KTwo Technologies to raise Rs 15 cr

KTwo Technologies to raise Rs 15 cr

BS Reporter / Chennai/ Bangalore April 17, 2009, 0:18 IST

KTwo Technology Solutions, a Bangalore-based two-year-old software products company, is planning to raise around Rs 15 crore to fuel its expansion plans. The company recorded revenues of Rs 11.56 crore for year-ending March 31, 2009, registering an organic growth of 83 per cent compared to the previous year. The EBITDA was Rs 1.61 crore, a growth of 128 per cent compared to the previous year. The company added 10 new clients during the year.

The company recorded revenues of Rs 11.56 crore for year-ending March 31, 2009, registering an organic growth of 83 per cent compared to the previous year. The EBITDA was Rs 1.61 crore, a growth of 128 per cent compared to the previous year. The company added 10 new clients during the year.

Established in February 2007, KTwo specialises in products and solutions that complete the last metre connection in an information link. “Last metre connectivity provides secure short range information transfer to enable end-user applications to seamlessly connect to supported services,” he detailed. Commenting on the results, Anant Koppar, chairman & CEO of KTwo, said, “Our consistent quarter-on-quarter and full year growth, both in terms of revenues as well as profitability points to a healthy trend for KTwo despite the global recessionary pressures.”

The company has built products like K-SpeaK - a Hands-Free-Car-Kit, KrysTalK - a wireless Headset, Cytosight - a Tele-pathology Product and Kshema - a Telemedicine Product in addition to the others. “Some of our products have already got traction with large Automotive OEMs,” Koppar added. Encouraged by this, KTwo has expanded its people and technology strengths in an effort to make inroads into newer markets and respond to fresh opportunity.

Koppar also said, “KTwo’s strong showing emerges from our capacity to offer a judicious mix of products and solutions in Last Metre Connectivity for a cross section of industries that include Healthcare, Automotive and Mobile Enterprises. We have attracted several seasoned professionals to pursue careers with us and have been successful in building a talented team of close to 200 employees.”

