Ethics in the digital workplace
Digitisation and automation technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), can affect working conditions in a variety of ways and their use in the workplace raises a host of new ethical concerns.
Pepco Group, a retail chain of discount shops offering clothing as well as household goods and toys, has announced that it will create up to 13,000 new jobs in Europe within the next three years. The expansion is a response to the increased price sensitivity of consumers around Europe as a consequence of the COVID-19 crisis.
The majority of the new jobs are to be created in continental Europe, including Austria where the chain is expanding its activities. Under the business expansion, the group targets to earn more than €1 billion within five to seven years.
Pepco Group was founded in 2014 as a subsidiary of Pepkor SA, a South African retail conglomerate. The Group now operates through two segments: a multi-price segment through PEPCO, founded in Poland in 1999, and a price-anchored segment through Poundland, founded in the UK in 1990, and Dealz, which was introduced in 2011 as part of Poundland’s international expansion. Employing about 35,000 staff, the group has more than 3,400 stores in total in 16 countries across Europe, including the UK, Spain, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Croatia, Hungary, Lithuania, Romania, Slovenia. In July 2021, the group debuted on the Warsaw stock market.
Eurofound (2021), Pepco Group, Business expansion in European Union, factsheet number 105110, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/105110.