Rabat – French engineering and technology consulting group Alten opens an automotive center of excellence in Rabat to train Moroccan engineers.
The center, which was inaugurated on Friday, will develop the ecosystem ESO, or Engineering Services Outsourcing, and reportedly create over new 550 jobs in the automotive sector.
The initiative translates an increasing need to train Moroccan engineers to more focused and specialized fields. According to Hajar Bououd, human resources manager at Alten, the training of engineers in Morocco remains too general and not adapted to the needs of the automotive industry, or more specifically to those of the firm. Bououd stressed the need to diversify the training fields in universities.
Alten dedicates 10 percent for training and induction programs and, according to Didier Marchet, Alten’s technical manager, the group aims at employing 1000 trained Moroccan engineers by 2020.
The center for excellence will collaborate with Moroccan universities for third-year students majoring in chemistry, physics, or mathematics. Forty-three students will begin the training next month.
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Mohamed Yatim, minister of employment, said that this initiative is significantly important for Morocco as quality technological training is necessary to face the changes and new jobs in the automotive sector, and as the country automotive industry is rapidly growing, becoming in only a few years the second largest in Africa.
Alten inaugurated a first Embedded Systems Automotive and Aeronautics branch in Fez in 2016 to initiate the ESO system in Morocco with over 300 positions, and have been present in Morocco since 2013.
It created two programs in the country already, Alten Boost, and Alten Upgrade, to train and help with the integration of young engineers seeking to specialize in computer sciences, automotive, and aeronautics, in the job market.
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The group is an international leader in the industry with a presence in 20 countries, 30.000 cooperators throughout the world, and a €1.975 billion revenue in 2017. Over 90 percent of Alten’s employees are highly skilled engineers.
