LEWISTON — A deal between Lisbon Street-based Argo Marketing and global tech support firm iYogi will bring at least 200 new jobs to Lewiston-Auburn and 150 more to Maine.

Vishal Dhar, co-founder of the Gurgaon, India-based tech firm, said the move represents a new direction for call center businesses.

“It’s a push for us to see how we can better resource our services to the U.S, and also to look at changing the dynamic of how services are driven,” Dhar said. “We need to have a globalized workforce today. It cannot be isolated.”

Dhar and Argo CEO Jason Levesque announced the partnership with an outdoor news conference Thursday afternoon in Lewiston’s Dufresne Plaza — just outside Argo’s headquarters.

Levesque said his company would hire up to 20 new employees per week, with 500 total Argo employees in Maine by February. Levesque said he’s confident he can find all the employees he needs locally.

“They are here,” he said. “We just have to get the message out, just like anything else. People have to understand they can work in a tech field here in Maine, even though it’s not a legacy business for us.”

The Lewiston Career Center, at 5 Mollison Way, will host a special job fair Monday, July 13, dedicated to filling the Argo-iYogi jobs, according to Center Manager Mary Lafontaine. The fair runs from 9 a.m. to noon and from 3 to 6 p.m. Monday.

Dhar co-founded iYogi in 2007, providing telephone tech support to computer users in the United States, United Kingdom, around Asia, the Middle East and Australia. Dhar said the market is changing and the company now supports a vast array of technical tools — from printers to smartphones to routers and networked household appliances.

“We work with around 500 technologies,” he said. “It ranges from hardware and peripherals like printers and routers. Phones are a growing area for us. And we are looking at the ‘Internet of things,’ the newer world of technology.”

Dhar said the U.S. is iYogi’s biggest customer base. His company began looking for a base of operations here six months ago, and selected Maine out of a group of 15 other states.

“We spoke to companies in almost all the states, and finally Maine was selected,” he said.

He worked with Gov. Paul LePage’s office, Levesque and local economic development officials.

“We needed to find a base of skills that we could help grow and train,” he said. “We found that in the center behind me, which already has 180 seats. And finally we needed to find the same spirit of entrepreneurship, that you can look at a job as a challenge and take it to a proof of concept.”

Levesque said the two companies began working together this spring. He tasked 20 of his top employees to work with iYogi and begin offering support through their center.

“We supplanted a group of 20 agents in India,” he said. “We took their volume. We took incoming calls from Americans looking to purchase their program. It was a good response.”

Levesque said most of the new jobs will be based out of the Lisbon Street headquarters, where they will join 200 employees. Another 150 iYogi jobs will be placed in Argo’s Pittsfield and South Portland operations.

The jobs should pay between $27,000 and $44,000 per year, depending upon experience, Levesque said.

Gov. Paul LePage applauded the deal.

“It’s an example of, if you work hard enough, you will succeed,” LePage said. “While we lent assistance, it’s not a government program — it’s a private-sector partnership. We are the partners that showed the environment, that the people of Maine want the private sector to succeed. It’s a partnership between two businesses, one in India and one in Lewiston, Maine.”

staylor@sunjournal.com

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