Market analytics to help move up the value chain

Symphony Services Corp (India) is betting big on the growth of the market analytics industry in India. The company has more than 1,000 people delivering analytics related work and expects to double this number by the mid of 2006.

In an interview with Pragati Simlote of CyberMedia News, Symphony Services Corp. (India) president Ajay Kela details the company's focus areas and its expansion plans.

What space does Symphony Service Corporation plays in?

Symphony Service Corporation is a 2,000 employee plus enterprise with core competencies in high-end analytics and commercial grade software product development. We help enterprises leverage the global economy to gain competitive advantage.

We have three primary offerings - Market Analytics Solutions, Spend Management Solutions and Commercial Software Solutions. The company is headquartered in Palo Alto, CA, with North American locations in Dallas, TX, Nashville, TN, and Waltham, MA; and India locations in Bangalore, Mumbai and Pune.

What is Market Analytics? What is the market for the same and its growth prospects?

Analytics or Market Analytics is all about high-end analysis that produces insights from relevant data to support fact-based strategic, tactical and operational decision-making that directly improves their bottom-line for customers. It involves five major steps: Data Extraction, Loading and Cleansing, Data Warehousing, Data Modeling, Intelligence / Analytics, Driving Insight.

Gartner has forecast that the business intelligence and data warehousing opportunity for consulting and systems integration companies will stay hot and grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 8.9 percent from 2002 to 2007. According to Gartner, there are six high growth industries in this segment - manufacturing, financial services, communications, services, healthcare and retail and wholesale.

Which segment is the company targeting for Market Analytics?

This analytics segment has the potential to grow immensely and steadily. Companies of all sizes are getting involved in analytics -- big players like GE and Citibank as well as mom-and-pop shops. Large enterprises are looking to derive value from analytics - with specific verticals like Telecom, FMCG, FSI and Pharmaceuticals most interested in the benefits of analytics. Symphony's focus is on the telecommunications, manufacturing, and retail vertical markets.

Where does the growth lie for the company?

We are a services provider of complex analytics and software engineering and development expertise. Within these segments, we are expanding in a variety of emerging verticals such as healthcare, embedded software and e-commerce applications. We believe that the markets for both advanced analytics and commercial software development will continue to grow at a robust rate and will continue to expand offshore.

What is the company's India footprint and what are your expansion plans?

India is poised to become a significant player in the world of analytics. Market analytics offers an opportunity for India to move out of labor arbitrage and up the value chain. We have more than 1,000 people delivering analytics related work and expects to double this number by the mid of 2006.

We operate global delivery centers in Bangalore, Mumbai and Pune. Symphony is looking at growing in the regions where it already has a presence. We are also making a substantial investment in building a campus in Bangalore and Pune and moving into an expandable location in Mumbai. Collectively Symphony Services will be adding 500,000 sq. ft of office space in the next six-nine months.