Anand Jhaveri - CEO of Rave Technologies was interviewed by the Outsoucing2india magazine . In this interview Anand reveals the company’s focus on Outsourced Product Development (OPD) and its strategic growth plans worldwide.
Excerpts:
Give us a broad idea about Rave’s service offerings across Industries
Rave is a niche player providing software product engineering services to the ISV segment since 1995. The spectrum of our services target software products from their early stages (Proof of Concept) through to their end of life stage. Using innovative techniques we have even helped our clients extend the life of their products and continue the revenue stream.
Most of our customers are software companies or ‘software-intensive’ businesses where software is key enabler for the revenue stream. Over a period of time, we have created products and methodologies that enable us to address the specific pain areas of ISVs in architecting, designing, developing, testing, and maintaining their products.
We have technical strengths on the major Microsoft (dot-net) and Java platforms and on the major database such as Oracle and SQL Server. We have executed wide range projects in the verticals of Insurance, Financial Services, Health Care, Automotive, Personal Information Systems, Entertainment Industry, and Retail through the ISVs.
What is your expertise in offering Offshore Product Development services for global ISVs?
When I returned to India after spending a few years in the Silicon Valley working with AMD & Clarity, I was clear that I wanted to continue working on cutting-edge technologies. I viewed software product development as cutting edge and hence Rave has been focused on doing high end product engineering work for our clients. In fact our very first client was a US ISV, making games and graphical components on the Windows platform. Even before anyone thought about OPD we were already doing it. We have mastered this art of product engineering and have acquired deep understanding of software product lifecycle. We have good grasp on the drivers and pain areas of ISVs through various stages starting from early stage proof of concepts through productization, roll-out, steady-state, and end-of-life. Our service portfolios are developed around these stages which clearly sets us apart from most other players whose service offerings are structured around technology or the software development life cycle.
While there is really no difference in the pitch of most offshore vendors, are there any instances of how you built up a value chain for a specific service / process?
It is really fascinating how things evolve when one decides to go out of his/her comfort zone and take up bigger challenges. For example - Initially most of our work used to involve development and maintenance of software products but over the years we learned that even the best engineered products would sometime fail in the market if the end-users do not find it easy to use. We have invested in building strong GUI capabilities in our delivery team. Even before the term Usability became popular we were helping our clients enhance their products by developing more effective GUI for better user experience. Today we have full fledged COE (Center of Excellence) on Usability Engineering.
We have also developed deep knowledge and expertise in performance improvement, scaling and reliability engineering. On products that we maintain, we have moved from bug-fixing to enhancement to performance tuning. This involves a broad range of skills and a deep understanding of contemporary tools and technologies and how best to deploy them.
In recent times there is a trend to move legacy products onto the Web using the Microsoft .Net platform. Many of our clients are now coming to us to consult with us on identifying effective strategies to migrate their products to .NET.
How has your global delivery model evolved to service your clients more effectively?
The traditional offshore IT industry has been built initially through low end work like body shopping, Y2K and later providing application support and maintenance services to enterprises. Such service required little or no sophistication in the delivery model.
Our objective is to provide a world class, high quality software product engineering service, delivered cost effectively, leveraging a global delivery model (20% onsite and 80% offshore). This is challenging. Our delivery model has matured significantly over the past 15 years. We have rich experience and are able to offer a wide range of choice to the customer. The highlights of the model are:
• Choice of methodologies….from traditional waterfall to modern agile methods
• Choice of location…from onsite to offshore and varying mixes, based on
control v/s cost trade-offs
• Choice of technologies…legacy to state of the art
• Choice of management and team structures…ranging from Rave managed
teams to client managed teams
• Ability to support early stage product engineering to mature products
• Support from quick-fixes and ‘hot fixes’ to large scale feature rich product
engineering
• Strong focus on performance, usability, scalability, reliability and
maintainability
• Fixed price and time and materials commercial models
• Local support teams
• Rich communication and interactions
• Early visibility of work products and deliverables, over the web
All our models are supported by strong quality processes, technical reviews and people management.
