Learning Byte banking on learning

HYDERABAD: US based organization with its subsidiary, Learning Byte in

Hyderabad is focussing itself to providing elearning in the Indian space. Where

lack of knowledge about IT issues is a major barrier in direct communication

between training HR and IT personnel, Learning Byte could prove to be a boon.

The company is developing a project for ICICI bank to reduce the time to be

productive for its front office personnel.

Learning Byte is a designing program for ICICI, which would enable the

organization to facilitate updation of skills and provide for uniformity of

systems and procedures across all the offices in the country. The project, which

is slated to be completed within one year, involves e-learning. "We

implement e-learning program by creating a high level e-learning design strategy

and then evaluating development tools and processes to implement that, till now

the project has already given us business of Rs 50 lakh and we are in the

process of developing a portal for them. The portal will act as a platform for

the organization to impart education for its employees" said, Indian

operations for Learning Byte CEO, Sunil Kandlikar.

The company is vying to solve the logistic issues related to training and

initially it is eyeing the techno-savvy organizations for its e-learning

offerings. "We are planning to expand our operations in India as well as in

the South-East Asian region, to cater to the growing needs of the corporate

education," he added. The company is opening its marketing office in Mumbai

in June, 2001 and would be looking towards setting up a similar marketing office

in Singapore within six months time.

According to Sunil the current slowdown in US is going to help the e-learning

business as more and more organizations will go for e-learning as it is easier

to be implemented and cost effective too when compared to the conventional

methods. At present around 90 per cent of the company's projects come from the

US and is projecting to garner revenues of $ 30 million out of this 10 per cent

will come from the Indian market.