Wings Infonet on expansion drive

Hyderabad-based Wings Infonet Limited, a provider of accounting and business management software solutions, plans to significantly enlarge its small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) market by strengthening the distribution network worldwide.

As part of this, the 15-year-old company would ramp up its headcount by 100 in the next one year to support its distribution network, on-going sales and related activities globally.

"The company currently has its branches in 25 cities in India and abroad, besides a 100-strong distributor and reseller network. We plan to expand our distribution chain to around 300 in the next one to one-and-a-half years. Our headcount will also correspondently grow from the present 160 to 260," Ajay Gandhi, director, Wings Infonet, told Business Standard.

The expansion plan is aimed at complementing the company's recently launched Wings e-Biz "� a seamlessly integrated suite of business software products. The privately-held firm will rely on internal sources to fund the expansion, he added.

e-Biz, which was launched in September this year, has been designed primarily for SMBs. The suite includes products for industry verticals like accounting, inventory, payroll, fixed assets, automobile, and food and beverages.

e-Biz products work in all world languages, enabling users to seamlessly change from one to another. It is also multicurrency-enabled with the ability to encrypt data. Each deployment typically costs between Rs 1 Lakh and Rs 5 Lakh.

Stating that technology adoption trends among SMBs are on the rise since the last 10 years, he said office automation products and solutions have become an integral part of SMBs to remain competitive and gain positive return on investment.

"We have been witnessing a huge traction for our new suite of products and have added 100 new customers since September. We expect to see 1,000 installations in the next one year," Gandhi said.

A study by New York-based AMI-Partners states that SMBs across the Indian sub-continent are set to spend $7.7 billion to beef up their IT infrastructure and solutions this year. There are over nine billion SMBs in India with an average spend of Rs 30 lakh, which is 0.21 per cent of their revenues. Globally, the IT spend is $150 billion.

Wings' products have over 50,000 users worldwide including Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, ITC Limited, Titan Industries and British American Tobacco.