Q&A With Promod Haque: “I am upbeat about wireless, online payments, IPTV and new content distributi

The Hindu Business Line: An interview with Promod Haque, Managing Partner of Norwest Venture Partners. His firm currently manages more than $1.8 billion in venture capital out of its office in Palo Alto, California. It has invested in Indian companies like Persistent Systems. Haque is upbeat about wireless and media business in India. Excerpts:

Q. What have been the key trends this year?
As mobile users in India are increasing, wireless data services and products continue to be extremely interesting investment opportunities for our firm. India also has low credit card penetration, and we believe there are opportunities for companies to create alternate online payment methods.
There are also tremendous opportunities in the media/broadcasting sector. Broadcasting is changing. In the past it was done through satellite and cable. In the future it will be done over the Internet. This will be taken one step further than what IPTV providers are talking about when they say they want to control the content (as satellite and cable providers have).
The Internet will become the transport mechanism for delivering television, movies and news. You will see a lot of new channels that will start to use the Internet as the platform for communication like publishers did when they first used the Internet to deliver content.
Imagine a world where we will be able to watch any local channel from India, China, the UK or the US, using the Internet.
New technology also will change the way content such as news, reviews of information, breaking stories, research reports, opinions, is transformed, aggregated and distributed over the Internet. In the past, finding important news or information was limited to some Web sites. The landscape has changed and we are seeing more local, user-contributed, content. Building on the blog phenomenon, there will be more uses and models for this technology.

Also read:
World’s No.1 VC, Promod Haque, To Look At Wireless Tech To Invest In India

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