L&T to hire 8,000 professionals for Vadodara IT park

VADODARA: India’s leading engineering and construction company, Larsen & Toubro (L&T), seems to be betting big on Vadodara. In times to come, the company will literally go on a hiring spree as it plans to recruit around 7,000 to 8,000 professionals, mainly engineers, by the year 2010 for its technology park at Waghodia in Vadodara district. L&T expects to operationalise the technology park by September 2008 year. Although the company wants to hire large number of engineers for its tech-park, it would hire professionals in phased manner.

“The recruitment process will span four phases. In the first phase, around 3,000 people will be offered employment,” said L&T chairman and managing director AM Naik, who was here in Vadodara to attend the CEO Meet organised by the Baroda Management Association to mark its golden jubilee year.

The company also wants to increase the number of professionals in its technology park to 10,000 by the year 2020, Mr Naik added. L&T, whose market capitalisation recently crossed Rs 1,00,000 crore, is investing close to Rs 500 crore to set up this technology park which covers 112 acres. The technology park will also have townships to accommodate a large number of people to be recruited by the company.

Apart from this, the park will also have a project management institute, convention centre, employees’ hostel, residential colony, food courts and entertainment facilities on the campus. L&T’s tech-park is aimed at improving synergy among its various divisions and bring majority of its operations to a single campus.

Terming Vadodara as the engineering capital of Gujarat, L&T CMD informed that Vadodara has around 28 engineering colleges. Additionally, Vadodara is the most cosmopolitan city of the state. “In case we do not get sufficient number of professionals, the company will not find it difficult to attract engineers from Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh to Vadodara as the cosmopolitan culture of the city makes it a good place to live in,” he adds. L&T wants to focus on smaller towns rather than big cities for its new projects, Naik said.

“That was the reason why L&T established it’s sizeable operations in Vadodara and nearby areas,” he said. The company has also bought few acres of land in Hazira to launch its manufacturing project. However, he did not divulge the details about the proposed project to be undertaken by the company.