Niits Cbt Tech Finds Market In The Us

Computer-based training (CBT) using multimedia technologies developed by the National Institute of Information Technology (NIIT) is helping the World Bank and top American corporations slash their soaring training costs. NIIT (USA), incorporated in Atlanta, has been hired by these institutions to develop CBT products to upgrade the skills of their employees.

The latest to utilise technology skills of NIIT is the global information technology (IT) giant Microsoft for whom a CBT product is being developed for the software it is currently developing. As soon Microsoft's product hits the market, the CBT module with NIIT's own brand name would also be released, says C N. Madhusudan, president and chief operating officer of NIIT Inc.

 

We are probably the worlds largest producer of CBT products, he said pointing out to the more than 200 titles it has brought out. We have the worlds largest CBT factory (in New Delhi and Calcutta) where 500 software engineers work on new products, he said.

Today everything that we do in the United States is for the global market, Madhusudan said.

All our clients have global implementation strategies whether it is the World Bank, Microsoft, Oracle, IBM or Boeing, he said.

Today our turnover is $10 million with an expected 400 per cent annual growth rate in the CBT segment. In the next few years we hope to hit $100 million from our CBT products, he added.

To enlarge the CBT marketshare in the US, which is dominated by customised products, NIIT Inc last month opened a web site where CBT products are offered for sale.

The initial response to the Internet shopping mall has been encouraging, Madhusudan said. The site offers CBT products for the Microsoft Certified Software Engineer (MCSE) course.

It offers 170 hours of interactive training including free online technical support for three months.

Madhusudan said, In the Internet shopping mall there is a catalogue of 200 titles and people anywhere in the United States can browse through it, get the pricing and details of upcoming courses, download demo products, ask technical questions and place orders, he said.

We are sitting on the tip of an iceberg of business opportunities, he said describing the high growth potential of the CBT segment of the $1.3 trillion global software market. He quoted International Data Corporation (IDC) research to say that the world market for IT and training market is growing at 12.7 percent annually.

IDC research shows that the focus on fast growing markets can be a major advantage for IT companies and the multimedia and Internet-based training are becoming key thrust areas of the future. In the US the CBT growth is expected to be 31.30 percent, IDC research shows. This is the high-growth market that NIIT Inc is targeting, he said.

As the technology is changing fast and new people are entering the IT usage segment, the traditional ways of training have become expensive, he pointed out. Besides the IT industry, sectors such as manufacturing and banking are also finding it prohibitively expensive to train people in new technologies through the conventional instructor-led class-room training, he asserted.

That is the reason why we are getting into the area of softskill training, Madhusudan said. Earlier NIIT Inc was developing only customized CBT for its clients. Today it is marketing CBT products under its own brand name so that the returns would be higher.

NIIT had tested the CBT market by taking up an assignment for Software Publishing Corporation which wanted one of its successful DOS-based softwares to have Windows-like features. NIIT Inc developed this and also added more efficiency to the product's engine.

Buoyed by the success of this, NIIT took up projects for Lexmark printers of IBM, Oracle Corporation and Sun Microsystems.

For Sun Microsystems, the brief was to develop a software for its commission and sales promotion people around the world. NIIT Inc helped the computer hardware major, which has unique worldwide commission payment for its salespeople, with a system that enabled the company to change the incentive scheme so that the models with the highest margins would get sold.

Another CBT package that NIIT Inc developed was for the World Bank to help managers at its contracted project sites execute work as per the bank's rules. The CBT allows officials at project sites to follow the World Bank commercial training, Madhusudan said.