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US companies lose 6–12 months to avoidable delays wrong city, wrong entity structure, compliance gaps, or a founding team that can’t recruit at pace. Xelium Labs removes every one of those blockers, from the RBI filing that unlocks your bank account to the 200th engineer you hire in year two.
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Active GCCs in India
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GCC workforce (projected 2026)
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Market size by 2030 (est.)
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Primary GCC hub cities
Pick the Wrong Structure
and You'll Rebuild It
Pick the Wrong Structure
and You'll Rebuild It
Wholly Owned Subsidiary (Pvt. Ltd.)
The standard structure for 90%+ of US GCCs. Lets you hold IP, issue Indian ESOPs, sign contracts, and repatriate profits as dividends. Incorporated under the Companies Act 2013 typically 25–40 days to receive a Certificate of Incorporation.
Joint Venture
Appropriate when you need a local partner's existing STPI/SEZ registration, established vendor relationships, or a ready talent pool — typically seen in manufacturing or regulated-sector GCCs where local expertise is operationally critical.
Branch or Liaison Office
Requires RBI approval and restricts revenue-generating activity. Use only if you need a market presence for 6–12 months before committing to full incorporation not as a permanent operating vehicle.
Employer of Record (EOR)
Hire 1–30 employees in India within 2 weeks no entity, no local bank account required. Cost runs 12–18% above direct employment. Use to start delivery immediately while your Pvt. Ltd. is being incorporated, then convert employees at go-live.
Not Every City Works for
Every Role Mix
50 Hires in 90 Days Is
Achievable — With the Right Process
01
Workforce Planning & JD Calibration
We rewrite US-market JDs for Indian talent pools, benchmark compensation against current Naukri and LinkedIn salary data by city and level, and build a 12-month hiring calendar with weekly targets.
02
Founding Team Hiring
The first 10–20 hires set attrition patterns and hiring brand for every cohort that follows. We prioritize candidates with GCC experience who can run structured interview loops and onboard junior talent without a playbook.
03
Ramp & Bulk Hiring
Dedicated sourcing pods for 50–500+ hire programs. We run parallel pipelines across active and passive candidate pools, manage offer-to-join drop-off with structured follow-up, and target a 90%+ offer acceptance rate.
04
Specialist & Niche Talent
For hard-to-fill roles — Reltio MDM, Azure Synapse, SAP S/4HANA Basis, MLOps — we draw on curated alumni networks and direct outreach to passive candidates, not just job board applications.
05
Ongoing TA Partnership
Once your GCC has a functioning TA team, we transition from lead recruiter to overflow and specialist partner — filling niche roles and managing peak-load hiring without the cost of a permanent expanded team.
What US Companies
Get Wrong
on Compliance
The three most common compliance failures for US-headquartered GCCs in India: classifying employees as contractors (triggering PF and ESI liability), missing the 30-day Shops & Establishments registration deadline after moving into a new office, and treating India’s DPDP Act as an afterthought rather than a day-one data architecture decision. We set up the right frameworks before you hire employee #1 — not after an audit surfaces the gaps.
Entity & Tax Registration
MCA incorporation, DIN/DSC for directors, PAN, TAN, GST registration, Professional Tax, and SEZ/STPI notification where your cost model benefits from the 15% corporate tax rate or STP duty exemptions.
HR Policy & Employment Contracts
India-specific offer letters, employment agreements, POSH policy (mandatory for all registered entities), leave policy aligned to state-specific rules, and an NDA/IP assignment framework that is enforceable under Indian contract law.
Labor Law Compliance
Shops & Establishments registration (state-specific, required within 30 days of commencing operations), EPF/ESI enrollment, Contract Labour Act registration if using third-party staffing, and mandatory gratuity provisioning from day one.
FEMA, Transfer Pricing & RBI
Foreign inward remittance certificates (FIRCs) for equity infusions, RBI reporting for overseas direct investment, arm's-length transfer pricing documentation for intercompany service fees, and repatriation structuring to minimize withholding tax leakage.
Data Privacy & the DPDP Act
India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act (2023) imposes consent, localization, and breach-notification obligations that affect how your GCC handles customer and employee data. We build DPDP compliance into your data architecture before the first production system goes live.
Ongoing Compliance Calendar
Monthly TDS filings, quarterly GST returns, annual Secretarial Audit (mandatory once headcount exceeds 50), and real-time monitoring of MCA and state labor department circulars that could affect your GCC's operating requirements.
Your First Employee Needs Working Laptop on Day One
Workspace & Facilities
Grade A office selection in tech parks (ITPL, Mindspace, Cybercity)
Managed/flex workspace for months 1–3 while permanent lease executes
Fit-out design: 80–100 sq ft per seat, server room, and all-hands area
Facilities vendor onboarding: housekeeping, security, and cafeteria
Employee cab policy and transport vendor empanelment
Technology & IT
Dual-ISP leased line setup (100 Mbps primary + 50 Mbps backup)
AWS/Azure India region setup, IAM, and parent-company SSO integration
Laptop procurement from Dell/Lenovo India with GST-compliant invoicing
India-ISP-compatible VPN config, EDR deployment, and DLP policy rollout
Local IT helpdesk (L1/L2) staffed from day one, SLA-bound to parent IT
HR & Payroll Systems
HRMS setup: Darwinbox, greytHR, or SAP SuccessFactors India module
Payroll processing with TDS computation, Form 16, and PT compliance
Biometric attendance, leave management, and performance review cycles
Headcount, attrition, and compensation analytics dashboards for US leadership
Operations Readiness
120-item day-1 readiness checklist with owner, status, and completion date
Structured 30-60-90 day onboarding program for all new hires
BCP with RPO/RTO defined for each critical function and a tested failover site
Monthly GCC scorecard: headcount, attrition, delivery velocity, and cost per seat
The Site Head You Hire
Determines the Next 200 Hires
Managing Director / Site Head
Should have P&L accountability for the India entity, a track record scaling a GCC past 200 people, and existing relationships with mid-senior engineering and product talent in the target city.
VP / Head of Engineering
Owns the engineering org design, technical hiring bar, and architecture governance. Critical that this person has run distributed teams with a US parent not just a local delivery team reporting to an offshore PM.
Head of HR / People Function
Needs deep knowledge of India compensation bands, attrition drivers by function and level, and POSH/statutory compliance. GCC experience is non-negotiable generalist CHRO experience from an Indian IT services firm is not a substitute.
Director of Operations
Accountable for facilities, vendor contracts, IT service delivery, and the monthly cost-per-seat report that US leadership scrutinizes. Typically the first internal hire after the MD, not the fifth.
CFO / Finance Controller
Must understand transfer pricing under India's Income Tax Act Section 92, FEMA reporting, and the intercompany billing model that determines how the GCC's cost is allocated back to the US parent.
Chief Data Officer / Head of AI
India is producing the majority of net-new AI/ML talent globally. The right CDO can hire 40–60 ML engineers in 18 months where a US-only team would struggle to find 10. This role justifies a premium the ROI is measurable.
Run It Like a Founder.
Hand It Over When You're Ready.
Build
Months 1–6Register, Staff & Launch
Incorporation, office setup, IT infrastructure, and hiring of the initial 10–30 team members to establish a fully operational GCC.
Operate
Months 6–24Scale & Govern
Ramp hiring, manage operations, ensure compliance, and establish governance frameworks to support sustainable growth.
Transfer
Months 18–30Knowledge Transfer
Complete operational handover with SOPs, vendor transitions, compliance documentation, and leadership continuity.
