Everonn to hive off higher education business

Educational and skills training firm Everonn is restructuring and redefining its focus areas. The company is exiting higher education and other capital intensive businesses. The Dubai-based GEMS group, which took full charge of the company in March after it acquired stakes through preferential allotment, is repositioning the education service provider. The official takeover had happened in early 2012. The company, whose revenues dropped to just Rs 10.47 crore in the June quarter from Rs 115.01 crore in the March quarter is bleeding, forcing it to restructure operations in an effort to stay afloat. “We want to position ourselves as a technology service and content provider. Earlier, we were buying hardware and running centres. We will slowly hive off these businesses or sell them to our partners, whom we will then service with our technology,” said MD of Everonn Education A Srinivasan, who was appointed in April. The new focus areas for the company are skill training, technology platforms and K-12 (kindergarten to Class 12) segment. “We are going back to our core strengths, which lie in software and skills training,” said Srinivasan. “Side ventures take too much bandwidth. We were buying hardware, doing software and running centres on franchisee models. We will get out of such highly capital-intensive businesses.” The company is also looking to exit remote-delivery platform for schools, which it was developing earlier, as the market is not ready and infrastructure problems will prove to be a bottleneck, he said. He also said the company will move out of test preparation for higher education but will continue in the school and skill segment. “Rather than running our own centres, we would look to sell software to established classes to increase their reach,” said Srinivasan. On the skills side, while government tenders are the main source of revenue, the company is also actively looking at the business generated from the corporate social responsibility regulation. “We have already done work for companies like Michelin and TVS. Healthcare and vocational training would be our main focus within this space,” said Vivek Harinarain, CEO of Everonn Skill Development, subsidiary of Everonn Education. The skill subsidiary earned around Rs 33 crore revenue, which it aims to increase to Rs 100 crore by next year, he said. Source: Education News