Guru's Article in ITMagz

The Challenges of Measuring Innovation

Written by Charu Bahri

The age of IT is in many ways an age of innovation. Our ever burgeoning, discerning, global consumer base recognises and rewards newness in product and process. Such prospective demand fuels R&D efforts across the world. But how is innovation measured?  The value of a new product or process depends on its market reception. Correctly gauged, this can translate into billions of rupees for an organisation. But an incorrect measure of innovation can spell its doom. After all, any R&D process calls for major budgetary outlays. In fact, R&D budgets often appear over-the-top, but cutting these may imply that a company is left with fewer products in the pipeline – a far from healthy situation, especially if the company’s bottomline is driven by innovation.  In Innovation and Entrepreneurship, management guru Peter Drucker defined innovation as a “specific instrument of entrepreneurship” and “the act that endows resources with a new capacity to create wealth.” In a world where change is rapid, and where a certain technology saturation level is already being spoken about, the quality and maturity of innovation metrics have assumed an important role in business. Innovation has, in many ways, become the central competitive factor in many industries, which must be measured from both – a technological as well as a human perspective.  The importance of the market’s maturity  The innovation process undoubtedly needs attention and funds, but this expenditure must be focused towards minimising risk. Besides, technological innovation must be in sync with market expectations or the level of maturity of a market, so as to ensure the easy absorption of new products.  As Gurudev Goud, regional director – global technology alliance and partner relations, and Prakasan Kappoth, manager – systematic innovation, both from MindTree Consulting, say, “Many technology products fail in the market because consumers are not yet ready to accept them, as they are ahead of their time. The Apple Newton is a good example of such a product. If consumer expectation is a measurement criterion, then yes, a failure to gauge the maturity level of a market leads to the failure of an innovation.” Research associate at the MIT Media Lab and a senior adviser to MIT’s Security Studies Programme, Michael Schrage emphasises this marketability aspect of innovation by saying, “Innovation is not what innovators innovate; it is what customers actually adopt.” What you spend is not always what you get It would, however, not be correct to assume that any innovation accepted by the market is good, regardless of its cost. Customer acceptance is a factor external to an organisation. Other internal factors, such as R&D spending, have a bearing on the quality of innovation. Goud and Kappoth highlight the financial constraints of innovation, especially insofar as ‘commercial innovation’ is concerned. They very practically point out that, “Ideas popping up in one’s mind very soon become shadowed by the implementation cost.” In other words, a good idea is not the sole measure of innovation. The idea must translate into a commercially feasible product, implying that both the process of product development and the product pricing must correlate with market expectations and the potential returns from the product. Hence, a case of “Let’s spend more, since we’ll end up with a better product” might not be financially sustainable.  Goud and Kappoth make another interesting observation about R&D spending and innovation. According to them, “The real innovation happens when one works within constraints, or makes something possible with the constraints.” The influence of management policy The mindset of an individual is also affected by an organisation’s management policies. Employees need an environment conducive to innovation, and once the right ideas emerge, these must be steered in the right direction by a proactive management. According to Goud and Kappoth, “Management nurturing is very important for the success of any innovation. The experimental mindset of an organisation plays a crucial role in encouraging an individual, and creating a motivating and supportive eco-system.” In fact, controls over the innovation process may only be implemented when a sound management policy that’s based on innovation best practices is in place. This in turn entails measuring innovation, as putting a value on innovation will help comparison between simultaneous R&D efforts. In a competitive environment, this enables the allocation of limited resources to where they can do a company the most good. The creative angle But as Dr Ashok Jhunjhunwala of the Department of Electrical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai comments, “There can’t really be an objective criteria for this [measuring innovation]. This requires knowledge of market, technologies available, the technology being patented, and the price point at which it can be introduced. The value is finally dependent on market success. Only a feel of experienced people, rather than objective criteria can be used.” The crux is that innovation is a creative process – and all creative processes involve an aspect of venturing into the unknown, or doing what has never been done before. An innovation metric must value its creativity as well as its functionality and business prospects. In the case of new technology, a value must be assigned to the entire range of the potential uses of the technology. In business parlance, this assumes the nature of a technology diffusion study, which looks into all possible ways a new technology may be applied. A listing of these uses is followed by a market projection for each, thus arriving at the value of the technology. The valuation process: First ideation  In a sense, the lifecycle of an idea is itself a process of valuation. An idea enters two distinct phases, ideation and incubation, prior to being developed into a product. Ideation is the process wherein the management studies all aspects of the idea to determine if it is in consonance with the organisation’s overall business direction, and hence worthy of financial backing. M Sridhar Chakravarthi, CEO of Sridhar’s Quality Academy, explains two processes -- the evaluation of the return on investment and the potential impact of an innovation -- as the practice of asking why we want to implement an innovative idea. As he says, “There has to be a very objective evaluation. ‘To improve client satisfaction’ is very vague. ‘To reduce billing cost per seat by $1 per hour’ is exciting and well appreciated by clients.”  A part of the ideation phase is a commercial feasibility study as well as a cost-benefit analysis, wherein Chakravarthi says the management understands the efforts and expenses involved in implementing the idea. These could involve re-training expenses, which he cites as usually neglected, or examining current commitments and other delivery pressures to come up with a possible implementation schedule. If the idea is relegated to the future due to lack of time, then the idea may not be worth the effort, as it failed to create the necessary urgency. While a certain section of people reckon that the valuation of innovation starts at the ideation phase, Goud and Kappoth believe measuring ideation may harm the idea generation capability in an innovation life cycle. They explain that ideation is a very sensitive and delicate process and hence, it should be nurtured rather than measured. Incubation: getting your priorities right The incubation phase that follows ideation also plays an important role in the process of measuring innovation. Chakravarthi describes this stage as the implementation of an idea, wherein actual brick and mortar work is done, and the necessary funds and resources are committed. The process needs to be carefully controlled and monitored. As he says, “There is no point in launching multiple teams with many initiatives and not monitoring their progress, as they would end up like our joint parliamentary committees, with hardly any results, if ever.” An idea that is deemed a potential success during the incubation stage enters the process of product development. An interesting observation made by Futurethink, a leading innovation research, tools and services firm, during its 2007 Futurethink Innovation Tracker survey, is that companies that consistently emphasise ‘delivering value’ over creativity per se, are significantly more effective at innovating. As such, while creativity must be emphasised, innovation may no longer be considered a predominantly creative endeavour. In the words of Lisa Bodell, CEO of Futurethink, “The free flow of ideas and creativity should not be underestimated. However, they should be viewed as a means to an end, not the end result.” The end now translates as delivering value, by launching a new product or process, after formulating an effective business strategy. Innovation by the takeover route Innovation can occur anywhere – in a garage or in a corporate R&D lab. But essentially, every idea goes through valuation processes prior to being converted into a saleable product. Some people believe that the real breakthroughs of our century were born in garages! Does that mean their valuation process was better? Not really, but it is true that while companies may be able to generate more ideas, they have more at stake. Their investments are obviously greater than a start-up, which is perhaps why we so often see huge companies purchase the work of smaller companies and launch or re-launch their products. Such takeovers make the process of valuing the worth of innovation much easier, as the spadework has already been effectively done on a small scale. This indicates the inherent difficulty of measuring innovation, and also points to the fact that innovation is not always born in R&D labs. In fact, innovation that’s related to improving the efficiency, effectiveness and productivity of an organisational process, is often arrived at by employees on the job. For instance, one of Dell Computers’ greatest innovations was to pioneer a new way of selling – customers specifying build-to-order systems online. Chakravarthi mentions three aspects of innovation – innovation aimed at solving a problem, an internal initiative aimed at improving business results by refining existing processes (even when they are working well), and thirdly, value addition for clients. He explains the last as, “What we do when we are forced by clients to justify our continued association. We then think out-of-the-box to come up with value additions for our clients!”  The incremental nature of innovation  All said and done, innovation may yield a new product or process, and insofar as products are concerned, it may produce a completely new product, technology or relate to ongoing product or technological development. In fact, the incremental nature of innovation in the world of information technology has made it easier to file a patent for a product, technology or process. Goud and Kappoth point out that anyone can file for a patent – if they could afford it – by making minor changes to, and thus bypassing, an existing patent. So while the creation of an innovation portfolio may list the number of patents as measurement criteria, the success of an innovation in real terms cannot be related to patent activity.  Besides, patent activity fails to capture process and business model innovations – the former is especially applicable in the case of ongoing product development. Process improvements may be linked to better functionality, cost or size reductions. However, according to Goud and Kappoth, innovations related to new product developments are more synergetic than ongoing product development. People involved in the process of developing completely new products tend to be more enthusiastic about researching a technology, markets, etc – which is great because launching a new technology or product requires emphasis on the execution of innovation. It is not enough to have an innovative product. The potential pitfalls are many – manufacturing, reliability, marketing, usability, customer support, costs, etc. Hence, a business needs to focus on business variables alongside R&D metrics.  Goud and Kappoth believe the type of metrics account for the success of a product. For instance, time and effort – a typical metric – may not have any impact on the success of a product, but metrics that explain where in the products’ S – Curve a business is, where it needs to go, and how, make more sense and are more relevant. IBM’s EBO framework In 2003, IBM came up with an emerging business opportunities (EBO) framework in partnership with Product Development Consulting Inc. The two firms put together their experience, available research and a database of innovation best practices to come up with a framework that helps tackle the problem of measuring innovation. This framework provides an objective way to measure many processes, and separates the development of completely new products and technologies from ongoing product improvement.  The model covers 30 aspects of innovation, aiming to help organisations figure out what works and what doesn’t. In a sense, the exhaustive coverage of this framework indicates that while there is no single measure of innovation, there is no escaping this process. Our increasingly competitive world requires, even forces, IT companies to innovate, or be left behind.  So if your innovation budgets are significant, you may need to take a long, hard look at your current innovation process to determine how mature your innovation metrics are. It is not an easy task but it definitely has the potential to transform your business.

