Chennai: The U.S. headquartered Laird Technologies Monday inaugurated its first offshore manufacturing facility in India.

Laird Technologies, a unit of the Britain-based Laird Group Private Limited Company, is a leader in the design and manufacture of customised, performance-critical products for wireless and other advanced electronics applications. It employs over 14,000 people across 40 facilities in 14 countries.

Set up with an investment of over $15 million, the Laird Technologies unit when fully operational will employ over 1,200 people at its Chennai facility.

"Availability of a skilled work force, support from the Tamil Nadu government, the presence of good logistics, lower costs and our 'close to the customer' strategy were reasons for the choice of Chennai as our first offshore location in India," S. Talpallikar, managing director of India operations, Laird Technologies said.

"This new facility will allow us to support our Indian customers with new products in a timely and efficient manner", the official said.

"With the new manufacturing facility we are poised to aggressively expand our customer base in India over the next 12-18 months", he added.