Clarendon will cater to Indian IT firms abroad

Clarendon Parker Middle East (CPME), a Dubai-based staffing solutions company which recently entered India through its joint venture with Mumbai-headquartered Rite Choice Consultants, is upbeat about its prospects in India.

This follows a slew of queries from Indian IT companies having operations in West Asia and South-East Asian countries.

"Many international software companies based out of Bangalore have already started to request meetings for their recruitment needs in their projects in West Asia and South East Asian region," Patrick Luby, chairman, Clarendon Parker Asia and MD, Clarendon Parker Middle East told Business Standard in Bangalore.

Both Luby and Virendra Rastogi, MD of Rite Choice who is now the MD of Clarendon Parker Asia through the company's 50:50 equity partnership with CPME said that many Indian IT companies having their client-base in countries like Japan, Malaysia and Singapore plan to move to those countries. "Many of them are in talks with us to meet their staffing solutions in those countries as very few IT pros working in India were showing interest in moving there due to enough opportunities at home," they said.

Luby said that Clarendon Parker Middle East has a database of 1.7 lakh candidates, of which 75,000 are Indians and most importantly, over 35 per cent of the candidates had IT backgrounds. "This provides us an edge over our competitors in relocating the candidates," Luby added.

Luby said that a Delhi-based company which plans to open a chemicals plant in Jordan was in touch with Clarendon Parker to fill various positions. "While they want the senior management staff to be non-resident Indians (NRIs) and expatriates, the middle-level managerial posts should be from local candidates preferably Jordanians."

The joint venture has already invested Rs 1 crore towards building its infrastructure in Indian cities and plans to open offices in Chennai, Pune, Hyderabad and Kolkata apart from its existing offices, which the company owned from Rite Choice.

The company is also expanding its existing offices in Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi and Ahmedabad and shifting to newer locations.

Clarendon Parker Middle East has already seven offices in West Asia including Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

Luby said the company plans to open 13 more offices in West Asia and India-specific business development centres in Dubai, Oman and other West Asian countries.

Besides, by the end of 2007, Clarendon Parker Asia plans to enter Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, and in 2008 to Malaysia and Singapore. In the first year of its operations, Clarendon Parker Asia is looking at a revenue of Rs 10 crore.