VETA to pump in Rs 15cr for 400 new learning centres

New Delhi, Nov 2 (UNI) VETA, a Chennai-based spoken English Training Academy, will open 75 direct learning centres in North by next year, besides expanding its total strength to 500 centres across India by 2012 with an investment of over Rs 15 crore.

''English has been our focus since 25 years and we see a great demand for learning communicative English in the North and thus have decided to expand our foray here,'' VETA GM (Franchise) V Gopalakrishnan said while speaking to UNI here.

The Vivekananda Institute, rechristened as VETA in 2004, presently has 100 centres across 70 cities and aims to tap the Hindi speaking belts in the North .

''We will open four centres in Noida and three each in Ghaziabad and Faridabad. VETA plans to cater to cities like Allahabad, Kanpur, Chandigarh, Meerut, etc, where the demand is higher as compared to South,'' he said.

With majority of its clientele applying for call centres/BPOs, Mr Gopalakrishnan said, the company is working out to come up with corporate training programmes in a six months time.

Besides, he replied in an affirmative way about the possibility of conducting campus interviews for the BPOs.

VETA, which has trained over 1.9 million students so far, offers courses in two models -- direct class coaching and distance education, with 90 per cent of its centres being franchise outlets.

The 400 new centres will be in the direct coaching form and would charge Rs 2,000-5,000 per student, he added.

The 25-year old company yesterday opened a centre in Lucknow and will open one in Sri Nagar by December first week, in addition to the one in Gurgaon opened last month to be followed by another one by sometime later next year.

VETA has 78 centres out of 100 in South alone from Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Puducherry.

The study material, developed and prepared by VETA, has courses varying from 1-2 months depending on the needs of the students of a particular course.

Its direct class coaching courses include Foundation, Fluent English, Pro English, Accent, TOEFL/IELTS, English Holiday and Sure Shot.

The distance learning programme -- Home Study Course Package -- is conducted through Chennai and caters to those who are hard pressed for time.

UNI PV DKS BS1749