Now, IT cos move from offshoring to advising strategy (India)

24 Feb 2009, 0520 hrs IST, N Shivapriya, ET Bureau

MUMBAI: From doing bits and pieces of design and testing on the electronics inside, a few Indian software firms are now partnering with their overseas clients to help them launch medical equipment and other devices for the Indian market.

Firms, HCL Technologies, for instance, have moved on from being offshore providers to becoming advisors on emerging market strategies for clients and even designing and manufacturing the final product.

Others like Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and MindTree, which were earlier doing verification and support for semiconductor vendors, are now partnering with them for end-to-end chip and product design.

“There are 4-5 firms here that are currently working on this model. What we are seeing, especially in industries like medical equipment and automotive, is that the manufacturer washes his hands of completely. The Indian IT firm handles everything from where to buy the chip to where to manufacture. This is more of an exploratory model, but if it works, we could see more such instances,” said Gartner Research principal research analyst Ganesh Ramamoorthy.

“We were not addressing the Indian market earlier, we were providing some pieces of the project and other technical resources. Now, we have started taking responsibility for the entire product. The client gives us the concept and then, we do everything starting from market research to the final prototype,” said HCL Technologies V-P and global head, life sciences and healthcare, Pradeep Nair.

HCL’s life sciences division has partnered with IIT Kharagpur; MIT, Apollo Hospitals and Doctor Kares Hospital. It is now taking this ‘cradle to grave’ model to other BRIC countries.

“The time-to-market pressure is very high. We are seeing more such end-to-end chip and product opportunities, especially in the area of automotive, hand-held devices, telecom infrastructure and consumer electronics,” said TCS head (embedded hardware) Rajaram Nayak. When launching a device for a new market such as India, the manufacturer has to consider various factors such as price points, user interface, local regulatory requirements and even reliability of power supply.

“A US company wanting to launch a portable sugar monitoring equipment in India may outsource the entire design to the Indian firm,” said Mr Ramamoorthy. “Semiconductor vendors looking to develop new products in niche segments such as automotive and medical devices for emerging markets, should either consider end-to-end outsourcing and product design or negotiate an equal risk/ reward partnership with Indian design services vendors,” he added.

MindTree president and co-CEO (R&D services), Vinod Deshmukh, said that because companies such as MindTree understood chip design they could also work with product manufacturers. Electronic equipment manufacturers consume a large number of semiconductors, making chip design a key element in the product design chain. “More and more electronics are going into hospitals. We are seeing this segment grow 70% even today,” said HCL Tech head, marketing (life sciences) Ravi Vij.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Infotech/IT-cos-move-to-manufacturing/articleshow/4179537.cms

alternates for me on a daily basis

The past few weeks, it's been Mumbai for me. As soon as I'm done with this project, it'll be Bangalore again. :eyes:

in the same job nightly for over two years. Ever heard of permanently upping the space? :o

What would they do with a SOC7?

;)