Emerging Company of the Year 2009 : Our biggest competency is to create innovative user experiences

What challenges did you face in the initial stage of setting up One97
Communications?

First, there was no reference for our customer in the technology we were
selling. As a start-up, we had to give confidence that we will deliver and not
run away. I found that nothing is better than taking money after the customer
has made some. This, in fact, gave birth to a revenue share model.

Second, the payment cycles were very long. We did not have a dedicated
billing and collection team (which we now have). This made all our cash flows
extremely strained.

Finally, we were independent people unlike our industry peers. So, all our
people, customers, and revenue came because we delivered.

In terms of innovation, what are your key achievements?

Since its inception, One97 has a number of firsts to its credit, like the
business model which has now become an industry standard. Using voice platform
to disseminate wide variety of content; music messaging, and voice SMS on
mobiles in India; India's first analytics driven interactive automated voice
calling platform for selling VAS and telco products; India's first voice based
gaming application for mobiles; India's first application to capture and
disseminate rural messaging and user generated content on voice; and m-commerce
on voice.

Furthermore, we aim at enabling telecom networks to become the best and most
used media to deliver content, information, and intelligent transactions to
consumers. For this, we have set up an R&D lab and are also incubating a few
businesses within One97. Our recent foray into mobile marketing with our
customer analytics engine-Oorjamatix-is a result of this practice.

What are your expansion plans?

We are very strong on the applications side and will continue to grow there.

We currently have the most widely deployed telecom application platform in
the country. We will be increasing our headcount from 720 to 1,000 by the end of
this financial year and are targeting a revenue of $100 mn in the next two
years.

On the domestic front, we are looking at growing both organically and
inorganically. We will continue to invest our time and resources in our R&D
center. We will also be introducing more services and products like PayTM-our
m-commerce initiative- and Ooorja-our initiative in the mobile marketing space.
On the global front, we plan to extend footprints in the developing economies.

Arpita Prem

arpitap@cybermedia.co.in