BS Online News
Saturday, September 4, 2004
IBM to train 40,000 Chinese in IT skills
Press Trust of India / New York September 4, 2004
The US-based International Business Machines (IBM) will train 40,000 Chinese in information technology over the next five years under an agreement signed by the company with Beijing.
IBM has signed an agreement with China Electronic Information Application Centre (CEIAEC), the training arm of China's ministry of information industry.
Economic growth and China's entry into WTO have generated an enormous demand for more skilled workers in virtually every vocation and profession, IBM said.
The training would target university and college students as well as graduates in the job market and cover professional training, basic programming in Chinese, OO/Java, Linux and e-business, the company said.
CEIAEC Director Xu Yu said providing world-class training programmes was a challenge to cost and time constraints.
"IBM is a recognised leader in IT training. Our collaboration with IBM enables us to deliver accessible, high-quality education that would otherwise be difficult, costly and time consuming to implement ourselves," he said.
The training programme will enhance the skills of China's workforce and the country's ability to compete globally, he added.
Arleta Chen, Director of IBM Learning Solutions, IBM Asia Pacific, said the course was designed to enable students to keep up with the latest trends in information technology.
"The programme is designed to shorten the skills gap between what students learn in the universities and what is required for working in the software industry."