Confluent Launches Dedicated GCC Strategy in India as AI Adoption Accelerates

Back in 2022, Confluent expanded its presence in India by opening a new office in Bengaluru, a strategic hub for its global data streaming ambitions. 

At the time, the company cited the rapid growth of the public cloud market and rising enterprise demand for real-time data infrastructure as key drivers of its expansion.

Over the years, Confluent has built a strong customer base in India across sectors such as food delivery, fintech, gaming, OTT, and e-commerce. 

Companies including Swiggy, Meesho, Mobile Premier League (MPL), Mindgate Solutions, Apna, Viacom18, Groww, InMobi, Glance, and Zee Entertainment have used Confluent’s streaming infrastructure to support use cases ranging from real-time payments and fraud detection to customer personalisation and large-scale content delivery.

Now, the company appears to be entering its next phase in India.

It started a dedicated GCC-focused strategy, as multinational enterprises increasingly position their India-based global capability centres (GCCs) at the centre of AI deployment, enterprise platform engineering, and real-time data operations.

Speaking to AIM, Alouk Kumar, CEO, Inductus Group, says the GCC ecosystem is undergoing a structural shift, with centres functioning as captive support units. 

Instead, GCCs are emerging as specialised hubs focused on domains such as AI, cloud computing, cybersecurity, analytics, and digital transformation.

Kumar notes that this evolution is enabling a new GCC-to-GCC collaboration model, in which capability centres increasingly share platforms, expertise, and innovation frameworks across enterprise ecosystems rather than operating in isolation. 

He says enterprises are now treating GCCs as strategic engines for intellectual capital, product innovation, and enterprise modernisation rather than purely execution-focused offshore centres.

The data streaming company says it has created a specialised team exclusively focused on supporting GCCs, describing the initiative as a key pillar of its long-term growth strategy in India.

Speaking to AIM, Rubal Sahni, who leads India and South Asia business for Confluent, says the company spent nearly a year restructuring internal operations and consulting enterprise partners before formally rolling out the initiative earlier this year.

“We are starting up a completely new team to serve the GCC market in India,” Sahni says.

The new strategy also aims to help GCCs accelerate AI deployment while simplifying coordination between India operations and the global headquarters.

“It took us one year to get the business case approved and make internal changes on how we engage with GCCs,” Sahni says.

One of the major structural changes was the integration of global account teams with India operations to create a unified customer engagement model. He adds that they work with one Confluent team, not separate US, India, or GCC teams.

The company also says it collaborated with consulting firms and enterprise partners while shaping the strategy.

“We surveyed a lot of GCCs and also worked with partners like EY and Deloitte to understand how we should strategise,” Sahni says.

Confluent’s Strategy for GCCs

Confluent says its GCC-focused strategy currently centres around AI deployment and Centralised enterprise data platforms. “These two are the key initiatives GCCs are running today, and both are central to us,” he states.

Sahni argues that enterprise AI adoption increasingly depends on real-time, governed, and contextualised data environments rather than merely access to large language models.

“Your AI outputs are only as good as the data you supply,” Sahni says. “Once you provide real-time data with governance, freshness and context, AI systems begin behaving reliably enough for production.”

The company expects GCC-led business to become a significant contributor to future revenues.

“The GCC contribution to our revenue would be easily north of 25% in a matter of two years,” Sahni states.

Confluent currently employs more than 500 people in India, most of them in engineering roles based in Bengaluru.

“Most of our Indian workforce is engineering talent,” she said. “A lot of the new AI tools and offerings are being developed from our Bengaluru engineering delivery centre.”

While the company declined to disclose customer names due to non-disclosure agreements, executives confirmed that Confluent is already working with multiple enterprise GCCs across India.

Experts Say GCC Model Is Undergoing Structural Shift

Zinnov President Nilesh Thakker says the rise of wholly owned GCC models reflects a deeper shift in enterprise strategy rather than temporary market trends.

“Setting up a wholly owned GCC in India has always been an option on the table,” Thakker says. “The model a company chooses comes down to leadership maturity and the prior experience of the leadership team in setting up and scaling global capability centres.”

He added that this shift could fundamentally alter the role of traditional IT services firms.

“As GCCs mature, enterprises are bringing their core work in-house,” Thakker says. “The differentiated capabilities, the IP-sensitive work, the functions closest to their business strategy.”

Thakker argues that service providers would now need to reposition themselves around transformation-led engagements, AI-native delivery, and deep industry expertise.

“The firms that grow through this cycle will be the ones that move toward the core alongside their clients,” he states. “Showing up as an execution vendor is not enough anymore.”