SGI eyes the billion dollar club

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Silicon Graphics International (SGI), one of the world leaders in the technical computing space, is riding high on its success in the last one year or so.

It is quite evident with the fact that the company grew by around 22 per cent last year and is on the path to generate billion dollar revenue in the immediate future.

“In the last 12 months, SGI has introduced world-class products, significantly expanded our global capability, delivered mission-critical solutions to marquee customers and established a new baseline and created a customer-oriented culture for the company. We continue to plan on an annual basis. As we look towards fiscal 2012 based on current business trends, we expect to grow revenues between 18—24 per cent,” said Mark Barrenechea, president and CEO, SGI.

Supporting some of the industry’s most mission-critical and large-scale computing applications, SGI’s goal is to accelerate time to results in key markets including public sector as well as commercial sectors like defence, financial services, research and education, manufacturing segment, etc.

Moreover, after making inroads into Japan and some EU countries like Germany and France, the company is now eyeing some of the new markets across the globe. For SGI, the largest market outside the US is the APAC region.

The man responsible of turning this bankrupt company into a half-billion-dollar powerhouse, Barrenechea, stated, “Now that we have established ourselves in Japan, the US, the UK, Germany, and France, we are looking to establish ourselves in newer markets like India, China, Brazil, and Russia amongst other geographies.”

This supercomputer major is quite buoyant about the Indian market, as it believes that India has a highly technical community on business apps side. Apparently, the company already has some major wins in the public as well as biosciences sector. Some of its esteemed customers in India are DRDO, CSIR, IITs, Tata, Honeywell, Maruti, IGIB (Delhi), NCBS (Bangalore), etc.

To penetrate deep into the Indian market, SGI is banking heavily on its traditional go-to-market (GTM) strategy of approaching its customers directly. “As far as GTM is concerned, we have been following a 'Direct Touch' model wherein we approach our customers directly; though in some cases, we take help of our local partners,” commented Barrenechea.

Going forward, SGI will strengthen its basic sales coverage model and make investments in human capital. And while it will continue with its Direct Touch model, the company is also open for partnerships with the leading Indian SIs like TCS, Wipro, HCL, and Infosys.