Thursday, January 13, 2005

OKCBusiness NewsWire



Oklahoma City selected for first CIBERsite



CIBER, Inc., one of the nation’s largest outsourcing firms, will open its first development center today in Oklahoma City. The CIBERsite will create approximately 200 development jobs in the area, tapping local technology talent.



“The whole concept was to come up with a comparative way to keep up with jobs that were going off shore,” said Mac Slingerlend, CIBER’s president and CEO.



The center, located at 6525 N. Meridian, is the first of several planned, low-cost facilities of its kind. The centers are designed to use the technology talent pools of mid-sized American metropolitan areas. Slingerlend said the jobs will pay between $35,000-$40,000 annually.



The Denver-based company began in 1994, and is publicly traded. Additional CIBERsites around the country are expected create more than 1,000 jobs nationwide. Slingerlend said Oklahoma City was the perfect market to launch the CIBERsites because most, if not all, of the company’s desires.



“Oklahoma City just grew to the top of the list,” he said. Slingerlend said that along with good technological education, the metro provides access to many military personnel who have the skills the company requires.

CIBERsite opens for business in city

By Melissa Marchel
The Oklahoman

CIBER Inc., an information technology development company, Thursday announced it is open for business in Oklahoma City.
A few employees already have started work and customers are touring the facilities, said Darryl Perkins, director of operations, after a ceremony Thursday announcing the company's presence here.

The Oklahoma City location will be the first of five software application and development centers, or CIBERsites, the company plans to open nationwide in the next 18 months, CIBER Chief Executive Officer Mac Slingerlend said.

Local offices will be at 6525 N Meridan Ave., on the sixth floor of an office building.

CIBER plans to employ 200 Oklahomans, adding people in increments of 10 to 20 a month as it builds clientele, Perkins said.

Employees will develop and support software for customers. CIBERsites deals with customers in three main groups: Fortune 500 companies, state and local government agencies and the federal government.

"What makes CIBERsites attractive, especially to government agencies, is that the work stays here," Perkins said, not outsourced overseas.

The pay for workers at the CIBERsite will range from $30,000 to $35,000 for entry-level positions to $50,000 upper-level jobs.

The company is looking for programmers and developers with a dot-net or Java backgrounds.

One to three years of experience is preferred for a consultant position and five or more years of experience for a senior consultant position, Perkins said.

The low cost of living and an educated work force drew CIBER to Oklahoma City, Slingerlend said.

Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett, Oklahoma Commerce Secretary Kathy Taylor and Fred Hall, chairman of the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce, were among city and state leaders who welcomed CIBER executives Thursday.

The Oklahoma City CIBERsite should be at full capacity by the end of the year, said Tim Boehm, CIBERsites division president.

People interested in applying for a position can contact the company on its Web site, www.ciber.com, or call recruiter Patrice Harris at 621-8354.

Mac Slingerlend

Company seeks jobs at low cost
By Julie E. Bisbee
Associated Press Writer

High operating costs in technology centers has prompted a Colorado-based information technology company to seek affordable midsize cities, such as Oklahoma City, for an initiative aimed at retaining software jobs in the United States.

CIBER, an international company that specializes in computer system management and program development, will open a programming center in Oklahoma City today. It's the first of five centers the company will open in smaller markets nationwide within the next year.

The locations, which haven't been decided, will employ about 200 people, said Mac Slingerlend, president and chief executive officer of the company. Combined, the centers, called CIBERsites, will create 1,000 U.S. jobs, Slingerlend said.

"I felt as a society, we do need to compete for these jobs and to do that we can't keep jobs where the cost of living is so high," Slingerlend said. "It just offers us a heck of an advantage and a choice to sending work offshore. It's good for our company, good for Oklahoma and good for our country."

Industry analysts expect an increasing amount of jobs to be exported to countries such as India, China and eastern Europe. Nearly 830,000 U.S. service oriented jobs -- including telemarketers, accountants and software engineers -- will move overseas by the end of 2005, according to a study by Forrester Research Inc., a Cambridge, Mass.-firm that tracks and analyzes trends in the technology industry.

Sending work offshore was an issue in the last presidential election. CIBER, like other companies, hopes to stem the exodus by tapping into the talent pools of mid-size cities where office space is cheaper and they can pay workers less than they do in places such as San Francisco or Boston.

Slingerlend said he expects to pay workers in Oklahoma City -- college graduates with experience in computer programming -- between $35,000 to $40,000 including benefits. The average salary for a computer programmer in the United States is $61,000.

"Though CIBERsite employees will be paid less than the national average, they will still earn more than their overseas counterparts," said CIBERsites Division President Tim Boehm. "Our ... clients will have another choice in avoiding the hidden costs of offshoring, such as language gaps, intellectual property protection, travel, time schedules, infrastructure vulnerability, political risks and increasingly high employee turnover."

CIBER, based in Greenwood Village-Colo., employs about 8,000 people and its stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange. The company has contracts with a variety of businesses and governments including Sprint, Ford Motor Co. and Xerox. CIBER also administers the Women, Infants and Children program for the Wisconsin Department of Health and Human Services, as well as a case management system for the Missouri Department of Economic Development's work force development division.

CIBER is not alone in its desire to locate in low-cost areas that can meet the need for qualified employees, said Harris Miller, president of the Information Technology Association of America, a trade organization for software and computer systems management companies.

"Many companies are doing it," Miller said, "but they aren't talking about it publicly."

Electronic Data Systems, an international Fortune 500 company that does computer programming and system maintenance for a variety of companies and governments in 60 countries, also has a network of sites in midsize cities, including Oklahoma City, said Travis Jacobsen, a spokesman for the company.

Of the 95 service centers the company operates around the world, half of them are in the United States and many of those are in low-cost cities, Jacobsen said. Since the early 1990s, the company has sought out medium-size markets that have enough capable employees.

"I hate to say it, but EDS sort of pioneered the industry," Jacobsen said. "We are always looking for ways to better deliver services to our customers and it's always better to get closer to your clients."

Miller downplays the importance of having American employees working on software development.

"From the customer's perspective, they really don't care very much if the development centers are in Oklahoma City or Manila," Miller said. "As long as they are getting a high quality product that meets their cost needs."

"Our ... clients will have another choice in avoiding the hidden costs of offshoring, such as language gaps, intellectual property protection, travel, time schedules, infrastructure vulnerability, political risks and increasingly high employee turnover."CIBERsites Division President Tim Boehm
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"Though CIBERsite employees will be paid less than the national average, they will still earn more than their overseas counterparts," said CIBERsites Division President Tim Boehm.

Sorry guys, for being so negative, but when the saving grace about our pay is that we're being paid more than workers in the third world, that sticks in my craw. I think it's great we're seen as having a workforce they're looking for, but I still resent representing the low-cost job market. You can argue that those jobs wouldn't be here if not for the lower salaries. But I still see it as a continuation of a salary gap that keeps OKC from being a bit wealthier -- and have more of those nicer stores that we find in other cities.