The Hindu Business Line : Symphony to focus on embedded software biz

Pune, Dec. 3 Product engineering outsourcing services provider Symphony Services is focusing on the embedded systems and software business, and expects this to contribute around 40 per cent of its revenue in a few years.

The company that now has three delivery centres in India also plans to develop a new business vertical in classic engineering design services, while keeping a goal of more than quadrupling its workforce in the country to 10,000 employees each in Bangalore and Pune.

Elaborating upon the company’s plans, Mr Gordon Brooks, President and CEO, Symphony Services, said that the embedded software business is expected to be worth $14.42 billion globally by 2010 and $43.07 billion by 2015. “It is a large part of our future,” he said, adding, “Classic engineering design services is projected to be at least as big as embedded.”

Disclosing that embedded software business currently accounts for around 5 per cent of the company’s revenue, Mr Brooks said that Symphony Services had recently made a foray into Japan. “We should have a formal sales strategy in place (for Japan) by the middle of 2008,” he said. A Nasscom survey places Indian exports from embedded software to be worth $10 billion by 2008.

Viable destination

Mr Brooks put India as the best country globally to set up a delivery centre, pointing that better domain skills and experienced manpower put it well ahead of China despite the latter being 20 per cent more price competitive.

“It is the only viable large scale destination for engineering talent, and the backlash against outsourcing is over,” he asserted. Currently 95 per cent of all deliveries are sourced from India.

The company has total employee strength of 3,800 in India today. “Our goal is to hire 10,000 each in Pune and Bangalore in the next few years,” Mr Brooks said.