Zendesk launches Pune Innovation Hub expansion

Zendesk has inaugurated its Pune Innovation Hub, marking an expansion of its research and development presence in India and strengthening its global product development operations.

The Zendesk Pune Innovation Hub has been established as part of the company’s strategy to scale new sources of talent and enhance collaboration across global teams. Pune now hosts one of Zendesk’s global growth centres, with the team expected to increase in scale and operational significance.

Strategic role in AI platform development

The Zendesk Pune Innovation Hub is positioned to play a central role in advancing AI-powered solutions built around the Zendesk Resolution Platform.

The facility operates as a full-spectrum innovation centre, bringing together:

• Product Management

• UX Design

• Engineering

• Service Reliability Engineering

This structure enables the Pune team to drive global product roadmaps with end-to-end accountability. The teams manage critical segments across the technology stack, including core cloud infrastructure, platform services and the application layer.

A key area of focus is the continued development of Zendesk’s Agent and Admin Workspaces, which underpin the company’s growing Employee Service offering.

Shashi Upadhyay, President of Product, Engineering and AI, Zendesk, said the Pune Innovation Hub reflects strategic acceleration in an AI-driven landscape. He noted that India has evolved into a strategic engine for innovation, with the new facility moving beyond execution to ownership of global product roadmaps.

Talent expansion and operational scale

The Zendesk Pune Innovation Hub currently comprises nearly 300 employees. The company plans to grow the team by an additional 15 percent before the end of 2026.

The Pune workforce is largely engineering-focused and complements Zendesk’s existing sales and support teams serving customers across India. The company works with organisations across sectors including B2B technology, retail, e-commerce and travel.

The expansion aligns local engineering capabilities with global product objectives, reinforcing India’s role within Zendesk’s worldwide operations.

Leadership and local integration

The Pune Hub is led by Vinod Shah, Vice President of Software Engineering, who brings over 24 years of engineering experience spanning the full product development lifecycle.

Shah highlighted the operational advantages of situating the R&D core in Pune. He said proximity between developers, customers and go-to-market teams allows engineers to gain direct insights into real-world workflows and customer challenges. This integration supports the development of globally scalable but locally informed service platforms.

Infrastructure designed for collaboration

The team operates from a facility in ABIL Boulevard, designed to support collaboration, innovation and cross-functional work.

By consolidating product management, engineering and reliability functions within a single location, the Zendesk Pune Innovation Hub strengthens coordination across the development lifecycle.

Expanding India’s role in global product strategy

The launch signals a shift in how multinational technology firms are positioning India within their global structures. Rather than functioning solely as support centres, hubs such as Pune are assuming responsibility for global roadmaps and platform evolution.

For Zendesk, the Pune Innovation Hub represents a structured expansion of R&D capacity tied directly to AI-led service technology. As the team scales, its influence over core platform architecture and product direction is expected to deepen within the company’s global framework.