US manufacturing giant Caterpillar plans to create 200 new back-office jobs at its shared services centre in Belfast. Caterpillar has been offered £1.7 million in support packages from the North’s department of enterprise and the department of employment towards the cost of its latest investment.
The jobs boost comes less than five months after Caterpillar, which manufactures a wide range of products including heavy machines and engines, announced a major redundancy programme in the North at its wholly-owned subsidiary FG Wilson which resulted in 760 job losses.
Yesterday the US group said its latest investment announcement illustrated Caterpillar’s “commitment to Northern Ireland”.
The 200 additional jobs will be in areas such as finance and human resources, and will be based at Springvale in west Belfast.
The new positions are expected to provide support services for Caterpillar’s European, African and Middle-Eastern operations.
Robert Kennedy, Caterpillar Northern Ireland operations director, said Belfast was chosen ahead of a number of sites in Europe.
