US-based firstRain to foray into India

New Delhi, Apr 22: US-based firstRain, a leading provider of search-driven research application for investment professionals, plans to enter into India in the next three-four years.

At present, the company provides its services in the United States only.

''We provide our services only to the US market as of now, and plan to move on to India in three to four years,'' firstRain President and CEO Penny Herscher Herscher told UNI here on her fourth visit to India.

Explaining the company's future plans, she added that the company would enter into London within the next two years, followed by Switzerland, and then the Asian countries such as China and India.

The company recently opened up its facility in Gurgaon and has a research and development centre (R&D) in Mumbai to provide services to the US market.

It commenced its operations in India in 2001.

''Our India operations are central to the company's overall business, rather than just an oursourcing model,'' firstRain India General Manager Udit Mathur said.

The company has doubled its employee count in India to 100 from 50 earlier over the past year to meet increased demand for its services from institutional investment firms, Mr Herscher said.

''We will further increase our existing employee count to 200 in India by the end of 2008,'' she said.

Major customers of the company include Symbol Technologies, Sanofi-Aventis, JPMorgan Chase and Citicorp Credit Services.

As a search engine though, the company is facing competition from search engine majors like Google and Yahoo, but is still confident about its offerings of specialised services, Ms Herscher said.

Founded in 2000, firstRain is a dual-national, venture-funded, privately held company headquartered in California. It has additional offices in New York, Gurgaon and Mumbai.

UNI