UiPath to ramp up India headcount to over 1,000 people this year

Robotics process automation (RPA) solutions firm UiPath aims to ramp up hiring in India this year to take its headcount to over 1,000 people in the country by the end of the year as it expands its operations in the country.

The Romanian company, which was valued at USD 3 billion when it closed its series C funding of USD 225 million in September last year, counts entities like CapitalG (formerly Google Capital), Sequoia Capital and Accel among its investors.

"We have about 340 people in India across various functions, including R&D. We expect this to be northwards of 1,000 by the end of the year...We are also looking at strengthening our R&D operations here, tripling it from over 75 people right now," UiPath India Chief Executive Officer Raghunath Subramanian told PTI.

Globally, the company has a headcount of about 2,400 people - which will also be ramped up as it strengthens its business in Americas, Japan and China, he added.

UiPath's India engineering centre in Bengaluru is part of the three development centres - Bucharest and Seattle being the others - that play a significant role for the company's global and India operations.

Besides, the company is looking at setting up three more offices in India in Kolkata, Pune and Chennai, a move that will help the company work closely with clients implementing automation solutions.

Subramanian said the company is witnessing a surge in demand for automation across verticals like banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), manufacturing and retail among others.

He added that the company is also betting big on global in-house centres (GICs or captives) of global enterprises operating in India.

"Another area where we see a lot of potential is the government. Automation can help increase productivity as well as bring in more transparency that can enhance citizen services. Automation can be a game-changer," Subramanian said.

UiPath clocked revenue of over USD 180 million at the end of December, 2018 with about 35 per cent of this coming from Americas. The remaining was almost equally split between Asia Pacific and Europe, Middle and Africa (EMEA) regions. The company does not provide country-specific revenue details.

Besides, the company also aims to train about one million globally on automation. Subramanian expects about half of this number to come from India itself as the company strikes a number of academic alliances to integrate automation as part of the curriculum.

"We are pushing for a 'Automation First' mindset and our vision is 'a robot for every person'. By automating processes, one can do away with repetitive and time-consuming tasks, which allows people to dedicate their time to more value-based work. We want to up-skill one million students in RPA by 2022, of which, 500,000 students will be from India," he said.