Vancouver will become home to a new cybersecurity centre for one of the world's major financial services and credit card companies.

At the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland, on January 23, Canadian Minister of Innovation, Science, and Industry Navdeep Bains and Mastercard CEO Ajay Banga announced the launch of Mastercard’s new intelligence and cyber centre in Vancouver, which is one of six global technology centres for the company.

The centre, which Mastercard has invested $510 million into in addition to $49 million in federal funding, will create 380 jobs and will focus on developing cyber solutions for payments, according to Mastercard.

B.C. Minister of Jobs, Economic Development and Competitiveness Michelle Mungall stated in a news release that that the expanded centre, located in the Exchange office tower on Howe Street, will also create 100 student co-op positions.

“MasterCard collaborated with the provincial and federal governments and the Vancouver Economic Commission on this decision,” Mungall explained.

Mastercard had acquired Vancouver-based NuData Security in 2017, which is based at the new centre, as well as Toronto-based Ethoca in 2019 for solutions across biometrics and fraud resolution.

“The Vancouver centre will help us meet the growing demand for technology solutions to reduce the cost of cyber-attacks, enable today’s connected devices to become tomorrow’s secure payment devices, and address the growing vulnerabilities associated with the Internet of Things,” Banga stated in a news release.

Bains stated that the new centre will help to address cybercrime in Canada, which is at an estimated $3 billion per year.

Mastercard’s Canadian headquarters are based in Toronto and its other global technology centres are in New York City, St. Louis, Pune-Vadodara (India), Dublin, and Sydney.