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Express Computer, January 30 2001


BanknetIndia.com to assist VRS
Feature by Srikanth RP  

Banknetindia.com, claimed to be India's first and only banking portal, has announced the launch of a special help-line facility for bankers, who are planning to take VRS or have already opted for it. The panel of Banknet India comprising of senior bankers, chartered accountants, HRD and tax consultants will answer queries relating to Voluntary retirement scheme and Post VRS tax planning. It will also help people in making decisions on investments and provide a range of saving options. The portal will also assist these bankers in finding alternate jobs and exploring other options.

Anurag Khanna, Chief Executive Officer, BanknetIndia.com says, "We are positioned as an advisory, training and information portal focussed on the banking sector and are on our way to form the largest virtual community of banking, finance and IT professionals. Along with B2B services we provide access to a wealth of knowledge and information on the banking and financial sectors and serve as a platform for interaction between service providers and users."

The site hopes to earn revenues through advertising and online sale of banking products. The portal provides a complete view on the banking sector, its history, latest news and developments, players and regulators and financial markets. In addition to this it provides extensive details on corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, venture capital, insurance, personal finance, project investments and career opportunities. Finer details are covered in banking basics, bank lending (both domestic and overseas borrowings), issues today, guidelines, regulations and policies etc.

With its target segment being banks and banking software companies, banking and finance professionals, NRI's, management students as well as job aspirants, the portal currently boasts of over 8000 registered subscribers which include nearly every bank in India and regulatory bodies as well as individuals from top IT companies and corporates.


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Business Standard, Thursday, December 16 1999


Web banking makes a beginning
Article by Avinash Celestine 

Internet banking is perhaps still in its infancy here in India but the next steps may already be under way. Two specialised sites devoted to banking and finance have been launched or are due to be launched by the end of this week. Are these sites the precursor of something bigger to come - perhaps a full-fledged portal or gateway site offering a range of financial services from insurance policies, car loans and credit cards to mutual fund units?

There is also another version of what could be a future trend. HDFC bank is to launch its HDFC Bank Shop by the beginning of next year. And it signifies another possible scenario as to where banks are headed. And last but not the least, ICICI bank has tied up with Satyam Infoway to launch a company which would sell retail banking products on the Internet.

The motivations of both Milan Sangani and Anurag Khanna in setting up their banking-specific sites were similar. Milan Sangani is managing director of Credit Resources India limited, the company which runs and manages financeinsights.com. Anurag Khanna is president of banknetindia.com.

"All the India-specific portal sites currently up and running on the Net are focused more on the equity market," says Khanna. "They provide stock tips to investors and give information mainly about the equity market."

Sangani concurs, "Most other sites focus on equity and giving stock tips to consumers. We wanted to provide a wider choice of personal finance products as well, like mutual funds, and retail loans."

But there are differences between the two sites. While finance insights.com is purely a personal finance site, banknetindia.com has a broader focus. It provides information on a range of banking issues from the current structure of the banking industry in India, jobs available in the banking sector, a special section on information of interest to non-resident Indians (NRIs), as well as basic information on fixed deposits, current and other types of accounts and descriptions of the various services that banks offer.

Finance insights is a personal finance site. If you are looking for say, a credit card, the site provides you information on the range of cards currently available. A visitor to the site who is looking to buy a credit card is taken through a range of questions as to the type of card he wants (for instance standard or gold) and the range of features that different cards have to offer (reward points, frequent flyer miles).

You then choose the card you want and fill out an online form. An e-mail is sent to the respective bank which then gets in touch directly with you. Sangani says that he has such an arrangement with the major banks.

Therefore, while financeinsights.com is looking to attract customers who are on the lookout for a retail product like credit cards, car loans or consumer loans, banknetindia.com's Khanna believes that professionals from the banking and finance industry will be the main group of people attracted to the site.

Khanna, a banker who formerly worked with SBI and then with a foreign bank actually started off his site a year ago in the form of an 'online club' which was devoted to answering queries from visitors. He found that many people, especially NRIs had basic queries about banking in India and about procedures to open various kinds of accounts and buy various products. "We functioned as a kind of helpline for people and this helped us when we decided to become a full-fledged site," he says.

He plans to provide information about all banks and their products, information about the latest directives and circulars from the RBI and articles on banking. At all times, he said the members of the online clubs which were the precursors to the site would help to evolve the focus for the site.

"Many of the features of the site are there because people gave us feedback about what they would like to see on the site," he says.

