NIIT Tech sees growth in travel, transportation vertical

Delhi-based NIIT Technologies is bullish on its Travel, Transportation and Logistics (TTL) vertical and expects it to grow 15 per cent year-on-year.

TTL’s share in NIIT’s total revenue stood at 34 per cent for the third quarter ended 31 December, 2009 while it contributed 27 per cent in the same quarter last year. The growth, the company said, is on back of airlines picking up and passengers coming back besides increase in cargo transportation.

The TTL vertical comprises airlines, airports, surface transport and travel distribution. Though airlines contribute the highest to the vertical at 38 per cent, its contribution was 50 per cent almost a year ago and has come down now. “We want a healthy mix of all the components as it was earlier skewed towards airlines. Now, the spread is equal though the growth from airports is slow,” said Narayanan Kallapiran, Global Head, TTL.

The share of airports and surface transport stands at 20 per cent each while travel distribution accounts for 22 per cent of TTL’s total revenues. NIIT Technologies’ TTL vertical has a headcount of 1,400 which is slightly over 30 per cent of the company’s total workforce.

“There are indications that budgets may increase this year. In fact, a lot of action is happening in the Asia Pacific region because China is the main manufacturing place,” he added.

On the logistics side, Kallapiran said the pile up of goods that happened in 2007, is now reducing. The company is servicing around 50 clients in the vertical. The company had launched solution accelerators that was used to automate the cargo facility at the new Bangalore airport and another was employed to ramp up the website of British Airways. NIIT had also tied up with SITA–providing air transportation communication and IT Solutions– to offer solution accelerators in airports for renewal, car parks’ management and check-in kiosks.