Guru's Article in E-Voice IT-Magz

‘The 2007 Digital Music Survey’ by Entertainment Media Research, which was conducted in association with leading law firm Olswang, reports that worldwide piracy is on the rise. Do IT experts agree? If so, does this mean security experts are fighting a losing battle? Or is there a way out?

We brought in Dr Prem Chand, vice president, E Security Services, Tech Mahindra; Rajesh Mani, practice head - Media & Entertainment DRM, Tech Mahindra; Nikhil Donde, principal consultant, PricewaterhouseCoopers; Deepak Prasad, general manager, SafeNet India; and Aravind T S, software engineer, Infosys, to discuss this seemingly ‘forever hot’ issue, and found that they all agreed that piracy is on the rise.

That privacy continues to prevail—nay, grow!—is not really surprising. As Donde points out, the Internet, although a technological boon, has simultaneously proved to be a bane, insofar as the proliferation and transfer of pirated content has been made very easy by way of downloads, and transmission across peer-to-peer networks, often traversing borders. Separately, barriers to the movement of pirated media have faded away as travel restrictions are lifted to encourage global travel, implying that master copies move easily from one country to another.

In fact, Prasad goes so far as to opine, “Piracy will worsen, as the exchange of information will become easier with further progress in technology. Better broadband speeds,” he says, “will allow the transfer of 500 MB of software or content in minutes.” Aravind too, predicts the worst, “The development of more software products translates into more piracy.” Undoubtedly, we would all like to avail of a still greater range of digital wares and content, but at what cost?

Too little of the right thing

Shockingly, this gloomy scenario prevails despite the millions of dollars being spent by companies around the world to devise better ways to protect digital products. These outlays have even spawned a lucrative anti-piracy specialist segment that draws some of the best minds of the IT industry. Imagine—Internet sources reveal that every month, Universal Music ostensibly spends US$ 4000 to protect a single album, and US$ 2000 to protect a single track. But, sadly, even such generous budgets have only managed to partially solve the problem. Piracy has still not been rooted out.

But why?

Is it a case of misplaced objectives? Or are companies doing too little of the right thing? Mani explains how the typical anti-piracy ‘job’ “is outsourced to specialist companies known as media defender services, who trawl the Web to determine, and then jam sites from where songs are being downloaded. Other digital protection technologies like encryption, watermarking and finger-printing solutions are also being applied, but more with the aim of determining areas where content is misused, and to determine the point of leakage, than as investigative and preventive mechanisms.”

Apparently then, current solutions are limited to one part of the piracy problem. For instance—consider that some music companies track the online purchases of music with the help of information included in the media content headers. These help determine say, if I’ve inappropriately shared music I’ve bought. But companies are still using such information only to suppress piracy—or as Donde says, “…to stifle the exchange process within the hacker community”—and take no direct legal action on offenders.

Borderless pirates

Could one reason for this supposed lack of follow-up action, as it were, be that offenders are situated across the world, and hence legal action would be both an expensive and confusing proposition? After all, as Aravind points out, “Piracy is a universal issue, even though volumes may differ from region to region, depending on how strict the local laws are.”

On the other hand, Dr Chand rues, “Piracy is definitely a universal issue, as prevalent in the US markets as in India. Check out any railway platform. You will see a plethora of pirated tech products being sold! Get to any torrent or P2P sites, where you get a varied list of content posted from different parts of the world.”

These insights highlight the fact that pirates and piracy are everywhere. Even so, legal action is easier in countries where anti-piracy laws have evolved, and hence are swifter to implement. In this regard, Prasad practically opines, “Though piracy is largely a universal issue, it is more rampant in developing economies where economically, software (and other digital content) is perceived as an unnecessary expense, specially where the price of the product is high.”

Are pirates born or made?

Prasad’s statement brings into focus a vital question—is piracy driven by careless, disrespectful attitudes, or is it a result of economic compulsions?

