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Spotlight
Security all the way
Having tasted success in Japan, the company is now looking
to make its mark at home. Deepalakshmi Krishnamurthy profiles K7, a security
pioneer
 K7
Computing, the Chennai based anti-virus company has launched ‘Total Security’,
a complete desktop security solutions recently in India. ‘Total Security’
is actually a renamed version of ‘Virus Security’, software used by
nearly four million users in Japan.
Total Security claims to be a complete IT security solution with features like
anti-virus, anti-spam, anti-spyware, firewall, privacy and system monitor. It
is designed to deliver the maximum while consuming minimal resources.
Though started in 1991, by J Kesavardhanan (CEO & CTO),
the company did not do well, even after tasting initial success. This resulted
in moving away from the Indian market for seven years. The company is back with
this new venture, with a revamped marketing strategy and of course, with a quality
product.
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 "People
lock their safe or cupboard as they know there are valuables in it but
many don’t lock the system as they don’t think that the data
is valuable"
- J Kesavardhanan
CEO & CTO, K7 Computing
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Kesavardhanan started his career as a system programmer. “I
like being a programmer and still write programs for my company,” says
Kesavardhanan He started writing cures for specific virus and released his first
anti-virus software called Vx2000. His software was provided as a complimentary
product along with SysReader, a magazine for programmers. Vx2000 was primarily
for DOS as it was the only operating system that prevailed at that point of
time.
K7 Computing was started in a room of an apartment with a
couple of programmers and a rented computer. It was largely a one-man show.
“The initial response was good and I promoted the company by issuing cures
as freeware for some common viruses,” said Kesavardhanan adding, “I
gave the cure for Dir2, a notorious virus then, for free of cost.” This
gave him huge publicity and helped popularize his anti-virus solution.
The popularity however didn’t help the firm to grow because of some wrong
decisions.
“I am bad at business,” admits Kesavardhanan. K7 Computing was still
running as a one-man show and he had too many sectors to concentrate upon. “I
made the mistake of marketing the product directly and not opting for any distributors,”
accepts Kesavardhanan. He could not convert prospective clients.
Realizing his blunders, he decided to close his branches and concentrate on
raising his product’s profile. Computing was no longer the same. “IT
security is more than anti-virus now and K7 worked on developing a total desktop
security solution,” said Kesavardhanan.
It was at that point of time that the company struck a deal with Japanese company
Sourcenext. K7 reduced its manpower from 80 to just 12 and it evolved into a
development company with Sourcenext taking care of marketing. Virus Security
was launched in 2003.
Things started working in favor of K7. Virus Security was a success in Japan
with over four million users and a market base of 25% and growing. Currently
Virus Security is ranked as the second best selling anti-virus software in Japan.
After tasting success in Japan, K7 Computing has turned to the Indian market
after seven years.
 K7
has launched Virus Security in India under the brand name Total Security.
“I don’t want to repeat my mistakes,”
said Kesavardhanan. He has roped in John Devashayam who will take
care of marketing, and concentrates only on development. K7 computing
has also appointed Compuage Infocom as its national distributor.
“We are going to sell our product through a partnership model,”
he added.
The company plans to create awareness on IT security. Kesavardhanan feels the
awareness of IT security is still weak amongst Indian PC users. “People
lock their safe or cupboard as they know there are valuables in it but many
don’t lock the system as they don’t think that the data is valuable.”
K7’s main objective to start the company was to create an international
product from India. “In most international products like Norton or McAfee,
Indians are involved in the development, but there aren’t many indigenous
companies,” he said.
Being an Indian company is an advantage in India but that is not going to drive
the marketing. “We’ll be marketing our product based on our salient
features like usage of limited resources, lower cost, better performance and
so on,” he said.
With the technology expanding, the company intends to concentrate on bringing
out an anti-virus solution for mobiles.
k.deepalakshmi@expressindia.com
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