Established in 2007, iYogi is a global provider of software and technical support services to small and medium enterprise business (SMBs), original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and operators.

In an interview with tele.net.in, Vishal Dhar, co-founder and president, marketing, iYogi, talks about the business opportunities in India, challenges in the market and future trends.

Excerpts…

What are the business opportunities offered by the Indian market?

India offers encouraging business opportunities to technology providers as the country is ranked fifth globally in terms of the number of PCs in use and is the second largest telecom market in the world. However, even with the rapid adoption of technology, the service industry for supporting telecom and IT industry is highly underserved in the country. Currently, the technology support market in India is highly fragmented. None of the players in the industry have holistic offerings to address the requirements of the small and medium enterprise business (SMB).

What are going to be the company’s focus areas in 2013-2014?

The company is focused on providing customised solutions to SMBs, the self-employed entrepreneur and digital home users. iYogi expects 10 per cent of its global revenue in 2013-14 to come from India and going forward India  will continue to be the fastest growing market for the company.  To tap business opportunities offered by SMB segment, the organisation is providing them customised and specialised services, extending beyond the traditional annual maintenance contracts. iYogi is addressing clients’ varied technology requirements through the company’s annual unlimited subscription plan. The plan is a single point solution to support and extend technology support and assistance to customers. Further, the company has extended its digital service cloud platform to original equipment manufacturers (oems), service providers, technology retailers and business processing outsourcing companies (bpos). the digital service cloud has the potential to help organisations generate operating income between $15 and $20 for every customer interaction undertaken by them.

In addition, the company is also diversifying its portfolio to provide digital marketing solutions to SMBs. Under iYogi’s nonstop marketing services business, the company will support SMBs create, manage and optimise online advertising campaigns in a cost-effective manner. Going forward, iYogi plans to double its headcount from 5,000 to 10,000 over the next three years and increase its footprint in Europe, Latin America and Asia-Pacific markets.

What are iYogi’s key offerings in the Indian market?

iYogi offers one-stop, on-demand service support for a wide range of technology products such as smartphones, tablets, laptops, traditional desktops, personal music players, printers, scanners smart TVs for consumers and SMBs. The company offers support for over 500 software applications, hardware devices and peripherals. iYogi provides comprehensive remote and on-site technical support for different computing devices and software to SMB segments through the organisation’s digital services cloud platform. with each customer interaction, the platform gets smarter – it documents each problem, solution and relevant hardware and software specs while capturing customer’s demographic information creating a behavioral profile.

The organisation also offers digital service cloud, as a hosted solution, to contact centres operated by OEMs and operators. The digital service cloud helps clients enhance customer resolution metrics through comprehensive support automation, superior customer engagement, knowledge management, and generating new service revenues.

How is cloud computing going to change the landscape of communications industry?

Cloud computing offers multiple benefits to large operators who have IT assets and network capabilities in place. For such players, it becomes easier to increase efficiency and reduce their operating costs by undertaking IT optimisation. Cloud computing also offers benefits to smaller service providers who can get customised cloud applications for addressing their specific business needs. In addition, cloud can help communications industry to restructure their business and operating model so that the employees can work out of different locations which could be closer to customers and suppliers.

What are the challenges facing the Indian service providers?

With customers having multiple choices in the marketplace, service providers face several challenges such as low revenues and increasing costs. In a highly competitive market, customer retention is a major concern amongst operators.

What are the trends that you foresee in the Indian telecom market?

The Indian telecom industry is expected to witness a lot of development in areas such as roaming, long term evolution (LTE), and cloud coverage for the enterprise market, mobile number portability and tariffs. Going forward, the country is expected to witness 4G network roll-outs. Players such as Reliance Jio Infocomm and Videocon Communications Limited are gearing up to launch 4G services. These roll-outs will bring in huge investment in telecom infrastructure industry, thereby driving the growth in the telecom sector.

Another prominent phenomenon is the increasing adoption of smartphones, which will be a key driver of e-commerce business in the country. In addition, leading telecom players could be seen reinventing their operating models with acquisitions, and change in retail and distribution network.