In efforts to expand the company’s customer relationship management, or “CRM,” software connections, open source CRM provider, SugarCRM has signed a partnership agreement with enterprise data services provider, Tata Communications (News - Alert).

This new agreement marks Tata’s customer base expansion in India; with its new ability to provide SugarCRM’s CRM software to organizations in India, Tata has marked its first entry into the software-as-a-service, or “SaaS (News - Alert),” space. 

While the announcement was made just recently, SugarCRM and Tata has been compiling this software selling plan since the beginning of 2009, as a way to pilot a program to build a larger – and more diverse and evolved – CRM service to meet India’s booming business needs.

Jeff Campbell, SugarCRM’s (News - Alert) vice president of worldwide sales, said that, as one of the fastest growing markets, the company sees a proficient and beneficial CRM system in need in India. 

“We see tremendous demand for our CRM services as companies embrace on-demand software to stay competitive in the marketplace,” Campbell said, adding that the continued relationship with Tata will help customers improve business through effective CRM.

By adopting and distributing SugarCRM’s software, Tata will bring an end-to-end service to help companies manage their marketing programs in a cohesive manner, increase effectiveness of sales teams, and provide stronger tools to their customer support teams, company officials said.

According to Angira Agrawal, general manager of SaaS & Enterprise Mobility, Tata Communications, the company has seen strong customer demand for subscription based services especially from sectors like contact centers, which require high sales, marketing and customer contact management.

By utilizing SugarCRM’s software services, which have provided outstanding results for companies that have previously enlisted the professional assistance of SugarCRM, Tata’s Indian customer base will most likely follow suit and grow exponentially. 

And, since Tata has already solidified itself in the Indian market, as a hosted MS Exchange service provider, the company will have less of a struggle breaking the SugarCRM software intro the space.