Sun Microsystems is planning to launch the latest version of its Solaris operating system in India by mid-November, having hired 200 developers in 2004.
"The headcount at India engineering centre has gone up from 650 people at the beginning of this year to 850 now. We are hiring and continuing to grow our engineering centre in India," K P Unnikrishnan, director at Sun Microsystems, India, said.
"The total strength of Sun in India is close to 1,000 and we have invested $ 120 million in the country. Investment is an ongoing process and will continue," he said.
Solaris 10, which is currently in the test stage, would be launched in India in mid-November and shipment would begin by December, Unnikrishnan said.
Sun has made substantial inroads in India with its office suite StarOffice but adoption of JavaDesktop has been low.
"Many companies, including PSUs, have migrated either partially or fully to StarOffice but we are yet to bag a big customer for java desktop," he said.
"The penetration of java desktop is taking time because it will require a lot of handholding and support from our side. Some small companies have switched to java desktop while a few are running pilot," he said.
Sun has already cornered a large chunk of the market in India. "Our challenge now is to grow the market and for that we are exploring new verticals and cities like Pune, Hyderabad and Chandigarh with our seven partners and 30 distributors," he said.
