Colliers has chalked out an aggressive plan to grow its Indian business and will hire at least 1,000 employees next year as well as launch two new services in January to expand its operations, its India CEO Ramesh Nair said.
Colliers India, which is part of Canada-based Colliers, has around 3,000 employees.
In an interview with PTI, Colliers India new chief executive officer (CEO) Ramesh Nair outlined his vision to be among the ''top three'' property consultants in the country in terms of ''profitability''.
Nair, an industry veteran with more than 20 years of experience, joined Colliers India as CEO in July this year. He is also the Managing Director, Market Development, Asia, Colliers.
Company to focus of five areas
Listing out his five focus areas, Nair said the company would increase the team size, adopt the right culture, market its brand well, introduce innovative technologies, and expand client relationships.
''We are going to stay focused on some of our big strengths. We are the largest project management company in the country.
''We need to gain market share in transactions related to office, industrial and warehousing and capital market segments. We will do that by making sure we hire talent at all levels in these three departments,'' he said.
Four departments -- project management, office, industrial and warehousing and capital market -- would be key growth engines and also areas where the company would pump in investments.
Hiring aggressively
Asked about current employees' strength and hiring plan, Nair said: ''Right now, we have approximately 3,000 people in the company. We hope to hire at least 1,000 people next year. We are aggressively hiring from competition.''
Out of 3,000 headcount, around 1,100 people are employed in facilities management services, while the remaining are in project management and other services.
The company is also exploring how it can incorporate ''liquid workforce'' to strengthen its various services.
He noted that all real estate segments including housing, office and shopping malls, have shown signs of revival after the second wave of the COVID pandemic on the back of improved economic growth and progress made in the vaccination programme.
Mergers and acquisitions
To expand India business, Nair highlighted that Colliers, besides roping him as CEO, had in 2019 acquired a controlling stake in Bengaluru-based project management firm Synergy Property Development Services, in one of the biggest merger and acquisition deals in this space.
''The goal in the next one year is to become the top three firms in India (in the property consultancy sector) in terms of profitability,'' Nair said, but refused to share the current India's revenue and profit numbers.
The company plans to add two new service lines in January next year, he said, but did not share further details.
''We want to make sure that we remain extremely focused both on the business development side and account management side,'' he said.
Nair said the company would strengthen its research team as it seeks to become the best thought leadership firm among property consultants.
''We have formidable competitors and we respect our competitors immensely. We hope to differentiate by making sure we focus on better client servicing, new technologies and quality research,'' he said, when asked about growing competition among realty consultants.
Colliers strengthens team
In January this year, Nair quit JLL India, where he held the position of CEO and Country Head and led a team of over 12,000 people.
Nair had joined global property consultant JLL as an analyst in 1999, and became the CEO of India business in 2017.
After joining Colliers India, Nair has been strengthening the team.
Recently, Colliers India appointed three senior directors -- Vimal Nadar, Arshish Kavarana and Neha Yadav -- in research, occupier consulting and office transactions, respectively.
It has brought a technology platform CoGence that enables remote site monitoring and advanced analytics for more efficient management of construction projects.
Globally, Colliers, a leading diversified professional services and investment management company, has operations in 66 countries with more than 15,000 enterprising professionals.
It provides expert advice to real estate occupiers, owners and investors.
Colliers has annualised revenues of $3.3 billion ($3.6 billion including affiliates) and $45 billion of assets under management.
