HEADLINES TODAY : PARAMOUNT TO ACQUIRE AEI CABLE

INDUSTRY
ACCEL BAGS JNU DEAL
Chennai
The Economic Times (Bangalore edition)Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) has partnered with Accel Frontline, a Chennai-based IT services provider, to develop software-based solutions and applications for its e-governance cell. JNU's e-governance cell was set up during the 10th Plan with a Rs 50 lakh grant by the University Grants Commission.




NASSCOM TO TAP YOUTH POWER
Guwahati
The TelegraphSmart and suave with a flair for English — this is how the information technology industry perceives the youth of the Northeast.

The country's biggest IT body, Nasscom, today rolled out its plans to tap the youth power of the region, which has an abundant talent pool of English-speaking boys and girls.

Over 20,000 youth from the region will sit for the National Assessment of Competency (NAC) test by Nasscom, which is considered to be the first step towards employment in the BPO and IT-enabled services sectors.

The IT industry expects nearly three lakh graduates to appear for the NAC test by 2009.

The first of the series of tests will begin in the third week of September and continue till December. The tests will be held at different centres across the region.




IT PARKS/SEZ

NEW JERSEY-BASED SMES MULL IT PARK
Hyderabad
The Hindu Business LineA consortium of 60 New Jersey-based technology companies have come calling to India with a proposal to set up an integrated technology park which will see initial investment of about Rs 1,200 crore.

The Small and Medium Enterprise Consortium (SMEC) now has about 60 companies as members with a combined turnover of $3 billion. It hinted that about 300 companies evinced interest in being part of the proposed project planned near Hyderabad.

Upendra J. Chivakula, Deputy Speaker of New Jersey General Assembly, along with other members of the consortium, said that the objective of such an initiative was to step up outsourcing work, network and connect with local people, create jobs, and take up social work.

As a part of this initiative, the consortium expects to invest about Rs 120 crore in International Institute of Information Technology, and some model schools, each with an outlay of Rs 12 crore.

The Chairman of SMEC, Mahender Musuku, said that there are scores of technology companies playing a very strategic role in enterprises in the US with employee strength ranging from a couple of hundreds and upwards. All these companies either have outsourcing capability or are in the process of looking at developing such a capability.




TCS, COGNIZANT AMONG 20 SEZS CLEARED
New Delhi
The Hindu Business Line DNA Mint The Tribune The Pioneer The Hindu Tata Consultancy Services and Cognizant Solutions India Pvt Ltd, both in Andhra Pradesh, were among the 20 special economic zones for Information Technology (IT) and ITES cleared for formal approval on Thursday by the Board of Approval for SEZs.

The BoA, which met under the Chairmanship of the Commerce Secretary, Gopal K. Pillai, also gave in-principle nod to seven SEZs, including a multi-product SEZ being promoted by Gitanjali Gems Ltd in Nagpur, Maharashtra, and a 208-hectares textile SEZ in Bidar district, Karnataka, by Jade Holdings Pvt Ltd.

Pillai told reporters here that with today's 20 formal approvals, the number of SEZs with formal approvals has gone to 386 out of which 142 have been notified so far.

Among the notable formal approvals include multi-services SEZ by Gujarat Finance City Development Company Ltd in Gandhinagar, agro and food processing SEZ by Nagaland Industrial Development Corporation Ltd in Dimapur, two IT/ITES SEZs by Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure Corporation Ltd, and a polymer-based SEZ by Asia Pacific Corporation Ltd in Gujarat's Kutch district.

Among the four SEZs for conversion from in-principle to formal approval include Alok Infrastructure Pvt Ltd for a textile SEZ in Dadra and Nagar Haveli and a multi-product SEZ spread over 1,263 hectares by Sterling Erection and Infrastructure Pvt Ltd.

Welspun Anjar SEZ for Engineering products and Gitanjali Gems Ltd for gems and jewellery SEZ in Aurangabad were the two important SEZs that were given in-principle nod by the BoA on Thursday.

Proposals of AEC Marketing for gems and jewellery SEZ in Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Anant Raj Industries' 10-hectare IT SEZs were not considered by the BoA as the local authorities in the respective regions withheld permissions for these proposals.




IT PARK IN KADAPA SOON
Kadapa
Deccan ChronicleDistrict collector M.T. Krishna Babu said that steps were being taken to construct an IT Park in 50 acres of land near Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences (Rims) on the outskirts of Kadapa city. Krishnababu inaugurated the regional information and public relations office that was shifted to the old Rims office here on Thursday. Speaking to newsmen, the collector said that Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy would inaugurate Rajiv Gruhakalpa housing complex constructed at a cost of Rs 12 crore here on September 5.




M&A

BT TO EXTEND XANSA DEAL
The Hindu Business LineXansa Plc, a UK provider of information-technology and business services, said BT Group Plc extended a contract valued at £128 million ($258 million) over six years. The contract "covers finance and accounting processing, accounts payable, cash, treasury, payroll, ledger and reporting services," Reading, England-based Xansa said in a statement distributed by the Regulatory News Service today.



PARAMOUNT TO ACQUIRE AEI CABLE
Kausik Datta, Mumbai
Business StandardNew Delhi-based Paramount Communications is close to acquiring Britley, UK-based AEI Cables. An announcement to this effect is expected to come shortly, if not tomorrow.

Sources close to the development said the deal size would be in the range of Rs 250-260 crore. UK-based investment banking firm Elara Capital is the adviser to Paramount. Sanjay Aggarwal, chairman and CEO, Paramount Communications, declined comments.

They added that the power cable maker Paramount would borrow for financing the deal, which would be around 80 percent of the company's sales last year. Paramount last year posted a net profit of Rs 37.5 crore over net sales of Rs 318 crore. Last year, it had raised $15 million (Rs 60 crore) through a GDR issue.

