Zensar to tie up with SMEs, universities

In an effort to reduce its dependence on the people-intensive outsourcing model, Zensar Technologies is putting in place a global delivery model that involves collaborations and partnerships with universities, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and independent solution vendors (ISVs).

"The information technology (IT) and IT-enabled services (ITeS) industry is people-intensive. It employs 1.6 million professionals and the estimated net addition of people for the financial year 2008 would be 2.5-3 lakh people. However, faced with an acute shortage of skilled manpower, increasing salary costs at 15 per cent a year on an average and the appreciating rupee against the dollar, the industry is battling with declining profit margins," Ganesh Natrajan, deputy chairman and managing director, Zensar, said.

However, Zensar, which is currently among the top-25 software services providers from India, with revenues of Rs 605.86 crore in FY07 and an employee headcount of 3,700 people, is aware that growth would not be solely dependent on workforce expansion.

"We will limit our direct employee headcount to 5,000 people, of which 3,000 will be in Pune, 1,000 in Hyderabad and 1,000 elsewhere," Ganesh said, adding that the company will have a virtual workforce of 5,000 by 2010.

The building blocks for the tiered development or virtual workforce include supply-side collaborations with universities and SMEs and demand-side partnerships with SMEs and ISVs.

The company has already tied up with eight universities across India, whereby 200 students are trained by the company to work on projects.

The partnerships with SMEs is a two-way relationship, where the company provides tools and process knowhow in return for extending its reach into untapped geographies.

"We are in talks with SMEs in Brazil and Ghana," said he, adding that the building blocks for the virtual workforce were in place.

The virtual workforce will be supported by its global delivery platform.

The company recently launched its Gdan'sk development centre in Poland, which along with Shenzen in China and Hyderabad form its Global platform.

"The global delivery platform constitutes 10 per cent of our overall revenues and by 2010 will account for 20 per cent of our revenues," he said. The model is designed on the lines of Aptech's partnership and collaborative development approach.