The US-based $230 million Bentley Systems, a leading provider of infrastructure engineering software solutions, is moving its testing and quality assurance operations to India as a part of its development initiatives.

The company has already set up a centre for this purpose in Mumbai, and has employed around 15 engineers.

"Currently, the entire core software development work happens out of the US. We also have a development centre in Finland. We are now looking at how we can expand our operations in India," Sandeep Srivastava, managing director, Bentley Systems India Pvt Ltd, said.

Bentley Systems has been operating in India since 1996. The company offers focused solutions to create, manage and publish engineering content critical to the design, construction, operation and maintenance of infrastructure assets.

The company also customises and personalises its software for users in India. Bentley develops software solutions to design buildings, roadways, manufacturing plants, and utility and telecommunications network.

According to Srivastava, the company, which started local operations through a liaison office in 1996, sees India as a key market.

"There are many large projects like the rural road development project, railways network expansion, etc. We see these as a potential market for our software. In fact, many of these are our existing customers," he said.

Bentley's local office was converted into a fully owned subsidiary of the parent company in 2000. It serves the south Asian markets, and provides consultancy and training services in several countries in the region.

Over the past few years, many infrastructure development companies around the world have begun using digital creation, management and dissemination tools to improve their efficiency, effectiveness and collaboration.

Multinational project engineering companies such as Forster Wheeler, Bechtel, Fluor Daniel and Montgomery Watson successfully use Bentley technology to run single virtual teams across India, Europe and America.

The Asia-Pacific region is expected to be at the forefront of growth for infrastructure engineering software because of the fast pace of infrastructure growth in developing economies.