US supply chain solution co ramps up local presence
economictimes.indiatimes.com
US supply chain solution co ramps up local presence
ISHANI DUTTAGUPTA
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ FRIDAY, JUNE 20, 2003 01:02:32 AM ]
NEW DELHI: It’s not just Microsoft, Oracle and Intel who are betting their dollars on India development centres. More and more US companies are choosing to go the Bangalore way.
One of the newbies is global supply chain execution solutions company Manhattan Associates, which is traded on the Nasdaq and posted $175.7m revenues in ‘02.
Incorporated in June ‘02, Manhattan’s Indian subsidiary has quietly ramped up to 130 people. “The India organisation has become the largest product development team for us globally and we have conceptualised and released solutions for the global market. In a short span of time, we are participating in the entire spectrum of Manhattan’s products,” says R Srinivasan, director India operations, Manhattan.
“The head count will further increase to 162 soon and significantly, the Indian arm has also set a record by achieving a 100% retention rate since launch. Our goal is to make MA India a great place to work in,” he adds.
In terms of investments, the total funding till now for India has been $3.5m. “Of this, $1.2m is in the form of capital investment, while operations costs account for $2,50,000 per month,” says Mr Srinivasan.
Interestingly, Manhattan, which started it’s Indian safari late despite having a former infosian, Deepak Raghavan, among its founders, is not looking only at the lower cost factor in India. “While traditionally the cost advantage is taken for granted, the issue of the quality of resources and the creation of intellectual property is equally important for us,” Ramesh Srinivasan, senior VP, technical and also an ex-infosian, told ET on video-conference from Atlanta, Georgia, where the company is headquartered. “The India centre, for instance, has primary responsibility, for the quality of our key open system warehouse management solution (WMS),” he added.
“The focus on the Indian operations will be to augment the existing R&D team within the next six months. Since ‘01, there has been a great deal of market pressure on us to get more done on our products, specially the flagship. So we felt that the R&D dollar could be extended by having a support centre in India. We don’t look at India as a centre to transfer jobs from the US but rather to extend our R&D on which we spent 21% of our revenues in ‘02. In ‘03, that will go up to 30%,” Mr Ramesh said. And while the India centre will be leveraged for Manhattan’s foray into the Asia-Pacific markets next year, switching to it for 24X7 customer support is also a possibility. The company, which initially talked to seven top IT players in India for a partnership before deciding to go alone in India, is open to acquisitions here. “We are open to product-based acquisitions. But the fit has to be good with our strategy and it must be kept in mind that we are not in the area of IT services,” Mr Ramesh said. In January this year, Manhattan acquired Logistics.com, a logistics planning and execution software maker in the US, for $20m.
Recently, the company announced a record 9% increase in revenues to $46.1m for the quarter ended March 31, ‘03. |
