2004-05 was a year of investments, scaling up, consolidation and structural metamorphosis for your Company. During the year, HTMT morphed into a Global Delivery IT/BPO Company with the inclusion of Philippines, USA, Canada and Mauritius in its delivery Platform.This was made possible by our all cash 100% acquisition of two companies at a cost of over US$ 22 million in phases (US $ 10 mn in 2005 - 06). As a result,HTMT's global IT/BPO revenues increased by 43% to Rs. 201 crores from Rs. 141 crores in the previous year.
Your Company has initiated steps to set up branches at all its international delivery locations. On completion of this process, the financial performances of all the international locations of HTMT would be combined with that of Indian operations thereby improving integration and ensuring seamless global operations,financial reporting and control.

IT/BPO business environment
Companies globally are focusing more on core activities and their business models are changing,providing for outsourcing of non-core activities and scaling down work force. India can only stand to gain;however, there will have to be greater value addition.

The industry is expected to get to US$ 50 bn in service exports by 2008 with 1.2 mn qualified people employed, the annual supply of people being 180,000.The domestic market will be US$ 20 bn and may require half-a-million people. Issues like Security,infrastructure and telecommunication should be focused on for the continued health of BPO industry in India.

Transformation into a Global Company
We had entered 2004-05 with a clear vision of transforming HTMT into a significant global player in the BPO space. All the key pre-requisites for this transformation of low client concentration, largerbusiness footprint leveraging the best skill sets that different geographies have to offer, enhanced depth of the Company's expertise in domains, technologies and processes, reallocation of strategic, financial & management resources and strong marketing front end were addressed by us during the year; thus smoothly ushering in the shift from one-off offshore sourcing to a more mature, distributed global delivery model.

The acquisitions of Source One Communications Inc,USA and Customer Contact Centre Inc, Manila added many marquee clients to HTMT's customer list,strengthened its front end in USA and expanded the Company's canvas of domain expertise from just Telecom, Insurance and Discrete Manufacturing to now include BFSI, Pharmaceuticals, Consumer Electronics, Household Products, Energy and Utilities.

Strategic entry into Domestic BPO space
During the year, HTMT was successful in getting prestigious domestic contracts in the telecom and insurance verticals. The Domestic BPO space not only provides HTMT with an opportunity to leverage its contact center domain expertise, superior technology but also broaden its customer base profitably with inclusion of highly respected Indian companies.

Investment in infrastructure and new acquisitions
In 2004-2005, HTMT invested approx. Rs. 65 crores on capex and various acquisitions. In the current In the current financial year, HTMT has taken on lease new premises at Hyderabad and Chennai for adding approximately 500 seats at each centre.

HTMT has also initiated implementation of prestigious project for creating an IT park named 'HTMT Cyberpark' in Manila, Philippines. HTMT Cyberpark is proposed to be operational by this year and will have a total capacity of over 2,500 seats.

Your Company's inorganic growth continued with the recent acquisition of Immaculate Interactions,a Bangalore based call center specializing in outbound/telemarketing space.

Media subsidiaries and other investments
While the Company is well on its way to achieve the vision of becoming a scale player in its core business of IT, the potential of Media subsidiaries of the Company is yet to be exploited to the fullest.A favourable decision on conditional access system (CAS) implementation from the High Court will definitely change the fortunes of these subsidiaries.The over crowding of the analog spectrum with over 300 channels now beamed over the country, as against over 100 channels earlier, has enabled IndusInd Media & Communications Limited (IMCL) to exploit its network efficiently. The broadband Internet Company In2Cable is leveraging IMCL's cable network to enhance it customers and revenue. Your Company's television content arm InNetwork Entertainment Limited continues to offer high quality entertainment to its viewers and is regularly in the process of updating its valuable content library for use over digital platforms

HTMT's 3.45% effective financial stake in the consolidated Hutch entity, Hutchison Essar Ltd, one of India's most valuable telecom companies will unlock enormous wealth for the shareholders. Your Company is in talks with various financial / strategic investors in this regard. It will be the endeavor of your Company to maximize its returns from this investment and will divest the stake at an opportune moment.

With the real estate market doing well, the value of your Company's 47 acres land at Bangalore near the proposed international airport road has grown significantly. The construction of new international airport will give a further boost to the value of this property.

HR Policy
The pro-active HR policy of your Company is well aligned with its business strategy of delivering differentiated value offerings to its clients. Within its policy framework, creativity and productivity have flourished, flexibility and profitability go hand-in-hand and work/life balance and hard work are not mutually exclusive. Your Company recognizes that employees are its most important assets, which provide it with the much needed competitive advantage. A very well thought out Incentive Plan coupled with the introduction of Employee Stock Options Scheme in the forthcoming years shall ensure higher employee morale and increase in employee productivity.

Continued Emphasis on Corporate Governance
As your Company expands its presence across multiple geographies, it is gearing up to uphold its tradition of meeting or exceeding the highest standards of corporate governance and would continue to ensure transparency to all its stakeholders and professionalism while maintaining highest standards of ethics

Outlook
The strategic plan of HTMT to grow its operations through restructuring and through organic and inorganic growth initiatives, in fulfillment of its vision of becoming a scale player, is in place for the period 2005-2010. This plan emphasizes on Inorganic Growth as a key focus area. With innovation as a distributed capability across the Company and co-creation of value in partnership with clients as its goal, HTMT will continue to inspire the confidence of the clients forgetting a steady flow of new business.
With all the necessary pieces now in place in theCompany's business model and ability to leverage the financial and operational resources, HTMT is ready to take off to the next level. The current deal flows in the BPO business, strong pipeline, recognition by customers, willingness among employees to compete and provide with a sense of accomplishment of building a global IT/BPO Company within a short span fills us with a sense of excitement to look forward to the Company's future growth.

I take this opportunity to sincerely thank the shareholders and the clients for the trust reposed on us and the employees for their unstinted co-operation and commitment.