Impact eyes domestic digitisation market

The niche player is looking at tapping the domestic industry

Impact Systems, a niche player with a strong focus on content management within the pharmaceuticals industry, is looking at tapping the domestic industry, says Dhananjay Datar, chief executive officer, Impact Systems Pvt Ltd.

With 80 per cent of its revenues coming from exports and 20 per cent from domestic customers, the company is targeting the government, e-learning and distance-learning markets, besides the banking, finance and pharmaceuticals sectors in India.

"The domestic market is picking up over the last 6 to 12 months and will see increased momentum over the next 2 years," adds Datar.

The reason for this increased momentum is the opening up of the markets, regulatory compliances and the enforcement of the Right to Information Act, he elaborated.

Working with clients like Pfizer, Wyeth and Bayer globally, the company is partnering with Zensar Technologies in India on a long-term basis for capturing the pharma industry.

"This is a strategic partnership with Zensar, where Zensar will offer the consulting engagements with support from us for their clients," said Datar.

Noting that Impact's role as a specialist would be beneficial for larger companies looking at tapping the pharmecuticals vertical, Datar said, adding, "We know our limitations and would thus look at partnering with bigger companies where our expertise can be employed to tap the market. We expect alliances to contribute to 25 per cent of our growth in the coming year as compared to 5 to 10 per cent in the past."

The company is the sole distributor of the digital pen and paper technology in the country and has already got a big break with Mumbai police getting ready to implement its technology as a pilot project by October.

"The science and technology ministry has commissioned us to digitise six police stations in Mumbai. In the first phase, police stations in DB Marg, Colaba and Nagpada will be implementing this system. We have created three digital paper forms for FIR, arrest and crime and this pilot project will be rolled out in October," said Datar, while adding that the company had received a go-ahead for six police stations and six forms from the ministry.

Once rolled out, this system will allow for capturing of data, indexing, searching and archiving of crime records with the use of key words. "Once archived, the entire digital forms matching the search criteria can be accessed," said Datar, who is also developing the software for digital forms.

Datar is optimistic of the government, health and insurance industry in India also being a huge market for the digital pen and paper technology, which allows for capturing of information at the point of origin.

"We are in talks with a few government and private hospitals for adopting this technology," said Datar, adding that capturing data of medical patients would become a prerequisite driven by the insurance industry and the government.