Will start work on West Bengal centre in 3-6 months: Infosys

IT major Infosys Technologies will start construction work on its first software development centre in West Bengal, at Rajarhat near here, in three to six months, a top company official said on Friday.

"We have paid the money and got possession of the land. We hope to start construction work in three to six months," Infosys Technologies executive co-chairman S Gopalakrishnan said on the sidelines of a Confederation of Indian Industry event in Kolkata.

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He said in the first phase, 5,000 jobs would be created and the approximate investment would be Rs 100 crore (Rs 1 billion).

He said while 35,000 professionals had been already hired so far this fiscal, another 10,000 would be hired by the end of March, 2012. The present headcount of the company is 1,40,000.

Asked whether Infosys would shift its focus outsidevthe US and Europe due to the slowdown in these economies, he said, "Any shift will take time."

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"We are looking at the markets of China, South Africa, Malaysia and Indonesia," he added.

Gopalakrishnan said despite the global turmoil, the IT sector has shown resilience and there have been no lay-offs.

"There would, however, be consolidation in IT sector and those who have the niche capability will survive," he said.