British oil major, BP Plc, on Thursday announced its plans to create a new centre for its global business services (GBS) operations in western city of Pune. The company is aiming to employ around 2,000 staff in the next few months.

“The BP led and operated centre, which will provide business processing and advanced analytics capabilities in support of BP businesses worldwide, is expected to begin operations by January 2021. When fully operational it is expected to employ around 2,000 staff,” the company said in a statement.

The new, company said, the center said, will assume operational ownership of third-party business processes and seek to further extend its work with analytics and data science capabilities to pursue better business outcomes.

Camille Drummond, BP Executive Vice President for GBS, said, “As BP works to reinvent itself and reimagine energy, we are excited to accelerate the transformation of our business processes. Our new centre in India will enable us to put digital at the heart of BP’s businesses.”

“Accessing India’s great talent pool and leveraging an agile mindset, we expect to advance the customer experience, adding further value to BP,” Drummond said.

“The new centre will lead BP’s development and application of cutting-edge digital solutions and agile ways of working as it works to increasingly automate and transform its transactional processes,” the statement said.

The company added that BP’s GBS organisation combines innovation and data analytics to deliver the most efficient and effective business solutions for its businesses. From customer service and vendor payments to financial accounting and control, it supports every part of BP.

This latest move will strengthen BP’s growing business presence in India.

BP regional president and head of country Sashi Mukundan said, “The centre will allow us to provide innovative solutions as we tap into India’s diverse and skilled workforce, expand our footprint here and develop low carbon businesses around the world.”

The new centre will begin to recruit digitally savvy and customer-focused candidates in the next few months, aiming to rapidly grow to a workforce of about 2,000 over time.

With its many investments in India and employing around 7,500 people in the oil, gas, lubricants and petrochemicals businesses, BP is one of the largest international energy companies in India.

It has a 30 per cent interest in gas blocks of Reliance Industries. Besides owning 49 per cent stake in Reliance Industries’ fuel retail venture, BP also has a 50:50 joint venture with Mukesh Ambani firm, called India Gas Solutions Pvt Ltd for sourcing and marketing gas in India.