Get the choicest book at your doorstep

Jan 07, 2010

HYDERABAD: In our fast-paced life driven by gadgets and gizmos, which work in a jiffy, when was the last time you bought and read your favourite Dan Brown's novel?

When work, family responsibilities, daily chores and chaotic traffic consume most of the time and to add to all this the idiot box making people couch potatoes, reading books has become a casualty.

If you are one of those, then www.eveninghour.com is the one-stop-shop from where you can get your favourite book or movie DVD at the click of a mouse. The website also has a book store associated to it in the city.

“Our endeavour is to make reading books a fad again. This shop is part of the click-and- mortar store concept and offers edutainment for people of all ages, with an array of books made available for them,” said G. Priyanka, a former techie who owns and runs the store.

The passion for books runs in the family with my father and husband, all pitching in and doing their bit, Ms Priyanka said and added buying books was an experience in itself.

The store started on October 23, 2009 issued 300 membership cards to its customers. Books are delivered at home on a request by an SMS, phone call or an online request on their site. It also has a wide range of DVDs of the latest flicks which can be either hired or bought online. Those interested can ask for a door delivery or pay a visit to the store.

Members of the bookstore can borrow books at a nominal fee of Rs 100 per month. It also has schemes tailor-made for the needs of both the novice and avid readers, offering films and books based on their interest.

“We will popularise the website through traditional systems like pamphlets, membership drives in schools, colleges, apartment complexes, search engine optimisation (SEO). As our members are quite satisfied with our service, the main engine of growth has been by word-of-mouth so far and we have been able to breakeven in just three months, “Ms Priyanka informed.

The family-owned store set up with an initial investment of Rs 15 lakh has 10,000 titles to boast of, out of which 600 books remain in circulation. The range of books spreads from fiction to autobiographies, religion, palmistry, health, astrology, and children's books.

It also has books in Telugu catering to varied interests, from religious books for the pious to modern literature from the likes of Kodavatiganti Kutumba Rao, Sri Sri among others.

For novice readers spoilt for choice and unable to zero in on a book, the website provides an editorial review of books and suggests books for study every week.

It has a 20 per cent discount offer for those purchasing books for over Rs 1,000. Members of the store can enjoy a discount of 8 per cent on books and 5 per cent on DVDs irrespective of the offer period.

The proprietors of www.eveninghour.com, Ms Priyanka and her father Nagendra Prasad, former Chief Engineer, State Police Housing Corporation, who shares the burden of running the store, say they have many more plans on the cards and hope to expand within the city and outside.

Mr. Prasad said the store had started book reading clubs which held discussions on Sundays and planned to extend to Saturdays also. “Reading books in a group helps in expanding knowledge, get different perspectives and also help network among people of similar interest,“ he added.

The store has also started arts and craft classes from January which are held on holidays and weekends. “We are holding games based on vocabulary building, puzzles, honing mathematical skills as a part of edutainment,” Ms Priyanka said.

The store plans to emerge as a brand, build a strong online intellectual community for books and hopes to expand from books and movies into crafts and other avocations which hone a person's all round development.

Adrenaline gushes at SVM@36

Feb 08, 2010

HYDERABAD: Penny wise, but certainly pound not foolish. You always have the option of rewriting the adage as Penny wise, pound wiser or intelligent when you get there to derive pleasure to your heart's content.

It is a place to unwind. Perhaps, one should descend floor after floor and enjoy every wee bit of it. Beginning the journey down the lane literally at the world class bowling alley, one reaches to test his/her cricketing capabilities like Sachin or Dhoni facing the ball at a pace bowler's velocity in a net practice.

Wanna savour teas from around the world, relish food from North India available along the NH-7 route, delectable chicken from Chettinad to Guntur in South Town, or barge into F3 noodles and pick up chicken delicacies from all the seven continents in the globe, finicky over hygiene to have the omnipresent street food like chaat, punugulu and mirchi bajji in the plush environs of a mall, play console games with people around the world or give your child the chance to bat using machine which bowls at 220 kmph, then head to SVM@36 at Jubilee Hills in the city.

