Design firm IDEA to invest Rs 41 crore

Innovative Design Engineering Animation (IDEA) Private Limited, an Ahmedabad-based industrial design, engineering and animation services provider, will be investing about $8 million (approximately Rs 41 crore) from its internal cash flows in domestic and international expansion over the next three years, said company’s director Deval Shah.

“We intend to expand our markets and increase our headcount to 350 by the end of 2011, from the current 100. Besides, part of the funds will go into creating additional infrastructure and setting up a prototype workshop in Ahmedabad, and initiating new branding strategies,” he told Business Standard.

Promoted by Shah and US-based Ajay Gupta, the closely-held company has a wholly-owned subsidiary in San Francisco with 25 sales and marketing professional. It is now looking at expanding its reach to Southeast Asia and West Asia where it plans to set up satellite offices, and a new facility to cater to the European markets.

Shah said the company, which currently sees 85 per cent of its revenues from the US, recently started focusing on the Indian market. “The largest issue that the Indian companies face is shrinking product development time to increase profitability. Moreover, consumers have become more demanding while the internal research and development (R&D) teams are failing to deliver to this demand. However, companies here have realised that outsourcing design is a good approach to develop new products and take the first wave on it,” he said, adding the company expects its revenue inflows from the Indian market to be about 40 per cent from the present 15 per cent in the next three years.