BANGALORE, INDIA: Lawson Software, the Minnesota-based third largest ERP company has entered the Indian market as part of the strategy to attract regional partners to serve customers.

According to a Gartner reports, India's ERP market is pegged at $143 million and is growing at 14-15 percent on a yearly basis. With more companies emerging in the infrastructure space, Lawson has opened an office in New Delhi to expand in the region. It has also appointed Kamal Sharma as its regional head for Lawson South Asia.

Talking to CIOL, Harry Debes, president & CEO of Lawson Software said, "we were predominantly a US-based company but have gone global since and have presence in about 33 countries. We see huge opportunities in India and other BRIC countries and expect to grow at a steady pace."

The company is already serving customers in India and Sri Lanka through partnerships with Symphony Services and ETP International and plans to draw on the expertise of more local partners and provide sales and marketing support via its India office.

"Even though SAP, Oracle, Peoplesoft have had their presence in India for several years, still we are sure of gaining a sizeable market share in the coming years through our partnership," remarks Debes.

In fact, the company entered India way back in 1994 and has about 25 customers existing in India and hopes to now focus on the mid-level customers. "Walmart, the leading global retail giants is one of Lawson's big corporate customers, so not necessarily targeting only on mid-sized or big corporates but will remain focused on new companies in fashion, F&B, healthcare, public sector verticals in India," says Sharma. 

But on specific verticals like the healthcare segment where in Lawson claims to have about a 60 percent market share in the USA, the company is looking for active partners in the healthcare industry mainly for back office. Likewise, it has already signed up with ITC, Reliance Retail, PTEX in the fashion and garment vertical and KPIT Cummins in the equipment service and retail segments. It also has TBA in the food & beverages (F&B), Symphony in the distribution & manufacturing and likely to enter in the other segments also shortly.  

The company plans to employ four initially at its Delhi office and grow over the years. On the global front, the company is expected to grow its headcount by 15 percent in 2008.

Lawson currently has offices in China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan and also in Thailand.