Of course, the crucial question is how both Sangani and Khanna intend to make money from the site. There are two possible sources of revenue for both sites. The first is from advertising. The second is from commissions received from the bank when a customer purchases the bank's product.

Khanna says that for the present at least the site is free and no commissions are to be charged. So he intends to get the large proportion of his revenue from advertising. A part of revenue might also come in from answering specific queries of customers.

"By and large our answers to visitors' queries are free of charge but if a visitor requires a very specific answer which requires some work, then we may charge for it."

He further adds, "Since this is a site which is focused on the banking industry, advertisers have knowledge of the type of visitors likely to frequent the site and can target their ads accordingly."

Sangani says that many of the bigger banks have agreed to enter into a partnering arrangement with financeinsights.com in which the bank pays the Website a commission whenever a visitor to the site buys into a product of the bank. "The banks which already had a concept of direct marketing to the customer did not have too many problems in switching over to the partnering arrangement with us. However, there are banks which do not have the requisite internal policies in place to enter into such an arrangement."

For these banks, the site displays all the requisite information about the product offered but it is up to the customer to approach the bank. In contrast to Khanna, Sangani believes that initially at least the large part of his revenue is likely to be from the commissions rather than advertising.

The challenges faced by these sites are big. There are the common problems faced by all Internet sites in India - low Net penetration and the need to build up their visibility and "stickiness" with Netsurfers. In addition, these sites face more specific problems. They are startups and are going to face stiff competition from existing sites like rediff.com and indiainfoline.com notwithstanding the fact that both of them are trying to differentiate themselves from the bigger portal sites.

"The fact is that the bigger portals obviously have a first mover advantage and have already established their brandnames to a certain extent. These sites are definitely going to have to differentiate themselves to a big extent and provide value added and specialised information to their visitors," says J Rajagopal, managing director, consulting at KPMG.

The portals are also not sitting still and are in fact getting into retailing of banking products. ICICI bank, for instance, has tied up with Satyam Infoway to set up a company for online distribution of retail banking products and services on the Net. The range of retail products to be distributed on the Net would include savings accounts, current accounts, FDs and bill payments. Other banks are likely to follow this trend and tie up with other portals offering similar kinds of services.

Another scenario to what web banking could look like in the future is perhaps provided by HDFC bank. Their concept of an HDFC Bank Shop is intended to promote the usage of their new debit card product.

The bank has tied up with a range of retailers across Mumbai to allow the bank's customers to buy a range of products available on the site and pay for it using their HDFC bank debit card.

Says Mudit Saxena, head of retail marketing at HDFC bank, "Gifting is an important aspect of buying over the Net so the site offers a lot of gift items like flowers, chocolates or CDs. If it is a big and an expensive item, people still prefer to do the purchase face to face rather than over the Net."

Besides promoting a wider use of the debit card, it also offers an opportunity to HDFC bank to cross sell its other products. Inspite of the fact that people would prefer to buy big items off rather than on the Net, consumer durable items are offered for purchase. "The site provides the facility for the visitor to take a loan to finance the purchase of the consumer durable good should he wish to buy it," says Saxena.


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The Economic Times, Wednesday, 15 December 1999


Return of the Pin-stripes
Article by George Cherian

Here’s final proof that we’ve come out of a `downturn’ as economists love to call it: after a long lull, recruitments are happening all over again. Job opportunities are clearly on the rise and though compensationpackets are not expected to touch the hideous levels they once did in 1991-92, most people are getting the sort of pay they ask for, or at least.

The economy is clearly on a rebound and the financial sector, which, as everyone says, mirrors the growth of industry, has also gained. It could, in large part, be attributed to the market-driven strategy of most banks to take the big plunge into retail finance.

But don’t forget that the stock markets are on fire too. Equity brokerages and foreign funds too are recruiting. Also, the dot.com fever which has engulfed us, is indirectly creating jobs in the financial sector. Seven active venture capital funds in India are together expected to take in about a 120 people at the finance and marketing level over the next few months. They will be posted in the dot.com companies they invest in.

The increasing number of people leaving the financial services sector to set up Internet startups is also throwing up a lot of vacancies. Less than a month ago, Anurag Khanna, head of corporate finance at Fuji Bank left to start banknetindia.com, an interactive banking portal. He will be joined by about 8-10 senior bankers in four months time. 

