BA Systems eyes 10pc of Indian networking solutions market

BA Systems, the Bangalore-based router manufacturing company, headquartered in San Jose, California, has entered the router market and is aiming at a market share of 10 percent in the networking solutions space in India by 2009-10.

The company has launched 'Enterprise' category of routers with a contract manufacturer in India. Its USP is its price, which it claims is about 30-50 percent cheaper than competitors. B. Jagadish, director marketing, BA Systems, speaks about the company's entry into the Asian market and the growing market for Enterprise routers, in an interview with CIOL's Manu Sharma. Excerpts:

CIOL: Being a US company what made you roll out your products in India?
B. Jagadish: BA Systems is headquartered in San Jose and has presence in Bangalore, Singapore, Hong Kong and China. We are targeting the Asia-Pacific market since it is growing by many folds in the Enterprise segment of routers. India, in particular, has a big market and the router market is growing at 15-18 percent. In comparison, it is growing by only 5 percent in the developed countries. Therefore, we have launched our products here and plan to expand overseas through our OEM network. In fact, we have already sent our first shipments to China and Bangladesh.

CIOL: Describe the Enterprise router market and what is its estimated growth in India?
BJ: The Enterprise routers industry segment is presently estimated at $4 billion and is likely to grow at a CAGR of 30 percent to touch $10-billion by 2010. According to an IDC report, while Edge, PC based, wireless, ADSL, broadband, XDSL and core routers make up most of this industry, Enterprise is in lesser numbers, but is catching up.

CIOL: What are the routers that you have launched and what applications do those support?
BJ: The BA Systems' EN3500, and EN2400 integrated routers uniquely address key customer requirements such as reduction in CAPEX and OPEX, and the power to implement IP networking services with minimal disruption and maximum remote control from a central location. This is achieved by combining the high performance and carrier-grade reliability of the BA Systems Operating System (BOS) with a central management application -- a BA Systems Element and Services Management Supervisor (BESS).
The modular, multi-threaded design of BOS, in combination with the EN series high-performance hardware, provides for the best-in-class performance, both raw and with multiple services loaded.

CIOL: Who are your competitors in this segment?
BJ: Cisco Systems has a market share of over 90 percent, while Juniper Networks, Nortel, Tasman, Huawei and 3Com are the other major players in this segment. BA Systems has just made an entry into the market and hopes to capture a 10 percent market share by 2010.

CIOL: How do you plan to tackle your competitors?
BJ: The BA Systems' EN series represents the next generation of integrated routing platforms. The EN series is the first routing platform that leverages the combination of optimized hardware with tested, interoperable, and modular high-performance operating system –(BOS), thereby affording significant CAPEX savings.
BA Systems' products are deployed in mission-critical networks at high profile customers, including a leading national telco, banks, stockbrokers, MSPs and BPOs. BA Systems strategically partners with channels, including systems integrators and service providers to go-to-market. The company provides partners with level-3 technical support, training and feature customization for partners/customers.

CIOL: What kind of marketing and sales support does the company provide?
BJ: Our support base for the customers will be out of India. We have already started a toll-fee line that will be attended by us starting next January. Presently, we provide technical support to our customers that make it unique unlike others and have no plans to outsource the aftersales support. We provide technical support to our customers to handle them faster and understand their needs better. Presently, it is offered 12x5, and once the volumes build up, it will be 24x7. The company also has marketing offices in Bangalore, Chennai and Delhi. Besides, we will have full-fledged offices in Mumbai, Kolkata, Ahmedabad and Hyderabad by October 2007.

CIOL: What sort of pricing models are you following for you products?
BJ: Our USP is our cost that is incomparable to any competitors even Cisco. Our solution comes at a cost that is at least 30 percent lower than close competitors Cisco, and can even be as less as 50 percent less if it is an end–to-end solution. Our hardware contributes a lot, while our software has own patent rights. We are the only router company with a local manufacturer. Neither Cisco, Juniper or anyone else has such a facility. Most of them source their products from either China or Taiwan.

CIOL: Who are your present customers and whom are you targeting?
BJ: Our products are affordable, off-the-shelf components. We started production in May 2006 and have already installed the products at the Taj Group, ITC, STPIs and co-operative banks. We also have corporate clients like Fortune Financials, Bosco Steel, BNA BPO and Divya Systems. The company will also be tapping into the railways, airlines, telecom and defence sectors in 2008 as they are all based on tenders.

CIOL: How is the feedback from your existing customers?
BJ: The feedback has been phenomenally good. It is because of our modular operating system, inherent features, rollback graceful restart, route tracking, SLA monitoring tool, etc. All of these are the major empowerments that our customers have experienced. We offer end-to-end solutions, including real-time WAN management. In fact, we have moved away from offering a product to a total solution.

Juniper expands R&D staff based in India

The company is planning to invest $400 million in next five years mainly for R&D activities and also add 300 more staff by mid 2008 in India.

Out of the total global strength of about 3,500 R&D workforce in Juniper Networks, close to 30 percent of the engineering workforce will be based in India doing research across all the product line. Now with India among the fastest-growing region in Asia pacific, the networking equipment major plans to invest $400 million in next five years in India mainly for R&D activities.

Talking to CIOL, Hitesh Sheth, executive vice-president & general manager of Ethernet Platform Business Group of Juniper Networks says, "India has the largest workforce for research & development globally and we are very bullish about it. Juniper has some major contribution from the R&D centre in Bangalore and plans to add 300 more R&D and operations staff by mid 2008 in India." In fact, since the strength of the team is expanding rapidly and will touch 1000 in India now, we are also expanding on our office premises here at the Bagmane Tech Park in Bangalore, he adds.

Juniper has major centers across the globe, headquartered in of San Jose, the company has other R&D centres in Westford in Massachusetts, Beijing, Canada, Israel and Bangalore, where the teams works in a matrix environment, says Sheth.

Lately the IT network infrastructure solution provider has increased its level of contribution towards evolution of global products for the company. In fact, the Bangalore R&D centre is engaged in developing networking platforms, routers and security products, switches and JNOS, the operating system. The centre has also developed fully-owned products.

Recently, Juniper unveiled its new high-performance network infrastructure offerings with a new family of Ethernet switches (EX series). "The team is now focused on completing the terabit-chassis EX switch, and further enhancing the fixed-configuration and virtual-chassis products. The Bangalore R&D team's contribution in the past and the recent success has prompted the company to hand over critical projects," he noted.

Narendra Venkaswamy, managing director of India & SAARC at Juniper Networks, Bangalore says, "the company will invest in research, engineering, switching products, security products. Globally our switching portfolio is largely focused here and we are also growing our sales team in Mumbai, Chennai, Delhi and other cities."

The company is focused on Internet protocol (IP) solutions market in India and it is expecting major market opportunities with telecom service providers rolling out their network infrastructure. Juniper India has around 1,250 employees and has invested $200 million in the last three years.

Juniper is also seeing major opportunity in the area of 3G equipment and infrastructure mainly routers, switches, WAN acceleration and security products to major service providers.
Reacting to the future of Juniper in India, Venkaswamy says the company has a $2.8 billion turnover for the year 2007 with Asia-Pacific contributing 23 percent. Besides telecom, Juniper India is also focusing on the segments of government, BFSI, IT and manufacturing.

"3G is one of the areas that has given us great growth in other parts of Asia. The future in 3G drives switching which drives routing and security. We are partnering with all major tier 1 service providers in India, who will be rolling out their 3G networks," says Sheth.