Baan Company NV of the Netherlands has announced its plans to set up a permanent office at the Infocity, Hyderabad. Investments will be made in acquiring state-of-the-art hardware and in imparting training to the employees. Baan already has a product development centre at Hyderabad. The company plans to make it the largest product development centre for Baan globally with an investment of over Rs. 20 crores ( $6 million ) in the next three years.

Explaining the reason for choosing Hyderabad, Baan said that it was happy with the results from the existing product development centre and also pleased with the quality of people from the universities and colleges of India.

The Bangalore-based BFL Software, which is a part of the $650 million Bangur Foundation Ltd., has added two plum accounts to its portfolio - that of the US-based AutoZone and ALLDATA Corporation. The company has set up a dedicated centre for ALLDATA Corporation and will be shortly inaugurating a dedicated centre for AutoZone. The total investment for the two centres would be around $1 million. BFL will be responsible for developing application packages in distribution management for both AutoZone and ALLDATA Corporation.

With these two accounts in hand, BFL's tally of dedicated customer service centres will go up to four. BFL already has dedicated centres for Compaq and Federal Express. The $2-billion AutoZone is one of the largest retail distributors of auto spares in the US with 1,143 stores located in 26 states. AutoZone intends to expand its chain of stores to around 2000 by 1997 and when that happens the company's distribution management system will be one of the key areas in determining its success.BFL will be instrumental in developing a distribution management package which will enable ALLDATA to distribute the CD-ROMS with updated version every fortnight. Compaq recently declared BFL its 'Asian Partner of the Year 1996', in recognition of the company's commitment to quality, innovation and value, as part of a strategic business relationship with Compaq.

Phoenix Home Life (PHL) Mutual Insurance Company, a US-based insurance company, has set up two 100% export oriented units (EOUs) in Bangalore. While PHL Software Services (PHLSS) is a 100% subsidiary of Phoenix Home Life, Command International Software (CIS) is a joint venture between Phoenix and its long-time IT consulting partner, Command Systems.

The two companies will develop application software to meet the insurance and financial services needs of the parent companies in the US and in the markets of America and Europe. In addition, Command International Software will concentrate on consulting and management of potential systems problems due to the century date change. The planned investment in PHLSS is to the tune of $1.15 million. Export earnings in the first year of operations are expected to be around $430,000. The parent companies will be investing 4.7 million (Rs. 16.45 crores) over the next two years in Command International Software (CIS). CIS envisages export earnings in the region of $300,000 in the first year. By the end of five years, the company expects to earn over $50 million from exports.

Verifone, the global transaction automation major which has made Bangalore its key software development centre, opened its Bangalore Development Centre recently and followed it up with the launch of a number of new products.

Verifone is also planning to shift its Internet Commerce Division (ICD) and its Consumer Systems Division (CSD) to Bangalore in the near future. Verifone designs, manufactures, markets and supports transaction automation solutions, including transaction computer system platforms and LAN and WAN systems. Its solutions are used by retail merchants, health-care providers, government agencies and consumers to electronically automate the processing of a variety of payment, benefits and information transactions.

The Consumer Systems Division is focused on the integration of transaction automation technology and software in a wide range of consumer products such a smart phones, PCs, cable television controllers and home security systems. Much of the software solutions are created from out of Bangalore with the software programmers working in tandem with other Verifone software centres located across the globe. Verifone India Chairman and Managing Director said "Bangalore is acknowledged as an excellent place for software solutions, which is why Verifone is increasingly centering its software thrust out here". The Bangalore Development Centre has a number of software projects grouped under three categories : client server, application and MIS development.

