Parmindar S Miglani

Keane, a US-based external service provider (ESP), recently took over Signal Tree India (presently operating as an IT solutions and services company), to enhance its offshore delivery capability. Keane India will serve as the offshore company of the parent, which until now had its delivery options as onsite, offsite and near-shore capability (in Canada). After this merger, Keane India will be integrated with Keane USA and all its 40 offices across the US, UK and Canada.

Explaining the takeover, Parmindar S Miglani, managing director, Keane India said, “With this tie-up, Keane will be able to offer flexible delivery options of onsite, offsite, near-shore and offshore and also give advantages of cost reduction to our customers. Whereas, for Keane India it will help in acquiring more projects and increasing our competence in verticals like manufacturing, government, high technology and energy sectors, in the next couple of years.” The company has been providing its value-added services to a wide spectrum of industries that include transportation, financial services, healthcare, hospitality and the consumer products sector.

The company’s team of nearly 750 technology consultants is working both at its onsite and offshore facilities. Keane India’s competence lies in its range of services that includes application outsourcing, total IT management, e-business and quality consultancy. And for its future initiatives, the company is planning to develop its expertise in Peoplesoft and SAP as future projects are expected to come in these areas. “We would soon be setting up a SAP practice at our Hyderabad facility,” said Miglani.

The company, which closed its books at $50 million last year, is presently aiming at a 100 percent growth target for the current financial year. Plans are on to increase its manpower and infrastructure base by about 10-15 percent in the current financial year, with 60 additional people already recruited for the new ventures.

For a seamless delivery model to ensure uniform high standards of quality deliverable to its customers across the organisation, Keane India has already embarked upon an approach for integration of its processes and quality integration with Keane USA. The company, which is already an SEI CMM Level 5 organisation, in addition to being ISO 9001 certified across its India technical centres, is now vying for ISO 9001:2000 certification to bring in more quality focus for its business. According to Miglani, “Since many of Keane Inc’s clients are still at the SEI CMM Level 3, there is a lot of opportunity in bringing them to higher levels through consultancy.”

While the company is presently focusing on the US market, in a couple of years it plans to look at other potential markets like the UK, France and Italy. Founded in 1965, Keane Inc. provides services like business consulting, application development and integration, and application development and management (ADM) outsourcing.