SUMMER TRAINING REPORT ON BRANDING & PROMOTION OF STELLAR INFORMATION SYSTEMS LTD STELLAR INFORMATION SYSTEMS LTD

Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of Post Graduate Programme By SURAJ KUMAR BOXI Batch-2011-13 Roll.no-FT-11-1044 IILM Graduate School of Management Greater Noida DECLARATION FORM I hereby declare that the project work entitled BRANDING & PROMOTION OF STELLAR INFORMATION SYSTEMS LTD. submitted by me for the Summer internship during the Po st Graduate Program to IILM Graduate School of Management, Greater Noida is my o riginal work and has not been submitted earlier either to IILM or to any other i nstitution for the fulfilment of the requirements for any other course of study. I also declare that no chapter of this manuscript, either in whole or in part, is copied from any other document. Signature of Student: Signature of Company Mentor: Name of Company Mentor: Name of Student: Designation: Date:Place:Date:Place:TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY..4 INTRODUCTION TO THE PROJECT.5 OBJECTIVE OF THE PROJECT...7 WHAT IS DATA RECOVERY.8 COMPANY OFFERINGS..9 SERVICE OFFERINGS..10 SOFTWARE OFFERINGS 10, 11. SERVICE MODEL12 ORGANISATIONAL STUCTURE..14, 15. SWOT ANALYSIS...16 VALUE DELIVERY SYSTEM18 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY..19 DATA COLLECTION AND SAMPLING...21 DATA ANALYSIS...24 FINDINGS, LIMITATIONS & SUGGESTIONS.28

10. 11.

CONCLUSION.30 LEARNING FROM SIP..31

Executive Summary This project was undertaken in Stellar Information Systems for 8 weeks for the p artial fulfilment of the course. My Industry Mentor Mr. Mani Bassi (Branch Manag er), to cover the entire Delhi-NCR region to brand and promote Stellar Informati on Systems Ltd. This was a sincere effort from my side to explore the awareness regarding data recovery in the market and the brand image of Stellar. The main objective of this study is to explore the market opportunities for the company and the mindset of the target market regarding Data recovery services in India. I adopted Exploratory as the research design for this project as the pro blem at hand was not specific and defined. Research was done through personal in teraction with clients and interview with IT-head of different corporate by a qu estionnaire. In my two months of conquest, I found that awareness regarding the data recovery was low and the image of Stellar was of a high end service provider. Target mar ket found the pricing of services and softwares offered by Stellar are very expen sive.

INTRODUCTION TO THE PROJECT Stellar Information Systems is into the business of data recovery. It is a trust ed data recovery solutions provider to various business houses. Stellar is marke t leader in data recovery as it has no competitors in India. It has its business in 12 major cities and state capitals of India .Besides this it has its offices in Europe (9 major countries) and U.S. (New Jersey). The project undertaken by me is Branding and Promotion of Stellar Information Sys tems It helps us to know the clients feedback and potential of Data recovery servi ces market. Stellar Information Systems provides data recovery services and soft wares for any kind of data crash in media like logical crash, physical crash and logical cum physical crash. The project has not only enlightened my knowledge but I hope my findings and ana lysis will add some value for stellar Information Systems. . The basic model of the questionnaire is based on clients direct approach by me and thus the analysis gives a full review and scenario for Data Recovery Services Industry. COMPANY PROFILE:Stellar Information Systems ltd, is an ISO 9001-2008 certified company specializ ing in data recovery software and data protection software, services and solutio ns. The company was established in 1993 by a group of technocrat professionals w hich is headquartered in Gurgaon and has expanded to new offices and labs in Ahm adabad, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai , Noid