Donde feels that piracy has not reduced because awareness has not increased the way it should have. At the same time, he segregates those patronising pirated products into three sets of people, in terms of their different attitudes towards piracy. “One set,” he says, “is genuinely unaware of the problem and its illegal nature, and hence uses pirated CDs—containing software or entertainment content. Another set consists of people who are aware of the piracy menace, yet who nevertheless get taken in. Consider a manufacturer who uses software that is partially built on pirated code as exemplifying this category. The last set of people includes those who resort to piracy because they have no choice—say an SME that would like to use genuine software but cannot afford it. So the third set faces a practical obstacle to conducting business. Even though I agree it can opt for open source software, sometimes business persons are not of a technical background, or they perceive software or IT as a mere support function to their core business; so they don’t spend too much time or energy on this problem.”

Apparently, some users’ attitude is an outcome of their economic compulsions. In fact, so long as price is a criteria driving or preventing piracy, the attitude of digital content creators and owners is also part of this ‘issue’.

Content owners, it could be said, must get real when it comes to pricing, and change their attitude too. For instance, a track that costs 1 USD cannot be priced at Rs 40 in India—that simply would not work. Pricing must be in consonance with the local market. For example, Tata Indicom is distributing tracks for Rs 6 to 7 to its broadband customers—this works well in India. As Mani puts it, “The idea is to make the content so affordable that people would rather buy it than pirate it.” Otherwise, even people who realise that piracy is wrong think twice about buying original content, and sometimes also veer towards piracy.

Innovation should be aimed at reducing prices

One could reason that if digital content owners would only siphon some of their spending on anti-piracy-ware into the technical development of cheaper products, the prices of software and content would drop as a result of technical evolution. According to Aravind, “The creation of products affordable to all would be the best solution.” He elucidates, “At present, way too many people want software for free and, in contrast, companies are not ready to cut down prices. Interestingly, both end up as losers. Those involved in piracy, either by pirating products or by using pirated products, sacrifice the security of their PCs, leaving them vulnerable to worms, viruses and other infections. On the other hand, companies are spending more time and money to protect their products from pirates. It would be better if they had spent the same money and time in making the product cheaper, and truly indispensable. A change in attitude has to be brought about, for sure, but it should be driven by the cost-effectiveness of products. This is also true in the case of emerging countries, where the US$-to-local currency ratio is high. I am not sure if there is a final solution to this problem, since educated people also indulge in it. However, its magnitude can be reduced by lowering costs.”

That educated people also indulge in piracy comes as no surprise—we may all have used some form of pirated product at some point in our lives. But do educated users have any genuine cause for complaint against the sellers of content, which drives them to accept piracy?

Digital ‘rights’ or digital ‘restrictions’?

Insofar as piracy is a function of attitude, Mani opines, “I would like to point out that users today perceive digital rights technology or management more as digital restriction technology or management. The technology that drives anti-piracy measures is still evolving, and as long as it remains in a state of flux, the users lose out by not truly availing of the digital rights they have purchased.”

For instance, if you buy music content, you would expect to be able to use it across all the players you own—perhaps a portable music player, laptop, a desktop, etc. As long as users are prevented from doing this because of certain technology restrictions (music playable on an iPod is not transferable) they tend to be less supportive of anti-piracy initiatives. They feel—‘I have been restricted from exercising my right, so why not resort to piracy now and then.’

Donde also explains how “…branding has created a demand for products across countries. When users desire a product, and it is either not locally available, or available at a price that is unaffordable, they resort to procuring its pirated version. So pricing is another major factor that needs to be addressed by content owners.”

Combat piracy via innovating licensing methods

So—we travel a full circle and come back to pricing! Even as he agrees that piracy is definitely a question of attitude, Prasad affirms that price is a barrier in curbing piracy. “Price,” he says, “could be reduced, with innovative licensing models to control the menace of piracy. Software and content development organisations should come up with innovative licensing models. These low price models, very near the cost of pirated products, will help push the adoption of licensed products by customers. Good licensing models, the option to pay per use, ‘n’ tier models, subscription and availability on mobile devices will all prove useful. The adoption of stronger protection technology, coupled with the use of protection technology in licensing, such as providing software or content for consumption at 10 per cent of the cost for a limited time period, will ensure a win-win situation for both developers and customers.”

Regarding tech innovations, Donde seconds the need for a proper licensing mechanism for solutions, as this will help change user attitudes. He cites the example of Microsoft coming up with a digital rights management solution, which was countered by a similar open source product by the Open Mobile Alliance. What this practically does is to create choice for users.

“Buy me—I’m licensed to support you”!

Eventually, such competition will drive prices further down, to the extent where users will no longer, in Prasad’s words, “…consider it worthwhile to own a pirated version. These low prices, coupled with a changing attitude towards piracy, whereby more users are keen to own authentic licensed versions of products rather than compromise on future support, upgrades, etc, is what will finally change the scenario.”

Aravind believes that customers may be encouraged to use genuine products by showing them how much they stand to lose in terms of product support and updates. He explains why cutting prices should never be an issue, as “…companies can still have back-end sales, charge for updates and support, and think up other novel ways to monetise their products. They should note that most of Google’s online services are free of cost. Here, perhaps, is a lesson for other companies—‘qualified customers are worth more than what you think’.”

Any solution will work—provided it is installed in time!

Speaking of lessons, companies must also take timely steps to ensure they are not caught off guard. Donde elucidates, “Digital rights management has its own place, as it helps meet key security objectives. Simultaneously, there are other measures intended to keep documents safe, code secure, and digital media protected. There is room for many specific solutions, and these are all useful, but sometimes people wake up only after they have suffered a loss to piracy. It is essential to bring in experts to assess the risk a company faces, not just once, but continuously at regular intervals. Sometimes, a company takes things lightly and gets caught at its weakest moment. Companies can only stay ahead of ‘pirates’ if they are actively involved in protecting their content.”

