Birmingham chosen as key base for BT
Birmingham has been chosen by BT Group as a key location for its future network of offices.
It is one of the first eight locations selected as part of its The Better Workplace Programme.
The others are Belfast, Bristol, Cardiff, Ipswich, London, Manchester and Edinburgh.
BT’s workplace improvement and consolidation programme is the biggest of its type ever undertaken in the UK and is expected to complete by 2023
More than 300 BT office locations across the UK will be consolidated to around 30 with all of the new locations having 5G connectivity as part of a three to five-year programme.
The site for the building in Birmingham, which will include corporate offices, contact centres and specialist sites, has yet to be announced.
BT Group currently employs more than 11,000 people across the Midlands and it says that its existing telephone exchanges will be retained.
It has not been revealed which sites in the West Midlands would close, but BT has a major calls centre at Providence Place, West Bromwich, and a worldwide network management centre at Oswestry.
Detailed plans for each new location are still to be finalised, but some existing BT buildings will be refurbished while others will see BT move into new offices.
“The Better Workplace Programme is about bringing our people together in brilliant spaces, and transforming the way we work,” said BT Group chief executive Philip Jansen.
"Revealing these eight locations is just the first step; we have dedicated teams working on identifying the best buildings to move into and which ones to re-design for the future. As a result of this programme, BT people will be housed in inspiring offices that are better for our business and better for our customers," he added.
BT Group will also exit its St Paul’s headquarters in London and is currently identifying a new home for the business in the capital.
