Hyderabad: Marlborough-based 3Com plans to open a design center in the city and will hire 50 to 100 developers at the unit. The site will support the company's US team developing VoIP products, focussing on software features and application development. The company clearly laid out the fact the Indian centre would not take away any jobs from the US.

The team in India would work on VoIP software features and application development the teams in the United States would focus on VoIP architecture and product development. According to the company the jobs added in India would free US engineers to work on a product 3Com will launch this summer aimed at helping big companies use the Internet for phone calls.

3Com will complete 25 years of operations this year. The firm has been under financial strain and reported a loss of $86 million, or 22 cents per share, on revenue of $172 million for the last quarter. For the same period last year, the company lost $79.2 million, or 20 cents per share, on revenue of $216.5 million. The company, in order to cut costs, is looking out for a low cost centre. It has been able to reduce workforce by 2,800, while building up its non-US design expertise.

3Com is the pioneer of ethernet. Way back in 1979, ethernet was co invented by 3 Com's Bob Metcalfe.