Calcutta was a natural choice for Mindtree managing director and CEO Debashis Chatterjee when he was chalking out the next phase of expansion for the IT firm.

Having worked in this city for about six years with his previous employer before taking up the top job at the Bangalore-based company two-and-a-half years ago, Chatterjee managed to climb the wall of perception to see why Calcutta should be a pit stop for Mindtree.

Even though the pandemic delayed the plan a bit, the company started hiring for the city as a base even though it had not formally opened an office yet. When the 56,000 square foot office at Sector V opened its doors on Wednesday, the global technology and consulting services firm had already hired 1,000 people for the centre.

In an interaction with The Telegraph on Thursday, Chatterjee, who goes by the name DC among industry peers, said his past experience in Bengal coupled with the improved supporting infrastructure was instrumental in convincing the board of Mindtree to expand in the city.

A graduate in mechanical engineering from Jadavpur University, Chatterjee had a 22 year stint in Cognizant before joining Mindtree.

Industry observers in Bengal said he was among those who had played a key role in Cognizant’s expansion in Calcutta.

“I came back to Calcutta initially in 1996 and I had a very good experience from my previous company in setting up the center and growing in Calcutta at a time when nobody believed in Calcutta. The talent which is available here is truly fantastic. When I took over this role and I was looking at the overall diversification strategy, we decided Calcutta to be part of that plan,” said Chatterjee, sitting across the new office here.

“Infrastructure is pretty good in Calcutta and connectivity is not that bad. There are good universities, engineering colleges, management institutes and the statistical institute in Calcutta. The government also has been very supportive,” he said, adding that this made the city a natural expansion choice for Mindtree.

Plans are afoot to double the headcount and floor space in the next 12 months — a plan which the industry veteran described as significant but feasible. The company occupies the 18th floor of Adventz Infinity at Sector V, Salt Lake, the city’s IT hub.

From Calcutta, the company plans to provide digital solutions, consulting, cloud services, core modernisation, product engineering, business intelligence, data analytics, CRM platform and cybersecurity services to clients in banking and financial services, insurance, travel, transportation and hospitality companies in North America, Europe and Asia Pacific.

Hybrid work

Chatterjee said Mindtree will follow a hybrid work model where some of its employees will be required to come to office and the rest can work remotely and the company has already built the technological capability.

“Even before the pandemic hit us, we had a work from home policy. When the pandemic hit, we were among the first ones to go for a 100 per cent remote working in no time because we knew how to do it. Some of these things will not change. From a future of work perspective, going forward, the new normal has to be a hybrid model,” Chatterjee said.

“From April onwards, at our development centers we are asking our people to come to office at least two days a week to start with and it could be scaled up to three days a week from May onwards,” he said adding that the percentage of people working remotely will evolve over a period of time.

Mindtree has already launched a returnship programme for technology professionals to restart their careers. Professionals with minimum two years of experience followed by a two-year break will be eligible for the programme kickstarted from Calcutta. It will be gradually expanded to other locations of the company.

Mindtree, a Larsen & Toubro group company, has presence in Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Calcutta, Pune, Noida and Bhubaneshwar.