AT PENNYWISE THEY SWEAR BY FINE BALANCE

AFTER GRADUATING FROM BITS, PILANI, THEY DIDN’T SEARCH for a garage for setting up an IT company. Instead they joined leading companies to learn the intricacies of running a business. Predictably, the experience gained and the money earned came in handy when these eight batch mates decided to come together again to give a concrete base to their technology concepts. That’s how Pennywise Solutions was born in June 2003. Set up with an initial investment of about Rs. 29 lac, the company offers application management and enterprise application integration services. It has another division - Wise brand - which deals with online media and advertising services. Besides, the company recently launched a community portal called tolmolbol.com.

"The idea of starting a company was on our minds while we were at BITS. It took three to four years for us to come together again to start a venture. It was easy for us to convince each other as there was this underlying trust that we can pull it off," says Amit Thakral, Vice-President (business development), PennyWise Solutions.

AnandMorzaria, CEO, was the first person to come out of the comfort zone of a highly-paid job with JPMorgan Chase and he persuaded others to join the venture. Besides Anand and his seven batchmates from BITS - B Ananth Vyas (CFO), Pavan Pochu (V.P. Operations), Venkat R Polana (V.P. Operations), Anshuman Dimri (V.P. Business Development), Amiit Thakral (V.P. Business Development), Ritesh Prasad (Director - Portal Operations), the team roped in Arup Kumar Dutta as chief operating officer.

"Currently, we have 50 clients and a chunk of our revenue comes from our services division. We understand the importance of the changing needs in business and make all their business applications easily extensible and scalable for any kind of change. These applications are based on rapid application development methodologies. As part of Wise Brands, we work on algorithms and give them good exposure on the net. We believe our portal. tolmolbol, will drive growth , "  says Amit.

“It is a platform, where one can raise his/her voice, and opinions on businesses, service professionals and local community organisations. Currently, the beta version covers almost all major towns in the country and give information on restaurants, events classified ads and interesting deals. Its also a place to meet friends,” says Rithesh. The companys alsolooking at adding people and developing new technologies to improve its business, “We are looking at adding new features to the community portal and the final version will be launched soon.