HCL Infinet to offer value-added services

NEW DELHI: HCL Infinet, the Internet services subsidiary of HCL Infosystems,
has launched its value-added Internet services in Delhi and Jaipur. These
services will be available in Mumbai and Bangalore shortly. The services include
hosting and co-location, Virtual Private Networks, ASP services and B2B digital
exchanges besides of course the plain vanilla access. The network is based on
ATM/Frame Relay with built-in redundancy in the servers. HCL Infinet also plans
to offer national and international roaming access and secure payment gateway.

The services will be expanded to 42 cities in the next three months and 60
cities by mid next year. The company targets 200,000 subscribers by June next
year. Says HCL Infinet president Saurabh Adhikari, "While established
players like Satyam have taken two years to achieve that number, we shall
achieve it within such a short span." The strategic intent of HCL Infinet
is to leverage on HCL Infosystems’ vast customer base. According to company
officials, it already has a customer base of 25,000 with 5-6000 active
customers. The company hopes to capitalize on its channel strengths both in the
corporate and consumer markets. It has a centralized help-desk and a network of
operations centers to provide customer care.

The company with an equity base of Rs 115 crore has invested Rs 45 crore in
the venture. The total investment in the Internet venture is expected to go up
to Rs125 crore. Officials expect to break-even by the second year of its
operations and said that an IPO is expected in the next 18 months.