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Sybase plans 250 training centres

Sybase India's Country Manager Ramana Gogula says the first of the centres would come up in Bangalore. It has been set up in partnership with Systems Logic. To start with, the centre would offer training in Powerbuilder and sequel servers.

"Apart from smaller players, we'll have a tie up with a major training house, the details of which are still being worked out," he said.

Sybase would provide training material for the centres and the students would be given Sybase certification, he said. The company plans to tie up with IITs, IIMs and RECs so that students from the institutions would get to work on Sybase products in the industry, he said.

Gogula said the liaison office in Bangalore would be converted to a wholly-owned subsidiary by yearend and the Bangalore office would function as the SAARC headquarters for the company.

The choice of Bangalore as location is because most of the hardware vendors are based there. For marketing, the company planned to focus on four vertical segments,, manufacturing, banking and insurance, energy and telecom.

"We are in the process of building up an image and identity for our company in the country. As part of that, the company is setting up a technology centre in Bangalore which will showcase our products working on all major platforms. The technology centre will be used as a proof of concept centre for a demonstration of Sybase products and for bench-marketing," he said.

According to him, the database market in the country is around Rs 1.5-2 billion and the company is no. 2 in the market. The company's sales and marketing channels include system integrators, distributors, resellers, solution providers and multinational consulting companies like the KPMG Peat Marwick, Price Waterhouse and Arthur Anderson.

At present, NIIT and Hexaware are the distributors of the company's products in the country and the solution providers include Ramco Systems, Dun and Bradstreet and Calcutta-based Ubest.

Gogula said "The company is evolving a scheme through which whoever is building applications on Sybase can register with us and we will market their applications in the international market. This way, they can sell their applications and we can push our database products," he said.

"To add value to our products, we also intend to train and authorise resellers," he said. The company has already invested $3 million and plans to invest another $3 million over the next three years.