Aspect Development  
Founder, Chairman & CEO: Dr. Romesh Wadhwani 
Founded: 1991 
Went public: 1996 
Number of employees: 300 
Revenues (1997): $44.37 million 
He started his first company right after finishing his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Carnegie Mellon University in 1972. The first shot was a good one – eight years later, the company, developing information systems for energy management and building automation, was acquired by a European firm. American Robot was shot No. 2 – a company handed over to him to partly own and fully run by VC firm Venrock Associates. Romesh Wadhwani grew this company from start-up to a $40 million business by 1988. With hundreds of competitors and a very difficult and low- margin market, he decided to slowly fade out of the company.  
 Only to start Aspect Development. The cost of purchased components for mechanical and electrical manufacturing industries had climbed from 35 percent to 70-80 percent during the ‘80s. That is where Romesh Wadhwani saw an opportunity—to find a solution and help these companies get better access to component supplies and design information. By managing this information, design engineers could easily pick the best, most cost-effective component early in the design cycle—the phase in which 70 percent or 80 percent of the total product cost is established. After pioneering the Component and Supplier Management (CSM) solutions market, it is today a world leader, with blue-chip customers across sectors. Says the Gartner Group, “We have positioned Aspect as a CS market leader because it offers the broadest, most complete CSM vision coupled with a high ability to execute.”  
 In December ’97, Aspect Development acquired privately-held CADIS, Inc., based in Boulder, Colo. CADIS has been a leading contender in the CSM market, with strengths in web publishing and industrial manufacturing solutions. Excluding the CADIS transaction, revenues for Aspect increased 83 percent to $44.37 million compared with revenues of $24.24 million recorded for the year ended December 31, 1996. Aspect’s customers are generally large electronics and mechanical equipment manufacturers, and include Motorola, Texas Instruments, Philips, and IBM.  
URL: http://www.aspectdv.com 
Headquarters: Mountain View, Calif. 
Phone: (650) 428-2700 

Cirrus Logic 
Founder & Chairman Emeritus: Suhas Patil 
Founded: 1984 
Went public: 1990 
President & CEO: Michael L. Hackworth 
Number of employees: 2135 
Revenues (1997): $879.3 million 
“When Mike Hackworth got together with Suhas Patil in 1984, he thought he might be able to use the software Patil had invented: a Storage/Logic Array program for very large scale integration (VLSI) design. Hackworth, then a senior vice president at Signetics (now Philips Semiconductor), was frustrated by the many months and great effort it was taking to bring out the new VLSI chips. Patil, a former MIT professor, had a new technique that got around the many problems encountered with gate arrays or standard cells, but he needed a partner to help move his start-up to the next stage.  
 “The two men hit it off, and Hackworth agreed to become a mentor to Patil Systems. Then came a revelation. ‘When I fully understood the power of Suhas’ software, it hit me like a ton of bricks that his design approach could be the basis for a new kind of chip company,’ Hackworth said. ‘I could see the opportunity to get complex chips out in just six months using system designers who didn’t require a knowledge of silicon. I got excited about hiring system engineers accustomed to designing at the board or box level, and having them use Patil’s software to innovate system-level chips.’ 
  . . . . . . “Throughout its swift ascent, Cirrus Logic has operated as a fabless company, utilizing the production capacity of other companies and focusing its investments in new product R&D rather than in building costly fabrication clean rooms. At the company’s present size and scale of operations, however, that is beginning to change. Cirrus Logic and IBM Corporation now share ownership of a company named MiCRUS with a fab in East Fishkill, N.Y. Production of Cirrus Logic wafers began there during the first quarter of 1995—essentially after a fabless Cirrus Logic reached its billion-dollar run rate.” 
Excerpted from: “The Making of Silicon Valley: A One Hundred Year Renaissance” (Palo Alto, Calif.: The Santa Clara Valley Historical Association, 1995) 
 Cirrus Logic manufactures integrated circuits for specialty markets such as communications, mass storage, and PC-based graphics. Products like modem chips, LAN controllers, semiconductor wafers, and serial and parallel I/O devices are all sold by Cirrus. Compaq accounts for approximately 10 percent of sales, while exports to Japan account for about 22 percent.  
URL: http://www.cirrus.com 
Headquarters: Fremont, Calif.  
Phone: (510) 623-8300 

