Indians target down under in global push

Friday 2nd February 2001

REVENUE SHARERS: Ambrish Desai, Manish Desai and Himanshu Ashar are the original partners in an email service provider that rewards heavy users by sharing its revenues with them

By S V Venkataraman

An Indian-based email service provider has gone global by entering the competitive New Zealand market with not just free services but also a share in its revenues for heavy users.

Chequemail.com was launched in Mumbai (Bombay) in October 1999 by Manish Desai, a computer engineer with expertise in developing a number of commercial websites. His other partners in the venture are his brother, Ambrish, who is responsible for marketing, and Himanshu Ashar, a chartered accountant who has the finance role.

The company has quickly grown - with more than 230,000 registered users. Explaining the company's philosophy, Manish Desai says: "There is more to the net than communication and buying and selling products. It is a medium of expression and building communities with potential waiting to be explored."

Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India holds 30% of Cheque.com shares while the Desai brothers and Mr Ashar own the rest.

Ambrish Desai says the company's purpose is simple: "We reward regular users by sharing a minimum of 30% of our revenues. It is easy and has no strings attached; all that the users must comply with is to log into the mail service at least 30 times a month.

"As well as email, the website offers a plethora of community building and personal services including discussion groups, greetings, reminders, bookmarks and a number of other privileges."

Eligible users receive quarterly payments, representing a share of the income earned by the company.

"We don't promise to make you rich," Ambrish Desai says, admitting disbursements thus far have been modest. But he says the concept is set to grow and offers a number of other benefits.

New Zealand is the first choice for the company's international launch. Manish Desai said the decision was largely influenced by the country's potential as an international e-commerce market place.

"New Zealand has one of the world's highest internet penetrations and the potential to replicate Ireland's highly successful economic model. Our office in Auckland provides services to users in New Zealand and Australia."

The key to the company's future success would be its ability to establish an accurate database. Advertisers form the backbone of its existence and Ambrish Desai says proprietary software has been developed to provide efficient services. The back-end operations and technology will remain based in India.

"This software can be used by advertisers to target their messages to users both online and offline."

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