Microsoft India PL

Microsoft Corporation India Private Limited

Type	Private
Industry	Software Consumer electronics Video game consoles
Headquarters	New Delhi, India[1]
Area served	All India
Key people	Steve Ballmer (CEO of Microsoft Corporation) Bhaskar Pramanik (Chairman of Microsoft India)
Products	Microsoft Windows Microsoft Office Microsoft Servers Windows Developer Tools Microsoft Expression Business Software Games[2] & Xbox 360[3] Windows Live[4] Windows Mobile Zune[5]
Employees	Approx 5300
Parent	Microsoft Corporation
Website	Microsoft India

Microsoft Corporation India Private Limited is a subsidiary of US software giant Microsoft Corporation headquartered in New Delhi. The company set up India operations in 1990 and has since been working closely with the Indian government, the IT industry, academia and the local developer community to partner in India's growth. There are three key objectives Microsoft India has focused on:

• To be a key IT partner to the Indian government and the local IT industry
• To support and fuel the growth of the local IT industry through its partner enabling programs
• To bridge the digital divide and enhance skill development under its Unlimited Potential program.

The company runs six business units in India - Microsoft Corporation India (Pvt) Ltd (the marketing division), Microsoft India Development Center, Microsoft Global Technical Support Centre, Microsoft IT, Microsoft Global Services India and Microsoft Research India – together representing the complete Microsoft product life cycle.

Microsoft currently has offices in 13 Indian cities:Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Chennai, Coimbatore, Hyderabad, Indore, Jaipur, Kochi, Kolkata, Mumbai, New Delhi, and Pune; and employs about 5,300 people in the country.

Microsoft India business units

1. Microsoft Research India, (MSR India), Bangalore, was established in January 2005. It focuses on developing technology for emerging markets, multilingual systems, sensor networks and Geographical Information Systems. Researchers collaborate with leading academic, government, and industry researchers to advance the application of state of the art technologies in the identified areas.

2. Microsoft India Development Center (MIDC), Hyderabad & Bangalore, plays a critical role in Microsoft's global product development initiatives and future product innovations. Currently working on more than 20 different products and technologies, some of the key development initiatives from MIDC include Data Protection Manager, RFID Platform Technologies, Office Mobile, Windows SFU, Features of Longhorn, Visual Studio, Office Live Meeting and Microsoft-CRM.

3. Microsoft IT, Hyderabad, develops mission critical enterprise applications that support Microsoft businesses worldwide. The unit’s vision is to work on the next technologies based on pre-ready to manufacture (RTM) Microsoft products and technologies like VB.NET; C#.NET; ASP.NET; SQL Server; Yukon; XML web services; SOAP; and BizTalk Server to develop applications. The focus also includes continuous process improvements using six sigma and TSP/PSP.

4. Microsoft Global Services India (MGSI), Hyderabad, is involved in the architecture and design of large, complex and challenging engagements or solutions based on cutting-edge Microsoft technologies. MGSI has some of the best and the brightest minds in information technology industry who serve the needs of global clients worldwide for their technology consulting and leading solution development and deployment. In addition, MGSI is tasked to drive the delivery engine for competitive migration activities.

5. Microsoft Corporation India (Pvt) Ltd, is the marketing subsidiary. It commenced its operations in India in 1990, and today has offices in 13 cities - Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Chennai, Coimbatore, Hyderabad, Indore, Jaipur, Kochi, Kolkata, Mumbai, New Delhi, and Pune. The entity is engaged in consulting and marketing of Microsoft products.

6. Global Technical Support Center (GTSC), Bangalore, was established in October 2003. It focuses on providing high level technical resolution services to English speaking customers and partners across the globe. Part of the Microsoft Customer Service and Support (CSS) organization it supports over 170 Microsoft products.

Realizing India’s potential

Microsoft works in close partnership with all stakeholders, including governments, Indian IT industry and academia, to ensure that technology is leveraged as a catalyst for enabling more and more businesses, individuals and communities to realize their full potential. Under its Unlimited Potential effort, Microsoft India is committed to working in the area of skill development in the country, in accordance with the identified priority for India. Efforts towards this include:

Partners in Learning aims to accelerate IT literacy and enhance the classroom environment among government schools across the country. Started in 2003, the first phase of the project – Project Shiksha – has so far equipped more than 6,47,000 government school teachers with IT skills, impacting more than 30 million students across the country.

Project Jyoti which provides learning for young adults, especially women, in rural and underserved communities, through Community Technology Learning Centers. Run in partnership with 14 NGOs currently, Project Jyoti supports 1,300 learning centres, which have trained 5, 00,000 people in IT skills till date.

Project Vikas to enhance the global competitiveness of the SMEs by IT enablement. Run in partnership with the National Manufacturing Competiveness Council (NMCC), it entails an action plan to help the Indian SMEs address their challenges through custom made, Cloud based technology solutions. It currently touches more than 3000 SMEs in 10 micro vertical clusters.

Project Kshamta is a joint initiative of the Indian Army and Microsoft India to develop employability skills among the army jawans to help open avenues of a second career option post retirement. So far, across 48 Army training establishments, 1347 master trainers have been trained and 1000 more are expected to be trained this year. The program is expected to train 1, 00,000 jawans by the end of 2012.

Project Bhasha for lowering the barrier for people who prefer computing in their local language. Microsoft provides local language interface packs for flagship Microsoft products in 12 Indian languages.

DreamSpark is a software giveaway for students, providing them with access to the latest Microsoft developer and designer tools at no charge. The program means to equip a new generation of technology leaders with the knowledge and tools they need to harness the magic of software to improve lives, solve problems and catalyze economic growth. More than 3.5 million students across India have availed of the broad range of software so far.

Innovation Alliance is a program introduced to support and foster innovation and entrepreneurship amongst students through a formal association with colleges. This initiative provides an opportunity to bridge the gap between industry requirements and student readiness thereby creating better employable opportunities, industry adoption and strengthening competencies amongst students. Four such centres already exists in India, and they have impacted more than 10,000 students; as well as helped train over 2000 unemployed women, youth and retired men.

MS Learning is a program that is aimed at reducing the barriers to training and certification at every level to help people get the training they need to maximize their potential. The Microsoft IT Academy (ITA) offers top-quality education programs on Microsoft technologies to students and enables them to acquire real-world skill sets. Every year, more than 100,000 people are certified; and in the last 14 years, the program certainly has impacted over 1 million people. There are more than 200 ITAs currently in the country.

BizSpark is a program designed to accelerate the success of IT entrepreneurs by providing them with software, support and visibility during the first three years. The program has already impacted over 1300 Indian startups by providing professional software at no charge; facilitated them with technical support and given them the chance to interact with venture capitalists like IDG Ventures.

Notes

1. ^ UPDATE: Microsoft India: Good Early Response To Windows 7 - WSJ.com
2. ^ microsoft.com/games/
3. ^ microsoft.com/xbox/
4. ^ help.live.com
5. ^ zune.net