The Hindu Business Line : Sierra Atlantic to invest $15 m more in India

SIERRA Atlantic, an enterprise integration solutions provider, plans to invest about $15 million in Indian operations by next year to establish own technology campus, more than double the headcount and launch a brand building exercise. Apart from organic growth, the company is eyeing strategic acquisitions in enterprise solutions space.

The Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Sierra Atlantic, Mr Raju Reddy, who is based in Fremont, California, was in India to oversee its operations, spoke to Business Line about the recent company board decisions and investment plans.

"The company has acquired technological expertise through our long-term association with leading technology companies such as Oracle, Siebel and others. This has also recently resulted in our establishing a interoperability laboratory where some of the top tech firms use to actually test their products and ensure quality assurance," he said.

"Our rapid growth in manpower to meet the increasing demands from 500 to 750 by June this year shows we would continue to recruit and invest. We anticipate to reach 2,000 by end of 2005. This means a separate campus in Hyderabad, which would be developed in phases. In phase-1, we will have about 1,000 capacity and eventually reach 4,000", he said

"We have built up a solid brand over the last few years and in terms of recall, we are rated high here after Satyam Computer and Dr Reddy's. We expect to build upon this both internally and externally. However, while we are currently not listed, we would also consider the possibility of making a public offer. The idea, however, is not to raise funds as we are cash-positive, but to extend our visibility. But I cannot say when this could possibly happen," he said.

"There are some companies which we could possibly acquire . Therefore, we are also aggressively looking to this strategy as a part of the brand building and consolidation exercise, " Mr Reddy said.