Innovate at both software and hardware levels

Simultaneously, technologists must focus on innovations both at the software and hardware levels. Hardware level protection is by now well known. For instance, companies have devised a secure music path concept, whereby digital music files are protected by virtue of analogue (player) sound cards. If people try to record a song playing via an analogue source, they will not be able to make a ‘digital’ quality recording. Other innovations happening at the hardware level are by Microsoft in Vista; they had earlier come up with the Secure Audio Path technology in XP and ME.

New formats like DTH (Direct To Home) TV involve the use of set-top boxes incorporating both software and hardware to counter piracy. If these boxes are opened, a key that was burnt into the hardware gets erased and the set-top box is rendered useless. Mani says, “This kind of software-hardware combo protective solution will succeed in limiting the access to a service or product—to those who possess hardware—as well as limit the range of services availed of—by coding the hardware according to rights paid for. Basically, companies must realise that consumers must retain the rights they pay for.”

Aravind also favours a combination of both kinds of protection. “While hardware-level protection makes the product machine-dependent, protection at the software level could be relatively easier to crack. Both have their own set of pros and cons, and striking a balance may only be a matter of time,” he says.

A multi-pronged effort

A balance could well be the way out—as Prasad explains that both hardware and software protection will co-exist due to the benefits each has to offer in varying scenarios. But holistic technological evolution must be matched by a renewed focus on awareness, to result in a permanent attitudinal change—among common people and in legislation. Donde cites the “…efforts of governments of Third World countries to enforce policies to ensure they use authorised software across departments. They are also waking up to the possibility of using open source licences. India is at the forefront of this awareness drive towards compliance, and is taking many steps in the right direction. People addressing the piracy problem must be very clear about where there is the most non-compliance. Advisory bodies could help launch ad campaigns, and suggest policy level changes such as the now reasonably comprehensive Indian IT Act,” he says.

At the end of the day, Dr Chand observes, “A mix of tech innovation and a change in attitudes, both at the user and corporate level, is what could solve piracy across the world. If technology is implemented in a user-friendly way, it is only a matter of time before piracy is eradicated.” Fair enough—at least we have something to look forward to!

The Voice of the People

In spite of all the rhetoric about containing (never mind eradicating) piracy, pirates and their wares abound. Why? Are the technological innovations coming out of small and large IT stables not useful, or lacking in genuine deterrents? Or are the masses just adamant about supporting piracy, for whatever reasons? On behalf of ‘i.t.’, Charu Bahri spoke to a few well-placed experts and consultants for their opinion on what would be the best approach to abolish piracy.

Is the piracy menace getting better or worse, and why?

“Most of China runs on pirated software, and there is little that the affected companies can do about it. Even Internet operating systems used in networking gear by companies like Cisco seem to have been pirated by Chinese companies providing similar equipment at a fraction of the cost. At the same time, software like Windows has evolved to make piracy difficult, if not impossible. Overall, piracy as an issue is moving to a different zone, with control and action shifting from regulatory machinery to the market participants themselves.”

– Sanjay Negi

“Yes! It is getting worse, with disruptive and storage technologies becoming cheaper and new technologies arriving on the scene. A few examples…

• People can send content, images and software easily on Bluetooth, IR (Infrared), Wi-Fi or Zigbee without realising the copyright violation.
• Technologies like DRM (Digital Rights Management) are creating more opportunities for hackers and underground sites, which increase traffic to their sites by hosting cracks, patches for breaking DRM codes.
• New technologies like wireless-USB (Universal Serial Bus)/UWB (ultra-wide band) and WiMAX will allow people to transmit gigabits of audio, video and other information in a jiffy to an innocent and honest user.
• Falling prices of storage technologies—SD (Secure Digital), MicroSD, etc allow people to store, carry and transmit large amounts of data and trade information.”

– Gurudev Goud

“I would like to point out that software piracy has always been one of the foundations of India’s IT success, especially amongst the small and medium enterprises. In fact, I am aware of companies of even 500 employees or nodes in the late nineties who maintained a 10 per cent licensing policy—for every 100 usage nodes, ten licences were the norm. Though there was at least a single licence of every software in use, under-licensing has always been the norm. I am sure that has changed for every company listed on NASDAQ, due to the appropriate declarations required by US legislation. I still believe that the norm may have been increased for other companies, but we are still a long way from adopting the ‘full licensing’ paradigm.

From a financial perspective, I am personally sure that full licensing, if adopted by any small and medium (less than Rs100 crores of turnover) technology enterprise will push its cost structures beyond competitive sustenance. And, as such, will serve to maintain the hegemony of the large and multinational software companies. If I want to buy twenty licences, I am likely to pay a price that is more than ten times the price per licence paid by an MNC with 250 or 1000 licences. If they will get the benefit of volume pricing, I, as an entrepreneur, am forced to take recourse to piracy to remain competitive.

Software piracy is not only about the rights of the vendor but also about the compulsions of the buyer.”

