India can be a potential market for shared PCs

NEW DELHI: Low-cost shared computing firm NComputing says India could become its second-largest market this year on the back of demand from schools and enterprises in the country. The firm recently completed one of the largest ICT deployments in India covering 1.8 million students across 5,000 schools in Andhra Pradesh.

NComputing���s virtualisation technology enables utilisation of the processing power of one computer by several

devices, thus lowering the cost of computing.

The NComputing device used to enable shared computing, is priced around $70 (about Rs 3,500). Chief marketing officer Raj Shah says the firm is hoping to sell 1.5-2 lakh devices in India this year. ���The work in Andhra Pradesh will give others a comfort level that it���s not an unproven model.���

In Andhra Pradesh, the California-headquartered firm, along with technology partners , completed the deployment in four months. NComputing is now in talks with 15 other states to pilot or execute similar projects.

Mr Shah has been meeting various state government officials to introduce them to PC virtualisation and explore implementation in areas besides education. According to him, The shared computing model can be deployed for kiosks under the e-governance projects and in government offices. Apart from government, the firm is also tapping companies wanting to save on their computing costs. It already has two enterprise clients ��� a call centre and an automobile company.

The company expects more business from enterprises in the current environment. ���In this economic environment of a protracted recession, more and more companies are looking for a smarter way to provide computing to employees ,��� Mr Shah said.

To tap enterprises better, NComputing has appointed Redington as its national distributor last year.