Twitter expands engineering team in India, appoints Apurva Dalal as Director of Engineering

Microblogging platform Twitter on Tuesday announced the appointment of former Uber executive, Apurva Dalal as Director of Engineering.

Twitter is also hiring for several other positions across engineering, product, research, and design.

"Starting on April 20, 2021, Apurva will become the senior-most member of Twitter's Engineering team in the country, based in Bengaluru and will be responsible for strengthening the company's engineering capacity and offerings for local and global audiences," Twitter said in a statement.

By committing to hire and develop local engineering talent, Twitter India will play an important role in the company's journey to become the world's most diverse, inclusive, and accessible tech company, it added.

The engineering team in Bengaluru, which has expanded rapidly over the past two years, will continue to focus on building more daily utility for new and existing audiences, with capabilities ranging from product development, research and design as well as data science and machine learning, the social media platform said.

Outside of the US, Twitter has dedicated engineering teams in multiple markets including London, Toronto, Singapore, and Bengaluru.

"The focus on developing engineering capabilities in India comes as part of the company's broader goal to increase its development velocity, including building a strong foundation for its product. This is what the core team will be focused on based out of Bengaluru," it said.

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India is a priority and one of the fastest-growing markets, globally for Twitter.

According to government data, Twitter has 1.75 crore users in India.

Dalal, who has worked with organisations like Google and eBay, last served as the engineering site lead for Uber Bengaluru.

Twitter said expanding the team in India aligns with its overall belief that having more employees at Twitter, living and working in places that are representative of all perspectives and cultures, and sharing local context about these conversations.

"Twitter is committed to building a truly global, inclusive, and accessible product. We're excited to bring some of the best, cutting-edge engineering jobs for a global Internet platform to India, a country that is not only a priority market for Twitter but is also a hub for world-class engineering talent," Twitter Vice President of Engineering Nick Caldwell said.

Under Dalal's leadership, the strengthened India engineering site will focus on building core capabilities in our technology to enable Twitter to serve the public conversation, he added.

Talking about the focus on India, Manish Maheshwari, Managing Director at Twitter India said the country has always been a priority market for Twitter and drives significant growth for the company.

"In fact, as previously shared, Twitter in India recorded a 74 percent year-on-year mDAU {monetisable daily active usage) growth in Q4 2020. In order to scale our reach and build a service that is truly for Indians and by Indians, we are investing in expanding our engineering team in the country," he added.

Dalal's expertise and vision will help the company strengthen its ability to enhance a service that millions of Indians rely on daily, he added.