Leading The Allied Forces

An 80% revenue growth in a slow market was a crowning glory for Nitin Shah
of Allied Digital. He is only too proud to be recognized as one of the fastest
growing SIs in the country. Nitin’s sights are now set on joining the leagues
of Wipro and HCL.

He started his career as an engineer. Today he is one of the fastest growing
systems integrators in the country. While his professional life may be dotted
with success stories, the man remains the same at heart and true to his beliefs.
Meet Nitin Shah, the leading force behind Allied Digital Services, a company
that is striding its way up to join the leagues of Wipro and HCL.

RE-STRATEGIZING PAYS UP

Nitin lives his life with a ‘never give-up’ attitude. And it is this
attitude that saw his company record 80% growth in revenues and a whopping 300%
jump in profits last fiscal. Allied’s revenue for 2002-03 stands tall at Rs
105 crore.

NITIN SHAH EYE-CATCHING ACTION Created direct presence in 56 locations across the country Achieved 80% revenue and 300% profitability growth Completed GAIL project in eight weeks across 53 locations Initiated strong brand-building exercise

"Re-strategize. That’s exactly what we did at Allied," explains
Nitin. In what he calls a ‘hyper-competitive’ market, Nitin decided to
implement changes with regards to three factors. These were: technology,
marketing and overall economic scenario. He further increased the technological
depth of the company by having 80% of his workforce with pure technology
backgrounds.

The other 20% was meant for commercial purposes. On the marketing front, he
invested on infrastructure and resources, and at the same time expanded his
reach. Today, Nitin credits the direct reach that he offers to customers at 56
locations across the country as his biggest USP. And he doesn’t sound a bit
over-ambitious while talking of increasing this number to over 70 by the
year-end.

HITTING THE HEADLINES

There were a number of achievements that kept Nitin and Allied Digital in
the headlines. The most prominent among these were the systems integration
project from Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL), WLAN implementation projects
at Oberoi and Taj and getting the MPR (Master Parts Reseller) status from HP.

Of all this, Nitin considers the GAIL project as the most memorable one. In
less than two month’s time the company deployed nearly 1,500 systems and
migrated data from old systems to new ones. And all this spread across 53
diverse locations throughout the country.

With a workforce of over 600 people, he has ensured that each of his customer
gets undivided attention. No matter which part of the country and what time of
the day.

EMPOWERER OF EMPLOYEES

By now, one may almost starts to wonder whether Allied Digital Services is
all about Nitin Shah? While it looks so, it isn’t so. Nitin’s true success
comes from the very fact that he has empowered his employees to the extent that
today he doesn’t get involved in any kind of transaction-based affairs.

Previously, he used to drive the technological initiatives for the company.
Now, he prefers to oversee the managerial and financial aspects of the
organization. Even his taste of book-reading has changed. "Now I read more
books on management strategies than technology," states Nitin.

Nitin has lot of serious thoughts on his mind. Brand-building is one of them.
While the company is doing everything right, branding is where it has been
lacking so far. And for the near future, that’s where Nitin is going to put
his focus on.

Creating a brand, which is as widely-recognizable as an Infosys or Wipro, is
what he is aspiring for. And for a person who has always believed in his
convictions and worked with a vision, accomplishing this task too doesn’t look
far from achievable.