The SVM@36, a flagship facility of Sri Venkateswara Multiplexes Pvt. Ltd., which was open on November 14, 2009 is spread over an area of 50,000 sq.ft. The mall has apportioned 20,000 sq.ft for food courts and 10 per cent of its space for Toon Kids. In a tete-a-tete with ww.andhrabusiness.com, Mr. Vijayender, Chairman of SVM@36, passionately described the features of the multiplex with great detail, the USP of the Hyderabadi wonder and the group’s plans over the next few years.

What is the USP of SVM@36? How is it different from other multiplexes?

It is tailor-made to suit the changing tastes of the public to help them unwind from their daily drudgery. Its USP would be combining gaming with food courts offering delectable delicacies from across the world.

The FAB (food and beverages) is a complete floor that offers a myriad choices for the foodies.

The place offers the numerous dishes available along the National Highway-7, which crisscrosses the country from the South to the North, at its NH-7 outlet.

Our South-Town food court serves lip-smacking chicken from Chettinad to Guntur, apart from numerous vegetarian and non-vegetarian items special to all the south Indian States. The South Indian breakfast wakes the place up and it is abuzz with activity from 7 a.m. itself.

What is exotic about food at SVM@36?

The international food court in an area of 9,000 sq.ft boasts of the likes of Walk In, Texas Chicken, Istanbul Kabab, Subway and Frootoholicks which serves 40 different mixes of fresh fruit juices. Tie-up with a local player specializing in Chinese food is on the cards. Our F3 noodles has chicken from 7 continents like Indonesian, Chinese, Middle Eastern, European, American and South Africa. An exclusive counter serving 25 varieties of omlettes in a food connoisseur's choicest destination.

The Finjaan serves 40 to 50 varieties of teas which are not milk-based like diet, health teas, jasmine tea, rose and other herbal teas.

Bandi -- yes, a pushcart indeed, serves all that is served on a roadside food joint. From Mirchi bajji to paanee puri, and ragada samosa to bhel puri to vada pav; they are all there.

K+B, kebabs plus biryani, yard serves hot the choicest and authentic biryanis and kebabs.
The food courts in the multiplex are open from 7 a.m until 12 midnight. Techies stop over to enjoy non-vegetarian breakfast very early in the mornings before they reach homes.

You covered food. How about gaming?

Oh, no. Food sections are not completely covered. We will get there, as we descend the floors.
Adults can enjoy rush bowling at our five-lane bowling alley where the ambience is changed everyday using UV lighting, brought here in association with Qubica AMF, procured from Virginia, US which is the number one company in the world.

Are the shoes given and beer served there? How is gaming different from the regular gaming zones?

Yes. There is no bowling alley in India that serves beer. We do. Shoes and the necessary paraphernalia is given to the players.

Golf enthusiasts can play virtual golf, with a simulator, an experience given for the first time in Hyderabad. The LAN-based gaming facility with a connectivity of 8mbps facilitates playing with people across the world for 30 people at a time.The online gaming is a big activity that holds the youth glued to their seats in front of the computers here.

The RUSH, India’s largest console gaming station, a unit of SVM@36, recently organised Rush Cyber Gaming League, (RCGL) a national championship league on January 16-17, 2010 and presented gifts worth Rs 1 lakh to winners.

We are organising a similar event -- Imba gaming -- on Saturday and Sunday that is on February 6-7, 2010 for which entry is absolutely free. We hope to draw much larger crowd this time.

There are three lounge rooms to give exclusive gaming experience and seclusion from the public too. The console gaming area has 30 consoles, X Box 360s, 10 playstation-IIIs, 10 Ninetendos, and a simulated Formula 1 racing car.

This mall provides facility for children to play cricket using a machine which bowls at 220 kmph. Speeds can be adjusted, though. This is a machine on which the likes of master blaster Sachin Tendulkar usually practice. This is targeted at the 5 to 10-year olds.

What more is coming up here?