Complete Business Solutions 
Founder, President & CEO: Rajendra B. Vattikuti 
Founded: 1985 
Went public: 1997 
Number of employees: 1431 
Revenues (1997): $123.8 million 
Complete Business Solutions is an information technology provider for mid-size to large companies. Some of the services provided include systems applications, development and maintenance, conversions and adaptations associated with the year 2000, contract programming, etc. Revenues of ’97 were $123.8 million, an increase of 33.5 percent over the figure for ’96 of $92.75 million. The Founder and CEO of Complete Business Solutions is Rajendra Vattikuti. The company’s customers include Chrysler, Ford, IBM, the states of Indiana and Nevada, American Presidential Lines and Unum. 
(Refer to “Winning the Software Services Game,” siliconindia, January 1998, page 43.http://www.siliconindia.com/5thCBSI.html) 
URL: http://www.cbsinc.com 
Headquarters: Farmington Hills, Mich.  
Phone: (248) 488-2088 

CyberMedia 
Founders: Unni Warrier, Srikanth Chari, Anne Lam & Jonathan Tran 
Founded: 1993 
Went public: 1996 
President & CEO: Unni Warrier 
Number of employees: 130 
Revenues (year): $78.6 million 
Revenues for this young corporation headed by CEO Unni Warrier grew from $4.8 million in 1995 to $38.5 million in 1996, a growth of 785 percent, to $78.6 in 1997, a growth of 104 percent. CyberMedia produces automatic service software, which diagnoses and solves common software problems with PCs. The benefit is that end users do not have to call technical support staffs for assistance. Products include First Aid and Oil Change software, which assist in solving Windows 95-based problems and automatic upgrading of various software over the Internet, respectively. CyberMedia is beginning to ship its software installed originally in PCs when they are shipped from the vendor. The company faces some competitive challenges from System Wizard, Symantec, Quarter Deck and other companies. Kanwal Rekhi was recently named its new chairman, and Jeffrey Beaumont resigned as chief financial officer. Rehki succeeds Unni Warrier as chairman, who will remain president and chief executive officer. 
(Refer to “The Passion Behind the Million Dollar Chase,” siliconindia, January 1998, page 12. http://www.siliconindia.com/5thCyberM.html) 
URL: http://www.CyberMedia.com 
Headquarters: Santa Monica, Calif. 
Phone: (310) 581-4700 

Digital Link 
Founder, Chairperson and interim President & CEO: Vinita Gupta 
Founded: 1985 
Went public: 1994 
Number of employees: 222 
Revenues (1997): $66 million 
After years of griping about her job as an engineer at Bell Northern Research, Vinita Gupta needed little coaxing to start her own company. That the encouragement came from husband Naren Gupta, himself a founder of an $84 million company  (see Integrated Systems Inc.) was hardly the issue. At 34, Gupta, a New Delhi-born engineering graduate of University of Roorkee in electronics and communications with a master’s in electrical engineering from the University of California, was itching for personal growth. 
 Thirteen years after she co-founded Digital Link in Palo Alto, Calif., Gupta’s personal growth trajectory has kept abreast with her $66 million high-tech company.  
 Digital Link makes high-speed digital access products for wide area networks (WANs). Its products include digital service units and multiplexers. Its customers are telephone companies, government, universities and utilities. It uses Value Added Resellers (VARs) and Original Equipment Manufactures (OEMs) to sell its products. Its devices let WANs access dedicated leased lines that use high-speed packet switching technologies such as frame relay, ISDN, switched megabit data services and ATMs. Its net revenues increased 27 percent, from $52 million in 1996 to $66 million in 1997.  Although earnings per share for fiscal year 1997 were $0.21 as compared to $0.52 for fiscal year 1996, Digital Link’s revenues  are growing at a strong  rate of 30 percent. 
URL: http://www.dl.com 
Headquarters: Sunnyvale, Calif.  
Phone: (408) 745-6200 

