THE HERO group, whose flagship firm was India's largest motorcycle maker, was pushing into information technology with a focus on IT-enabled business services and training for such services, a senior official said.

Group company Hero Corporate Service Limited is undertaking this thrust through three divisions - Hero ITES for computer-enabled services, Hero Mindmine for training and Hero Soft for software services for the manufacturing sector.

"We are hoping the company (revenue) would be about Rs 200 crore in the next two to three years," Sunil Munjal, managing director of Hero Corporate Services, said.

The provision of computerized services such as customer relations and back-office processing is a hot sector in India, whose cheap, skilled, English-speaking and IT-savvy workforce is attracting many overseas companies to shift such work here.

The National Association of Software and Services Companies forecasts that India's revenues from IT-enabled services could rise more than 20 times to Rs 81,000 crore by 2008, when the sector could employ up to 1.1 million people.

Although six years old, Hero Corporate Service Limited was mostly offering a variety of consultancy services to the Hero group and has started looking outside only in the past 12 to 15 months.

Training key:

While several entrepreneurs and established companies are entering the computerized services business, training of personnel is becoming key to the success of these ventures.

The Mindmine division trains students in customer service and in basic computing, tele-marketing and analytical skills and imparts language and speaking skills using expertise from two US firms, Munjal said.

"In the three divisions that we have, Hero Mindmine will clearly have the largest exposure in India," he said.

Mindmine has trained over 700 people over the past nine months through centres in Delhi, Gurgaon and Chandigarh, and it has opened another center in Bombay. It also plans to offer training through franchisees.

Its students now work in call centers run by leading companies such as GE Capital Services India, Spectramind and Daksh.

Call center operations:

Hero ITES, previously known as Hero Serveit already has a 280-seat customer contact center in Gurgaon and plans to add another 440 seats over the next few months. Plans are also afoot to set up another call center, Munjal said, although he declined to name existing clients.

The company also has a stake in US call center operator FirstRing Inc, which has a delivery center in Bangalore.

"We took a stake in FirstRing to learn about the business," Munjal said, without revealing the size of the holding. "We will not look at another acquisition for learning purposes but for business growth, if there is any opportunity."

Herosoft, the software services division, now has only three clients outside the Hero group, but has set up an office in the United States to pursue more business from there, Munjal said.