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Spotlight
CMS: still going strong
From 1976 to 2005, the company has spread its reach across
domains while focussing largely on the domestic market, finds Shivani Shinde.
When three ex-IBM employees came together to form a company in 1976, little
did they know that the company they started as a network integration and infrastructure
management provider would grow into one of the top solution providers in India.
CMS topped the IDC Report 2004 when it came to CIO satisfaction.
The company’s revenues have crossed Rs 500 crore, with clientele across
BFSI, telecom, traffic, government, retail, health, corporates and education.
Recently, the company consolidated its various services under four main heads—IT
infrastructure services (servers, network equipment, workstations), IT services
(maintenance, facilities management, software services applications), IT-enabled
services (printing cards, cash management, e-governance) and IT-related services
(traffic, energy, security systems, training). Company sources disclose that
the growth rate of each of these verticals has been around 20 percent.
Spreading its wings
The company has grown to over 9,000-plus professionals across the globe and
250 locations across the country. It is present in major economies such as the
US and the APAC nations, and has offices in Australia, Singapore, Japan, Netherlands,
Britain and the UAE.
According to R D Grover, Chairman & Managing Director, CMS, “The businesses
in the group have evolved due to the spirit of responsiveness on the part of
CMS, and recognising a need or bottleneck at the customer site.” He says
that some of these strategic business units have grown to provide services such
as IT consulting, networking solutions, and facility management services.
| Revenues |
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Year
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Sales revenue
(in Rs crore)
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2004-2005
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547
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2003-2004
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480
|
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2002-2003
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381
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One of the factors that helped CMS reach its present position was that it
was one of the few companies (such as HCL, TCS and Wipro Infotech) that focussed
on the domestic market.
An instance of its success is Systime Computer Systems. Systime, a wholly-owned
subsidiary of CMS, has about 5,500 employees and 30 offices worldwide. Today,
Systime is the preferred business partner of JD Edwards and Cognos in India.
CMS provides security solutions through its other subsidiary DITL, the leader
in access control and CCTV systems technology solutions. The company specialises
in onsite and offshore software development, software export, facilities management,
conversion, re-engineering and consulting. Today, Systime provides IT services
for collaborative commerce solutions including ERP, CRM and SCM. Its alliances
with numerous e-collaboration partners (such as PeopleSoft, Ariba, BEA and WebMethods)
enable it to deliver solutions that span technologies, platforms and business
processes.
| Parking system at Inorbit Mall (Mumbai) |
| Recently, CMS deployed a state-of-the-art parking lot management system
at the Inorbit Mall in suburban Mumbai. The system provides independent
control of entry lanes in a multi-lane traffic circulation environment.
This is how it works. Every incoming vehicle is
sensed by an inductive arming loop and the system gets activated. The
operator validates the vehicle by entering the vehicle registration number
and collects parking charges. Then the barrier opens and the vehicle is
allowed to enter the parking lot. The system allows the service provider
to implement a flexible tariff plan to maximise revenue collection. The
system can also be linked with several customer loyalty programmes and
discount options to allow the mall operator to retain customers even while
maxing revenue. At the exit, there is an exit loop to sense the vehicle
passage, and the lane barrier is activated to allow the vehicle to exit
the parking lot. Other features include initiating SMS alerts to parking
authorities in case the parking lot is full.
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Moving into new areas
Of late, CMS has started positioning itself more as a systems integrator than
a networking provider. Printing solutions seems to be the first catalyst to
this systems integration thrust; CMS has tied up with Hyderabad-based Fortune
Informatics that will provide it with output management solutions.
Says Grover, “Our end-to-end printing solution offerings include vendor
management, print design and layout, printing, stuffing and finally mailing.
We have expertise in variable data printing, and have carved out the largest
marketshare in the telecom billing, credit card and insurance sectors.”
In the last few months, CMS has set up three proof-of-concept centres for printing
solutions in Delhi, Chennai and Navi Mumbai. Currently, it prints over 12 million
statements per month and has more than 60 clients.
The solutions have even crossed Indian shores. CMS does printing for American
Express in Sydney from its Gurgaon facility.
Storage solutions is another area of growth for
CMS. For other storage management solutions, the company has tie-ups
with Legato and Veritas.
The company’s alliances with storage vendors such as StorageTek, Veritas,
Backbone, Brocade, Hitachi and NetApp give it the leverage to address a client’s
storage needs with comprehensive solutions. Its storage clients include VSNL,
Morgan Stanley and Philips.
While printing and storage are new ventures with a lot of potential, Grover’s
passion is for smart card-based solutions where CMS has been a pioneer. “99
percent of credit / debit cards in India are produced on systems provided by
CMS card technology and outsourcing services,” Grover declares.
Being a master distributor of the DataCard Group in India, CMS provides outsourcing
facilities for personalisation of plastic cards with Magstripe encoding, embossing,
photos, text, barcodes, biometrics and signatures. The CMS manufacturing plant
at Pune can generate about 20,000 automated plastic cards a day.
Acquisitions have also played an important role in the areas
of ERP / business intelligence and security. CMS is the only company
in India to implement face recognition-based access control systems.
The company has three R&D centres at Mumbai, Pune and Thiruvananthapuram.
It also has software development centres at Chennai, Mumbai and
Pune.
Niche presence reloaded
Breaking ground isn’t new to this organisation, hence
its presence in e-governance hasn’t surprised many. “We have successfully
implemented the eSeva project in Hyderabad. The government’s objective
was to offer good governance and improve the efficiency and speed of a variety
of its public service offerings,” explains Grover.
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We have expertise in variable data printing, and have
carved out the largest marketshare in the telecom billing, credit card
and insurance sectors
R D Grover
Chairman & Managing Director
CMS
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Another area where CMS has been able to find a niche is the
traffic management and control segment. CMS Traffic Systems started in 1989
as a division and is now a full-fledged company. The idea behind the initiative
was the need for applications to assess real-time situations of traffic flow.
The emergency telephone system on the Mumbai-Pune Express Highway has been installed
by the company.
CMS has also installed Vehicle Actuated Systems in New Delhi, Surat, Ahmedabad,
Jaipur, Pune, Panvel, Bangalore and Navi Mumbai.
Cash management is yet another of the company’s successful initiatives.
CMS Securitas is a service provider that focusses on cash management. The offerings
include ATM cash replenishment & deposit processing, cash delivery &
pick up, cheque pick up, draft delivery, cash processing, and currency &
bullion transportation.
Strong foundations
System integration continues to be the company’s strongest vertical. According
to analysts, almost 60 percent of the company’s revenues come from the
domestic market.
CMS has also ventured successfully into education. It has over 50 training facilities
spread across 9 states and 21 cities in India. Its courses have won it recognition
from Red Hat as Red Hat Training Partner, Novell as its Education Academic Partner,
and Microsoft as Microsoft-certified partner.
Looking ahead
The company is celebrating 30 years of operations this year. States Grover,
“Our objective is to emerge as a one-stop solutions provider offering a
wide spectrum of services with excellent project management skills that translate
into customer satisfaction.”
With IT companies having shifted focus to the domestic market and realising
that there is a vast segment to cater to right here at home, CMS needs to keep
an eye on fleet-footed rivals which are eyeing this space. Analysts reckon that
CMS can probably maintain a 17-20 percent growth rate, but Grover is confident
of surpassing it. With its expertise and know-how, CMS certainly seems to be
having the upper hand.
shivani@expresscomputeronline.com
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