i2 Technologies 
Founders: Sanjiv Sidhu & Ken Sharma 
Founded: 1988 
Went public: 1996 
CEO: Sanjiv Sidhu 
Number of employees: over 800 
Revenues (1997): $200.7 million 
In 1988, in the midst of a hot career at Texas Instruments and with his wife pregnant, when Sanjiv Sidhu informed his boss he was quitting, the latter was baffled. “ ‘Why are you quitting? You’ll be a vice president at TI!’ ” Sidhu remembers. “I didn’t say it, but I was thinking: That’s why I’m quitting.” 
 Ten years, $415 million, and a slot in Forbes 400 later, his former boss no doubt wishes he could bite back his words.  
 From his Dallas apartment, Sidhu started  i2 Technologies, a software company that has passed the $200 million revenue mark, where he owns over 60 percent of the company stock.  
 How did the son of a chemist in Hyderabad who lacked the patience to go through with his Ph.D. program at Case Western University in Cleveland strike it so rich and so soon? 
 To put it in one word, Rhythm.  
Rhythm is the basic program created by Sidhu to help organize the manufacturing process. Users of Rhythm include Caterpillar, Black & Decker, 3M and Bethlehem Steel, some of whom pay as much as $12 million apiece for i2’s software packages. This software is able to track raw materials purchases, track work in process through multiple sites, and track delivery to customers. The products are suited for industries such as automotive, high tech, pharmaceuticals, textiles and paper. Not surprisingly, i2 is experiencing rapid growth. Revenues for 1997 were $200.7 million, an increase of 128 percent over the 1996 figures of $87.9 million. License revenues of $134.7 million for the year led this growth with a 134 percent increase over 1996 license revenues of $57.5 million.  
URL: http://www.i2.com 
Headquarters: Dallas, Texas  
Phone: (214) 860-6063 

Information Management Resources 
Founder, President & CEO: Satish Sanan 
Founded: 1988 
Went public: 1996 
Number of employees: 875 
Revenues (1997): $83.5 million 
Born in India and educated in England, Satish K. Sanan began his career as a software engineer and worked his way to the top ranks in his firm before quitting to form Information Management Systems in Clearwater, Fla. After being a customer of software service firms such as CIO and then being on the systems integration side, Sanan was looking to create a company that would bring some creativity and innovation to the delivery of IT solutions.  
 Today, IMR provides software and transitional outsourcing services to large businesses in the retail, insurance, financial and utility industries. It develops software, application maintenance, system conversion, and software adaptations associated with the Year 2000 problem.  IMRS’s Transform series of tools provides automated support in migration/re-engineering services and is a successful Y2K service offering.  
 For software coding and testing, IMRS has an offshore facility in Bangalore where an average 70 percent of the work takes place. It also has offshore software centers in Ireland. 
 The company’s client base sports over 50 Fortune 500 companies. Revenues for 1996 were $27.9 million, a 22.9 percent increase over 1995. Revenues for 1997 jumped to $83.5 million.  
URL: http://www.imr.com 
Headquarters: Clearwater, Fla. 
Phone: (813) 797-7080 

Integrated Process Equipment 
Founder & chairman of the board: Sanjeev Chitre 
Founded: 1989  
Went public: 1992 
President & CEO: Roger D. McDaniel 
Number of employees: 965 
Revenues (1997): $188.8 million 
Integrated Process Equipment creates systems that improve the integrated circuit performance for semiconductor manufacturers. IPEC’s wholly-owned subsidiary, IPEC Planar is the leader in the CMP (Chemical Mechanical Planarization) segment of the semiconductor capital equipment industry. IPEC Precision, another subsidiary, manufactures advanced plasma-assisted chemical etching equipment and metrology equipment for use primarily in the manufacturing of silicon wafers and semiconductor devices. The company has followed founder and chairman Sanjeev Chitre’s vision and intuitive business strategies in its highly specialized and competitive market.  
 IPEC’s Customers include Intel, IBM, and Motorola. Revenues for the last five quarters, have increased between 3 percent and 20 percent. 1997 saw revenues of $188.8 million. Though the company was in the red last year, it has been able to turn around in the last  four quarters and spring back to profitability.  
URL: http://www.ipec.com 
Headquarters: San Jose, Calif. 
Phone: (408) 436-2170 

