Ramco Systems surged 10% on Thursday, indicating high volatility, after it fell nearly 10% on Wednesday.

The scrip of the IT company was locked at the 10% upper limit of Rs 535.35 in mid-morning trades. There were 5,187 buyers on the counter at the upper limit. Around 150,000 Ramco Systems shares changed hands on BSE.

On Wednesday, the scrip plunged 9.85% to Rs 486.70 on a volume of 190,000 shares. The fall on the counter came amid rumours that stock market operator Rakesh Jhunjhunwala is in trouble. Rakesh is normally very active in Ramco. Of late, the counter has displayed immense volatility. This followed a spirited rally from the November 2002 low of Rs 118.25 and this was held to be Rakesh Jhunjhunwala-led buying.

However, the counter today has come alive on a host of developments announced by the company including client wins and new products.

Ramco today announced major customer wins in the US for its enterprise applications. With over 140 installations in the US, Ramco Systems is gaining market traction by focusing on state-of-the art enterprise solutions and exceeding customer expectations to ensure satisfaction, Ramco has said. "We have had tremendous success penetrating the US with Ramco's software solutions and services which is reflected in our prestigious customer base," said Anil Kumar, Ramco Systems' director of enterprise solutions for North America. "Our objective for 2003 is to ensure that our customers are able to leverage the power of our next generation of enterprise applications to meet their own business objectives. Even in this cautious economy, we expect significant growth this year,'' he added.

Ramco Systems has also announced the launch of Ramco Enterprise Custom Solutions. The services include "business transformation" solutions - a range of application development and integration capabilities, as well as "collaborative development centers" - next-generation development outsourcing using web. "Ramco Enterprise Custom solutions focuses on areas of high return and opportunity within the customer's application portfolio to keep their business software aligned to the way their business really works." said P R Venketarama Raja, vice-chairman and managing director of Ramco Systems.

Ramco also announced today delivery of its ground breaking model-based application development and delivery platform called Ramco Virtual Networks. Ramco VirtualWorks includes a model-based architecture, a complete web-enabled set of workbenches for the application development lifecycle, as well as methodologies for all stages of implementation. An extreme productivity platform Ramco VirtualWorks allows faster and higher quality application design, development and delivery than the current generation of enterprise class software.

Some time back, Ramco won a Rs 5-crore order from Tirupati Tirumala Devasthanam to develop an integrated system for front-office solutions and back-office automation for various departments. Ramco Systems will be working closely with Reliance Infocomm, part of the Reliance Group, which will provide the infrastructure facilities for TTD.

Earlier, Ramco Systems announced that it had secured a work order from the Andhra Pradesh government to design, deploy and implement human resources management solutions, self-service and learning management solutions. The order is to develop, implement and rollout next-generation HRMS. The consortium, led by Ramco Systems, comprises Hewitt Associates and The Boston Group.

Previously, a pure ERP company and a major player in that segment, Ramco System's fortunes were hit in the last couple of years as the ERP market went into a tailspin. A global slowdown in the IT sector added to its woes. With a view to diversify, Ramco Systems made the transition from a pure ERP product firm into a complete vendor of solutions and services of enterprise applications. But to do so, it had to invest big in e.applications, a Net-based transaction processing solution for enterprises, and RamcoVirtualworks, a component-based architecture in which an application is developed by assembling pre-built components (thus cutting cost and time).