Interview of Anant Koppar

Anant Koppar, CEO KTwo Technology Solutions

Written by Dheeraj

COMPANY PROFILE: As software development increasingly dominates the engineering process in consumer and industrial products the primary challenge today is developing high-quality, reliable software to embed in these products. KTwo Technology Solutions is a products company driven by a winning top team of professionals who possess experience and knowledge in rolling out innovative new products in international markets. Operating on a well defined agenda KTwo harnesses the potential of Indian and Global talent pool to build and deliver world-class products tailored to varied budgets in a global market. The key objective of the company is to build and consolidate products to create solutions that align high utility with value for the TCO. KTwo’s basket of products offers a point solution in itself or a combined bundle as a larger point solution. We also focus on building industry frameworks to serve as a basis for vertical solutions in niche industry segments. Headed by Anant Koppar a visionary technology leader, KTwo is driven by a team of technologists and domain experts with extensive experience in rolling out new products in the market. CEO PROFILE: Mr. Anant R Koppar who is from a rural part of Karnataka has made a name across the globe in the field of Information Technology. Hailing from Gadag, Northern part of Karnataka, he is one of the success stories and a role model for people coming from rural middle class backgrounds for corporate success. With a Master's Degree in Computer Engineering from IIT Kharagpur, he started his career in Wipro. He also had a brief stint as a lecturer in an engineering college. He further went on to be a part of the teams that set up Tata Elxsi and BFL Software now known as MphasiS BFL Limited. He founded Kshema Technologies in 1997 and grew it to large niche technology services provider in 6 years. Kshema has the distinction of being a pioneer in the software services industry to cater to Industrial Automation, Healthcare, Life Sciences and Mobile Telephony Industries. Kshema merged with MphasiS in 2004. A certified "Project Management Professional" by Project Management Institute, he was the first CEO in India to get this certification. He was awarded the "Entrepreneur of the District" distinction by the Gadag District Chamber of Commerce in the year 2000. He was also recognized as "Entrepreneur Extraordinaire" at the Asian Conference for Young Entrepreneurs in 1999. He is also an immediate past President of Bangalore Chamber of Industry and Commerce and past President of PMI Bangalore Chapter. Presently Anant lives in Bangalore. CEO Under Scan: Mr. Anant Koppar, CEO KTwo Technology Solutions Telephonic Interview by: Mr. Dheeraj, Facilitator and Founder, The CEO Insights Before starting this venture what all business ideas you had? Before this I had been working with services companies only. I started my career in Wipro then two startups. All of them included me working in services area (technology Services). But I actually wanted to do something new, then I thought it should be different from the services part. It should be to deal with way we needed to grow so I thought let me give a shot to it and work towards product building. But here we had to ensure that it is a niche area so we took Last Meter Connectivity. You are from an IIT- Kharagpur? How is it helping you in this venture? Yeah, it definitely helps, but it doesn’t mean that you have to have an education from IIT or its likes to be successful. They develop the thought process of the students which helps them learn beyond the books. In IITs the way the curriculum is administered is very much different from other colleges, and I think that now some the colleges do imitate the kind of system IITs are having. Your tag line says “last meter connectivity”. Please tell us something about this. See Last Meter Connectivity is to do with connecting the last points of inputs to the enterprise. We believe that there has been a significant change the way we work. It basically provides secure, reliable, high quality short range information transfer by means of wireless communication enabling substantial improvements in productivity and convenience. Like for e.g. earlier there used to be a clinic, now you have different kind of devices by which you can check many a things at home. So now it is more distributed, like if you have a blood pressure meter, you take reading from that but you can’t save the readings except in the machine where you have 2/3 last readings. But when you see a physician, he may require a trend of say last 50 readings. Hence there lies a gap. So if I am able to connect do to the connective where I connect the blood pressure meter to a PC through some technology, the problem can be solved. In nut shell, this is a concept of providing information anywhere at anytime in any device. How do you see urself as an entrepreneur? As I said, I had been an entrepreneur from 1993; this way I have been very comfortable with working for my own rather than working for someone else. This makes me my own boss, I can take decisions. We also have a team which helps us in doing that. I mean, it has been a wonderful experience. Please tell us about your Vision and Mission? Our vision is simply enhancing the quality of life by building world class products and solutions through innovative application of technology. Our Mission is: · To be a globally dominant product Brand in the industry and segments of our choice by 2012 · Be a dream destination for every innovator to unleash their creativity by fostering a world class environment · Be a predominantly Employee Owned Organization What are your organizational values? · Highest Order of Ethical Business Practices · Value Based Mutually Beneficial Relationship with all Stakeholders · Recognition of Individual Brilliance within the context of Team – play · Freedom to Innovate · Tolerance for Failure - Concept of "Fast Fail" Who are your major competitors? There are competitors in the components we use, but company wise we do not have any competitor. I have read that your business reached its breakeven in the very first year; so how is it performing now. Any comment on your operational efficiency. We have grown well in this year. We have around 250+ people working for us. This year also we would reach our breakeven irrespective of high expenditure on Research and Development. And I think we have good operational efficiency and I think this is how we have been able to reach our breakeven. What are your future plans? How do you see your company evolving in the next five years? We should be good name to be reckoned with. We would like to be one of India’s foremost product companies. We would be definitely achieving our financial goals. And if we achieve a right size in the coming two to three years and market performs good then we may think to come up with an IPO. Please comment on the strategies your company is adopting to capture a higher market share amidst stiff competition? See there is a lot of anticipated competition, whatever you do there is someone else who wants to do the same thing. One of the strategies is how we can provide our products in a niche area and try to focus ad develop expertise in that area so that we have a competitive advantage on our competitor. I think to become successful, this is very important. Are you considering any strategic alliance or other measures to augment your market reach or business capabilities? Actually we do have Strategic alliances, for e.g. we have alliances with our hardware manufacturers and hospital management companies. We need to have these kinds of alliances to grow. More or less we are self funded, but later in future we may look for some venture capitalists to get funding. How do you react to his present economic downturn? This year till now it is now affecting But definitely there is a slow down. There will be issues with getting new orders, but this is part and parcel of the business, we need to make our strategies keeping this in mind. Any comment on the recent Mumbai Episode? What should govt. do? It is a sad event; I blame the entire community for taking it lightly. Many times we tend to adjust ourselves to things like this. But I think we need to take some stringent actions. Government should also have taken stricter steps.