a , Pune and Vashi. With over a decade of experience in this field, Stellar has established itself as a market leader with a proven track record. Equipped with necessary infrastructure and trained manpower Stellar provides accurate, confide ntial and cost effective data safety and integrity solutions to its customers. I t is number one in development of data recovery and data loss prevention softwar e in the whole of South Asian region where it commands a majority of market shar e. Stellar is the only data recovery player to be equipped with CLASS-100 CLEAN ROOM lab facility to ensure effective recovery even in cases of media that is se verely damaged. Stellar data recovery solutions encompass a wide range of softwa re for almost any data loss situation ranging from accidental formats to virus a ttacks to software malfunctions. Most major operating systems are supported in cluding Windows, Macintosh, UNIX, Linux and Novell . Additional data recovery so lutions include recovery from CD-ROMS, Digital Media Recovery (such as digital p ictures or music files),and E-mail recovery. Stellar also provides data protecti on , data back-up, and data erasure software .Stellar Data Recovery services pro vides personalised inspection of damaged storage media that is Hard disks. Trai ned personnel inspect corrupt storage media and then recover lost data using tec hniques ranging from low level repairing of the disk to intensive usage of data r ecovery software. Stellar also provides services on computer forensics to variou s law enforcement agencies .The Company provides electronic discovery services t hat help these agencies to quickly and cost effectively look for data that can b e used as evidence in criminal cases and economic offences. The superior R&D and the highly trained professionals are the driving factors be hind the company huge success. Stellar has an impressive clientele database of c ustomers which bears testimony to this fact. Our customers include large corpora te giants as well as individual users. Over 1,000,000 satisfied customers across 137 countries including USA, UK, Germany, Spain, Italy, France, Australia, U.A. E, Japan have reinforced their faith in Stellar offerings .Stellar wide spread partner network around the globe ensures comprehensive pre-sales and post-sales support to our customers .Since 1993,Stellar is a customer oriented data recove ry solution provider bringing back smiles after critical data loss situations. W ith a strong presence in USA, Europe and Asia, today the company have more than 1 million + happy customers throughout the globe. Our noteworthy clients are Bha rti, BP, BSNL, CBI, Hero Honda, Maruti, RBI, Reliance, SBI, VSNL, Wipro, Cisco S ystems, Citibank, Coca-Cola, Ericson, Honda, KPMG, L&T, McDonalds, Motorola, Pep si, Ray-Ban, Samsung, and other such organizations. Stellar work has been recogn ized and certified by various associations. Some of the awards that Stellar has received over the years are Best Software (awarded at Compass IT exhibition), PC World Editors Choice Award, Best Data Recovery Software Vendor (Techies Award), and so on.

OBJECTIVE OF THE PROJECT

 Understand the business model of the data recovery services and softwares that th e company offer, the clientele they have. To study the brand awareness of Stellar product and services in and around Delhi . 3rd Parties and corporate perception and satisfaction level for its range of pro ducts that provide solution for data recovery. Understand the future prospects of the business. Diagnose problems in the existing modus operandi and anticipated problem. Based on the diagnosis of the existing and anticipated problem, develop growth s trategies and client takeaways which can be customized according to the business need.

WHAT IS DATA RECOVERY Data Recovery basically means taking files that were once damaged or corrupted d ue to natural disasters, virus attacks, user errors, software errors or hard dri ve failures and restoring or retrieving the data in those files. As the instance s of hacking and virus cases escalate, so will the number of people needin g help with their data. Well, it s really not black magic or rocket science. It s just a matter of having the right tools and the knowledge necessary to know wh at to do, much like a surgeon performing heart by-pass surgery. Many prominent d ata recovery facilities have a large array of hardware, software and tools for r ecovering data. Generally speaking when a hard drive is received by a data recov ery firm, the first thing they do is evaluate it, and determine what recovery so lution will be necessary. If the drive failure is a logical issue as mentioned e arlier, then a scan of the drive will be performed to try and repair the file sy stem corruption. Sometimes a partition can be repaired and the drive restored to the status that it was before the failure. If this is not possible, then a very low-level scan will be performed that essentially searches every sector of the hard drive for files. Once the files are located, they can then be copied to the media of choice, i.e. a CD-ROM, DVD-ROM or another hard drive. Logical recoveri es can take up an enormous amount of time, especially if the drive is on the ver ge of physical failure. It s not uncommon to allow for one day of scanning and a day for recovering the found files. If the drive has suffered a physical failur e, then the recovery procedure is quite a bit more challenging. As mentioned abo ve, there are really two sub-categories of physical failure; mechanical and elec