Integrated Systems 
Founder & Chairman: Naren Gupta 
Founded: 1980 
Went public: 1990 
President & CEO: David P. St. Charles 
Number of employees: 510 
Revenues (1997): $105.5 million 
Winner of the President of India’s Gold Medal for best performance in the Indian Institute of Technology’s class of 1969, Naren Gupta has continued to strike gold ever since. With an M.S. in engineering from the California Institute of Technology and a doctorate from Stanford University, Gupta founded Integrated Systems in 1980. Until May 1994, he also served as President and Chief Executive Officer.  
 The company designs and produces software for computers called embedded systems microprocessors which control everything from checkout stands at the supermarket to car ignitions.  
 Its 1997 revenues were $105.5 million, up 25 percent from $84.4 in ’96, which in turn was up over 62 percent from ’95. The company has a market capitalization of $1,982.6 billion and no debt.  
Integrated Systems recently acquired Novell’s FlexOS line of operating systems with the goal of expanding its product line for the embedded systems market. The Silicon Valley-based company produces some of the world’s most reliable operating systems for the aerospace, automotive, multimedia entertainment, office and retail automation, and industrial process control markets. 
URL: http://www.isi.com 
Headquarters: Sunnyvale, Calif.  
Phone: (408) 542-1500 

Intelligroup 
Founder, Chairman of the Board & President, Corporate Services: Ashok Pandey 
Founded: 1987 
Went public: 1996 
CEO & President, North American Operations: Raj Koneru 
Number of employees: 369 
Revenues (1997): $80.2 million 
A graduate of the Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS) Pillani, with a master’s in computer science from City University of New York, Ashok Pandey founded Intelligroup in 1987. He served as director, chairman of the board, president and CEO until November 1997. Before 1987,  Pandey had nearly 12 years experience in developing systems and application software. Along with his fellow officers and directors, he owns a controlling interest in the company.  
 President and CEO Raj Koneru, also a BITS-Pillani alumnus, co-founded Oxford Systems Inc., a systems integration company, with Nagarjun Valluripalli in 1993. 
 Intelligroup has proprietary software which helps clients redesign their business processes in product development, service delivery, manufacturing, revenues and human resources. 
The company partners with a select group of leaders in client/server development technologies, enterprise resource planning solutions (ERP) and new emerging technologies. Clients include IBM, Ernst & Young, Citibank, American Cynamid, and AT&T.  
 Revenue for ’97 was $80.2 million, an increase of 70 percent from 1996. Net income for the year ’97 was $4.5 million, compared to $1.9 million for 1996. The company operates with virtually no debt and has a market capitalization of $376.8 million.  
URL: http://www.intelligroup.com 
Headquarters: Iselin, N.J.  
Phone: (908) 750-1600 

LCC International 
Founder & Chairman: Dr. Rajendra Singh and Neera Singh 
Founded: 1983 
Went public: 1996 
CEO: Geoffrey Scott Carroll 
Number of employees: 887 
Revenues (1997): $155.2 million 
This McLean, Virginia based company helps providers of wireless telecommunications services, including Nextel Communications, AT&T Wireless, and Pacific Bell Mobile Services, determine the best locations for transmission towers. The company provides hardware, software and services to engineer sites, helps determine appropriate capacity for each site and assists in the deployment of the wireless networks. 
 The company provides goods and services to over 200 wireless system operators in over 40 nations. LCC’s US clients include seven of the 10 largest US cellular systems operators.  
Revenues for the year ’97 were $155.2 million, up 9.7 percent from the $141.6 million posted for the year ’96. Normalized net income for the year was $5.6 million compared to $7.7 million for calendar year 1996, a decrease of $2.1 million or 27 percent. LCC International has a market capitalization of $123.25 million.  
URL: http://www.lccinc.com 
Headquarters: McLean, Va.  
Phone: (703) 873-2000 

