Silverline Technologies Bright Silver Lining

The company, after taking complete
stake in its US-based arm Silverline Technologies, went for a change of name
from Silverline Industries to Silverline Technologies. And by getting listed at
the New York Stock Exchange, it made forays into the US market. The turnover of
the company went up 77% over the previous year. It clocked Rs 195 crore in the
last fiscal as opposed to Rs 110 crore in 1998-99.

The interesting factor is that
Silverline’s operating margin fell from 49% in the fiscal 1998-99 to 41% in
1999-00. The fall in the operating margin has been attributed to the rising
salaries and the company’s inability to renegotiate rates with clients due to
long-term obligations with them, among others factors. All this did not augur
well for the company, though it managed to increase its software exports by 84%.
Software exports contributed 98% to the total turnover by clocking Rs 191 crore
as compared to Rs 104 crore in the previous year, while the rest came from the
domestic market. However, the domestic market showed a sharp decline of 33% in
the last fiscal when compared to the previous year.

In the domestic segment, training made
up 60% of the revenue. Services contributed 28%, while the small office home
office segment contributed 12% to the total domestic kitty. On the exports
front, the US continued to bring in rich dividends–almost 89%–while the rest
was accounted for by the Asia-Pacific region. But Silverline was not able to
make any impact on the European market, despite having opened up marketing
offices in that region.

The onsite to offshore mix of revenues stood at 66% to
34%. The company’s productivity per person also increased to Rs 15 lakh.
However, the company has to invest in branding and move away from the low-cost
model approach, if it has to make a mark on the global arena. DQ

Fact Sheet

START-UP YEAR: 1992 PRODUCTS AND SERVICES: Ebusiness,
CRM, client server applications, mainframe-based development, web-based
application development, legacy transformation systems TECHNICAL COLLABORATION:
IBM, Oracle, Seibel, SEEC EMPLOYEES: 1,333 BRANCH OFFICES: 11 DEALER OUTLETS: 5
ADDRESS: Unit 121, SDF IV, SEEPZ, Andheri (E), Mumbai 400 096 TEL: 829 1950, 829
0322 FAX: 829 0199 WEBSITE: www.silverline.com