IIHT eyes Middle East, Africa

Pratima Harigunani

PUNE, INDIA: Bangalore-based IT hardware-training firm, the Indian Institute of Hardware Technology, is keen on expanding its footprint across India and the globe.

It is aiming to add 100 more centers to its current network of 200 centres this year. On the international map, it is now looking at Asian countries, the Middle East and Africa.

A center in Bahrain is expected to go live in the next quarter. CEO Keshava Raju said that the firm would be looking aggressively at 25 emerging markets in the next three years.

“There is immense potential with booming GDP, population and markets in these geographies. Last year we entered China with a JV and have 10 centres already. We have already opened ground in Nigeria.” The company has recently tied up Sikkim Manipal University (SMU) for graduation and postgraduate courses in Infrastructure Management Services (IMS) wherein during the initial phase, IIHT would launch 50 exclusive centers.

On the longer track, are plans to create 100 IIHT Varsity centers. IIHT estimates huge opportunity in the class B&C cities citing the two million job requirements in the IMS industry according to Nasscom. These courses are touted to complete its spread with a presence in the fresh grad pool too that will add to its 11 centres on the enterprise side, and 200 on the retail side. IIHT's training covers areas like hardware, system administration and network administration, information security, database administration, and communication engineering. The company has about 200 centres in India, trains about 60,000 students every year and has alliances with firms like Microsoft, Hewlett Packard, Sun Microsystems and Oracle.