Persistent Systems, an digital engineering firm based in India, is launching a global private equity hub in Plano.
It’s the latest major IT consulting firm from India to put down roots in Dallas-Fort Worth, following corporations like Wipro, Infosys and Tech Mahindra.
Persistent is looking to expand its presence in the private equity market by consulting with global firms and their portfolio companies. Persistent works with its clients to create digital platforms, like software or apps, for tech, banking and health care firms.
The company has more than 22,750 employees worldwide, with nearly 100 based in North Texas.
Heading the private equity hub is vice president Punit Kulkarni, who’s worked in D-FW for two decades. Prior to joining Persistent four years ago, he was senior director of marketing, adviser relations and strategic engagement at Harman International.
Kulkarni said Persistent chose D-FW because of its increased availability of talent and competitive private equity and tech scene.
“Dallas as a market has grown a lot,” he said. “This is a good opportunity and a presence for us.”
The publicly-traded company is present in 21 countries and reached $1 billion in revenue in April. Anand Deshpande, the firm’s founder, said the group’s agility in changing economic environments and innovation enabled it to reach a significant financial milestone.
“I’m incredibly thankful to our committed team, diverse client base, and the entire ecosystem that built Persistent from a small, Pune-based product engineering services provider to a multinational enterprise modernization and digital engineering powerhouse,” Deshpande said.
Pune, a city of about 3 million people in western India, is considered one of the country’s largest information technology hubs.
The company has two other major U.S. offices in Bridgewater, N.J., and Santa Clara, Calif. It also has smaller offices across the country.
Kulkarni views the Tennyson Parkway office as a starter home for the hub, hoping to expand as Persistent builds out its team with more IT system developers and data scientists. He said the Plano office expands the company’s onshore capabilities to serve private equity clients across the globe.
“The maturity of our playbooks and exceptional talent will help position Persistent as a prime value-creation partner, right from acquisition to divestiture,” he said.
D-FW has one of the largest Indian-American populations in the nation, with more than 220,000 residents in the region. They account for just over half of Texas’ overall Indian American population of 434,221.
