The Hindu Business Line : PCOs to reinvent themselves -- With a little help from IT giants

BELIEVE it or not. The who's who of the international and Indian IT companies have rushed to the rescue of the 12 lakh STD/PCO operators across the country who have suffered a sharp fall in their revenues following the sharp downward revision in STD tariffs over a month ago.

Companies, the likes of Sun Microsystems, Compaq Computers

SchlumbergerSema, Proton World International, Wincor Nixdorf, ACI Worldwide, Aplab, BAeHAL Software Ltd, FSS, Gemplus, Infineon Technologies, CMS Computers, Datacard Corporation and Pico-Peta Simputers have formed an industry consortium to re-invent the old isolated STD/ISD/PCO booths as a totally new technology-driven multi-purpose communications powerhouse.

The consortium led by Alittleworld Pvt Ltd, hopes to bring all PCO/STD booth operators under one banner and upgrade them to provide high-speed Internet and a range of new services like utility bill payment, low priced Net telephony, point-to-point video-conferencing and text/voice messaging.

According to Mr Anurag Gupta, CEO, Alittleworld Pvt Ltd, the public will access the new services through pre-paid re-loadable smartcards, which will be issued by the PCO/STD booths. These cards can be purchased, loaded, reloaded, used and refunded at all booths, he said.

He noted that central systems for transaction processing, billing, card and application management are to be set up by the supporting industry consortium. Several banks have also come forward to participate in this project because of the great synergy of smartcards with small value payments, he noted. The IT companies will have a revenue sharing arrangement with the booth operators, and there will be no equity participation.

To begin with, the booth operators have already formed an all-India association called the All India Sanchar Sewa PCO Society to organise themselves and begin their "new life."

According to Mr Surjeet Singh Khunger, Chairman of the new association, following the cut in STD tariffs, the booth operators have been losing close to 60 per cent of their revenues every month. They at present get a commission ranging from 20 to 25 per cent of their revenues. With the volumes not picking up, it has turned out to be a lose-lose situation for them, he said.

While representations to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) have not worked, they have now decided to take matters in their own hands, he said.

A total of 22,500 booths will be upgraded in 21 cities in the first commercial pilot phase, followed by one-lakh booths in the first full year of deployment. Two lakh upgraded booths will collectively bring in investments of Rs 1,500 crore over three years, Mr Khunger noted.

He said that each booth owner would invest between Rs 40,000 and Rs 75,000 apart from providing an already existing establishment and labour.

"The setting up of the back-end systems will be funded through key participation from the IT industry giants and major financial institutions. It will be one of the most significant new initiatives for employment generation, as the delivery of new services will create demand for new jobs centred around this initiative," he said.

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