Speaking to The Financial Express, Milestone Entertainment chairman and managing director Jayant Sharma said the site -- www.milestoneindia.com -- should be up within the next three weeks. "We will have our music catalogue on the Net. It will be an easy medium to learn about our products."

Though the site will start as an electronic catalogue information provider, it will gradually move to a business-to-business model by the middle of next year. This will enable the company to check the inventory position with its dealers through the Net. Besides, order forms will be made available. "It will act as an interface for our retailers," said Sharma.

Milestone is working on a new ERP backbone which will facilitate the working of the business-to-business model. For the Web-enabled ERPsolution, the company is in talks with several vendors.

The next stage will be to move to the business-to-consumer model. This will, however, depend on the government putting cyber laws and security systems in place. Milestone, with its specialisation in distribution, is at an advantage to benefit from selling music online, said Sharma. "As a distributor of major record companies, we have already built the warehouse backbone throughout the country. The strength of our logistics will help us when we start e-commerce."

Though Milestone will not provide downloading facilities yet, the company will use the website for synergistic purposes. Said Rajeev Sharma, vice-chairman and managing director, Milestone Entertainment, "we have identified a novel concept, enhanced CD/CD-ROM samplers, for launching new artists. We are confident that our innovative additions will catch up fast in the industry."

Milestone will also use the Net to promote artistes. The site will have bio-sketches of the artistes, provide theirtouring dates and other sorts of information which surfers can download. For starters, Milestone will make available around 2,000 catalogues. And every month, there will be an addition of 30 albums.

The site will have three broad menus: Corporate Overview, Music Section and Milestone Interactive. However, Milestone Interactive can be accessed directly by logging on to www.milestoneinteractive.com. Milestone Interactive Software is one of the three companies of the group and specialises in interactive games and computer-based training software, targeted at corporates, government, banks, FIs and training institutes. The company has exclusive distribution and licensing arrangements with leading publishers like Activision Inc, Australia and Acclaim Entertainment Ltd, US.

What will be Milestone's strength in e-retailing? "We are content providers. E-commerce will be an additional channel for sales and distribution for us," said Sharma.