Source: www.business-standard.com

Thales Group, the international defence and civil security electronics technology supplier, selecting Chennai as its global system development and export hub, has opened a $1.3-million software centre in this South Indian city.

Jean Paul Lepeytre, Senior Vice President for Thales security services and services divisions says: “Thales Software India has invested 1-million euros in developing the Chennai facility and hopes to triple this investment in the coming years, by employing a thousand software engineers here by 2010.”

Earning $400-million in revenues from its India operations, TSI hopes to increase it in the coming years by exporting software systems, for all its ongoing and future operations in 50 and more countries, Thales officials affirm.

Thales security and services division will form a base for the development centre of the entire group in Chennai, confirms a TSI official following the formal opening its software centre. Francois Dupont, Country Director – Thales says: “Our Chennai centre will provide the domain specific expertise for all our world operations and anything TSI does here will be exported and available in our products elsewhere,” adding: “There is a huge market for air traffic control software and we hope to fullfil this need, especially in countries like India.”

To begin with, the Chennai centre will develop software for ATMs and IFSs, with the central government the group’s biggest in the world, at par with its in-flight entertainment system centres in US and France.

Thales (formerly Thomson Components and Thomson CSF) has been a leading global electronics and systems group for 37-years catering to defence, aerospace and security markets worldwide, supported by a comprehensive services offering.

Key component supplier to US and other military, Thales also sells its products to telecommunication, medical, broadcast and science markets.

Reynald Seznec, Senior Vice President of Thales says, the group’s civil and military businesses have developed parallel to each other, with 50% offerings coming from the civilian sector.

In the transport segment, Thales supplies signalling systems to Germany and Spain, ticketing systems to Canada, airport security systems to Gulf countries and urban rail systems to British and Greek markets, as it hopes to consolidate a deal with Eurobahn.

“We have provided the ticketing system to the Delhi metro rail and hope to look at other rail systems in India”, says Lepeytre. As well, the five Scorpion submarines that India has signed for, are being fitted with Thales systems at the Mazegaon docks. The new batch of T-90 tanks India got from Russia are being fitted with Thales fire control systems. Apart from that, Indian Airlines, Air India and Kingfisher Airlines are also getting their in-flight entertainment systems from Thales.

“Only restrictions on exports from Chennai will be the laws that are in force for defence systems and we comply with the laws of the exporting and importing countries. These legal issues can be managed”, says Seznec.

Source: www.business-standard.com

Looking at opportunities in knowledge process outsourcing (KPO), as part of its growth plan in the segment, rating agency ICRA may look for possible acquisitions in the domestic and international markets. The news is confirmed by P.K. Choudhary, Vice-Chairman & Group CEO, who says his firm is looking to target a niche player with potential.

As part of its growth plan, ICRA Techno Analytics (ICTEAS), a subsidiary of ICRA’s KPO arm, has got its subsidiary incorporated in the US under the title of ICRA Techno Analytics Inc, which has been set up according to the New Jersey Business Corporation Act, USA. The new firm has been incorporated for the purpose of information technology services and products, engineering services, business and knowledge process outsourcing, management consulting services, research and information services and publication.

The New Jersey office has been set up basically for helping source clients, and a company representative is to be placed in US for tapping clients.

With a staff strength of 150 working out of a 14,000 sq. ft. off-shore development centre, ICRA Techno offers off-shore and on-site Software development, BPO and engineering services, services that help to reduce development costs, substantially.

“We believe that a quality delivery house must emphasise on the right processes and client IP protection. Our HR processes ensure quality manpower,low attrition of 10-12% and, therefore timely delivery on our projects,” says Choudhury.

According to Choudhary, an ISO:27001 certification was awarded to ICRA Techno recently, for addressing security issues, and only after a thorough inspection of the security systems of company processes.

Techno ICRA’s domain areas in software services include finance, supply chain, distribution, hand held solutions, demand and forecast and data warehousing industry segments. As for BPO services, they comprise of data aggregation, equity research and business analytics. “We also offer engineering project management and design services both on-site and off-shore,” concludes Choudhury.