Mastech 
Founders & Chairmen: Ashok K. Trivedi (President) & Sunil Wadhwani (CEO) 
Founded: 1986 
Went public: 1996 
Number of employees: 2500 
Revenues (1997): $196.0 million 
Mastech provides information technology services and outsourcing to large companies such as AT&T, Citibank, EDS, IBM, Intel, Nike, Oracle, and Wal-Mart. Its services include solutions to data processing problems associated with the year 2000, client/server system design and development, conversion and migration services, and maintenance outsourcing.  
 Under the guidance of the founders, Ashok Trivedi and Sunil Wadhwani, for the year ’97, Mastech recorded revenues of $196.0 million, up 59 percent from revenues of $123.4 million for the same period in 1996. Net income for 1997 was $15.6 million, an increase of 61 percent compared to a pro forma net income of $8.2 million.  
 This Oakdale, Pa.-based company’s market capitalization crossed the $1 billion mark in February ’98 and is one of the fastest growing companies in the Index. It has business alliances with Baan, Oracle and Viasoft.  
(Refer to ‘You Can Make It Happen,’ siliconindia January ’98, page 20.http://www.siliconindia.com/5thMastech.html) 
URL: http://www.mastech.com 
Headquarters: Oakdale, Pa.  
Phone: (412) 787-2100 

Microchip Technologies 
Founder, Chairman, President & CEO: Steve Sanghi 
Founded: 1989 
Went public: 1996 
Number of employees: 1879 
Revenues (fiscal 1997): $334.3 million 
On the brink of death, a semiconductor subsidiary of the Chicago-based General Instrument Corp. put up an advertisement for buyers, clearly elucidating the ills that wracked the Arizona firm: low yields and obsolete technology. 
 Not the sort of offering investors would jump to, but Punjab University graduate Steve Sanghi and his associates believed a salvage operation was possible. 
 Nine years later, the semiconductor company has passed from the salvaging stage to the thriving stage. Today, Microchip Technology develops and manufactures field programmable microprocessors and related specialty products used by Original Equipment Manufacturers to produce a wide range of products. Its products are used in high-volume embedded control applications in the consumer, automotive, office automation, communication and industrial markets.  
 Revenues were up over 16 percent for fiscal year 1997 to $334.3 million and the company paid off $26.3 million of its long-term debt. At the end of the second quarter of 1998, revenues were over $200 million and growing steadily.  
 What’s more, the Arizona-based company has thrived in daunting market niches crowded with giants like Motorola, Intel, National Semiconductor and Hitachi. Sanghi himself attributes Microchip’s success to a changed focus from commodity parts to strategic micro-controllers and other embedded products.  
URL: http://www.microchip.com 
Headquarters: Chandler, Ariz. 
Phone: (602) 786-7200 

