CGI to expand its S.A. staffing by 250

CGI Federal, a giant consulting and support contractor to the U.S. government, will expand its San Antonio staff by 250 workers, with the first 100 to begin training within two weeks, the San Antonio Economic Development Foundation says.

The company will begin hiring for the remaining 150 positions in June. CGI Federal already employs about 80 people in San Antonio.

The 250 new workers will all be professional positions, said Rob Rolf, a CGI vice president based in Ohio. The employees hired in the expansion will work at newly leased space at 5555 Northwest Parkway in the University Park, Rolf said. The addition of the 250 workers will make San Antonio one of CGI's largest Texas offices.

Rolf said the company is declining to reveal the salary ranges for the new employees or to reveal what federal agencies the new employees will work with.

Rolf added that the expansion is happening despite the federal government's automatic spending cuts, called sequestration, that began in March.

“Sequestration doesn't hit all programs. The work in this facility is in areas that are prioritized in the current budget,” Rolf said.

San Antonio was chosen for the expansion because SAEDF was able to “stand up this facility in 90 days,” Rolf said.

SAEDF, the nonprofit agency that spearheads corporate recruitment, retention and expansion efforts here, formally will announce the expansion Wednesday.

CGI Federal is a wholly owned U.S. operating subsidiary of Montreal, Canada-based CGI Group Inc., an international information technology, consulting, systems integration and outsourcing company.

The CGI Group was founded in 1976 and employs about 71,000 workers in the Americas, Europe and Asia Pacific. The CGI Group says it's the fifth-largest company of its kind in the world.

Word of the new jobs comes less than a week after locally based HVHC Inc., an eyewear maker, said it will open a plant in West San Antonio this year — its second in the region — and eventually hire 600 workers to staff it. HVHC also plans to hire 150 employees at its downtown headquarters, in addition to 350 already working in the Houston Street office.

CGI Federal's San Antonio expansion will bring the subsidiary's total Texas employment to more than 1,000.

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In Texas, CGI Group also operates offices in Austin, Belton, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston and San Angelo, according to the company's website.

No state, city or county incentives are involved in the expansion.

CGI Federal's new employees will do software development and provide operational support services for the federal government.

CGI Federal has worked with U.S. defense, civilian and intelligence agencies. The company works with more than 2,000 government organizations in 15 countries.

“This expansion is an exciting one, and it's also a great example of SAEDF's business retention and expansion efforts as we work with businesses like CGI Group in San Antonio to help them continue to grow their operations locally,” said Misty Mayo, EDF executive vice president, in a statement prepared before Wednesday's announcement.

“Through our collaborative business retention efforts, we learned of the CGI project and were able to position San Antonio as the premier location to align with their business needs,” Mayo said.

dhendricks@express-news.net