Tenacious Team Player

They say that when the going is tough, the tough get going. And if there is one thing DV Venkatachalapathi has picked up over the years, it is a tenacity to keep going despite hurdles blocking his path. 

He launched Vikas Microchip in 1995 with a basic investment of Rs 3 lakh and in 2000-01, the company has posted a turnover of Rs 10 cror. This is a 100 percent growth over the previous fiscal. Germinating as a software development firm, Vikas Microship has today made inroads into networking and e-enabled services.

Venkatachalapathi attributes this success to his will to succeed and fight stiff competition. These characteristics have helped him and his company to survive the slump in the IT industry. "While other companies are laying their staff off, we have hired about 20 engineers to strengthen our support team," he says.

Venkatachalapathi is of the opinion that to survive in the highly competitive IT industry, one has to constantly change the area of expertise and master every business aspect. "Almost every year I enter into new businesses and this has proved to be helpful as we are not bound to a single revenue flow. However, service and support will always remain our core focus area," he states.

And this focus has not gone unnoticed by the company's principals. In fact, Vikas Microchip bagged the best support service award from Microsoft during 2000-01. 

Building employees commitment

Venkatachalapathi strongly believes that his employees as a team are the building blocks of his success and tries to maintain their enthusiasm levels. He makes every possible effort to ensure total employee commitment and dedication in the projects undertaken by them.

Hari Prasad, who handles the software solutions division in Vikas Microchip is one such committed employee who has been with the company for over a year. He says that Venkatachalapathi is totally service oriented and over the years has built strong values and policies in the organization as well as the clients. "Above all, I like his business ethics," he adds.

Given the company's concentration on sales and service, it is not surprising to note that Venkatachalapathi pays special attention to the support team. "My entire team makes sure that they stick to the strict quality levels which our customers expect from us. And they do this on their own, without any prompting from me," says

Venkatchalapathi. 

The days of struggle

Today sitting in his busy office, Venkatachalapathi recalls his earlier days, when he entered the business, after graduating in computer science in 1995. "I always wanted to do something different, and simultaneously thought about going to the US to do my MS before getting into business," says he.

But when he looked around and saw untapped opportunities in the educational segment within the country, he decided to stay back and focus on business. "Opportunity knocks only once and I grabbed it," he says with a smile. After an in-depth study of the educational institutions, he began developing his first software product with the launch of Vikas Microchip.

The beginning was made at a small office in Koramangala with four software professionals. Despite several hardships, the team succeeded in developing VSIM, an educational software, which was targeted at engineering students. Venkatachalapathi thought his days of struggle were coming to an end, when a couple of educational institutions came forward with proposals to include the product into the engineering curriculum. 

But his hopes were short-lived. "Our business model did not work as we expected and by the end of the year we had to give away our flagship product for free," recalls Venkatachalapathi with a sigh. 

But opportunity knocked his doors again in 1996, when the service segment became a growing market. Venkatachalapathi decided to start a service division, again targeting educational institutions. 

Venkatachalapathi got his first break in the government sector when he was engaged to develop a software to screen the recruitment applications for Karnataka's Department of Social Welfare Services. "The project was a success, though the profit margin was meager," Venkatachalapathi recollects. 

The new beginning

Vikas Microchip made a new beginning in 1998 when the company forayed into networking market. Since then, it has executed several projects and signed up strategic alliances with partners like Microsoft, Novell and Oracle. "With our proven track record and expertise, we have to our credit several alliances with global players," says

Venkatachalapathi. 

Towards the fag end of 2000-01, Vikas Microchip entered into e-enabled services with the launch of Vikas Global Solutions. According to Venkatachalapathi, the company is likely to go public by the end of this fiscal in the Australian market, where it has opened a branch office. 

In India Vikas Global will open offices in Mysore, Trivananthapuram and Mangalore within two months. Meanwhile, by the end of this year, Venkatachalapathi plans to open a full fledged facility for e-enabled services development in Bangalore which will house around 500 people. 

All said and done, the company's growing focus on government and educational institutions could improve its growth in terms of sales. Also with Venkatachalapathi's philosophy to be a 100 percent service oriented company, the sun is definitely shining brightly on Vikas Microchip and Vikas Global Solutions. 

Sunila Paul  in Bangalore