First, the roadmap: "Can you live without it," he asked the Web Developers' Forum of IIW 2000 on Friday. Will it be to your competitive advantage? Finally, what if your competition has it?

Having answered these questions, the next step is to build the context by defining the customer, experience and quality of learning. This is easier said than done considering the complexities involved. But rope in inspired teachers, leverage peer to peer relationships and provide a good environment for learning. "For instance, a guy may not learn much in a cyber cafe if his neighbour is doing distracting things."

The revenue model be dollar-per-practice (service licences), dollar-per-desktop (authorising software licences) or dollar-per-copy (player or distribution licences), Mr Bala said.

"India has a great potential for e-learning," he said, estimating the Indian market for B2C supplemental learning at Rs 1,600 crore. "You are helping the student and the tutor make the paradigm shift. What you do much ease the transportation.... become a mentor," Bala advises. How? Keep the content and methodology simple and deliver something that works quickly. But, be wary of the disadvantages of e-learning: technical complexity in deploying the system and paucity of models to teach. "The more complex the learning is, the more hybrid (online and offline) the model will be, with offline becoming more important."