Larger enterprises are moving towards hybrid cloud stacks: Lingaro's Sam Mantle

Lingaro Group, founded in 2008 in Warsaw, Poland, specialises in data analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) services. Over the past 17 years, the company has expanded globally. In India, Lingaro focuses on delivering tailored data solutions, including advanced analytics, AI, and machine learning, to help businesses drive digital transformation.

In a conversation with TechCircle, Sam Mantle, CEO of Lingaro, discusses the company’s growth strategy in India and globally, highlighting India’s key role in its expansion, the company’s customised solutions for Indian businesses, and its perspective on future tech trends, including generative AI and hybrid cloud stacks. Edited Excerpts:  
 
How does the Indian market fit into Lingaro Group's global growth strategy? 

India plays a crucial role for us from several perspectives. Firstly, the talent we access in India is a significant part of our global workforce. With a remote-first hiring policy, we’ve been able to tap into a vast pool of skilled professionals across India. Our team includes colleagues in cities like Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Delhi, and Mumbai, allowing us to collaborate with some of the best data engineers and consultants available. This talent pool is essential to our success. 

Secondly, India’s rapidly evolving market offers immense opportunities. We’re particularly focused on the Global Capability Centers (GCCs) because many large international enterprises have established and are expanding in India. With our strong presence in the country, we’re well-positioned to partner with these companies in the areas of data and analytics—services that operate at the higher end of the technology value chain. This makes India highly attractive both for talent acquisition and for growing our business by supporting international clients investing in the region. 

Finally, many of our global clients rely on us to have a worldwide footprint. With their internal teams often based in India, they expect us to work alongside them seamlessly, aligning with their geography and time zones. It’s critical for us to have a strong presence in India and attract the right talent to meet these expectations. 

How does your company tailor its data services to meet the unique needs of Indian businesses across industries?

Many of our clients operate in sectors like consumer products, fast-moving consumer goods, and retail. In these industries, staying competitive in the data and analytics space requires not only advanced technical expertise but also a clear grasp of business priorities. 

Our approach is rooted in aligning technology with business goals. For instance, when working with clients in India, we engage in conversations with their leadership—VPs of supply chain or SVPs of sales and marketing—to understand their key objectives and unique differentiators. From there, we help translate those goals into a cohesive data strategy. We design and build the necessary data assets and orchestrate them so they can be accessed and analysed efficiently. 

In today’s world, where artificial intelligence is dominating the conversation, we help clients maximise the potential of their data assets. Whether by using proprietary algorithms or commercially available ones, we enable businesses to combine data and AI to achieve breakthrough performance improvements. 

Your company recently announced a 30% year-over-year growth target in India. What strategies support this goal, and how does it align with the GCC market opportunity? 

Let’s start with the opportunity around GCCs. It’s no secret that a significant number of large enterprises have already established or are actively setting up GCCs across India. In fact, the latest figures suggest there are nearly 1,800 GCCs in place today—a number that is only expected to grow. 

This presents a unique opportunity. In recent years, many traditional service providers have heavily focused on outsourcing, offering external support to these same enterprises. However, we’re now seeing a shift: many global organisations are bringing certain workloads and capabilities back in-house. They recognise the importance of maintaining close ownership of critical activities, especially in areas like data analytics. 

Data analytics is a key focus for these enterprises, and Lingaro is well-positioned to meet this need. We bring deep expertise across both technology and business domains, but unlike many traditional providers, we don’t have a legacy of large-scale outsourcing in India. This gives us the flexibility to work as genuine partners, helping companies build in-house capabilities. We support them with fresh ideas, external consulting, and scaling when needed—allowing them to maximise their potential without losing control or ownership of these functions. 

While we aren’t fixated on a specific growth target like 30%, our focus is on maximising growth while laying the necessary foundations to sustain it.

Can you share a specific hiring target or number for your plan in India? 

We’re nearing the 200-employee-mark today. The next milestone is to double that, aiming to reach 400 to 500 employees within the next 18 months. This target is already part of our internal plans. 

How is your company incorporating generative AI into solutions for enterprise clients, particularly in India? 

There are two key areas we're focusing on. First, we have a robust data science capability within the company. Many businesses face the decision of whether to develop their own generative AI algorithms or use off-the-shelf solutions from external providers. Larger enterprises, in particular, remain cautious about external solutions due to concerns over data exposure and losing control of sensitive information. With experience in building algorithms and providing data science services to numerous clients, including those in India, we are well-positioned to address these challenges. 

The second area, which is a core strength for Lingaro, lies in integrating data into these AI models—whether companies build their own models internally or leverage external ones. Successfully integrating data requires navigating the complexity of data assets while ensuring proper governance and compliance. This is a critical factor in scaling generative AI effectively. 

If the data going into the model isn’t accurate, there’s a significant risk that the model’s outputs will also be unreliable. That’s why our focus on the data space is essential for unlocking the potential of generative AI at scale. Our most advanced clients recognise this and depend on us to establish secure foundations that allow their data to flow seamlessly into AI algorithms. This ensures the automated outputs generated by these models can drive meaningful improvements in their business performance.

What technology trends in data analytics or AI do you think will dominate the enterprise tech landscape in the next five years? 

I have two key observations. First, from a hyperscaler perspective, larger enterprises are increasingly moving towards hybrid cloud stacks. For instance, organisations that started with Microsoft are now adopting Google or AWS, and vice versa. This shift is driven by the risks and inefficiencies of relying on a single provider. Consequently, companies like Lingaro, especially those in the data space, must be proficient across multiple platforms. They also need to understand how to leverage the unique strengths of each hyperscaler. The cloud journey has been evolving for years, and I expect hybrid adoption to continue growing. 

Second, from a generative AI perspective, I believe the larger players will dominate the algorithm and AI space. Even companies that have led with in-house data science and algorithm development will likely shift towards established platforms over time. This is simply because of the resources and innovation power these major players bring to the table. 

In analytics, I foresee a similar trend, where the bigger players will dominate—just as we’ve seen in the cloud space. That said, Lingaro is well-positioned in the data space because of its highly personalised nature. Every company has unique needs and operates hybrid environments with different tools. This creates a demand for bespoke services, which Lingaro excels in providing.