eFE INTERVIEW -- Sunil Lulla, Chief executive officer, Indya.com

‘We will enter broadband next year’

The much-talked about Indya.com buyout by Star left several questions unanswered. Issues on the nature of the deal, the consideration paid by STAR and subsequent protests by some minority shareholders have been raised since the deal was announced a few days ago. Indya.com CEO Sunil Lulla took some time off during a press conference in Mumbai to launch Indya Tickets, to touch upon these issues in an interview with Priya Srinivasan.

Why the decision to sell Indya.com at this juncture to Star?
This is a question best answered by the shareholders concerned, all I can say is that they saw synergies between Indya.com and Star’s businesses. It was in the best interests of the company as well.

Is it true that a consideration of $10 million was paid by Star to acquire the rest of the stake in the portal? If so, why the sharp dip in valuation—Star had earlier paid $50 million to acquire 33 per cent in the company?
First of all, we never said $10 million, it was pure conjecture on the part of the papers. We have not disclosed the price of this acquisition.

Was anything paid by Star at all for this acquisition? If so, how much of it was an upfront cash consideration?
Considering that it was an acquisition, some sort of cash payout ispart of the deal, but I am not at liberty to disclose the extent of the payout.

Now that you have a strong ally like Star TV, what are your immediate business plans to leverage this relationship?
There are several possibilities and it is not all about broadband. We have gained the Star franchise network, which is their household brand name. They can drive audiences to us, while we can drive our users to STAR. We have also embarked on content integration and are creating all sorts of interactive services. There are also great synergies for advertisers since we can now offer integrated solutions.

What are your long term plans as far as broadband goes? Also considering that broadband has not really taken off even in markets like the US, what scope do you see here?
We will enter broadband by mid-2002, we feel the market will be ready by then. The US may not be the perfect paradigm to follow in this case. Look at Korea instead where broadband is a success. It is after all a multiplex experience which touches both the television and the PC and delivers several value propositions.

Finally, there have been some issues after the acquisition by Star where minority shareholders claim that they were not kept informed about the sellout, what are your comments on this?
An offer was made by Star to all the shareholders concerned to buyout their stakes, it is untrue that they were not kept in the loop.