“At the latest news, the Webhelp project is part of a minority of projects announced by Montréal International (MI) which have not materialized,” indicated Ève Caron, director of public relations at MI when The newspaper wanted to know if the 1000 jobs announced in 2020 had seen the light of day or not.
A week ago, The newspaper reported that the Japanese auto parts giant Denso, warmly welcomed by our leaders, ultimately did not have an R&D lab or employee with us.
Gold, The newspaper learned that the customer experience provider Webhelp, which wanted to hire 1,000 people paid between $15 and $20 per hour in teleworking “in Quebec, in Gaspésie, in Estrie, not necessarily only in Montreal”, did not have no longer materialized its Quebec ambitions, according to Montréal International (MI).
“In the fall of 2020, this project proved to be particularly strategic due to the “hybrid” nature of the jobs created in a context of confinement linked to the global pandemic,” explained Ève Caron of MI.
However, “the rise in wages combined with the global economic slowdown following this volatile period has dampened the enthusiasm of certain investors,” she continued.
Note that Quebec had not granted financial support to the company.
Evasive Webhelp
Questioned many times by The newspaper, Webhelp ended up responding through its parent company, Concentrix, that it did indeed still have employees here, but refused to say how many.
“We continue to have team members (or “game-changers” as we call our team members) in Quebec and we continue to serve customers in this market,” was limited to state laconically.
It was last March that Webhelp, which was then the largest private asset of Groupe Bruxelles Lambert (GBL), of which Power Corporation is a 15.5% shareholder, combined its activities with the Californian giant Concentrix.
More than 20% do not see the light of day
Furthermore, Montréal International (MI) clarified Newspaper that more than one in five investment announcements hardly come to fruition after three years.
“Surveys carried out among foreign investors supported by MI demonstrated, until 2019, that more than 80% of the projects we announced were carried out over three years,” detailed Ève Caron of the organization.
“We had to stop carrying out these surveys due to lack of internal staff,” she added.
Remember that Montréal International laid off nearly 20% of its workforce last Wednesday.
“What hurts the most is our agreement with the Ministry of Immigration, Francisation and Integration of $1.8 million which is not renewed,” explained in particular in an interview with Newspaper its CEO, Stéphane Paquet.
–With the collaboration of Sylvain Larocque