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Zoho on cloud 9 with new product from Tenkasi centre
As one of the pioneers in building world-class software products in India, Sridhar Vembu, the CEO of Zoho Corp, headquartered in California, has come a long way. Having kick-started the journey in 1996, creating at first, products focused on networking equipment vendors, the company made inroads into the arena of SaaS (Software as a Service) cloud offerings in 2006.
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Chennai
Last week, the company, which has its international headquarters in Chennai, launched Zoho Desk, a context-aware help desk software that was built in the lush green expanses of rural Tamil Nadu – in Tenkasi. In an interview to DTNext, Sridhar, who believes “you don’t need to be in Silicon Valley to create a top-class software business,” opens up on what prompted him to bring business back home and the way forward for the company and India Inc.
Talking about the impetus behind setting base in Tenkasi, Sridhar says, “Around 10 years ago, I started blogging about the need for not overcrowding Chennai as an employment hub. We wanted to set up base in a town of 1,00,000 people, which is the sweet spot as Tenkasi has about 70,000 people. Five years ago, three staff members moved here to start operations and they said nobody here writes code. But I believe talented young people in rural India should not have to leave home seeking job opportunities. The model of urbanisation followed in our country creates overcrowded, polluted metros and robs rural areas of their talents.” He goes on to add, “We work in the ‘cloud industry’ where the belief is that the only location that matters is few square miles of downtown San Francisco. We are turning that diktat on its head.
We started out with three engineers and today we are a 150-member strong team in Tenkasi. This office building here in Mathalamparai was an abandoned fruit pulp factory populated by snakes. Now our nearest competition is in San Francisco. This location is strategic as we can also ‘steal’ talented people from Kerala.” Giving us a lowdown on the talent pool in this region, Sridhar says, “I make sure I come here every few months. We have a Zoho University campus in Chennai as well in Tenkasi. This is the fourth batch in Tenkasi and the 31st batch overall in the company. From Zoho University Tenkasi, there are about 60 graduates who have gone on to join the company. Almost 25 of them work at Zoho Desk, of the 100-130 people in this team. The remaining 35 students joined the Chennai office.
We are building a bigger facility here in Tenkasi which will be thrice as large. Most of the Tenkasi team has been working on Zoho Desk for the past five years. Right now, there is a waiting list of about 300 people from the Zoho Chennai office to be transferred to Tenkasi. They have been waiting for more than a year.” Sridhar is quite optimistic about the entrepreneurial climate in Tamil Nadu. He says, “We have good support from the government in terms of approvals. The IT secretary has lent us his full-fledged cooperation. Think about things like land acquisition which is a major issue if you are in the north. In Tamil Nadu, it is a fairly straightforward process. With respect to Ease of Doing Business, competition among states in India is good as we now spur each other on. I admire the initiatives taken by the AP government for what they have done as it keeps us on our toes.
All the states are now witnessing a lots of action in terms of who is landing more business and pushing entrepreneurship in India. All this is good for the nation.” Commenting on the global winds of change that are now affecting businesses all over, Sridhar points out, “Some of the broad trends are already visible. You have global trade as a percentage of global GDP dropping. That has been happening for several years now.
The last 40 years of the world economy has been about increasing trade. Now that its dropping, it means countries have to focus more on domestic economies and ground realities and not just exports. Particularly, this East Asian model of export-driven development and export as the sole priority has to reverse. Even the Chinese President has said that their focus now is on internal markets in China. We need to do the same in India.” Sridhar believes there is an urgent need for the government to revamp its economic priorities.
“Despite being the world’s moviemaking capital, all our hardware is imported. Every hospital equipment is imported. Even our cellphone parts are made abroad. In textiles, the best machines come from Germany. We don’t manufacture any such component. So, India runs a massive trade deficit, about $120 billion a year. We make it up with overseas remittance. We send workers abroad to help bridge this gap. But this is unsustainable as we can’t keep sending people abroad to be able to buy goods. We need to start making them here and creating jobs here. That’s where the economic priorities should lie and I completely stand by the Make in India initiative.”
On its expansion plans, he says, “The Tenkasi office is part of a 15-acre campus and as we have our hands full, expansion will have to wait. Product-wise this whole cloud OS model, which runs a business, is coming together nicely. The Platform as a Service (Paas) vertical is also something that looks promising. But, we are just getting started, aren’t we?”
VEMBU SPEAK
- You don’t need to be in Silicon Valley to create a topclass software business
- Did not want to overcrowd Chennai as an employment hub
- We wanted to set up base in a town of 1,00,000 people, which is the sweet spot as Tenkasi has about 70,000 people
- 5 years ago, 3 staff members moved here to start operations. Nobody here writes code. But talented young people in rural India should not have to leave home seeking job opportunities
- Began with 3 engineers; now we are a 150-member strong team in Tenkasi
- Operate in once-abandoned snake-ridden fruit pulp factory at Mathalamparai; our nearest competition is in San Francisco! This location is strategic as we can also ‘steal’ talented people from Kerala
- The 4th batch of Zoho University campus is Zoho’s 31st batch; from Zoho University Tenkasi, about 60 graduates have gone on to join the company
- TN govt provides good support in terms of approvals; land acquisition a major issue in North; in TN, it is a fairly straightforward process
- Ease of Doing Business: competition among states in India is good as we now spur each other on
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