Where do you feel your competitive strength lies…which drives your growth!
There is one fundamental factor which gives us strong competitive strength and that is focus. This focus very clearly defines the type of customers we serve (ISV’s), services we offer, technologies we support, verticals or domains we serve and the locations we operate in.We are a highly focused company. We focus all our energies on a specific task we take up. For us it is only Product Engineering and nothing else. We do what we are best at and we keep improving on it year after year.
We have built up a very strong mobile practice, In fact one of the products that we developed won the highly coveted Handango Champions Award at Handango Summit held in the US this year. We have been mastering the complexities of the different mobile Operating Systems and devices for over 4 years and see this as a big opportunity for Rave in the future.
We are undoubtedly a market leader as a provider of pure OPD services in the UK; our track record in this market is always going to be a firm foundation for growth.
How important are SLAs in your relationship with your clients?
SLAs are very important in structuring Win-Win Offshore engagements with any software company. Our SLAs address critical parameters like Schedule variance, Effort variance, Quality metrics (e.g. defect density), Productivity metrics etc. These SLAs raise the bar for Rave to improve the level of service, quality and productivity we deliver to our clients over time. For our clients this means assured ROI.
What is the unique value proposition of Rave?
The values we deliver to our clients go well beyond cost reduction. This includes improved operating efficiency, faster Time-to-Market, IP protection, knowledge retention, revenue enhancement, process improvement and of course enhanced scalability, reliability and performance of our client’s products.
When India is leveraging its strength and location to become a global outsourcing hub, How does Rave Technologies plan to evolve itself in the new and globally competitive environment?
Rave has the courage and conviction to take uncharted paths. I myself was probably one of those rare techies who decided to return from Silicon Valley to India in late 80s. In this offshore software business when everyone was focusing on low end Y2K kind of work Rave was doing high end technology work. When almost all the Indian players were rushing to tap opportunities in the US we slowly and steadily established leadership position in our segment in the UK market. Now, when others are trying to expand in to Europe and EMEA we are implementing a strategy to expand in a big way in to US. We are also strengthening our delivery capabilities and expanding our portfolio of services for ISVs. In the past Rave has been quite low profile but going forward you will notice aggressive growth plans being executed by Rave and visible to the world.
For Rave how critical is the onsite presence and do you find it crucial for building a long term relationship?
Onsite presence is quite crucial to manage the relationship when you are working with a highly dynamic business like ISVs. We have to align ourselves with the dynamics on the ground almost on daily bases. Depending on the nature and tenure of the engagement we have either an Onsite Coordinator or an Account Manager with strong delivery background managing the relationship.
How do you plan to position Rave in Asia Pacific over the next 5 years in Offshore Product development space?
I see Rave focusing more on the Europe and US market for coming 2-3 years. We see tremendous untapped potential and growth opportunity in these markets. At the same time we will definitely keep our eyes open to emerging opportunities in other geographies.
About Rave Technologies:
Since its inception in 1987, Rave Technologies a Pure Play Software Product Engineering Services Provider has earned a reputation for delighting its clients by consistently surpassing expectations and helping them deliver robust, market ready software products that meet the highest standards of engineering and user expereince.
Rave Technologies is distinguished by its unwavering commitment to delivering value by focusing on grooming efficient and talented personnel, innovation, technology strengths and quality practices. In addition, inherent to Rave’s processes, are practices that address key ISV concerns such as protection of intellectual property, knowledge retention and ROI.
Headquartered in India with a SEI-CMMi Level 3–compliant Global Delivery Center in Mumbai, Rave has a global footprint that encompasses USA, UK and European markets. With its global presence, Rave Technologies offers the benefits of both, the near-shore control and high quality, cost-effective offshore delivery.
Contact:
Ashish Desai
Rave Technologies Pvt. Ltd.
Vice President - Marketing
ashish.desai@rave-tech.com |
