It’s really the Christmas time for the global semiconductor industry. India is not left behind in the global race, as the subcontinent’s semiconductor industry is heading towards $52.58 billion revenue by 2020, driven by burgeoning demand from Internet of Things (IoT), while the government initiatives like Make in India act as a catalyst. In fact, the credit goes to augmenting service warehouses, and it’s still an irony that the country lacks turnkey semiconductor solution providers. Predominant rationale has been the shortage of employable VLSI talents and hands-on experience to handle complex designs like IoT systems and Miniaturization.

But, none of these matter to BlackPepper Technologies - a turn key semiconductor solution provider that manifests the highest amount of predictability and delivers quality in the shortest turnaround time; owing to its unique employee ownership model, which over the years has been magnetic in attracting the top talent available in the Indian semiconductor industry. Incepted by Harikrishnan Puravankara (Founder & CEO) in 2010 and commenced its operations in 2012 by rendering Physical Design services for Tier-1 semiconductor companies, BlackPepper today is an end-to-end hardware design provider which is built on high-value engineering capabilities that are at par, if not above, the global design service space.

The Art of Self-Sustainability
Comprised of a handpicked passionate engineering team that possesses an average hands-on experience of 6.5 years in executing System on Chip (SOC) to system design capabilities, BlackPepper over the years has emerged to be the go-to provider for implementing complex SOCs that are critical in terms of meeting power, performance and area targets, in IoT, automotive, wireless and healthcare domains. Unlike other semiconductor design companies, BlackPepepr has built end-to-end functional units ranging from Embedded Software, Logic Design, Design for Test, Physical Design, Board Design, Analog & Mixed Signal Design, Post Silicon Validation, Yield Optimization and Supply Chain Management, which can operate independently or can be stitched together into integrated programs to execute

on a turnkey basis. No wonder Black Pepper's impressive customer ecosystem includes twelve of the top twenty global semiconductor companies. The company is also building customers across Tier 2 and Tier 3 segments to bid for spec to product offerings. The company has started to see significant success and they are also re-inventing interesting business models that are more appropriate in the current environment.

EYWA, BlackPepper's home-grown technology framework, simply removes sub optimality from the design process, which in fact plagues the design process in many of its competitors

The company looks to aggressively expand its global footprint leveraging its two core assets - Lean Team of Engineers (LTE) and EYWA, which are back-lifted by a supporting framework devised with SSCS (Sure Shot Convergence System) and DEOD (Design Environment On-Demand). It's quite amazing the way BlackPepper transforms an ordinary design engineer to an architect level with the help of its (LTE) talent transformation framework and empowers him with the ability to address the industry’s biggest ARM (Acquire, Retain & Motivate)nightmare. “For instance,our LTE framework allows two of our engineers to design a semiconductor block far better and quicker, which typically takes five engineers in other companies,” proclaims Jei Narayanan, COO.

EYWA, BlackPepper’s home-grown technology framework, simply removes sub optimality from the design process, which in fact plagues the design process in many of its competitors. “A unique combination of various technology components, EYWA allows optimization of human and compute resources, which brings forth a product (be it hardware, software, silicon or a system) with better quality, lower cost and gets realized predictably on time,” asserts Manoj Sundareswaran, EVP-Delivery, BlackPepper, who was with Infineon Technologies and was responsible for end-to-end system design and semiconductor manufacturing.

“We are flattered for consistently being an acquisition target of several major players; however we would like to reiterate that we are, quite simply, not for sale. We need clear mind-space to execute our carefully charted long-term plans with precision and freedom. Our stated plan of record is to go IPO,” says Hari Krishnan Puravankara, EVP-Delivery, BlackPepper. BlackPepper is visibly proud of its reputation as a ‘No nonsense company'.

A Passionate Team Taking the Mission Forward
BlackPepper is built on human values rather than conventional corporate priorities. Every Pepperite among the 200 has strong engineering capabilities, passion for excellence, and above all, is a fine human being. For BlackPepper, every Pepperite comes first, and for every Pepperite, the customer comes first. The company believes in the philosophy of collective entrepreneurship and encourages every single Pepperite to think freely, innovate tirelessly, question fearlessly and be deeply involved in every facet of the BlackPepper success story. The company is setting a very unique example by offering a specific percentage equity to each of its employee and ensuring that the company is owned by them as much a promoter or investor. “In 2021 when the company gets listed, we sure should find multiple millionaires emerging from BlackPepper Technologies,” asserts Hari.

All set to open a design center in the U.S., BlackPepper over the years has extended its branches to Taiwan, China and Singapore, while also deepening its roots in India. En route to the future, the company has no intention to digress from its mantra - 'Democratizing Innovation'. One of the promising steps in this route has been the recently launched Pepper Council, a forum that provides a platform for any individual around the world to submit their ideas, materialize and monetize it via BlackPepper. Endeavoring to act as the innovation marketplace for the country, while maintaining its position as the go-to-design consulting & services choice for all semiconductor & system companies, BlackPepper anticipates becoming a 250 member strong top class semiconductor technology company by the end of FY 2017. As the subcontinent’s semiconductor industry is growing at a CAGR of 26.72 per cent, the best days for BlackPepper are in the making.

Key Management:
Hari Krishnan Puravankara, Founder & CEO
A passionate entrepreneur, Hari holds strong technology and business acumen. Having won several awards during his engineering days, Hari started his career with Wipro and later moved to Magma Design Automation driving their APAC business roadmap. He founded Black Pepper Technologies in 2010 with a vision to build end-to-end silicon to system design house. He was instrumental in growing the organization with limited angel capital.

Offices: Bangalore (Headquarter), US, Taiwan, China & Singapore