For years, India’s global capability centres in financial services and cybersecurity were viewed largely as extensions of headquarters. That equation is changing fast, as leaders push for deeper product ownership, faster decision making and tighter alignment with global priorities.

In a recent episode of GCC Giants, Shivi Mithal, vice president and country manager India at Mimecast, and Sunil Shirguppe, senior vice president and India country head at Greenlight Financial, outlined how their centres are moving from compliance and risk functions to front line innovation.

“Whatever teams or functions we have set up here, we have made sure that there is complete front to back ownership,” said Shirguppe. The India hub for Greenlight includes engineering, security, product, design and operations. “The combination of our decision to how the market has evolved has really helped us sort of shape up the GCCs.”

Mithal echoed this shift.

Mimecast’s India centre was set up “as a true GCC, which means that all the roles were global.” Leadership structures are determined by capability, not geography.

AI, Data and the Push for Proactive Risk Management

Shirguppe said the rise of AI tools has changed how fintechs test and deploy ideas. “Because of this AI, all the tools that are out there…building these quick POCs and then trying them out on our customers has become very easy right now.”

For a mobile-first platform serving more than two million paying subscribers, understanding user behaviour without direct interaction is critical. “Anything that we put on the mobile platform, how well it is tagged…we can track how the consumers are doing,” he said.

At Mimecast, analytics sits at the heart of cyber defence.

“Every time it is going to be a new kind of attack,” Mithal said. One example is business email compromise detection.

Threats detected in one region are rapidly escalated globally. “The moment we detect the threat for the first time, immediately we will increase the security policy across all our customers through the globe.”

Talent Structures Built for Speed

Cybersecurity work demands rapid response.

“Any new kind of threat has to be resolved or defended in hours at max a day,” Mithal said. Mimecast uses a ‘kite’ structure, with a high concentration of experienced engineers. “If we have too many junior members they would take time. No, so we do not have a pyramid, we have a kite.”

Greenlight’s India teams, despite not serving local customers yet, drive strategy globally.

“All risk efforts for Greenlight…run out of India,” Shirguppe said.

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