tronic. An important element in recovering data from a physical failure is havin g the necessary parts to get the drive functioning again. Types Hard disk Crash Physical Crash:When drive is making a ticking or a scratching noise due to age or bad parts th e aperture arms in the hard drive can fail ,failed motors or the platters can be come damaged and lose the data that they hold. Physical damage could also be due to mishandling of the drive or circuit failure of the PCB board which is attach ed to the hard drive . Physical damage always causes at least some data loss, an d in many cases due to physical damage the logical structures of the file system also may get damaged , all such damages constitute physical crashes of the hard drive. Another physical issue that sometimes rears its ugly head is an electron ic failure. If you look at a hard drive you will notice a circuit board on the b ottom . This board is basically the brains of the drive , and it is where the co mputer interfaces to the hard drive. An electrical failure can occur unexpectedl y at any time .Even brand new hard drives are not totally immune to have electri cal failures .Sometimes its just a faulty component; sometimes its improper instal lation( i.e. electro-static discharge, grounding out the board , damaging circui try during installation).

Logical Crash:Far more common than physical damage is logical damage to a file system. Logical damage is primarily caused by human error which includes accidental deletion of files, accidentally formatting drive and power outages may cause file system st ructures getting damaged. Logical failures are usually a result of file system c orruption. This can occur due to a virus accidental deletion of key files or reg istry components and in some cases even electro-static discharge. In most cases where a logical failure has occurred, the drive is still recognized by the syste m BIOS, but it will not boot. In most cases your data should still be intact on the drive, even though it may appear to be inaccessible.

COMPANY OFFERINGS:-

SERVICE OFFERINGS:Stellar offers data recovery services from all data storage media across any OS platform: Hard Disk USB Drive DVD Blue Ray Disk Solid State Disk Digital Media RAID Configured Multi Disk(0,1,2,3,4,5,5e) NAS

SOFTWARE OFFERINGS: #Apart from Data Recovery Services, Stellar deals in Data Recovery software as w ell. Since Stellar has its own R&D, so it develops its Proprietary Software, whi ch helps in Data Recovery & Data safety. Stellar Phoenix DO IT YOURSELF SOFTWARE SUITES is a perfect collection or range of softwares that comes in different suite s( Enterprise suite, Business+ Suite, Business Suite, Standard Suite) .In order to meet the organisational requirement in creating a first level of deterrent to data loss. Some attributes of softwares: Easy installation Do it yourself suites Free Demo with preview of recoverable files Live Updates 24*5 Technical support Online Upgrade Affordable Solution

The widest range of data recovery, password recovery, email recovery, file repai r etcare as follows:(a)Data Recovery: Window data Recovery Novell Linux CD-ROM Macintosh(HFS &HFS+) Photo Unix (b)File Recovery: Windows file recovery Deleted file recovery Word recovery Excel recovery Access recovery Zip (c) Email recovery: Mailbox Standard Outlook PST repair

Exchange Desktop (d)Prevent Data Stellar Stellar Stellar Stellar loss: Data Care Suite Shield Insta Backup SMART

(e) Safe Data Eraser

SERVICE MODEL At Stellar, We believe that your data crash causes are different so are our serv ice plans. We have devised various service plans so that it suits your need as p er the crash scenario. Keeping up the tradition of achieving total customer sati sfaction, Stellar indigenously develops tools & Processes which are Read-Only an d does not harm the data status on the crashed media irrespective of the outcome of the recovery process. Data Recovery Process At Stellar we respect your valuable time and has evolved a strict documented pro cess as per ISO 9001:2000 norms to ensure confidentiality, consistency & transpa rency each time every time. Stellar uses Read-Only processes on your crashed med ia so that your media status is not changed irrespective of the recovery process outcome. Customer is required to fill - in a media assessment form and provide it along with the media at our Data Recovery labs. Outstation customers need to follow the instructions on how to pack their media & send it to nearest Stellar Data Recovery Lab Once the media is received; the crashed media is assigned a unique job reference id, which would be helpful for the customer in future correspondence. Evaluation of the Media at our Data Recovery Labs: Once media for data recovery along with necessary details reach our lab, our spe cialists will analyze the nature and amount of corruption/damage, its probable ca use, assessing and working out the fastest data recovery process. The Evaluation of your media will be done free of cost by our data recovery spec ialists. In Post Evaluation we submit the following details: 1. An estimate of the percentage of data recovery possible. 2. The time involved in the data recovery process. 3. The Cost estimate for data recovery job. The Evaluation report along with the quotation is sent across to the customer th rough- email/telephone/fax

