By Nishant Arora

New Delhi, Jul 25 (IANS): As the country moves to attract more people from around the globe for its initiatives like 'Make in India,' 'Digital India' and 'Smart India', the country has already become one of the fastest growing regions for software major Adobe across Asia-Pacific, especially in the Cloud-based IT services and research.

The company's cloud solutions are already powering the digital transformation wave for India, according to Kulmeet Bawa, Managing Director, South Asia, Adobe.

"Most of the country's leading brands across sectors are our customers, including Indigo Airlines, Mindtree, MakeMyTrip, SpiceJet, Airtel, Flipkart, Manipal Education and IDFC Bank, among others," Bawa told IANS.

Adobe, which came to India in 1997, currently has 3,700 employees at its two major offices in Noida and Bengaluru and the newly-launched branch office in Gurgaon.

Riding on the success of its cloud portfolio, Adobe achieved revenue of approximately $4.8 billion in fiscal 2015.

"The market demand for our cloud solutions has seen us achieve record quarterly revenue of $1.4 billion for the second quarter in the fiscal year 2016, representing year-over-year growth of 20 percent," Bawa added.

Adobe's in-demand Creative Cloud business offers tools and services for creating digital media. The other two -- Document Cloud which provides a modern way to manage documents across devices and Marketing Cloud which delivers solutions for data-driven marketing -- are also seeing a sharp rise.

According to a recent Adobe-sponsored International Data Corporation (IDC) survey, 72 percent of businesses reported that improving document processes would increase customer satisfaction and yet 80 percent of those processes still rely on paper.

Adobe India continues to see major growth and India is, in fact, one of the most strategic markets for the company globally. "A key differentiator for Adobe India is its contribution to the company's intellectual property creation and ensuring that an outstanding customer experience is delivered," Bawa added.

The research and development (R&D) centre in India is an integral part of the company's innovation agenda, proving to be a significant contributor in creating, developing and supporting products and innovations.

"On average, Adobe India lab files two patents per person per year and this number is growing as we speak -- a significant number for any R&D setup to take pride in. For Adobe Marketing Cloud specifically, the India R&D centre has already filed around 10 patents this year," he told IANS.

In an era of the connected consumers, Indians are using more content across more devices than ever before and expect amazing experiences to be delivered to them.

"At Adobe, we believe that standout customer experiences are the core of driving meaningful, measurable impact and transforming how companies do business. Whether it's on the design, content, data or document management, we take pride in delivering great customer experiences that are compelling, personal, useful and relevant to users," Bawa asserted.

In India, the company is experiencing strong growth momentum in verticals ranging from education, travel and hospitality, banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), IT and ITeS, media and entertainment and government agencies, among others.

"Going ahead, our strategy will be to continue leveraging this market opportunity and strengthen our position in the market," Bawa noted.

Being one of its largest operations worldwide, over a third of Adobe's overall research and development are happening out of the India labs. "In many aspects, our India R&D centre has end-to-end ownership of the products or solutions, including requirements for research and development, testing and even marketing of the product," the Adobe executive informed.

The lab has worked on cutting-edge research areas like big data, data analytics, machine learning, social work analysis and natural language processing.

"Investing in human capital is another big focus for us. For instance, we have appointed noted computer scientist Anandan Padmanabhan as vice-president, Adobe Research, to head our Big Data Experience Lab (BEL) in Bengaluru," Bawa said.

When it comes to 'Smart Cities,' Adobe is involved in states like Gujarat where its technologies have bridged the digital divide across more than 18,000 villages so far.

"The success we are experiencing here is a testament to our strong presence in the country and the exploding demand for digital experience solutions in the country," Bawa noted.