[2] His academic interests include education for engineers of the future, computer networks, distributed systems, telecom software and performance evaluation among others.

After receiving his PhD, Gonsalves served as an Assistant Professor in the Computer Science Department at WPI, Massachusetts from July 1986 to December 1988.

He returned to India and joined the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, IIT Madras as Assistant Professor in January 1989.

[3] Besides simulation studies, he conducted measurements on an early Ethernet LAN at Xerox PARC that established the capability of this data network to also transmit voice.

[P 1][P 2] In the first decade of his academic career, he broadened his research on LANs [P 3] to include the transport layer [P 4] and operating systems.

[P 5][P 6] In the early 1990s, Gonsalves with two colleagues Ashok Jhunjhunwala and Bhaskar Ramamurthi decided to focus their research on technology for mass use in India.

This included Minnow, a Linux-based server for small ISPs,[P 10] and BlueBill, a low-cost telecom billing package.

[P 11] Based on many years of research in network management systems he co-founded NMSWorks Software (P) Ltd and designed its flagship product, CygNet.

[P 12][P 13][P 14][P 15][P 16][P 17] Working with several companies incubated by RTBI on Internet-based products for rural India, his research interests further broadened to include distributed systems.

[P 22] During the decade following 2010, he started to apply machine learning and data science to diverse fields such as computer networks[P 23]

constructed space with residential, academic and recreational facilities at par with the best higher education institutions in India.

[13] Prof. Gonsalves was instrumental in setting up IIT Mandi Catalyst, the first technology business incubator in Himachal Pradesh, in 2016.

Prof. Gonsalves was appointed the National Project Coordinator for FarmerZone, a project that harnesses artificial intelligence for crop management advisories to small and medium farmers, initially helping over 1000 potato farmers in Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh.

[30][31] Since 2016, under Prof. Gonsalves' leadership, IIT Mandi had organized a unique, fully faculty-mentored induction or orientation programme for its new BTech students.

[35] After his retirement as Director, IIT Mandi in June 2020, Prof. Gonsalves has been active in improving education in engineering colleges in India.

[36][37] He is a founding member of the Steering Committee of the CSEDU programme aimed at improving the effectiveness of teaching of computer science subjects in colleges.

In this capacity, he visits engineering colleges in different parts of India to deliver expert lectures and to mentor faculty and students.