Zoho Corp plans to hire up to 2,000 people for its rural offices by December end as the software-as-a-service (SaaS) unicorn continues to bolster its rural network at a time when the pandemic is rewriting the rules of operating from large brick-and-mortar offices in main urban centres.

“About 85 per cent of the new hires will be for India. We have a good pipeline of hiring, and it will continue next year,” Sridhar Vembu, co-founder and chief executive at Zoho, said in an interview.

Zoho currently has about 10,000 people globally. The new hires will be made across all functions, including software development, support, marketing, sales and administration, Vembu said.

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“We need all roles because when we are setting up rural centres, we need people with local knowledge who can run these centres from an operations point of view,” he said.

Zoho has been promoting the reverse migration of talent with the concept of rural offices. These are small establishments that can accommodate 20-60 people. It opened its first rural office in 2011 in Tenkasi, a village in Tamil Nadu.

Zoho Desk is the company’s customer support software developed and launched from the Tenkasi office in 2016. The Tenksai office currently has about 500 employees.