Balachandran acquires under 5 per cent stake in Allsec

Priya Srinivasan

Mumbai, April 26 : MR Bala V Balachandran, distinguished Professor in accounting, information systems and decision sciences at the JL Kellogg Graduate School of Management has acquired “under 5 per cent” stake in Chennai-based Allsec Technologies Ltd — a response management company with a wholly owned subsidiary the US called Allsectech Inc.

Mr Balachandran has made a capital investment in the company, though he did not disclose the extent of the investment and has joined the board of directors.

“We really need someone who can help us enter markets like the US and Mr Balachandran’s ability to do that means much more than a capital investment for us,” says Allsectech Inc president A Saravanan.

“I have taken a very small equity stake in the company and my primary function is to represent startups like these in the US” says Mr Balachandran.

Allsec Technologies is also in the process of raising $5.5 million to $6 million to fund a 500 seat call centre in Chennai according to Mr Saravanan. The investors comprise one of Allsec’s clients alongwith financial institutions. Mr Saravanan added that Allsec’s centre in Chennai went live in January this year and the company services two global companies out of this centre. Though he did not disclose the names of these clients, he said that one was a Fortune 100 company while the other was an international credit card company.

The company has presence in India and the US. While its call centre operations are Chennai-based, the company’s marketing operations are conducted out of the US.

Allsec Technologies was set up by entrepreneurs R Jagadish and A Saravanan and the board of directors comprises other prominent members like Lucent Technologies director R&D Dilip Patel. The company’s US office provides first level customer support for clients of the call centre and continuous monitoring of the level of performance of the call centre.