22By7, the Bengaluru-based established player in the market says there is no pressure from the new-age start-up companies, thanks to their competitive cutting-edge technologies. However, they are constantly watching the competition and start-up firms. Here is what Venkat Murthy, Founder and CEO, who calls himself Prime mover of 22By7 tells B Swaminathan on his firm’s performance in the last fiscal and plans for the coming days. Edited Exceprts
Cell IT: How you view your organization’s performance in FY 2015-16
Venkat Murthy (Venkat): Fiscal year 2015-16 has proved to be a remarkable year for us. To be precise, our team devoted their energy to satisfying and rewarding clients with exceptional performance. Last year we moved our entire focus on creating a continuous growth scenario and we have achieved our set milestones. We kept our attrition level to less than <8%.
Another instance, our service package, ASSIST has seen 100% growth in Service Revenues.
Cell IT: List out the highlights of your organization in FY2015-16
Venkat: We celebrated ASSIST’s 100% growth in service revenues last year along with our strict adherence to “Business Continuity” model helped us gain more visibility. We can call ourselves, without a shed of doubt, the new generation IT
solutions provider.
Our focus in emerging technologies like Cloud Offerings, Migration, Converged solutions and solutions to modernizing the data centres through our CEC (Customer Experience Centre) has been beneficial and has given us edge over our competitors in the market.
Cell IT: List out the top 5 achievements of your organizations in FY2015-16
Venkat:
- We have attained highest levels of technical certification with all vendors
- Revenue grew by 76% and operating profit by 121%
- As of today, we have 434 clients in the pool
- We have commenced full-fledged operations at Hyderabad and Mumbai
- ASSIST Service package’s seen 100% growth in service revenues
Cell IT: What are the plans you are having for your organization for the forthcoming year?
Venkat: 22by7 plans to put every single achievement from the past year in new areas to enable similar momentum this year and the year forward. Our experience in the IT/ITES, Manufacturing, Retail, E –commerce, Pharmaceuticals, Communication Services, Hospitality will help us all to create the same impact on the one’s we are yet to focus on. We plan to focus more on providing New Generation IT Solution through Modernizing the data centre, End user computing, Hyper-converged platform, Information security etc.
It is absolutely necessary that I address an important issue by saying that we would like to reach out to more prospective customers by targeted marketing and convert those into a profitable venture.
Cell IT: What are the key industry verticals your current clientele houses?
Venkat: IT/ITES, Healthcare, Retail, Manufacturing / Construction, Automobile/Insurance, Hospitality, Logistics and Distribution, E-Commerce, Communication Services and Media
Cell IT: What are the key industry verticals you want to focus in the coming fiscal?
Venkat: Many are there. However, the top in our charts are Smart Cities, Logistics and Distribution, Airlines, Hospitality, Communications Services, E-Commerce and Healthcare.
Cell IT: Please explain your expansion plans. (In terms of geography and workforce)
Venkat: India is the land of opportunities, if you can uncover, there’s so much to do right here. Which is why our primarily focus is on Indian soil, surely, we would love to expand further through the possibilities of reaching out to emerging & developing markets but for now we would like to see ourselves amongst the top 5 giants in the Indian market and take challenges head on.
We have supplemented our teams in R & D activities and marketing areas. Plus, we are planning to increase our work force proportionately to our growth matrix.
Cell IT: What are the top 3 key trends every channel partner should know in the current scenario?
Venkat:Channel partner should focus on their differentiation of how to evolve from a second platform IT to third platform IT, namely; Cloud, Information Security, Mobility, Migration, Converged solutions and solutions to modernize the data centres. The 3 key trends a channel partner should have their eyes on are the way IT is evolving, changes in the customer buying patterns and buying models hence the process profitability is ascertained.
Cell IT: What are the ways you think the channel partners make sense in the current scenario? Do you think the channels have value proposition?
Venkat:While Information Technology is playing a vital in organisational growth; the expectations from IT as a separate business unit is on significant rise. To attain the competitive advantage, it is pivotal that the processes in the form of automation, consolidation, application delivery and performance etc…, has to be, beyond a doubt, the best in class. Designing products meeting the specific requirements from the end customers should yield progressive business in the years to come.
Cell IT: How established companies like you are planning to take the start-up companies?
Venkat: We stay vigilant and analyse how new-entrees are performing in the market by keeping a close watch. Considering the fact that we have been in the market for the last 10 years and we have always taken consultative approach to address any issue. Our go-to-market strategies and approach are miles ahead.
This answer is certainly not intended to be an exhaustive one but we identified the key areas which give us the competitive edge over our competition or start-ups by ensuring that business stakeholders are well trained and are able to understand customers’ business needs while providing solutions in the niche areas for continual growth.