Symantec is doing “cutting edge” Research & Development work in India, products, innovations and solutions from which are marketed globally.
“We are doing cutting edge R&D work covering cybersecurity services, threat and information protection and big data analytics for global markets as well as serving the Indian market,” said Sanjay Rohatgi, senior vice president Asia Pacific and Japan, Symantec.
“There are a number of Symantec products that are completely designed, developed and tested in India and put on the global market,” he said. “At times, R&D in India is leading the development for a certain line of products for the company.”
Symantec has R&D centres at Pune for enterprise security, Chennai for Norton and Bangalore for website security/trust services.
The international company, giving top priority on security for global network in its business strategies, has more than one in three engineers based India.
Having first moved to India in 1994, Symantec has built business operations across major cities including Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai and Pune.
India, with one of the world’s largest IT expertise hub, remains the top R&D place for international corporations, highlighted Rohatgi, stressing its importance for Symantec.
For the domestic market, Symantec is logged into the “Digital India” initiative through various partnerships with government agencies.
“We are working very closely with the government agencies on the Digital India initiative, covering not only the broadband but the whole spectrum including smart cities,” he said.
“To us smart city means how we effectively deliver citizen services, e-governance and help effectively manage utilities and security,” explained Rohatgi with confidence of taking a technology leadership in India’s 100 smart city development.
Symantec also contributes its expertise to manage cybersecurity and other threats to the information technology network in the country in many ways, he added.
It is helping in scaling up the professional levels in managing cyber security threats in India, which has the highest rate of attacks in Asia, given the country’s large IT community. The Indian IT network gets an estimated 35 per cent of the cybersecurity attacks in Asia, according to daily monitoring at Symantec centres.
In June 2015, Symantec signed a memorandum of understanding with the National Association of Software and Service Companies (Nasscom) to help increase the number of certified cyber security professionals in India.
Nasscom has set a target to have one million certified cyber security professionals in the country in the coming years, up from over 64,000 in 2015.
Symantec has joined Nasscom, Sector Skill Council and Data Security Council of India to train and create new job opportunities in the field of cyber security.
Curriculums are being developed for five prioritized job roles in cyber security. Symantec is also working on programme to train the trainers which is one of the most efficient way to increase the number of certified professionals in managing cybersecurity, he pointed out.
Another major manpower development initiative from the corporation is scholarship offers to the first batch of 1,000 women undertaking the cyber security certification program as well as internships with employment opportunities for certified trainees.
“Our experts will train the trainers which is the fastest way to scale up and achieve one million certified cybersecurity professionals. Post launching the course, Symantech hopes to train 50,000 over the next three years,” he said
“We are also looking at opportunity for Symantec employees to be subject matter experts in this initiative,” he said.
“India is a large market for Symantec and an equally large source of skilling manpower for deployment elsewhere in the world as well as hub in leading the development of our products, innovations and solutions for the global markets,” said Rohatgi. fii-news.com
