Rukmini Priyadarshini

Mr Ramesh Emani, President, PES, Wipro

Bangalore , Aug. 7

WIPRO expects semiconductor, telecom and CE companies to increasingly outsource their research and development (R&D) to cut time to market.

Speaking to Business Line, Mr Ramesh Emani, President, Product Engineering Services (PES), Wipro, said that the new 10,000-strong R&D division created by Wipro is poised to see R&D outsourcing from companies looking to get higher value.

"The main reason for our customers to outsource R&D is to cut time to market."

"Size has value and with the largest such R&D team in the world, we can synergise the team, since customers see enormous value in outsourcing R&D services.

We have proved that R&D is outsourceable," says Mr Emani, adding that many companies that are planning captive R&D centres in India are open to outsourcing to Wipro.

Outsourced product development could save a company $2-5 million in costs, but outsourced R&D — even if a product hits the market three months earlier — could lead to $80-100 million in additional revenues since time-to-market is crucial to product companies, says Mr Emani.

Wipro also claims having greater market knowledge, offers reduced investments in quality processes and says its soup-to-nuts type of solutions has found favour with customers. "Our R&D services are through developing technologies (WLAN, Linux, multimedia), partnerships — with semiconductor foundries (SMIC, TSMC, UMC) or platform companies (Microsoft, ARM and Symbian), and by building proof of concept solutions." According to him, Wipro's new PES division enables it to offer more services to existing customers as well as go after new services and competencies to new customers.

The PES division is the largest in the world and more than double the nearest competition in India, says Mr Emani. Outsourced R&D services account for 15 per cent of the total R&D pie, which is expected to go up to 35-40 per cent.

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