Rural Tele-Pathology On YouTube

Hi Friend & KTwo Well Wisher,

I am pleased to send you the KTwo product “CytoSight” featured by Intel.

KTwo’s CytoSight a Telepathology Solution helps in making a difference and improving peoples life. This product is powered by Intel.

Do check the link below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssp4cJyfOEU

Warm Regards,

Guru
-----------------------------------
Gurudev.R.Goud
Vice President-Business Development
KTwo Technology Solutions-“Last Metre Connectivity™ Solutions Company”
North Block, 1st Floor, Rajajinagar IT Park, Bangalore-560 044, India.
(+91)(80) 2314 4422 X 120|US-TollFree (+1) 866 248 9040|(+91)98866 93 861| |SkPe:ggurudev|(+91)(80) 2314 4411|guru@ktwo.co.in|www.ktwo.co.in |Logon to www.ksmart.co.in - the premier online software shopping mart from KTwo

KTwo unveils low cost Tele-Diagnostics Device Devices built on high performance Intel Embedded Platform

CytoSight and TomoSight are easy to use and can be operated with minimal training. They are Human Engineered for good user experience on any internet connection. As they are developed on the Intel Embedded Technology, it gives the added benefit of high performance, low power, wide acceptance, easy serviceability and very low total cost of ownership for the cost conscious rural market.

(I-Newswire) - Bangalore, India – October 15 2008 - KTwo Technology Solutions, a 200 plus people Bangalore based company and an Intel India Design house vendor unveiled its Healthcare device targeted at rural and urban markets. The device is built on an Intel Embedded platform and runs innovative applications for tele-pathology “CytoSight” and tele-radiology “TomoSight”. Pathology and Radiology laboratories play a very vital role in the healthcare industry. However, setting up a lab is an expensive proposition and so labs are far fewer in number than needed in a developing country such as ours. CytoSight: The common practice today is that most of pathology labs in India merely act as ‘collection centers’ of samples which are dispatched to a nearby ‘reference lab’ which is supported by a Pathologist. Inadequate infrastructure for such collaboration between centers leads to reduced lab efficiency. KTwo’s CytoSight addresses this problem; CytoSight’s innovative imaging algorithm captures impressions of the pathology sample from the microscope and makes it available to the pathologist/physician situated in the remote and urban areas. This enables Specialist Pathology expertise available to rural/remote populations. TomoSight: Shortage of radiologists and inadequate infrastructure for collaboration between radiologist and the rural as well as urban hospitals has resulted in delayed diagnosis of radiology scans. KTwo’s TomoSight addresses this problem and makes the pre-captured x-Ray/CT/MR images available to the radiologist anywhere and anytime; TomoSight further enables the radiologist to give expert opinion instantaneously enabling Specialist Radiology expertise available to any remote location. Anant Koppar President and CEO of KTwo Technology Solutions said that “CytoSight and TomoSight” will help the small, medium and large hospital chains to extend their pathology and radiology services to cover a wider rural market and hence rural India will benefit from quality and specialist healthcare expertise now available only in Metros and big cities’’ CytoSight and TomoSight are easy to use and can be operated with minimal training. They are Human Engineered for good user experience on any internet connection. As they are developed on the Intel Embedded Technology, it gives the added benefit of high performance, low power, wide acceptance, easy serviceability and very low total cost of ownership for the cost conscious rural market. “With excellent support and mindshare from the Intel Embedded Group in Bangalore, KTwo plans to roll out more innovative products on the Intel Embedded Platform for the growing healthcare rural and urban market on India” said Mr. Koppar. “With the launch of our India Design House program last year, we are enabling Indian design houses to play an increasingly active role in platform definition and design for customers worldwide,” said Sanat Rao, Marketing Director ( Emerging Markets ), Embedded and Communications Group, Intel South Asia. “KTwo was one such design company which signed up for this program. The collaboration between the two companies sees KTwo offering a unique design and Intel providing hardware and software support, technical consultation, training and co-marketing with KTwo. This is a great example of Intel architecture powering new applications.” About KTwo Headed by Anant Koppar, KTwo Technology Solutions builds Last Metre Connectivity products and solutions. KTwo was started with its key objective to improve the quality by applying innovation. Currently 200 people strong and growing, KTwo develops innovative healthcare solutions for the growing rural markets in Asia and its customers include a leading international hospital chain spread across Asia. # # # # # # # KTwo Contact Gurudev.R.Goud Vice President-Business Development KTwo Technology Solutions-“Last Metre Connectivity™ Solutions Company” North Block, 1st Floor, Rajajinagar IT Park, Bangalore-560 044, India. ( +91 )( 80 ) 2314 4422 X 120 US-Toll Free ( +1 ) 866 248 9040|( +91 )98866 93 861| |SkPe: ggurudev|( +91 )( 80 ) 2314 4411 guru@ktwo.co.in|www.ktwo.co.in Press Contact: Shubhendu Nath CHANGE AGENTS PR +91.80.41603144, +91.9901992978 shubhendu.nath@changeagents.in

HIV related-Utthana Charitable Trust launches special program for Orphaned and Vulnerable Children

Utthana Charitable Trust launches special program for Orphaned and Vulnerable Children (HIV related)

Care and Support for OVC (Orphaned and Vulnerable Children), Bagalkot District, Karnataka

Bangalore, India — October 30, 2008 — Utthana Charitable Trust, the brainchild of Mr & Mrs. Anant R Koppar and dedicated to improving the lives of underprivileged children, and Karnataka Health Promotion Trust (KHPT) have come together and announced their tie-up as well as launch of a special childcare program ‘Care and Support for OVC (Orphaned and Vulnerable Children), Bagalkot District, Karnataka’.