Many more, if I should say. Telugu pop singer Smitha is opening music and dance (MAD) wing on the topr floor. It will be operational very soon.

What was the investment that went into SVM@36?

We have invested around Rs 10 crore. Some of our floors in our five-floor facility have been leased out to branded companies, especially the international food court.

What about SVM’s expansion plans for AP and the rest of India?

We are shortly opening a two-screen multiplex in Karimnagar this month. A four-screen multiplex near Benz Circle in Vijayawada which will open in October. Multiplexes will also come up at Trimulgherry, Himayatnagar and Dilsukhnagar on a franchisee model in Hyderabad. A six-screen multiplex will come up at the RTC X Roads in the place of Odeon Theatre complex, which we own, in the next three years.

An 8,00,000 sq.ft mall will come up at Patny with eight screens with a 2,00,000 sq.ft parking lot.

We hope to become a leading player in south India and reach Chennai, Bangalore, Mysore and Coimbatore among others and wish to consider an IPO in the next three years. We want to be in the bracket of Cinemax and PVR Cinemas.

How many footfalls do you record every day?

We currently have 1,200 footfalls on week days and 3,000 footfalls on weekends and the response has been as on expected lines.

Targeting IT crowd and corporates, we have kept the prices in the modest Rs 200 range to attract repeat visitors.

Are you considering entering into adventure sports like bungee jumping, para gliding etc?

We are mulling a 1,00,000 sq.ft area in Hyderabad for adventure sports like bungee jumping, para gliding etc. We have many plans, but let's put them for next time.

KCR-from zero to hero

Jan 2, 2009

HYDERABAD: The chequered history of TRS supremo K. Chandrasekhar Rao has been a roller-coaster ride ever since he started the party in 2001.

Floating TRS after giving up the deputy-speaker’s post in the Assembly, KCR aligned with the Congress party in the 2004 Assembly polls. He then agreed to setting up of a second State Reorganisation Commission (SRC) and joined UPA government which mentioned Telangana issue in its common minimum programme.

Mr Rao relied on lobbying for the next few years rejecting any middle-ground and said he would settle nothing short of Telangana State. He refused to take up issues like GO 610, which promises jobs to locals and threw his lot on political lobbying as a measure to secure his goal.

His occasional claims of having secured assurances from UPA Chairperson Ms Sonia Gandhi on Statehood made him a laughing stock, as she never openly seconded or denied them. He would go gaga and eulogise Sonia claiming the delivery of Statehood was imminent after his trips to Delhi.

Repeated assertions of the late CM YSR pooh-poohing all the claims of KCR smoked him out of the government, with his credibility being called into question. He took to a farcical one-day fast at Jantar-Mantar which neither helped the cause nor resurrected his sagging image.

His repeated reliance on the electoral gains of his party's candidates at the State and Centre as a benchmark for his party's cause lost steam. The vigour and vitality, the hallmark of any party whose moorings lie in a single point agenda were lost, and so did the political fortunes of his party as he failed to kindle the movement even as it lost its fizz.

Having failed to get any assurance on statehood for the region, KCR then latched on to the Telugu Desam party which until then stood for an united Andhra and went to the polls projecting the then CM YSR as a stumbling block for the avowed goal of his party. The alliance proved to be an un-doing for the party as it was perceived opportunistic and received severe drubbing in the 2009 polls.

Many a TRS legislator lost the polls with even KCR scraping through with a wafer-thin majority of 15,000 votes, a sharp fall from the 2,20,000 majority he secured earlier. Mr KCR had to face repeated dissidence within the party with his detractors deriding him of insincerity. The credit of keeping the party afloat despite many a reverses goes to him and has remained the icon of the agitation.

A person who has not lost an election in his entire political career until now, has taken up to the path of agitation to achieve his goal now, which has paid him rich dividends as made him a force to reckon with. The ham handed and strong-arm tactics approach of the Centre to the peaceful agitation taken up by him have brought many sections of the people students, workers, government employees into the agitation.

After the death of YSR things changed for good for TRS and KCR undertook fast-unto-death for the Statehood and the Centre hurriedly announced that it would begin the process of Telangana statehood.

