Oracle has spent nearly $2 billion in India on development centers, investments in companies Oracle will increase the number of staff it has in India to 10,000 from 8,600 over the next eight months, the company said Tuesday.The additional staff will be in the areas of sales and marketing, product development, consulting, product support, and services, Oracle President Charles Phillips told reporters in Mumbai.India is already home to Oracle’s biggest R&D (research and development) center outside the U.S., Phillips said. The Redwood Shores, California, company first set up operations in India 19 years ago and has spent nearly $2 billion there so far on development centers and investments in companies, he said. Last year, Oracle acquired a 41 percent stake in i-flex solutions, a banking software company in Mumbai. It also acquired the development centers that outsourcers in India were running for PeopleSoft, which Oracle bought last year.India is one of the two fastest-growing markets for Oracle in the Asia Pacific region, according to Derek Williams, executive vice president of Oracle in Asia Pacific.The next big opportunity for Oracle in India is in small and medium businesses outside the country’s metropolitan areas, where there is a lot of purchasing power, Williams said. Oracle has 6,000 database customers and 400 applications customers in India, he said. Philips and other top Oracle executives are in Mumbai for a two-day Oracle OpenWorld event. Software DevelopmentTechnology IndustryDatabasesSmall and Medium Business