City welcomes new employer, Tata Consultancy Services, to Cedar Rapids

CEDAR RAPIDS - Cedar Rapids officials welcomed the city's newest employer to town with hopes the company will stick around for the long haul.

Tata Consultancy Services and the city held a news conference Monday to serve as a sort of meet-and-greet with company leaders.

'This is Day 1 of what we expect to be a long and profitable relationship between TCS and Cedar Rapids,” Mayor Brad Hart said.

Based in Mumbai, India, TCS came to Cedar Rapids as part of a deal it inked with Transamerica, a financial services company. Transamerica outsourced administration of its insurance and annuities business to TCS, which included 882 employees in Cedar Rapids.

About 860 of those employees took jobs with TCS and will work at an office at 4333 Edgewood Rd. NE, owned by Transamerica.

'This partnership brings in this new company into our city. Right now, they're working with Transamerica, but the idea we would like to see is to work with them so we can continue to see growth, they'll be established here so they can take on new clients, other people to work with and hopefully increase their employment base in Cedar Rapids,” city Economic Development Manager Jasmine Almoayed said after the news conference.

By absorbing 860 people, TCS became one of Cedar Rapids' largest employers 'overnight,” Mayor Brad Hart said. As some of those former Transamerica employees ate lunch nearby, Hart thanked TCS for taking on the employees and office space previously occupied by Transamerica.

'We're really excited that TCS decided to plant roots in Cedar Rapids and it's going to be great watching you grow right here in this wonderful city of ours,” Hart said during the news conference.

Balaji Ganapathy, head of workforce effectiveness for TCS, said Monday was 'the start of a long journey for both Transamerica and TCS.” He said TCS wants to bring company initiatives focused on science, technology, engineering and math education to the city's schools, such as one focused on 'underserved and underrepresented parts of the community.”

'We are an organization that has always put the community's need over ours, which is why we've chosen the long path to success,” Ganapathy said in an interview.

Tata Consultancy is an information technology and consulting company that is a subsidiary of the Tata group, a Mumbai-based conglomerate that owns businesses in the retail, manufacturing, aerospace and infrastructure sectors, among others. The company reported having about 700,000 employees and $100 billion in revenue last year.

While Tata Consultancy takes over the Edgewood Road offices, Transamerica and its parent company, AEGON, will move all their 2,600 Cedar Rapids employees to their southwest campus on C Street SW.

l Comments: (319) 398-8366; matthew.patane@thegazette.com