NEWS-INDIA: IBM to invest $100 million over two years in Indian labs

[Frederick Noronha <fred@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

IBM to invest $100 million over two years in Indian labs

from India Abroad News Service

New Delhi, Mar 13 - U.S.-based information technology (IT) giant IBM said
Tuesday the company would invest $100 million over the next two years on
expansion of its two existing facilities and setting up a new laboratory in
India.

"IBM will invest $100 million over the next two years towards the
development of its software laboratories in Bangalore and Pune. A new center
will be opened in Gurgaon (on the outskirts of Delhi) this year," a press
statement issued by the company said here.

The company will induct 1,700 software professionals this year in its three
laboratories to take the total number of professionals to 4,500, the
statement said, adding the number of software engineers would jump to 10,000
engineers over the next few years.

IBM's software labs would focus on specific technologies including Linux,
the popular alternative operating system that is freely available to
programmers.

"We have enabled our entire range of hardware, software, middleware and
services on Linux. We have announced our faith in its future and many of our
key strategies will be built around Linux," Abraham Thomas, managing
director and chief executive officer of IBM India Ltd., said.

The IBM Linux Development center in Bangalore, one among seven such IBM
facilities worldwide, supports business partners and independent software
vendors across the south Asia region. The company has also set up a Linux
Competency Center in Bangalore where it develops standards and embedded
software for open source.

"We will soon announce a university program that will enable universities to
develop curriculum with applications, middleware and tools on Linux," Thomas
said.

-- India Abroad News Service