Staying Agile, Surging Ahead
With its recent acquisition of Netherlands-based Avensus Netherlands BV for USD 9 Million, Indian IT firm Omnitech InfoSolutions Ltd is poised to strengthen its Managed Services and Cloud Computing Offerings in the European market. COO and Head Global Operations Anurag Shah spoke to Connect about their plans ahead.
How does acquiring Dutch company Avensus Netherlands BV benefit Omnitech’s profile in the European market?
Currently, Avensus caters to the Benelux market, and through this acquisition, Omnitech plans to further leverage the expertise of Avensus and expand across the entire Europe over the period of next three years. This merger not only brings great value to our customers, but also to our staff because it gives us the opportunity to fulfil our customer-oriented ambitions at an extended professional and also international level. We are looking at a 4-pronged approach to benefit from this transaction:
a) Build a strong platform for our European growth plans
b) Cross sell Omnitech’s services to existing customers and increase our revenue share in those customers
c) To acquire their local and capable team which can be leveraged for future growth within Europe & also globally
d) Leverage on the Global Delivery Model of Omnitech to offer competitive solutions to the European markets
What is the value proposition that Omnitech offers to European customers at this point?
Omnitech is a leader in Managed IT services like Infrastructure Management, Application Management and DR/BCP along with many industry specific solutions. Most of these services will be extended to our European customers but high focus will be on areas like Remote Infrastructure Management, Application Management & Testing Services. All these services will enable customers to reduce their cost of operations, offer higher level of SLAs to their end users and also enable them to offer additional services that they aren’t able to provide currently.
What percentage of your total business is Europe-based? What’s the outlook for European business in the coming years?
Currently as on Q2, FY 2011, the European business is 7% of the total revenue, but Omnitech will get an access to over 100 existing customers of Avensus, to explore cross selling of its services like remote infrastructure management, application management, performance management, business continuity services and domain specific services. We plan to grow this business multi-fold over the period of next three years. Omnitech expects to add nearly USD 3 Million to the top line by the end of current fiscal – FY 11. Omnitech aims to achieve multi-fold growth (around USD 30 - 35 Million) through entire Europe with Avensus as a platform by FY-14. The current team is committed to continue to work post the acquisition and merged entity shall grow its team size to around 150 people in next 3 years. The total staff strength of Omnitech will reach globally to 1100+ employees post acquisition.
If you look at the software and IT services scenario, several Indian companies have set up operations in the Netherlands. How does the specific location of the office matter to your operations? Is a Dutch location of specific benefit, in terms of visa processes, taxation, access to customers, etc?
Our target market is small and midcap companies and this market is not so highly penetrated in Europe. Post the downturn, Europe is increasingly looking at cost optimization & innovative solutions, which has been shaping up well for us. Our initial focus in on the Benelux market and then eventually expand to other countries like France, Germany, etc. Hence The Netherlands forms an ideal starting place for us to build a platform for the future. Also Netherlands has much higher levels of English speaking population which makes it easier for us to setup our operations there. When we did a regional survey and found that many other laws like Taxation, Visa rules, etc. were very favourable to our needs.
What would you say is your key challenge in 2011 and your key advantage?
Our key advantage is our wide spectrum of services offerings that are usually not available to the SME customers from a single vendor. Our proven quality of delivery is also a major advantage to us. The key challenge for us, specifically to the European market to align our offerings, delivery model & processes to suite the local needs from cultural as well as business needs. We are building a high percent of local team to overcome this challenge.
What is your strategy for success going to be in the European IT segment?
We will offer a set of very niche services (Security, Cloud based services, etc.) along with the regular Managed services. This combined with our Global Delivery Model will create a significant value proposition for our customers. We also plan to launch our innovative domain specific services and enable us to add high grade Security services to our portfolio which can be leveraged across our global customer base. We are also working on a few, very focused, customer segments to enable us to provide then services that are very customized to their specific needs. We are also building a balanced mix of local & global teams to ensure that we provide complete comfort to the customers while delivering global quality services.
Source: Indo Dutch Connect, Issue 51 |
