Microsoft goes North with their new research and development centre in the Galilee city of Nazareth. The third R&D centre of the giant software enterprise is going to employ around 50 people, bringing the number of Microsoft employees in Israel (Haifa, Herzliya and now Nazereth) to 1000.
‘The new site is an additional step in our efforts to integrate Arab engineers in our development enterprise in Israel, and to deepen our activities in the country’s North,’ says Yoram Yaacovi, the director of development at Microsoft Israel R&D Centre.
The Nazareth-based team is going to work on major projects involving cyber-security, big data, business intelligence, cloud storage, and personalization. According to Yaacovi the software house strives to ensure that number of Arab engineers will be close to their relative share of the population.
This isn’t far from the Technion’s graduation quota: 25% of computer science graduates are Israeli-Arabs while only a 10th finds career opportunities in the industry.
