'ASP–a solution-based field, ensures success to partners with a different mindset.'

As the CEO of CA Satyam ASP Pvt Ltd (C&S), Ninad Karpe’s mission is to

ensure that C&S becomes a leader in the ASP segment. With corporates not

willing to spend money to get software on tap, he has a difficult task ahead. So

C&S is exploring other fields within the ASP umbrella like e-learning. Prior

to his current role, Ninad was the executive director at Computer Associates

India Pvt Ltd and was responsible for setting up CA offices in India. In a chat

with DQCI, Ninad outlines how ASP could be a profitable business for solution

providers among partners. 

ASP came with a bang some time ago. But today nothing much is heard. What

is CA Satyam ASP doing today?



We have three lines of business. First, we are looking at software to

enhance productivity. Here we will offer software as a service and retail it for

usage in business. Second, we offer updated software to people who are

interested in latest technology. We are ready to do business through the Net and

we call this business line eMpower.

We as a company have plenty of applications to move on to the Net and then

provide these applications as an ASP. We can also specifically design software

applications as per the needs of corporates. For instance, if you have an ERP

system, which you don’t want to throw away, we can put a layer on top. This

layer can help pick up information from the ERP or can put the entire data on

the intranet through the Internet. Any person from anywhere can access this

information which was not possible earlier.

Our third line of business is eNlighten which covers two aspects, namely,

e-learning and communication and collaboration tools. We help corporates to

organize virtual class rooms and provide training to their employees. We are

very aggressive on this line of business.

How many clients have done business with you so far?



One of the clients is Sedgwick Parekh (SP). This company is in to

health-care management business. It goes to corporates to manage things like

hospitalization of employees and medical claims. This company has been recently

taken over by United Health Care which is a $ 22 billion company, number two in

its field. We have sold Think Tank learning management system to SP which has

helped it to provide online training to employees at their places of work. The

software has features to keep a track of the courses attended by employees as

well as evaluate their learning.

Who selects the courses for the employees? Is it done by C&S or by

your clients?



The selection is carried out by the person who drives knowledge within the

client company. It could be the HR manager or chief knowledge officer, whoever

is designated for the job. These courses could either be internal knowledge

which is captured in text format and then converted to e-learning format with

the use of graphic animations. There are off-the-shelf courses as well that

teach presentation, communication skills and personality development.

What this means is that client coming to you will have to first invest in

connectivity infrastructure to take advantage of your eLearning business.



Correct. Of course, a lot of learning can also be done through the Internet

for which a company does not have to have an internal network.

How can your clients be sure that the courses you provide are relevant to

their employees?



The courses are provided based on the job description of each category of

employees. The HR manager or the chief knowledge officer of a company has to

decide on the skills that each employee needs to acquire, the training that

needs to be given. Based on this feedback we provide the necessary courses.

We are involved with ICICI in a big project wherein we are enabling their

front-end people, who are always on the field, to have a complete knowledge

about the products and updates on latest developments. So whenever these

employees want to update themselves with the latest information, they log on to

the Internet and using the security measures, access their product details or

training material.

But what is the expertise provided by C&S here? Even a company website

can provide this information.



But the company website can’t do the tracking and assessment. We do skill

gap analysis for our clients. We track for our client, each of the employee’s

training and do the assessment job as well. The ICICI project was started long

back by a Pune-based company called Brainvisa who developed the product called

Think Tank. Presently we have the exclusive rights for selling this product

throughout the country.

We have worked with Centurion Bank to train their customer care agents. The

bank wants us to provide a uniform online training for all these agents

throughout the country.

What is C&S’s mission in the marketplace?



We want to become the number one ASP in India. This is our mission and we

intend achieving this mission through eNable, eMpower and eNlighten business

lines.

What business model do you follow? How much do you sell directly and how

much through partners?



The ASP business is on the road to reach out to a large number of customers

all over the country. We do business directly as well as through partners. In

fact, we already have partners in our eNlighten division. There are partners

working in Chennai on one of the government accounts. We want to drive our

eNable line of business with partners as well. But the eMpower line of business

will be done directly because a lot of designing and developing of software is

involved here.

What is your plan of action for the next twelve months?



What we have done in the last nine months is to understand what the market wants
and tried to gauge the market response for our products. With a couple of sales

under our belt, now we will be slowly appointing partners. This is really a

solution-based field and partners can be successful here with a different

mindset. For our eNlighten division we will be recruiting more partners in the

next twelve months.

Our business philosophy is to sell products directly for the initial few

months, bag a few contracts and then approach the market through the partners.

SYLVESTER LOBO in Mumbai