Context
Align Technology, a global medical device company best known for its Invisalign® system and iTero™ intraoral scanners, was in the early stages of expanding its technical capabilities with a Technology and R&D Global Capability Center (GCC) in Hyderabad.
Although the firm had maintained a presence in India for some time, it was still in the process of building familiarity and recognition among high-intent product and tech professionals. Compounding this was Hyderabad’s perception challenge- while viable from a cost and scalability perspective, it was not traditionally viewed as the destination of choice for product-first tech talent, much of which was concentrated in Bengaluru.
Align was at a crossroads as it was navigating critical questions around how to scale, how to attract high-quality talent, and how to balance global expectations with local realities. That’s when they engaged with The LHR Group.
The Challenge
From the outset, Align’s U.S based leadership team was operating with a limited understanding of the Indian job market.
Key friction points included:
- Geographic Constraints: Align had already set up in Hyderabad, but was struggling to attract the right tech talent in a region that wasn’t traditionally seen as a first-choice destination by product engineers.
- Market Misalignment: U.S. based leadership expectations clashed with India’s hiring realities- long notice periods, offer shopping, and delayed joining timelines made it difficult to close talent in a high-velocity market.
- Talent Decision Delays: The interview process was slow, candidate drop-offs were high, and offer reneging was becoming a recurring issue.
Despite initial attempts, Align was unable to translate hiring intent into closures.
Our Approach
We began with deep listening and ground truthing- understanding both Align’s expectations and the realities of India’s talent ecosystem.
Regional Talent Mapping
Since the GCC had already been established in Hyderabad, our task was to unlock its potential.
We mapped leading product-led companies in the region to identify concentrated talent pools and designed a localised sourcing strategy to target top performers.
We also went beyond Hyderabad to engage with Telugu-speaking tech professionals based in other cities and positioned a return to Hyderabad as a compelling personal and professional move.
We helped reframe Hyderabad not as a limitation but as a strategic location that offered faster hiring cycles, lower attrition risks, and long-term value alignment- if approached the right way.
Market Intelligence & Education
We provided comparative hiring insights between the U.S. and India and highlighted critical nuances like job security perceptions, multiple-offer dynamics, and drop-off risks.
We also conducted a salary benchmarking survey to align expectations with market realities, which became a key input into their compensation strategy.
Accelerated Interview Strategy:
We worked with Align’s U.S. leadership to redesign their interview cadence- training their panels to move faster and focus on immediate joiners only.
Offer Structuring Tactics:
To mitigate offer-shopping, we implemented a “same-day offer issuance” model- issuing the formal letter only on the candidate’s joining date while aligning expectations in advance.
The Impact
Our partnership led to high-quality, high-velocity hiring and we successfully closed 98 critical tech and R&D roles for Align U.S. in Hyderabad.
The success of this engagement sparked interest from the Align Israel team, and with strong internal word-of-mouth, we were brought in to build their tech team in Pune.
Today, Align’s India GCC is contributing meaningfully to global innovation across product, R&D, and engineering.
Why The LHR Group
We understand what it takes to build high-performing global teams within Indian talent ecosystems.
From advising on cost-to-capacity trade-offs to aligning hiring strategies with local realities, we deliver both insight and execution.
That’s how we help global firms build in India.
