Mahindra Satyam in outsourcing deal with SAAB

MUMBAI, INDIA: Indian IT services firm Mahindra Satyam today announced that it has entered into a tie-up with defence and security company SAAB to develop its operations in India for the global defence and the homeland security market.

Mahindra Satyam and SAAB have already initiated the setup of a Centre of Excellence for Network Centric Warfare (CoECoE–NCW), which will offer comprehensive skills and repository of tools, system, middleware, integration platforms and system showcases in the field of NCW, said a press release.

This will be a development centre for mission-critical applications and C4I (Command, Control, Communications, Computers, and Intelligence) solutions for global opportunities accessible to either of the partners.

Though the financials of the deal were not announced according to an Economic Times report, the deal is worth $400 million.

On the collaboration, Ake Svensson, president and CEO of SAAB said, “We view the relationship with Mahindra Satyam as a strategic meeting of two highly skilled teams in technical and engineering excellence.”

He said one of the activities under the initiative would be to address the Battlefield Management System (BMS) for the Indian Army.

Anand Mahindra, vice chairman and managing director of Mahindra Group said, “This collaboration is a strategic step towards synergizing Mahindra Satyam's unique strengths in mission critical systems, ERP, engineering services, avionics and integration and Mahindra Systech's manufacturing capabilities and engineering excellence.”

He said this would leverage SAAB's expertise in C4I programmes.