Investment banks, after a bad spell, are once again clinching deals. In calendar 1999, the total number of deals brokered by investment banks is estimated to have been over Rs 10,000 cr, the most talked about one being the Rs 499 cr Satyam Infoway-IndiaWorld deal handled by DSP Merrill Lynch. Jobs are at last opening up in the project finance and capital markets functions of investment banks.

And then, of course, there are the insurance ventures which are looking to poach marketing talent, not from banks or other financial services firms, but from FMCG majors like Hindustan Lever and Procter & Gamble. Head hunters say that the actuary functions at insurance companies will initially be headed by expatriates brought in by the foreign partners.

One insurance company, for instance, is speaking to an executive search firm for recruiting anywhere between 1,000 to 5,000 people as employees and agents.

The mad rush into retail by many banks is also creating jobs. ABN Amro Bank, which recently acquired the retail assets base of Bank of America is thinking big in retail and is recruiting 70 people for this business. Banque Nationale de Paris (BNP), which has announced its intention of getting into the retail finance business in a big way, plans to increase its headcount by 80 over the next year. A Rs 500-cr Indian company is in the process of recruiting 150 people for a financial services venture it proposes to float in partnership with a multi-national company.

“Globally, there is a lot of money chasing too few opportunities. India is a promising emerging market and the perception of our country is changing globally. The number of Indians that are in the glare of the international media is just a pointer,” says Anuroop Tony Singh, ANZ Grindlays Bank’s country head in India. “Foreign investment is going
to pour in,” he adds.

Placement services firms are the most elated with the current trend. After months, actually years, of doing little more than chew on their finger nails, they are once again back in business.

“The catch word at executive search firms has changed from ‘wait and watch’ to ‘let’s go’,” says Sunit Mehra, senior partner at Horton International. Horton International is a CEO search firm that focuses on placements in the financial services, pharmaceutical and chemicals industries. Bankers are smiling once again. “There is that feel good factor now,” says Mehra.

There has been a lot of movement at top levels in the banking industry. Over 40 senior foreign bank executives are in the process of moving house in south-Mumbai, mostly as a result of job changes. Real estate agents too are smiling.

Never mind last week’s Cogentrix affair. Foreign companies are still bullish on India. That only means more investments and, naturally, more job opportunities. Recruitments in the financial services sector, though they do not and will not compare to the information technology and media businesses, are definitely on a high.

“This time, its quite different from 1997 when most of the work we did was replacement hiring. Over the last six months we have seen that hiring is being driven by expansion,” says Sonal Agrawal Bali, director, ABC Search.

Bali believes the current trend will hold. “Retail banking is not exactly cyclical. Moreover, the enormous amounts of money banks have invested in building up their infrastructure will not permit them to get out of the business so easily,” she says. Singh agrees. “The current trend will hold. There may be some over-recruitment initially but that will correct itself.

Most banks are looking at expanding their customer base and they are willing to look at people from different backgrounds such as marketing and IT. Movement in the financial services business has been very intense. ABC Search claims that business from recruits for financial services has grown by a 100% over the last six months.

ANZ Grindlays Bank has seen six top-level executives join the bank over the last few months, and if insiders are to be believed, there are still more people expected to join the bank.

However, changing jobs and getting double your previous salary is something of the past. “Today, salaries are marked to business realities. A 15-25% hike is considered a good deal,” says Bali. But the stagnant salaries that finance professionals had to live with have also gone. “Increments are happening but it is only the valued employees that are getting huge increments to keep them from leaving to join other banks,” says Mehra.

Things were not exactly hunky dory for the financial services sector in 1998 and the first half of this year. Those 18 months saw Standard Chartered Bank say good-bye to 1,122 of its employees. HSBC’s voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) had a 100 takers and Citibank eased out over 200 employees through a VRS too.

ANZ Grindlays, in end-1998, through an ‘organisational restructuring programme’, had around 60 senior executives leave the bank. Stanchart’s ‘early separation scheme’ was mostly opted for by staff at the clerical level. The bank has identified a further 200 people as excess staff and these people may leave by the end of the financial year. But things are looking a lot better now.

“From a negative, where people were being laid off, things have turned positive and recruitments are happening all over again. That’s an almost 180 degree turn,” says Mehra.

About 10 months back, the streets might have been full of bankers and investment bankers in search of jobs. Many were willing to take up jobs at smaller banks for less than half their previous pay but the worst may be over. Thanks to the recovering economy. Thanks to the insurance bill. No, thanks to Yashwant Sinha.


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