Wipro in China foray, plans SW unit

BANGALORE: Wipro Ltd., India's No. 3 software service exporter, has launched a Chinese subsidiary and aims to set up a technology centre later this year, a senior company official said.

"We are in the first phase going to serve clients with a China footprint. The second step will be to do an ODC (offshore development centre) in China," Sudip Nandy, chief strategy officer of the 35,000-employee-strong company, said.

Unlike rivals Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys Technologies, which plan to set up software centres employing Chinese from the start, New York-listed Wipro would initially deploy 35 to 40 Chinese-speaking workers from Yokohama in Japan, Nandy said.

The company would later hire Chinese workers for the software centre, he added.

Indian software developers in the $16 billion outsourcing industry have woken up to concerns that China could be a threat to India's prowess, so they are taking the battle to the country.

Nandy recently visited China with a delegation of India's National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) aimed at boosting industry cooperation between the two countries.