Subex Systems, Bangalore, which has a spate of tie-ups in the area of telecom products with Solaic of France to distribute SIM cards (which are used in cellular networks for identification), AU-System of Sweden, a subsidiary of Swedish telecom company Telia, for SIM cards personalisation systems and with Allgon Mobile AB, also of Sweden, for mobile phone accessories (marketed by a separate company Subex Cellcom), plans to set up a software development centre. An initial investment of Rs. 2 crore ($600,000) is expected to go into the software centre. The Centre will cater to the domestic as well as the export market. While projects will form the platform for its entry into the export market, it is through products that the company plans to enter the domestic market.

The Calcutta-based Nicco Corporation has decided to spin off its software division in the United States into a wholly-owned subsidiary. The subsidiary will be called Nicco Infotech Inc. Nicco will transfer the assets and liabilities of its software development branch in the US at book value to the proposed subsidiary Nicco Infotech Inc. Nicco expects that in the next two to three years the subsidiary will be listed in the US stock markets in order to improve its activities at New Jersey and also expand the range of software exports. Nicco has a software training unit at the Software Development Facility (SDF) in Salt Lake, Calcutta, and has major clients like AT&T and the America Bureau of Shipping.

Computervision Corporation of the US plans to invest $30 million in its 100% subsidiary, ComputerVision R&D (India), located at Pune. The new investment plans are in addition to the $15 million already invested in both hardware and software to enhance the contribution of research and development efforts in Pune.

The Indian subsidiary has set up a new software development facility over a 47,000 square feet area to accommodate upto 300 software developers. The company has the capability to meet the software requirements of consumer products to aircraft to ship building. With the new investment, the Pune plant will become the largest operational base of Computervision. The unit is already contributing close to 50% of the R&D work for its parents world-wide requirements. Computervision Corporation is a $500 million R&D software development firm with operations in the US and Singapore, besides Pune.

Silicon Graphics Systems (India) Ltd (SGSIL), a wholly owned subsidiary of Silicon Graphics Inc. of US, will invest about Rs 200.00 crores ( $ 66 millions) for assembling low-end systems in India. The actual assembling of low-end systems in Delhi is expected to begin in the next six months.

There is a possibility that Silicon Graphics may start a software development facility in India. This is an additional factor that will require significantly higher investment from the company. Currently, Silicon Graphics has invested in Pentafour Digital Imaging Centre, Madras and the Super Computing Resource Centre to be opened shortly in Bangalore.

The company claims that the Pentafour Digital Imaging Centre at Madras is the first of its kind outside North America and Europe. In over two years of its existence, Silicon Graphics has recorded 100 % growth and its revenues are to touch Rs. 120 crores ($ 34 million) in 1996-97. India ranks sixth in Silicon Graphics' global strategy. The company does not have a factory in India.

There is a great scope for ISDN in India in the near future and one company which is set to capitalise this trend is CoSystems India Pvt Ltd., a subsidiary of CoSystems Inc., of the US. To meet the growing demand for ISDN, the company is investing Rs. 1 crore ($300,000) in upgrading its existing facility in Bangalore. It has already invested Rs. 3 crores ($900,000) in a modern engineering centre.

The expansion is in line with the company's thrust to be a leader in the inter-networking protocol products and services. The new facility has two ISDN lines, among the few operational in the country. CoSystems is also a forerunner to its plans for direct entry into the telecom market with its ISDN and Internet-related products. Headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, CoSystems is a leading technology-holding company dedicated to developing technology, end-user products and solutions in networking and data communications.

US-based software design technology and services company, Duet Technologies Inc., will invest over US $2 million during 1997 in expanding the facilities of Duet Technologies, the development arm of the US company in India. The company will invest an additional US $5 million by the year 2000.

Duet Technologies Inc., has recently bought CrossCheck, a trans-national company. The main thrust areas for both the companies would be design technology and telecom networking. Duet would leverage selective mergers and acquisitions both in India and in the US, as its growth strategy to obtain market resources and technology synergy. The company also plans to increase substantially its engineering resources in India from the existing 250 engineers to 800 engineers by the end of 1998, a strength which will further go up to 1500 by the turn of the century.