The Hindu Business Line,  August 9, 2006

Servion close to sealing deal to fund expansion. To foray into south east Asia, China.

Chennai, August 8, 2006 - Servion Global Solutions is to raise about $ 5 million (Rs. 25 Crore) for its expansion plans. It will finalize a deal in the next few days, according to Mr. G. Shankaran Nair, President, Corporate Strategy, Servion Global.

Servion Global Solutions, the Chennai-based company that develops software solutions for the customer interatction management (CIM) industry, including contact centres, is to raise about $ 5 million (Rs 25 Crore) for its expansion plans.

“We will finalize a deal in the next few days,” said Mr. G. Shankaran Nair, President, Corporate Strategy, Servion Global Solutions.

Growth Plans
Servion's promoters last year bought back 37 per cent of the stake in the company from Citicorp to increase their share holding to nearly 90 per cent – the rest is held by employees and Templeton. The promoters would give away some of their stake to bring in private investment, he told Business Line.

The expansion plan includes entering new places, including Korea and Indonesia through partnerships, and Malaysia on its own. The company is also exploring an entry into China and Japan, though nothing has been finalized, he said. Servion would increase its staff strength to 420 by March 2007 from the present 380, he added.

Mr. Nair said the company reported revenue of Rs. 80 crore for fiscal ending March 2006 and hopes for a 40 per cent growth this fiscal. He pointed out that the September 11 attack on the US had a severe effect on the company’s performance.

The company restructured its business focus and concentrated on various geographies instead of each industry. “In the last year-and-a-half we have recovered fast and are now in a growth mode,"  he added.

Services Provided
Globally the CIM market, which includes automatic call distribution (ACD), is about $ 4 billion and the Indian market is about $ 250 million. Except ACD, Servion offers solutions that encompass multi-media contact centres, computer telephony integration, self-service channels like interactive voice recognition system, speech recognition, and outbound interactions in dialers and multi-media notifications. Through Avaya GlobalConnect, Servion offers ACD solution, he said.

Using its Contact Optimisation solutions, Servion helps its clients analyze customer interaction strategy, offers suggestions, and where required, a corrective course of action.

For instance, in a green field consulting assignment, the company begins by analyzing and understanding the organizations' business, its interactions with customers and its requirements.

Based on the findings, Servion helps organisations build their contact centres as per the need. The consulting assignment includes designing the operating support and business support systems, technology and operating parameters for the centre, he said.