NeoMagic  
Founders: Prakash Agarwal (President & CEO), Kamran Elahian (Chairman), Ravi Ranganathan (Director of Hardware), Clement Leung (VP, Engineering), Chet Bassetti (Manager of Display Technology), Deep Puar (VP, Technology) 
Founded: 1993 
Went public: 1996 
Number of employees: 94 
Revenues (fiscal 1998): $124.7 million 
NeoMagic was founded with the singular focus of bringing desktop performance to mobile computers without compromise through a unique semiconductor technology. The founders recognized the need to eliminate the considerable compromises in performance, power consumption, size and weight that designers must make when creating mobile computers. NeoMagic accomplished this mission by developing MAGICWARE ™ , the first high-performance, low-voltage silicon technology that integrates large DRAM memory and complex logic subsystems into a single chip.  
 NeoMagic has a core group of major customers, which include Acer, Sharp, NEC, Sony, Texas Instruments, Hitachi, Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard, Dell and Compaq. Net revenues for the fiscal year ended January 31, 1998 totaled $124.7 million, an increase of  206 percent from fiscal 1997 net revenues of $40.8 million. Net income for the year was $20.8 million, compared to a net loss of $1.2 million, or $(0.06) per diluted share, for the fiscal year ended January 31, 1997. NeoMagic is growing fast and has a market capitalization of $435 million. This Silicon Valley-based company is able to integrate video and graphics functions onto a single chip and accelerate the notebook PC. The company dominates its industry and eight out of 10 notebook PCs use the NeoMagic 128-bit accelerator chip. 
URL: http://www.neomagic.com 
Headquarters: Santa Clara, Calif.  
Phone: (408) 988-7020 

Pinnacle Systems 
Founder: Ajay Chopra 
Founded: 1986 
Went public: 1994 
CEO: Mark Sanders 
Number of employees: Over 300 
Revenues (1997): $65.1 million 
With five Emmy awards for technical achievement in video, Pinnacle Systems’ broadcast, desktop, and consumer groups are on the cutting edge of the audio-visual high-tech business. The company makes professional quality video-editing tools for real-time video processing. Their digital video management tools perform a variety of on-air, production, and post-production functions such as the addition of special effects, image management, capture, storage and playout, as well as graphics and title creations. 
 Revenues figures for 1997 were $37.5 million and it lost money due to higher marketing and operational expenses. During the first fiscal quarter of 1998 though, net revenues were $16.5 million, compared to $12.4 million in the prior quarter, which ended June 30, 1997. The net loss for the first fiscal quarter of 1998 was $16.3 million. 
URL: http://www.pinnaclesys.com 
Headquarters: Mountain View, Calif.  
Phone: (650) 237-1851 

Primus Telecommunications 
Founder, Chairman, President & CEO: K. Paul Singh 
Founded: 1994 
Went public: 1996 
Number of employees: 315 
Revenues (1997): $202 million 
Founded by K. Paul Singh, who holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and an MSEE from the State University of New York, Primus is an international telecommunications group focused on providing international and domestic long-distance service by establishing long-distance switches all over the world. This will eventually reduce the price of overseas calls. These international gateway switches have been installed in Washington, D.C., New York, Los Angeles, Toronto, Vancouver, London, and Australia and provide service to over 200 countries. 
 With two successful start-ups under his belt, Singh has become a veteran of the telecommunications industry in a relatively short period. He served as Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Overseas Telecommunications, Inc.(OTI), a privately held company funded by venture capital and corporate partners. Among its customers, OTI gained more than 100 large US-based multinationals, including several Fortune 100 companies, before being acquired by MCI Telecommunications Corporation in 1991. Prior to founding OTI, Singh founded Cygnus Satellite Corporation, a pioneer in obtaining a license to launch private satellites for international use in competition with the INTELSAT monopoly. The company was acquired by Panamsat. 
 Revenues for 1996 were $173 million, up from $1.2 million. In 1997, revenue went up $107 million to touch $202 million. While 1997 saw a net loss of $36.2 million, the company had an annual growth rate of over 45 percent.  
URL: http://www.primustel.com 
Headquarters: Vienna, Va. 
Phone: (703) 902-2800 

SEEC 
Founder: Ravi Koka and John Godfrey 
Founded: 1988 
Went public: 1997 
CEO: Ravi Koka 
Number of employees: 68 
Revenues (1997): $9.06 million 
SEEC provides tools for maintaining and enhancing the value of legacy systems applications. Founded by John Godfrey and Ravi Koka, the latter a former IBM man with over 20 years experience in systems and application software development and currently an adjunct professor at Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Computer Science, SEEC has emerged a top vendor for a complete Year 2000 solution. Its software products are based on the company’s core COBOL analysis technology. They provide an integrated way to automate many of the procedures required for COBOL application maintenance and redevelopment, including Year 2000 conversion and compliance. The company also designs software used to transfer existing COBOL applications from mainframe to client/server. 
 Clients have included Mack Trucks, Sallie Mae, Mellon Bank, and Northern Illinois Gas.  
URL: http://www.seec.com 
Headquarters: Pittsburgh, Pa. 
Phone: (510) 736-8166 

