The Hindu Business Line : Mentor Graphics expands R&D work in India

MENTOR Graphics Corporation, the $675-million EDA (electronic design automation) solutions provider, is expanding and consolidating its R&D capability here while targeting the potential market in the region, particularly India.

The Managing Director of Mentor Graphics (India), Dr Srinivas Mandavalli, told Business Line that the company had expanded its Indian operations significantly over the last two years, both at Noida and Hyderabad, and earlier this year commissioned a new sales and support facility at Bangalore targeting the domestic market.

Dr. Mandavalli said: "Mentor Graphics researchers in India address EDA requirements of multinational companies based here while supporting global market. As the semiconductor industry grows and more corporations set up their base in India, the demand for EDA tools is set to grow. Lately, we are seeing heightened investments in the domestic market as large corporations continue to expand their work portfolio. The company expansion is not really in terms of headcount, but encompasses a larger R&D role along with support mandate."

"Over the last three years, the engineering team here has grown from 60 to 200 and we continue to expand our operations as planned. The growth in the R&D area is often modest compared to the headcount in the IT services space. Interestingly, the overall research work scope has expanded significantly with the R&D teams fully integrated across locations. The areas now addressed include PCB (printed circuit board) chip design, hardware-software co-verification and cabling and wireless harness tools," Dr Mandavalli explained.

Gartner Dataquest report estimates the EDA market in India at over $32 million in 2003. Established in 1981, Mentor Graphics with revenues of $675 million, employs about 3,800 people worldwide.

A little over 10 per cent of its overall numbers is based out of India centres now operating from three locations. In 2002, Mentor had announced investment of about $50 million in a phased manner spread over five years.