Hyperion plans subsidiary in India

Hyperion Solutions, a provider of Business Performance Management (BPM) software, has decided to have its own subsidiary in India soon. The Indian subsidiary - Hyperion Systems India Pvt Ltd - which is yet to be registered, would have sales offices in Bangalore and Mumbai, informed a top official of the US-headquartered company.

Suganthi Shivkumar, MD, Asean/India, Hyperion Solutions Asia Pvt Ltd who will be heading the company's Indian subsidiary told Business Standard that in the first phase, the sales offices in Bangalore and Mumbai would have a core team of three members each.

They would be working with channel partners in identifying opportunities in the Indian market and working with Indian clients in setting up BPM enabled environment. In the second phase, the company plans to open offices in other Indian cities as well, she informed.

The announcement comes at a time when Hyperion is launching its latest BPM solution Hyperion System 9 (HS 9) in the Indian market. According to Hyperion, HS 9 is a solution that integrates financial management applications with Business Intelligence (BI) platform for business reporting and analysis.

Suganthi said while most players provide only BI, "this was for the first time that we have clubbed together the BPM system, financial management applications, BI platform and foundation services in a single platform, that has the ability to take business intelligence to the next level with forward looking predictive technology or capability".

This, she added, helps the financial managers by accurately predicting future results, making confident decisions and efficiently allocating resources while setting and meeting stakeholders' expectations.

Adding to this, Sebastien Marotte, vice president, Hyperion Solutions Asia said global businesses were looking at solutions that help enhance business productivity and in measuring or monitoring performance. "Our vision is to enable our clients in generating more value in their businesses in managing their business environment effectively," he noted.

Hyperion, which had a turnover of $703 million in the last fiscal, according to IDC has a share of 21 per cent of the global BI market. Headquartered at Santa Clara in US, the company has development centres in US, South Canada and Australia.

In India, the company works with the help of many offshore development partners who have their centres of excellence with dedicated team specifically for Hyperion, Suganthi added.

About the possibility of having its own R&D centre in India, she said since the company had just started its Indian subsidiary, there was enough possibility of opening its own development centre in India soon. She said India is the most promising market in the Asia Pacific region for Hyperion's range of products, having a growth rate of 27-28 per cent in BPM space.

"With the Indian economy growing at a faster pace, Indian companies will increasingly require allocations that help intelligent business management", she added. According to IDC, the market size for BPM software in India is presently $10-11 million.

Hyperion has about 30 clients in India which include Reliance Industries, Maruti Udyog, Toyota, Bharati, Hutch, IBM, Citigroup, Aditya Birla Group and American Express. The company currently operates in 45 countries and has 2,500 people in its pay roll.