IBM Corp. plans to move up to several thousand skilled software jobs from the United States to India, China and other countries, which could amount to one of the biggest such actions yet in the technology industry.
IBM documents obtained by The Wall Street Journal said about 4,700 programming jobs could be shifted overseas to save costs, a growing high-tech industry trend known as "offshoring."
More than 900 people are already scheduled to be told of the move in the first half of 2004, while another 3,700 jobs have been identified as having the "potential to move offshore," the Journal said. IBM already has hired 500 engineers in India to take on some of the work that will be moved, the Journal reported.
While companies long ago began moving manufacturing jobs and other blue-collar work to Asia, big business is now increasingly shifting skilled work there as well. According to International Data Corp., foreign workers performed about 5 percent of information technology services for American companies this year, but by 2007, that share will grow to 23 percent.
News source: CNN
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