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Preeti M. Pandey

A connectivity provider, this company is moving into offering e-learning solutions. Why? eWorld checks out the rationale behind the venture.

THE international e-learning market has been awaiting the attention of the Indian IT industry for sometime now. Although attempts were made by a few firms to foray into this area, e-learning services did not quite take off. With a projected value of $28.6 billion by 2006, increasing at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.1 per cent, according to IDC, a lucrative business opportunity awaits Indian firms. Not surprisingly, V-SAT connectivity provider Comsat Max is exploring the potential offered by e-learning to reach out to international markets. Understandably, much of the e-larning market is in the US where it is estimated to touch $18.3 billion by 2006.

Joyjit Chatterji, Vice-President, Comsat Max, outlines the strategy that would be adopted by Comsat Max to venture into the global arena.

From being a V-SAT connectivity provider, Comsat Max is diversifying its business to offer e-learning solutions. Does this mean the company is going on a restructuring mode?

This year, we will consolidate our business in our bid to become a $100-million company by 2009. And offering e-learning solutions is just an extension of the other services like network management and disaster recovery since all of these ride on V-SAT connectivity. While our V-SAT business contributes 80 per cent of the business currently with the balance coming from the other services offered by Comsat Max, this is going to change over the coming years.

We expect estimated revenues of $20 million from the e-learning practice once the comprehensive solution is in place. Comsat Max will look at the overseas markets, the US in particular, to market its learning management solution.

E-learning was talked of as a big business in India a few years ago, yet the concept failed to take off...

Yes, e-learning was perceived as a big businesses opportunity. It should be understood though that when this was expected to take off, Indian companies were really not ready. Now, however, with businesses going global, it has become imperative that companies are able to use their knowledge repository to train employees and gain more business in the process. Insurance, banking and finance, automobiles — all these industries need to constantly update their agents or dealer network on the latest product offering and technical specifications and e-learning is a good way to do just this.

An insurance company, for instance, invests as much as Rs 10 crore and upwards for training its agents. This just goes to show the business opportunity present if the company decides to train them through a learning management system (LMS).

Will this mean the human element will become redundant in HR training and what sort of cost savings can be expected?

Face-to-face training will always be required but an LMS system will be able to track preferences of students, measure the effectiveness of the module, link the (LMS) system to the HR department, making it easier for the HR head to monitor the effectiveness of the module and productivity of the employees. Comsat Max's LMS also allows the instructor to integrate his training module to the system.

We will introduce a comprehensive e-learning solution that will merge the two offerings of (Comsat Max's) Knowledge Management and Learning Management solutions with the corporate sector and end-consumer being the target clientele.

What about savings?

A corporate could utilise the e-learning solution in an application service provider (ASP) mode, resulting in cost savings between 40-60 per cent over a three-year period. We will host the content on our server and route it to the customer's LAN network. Comsat Max is looking to push the e-learning business through the ASP option. While purchase of an LMS licence might cost between Rs 3,000 and Rs 5,000 per user, the knowledge management module for a mid-sized implementation (100 users) falls in the Rs 40 lakh range.

Going ahead, will Comsat Max change focus to primarily market its e-learning services?

We intend to take our e-learning services overseas. The US is a very lucrative market for learning management solutions where the market is an estimated $11 billion. We might also look at domain specialisation in the LMS space. As far as V-SAT business is concerned, we are connectivity providers and will continue to be that. Right now, our focus has shifted to international markets such as the US and West Asia. The company's growth strategy is to win large orders in West Asia for Comsat Max's facility management and network infrastructure services. Infrastructure management will also be a major area for us given that the segment is a billion-dollar market. We are in the process of scouting deals in the US.

Picture by K. Ramesh Babu

preetim@thehindu.co.in

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