SME BIZ
K7 COMPUTING
REVERSING THE ORDER OF BUSINESS Deciding what you want to do with your life is not an easy task no matter how old or young you are. But there are those who irrespecive of their age are quite clear on the path they want to tread. BY SANJAY MOHAPATRA
sanjay@smechannels.com
FACTS ABOUT Year of operation in India
:
1991
Headquarter
:
Chennai
Key Executives Direct Presence In
:
Jayaraman Kesavardhanan, (Keseven) Founder and CEO, K7 Computings Consumers/ SoHo/ Enterprise
Key products
:
K7 Business Lite, K7 Business Security, K7 Ultimate Security Gold, K7 Ultimate Security, K7 Total Security, K7 AntiVirus Premium, K7 Anti-Virus Plus, K7 Secure-Web
Website
:
www.k7computing.com
:
A
popular saying says that life is short, who can play faster. How many of us were even sure what we wanted to do at the age of 15 or even start a business? There are some cases, though not many, and one such home grown wonder is founder and CEO of K7 Computing Pvt. Ltd., Jayaraman Kesavardhanan, also known as Keseven in the industry. He realised his potential of developing software at a very young age – right after passing his 10th standard during 1984-85. It was an accidental move for him but definitely worth it. The life changing incident occured when during the summer vacation, he joined an institute of computers and attended a one and half month course on computer programming. It proved to be the turning point in his life. While learning programing Keseven realized that this was what he should pursue. He discontinued his schooling took specialization on system level assembly language. He also learnt the low-level programming and how software and hardware work together. Keseven says, “Somewhere down the line I realised that there was no requirement of systems level programmers as there was not much
opportunity during those times, where one could employ the talent of assembly language. So I did some freelance consulting, helping people to learn system- level language and taught people low-level programming, etc. And it was in 1988, that virus made its appearence. It was easy for me to understand the structure of virus and I distributed a lot of free cure. While doing so I was fascinated by the shareware programmes available those days, as Norton and McAfee were available then. This made me think that if these companies can do so why can’t I. I realized that people were thinking about services, value addition, etc. not product development. Therefore, in 1991, I started a security company named K7 Computing, out of Chennai.” “I was very clear on never moving out of Chennai and the intention was to develop a product from India and take it to the world-wide market because my fascination with the idea that if Norton and McAfee could come to this part of the world why cannot we go to the other partners of the market too.” Of course K7 had its ups and downs but most importantly the company stayed focussed on Antivirus and brought out a great product called VX2000 in those days. Keseven said, “We did a lot
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