JYSK to open tech hub in Portugal
JYSK, the Danish home and furniture retailer, is to open a new tech hub in Portugal as it looks to develop more IT solutions to enhance the customer experience.
Due to launch this spring, the facility in Lisbon will be an extension of JYSK’s primary IT departments in Handewitt in Germany and Aarhus in Denmark.
To help staff the hub, JYSK has partnered with a local company in Portugal that will help with recruitment in the start-up phase and also provide office facilities. All new employees will be fully integrated as JYSK employees.
The first software engineers are expected to start in May as the retailer looks to have 10 to 15 people employed before the summer holiday period.
Never Miss a Retail Update!Thomas Høiberg Jensen, director SAP and IT development at JYSK, said: “In the beginning, the focus will be on hiring colleagues with Java competencies who can actively contribute to our agile teams, as well as a local team leader who can support the development of the location.
“The goal is to create a tech hub that enables even faster growth and innovation for the benefit of both our stores and customers.”
JYSK said it had chosen Lisbon as the location due to it having a good range of qualified candidates, many people speaking English at a high level, and the city having only one hour’s time difference from its IT departments in Aarhus and Handewitt.
The retailer said it also wants to ensure that IT can support its growth ambitions. As a result, it has elevated IT to the top management level of the business with the promotion of Keld Marott to executive vice president of IT.
Marott said: “Although our recruitment has never been faster, the greater ambitions in IT have led to more open IT positions. The office in Lisbon will help this.”
JYSK has more than 3,500 stores and webshops in 48 countries, including the UK.