Recovery of your data from the media: Based on the Evaluation report provided by our Data Recovery specialists, custom er can give his consent whether we should proceed with the Data Recovery job or not. Once the customer agrees to the above, he needs to send across a work order . Our specialists would start the recovery process and ensure that the recovery

of data is done to your satisfaction. Handing over the data to the customer: Once the Data recovery process is complete, the customer care executive / coordi nator sends you the Directory Listing in a text file on E-mail alternatively you may also verify your Data at the Stellar Lab and register your written acceptan ce by E-mail/Fax. The Data is delivered on a Free DVD or on hard disk supplied by customer. Service Options We understand that your circumstances and need for a recovery is different each time. To suit your need we have introduced a number of service options. The serv ice plans are categorized into Off-site (In-Lab) and On-site (Customers Premises) and offer a wide range of service deliverables. To know more about each plan, c ontact your nearest data recovery lab. We offer Standard & Priority Service plans for both Off-site (In Lab) and On-sit e (Customer premises) data Recovery Services. Standard Plan Evaluation Recovery Process Logical Crashes 4 Business Hours 3-4 Business Days * Physical Crashes 4 Business Hours 5-6 Business Days* Priority Plan Evaluation Recovery Process Logical Crashes With-in 4 Hours With in 48 Hours Physical Crashes With-in 4 Hours With in 48 Hours Stellar provides both On-Site & Off-Site data recovery solution. QUALITY POLICY:Achieving total customer satisfaction by delivering data security and safety thro ugh quality -products, services, solutions and training. Aiming for the continuous improvement in our services and products through struc tured employee training programs and involvement of our business partners. ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE OF STELLAR INFORMATION SYSTEMS LTD. BUSINESS UNIT

TECHNICAL UNIT

SWOT ANALYSIS STRENGHT 1. Worldwide presence. 2. 1,100,000 satisfied clients. 3. CLASS 100 Clean Room lab. 4. 100% data recovery guarantee. 5. Employs special techniques and proprietary tools for data recovery. 6. 39 Recovery Engineers. 7. 60 R&D specialists in data handling. 8. Dedicated technical support team and helpdesk 24*5. 9. 54 Indigenous recovery software 10. 12,000+ spare hard disk inventory. 11. Strong brand name in the market.

WEAKNESS 1. High pricing policy. 2. Strict adherence to priority service. 3. Lack of interest shown among 3rd parties for the business provided by st ellar. 4. Lack of aggressive marketing. 5. Lack of manpower in sales force.

OPPORTUNITIES 1. Large untapped market. 2. Increasing usage of computers in corporate 3. Signing up with local 3rd parties to Stellar. 4. Tapping the increased volume of educational institutes, travel agencies. 5. Rapid growth in industrial sector and huge volume of data being daily ex changed and stored which needs backup and recovery.