SMART Modular Technologies 
Founders: Ajay Shah, Mukesh Patel, Lata Krishnan 
Founded: 1988 
Went public: 1995 
CEO: Ajay Shah 
Number of employees: Over 800 
Revenues (fiscal year 1997): $694.7 million 
Ajay Shah is not afraid to admit he’s cheap. In the Nov. 4, 1996 Forbes issue on the ‘Best Small Companies of America,’ the Ugandan-born Shah extolled the virtues of cutting costs. It certainly seems to have worked for the co-founder of SMART, who despaired of India’s socialist bureaucracy where he moved after his family was kicked out of Uganda by Idi Amin.  
 In 1980, he left for Stanford University to earn a master’s in engineering management before heading for a successful corporate career. He decided to start SMART when his employers turned down his idea for so-called memory modules which would permit computer makers to design a basic PC with different levels of memory, selling at different prices. 
 Today, SMART produces PC cards, embedded computers, and memory enhancement modules. It offers over 500 products under the names Apex Data and SMART. Customers include semiconductor manufacturers, computer distributors, end users, and major electronic OEMs with sales focused around such memory products as large capacity main (DRAM), specialized high-speed (SRAM), and Flash memory.  
 Shah has led the company to revenues of $694.7 million in fiscal year 1997, up almost 73 percent from $401.8 million in fiscal year 1996. The company’s stock has done well since listing and its products have a very wide application in several industries. Obviously, a philosophy of watching costs is not just cheap—it’s effective. 
URL: http://www.smartm.com 
Headquarters: Fremont, Calif. 
Phone: (510) 623-1434 

Syntel 
Founders: Bharat Desai & Neerja Sethi 
Founded: 1980 
Went public: 1997 
President & CEO: Bharat Desai 
Number of employees: 1847 
Revenues (1997): approx. $110 million 
It was a cold day about six years ago when a doctor received a call from Neerja Sethi, co-founder, along with her husband Bharat Desai of the software services megalith, Syntel. Syntel had hired a consultant to join their US operation. But just when he was starting, the consultant needed emergency care. “She was clearly worried and it was not at all from a business perspective,” this doctor reminisces. “It was like a family member she cared for. It was critical to this young man’s life and this company cared. You don’t find that a lot.”  
 The hiring and supporting of the right people worldwide have created many grateful “members” of the Syntel clan, whether they continue to work there or not. “They are not the kind of vicious company that comes after you, or refuses to work with you because something causes you to leave,” said one former employee. “They win you over and you continue to want to share in their glory and defend them in their tough times.” 
 Syntel has seen tough times, especially during the much-publicized Department of Labor investigation, when many eyes were focused on it, making it difficult for Desai to continue toward his goal. “It was super to work for him even through tough times. B.D. (as he is known at work) and Neerja are both geniuses and they supported people’s personal goals as well as the whole company’s goals,” said one former Syntel-ite now working toward a higher degree. This was also reflected in their support of the 72 Hours for the Heart World Record dance show put on by a former employee, Vidya Chandrasekhar. During that time, the efforts of the company raised nearly $5,000, and members of Syntel were present to pull the dancer through her three-day solo performance around the clock.  
 The company supplies information technology and staffing services to large companies and government agencies. The company develops software based on contracts obtained and executes them both in India (through its subsidiary) and in US. Its revenues are expected to be up 30 percent in 1997 over 1996, and it should net a profit of $6 million in 1997 as opposed to $2.8 million in the previous year.  
URL: http://www.syntelinc.com 
Headquarters: Troy, Mich.  
Phone: (248) 619-2800 

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