Keane India to up headcount to 5000

Company earmarks total investment of about $25 million in India till 2006

Keane India Limited, an IT solutions and services company, is planning to increase the head count in India to about 5,000 by 2006. The company has earmarked a total investment of about $25 million in India till 2006.

The company today unveiled its $4-million centralised testing facility, which will employ 100 people, at the Cyber Pearl, the third phase of the Hitec City here. The new facility occupies a full floor spanning around 38,500 sq ft to seat about 350 workstations with other support facilities. The Hyderabad operations of Keane will be ramped up to about 1,000 personnel from the present strength of 600, in the next twelve months time.

The company, which is a fully owned subsidiary of Keane Inc, has advanced development centres (ADCs) in Gurgaon, Noida and Hyderabad, with a total workforce of over 1,350 professionals.

Addressing a media conference after inaugurating the new facility, Laurence Shaw, senior vice-president of Keane Inc's international operations, said that the company's operations both in Hyderabad and Delhi have been growing substantially.

"With an impressive growth rate of over 100 per cent on a year-on-year basis, India is part of our strategic growth capability," he said.

"We have undertaken many initiatives to enhance our organisation and market approach to address India's changing market dynamics and opportunities. For example, we are also strengthening our vertical go-to-market capabilities in the financial services, insurance, healthcare and public sector markets."

While anticipating no competition to India's global leader position in applications outsourcing and BPO from China in the next five to seven years, Shaw said countries like India would become specialised in specific areas going further deeper in terms of services and capabilities.

"China is still five to seven years away as a real-time competitor to India. The present global leaders will emerge with more specialised skills by then," he said.

The Hyderabad testing centre will function as the company's centralised testing facility for all the global IT products. According to Shaw, the customer base for this facility is expected to grow faster from the current number of six very soon.