Ma Foi expands in Bengal

Ma Foi Management Consultants, India's largest HR services provider, has set up an office in Siliguri, the financial hub of north Bengal often described as the gateway town to north-eastern India.

Ma Foi's business partner operations in Siliguri would its fifth office in eastern India and first in West Bengal outside Kolkata.

The office was formally inaugurated by Rahul Shankar, the local head of Coca-Cola, in the presence of Malay K Karanjai, principal of Siliguri College, and E Balaji, executive director of Ma Foi Management Consultants, the company said in a release.

Ma Foi said it would use the Siliguri centre to service employers on a continuous basis.

Balaji said he felt the Siliguri"�Darjeeling-Gangtok belt was rich in talent, with over 75 colleges in the vicinity, offering candidates with the competitive advantage of speaking good English apart from being hard working and industrious.

He felt the location was an ideal sourcing pool for the ITES industry.

Ma Foi's business partner operations will be headed by Keerthi Saha.

The centre would offer flexi-staffing, recruitment, assessment and payroll outsourcing services.

Siliguri had emerged as the main commercial city in north Bengal owing to its strategic location near international and state borders.

The Siliguri-Jalpaiguri Development Authority (SJDA) has taken up development projects to make it the most urbanized centres in the region after Kolkata, Ma Foi pointed out in its release.

With the opening of Nathula Pass for Indo-China trade, Siliguri would become an even more important trading hub.

The region offered good industrial and social infrastructure with five industrial belts at Rani Nagar, Cooch Behar, Dab Gram, Chandmoni and Jalpaiguri.

Tr aditional industries like tea, timber, tobacco and tourism were the mainstay of the economy in the region.

Siliguri was attracting private investments in infrastructure, housing, transport, tourism and agro-based industries, with ITC and the Taj Group having acquired land there, Ma Foi's release added.

Coke had a bottling plant here while process Industries like Pran Foods of Bangladesh and Dabur were in talks to set up projects in the zone, which also offered great potential for herb-based industries.

Ma Foi had recently developed its franchising model to widen territory for sourcing of talent and enhance delivery of flexi-staffing and permanent staffing, the company said.

Ma Foi was the leader in flexi-staffing in India with 12800 deputees serving across 490 locations at present.

The 13-year-old Ma Foi has placed more than 58486 personnel across 30 countries.

It has 50 offices in India, UAE, UK, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Muscat.

It posted revenue of Rs122 crore for the year ending December 2004.

Vedior, one of the world's largest recruitment companies and leaders in specialist staffing business, recently invested in Ma Foi.

New venture

• The business partner operations in Siliguri would its fifth office in eastern India
• Ma Foi had recently developed its franchising model to widen territory for sourcing of talent
• The business partner operations will be headed by Keerthi Saha