In less than three years as the Managing Director of India & SAARC at Polycom Minhaj Zia has been elevated to a larger global role, as Vice-President – South East Asia, India & SAARC.

In his new role, Zia, who will be based in Singapore, is responsible for sales and revenue growth, gaining market share in core and adjacent markets, establishing government relationships, building a strong leadership team, collaborating and supporting APAC-wide initiatives to deliver growth.

Confirming the development, Zia said: “In addition to India and SAARC, I will also be responsible for South East Asia which comprises 11 countries and is a $2.3-trillion economy. I am relocating from Mumbai to Singapore by month-end. Since South East Asia is a new geography for me, I will dedicate the first quarter to building new relationships, understanding different customers segments and local laws/regulations. The second quarter is when I will draw up a plan for the next three years, from 2017 – 2019, followed by execution.”

Zia joined Polycom, a video-conferencing company, in October 2013 from rival Cisco where he spent over 7 years as Director Sales – Collaboration for India & SAARC. Under his leadership, Polycom’s India revenues grew at a CAGR of 32 per cent over the last three years, contributing nearly 30 per cent to its global revenue of $1.4 billion. Polycom’s India market share in videoconferencing grew from 36 per cent in 2013 to 44 per cent in 2015 (Frost & Sullivan) and won the Frost & Sullivan Market leadership award in the Enterprise Video category in 2014 and 2015, beating Cisco which took the award in 2012 and 2013.

India is Polycom Inc’s second largest market in Asia Pacific after China. Of the company’s 3,000-strong global team, 650 are in India, of which 50 are part of the sales organisation and 600 are engineers who are part of the three R&D centres in Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Gurgaon. While most of the voice engineering globally happens in India, as well as a part of the video infrastructure engineering; the hardware is imported. Asked if the company will start manufacturing in India, Zia said: “We have plans to manufacture in India and will keep you posted as and when they materialise.”

Asked about how he will manage the India market from afar, Zia said “I have built great relationships with partners, distributors, customers etc., and a strong leadership team in India. For instance, Ankur Goel who heads our commercial and public sector businesses which constitutes 70 per cent of our overall business in India is doing a great job. With all this in place, I can remotely manage the India market from Singapore.”

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