ICICI Infotech enters product development tie-up

BANGALORE: ICICI Infotech Services Ltd. has announced a tie up with the

Germany-based Fraunhofer Institute of Software and Systems Engineering (ISST)

that will allow it to use the technologies of the latter to develop products and

solutions. To start with, the two organizations would come together to develop a

"next generation" search engine solution that would be more based on

the context and "provide information that the user is looking for",

said ICICI Infotech Joint President Manoj Kunkalienkar. He added that the

product would be of use in intelligent marketing, B2B sector, content management

and data warehousing.

ICICI Infotech will use the research expertise of ISST and productise the

technology, and jointly market it. According to Manoj, a team of about 10-12

engineers will start working on the product next week and would need about seven

months to be able to start selling. Revenue from the product would be shared

between the two organizations. Speaking to the press on the occasion, ICICI

Infotech Managing Director and CEO V. Srinivasan said that the tie would also

help the company in its marketing exercise in the European region.

Srinivasan said that the company was able to reduce its dependency on its

parent ICICI during the year. "About 35-40 per cent of our revenue comes

from ICICI projects," he added. Last year this figure was 63 per cent.

ICICI Infotech plans to increase its focus on product development. According

to Srinivasan, this year products will fetch about 6-8 per cent of the revenue.

However, this figure will go up during the next fiscal. The company is currently

offering products and services in banking and insurance sectors, and plans to

enter the pension and mutual fund sector with its own products. It also will

increase its exposure in other areas than India and Asia to Europe and Middle

East.

Srinivasan said that the company would continue to look for acquisition

opportunities. "In two years we have acquired seven companies," he

remarked. ICICI had posted Rs 120 crore revenue during the first half of the

current fiscal and expects to do slightly better during the second half to end

the year at about Rs 270 crore.