The Centre’s announcement has sparked a riot of protests across the coastal Andhra and Rayalseema with peoples’ representatives putting in their papers and few leaders going on indefinite fast triggering violence and constitutional crisis as the assembly was in session.

The Centre issued a fresh statement saying that there was no consensus and it again triggered violence in Telangana region.

KCR was also successful in bringing all political parties together forming a Joint Action Committee (JAC). TDP at the last moment went back and said it will wage its own war.

However, KCR, who started the year with a low rating as he lost winning margins in every successive election he fought, became a force to reckon with at year-end.

Passion pops up portal and now it pays

Mar 17, 2010

Ramu R. Kallepalli, who has had a fad for travel and wished to open a travel business of his own, is now living his dream. As someone who thinks differently,, he does not prefer doing things in a routine way and become another run-of-the-mill player in business. And true to his wont, his web portal positions itself as one which promotes red hot travel ideas.

Mr. Kallepalli who launched his portal www.travelspice.com, showcased it in the recent software show organised by ITsAP here.

What is the USP of travelspice.com? How are you positioning yourself?

We offer off-beat vacations like wildlife safari, pilgrimages and eco-tourism spots to all domestic and international destinations. As an end-to-end travel products company our collaboration extends to hotels, airlines and booking buses.

More than 4,000 hotels are listed with our portal, but won't let even others out if customers seek our services. We also help our customers get visas and passports and develop a strong customer relationship, which we leverage to sell all our products. The website is meant to be an interface between the customer and the suppliers of all travel services. We also sell our products offline.

What is your revenue generation model?
We first identify properties with potential and market them to customers and take a margin from them. There are excellent properties on the Tungabhadra, and eco-tourist resorts in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Gujarat, which pay us up to 25 per cent as commission, as they are unable to get customers on their own.

One can also book airlines tickets on our site, but we get less from them as airlines don’t rely on us heavily. We also advertise properties like Chitvan in Kanha National Park in Madhya Pradesh on our site. But when a person clicks for information on it, he is directed to book the property within the portal.

How do you plan to further popularize your website?
We are into SEO (search engine optimization) and SEM (search engine marketing) to promote our website. We had advertisements on 120 buses of APSRTC and Prasad’s Imax. We identify and look for mediums which don’t see advertisements as their principal source of revenue but have a niche customer base to promote ourselves. We are also collaborating with all airlines.

Has your company achieved break even? Are you posting profits?
We started as a travel agency, built a dedicated customer base and then started the portal only last week. Having started in 2007, we have been accredited by both IATA (International Air Transport Association) and TAAI (Travel Agents Association of India) and earn Rs 40 lakh per month right now and hope to increase it to Rs one crore by the end of the year.

Tell us about the investment that went into the business?
I have personally invested one million dollars into it. Five angel investors have funded us with Rs 20 lakh. We are inviting people with experience and are ready to offer them sweat equity to head our various divisions.

Apart from the customer relationship, we outsource all our other activities like our HR, technical development of our site and take IP for all such developments to ourselves.

Tell us about yourself?
I have a master’s degree from the US and did my MBA from one of the best business schools in Chicago. I had headed the performance architecture group for Oracle in Chicago. Then ran an IT consulting company there and was earning two million dollars per annum, after which I shifted to India and started this which has long been in my mind.

I will be moderating a panel discussion on travel, tourism, hospitality entrepreneurship summit on March 26 in the city.

Face the ball, leverage your skill

Mar 27, 2010

Cricket is a religion in India and most Indians are staunch devotees. The gentleman’s game, which is said to be an Indian game accidentally discovered in Britain, has become a money spinner for a wide range of advertisers who piggyback on it to leverage their sales. Not surprisingly, the companies are raking in a record moolah out of the IPL season III.

It is not an exaggeration to say that a majority of Indians would have at some point in their life dabbled in cricket. Many of them hanker in their heart of hearts to play a Bret Lee or Shoaib Akhtar ball. Such cricket aficionado can realise their dreams with the bowling machines made by the city-based Leverage Sports Technologies.

