Ahmedabad based IT company Elitecore today said it has won the Nasscom Innovation award of the year for its 'Cyberoam Layer 8 technology'.

The company which focuses on internet security and convergent billing solutions markets is the first IT company from Gujarat to have bagged the best innovator award in the 'new technology advancement' category of Nasscom award.

"It's a honour to have won the Nasscom innovation award this year. We were selected out of the 300 odd firms competing for this coveted award," Chief Executive Officer Elitecore Hemal Patel said.

"Cyberoam Layer 8 technology was considered the best entry for its ability to tie end user identity with network security across the entire range of it's UTM appliances," he said.

"The company has also been ranked as the number one UTM appliance vendor in India by the premier ICT market intelligence firm International Data Corporation(IDC) based on revenue figures for quarter ending September" Patel said.

The brand clocked revenue of USD 2.71 million, out of the total India UTM appliance market size of USD 11.52 million during the third quarter, bagging a 23.5 per cent market share.

"Our product ranks amongst the top three brands in Middle East countries and number one in few African countries where we are competing with brands like Sonic Wall," he said.

The company with an average EBIDTA of 22 per cent in last seven years is looking to close with revenue of USD 28 million by this fiscal end..    

"India contributes nearly 35 per cent of our revenues, while second largest business comes from middle east countries. Europe is third largest in revenue terms," Patel said.

The company with a network of 55 distributors has presence in 110 countries.

Patel, attributes the growing popularity of the brand in India to the higher internet penetration in the country.

The company is looking for overseas acquisition in Europe and US to expand its global footprint.

"We are looking for technical alliance with overseas firm in US and Europe. It could be through acquisition route," Patel said adding that in August last year it had tried to acquire a IT company in France.

The company has earmarked a fund of 30 million USD for acquisitions overseas.

The company has proposed to come out with an innovative gizmo -Small Office Home Office(SOHO)-focused on securing Wi Fi access at homes.

"We shall be launching SOHO in September this year, which aims at providing secured Wi Fi connections at homes and is a smaller variant of UTM," Patel said.

The US based Carlyle Investment has so far invested 10.3 million USD in the company, a company official said.

The company with a strength of 500 employees has projected to cross USD 35 million USD turnover mark by 2011-2012.