THREATS 1. Margins are likely to be under pressure as competition with other player will intensify 2. No entry barriers for new entrants, such as new multi nationals and othe r local 3rd parties. 3. Customer inclination towards low- priced product and services rather tha n quality. 4. Free data recovery softwares available online. STELLAR VALUE DELIVERY SYSTEM:

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY Marketing research is the process collecting and analyzing marketing information and ultimately arriving at certain conclusion. Management in any organization n eed information about the potential market and to design plans as per the changi ng Market scenario. Marketing research includes all the activities that enable a n organization to obtain the vital information. This research is very important in strategy formation and Promotion of the company. There are many type of research some are causal, descriptive, explorative etc. e ach research type is being used for various purposes. In this research I have us ed explorative research methodology; I tried to figure out opportunities and fut ure threats lying in the market for Stellar Information Systems Ltd. and tried t o promote the company and enhance its awareness in the market. Research design is the plan, structure and strategy of investigation conceived s o as to obtain to research problem and control variances. It is the specificatio n of methods and procedures for acquiring the information needed. It is overall operational pattern or framework of the project that stipulated what information is to be collected and from which source and by what procedure. TYPE OF RESEARCH CARRIED OUT: In my project work I used exploratory research, as it aim to answering question about sale, brand availability, service quality, etc. In the new era of globaliz ation there is immense competition between various brands. Thus in the new age m arketing brand image is extremely crucial & awareness of brand image leads to in crease in sales. Dealers play a vital role in positioning the brand at the right

place & at the right time. They are the basic marketers of a product & basicall y help in creating a picture frame in the consumers mind about the image of the product. Thus utmost importance must be given to dealers satisfaction & emphasis should be given on meeting their requirement.

MY FIELD WORK : To meet with clients (3rd parties as well as Corporate) Maintain Clients relationship. Identifying new clients, managing existing clients. Its not a sales job as such with targets but we need to promote our company produ cts. The main products of our company are related to data recovery(softwares). Our softwares come in different suites like (Enterprise suite, Business+ suite, B usiness suite, Standard suite & PST suite) So basically we are supposed to explain the details of these softwares with their use and validity.

DATA COLLECTION & SAMPLING To achieve the objectives, the primary as well as secondary sources of data are used. PRIMARY DATA SECONDARY DATA

PRIMARY DATA: Primary data is that kind of data which is collected by the investigator himself for the purpose of the specific study. The data such collected is original in c haracter and authentic. We interviewed without any structured set of questions j ust to know the brand awareness of the company. The valuable feedbacks, knowledg e about company, perception towards its products are some primary data for my re search work. SECONDARY DATA: When an investigator uses the data that has been already collected by others is called secondary data. The secondary data could be collected from Journals, Repo rts and Various Publications. The advantages of secondary data can be economical , both in the term of money and time spent. The company past reports, various we bsites, books, and assistance from company employees are my secondary data used in this research.

The data were collected through the following methodical techniques in the prese nt project work. 1. 2. Through interview Through observation

INTERVIEW METHOD: Interview method helps in getting an insight into the prospective clients mind. I adopted this method as I needed to promote my company in the market as well as try building an image among them. This helped me in gathering personal and prof essional information regarding data recovery as well the image of stellar in the market. For this purpose, various questions were asked randomly to the customer s and their vital feedbacks were collected. With this method I was also able to clear the doubts of the customer regarding data recovery issues such as data lea kage and data revival possibility in case of physical data damage. OBSERVATION METHOD: During the project work, I contact the 3rd parties and Corporate particularly an d find their opinion about the Stellar Information Systems. In the observation m ethod the researcher himself collects the necessary information by observing the phenomenon. Observation may be conducted on in the natural field or in the form of experiment. I used uncontrolled observation that takes place in the natural setting. Agents and customer are free to express their felling about the product and services offered by the company. The observation method gave me an idea abo ut the satisfaction level of customer and agents and gained the precious knowled ge about the market situation which made me understand the need of data recovery in different form of business (manufacturing companies, service companies, 3rd parties etc..) . SAMPLE COLLECTION Data has been collected from various areas and agencies (3rd Parties as well as Corporate). Sample size of agents covered: 1000 Other information related to project has been taken from company website. TYPES OF SAMPLING DESIGN STRATIFIED RANDOM SAMPLING: - A stratified random sampling is divided into mutua lly exclusive and mutually exhaustive strata or sub group and then a simple rand om sample is selected with in each of the strata or sub group. Reasons:1. As I was assigned various areas in and around Delhi. 2. Clients (3rd parties & Corporate) were homogenous in nature which was st udied exhaustively. 3. Segmenting customer or client base in order to target them in a better w ay.

