‘Cogito Ergo Sum’ or `I think therefore I am’, the famous words of philosopher Rene Descartes has found its way into the Information Technology (IT) world. `Ittiam’, in short for `I Think Therefore I Am’, is the new name of the company launched by former Managing Director of Texas Instruments Srini Rajam.

“After a lot of brain-storming we arrived at this name. We thought it was the most appropriate name that we could have as the words symbolise all that a digital signal processor (DSP) software engineer stands for,” Rajam told media persons here on Wednesday.

Ittiam Systems Private Ltd has been started by Rajam along with six colleagues from Texas Instruments (India) and is focused on DSP-based systems in wireline, wireless, audio-speech and video-imaging markets.

Ittiam has already opened a subsidiary in the US and has representations in the UK and Japan, Rajam said. He said the company hoped to break-even within two years of operations. Ittiam was launched in January 2001.

“Our aim is to grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 40 per cent for the next five years. The revenue forecast for 2005 is $40 million,” he said. Rajam said the company was still tying up its financial structure and break-up of revenue targets.

Ittiam has already secured $5 million as seed amount from Global Technology Ventures (GTV), an investment arm of Sivan Securities. GTV has an investment from Bank of America Equity Partners also.

Rajam said the company would be going for a second round of funding in another six to 12 months. “We will be looking at a same order as the first round of funding. The second round of funding will help us to accelerate product development,” he said.

Rajam said the company currently had a strength of 40 people and would soon go up to 50. “We are looking at a 200-strong workforce by the end of 2002. When we put out an ad during January for recruitment, we received 10,000 resumes. We selected 20 people from the 10,000 resumes,” he said.

Rajam said the company currently was operating out of 11,000 square feet space and this would double by the end of next year.

Ittiam will be delivering its first custom-product next week. “By the end of this year, we will be coming out with the first product for the mass market,” he said.

“Our vision is to become the world’s best DSP software and systems company,” he said. Regarding the impact of slowdown in the US, Rajam said: “It is a great time to start a company. The change happening is a great thing for Ittiam as we are developing products for the next generation gizmos.”