Software in brand-building as biz scales new heights

IN A sign of the changing times and their increasing visibility, branding is emerging from the shadows to becoming an important activity warranting top management’s attention for software companies. At a recent meeting on its IPO, industry veteran and CMD of Mindtree Consulting Ashok Soota, said one of the focus areas for the company was to strengthen its brand to attract talent and clients. Part of the IPO proceeds were also earmarked for this purpose. A month or so earlier, Tech Mahindra, that is moving into the high-growth trajectory with large projects from British Telecom (BT) and AT&T, said it was working on an exercise to give a definite shape to its brand. Barely a year ago, Tech Mahindra was called Mahindra BT and branding was of little concern to the company because it was perceived as a BT captive. The recent, enhanced focus on branding is in contrast to the approach software companies in India have followed all these years. So far, companies have relied more on vendor events, product meets and their own websites to get in touch with potential clients. “Branding was not the focus because the projects were more sales driven. But with companies now having attained scale and visibility, brands have become more key,” says Jayanthi Badrinath of Prayag Consulting, a firm that offers marketing consulting services to the hi-tech industry. An IPO or an ADS for many players, is also a means to get more visibility among its potential customers — a key reason why many Indian IT firms list overseas. Software leader, Infosys Technologies, was one of the few software companies to realise the importance of a strong brand early on. The company enjoys a premium positioning among the offshore players and is known to command higher billing rates than some peers. In FY06, its brand was valued at Rs 22,915 crore, 62% up from its valuation the previous year. In comparison, during the same period, its market capitalisation was up only by 34.5%. In FY07, its brand value is poised to only get a steeper boost because it was featured extensively, Thomas Friedman’s bestseller, ‘The World is Flat’. Capitalising on this, the company has also started incorporating the phrase “winning in a flat world” in all investor and media communication from mid-2006. “Win in a flat world” is now a tag line displayed on its website. Inspired by the runaway success of the book, Wipro also got heavy duty coverage in ‘Bangalore Tiger’, a book by journalist, Steve Hamm. However, the book did not meet with the same level of success. TCS too, is the process of launching a massive global branding exercise with the tagline “Experience Certainty” targetted at its customers and own employees. The exercise is estimated to cost $8 million-$10 million over the next 12 months. Interestingly, it is not just Indian software firms that are working towards creating more awareness for their brands. Established multinationals are also working towards getting more brand visibility in countries like India. Cap Gemini, which acquired Kanbay Consulting last year for its offshore presence in India, is on a hiring spree here and Salil Parekh, executive chairman, Cap Gemini, says one the firm’s most daunting tasks is create more awareness for its brand in India. The European consulting major is well-known globally but in India, home-grown majors such as Infosys, TCS and Wipro, and multinationals such as IBM, are better known.

Courtesy: EconomicTimes
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