Care and Support for OVC program emphasizes on encouraging extended families, relatives and communities to provide care for orphans, nutritional support, health support, education support and support for OVC.

Nutritional support will be extended to families that are in dire need of basic and immediate support. Health support seeks to ensure that all requirement of children in particular the ongoing support to the various health needs including provision of prophylactic & OI medication is met. Educational support aims to support educational needs of children keeping in view the reality that most PLHIV families find it hard to sustain the diverse needs of the family given their poor state of health and regular absence from work.

The Utthana Charitable Trust is supported by an impressive number of patrons from the IT industry and is taken forward by a highly committed, voluntary team from within KTwo. KTwo Technology Solutions Pvt Ltd, Bangalore supports Utthana in all its charitable activities as a part of its Corporate Social Responsibility. Through the generosity of contributors the trust has been able to provide needy children with a variety of programs and services to meet their basic needs, enhance their human dignity and raise their physical and educational levels in a meaningful, way. Utthana Charitable Trust, which has grown in a short span of time has succeeded in touching the lives of many young people, many of whom are trapped in the vicious cycle of poverty and social marginalization.

“We will have focus on empowering or supporting single parent households. The support will be to the single parents (due to HIV) to provide comprehensive care to their children (infected and affected),” said Mr Anant Koppar. “Child specific activities will be conducted with the use of special tools to assess psychomotor development of infected and affected children.”

Karnataka Health Promotion Trust (KHPT) is a partnership between the Karnataka State AIDS Prevention Society (KSAPS) and the University of Manitoba, Canada. KHPT’s objectives are to support activities in the areas of reproductive health and HIV and AIDS, and to support activities and projects that will lead to the enhanced health and well being of individuals and communities in India.

Dr.Stephen Moses, Managing Trustee, Karnataka Health Promotion Trust, observed “with a background of India being third largest HIV infected country in the world and about 4-5 million children with HIV positive parents, we are very grateful to the Utthana Charitable Trust for supporting this extremely important care and support initiative for vulnerable children in Bagalkot District", and added “we hope that this will be the beginning of a long and productive collaboration with Utthana, which will provide much needed assistance to children and others who are in need in Karnataka

The proposed project will extend the support for the children for - Education ( 350 Children), Medical (450 Children) and Travel (106 children) components for a period of One year.

Did we know and realize that out of every 100 disadvantaged children:

• 1 dies before birth.
• Another does not live to see its first birthday.
• 6 - 7 die when they are between 1 and 5 years old.
• And only 15 - 20 grow to their full potential.
• 63% of all Indian children between 1 and 4 years are malnourished to some degree.
• Only 50% of the children in the age group 6 - 14 have access to primary education.
• At least 4000 infant girls are killed every year in India.
• Over 6.5 lakh children die every year from disease, with around 2000 babies dying per year.

About Utthana Charitable Trust

The Utthana Charitable Trust, dedicated to improving the lives of children living in dire poverty, was initiated by Anant R Koppar, CEO, KTwo Technology Solutions. Utthana's objective is to help free young children from poverty and abuse.

Our purpose is also to the help the other weaker sections of society, and pitch in wherever we can to help the underprivileged live better. To carry our work forward we have identified fund-raising activities that would make the organization meaningful. For more information on this specific project, please visit Utthana website: http://www.utthana.com/

About KHPT

Karnataka Health Promotion Trust established in 2003 as a partnership between the Karnataka State AIDS Prevention Society (KSAPS) and the University of Manitoba, Canada to deliver HIV-and AIDS-related Prevention, Care/support programmes and services. KSAPS is the government body implementing the National AIDS Control Organization’s (NACO) National AIDS Control Programme in Karnataka.

SAMASTHA- integrated HIV and AIDS Prevention and Care in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh is funded by United States Agency for International Development ( USAID).

University of Manitoba(UOM) is the Prime recipient for SAMASTHA Project and KHPT is its lead implementation partner in India. Website: http://www.khpt.org/

Contact Person for KHPT- Miss. Mallika Biddappa, Ph: 9341032266.

KTwo Contact

Gurudev.R.Goud

Vice President-Marketing and Business Development

KTwo Technology Solutions-“Last Metre Connectivity™ Solutions Company”

North Block, 1st Floor, Rajajinagar IT Park, Bangalore-560 044, India. (+91)(80) 2314 4422 X 120

US-Toll Free (+1) 866 248 9040|(+91)98866 93 861| |SkPe: ggurudev|(+91)(80) 2314 4411 guru@ktwo.co.in|www.ktwo.co.in

Press contact:

Shubhendu Nath

CHANGE AGENTS PR

+91.80.41603144, +91.9901992978

shubhendu.nath@changeagents.in