The Hindu Business Line : 4CS plans to expand Indian operations

Hyderabad May 1 American farmers owning tractors made by M&M, have, beginning 2007, a 24x7 customer service to meet their vehicle and parts warranty fulfilment, wherever they are located in the US.

The company has offered to take care of the spare parts problem or larger problems concerning the tractors within 24 hours of registration of the matter.

Similarly, Kawasaki has a large programme covering its warranty services.

Behind the implementation of these projects is 4CS, a provider of warranty software applications.

The company is promoted by Mr Ashok Kartham, of Indian origin, and has offices in Illinois and Hyderabad.

Mr Kartham, who has done stints at the R&D Centre of CMC and Satyam Computers, is in India busy trying to make inroads into the booming Indian automobile sector with the company's proprietary iWarranty software.

"We are close to working with the Mahindra Group in India also for offering the services," he told Business Line.

The $15-million company has Mitsubishi Caterpillar, ,Trane and Kone.

With companies spending about 2-3 per cent on warranty and related services, 4CS, with its early entrant advantage, is planning to rapidly expand in the US, Europe, Japan and soon in India.

In the automobile sector alone, the annual spend on warranty is estimated to be $30 billion.

iWarranty is platform-independent - it sits easily with ERP and SAP users.

The totally automated management process helps reduce the warranty costs of products by timely information and inputs to the suppliers and business partners along with the main manufacturers.

Mr R. Dasari, Director (Technical) of the India Development Centre in Hyderabad, said that the software takes warranty beyond the traditional accounting function of claims.

4CS, which also has customer service operations (CSO) in Hyderabad with about 60 staff, plans to increase the strength to 500 in 2-3 years.

The CSO will offer 24x7 services, high-value products and focus on automobiles, heavy equipment manufacturers and infrastructure sectors.

Aerospace and consumer goods are future sectors.