Pawan Kumar, chief executive officer of DSQ World.Com, is of the view that shrink-wrapped software can be distributed via the net and the tie-up with Computer Associates will greatly help the bottom line of the company.

"At present piracy rate of software is said to be 62 per cent. The Net can be used as a distribution channel for shrink-wrapped software and revenues of software companies can grow substantially," Pawan Kumar told eFE in an exclusive interview.

The point is well made as the decision to offer software products like Lotus and IBN products on the Net comes at a time when the Indian government has just passed the Information Technology Bill and has decided to tighten up IPR regulations. According to Pawan Kumar the priority of the company will be to focus on ASP, multi-portal and ISP services, but to start with, the company will focus on web-hosted applications providing specialised services in areas like customer relations management (CRM), supply chain management (SCM) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions for corporates.

The company's priority now is the launch of a stock-trading portal through a tie-up with a Mumbai-based stock broker. The portal will be WAP (wireless application protocol) enabled. Besides, the technology back-up for speech-enabled transactions has been identified and will be on offer as the portal goes on stream by July.

Primarily, the service will be targeted to enable non-resident Indians in the US, UK and Singapore to execute stock transactions online.

The company also has an ISP licence and it has already set up high-speed data communication facilities in the four metros and Bangalore. The connectivity is to be extended to cover 15 cities by end-September and the plans are to expand this to 50 cities by the year-end.

According to Pawan Kumar, high bandwidth connectivity is to be provided with a tie-up with AT&T or MCI. The company is going for 8 MBPS connectivity by investing $2 million. Connectivity to US will account for 4 MBPS while 2 MBPS links each will be respectively earmarked for the UK and Singapore.

After the ASP and multi-portal services are launched it is possible that DSQ.World.Com could be converted into a subsidiary of DSQ SoFtware Ltd, Pawan Kumar hinted. Evidently a revenue generating dotcom model with an investment of Rs 175 crore will be better off if it is within the fold of DSQ Software Ltd.