DATA ANALYSIS 1. HAVE YOU HEARD THE NAME OF STELLAR INFORMATION SYSTEMS LTD.?

2.

HAVE YOU EVER FACED DATA RECOVERY ISSUE?

3.

WHAT MEASURES DO YOU TAKE INCASE OF DATA LOSS?

4.

ARE YOU SATISFIED WITH THE SERVICES PROVIDED BY STELLAR?

5.

WHAT ARE THE MAJOR OBSTACLES IN AVAILING SERVICES FROM STELLAR?

6.

MARKET SHARE OF STELLAR INFORMATION SYSTEM IN ORGANISED SECTOR?

7.

BUSINESS BREAK DOWN

FINDINGS:Based on the data acquired from the one to one interaction with people at 3rd pa rties agency and corporate, the following are the diagnosed business problems: Pricing of the services and softwares provided by Stellar is 4-5 times more than the local vendors. Large corporate are satisfied by the high quality performance delivered by Stell ar. One of the major problems is lack of professionalism in the area of Business Dev elopment. They highly lack communication skills, client satisfaction, service or ientation which is the imperatives of this trade. 3rd Parties are sceptical about sending the hard disk to stellar as they find th eir customers unwilling to pay high price. Stellar having its presence strategically placed in 12 major cities helps it to get business PAN India. Class 100 Lab standing as its USP is highly attractive for the corporate and dat a security guarantee plays pivotal role in alluring those who fear going to kina ra vendors for data recovery and get themselves vulnerable to duplication and da ta leakage.

LIMITATION: Complete Delhi region could not be studied exhaustively but relatively 1000 comp anies and 3rd parties were taken into consideration. Some of the clients were unwilling to devote time and information needed for thi s project. Few of the data was collected using the help of the internet which may or may no t be 100% accurate. Scorching heat at times left me exhausted and sapped my energy which again was a big hurdle.

SUGGESTIONS: Need to increase the sales force. Pricing needs to be competitive and hence there needs to be reduced. Needs to market itself aggressively tap the large developing market. Attractive incentives and rewards needs to be given to 3rd parties to allure the m into giving their major chunk of business. Major business for WIPE software lies with the CAs and law firms and hence speci al attractive packages needs to be designed.

CONCLUSIONS:Lately, in India, an increase in the level of competition and market demands, to gether with increased dependence on technology for core business processes has n ecessitated the need for data recovery by companies. Another sector which has gr own tremendously is the software and ITES sector. As corporate networks get comp lex and data capture and storage becomes challenging, the industry is bound to s ee a shift towards replication of critical resources, business applications and processes. Data recovery as a networking solution, although new at this point of time, will become routine for corporate in near future. Hence it is very necess ary for the company increase its brand value and position itself as the #1 Data Recovery Company.

LEARNING FROM SIP:Theoretical Perspective :Dos & Donts In case of Hard Disk crash: Check all the connections of the media (power and data connections). If this fails, try connecting the same media on another working machine. If the above measure also fails, confirm whether the controller card is Ok. If every above given effort fails, immediately stop working on the media and con tact us. Don t run any repair utility because these utilities can further aggravate the p roblem. These utilities are made to rectify any anomalies in the file system & g et you working and not to recover your data. Don t let anybody, even your support engineer, experiment with the media. Don t work on the media. Practical Perspective: Client handling is a difficult task where in a thorough knowledge of your produc t and services and high degree of professionalism is required to undertake the t ask. 2 months of extensive marketing and promotional drive for stellar information sy stems ltd helped us to inculcate the various business models present in the mark et and changing perspective of data recovery as per the specific clients. This project also helped me to implement the theoretical concepts of marketing i mbibed by me in my PGDM into practical application in the real market scenario.

BIBLOGRAPHY www.stellarinfo.com www.google.com Knowledge shared by mentor Company brochure and reports.