Computer Associates, a leading global provider of management software, has said that it will double its engineering headcount in India over the next twelve months.

Importantly, CA has indicated that it would not fill up future vacancies that may crop up in its engineering team in the United States but would rather hire in India.

Yogesh Gupta, chief technology officer of Computer Associates Inc. told Business Standard that the company, which had about 5,000 engineers worldwide, would double its headcount at its Hyderabad development centre from the present 400 to about 800 in the next 12 months.

"In the next one year 20 per cent of our engineering team will be based out of India," Gupta pointed out.

"We have ramped up our operations significantly in India over the last seven months. We have about 400 employees in Hyderabad at present and expect to double this in the next one year. Additionally, we are not filling up vacancies that are cropping up in the US and instead replace them with jobs in India," Gupta said.

For a product company, unlike an IT services company, the recruitment of 400 people is a very significant number. Companies like TCS, Infosys and Wipro recruit close to 5,000 software developers every year, while product companies like an Oracle or a CA or a Microsoft recruit selectively not even 10 per cent of these numbers annually.

"By recruiting in India we are able to get not only quality software professionals but also ensure that we are able to probably recruit two engineers in India for the price of one engineer in the US, as cost structures are far lower here," Gupta said.

CA designs, markets and licenses computer software products that allow businesses to efficiently run, manage and automate aspects of their IT operations.

CA has an enviable portfolio of software products that are structured to co-exist and operate with all major hardware platforms, operating systems and products marketed by other hardware and software companies.

It is considered an independent software vendor (ISV) and develops and licenses software products that can increase the efficiency of computer hardware platforms or operating systems sold by other vendors.

CA, which follows an April to March accounting year, had reported an eight per cent increase in revenues for the last fiscal at $3.28 billion. Net loss from continuing operations reduced significantly by 87 per cent to touch $36 million.

The increase in revenues reflects, according to analysts, the success of the CA's transition to a new business model which has resulted in a significant increase in subscription revenues. The lower net loss also is reflective of CA's focus on reducing costs.

The focus on reducing costs may be one of the main reasons for the company looking at aggressively ramping up its Indian development related operations. On the business side, the company sees increased Indian defence spending positively impacting its business in the country.

According to Pravir Arora, director marketing, India and SAARC, Computer Associates, the company continued to see good business from the banking and finance sectors, while telecom and government spending also was spurring growth.

"The Indian and Chinese markets are growing at more or less the same levels, of about 70 per cent annually," Arora said.