Continuous Computing, a San Diego-based company, provides high availability
platform solutions that enable telecom equipment manufacturers to rapidly deploy
converged communications. The company is a global provider of high availability
platform solutions for telecom equipment manufacturers, particularly targeting
wireless and VoIP applications. Pradeep Malhotra, managing director of
Continuous Computing, talks to Bhaswati Chakravorty of Dataquest about the
company's corporate strategy and expansion plans for India, role of triple
play in the market and key challenges for the relatively young company.
How important is the Indian market to your growth strategy?
The Indian telecom market is growing at a huge pace. Gartner predicts that
by the end of 2005, there would be 100 million wireless subscribers. Most of the
carriers are growing very fast and are likely to use next generation networks
rather than deploy old style switched infrastructure. We are equipped to take
advantage of this opportunity. We are going to double the headcount at the
Bangalore center by the end of this year. We have recently launched the new
Trillium+ product line. We are very bullish on the Indian market.
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We are planning to invest over $3 million in the Indian operations over the
next three years. The India center will serve as a key element of Continuous
Computing's development infrastructure and will also provide pre-and
post-sales support for the company's customers in the high-growth Indian
market as well as the entire Asian region. This center also provides time zone
support for our European customers
What would be the role pf Triple play in the market? Do you see an
opportunity for your company in Triple play?
We are definitely eyeing the "triple play" era. Triple play or
convergence of voice, video and data, enables telecom equipment makers to offer
a host of services on a common platform. India is on the verge of convergence.
Teledensity and PC penetration are increasing. Indications are that VoIP (voice
over Internet protocol) will become mainstream. Value adds such as
location-based services and video streaming require a converged network to
support their roll-out. Delivering triple play services over broadband is the
next revenue-generating service for operators and service providers.
What are some of your biggest growth challenges?
Our biggest challenges are finding great people and managing the rapid
growth of our business. The last four consecutive quarters have each seen record
growth. We are constantly on the lookout for exceptional engineers, strong
salespeople, production personnel, marketing professionals and so on.
On the product side, wireless and Voice over IP are two of the
fastest-growing and most rapidly evolving segments of the entire telecom
industry. Staying at the forefront of these changes in order to have insight
into the future and to deliver leading edge products as part of the best total
solution to our customers is a continual challenge.