Salesforce to expand investments, operations in India, says Parameswaran

Don't want to miss the best from Business Standard?

US-based IT firm Salesforce, which has witnessed multi-fold growth in its business and investment, will continue to invest and grow in India, as the country has the right set of talent pool available, its Executive Vice President and MD (South Asia) Arun Kumar Parameswaran said.

Salesforce started operations in India in 2005 with its first centre of excellence in Hyderabad. Now, the company is spread to six locations in India with an annual revenue of $ 1 billion and a workforce of over 13,000. India is the second-biggest market for the company after the US.

"We were about 2,500 in 2020...now, we have a headcount of over 13,000, over a five-fold jump...we will continue to invest and grow in India because the country has a lot of skills that everybody wants to hire," he told PTI in an interaction.

Besides, he said the company has a proven track record of being able to deliver innovation at scale and speed.

The global customer relationship management (CRM) technology solutions giant Salesforce expects its global revenues to cross $41 billion in FY26.

Talking about public sector enterprises, he said they are gradually adopting cloud and Artificial Intelligence to bring in customer ease.

Ethical and responsible AI is the core of innovation and the development of products, Salesforce, VP, Product Management/Responsible AI & Tech, Rob Katz said.

The company follows an AI acceptable policy and ensures 100 per cent data privacy and protection, he added.

Earlier, talking to PTI, Salesforce South Asia CEO Arundhati Bhattacharya said BFSI, retail and manufacturing will drive the US-based IT firm Salesforce's growth in India over the next three years.

"The three-year agenda remains more or less the same. We still see a lot of growth coming out of the BFSI sector and the retail sector. We see plenty of growth in manufacturing, travel, tourism, hotels and healthcare. So, many of these sectors are showing pretty steady and good growth," Bhattacharya had said.

"Even smaller sectors, like real estate and education, are showing pretty good growth. So, in India, I would say that the growth remains pretty consistent in the areas that we have been in, and we continue to see momentum over there. With the newer kinds of technologies that are coming in, there is a lot of openness as to how it should be developed, or how it should be absorbed."  Speaking about AI adoption by Indian banks, Bhattacharya had said every single company in its board conversations earlier used to talk about digitisation, but now talks about the adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

"Where they will make the most of it in order to get the best returns is probably the concern. It's not a question of using it. I think most boards are convinced that they need to use it. It's a question as to where and how you put transactions on it? Do you put things like grievance portals on it?  "Where exactly do you put it in order to get the best value out of it? I think those conversations are still on. Not every company is convinced about everything, but the fact that they will be bringing it sooner than later," she had said.

Some pilot stages are going on with some of the banks, she added.