The machines bowl like a seven-year-old kid for a novice and amateur cricketer, while at the same time testing a professional cricketer’s preparedness. No wonder, cricketers fall back on the machines made by LST from Hyderabad to hone their skill.

"We make bowling machines for cricket, field hockey, baseball and tennis. In the domestic market, the cricket machines are the most sought after with tennis coming next," says P.V.Parthasarathi, CEO of Leverage Sports Technologies, in an interview with AndhraBusiness.com.

Excerpts:

1. Are your machines designed, developed and produced indigenously? How much does the import component amount to?
The machines are entirely designed, developed and produced indigenous ly with absolutely no import component in them, except for the electronic components used in the machine. We use the services of some ancillary industries funded by us to make some components. The nets used by players are made by such units.

2. Tell us about your collaboration with foreign companies, both technical and financial?
We don’t have any technical or financial collaboration with any foreign or domestic company. We invested heavily into R&D and came up with the technology indigenously. Foreign contribution could be some two to three per cent and is negligible.
Our company is the only manufacturer of such machines in Asia.

3. What is the range of the products from your stable and what is their price range?
We have machines to suit every pocket and need. Our machines are of three types- softball, hard ball and the others which can bowl both the balls.

The basic machine used for entertainment can come from a minimum of Rs 50,000 to a maximum of Rs 3,50,000, while a professional one starts from Rs 1,00,000 and can go up to a maximum of Rs 12,00,000.

Our fastest bowling machine can bowl at 270 kmph and can replicate a Bret Lee, Praveen Kumar or Shoaib Akhtar’s ball. The machines can even spin the ball.

Before we started making these machines, they were imported from UK and basically bowled balls in the same line and length. But our machines can now bowl a yorker, short-pitched ball or simulate any kind of ball without the batsman knowing beforehand. Thus they come in handy to a batsman to hone his/her talent.

4. What is the share of Leverage in the bowling machine market in India and the world? Tell us about the export of your products to various countries.
We have a 70 per cent share in the domestic market and 30 per cent in the international circuit. Our base ball machines are completely exported to US. We also make golf simulation machines.

The Middle-East, Sri Lanka, Australia, UK and US are our major export markets.

5. Which of your machines is the most sought after? The one which bowls with the tennis ball or hard ball? What is the USP of the machines?
Professionals now practice more with the tennis ball as it reduces the chances of injury and makes them more agile. Ours is the only machine which can spin and swing the tennis ball in the world. The bounce generated by our machine is the same for a hard ball or tennis ball, because of the bounce containing technology they have. This is their USP.

We are now manufacturing special synthetic balls used mostly by professionals and can be used up to three years. The ball is aero-dynamically made similar to a golf ball. We can make around 5,000 such balls a day on demand.

6. Are any new products in the pipeline apart from the 20 already in the market?
We are coming up with a virtual stadium machine, where in a batsman can practice with the digital image of a Zaheer Khan coming forward to bowl, even as the ball is actually bowled by the machine. The machine can assign the speed and agility with which a player, who is fielding, can throw and hit the ball to the stumps after the batsman hits it in a particular direction.

This will help the player’s even practice running between the wickets. It will shortly hit the market at a cost of Rs 1 crore. Patents for 12 features in our products are pending approval. We are continuously studying new technologies like the one used in golf simulation.

We have a technology which can be leveraged to train a person, with the help of a laptop with the connectivity options in it, using satellite enabled technology.

The company will also introduce volleyball and football machines. The football machine helps goal-keeper train for penalty kicks.

7. Do malls, clubs and resorts form a major chunk of your market?
Our market is equally divided between the machines used by professionals and entertainment. We either sell the machines or give them to malls, clubs and resorts on a revenue-sharing basis. But largely, we sell them as managing them becomes a problem. A mall, on an average, makes Rs 1 lakh on the machine per month and recovers the cost of Rs 2.5 lakh in no time.

