Rolta plans to expand

The company is building two new facilities in Mumbai and is plan-ning to hire

around 10,000 people over the next few years.

Rolta India that had gone into the quiet period following income tax raids

has now geared up to expand its exis-ting business and is building two new

facilities in Mumbai.

The facilities would be built in a total space of two lakh square feet, which

would have a capacity of accommodating 10,000 people that the com-pany planning

to hire in the next few years. The company is also on the look out for overseas

acquisition.

Atul Tayal, Joint MD, Rolta said, "Currently, we have around 3,500

people working in different divisions which we plan to triple in the next few

years. There was an incessant need to build new facilities because all the three

business units have been growing at the rapid pace."

The new facilities would be ready by April 2005 and initially more than 1,000

people are expected to move in it, the hiring for which has been going on. The

three business units that include GIS, e solutions and engineering are already

giving good returns and since the company intends to add to value to these

existing business units, it is contemplating the inorganic route of growth and

is out to acquire companies that can add value to it.

More than 60 percent of revenues of company come from GIS business wherein it

provides mapped data to most of the government depart-ments. The company is now

focusing on private as well as public sector companies in this segment and has

bagged the order from BSNL recently.

Since Rolta India has the largest mapping data avai-lable with it in India,

the Government Survey of India has made the company its preferred partner for

setting-up the planetarium and mus-eum that would showcase the mapped areas of

diffe-rent countries.

The company would be in a position to sell that data to private companies as

well if the government changes its policy on it. Currently, as per government

policy the com-pany cannot sell or share the mapped data information available

with it. "Once government makes changes in the policy, we would be able to

sell mapped data and that would be a new business line with huge revenues,"

Tayal added.

Rahul Gupta


Mumbai (CyberMedia News)