The formation of a dedicated space for electronics industry in 1976 was one of the key factors in Bengaluru’s later fame as the “Silicon Valley of India”. Infosys changed the face of the software industry by building it’s pathbreaking self-contained campus called “Infosys City” inside the Electronics City industrial township. This story traces the path of how infrastructure kept up with the pace of the Infosys’s growth and contributed towards it becoming a global leader in consulting and information technology services today.
Text by Arvind Krishnaswamy
Don Hoefler, a journalist, first used the term “Silicon Valley” in 1971 to describe the growing semiconductor industry in the Santa Clara valley just south of San Francisco in California. This valley is between two mountain ranges rising 3000 to 5000 feet on either side. Sometime later, Bengaluru which is at 3000 feet elevation was called the “Silicon Valley of India”. This is a misnomer because Bengaluru is not in a valley but the label stuck and continues to be used today.
The 1980s was not an easy time to set up any business in India. Bureaucratic red tape was at its peak and it was almost impossible to achieve anything quickly. It took several months to get a telephone connection and many years to import a computer. Braving these headwinds, Infosys was founded in July 1981 with its first office in the spare bedroom of Sudha and Narayana Murthy’s Deccan Gymkhana apartment in Pune. In November 1982, Infosys formally relocated to Bengaluru and a month later in December, a house on 10th A Main Road and 36th Cross in Jayanagar was chosen for the new office. It was on the road next to the popular Shalini restaurant of those times, opposite the playground now known as Shalini ground. One of the reasons for selecting Jayanagar was its proximity to Adugodi where MICO, its first data centre customer, was located.
Within a few years, the office space became too small. Hence in 1985, another bungalow which could accommodate about 25 to 30 employees was leased on 7th main, Jayanagar 5th Block and this became “Infosys House” or the Software Products Marketing Division (SPDM) which sold personal computer software from companies like Borland, Peter Norton and Symantec.
After Jayanagar, Infosys opened a new office in the Reddy building in Koramangala followed by a second location in the so-called “Pink Building” opposite the Koramangala police station. Then, it was decided to move SPDM to Manipal Centre on Dickenson Road (this also became the registered corporate office). As operations were distributed across all these different buildings across the city, it was naturally challenging to coordinate activities. Hence, Narayana Murthy wanted to build a self contained software campus for Infosys after the company had its IPO in 1993. His vision was to create an environment that took care of every basic need and let the employee focus on work. His dream campus would have ample workspace, gardens, libraries, conference rooms, parking, food court and many other facilities. This was essential to attract and retain employees when the average tenure was only 3 years in this industry. He envisioned at least 200 square feet work space per person and large enough for 1000 employees in the first phase. But the core city area did not have either the space or buildings that were large enough. So, he applied for land within Electronics City, about 20 kms from the city in the village of Konappana Agrahara. Infosys was allotted a fraction of the land sought and the original plot closer to the Hosur Road was changed to another parcel which did not have direct, easy access. This was because Narayana Murthy refused to guarantee a job (without passing a written aptitude test) for the relative of a government official. People had to travel an extra 2 kms just to reach this location towards the interior of the area. Many years later, this proved to be a blessing in disguise because Infosys was able to acquire adjacent land and expand the campus easily.
The first building completed in 11 months had 160,000 square feet of office space and it cost ₹17.22 crores (incidentally when the company revenue was only ₹8.66 crores). It was designed by the city’s first architectural firm Chandavarkar and Thacker (now renamed as CnT Architects) founded by Narayan Chandavarkar in 1947. The building now known as Heritage Building built of granite and brick, was based on the founder’s desire to construct a simple, sustainable building representing Indian values. Most of the building was naturally ventilated with limited use of air conditioning only in conference rooms. When the building was inaugurated in June 1994, Infosys ran out of space the very first day it occupied the building. Steel girders had to be erected on the rooftop and temporary seating was added in about a month’s time. The environment resembled a college campus and the typical Infosys employee was described by Nandan Nilekani as “someone in early to late twenties from the best colleges with an engineering background and sound knowledge of mathematics” (the average age of an Infosys employee was 26.5 in the year 2000). The Bangalore Urban Art Commission awarded it best managed building and garden for 1998 and 1999. At that time it was India’s largest software development centre in a single location and also boasted of the country’s largest computer network. The building had over a thousand networked computers, multiple communication links and backup electricity generation facilities.
It was not all smooth sailing even in these “developed” industrial parks. Roads were not in good shape with poor maintenance. In early 1996, it took an hour to commute from the city to the Infosys campus and Hosur Road was a single lane highway that could barely handle traffic in both directions. It was a paradigm shift and a major risk when Infosys moved outside city limits. At one point, many companies laughed at Infosys for moving outside the city limits when everyone wanted to be in the central business district. Employees from different parts of the city came to Koramangala to take a bus to the new campus. In the evening, the bus dropped employees back to Koramangala for them to return home. The company leased a blue coloured bus (purchased from a public sector company and repainted) with Infosys written in dark blue letters. Amusingly, some people thought “Infosys” was a transport service that was growing rapidly, when they added two more buses. There were hiccups like the one in 1996, when General Electric (GE) terminated their contract which contributed a quarter of Infosys revenue. Apprehensive about their future and the long commute to its campus, many employees quit and joined competitors operating in the core city.
