it certainly would not be so comfortable!
Finally, a question about GlobalLogic’s plans in Gdańsk. You want to hire 120 specialists by the end of the year. Any forecasts for the next year?
KŚ: 120 people is just the first stage – our ambitions in the Tri-City are much bigger. We believe that close cooperation with the city and universities, as well as close contact with the local IT community, will allow us to maintain our high growth rate. At GlobalLogic, we place a high value on competence development and we want to actively support engineers building careers in Gdańsk. In this way, we will attract people looking for an interesting working environment and stability, who also care about well-functioning training and mentoring programmes allowing them, under the guidance of more experienced colleagues, to develop both in their technological field and acquire completely new competences. Increasing the size of the staff is one thing, but we will certainly also develop in terms of higher specialisation of engineers, which is one of the key elements of GlobalLogic’s strategy.
Kamil Świadek is the director of GlobalLogic’s branch office in Gdańsk. He has been working successfully in the IT industry for over sixteen years, specialising in project and programme management, team leadership and development and pre-sales activities. He graduated from the Szczecin University of Technology with a specialisation in ‘Electronics and Telecommunications’, as well as from the West Pomeranian Business School with an Executive MBA degree. In his everyday life he is passionate about technological innovation, automobiles and photography.
For the Invest in Pomerania initiative, coordinated by the Pomerania Development Agency, GlobalLogic’s presence in Gdansk is another investment project resulting from the Pomeranian local government’s strategy for the development of the region’s economy.
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About GlobalLogic
GlobalLogic is a leader in digital engineering. It helps brands across the globe design and build innovative products, platforms, and digital experiences for the modern world. By integrating experience design, complex engineering, and data expertise – GlobalLogic helps its customers imagine what’s possible and accelerate their transition into tomorrow’s digital businesses.
GlobalLogic has design studios and engineering centres around the world. Due to this, GlobalLogic may provide extensive specialist knowledge to customers in automotive, telecommunications, financial, healthcare, biotechnology, manufacturing, media, entertainment, electronic component production and technology sectors.
GlobalLogic is a Hitachi Group Company operating under Hitachi, Ltd. (TSE: 6501) which contributes to a sustainable society with a higher quality of life by driving innovation through data and technology as the Social Innovation Business.
Source: Globallogic
