KUALA LUMPUR (March 23): IBM will be shutting down its Global Delivery Centre located in Cyberjaya, Selangor on May 31 — seven years after it was first opened in February 2014.
"As part of IBM's continual review of the most efficient way to source our products and services, our global centre supporting client information technology (IT) infrastructure in Malaysia will close on May 31. There is no impact on other IBM operations in Malaysia," an IBM spokesperson told The Edge.
Aside from its Cyberjaya operations, IBM also has a head office located in Bandar Utama, Petaling Jaya.
"IBM remains committed to Malaysia and will continue to focus on building its capacity and capability to help our clients on their hybrid cloud and AI (artificial intelligence) journeys; and the nation in its pursuit to be a knowledge-based society as set out in the Digital Economy Blueprint," the spokesperson added.
However, the spokesperson declined to disclose how many jobs will be lost as a result of the closure of the Cyberjaya centre.
IT professional circles in Malaysia have been abuzz with news of IBM's Cyberjaya centre closure, with messages on online forums claiming that the shutdown will put over 1,000 employees out of work.
Many are understood to have started submitting their job applications to other IT companies in the country.
Meanwhile, operations at IBM's head office located in Bandar Utama, Petaling Jaya will continue to operate as usual.
IBM was one of the first technology companies to invest in Cyberjaya. Back in 2011, former Malaysian prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak announced the American multinational company, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, would be investing RM1 billion to develop the Global Delivery Centre in Cyberjaya. Najib also said then that the centre was expected to create 3,000 skilled jobs.
According to a 2014 article by Digital News Asia (DNA), IBM's Global Delivery Centre in Cyberjaya delivered high value services to clients in the areas of software platform management, server systems operations, security and risk management, and project management.
The centre also supported IBM's cloud services, including the provisioning and management of IBM SmartCloud Enterprise + (SCE+) solutions, designed for running critical enterprise workloads, such as enterprise resource planning and customer relationship management (CRM) applications, DNA reported.
IBM is not the first multinational to exit Cyberjaya in recent months. According to a report by telecoms news provider TelcoTitans, German IT company T-Systems sold its business in Malaysia to private investment holding firm Quintephi Sdn Bhd at the end of November last year.
"The transition is expected to be completed in mid-2021, at which point T-Systems will no longer have a presence in the country. T-Systems had more than 800 employees in Cyberjava in 2019," the report said.