Around 1996, Infosys added more seats in BTM Layout where the Banking Software division was located before moving to SJR Towers on Bannerghatta Road. At this time, Infosys owned offices in Manipal Centre and Electronics City and all other locations were leased.
When Mohandas Pai joined Infosys and later became CFO, he also took charge of infrastructure. For the first time in 1998, a dedicated infrastructure team was formed. The first objective for the new infrastructure team was to strategize on how to keep pace with the company’s growth.
Infosys was very particular about the process for selection of architects and builders. The company worked with many architects over time starting with Chandavarkar and Thacker, then Sundaram (founded as Karekar and Sundaram in 1963), followed by Venkataramanan Associates, C R Narayana Rao and Hafeez Contractor. Shortlisted architects were called for design presentations and the best design was selected. Key employees of Infosys who were involved said that Narayana Murthy was so passionate about infrastructure development that he was personally involved in all aspects of every building and every campus Infosys ever built. It is said that, on the day he retired as an executive, one of the last meetings he chaired was an infrastructure meeting.
The launchpad for future expansion was created between 1998 and 2001. Narayana Murthy presented his vision statement for the company’s growth. At the time, it sounded so futuristic that no one really thought it was possible. For example, Infosys bought a 100-acre barren land belonging to KIADB in Mysuru, when Infosys had just over a thousand employees. Narayana Murthy prophesied that one day in future that the land would not be adequate. It became true with Infosys expanding into more than 385 acres today in Mysuru alone.
There were three main drivers for infrastructure – time, image and quality. As Infosys expanded, a just-in-time approach was adopted and each building constructed was occupied on the day it was ready. At the time of bhoomi pooja, Narayana Murthy would set a time target to complete work and fix the date for opening the campus. Later, he challenged the team to complete buildings in just 7 months from the start of construction. At the same time, his philosophy was that a new campus should be better than the earlier ones. Any mistakes committed earlier should not be repeated and the latest campus should be the best.
Why was there so much focus on quality? When new batches of employees were recruited, Narayana Murthy wanted them to experience high quality, demand high quality in their work environment, and develop and deliver high quality software. The objective was to transform employees to think quality from the day they walk into the Infosys campus. Bringing this cultural change was only possible in Infosys owned campuses and not in rented or leased buildings where they did not have total control. On January 19, 2001 in a speech at the Infosys City, former Prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee called the Infosys campus as “new temple of Modern India” where he saw the confluence of Saraswathi, Laxmi and Shakti.
Building exteriors were designed to look grand and spectacular with use of glass, steel and alucobond (popularly known as software facade). All the buildings were set amidst a green landscape and infrastructure became a marketing statement to customers and visitors.
Infosys also wanted one signature building in each campus, something that was unique to show the capabilities of Indian architects and builders. For example, Building 18 had a hyperbolic paraboloid shell roof, a unique structure like the Sydney Opera House. Designed by Sundaram Architects, it was built by Consolidated Construction Consortium Limited (CCCL) founded by R. Sarabeswar, who noted in an interview, “It was a difficult project and many contractors had shied away from the job because it had a unique curvi-linear structure. We took it up as a challenge and completed the project on time.” Over 20 concrete mixers were used to pour concrete continuously into the three domes during construction. Around 2001, Infosys was the largest single buyer of steel and cement in India for construction of campuses.
The Bengaluru campus evolved over a long period of time and faced many challenges. The land was at a gradient with Building 1 (Corporate) being at a higher elevation compared to Building 44 (“Washing Machine Building”) near the Hosur Road. Rainwater flooding was controlled by drilling sink wells along the water flow path, so that each one got filled with the overflow. A pond was built near the Education and Research Building 12 to store treated water which was used for gardening.
Infosys also started focusing on green building requirements. Where glass was used, building position and direction was designed to reduce heat ingress. Local materials were sourced to avoid transportation over long distances and hollow bricks were used as heat shields. Most buildings after 2006 are LEED platinum certified.
Employees recall many memorable moments over the years. In January 2000, when Lawrence Summers, the US Treasury Secretary visited Infosys, the lunch was arranged in the data center building amidst the computers as a unique experience. Then Nordstrom CIO Mike Richardson inaugurated the swimming pool in 2002 à la Gundu Rao (former Chief Minister of Karnataka) by jumping into the pool in his swimming trunks. Once, Narayana Murthy climbed up to the water tank on top of the heritage building to depict Infosys’s growth on the “ladder of success”.
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori, who was about to leave after his tour of Infosys campus, noticed the putting green near Building 6 and removed his coat to play a round of golf, his favourite sport. He hit the ball out of the campus into the neighbouring campus followed by a roar of approval from gathered employees.
Looking back, Infosys has had an amazing journey from the one bedroom office in Pune and the two residential houses in Jayanagar to over 274 offices in 56 countries across the globe today.
References:
Stallmeyer, John C, (2011) Building Bangalore, Routledge Contemporary South Asia
Divakaruni, Chitra Banerjee (2023) An Uncommon Love, The Early Life of Sudha and Narayana Murthy, Juggernaut
Heitzman, James (2004) Network City: Planning the Information Society in Bangalore, Oxford University Press
Infosys Annual Reports https://www.infosys.com/investors/reports-filings/annual-report/annual-reports.html
Rapaport, Richard (1996) Bangalore https://www.wired.com/1996/02/bangalore/
