India may become Zoho's 2nd-largest mkt in 2-3 years: Sridhar Vembu

Most of our products are now integrated with ChatGPT. We are rolling out integrations every week, he says

Chennai-based unicorn Zoho Corporation claims to be the first bootstrapped software-as-a-service company to have crossed 100 million users across its various business applications (apps). For Zoho, India is currently the third largest market after the US and the European Union (EU). In terms of pace of growth, India is the fastest-growing market, having grown 37 per cent in 2022. SRIDHAR VEMBU, co-founder and chief executive officer of Zoho Corporation, talks about the India growth story and its collaboration platforms in an interview with Ayushman Baruah on the sidelines of Zoholics India, the company’s annual user conference in Bengaluru. Edited excerpts:

How important is India as a market and what is driving its growth?
 

Today, India is our third largest market after the US and the EU.

In terms of pace of growth, India is already the fastest-growing market, growing at 37 per cent in 2022. India could be the second largest market for us in the next two to three years and perhaps the largest in 10 years.

Both wins from small and medium businesses and large enterprises are driving this growth. We are seeing a lot of migrations from the likes of Salesforce, and this is globally true.

Large Indian corporations have come to see us as a very serious technology player that can take on Salesforce and solve problems faster, better, and in a more affordable manner.

As Zoho bets on the hub-and-spoke model, any further expansion plans you have?
 

Yes, at Zoho, we follow a hub-and-spoke model of offices to cater to a distributed workforce. And that is how we are expanding our presence too. We have opened offices or are in the process of opening them in Tier-II and -III towns in Tamil Nadu like Tirunelveli, Palladam, Madurai, and Thanjavur.

These allow us to accommodate about 500-1,000 people. So this is where a lot of the growth is going to happen. But our hiring rate will fluctuate. We have generally slowed down now because of the global macroeconomic backdrop.

What percentage of Zoho products are now integrated with ChatGPT?
 

Most of our products are now integrated with ChatGPT. We are rolling out integrations every week. We have licensed all of them. We have also invested in domain-specific models tailored for specific uses such as human resources or finance or recruitment.

What traction is your collaboration platform Zoho Cliq seeing in India?
 

The traction is very good. It’s accelerating now. We are also putting a lot of new capabilities into it. For example, on Monday we launched Cliq Rooms, a smart conference room solution, and announced new updates to Zoho Cliq, our communication and collaboration platform, that will enable it to further boost its upmarket momentum.

The improved platform capabilities of Cliq enable cross-functional collaboration in organisations. Zoho offers the operating system for business, and we call Cliq the operating system for Zoho.

The entire functionality of the Zoho suite is increasingly available through Cliq, with its beautiful messaging interface. This allows employees across a large organisation, like Zoho Corporation itself, to communicate and collaborate. Zoho Cliq is one of the most used apps in Zoho One.

Given your scale and size, haven’t you thought of any acquisitions?
 

We don’t have an acquisition plan. We only do it if there is any particular company we like and if our values align with it. We have done only a few small acquisitions in the past. We are not averse to doing acquisitions, but we don’t go for the hyped valuation-driven acquisitions. We look for critical technology-driven acquisitions that add to our capabilities.