India to be the focus for both in terms of talent and market

THE acquisition of LinkedIn by Microsoft is likely to further increase India’s importance as a location for both talent and market as the two companies have the largest development centres here outside of their headquarters in the US, reports fe

Bureau in Bengaluru. Microsoft opened its development centre in Hyderabad in 1998 and followed it up with a global technical centre in Bengaluru. It has its presence in over 10 cities and employs around 7,000 people.

For LinkedIn, India is its second largest market outside the US with over 35 million members and the company had recently announced doubling its office space in Bengaluru. The new office will house functionally diverse LinkedIn employees, from the product and sales teams.

Besides being the source of talent, India also represents a key market for both companies. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella had recently made his third visit to India and also met Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The IT giant has taken major strides in its cloud business with the opening of multiple data centres in the country.

Sanjoy Sen, doctoral research scholar, Aston Business School, UK, said, “The strategic interest of Microsoft in being better connected with a massive community of professionals around the world offers a far more rewarding opportunity. I would expect Microsoft to exploit this opportunity by bringing its brand and offerings closer to professionals connected via LinkedIn through the power of social networking which is bound to translate to additional sales revenues in the years to come.”

Microsoft provides its entire array of services and products here and India represents one of the key markets for the company in the Asia Pacific region with a growing base of smartphones and the e-governance initiatives of the various state governments.