DBS tech hub to hire 1,000 engineers

To open two lakh sq. ft. facility in city

DBS Asia Hub 2 in Hyderabad, the largest technology and operations hub of DBS Group outside Singapore, is being expanded with the addition of one more, nearly two lakh sq. ft. facility here and recruitment of 1,000 professionals, primarily engineers.

“We expect to employ one thousand more people in [the next] 12-18 months as we build new solutions,” DBS Bank India CEO Surojit Shome said on Tuesday.

Speaking to the media after opening the Hyderabad branch of the bank, he highlighted the role of DBS Asia Hub 2 for the Singapore-headquartered financial services group. “We build all over our products either in Singapore or in India and in collaboration. They are core drivers of our innovation,” he said.

The hub in Hyderabad, functioning from a two lakh sq. ft. facility at Waverock in Gachibowli, employed around 2,000 people – 1,200 engineers who work with DBS and about 600-800 who work with partners who build the products, he said.

The head of DBS Asia Hub 2, Mohit Kapoor, said a 180,000 sq. ft. building at Madhapur, near IKEA, was being finalised for hosting the second development centre. Though there was still space to accommodate up to 200 more at the existing facility, the group sought to plan in advance for the future growth.

While recruitment was already under way, the centre was likely to take shape in the next 18 months.

To queries on the products and solutions made by the hub in the city, Mr. Kapoor said there were some technology pivots that were common across customers and market segments, mainly around cloud, data and analytics, digital and automation. “Those are the things we do for all market segments. From here, we are building technology products for all the six prime markets – India, China, Taiwan, Indonesia, Singapore and Hong Kong,” he said.

On the recruitment process, he said hiring through hackathons was one of them. Mr. Shome said most of the 1,000 people to be recruited for the hub would be engineers and people with software skills. For DBS Group, 50% of the digital solutions are built out of the centre in Hyderabad.