The franchising portal expects to secure revenues of Rs 1 crore in the first financial year and around Rs 5-6 crore in the second year. Says Kapil Mohan Dhingra, chief operating officer, Indus Franchising: ``We expect positive cash flows in the first quarter of the second financial 2001-02 (on an expenditure of Rs 1.25 crore).''

How? According to the gameplan, the B2B portal is intended to create a platform for interaction and transaction between franchisors, franchising services providers and prospective franchisees. The franchising business has expanded from apparel, footwear and restaurants to IT education, healthcare, entertainment, cyber kiosks and e-commerce.

The new franchising development activities are estimated to constitute Rs 500 crore market in India. Says Dhingra, ``A franchisor typically spends Rs 80,000-Rs 1.25 lakh in the acquisition of a franchisee. Our exchange will eliminate inefficiencies involved in the conventional way of sourcing franchisees (like placing ads) and reduce costs significantly.''

The company is beginning with a registration fee for franchisees (Rs 450 for six months per franchisee) and franchisors (Rs 14,000 for four months per franchisor) before launching transaction-based fee revenue stream, when it will charge success fees on the implementation of the deal.

Transaction-based fees are expected to account for over one-third of revenue in the year 2001-02. Towards this end, the portal will appoint its own franchisees who will undertake city-specific franchising sourcing initiatives. Under this model, a franchisee will secure 60 per cent of transaction and the Indus Franchising 40 per cent.

Between February 1, 2001 and 2002, Indus Franchising will set up a team of 45-50 franchisees. In line with a national roll out-starting with focusing on north, the portal will move to south, west and east in the next six months-the portal is expected to have 20 employees by the year-end which will double by 2002.

The portal's technology partner is 4Cplus.com Ltd (who have created tehelka.com). To bring the site closer to regional markets, the site will also be offered in vernacular languages like Hindi, Gujrati, Tamil and Bengali. The company has started making presentations to franchisors (estimated to be around 800 in the country). Says Dhingra, ``We expect 40 franchisors by next month and around 200 by March 2001.''

The portal has also initiated the first ever annual survey on franchising to create a structured body of information on the franchising sector and find out franchisee selection practices and franchisee business practices. The survey is being coordinated by Rajiv Dant, an exponent of channel management and franchising at Boston University in the US.

According to the company, the survey will help firstfranchsing.com in creating quality information in an arena where there are no disclosure norms, franchsing laws and business practices.

It is also working closely with Franchising India 2000, which will travel to 10 cities in the next four months, to secure new opportunities and to reach out to the franchise community. To make the portal interactive, Indus Franchsing will tie-up with leading national and international franchisee consultants, including franchisee writer Nany R Scott. Call it a network for networkers.