How Kovai is reaping benefits by solving enterprises problems?

• Aims to grow to $30m in the next three years and attain unicorn status by 2030.
• Their next product will be launched in the next 12 to 18 months.
• CEO’s objective is to make Coimbatore, a Tamil Nadu state, into the next big SaaS hub in India.
• Aims to scale its headcount at London and Coimbatore offices in the next 18 months and then look at international expansion plans, starting with the US.

Entrepreneurs start with solving a problem for customers and the same is the case for Saravana Kumar, Founder and CEO of enterprise software-as-a-service company – Kovai.co.

Kumar, after working for various companies such as Accenture, Fidelity Investments and Microsoft, came back to London in 2000.

As a software consultant in Microsoft, he identified a problem with Microsoft BizTalk Server, which helps companies to integrate systems.

“I used to be a consultant, working on this particular technology, for 10 years and saw a pattern with all the large customers in finding it difficult to manage, monitor and audit day-to-day operational challenges as Microsoft was not really solving that problem,” Kumar said.

He used to build custom solutions for companies in solving it and decided to launch BizTalk360 to monitor, manage and audit Microsoft BizTalk Server.

First five years, Kovai focused only on Microsoft BizTalk Server and acquired many customers.

Expanding portfolio

Kovai was launched out of a solution designed for a common problem in 2010 and the real product was launched in 2011.

Since 2016, he said that that they have expanded their portfolio and when they identified problems in Microsoft Azure, Document360, a self-service knowledge base solution for SaaS enterprises, was launched in 2017.

Serverless360 is an enterprise product, focused on Microsoft Azure, with human management monitoring capabilities.

“We are building new SaaS products and our idea is to launch a new product every three years. Our next product will be launched in the next eight months,” Kumar said.

Kumar, who started Kovai with five people in London, now has 240 employees with an office in Coimbatore, India.

He said that 95 per cent of their employees are based out of Coimbatore.

With more than 2,000 clients from about 60 countries and $10 million in revenues under its belt, Kumar does not want to sit on the laurels.

IPO on the radar

“Our objective is to get to $30 million in three years.  The internal objective is to become a unicorn by 2030 out of Coimbatore and turn the state into the next big SaaS hub in the country. In technology space, 2030 is a long time and it can happen before that also.

“Unicorn is just a number and a side effect of doing great things. Eventually, for any tech company, the route is well defined, that is to reach an IPO status if possible and that is the end destination.  We don’t want to jump the gun too soon and our key focus is right now to focus on products and maximise revenues,” he said.

Moreover, he said that Kovai will be bootstrapped as much as possible but if there is an opportunity to grow, then “we may consider raising funds. We are sufficient for the next 12 to 18 months,” he said. 

The challenge, Kumar faces, is getting the right talented people as they are adding eight to ten people per month.

“We aim to scale our headcount at London and Coimbatore offices in the next 18 months and then look at international expansion plans, starting with the US. We acquired Cerebrata Software in 2019 and are on the lookout for opportunities such as a company or a good team that can add value to our company,” he said.

The US and Europe contribute 40 per cent to the revenues, 20 per cent from Australia, New Zealand, Japan and the rest are from the rest of the world.

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