MERA, a global software services provider based in Zurich, has announced opening a software development division in Vilnius, Lithuania. Over the course of several years, the company plans to employ over 200 software engineering professionals.
The opening of this centre is in line with the expansion strategy of the company, which has a strong focus on Europe, where 45% of its revenues originate.
“The strategic location of the new office will give us an advantage to better communicate with our customers from Scandinavian countries, Germany, and France and an opportunity to establish new business contacts in the region,” says Alex Bogachek, MERA’s CEO.
MERA intends to build a core team as soon as possible and is on the lookout for engineers proficient in JavaScript, GO, C/C++, Objective C, Swift, Java, Python and other programming languages. As the company has clients in multiple technology sectors, new employees will have a chance to take a deep dive into such promising industries as AI, Robotics, IIoT and Fintech, among many others.
MERA comes to Lithuania to build a company that has everything to ensure that its employees can realize their ambition and potential: continuous experience growth, interesting projects, ability to travel and learning from world’s famous technology companies.
“Our customers come from different industries and parts of the world. However, what unites them is that they see MERA as a company of professionals who keep pace with modern technologies and go beyond their call of duty to get things done. MERA is well-known for its high quality of service. But it is not possible to maintain the quality at high level without experts on-board. We welcome to our new company professionals who are ready to share their knowledge and open for new experience,” comments Igor Piruyan, MERA’s COO.
In other countries, where MERA operates its R&D centres, MERA is well known for collaboration with leading universities and students in many forms: from holding seminars and hackathons, mentoring students writing their graduate theses to research projects implemented in cooperation with universities, technological leaders and industrial associations. The company plans to transfer this established practice to Lithuania as well.
“Thus, students will be able to gain real-world software development experience to complement their classroom-based studies,” comments Alex Bogachek.
According to Mantas Katinas, Managing Director of Invest Lithuania, the collaborative aspect of MERA will be well appreciated by universities in Lithuania.
“Lithuania is already the first country in the CEE region when it comes to business-university collaboration in R&D, and various partnerships are a common experience. Examples span from Intermedix establishing a joint Big Data lab with KTU to Cognizant developing specialized Norwegian language courses for future finance professionals at VGTU. MERA will be a great addition to this picture, as universities value initiative coming from companies working with the technology that future graduates will face on the job market,” Mantas Katinas says.
“The plans MERA has to include young specialists in the development of solutions in the fields of Robotics, IIoT and Fintech can help Lithuania compensate for the relatively small number of IT specialists by increasing their quality. Lithuania is constantly increasing funding for IT studies, however, as in many other European countries, the needs of the ever-expanding market are hard to fulfill. MERA will help young professionals to complement the basic knowledge gained in class with specific, high-level competencies. This will allow Lithuania to create an increasing number of high value-added IT products with the available resources,” says Virginijus Sinkevičius, Lithuania’s Minister of Economy.
Counting almost 30 years in business, MERA has come a long way from a small IT firm established in Nizhny Novgorod to an international company with more than 1500 employees worldwide. In addition to the upcoming office in Vilnius and headquarters in Zurich, MERA has sales offices in the US and R&D centres in Serbia and Russia. More information available on MERA’s website www.mera.com.
