José Cruz, CEO of Aubay Portugal, in an interview with CNN Portugal’s Pitch

Aubay Portugal is expanding its teams and investing heavily in specialist talent, with around 150 vacancies currently available across various technology sectors, ranging from software development to data science, artificial intelligence, DevOps and project management. In an interview on CNN Portugal’s Pitch programme, Aubay Portugal’s CEO, José Cruz, emphasised that the company’s growth in the country is closely linked to its ability to attract and develop skilled people.

More than just technical skills, the company is looking for professionals with a desire to learn and develop. José Cruz emphasised that Aubay wants people “who want to develop, who are willing to learn, who are not just technical experts, but who are capable of adding value, [who] are capable of interacting with clients”.

Founded in 1998, Aubay is a French IT consultancy firm with clients in sectors such as banking, insurance, transport, media and telecommunications. In Portugal, the operation began very quietly: “At the start we had just one client, so it was very difficult to make a name for Aubay at that time. Even today, what we see is significant growth in the early stages,” recalled José Cruz. Today, the group has a turnover of over 600 million euros, employs more than 9,000 people, and Portugal accounts for around 13% of its turnover.

The growth of the Portuguese operation has also been reflected in the evolution of the internal structure, which has grown from a very small team to around 150 people in the central organisation. Throughout this journey, the current CEO has taken on various responsibilities, ranging from roles as Business Manager to coordinating teams, operations, recruitment and business, until he reached the leadership of Aubay Portugal, an invitation he describes as a source of pride and great responsibility.

In an interview with CNN Portugal, José Cruz highlighted the company’s culture as one of the pillars of its success: a culture of openness, feedback and development, which he aims to preserve and build upon. The aim is twofold: “to keep teams motivated and satisfied, to develop people, and to maintain an attractive company for our employees” and, at the same time, “to remain competitive with our clients, to add value” and to keep pace with the processes of digital transformation and the adoption of artificial intelligence.

At the heart of this approach are people. “It is people who create technology, who bring ideas, who innovate, who develop. That is why our key differentiator is people,” summarised the CEO, adding that the ability to engage with the client, understand their needs and find solutions together is a distinctive feature of how Aubay operates in the market.

Portugal is playing an increasingly important role in the group’s strategy, attracting the attention of international companies looking to set up technology teams or expand their capacity in the country. According to José Cruz, the country has “strong skills” and “the potential to establish itself as a leading hub for technology, innovation and artificial intelligence” – a development that Aubay has been monitoring and fostering.

In Portugal, the company operates in three main business areas: Professional Services, where it allocates its teams’ capacity to clients; services for international companies seeking to establish a presence in the country; and more complex projects, services and solutions, such as developing applications from scratch or managing testing and development activities. With a clear objective of continuing to grow organically “here in Portugal” and against a backdrop of the group’s European expansion, the responsibility is, in the CEO’s words, “greater”.

The programme can be viewed in full on the Pitch Brand and Content channel, here,