The Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (the dtic) congratulates Sigma Connect SA and Shadow Careers on the launch of their respective business centres in Mitchells Plain on 7 July 2022. The Global Business Services (GBS) sector is an important sector for youth employment and a key contributor to the economy.
Sigma Connected has been delivering call centre services out of Cape Town for over 11 years, servicing UK clients across four call centres and employing over 1700 team members. Sigma Connected has launched Sigma Connected South Africa with a focus on serving the country’s domestic clients. It is envisaged that the new venture will create up to 1000 new jobs. The new venture will support businesses in the telecommunications, retail, insurance, financial services, government and logistics industries. The launch of the new business involved the opening of a new headquarters in the Cape Town suburb of Woodstock and a 90-seater contact centre in Mitchells Plain.
Shadow Careers opened its initial training centre in Mitchells Plain in 2020. It has now opened a 120 seater-training centre next door to the Sigma Connected SA call centre. Shadow Careers creates permanent careers for excluded youth through a unique three-month role specific training course. The programme prepares youth for permanent careers and has achieved a success rate of 95% in terms of placing youth into permanent jobs in the GBS sector. The organisation has already trained 190 unemployed youth and have successfully placed 180 successful graduates with companies such as Sigma Connected and EXL. Relevant gender breakdown of trained youth is 60 % women and 40 % men. Sigma Connect and Shadow Careers have created over 120 new jobs already and the ultimate aim is to triple in size by growing existing business and winning new contracts across the country, which will add to the new jobs over the next three years.
According to Acting Director-General (ADG) Shabeer Khan, the initiative ties in with the objectives of the GBS Masterplan of increasing the employment opportunities for youth in South Africa. Furthermore, the GBS masterplan objectives of training and placement of youth and the development of infrastructure in emerging locations such as Mitchells Plain are achieved with initiatives of this nature. ADG Khan indicated that this is an excellent initiative that should be replicated all over South Africa.
“I am glad that Sigma Connect SA recently participated in the Presidential Investment Conference where Mr Ruben Moggee, CEO of Sigma Connected’s parent Group, namely Digical, announced an investment of approximately R267 million. We appreciate the fact that Sigma Connect SA has started with the roll out of this investment through the opening of its head office in Woodstock and this call centre in Mitchells Plain. The opening of the call centre in an emerging location like Mitchells Plain is commended as it contributes to the development of this area. The skills development initiative for youth by Shadow Careers and Sigma Connected is noted as an initiative that should be replicated all over South Africa in order to create jobs for unemployed youth” says ADG Khan.
Enquiries:
Bongani Lukhele – Director: Media Relations
Tel: (012) 394 1643
Mobile: 079 5083 457
WhatsApp: 074 2998 512
E-mail: BLukhele@thedtic.gov.za
Issued by: The Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (the dtic)
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