Jobs go to India under Telstra growth plan Telstra plans to shift 170 jobs in its fast-growing cloud services division to India and cut a further 90 contract roles, saying the cuts are a strategic move in growing its business in Asia. The telco announced on Tuesday it will start shifting the jobs from its Network Applications and Services (NAS) division by October, unless discussions with employees result in some change to the plan. NAS head David Burns said the 260 job cuts would affect staff in all capital cities and covered "back-office functions," rather than customer-facing roles. Mr Burns said while NAS was a successful unit, the job shifts were part of a growth plan for the business. "We think our current business model is limited," he told reporters during a teleconference. This is a really strategic and important announcement to help us in that growth strategy. Asked why the jobs could not be done in Australia, Mr Burns said the move was "about growth," supporting clients offshore and being able to respond to growth quickly. "We need to be able to support our customers as they move into that South-East Asian region and we need to be competitive as we do that," he said. Mr Burns said industrial relations was not an issue in the decision. Telstra announced its plans to staff on Tuesday and Mr Burns said the company was consulting with affected staff before making a final decision because staff may offer information which changes the course of the decision. However Shane Murphy, NSW assistant secretary of communications industry union the CEPU, said he had no doubt the jobs would be going offshore. "We have heard this before, when Telstra was offshoring call centre jobs to the Philippines and India," he said. Mr Murphy said the jobs targeted include 89 customer service roles. If it proceeds, the plan will take six months to complete. NAS appears to be negotiating a commercial relationship with a third-party service provider in India rather than creating a new facility. Mr Burns said India "became a natural fit" because of the availability of skills and talent. The business provides cloud-based IT network, communications and business transformation services and is one of Telstra's strongest-growing divisions. It has customers in Asia including Jetstar, Volvo, FedEx and Fitness First. NAS, which has 2,700 staff in total, added 146 staff in Australia in the last financial year and will hire 350 people under the six-year Defence contract. CEPU representatives are due to meet with the company in Melbourne on Thursday.