We are a member of the Indian Association of Amusement Parks and Industries, which facilitates the sales of our machines to resorts, theme parks, malls and water parks. To top it all, the machines use very minimal power.

Marketing was never a problem because of their wide usage, as people got to know by word of mouth. Though we officially have 20 dealers across the country, sales have mostly happened through contacts, as 50 per cent of our customers have facilitated sales for us.
Apart from malls, the machines powered by batteries can also be used in beaches and can work continuously for 15 hours without being recharged.

8. Tell us about the after sales service offered by you?
The machines are rugged and can be used by places of entertainment like malls for up to three to five years without any maintenance. But the machines used in professional cricket continue to work for up to 10 years.

Our machines don’t need regular maintenance and can be trouble-shot by even a layman, as we give the design also to the user. We guarantee the machines for one year.

9. Do you have any tie-ups with advertisers as part of your OOH publicity at malls, clubs and resorts with the likes of Nokia, Knight Riders of IPL, Sprite etc?
Many advertisers are using our machines for OOH publicity. We have tailor-made machines for them. The likes of Kolkata Knight Riders used them for their road shows, where in free IPL tickets were given to persons if they hit a six.

They are now being used even in marriages and functions as a means of entertainment. Such customers either rent them from us or buy them. The Middle-East is a good market for such machines.

10. Name the cricket academies and celebrities who are using your products?
Our customers include the premier training academy for international cricketers, run by the BCCI (Board of Control For Cricket In India), the National Cricket Academy in Bangalore, to local trainee ones in Hyderabad like M.L.Jaisimha Academy, Vijay Paul Academy, Arshad Ayub Academy and Raju’s Cricket Club.

11. Who are your competitors in the domestic and international market? What is the share of export market in your revenues?
As I already told you we don’t have any competitor in the domestic market. In cricket-playing nations like Australia and UK, they buy their products more, though they know that our machines are superior.

That’s why we are marketing our products with the tag `Experience the power of Indian manufacturing.’ All our competitors have been in the field for around 30 years, while we started as recently as 2008. Our achievement is definitely remarkable given our recent foray into this business vertical.

We employ around 200 persons and can make around 10 machines per day, but always make them on receipt of bookings as we continuously upgrade our machines infusing new technology. That the real estate players are offering our machines as a freebie to customers while delivering the homes shows their popularity.

12. Do you have any unique ideas to add to the sporting experience?
We are shortly hitting the cyberspace with a social networking site where in a lakh videos of players in reputed cricketing academies will be uploaded. The services of reputed coaches who have trained the likes of Azharuddin will be commissioned to rate them. They will be analysed using a video analysis software. People who see the videos can also vote for their favourite players.

13. Do you propose any expansion and diversification and how do you plan to raise funds for these?
An IPO is on the cards to fund the financial requirements. Expansion will happen in the newer areas like football and volleyball. We are waiting for the right time to take the move. We are eying tie-ups at the highest body level with the likes of FIFA (Federation of International Football Association). We will leverage them before taking the IPO route.

Many wanted to have a share in the company, but we were not willing to do so. All our finances have only been loans from banks like the Canara Bank which is our main financier and the rest are from internal accruals. No venture capitalist is involved in the project. We might need investments when we launch our virtual machines in football, golf and others.
But we will definitely confine ourselves to sports technology and not get into sports management.

14. Tell us about yourself?
I am basically a B.E in civil engineering and had nothing to do with mechanical engineering which my company is into. We had presence in the food processing industry and manufactured coffee and tea vending machines for corporates like Nestle. We make both the large ones used in corporate offices to the miniature ones, which can be fit into a car which we called ‘Hottie” which can service piping hot coffee or tea for six hours.

We had taken up a few mechanical and electronic projects earlier, our bowling machines are a blend of both these as in robotic technology. In future, robotics is going to play a more pivotal role. A robot, a humanoid of sorts which can bowl, could be on the cards.

My dream is to manufacture a miniature bowling machine, which can suit the purse of any person at Rs 15,000, which can be used within the cosy confines of homes. We are shortly launching this product.