The IT factor - AstraZeneca Careers

The IT factor
technology and support for the changing world of science
At AstraZeneca, we have a great working environment that’s full
of outstanding talent as well as opportunities for collaboration and
innovation. Our pipeline is rich with some of the most talented
minds in IT, creating a high-performance work culture that offers
outstanding career development, stability and a solid work-life
balance – perfect for people who share our passion for success.
Breaking new ground
The cornerstone of our IT strategy is the establishment of our Global Technology
Centres, or GTCs. These global centres of expertise will provide IT support to our
entire business. We’re counting on the talent assembled at our GTCs to help us
simplify our support structures and improve our responsiveness to business needs.
To take our control and technology capabilities to the next level, we’re setting up
the first GTC in Chennai, India. This state-of-the-art centre will offer a full range of
innovative services, including:
· SAP/ERP support and development
· Application maintenance and development for other business critical applications
· BI/Analytics an information management
· Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) services
· Desktop, network and server infrastructure monitoring and management
· Cloud and mobile services
At AstraZeneca, we empower you to enhance your IT skills and share your ideas
in a cutting-edge environment where you are set up to succeed and develop
your capabilities.
IT MAKES IT ALL POSSIBLE
At AstraZeneca, we don’t view IT as a separate entity – it underpins
everything we do and it’s absolutely critical to the success of the
company. It’s at the heart of all business areas, from Research and
Development through Operations and into Sales.
IT at AstraZeneca is innovative, contemporary, pervasive and business-critical. We’ve
made it our ambition to be a world-class IT organisation, delivering twice as much to the
business while also reducing cost – so that the business can invest further in discovering
and developing new medicines. To improve the value we deliver, we continuously review
the way we do things and make modifications to accommodate the changing business
landscape. Our journey to a world-class organisation focuses on five key areas:
Customer Focus
Improving the user experience by simplifying
systems and processes, while strengthening
how we align to the business
Operational Excellence
Building a stable, secure IT environment
and developing world-class technical
capabilities
Technical Leadership
Improving delivery and pursuing
leading-edge technology projects
Simplification
Making IT organisation and processes
more intuitive and avoiding waste
Collaboration
Making effective collaboration tools
available and improving the way we
work with partners
IT innovation and Chennai
Chennai will be the first GTC and will serve as the model that defines our future
success. It will employ around 1000 people by 2016.
Why Chennai? The large, mature pool of IT talent in the region, the pace of the
local IT industry’s development and the fact that Chennai is seen as India’s health
care capital have all made the decision a relatively simple one. Our goal is to have a
modern, vibrant, open-plan environment in the Chennai centre, and to have it up and
running by August of 2014.
“The proposed GTCs
will enable us to strengthen
internal technology
capabilities, secure high
quality talent and simplify
our operating model”
Dave Smoley, CIO.
OUR CULTURE
Technology and patient-focused, agile and high performing with an
entrepreneurial spirit – this is an exciting and empowering place
to work. At AstraZeneca you’ll find different people with unique
talents and wide-ranging backgrounds, but what connects them is
a passion for meeting challenges and succeeding.
We’re taking technology and medicine to the
next level
Making the world’s most serious illnesses a thing of the past is what
inspires people to work here. It focuses our minds and drives our
ambition. That’s why AstraZeneca is a highly creative and innovative
environment, as well as a place where new ideas are shared, conventions
are challenged and every day is both enlightening and rewarding.
Be challenged in a vibrant, stimulating workplace
Our workplaces have been created to engage, motivate and inspire
our people. Careful thought has gone into the locations to make sure
that our IT professionals are located close to globally recognised IT
hotspots where they can collaborate and forge new partnerships.
We value the power of our differences
Diverse teams are innovative teams, and at AstraZeneca we see
diversity as a big advantage. That’s one of the reasons why in 2012 we
received Opportunity Now’s Global ‘Excellence in Practice Award’ for
the work we’re doing in Asia to develop talent. We were also included
in The Times Top 50 Employers for Women list for the first time, and we
placed on the Top Employers List by Equal Opportunity and Diversity
MBA Magazines.
The possibilities for your career are limitless
Your personal development is very important to us. We want you to win
in your work and enjoy what you do. Our commitment to your future
means you never stop learning and your skills never stop growing. We’ll
encourage and support you, and go the extra mile to help you develop
your capabilities to the full.
WORKING AT ASTRAZENECA
Join our team in Chennai, and you’ll gain exposure to a truly international business that
operates in over 100 countries and offers plenty of chances for you to grow and move
your career forward. You’ll also deal with leading-edge IT technologies and sharpen
your skills by undertaking highly varied work in a stable environment that prizes diversity
and rewards creativity. Last but not least, you’ll contribute to the advancement of
medicines that make a real difference to the lives of patients around the world.
We’re specifically looking for:
· Individuals with global work experience, particularly consultants
and engineers for large enterprise application platforms
· Web and mobile application architects and developers
· Desktop, network and server engineers and architects
· Data and information architects and developers
· Graduates or engineers with excellent customer-facing skills
Meet David Smoley,
CIO AstraZeneca:
What is the role of the Chennai
GTC? How will it help improve
business performance?
Have you finalised the location and
land for the GTC? What are the
options you are looking at?
The GTC will help us achieve direct
control over our IT operations, while
driving improved knowledge transfer
and retention. It will help improve
business performance by giving
us greater agility and improving
responsiveness to the business.
We have signed a lease on a state of the
art building at Ramanujan IT City with
two floors totalling 100,000 sq ft now
reserved for AZ.
What kind of work will the people at
the centre be doing? Will you develop
products here or will it only be support?
The centre will deliver application
development and maintenance as
well as infrastructure management
and service operations. One of our
key objectives is to achieve technical
leadership in our IT, and the Chennai
centre will give us the ability to build the
world-class technical capability we need
to achieve that objective.
What is your recruitment strategy –
how many people will you be hiring
this year and over the long term?
We will invest significantly in this
centre both in terms of manpower and
technology. We plan to hire hundreds of
people this year.
What is the contribution of IT to
the pharmaceutical sector? How is
it evolving?
IT expertise helps us drive simplification
in the use of technology, for example
using cloud services to drive down cost,
improve reliability and release funds to be
invested elsewhere in the business.
Innovation is at the heart of everything we do – from our
medicines research to how we run our business. We constantly
look for new and better ways of doing things to meet the needs
of a changing world, now and in the future.
For more information about a career at AstraZeneca visit
astrazenecacareers.com
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