Paramount provides cabling solutions to power, telecom and IT, railways and petrochemical industries. It has a flexible manufacturing capacity to shift focus on manufacturing one type of cable to another.




SOFTWARE

SATNAV TECH SEWS UP $10-M EXPANSION PLAN
V.Rishi Kumar, Hyderabad
The Hindu Business Line Business StandardSatNav Technologies has embarked on plans to expand its domestic and international operations with an investment outlay of $10 million.

The Founder and Managing Director of SatNav, Amit Prasad, said that from a start-up a few years ago, the company has now moved on to the next phase of growth which is reflected in the performance of the company.

Prasad said that the company had consolidated its business in India and now planned to expand its presence in the Asia Pacific region and West Asia with its flagship product 'a-mantra', a facilities management suite.

"Initially, the company was in pursuit of investments from private equity players. But now the strategy has changed. We plan to meet our expansion requirements through a combination of internal accruals and debt," he explained.




TCS BAGS $140-M BSNL CONTRACT
Mumbai
The Economic Times The Hindu Business Line The Times of India Business Standard Deccan Chronicle The Financial Express The Telegraph Deccan Herald The Hindu Software exporter Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has won a nine-year contract worth $140 million (Rs 574 crore) from Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL). The deal, covering the north and west of India, includes deploying operational support systems (OSS) and business support systems (BSS) components such as customer relationship management, billing, mediation and directory enquiry.

The first two years of the engagement will involve setting up the new systems in association with its partners and upgrading from the existing systems. The latter will involve operating and maintaining the systems. The revenue flowing in from the project in the first two years will be larger than in the rest of the years. The systems integration involves managing the overall engagement along with a large team of hardware, software and application partners. The $140 million is revenue that TCS will earn from the contract.

HCL Infosystems had won a similar deal of Rs 500 crore for the south and east regions from BSNL.

"The deal is comparable to any other global deal," said TCS head (global sales) N Chandrasekaran. He said it would also serve to showcase the company's capabilities in telecom. Some of the telecom contracts that are coming up globally are in systems integration, 3G, convergent billing and managed services. These are largely in Africa, Latin America and in the Asia Pacific. All these deals are fairly large size and range from $50 million to $200 million.

TCS gets around 9-10 percent of its revenues from the domestic market. "TCS is extremely focused on the domestic market. We will continue to bid for projects in India," Chandrasekaran said. The margins from the BSNL contract would be comparable to global margins, he added.

Earlier, TCS had won a large outsourcing contract for managing the IT infrastructure needs of Tata Teleservices. The agreement, signed in 2005, was valued at Rs 1,000 crore.




EMERSON SETS UP DESIGN ENGINEERING CENTRE IN MOHALI
Komal Amit Gera, New Delhi, Chandigarh
Business StandardEmerson Electric Company inaugurated its Design Engineering Centre at Quark city in Mohali today.

The move can be considered as the revival of the software business in Mohali after Tech Mahindra, Infosys and Tech Mahindra quit the place in the last few years.

The company has taken the premises on rent at Quark and would run under the Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) umbrella.

According to sources, it expects export of Rs 45 crore in the first year and about Rs 400crore-Rs 500 crore after the completion of the project.

The company officials refused to disclose the investment figures but said that the amount would be substantial. This is the second corporate centre of Emerson in India, the first one was set in Pune.

According to Pradipta Sen, president (India region of Emerson Electric Company), "The facility at Pune was set up in year 2003 that now engages 456 people and 34 divisions and we want to replicate the same success in Mohali."




HARDWARE

FAB COMPANIES NOW DRIVE PC DESIGNS
PP Thimmaya, Bangalore
The Economic TimesThe PC market in India has taken the unconventional route with major chipmakers like Intel and AMD coming out with new designs for computers that appeal to masses both in terms of price and value. The conventional PC does not seem to be the preferred bet for those looking at increasing penetration of the Indian market as chip makers and hardware manufacturers are coming out with new form factors which suit Indian conditions.

If Intel has come out with its Classmate PC, which is more of a miniature form of notebook computer, then AMD has designed new form factor PCs where the central processing unit (CPU) has been shrunk to a minimal size. AMD's designed product is being manufactured and marketed by Wipro Infotech under the brand name Protos. AMD India MD Alok Ohrie says: "We are trying to facilitate a computing environment for the masses and thereby create a new market."

These new form factor PCs are not just about design itself, they are competitively priced too. The Protos is priced at Rs 14,000 at the entry level while Intel's Classmate PC comes with a bundled cost of around Rs 17,000.

However, Ashutosh Vaidya, V-P, Wipro personal computing, Wipro Infotech, says it is not just the price which will drive these PCs, but the value and functionality it generates. In case of Protos, it can be run on a 12-volt battery and can withstand extreme weather conditions and has all the features of a normal PC.

Vaidya says the company is looking at adding more applications on Protos and would like to make it a more solution-oriented machine. In the case of Classmate PC, Intel is targeting the education sector, especially schools since the machine is more attuned to children.

According to IDC, the installed PC base in the country recorded a compounded annual growth rate of 32.3 percent from 9.5 million in 2003 to cross 22 million in 2006, thereby more than doubling in a three-year time frame.




ENERGY-EFFICIENT HARD DRIVES FROM WESTERN DIGITAL
R. Savitha, Pune
The Hindu Business Line Western Digital has announced a new line of hard drives designed with energy efficiency in mind. These hard drives are estimated to consume almost 40 percent less power than normal drives.

According to WD, each of these drives will save about 13.8 kg of carbon dioxide per year. For a large data centre, such as a bank, savings could be around 248 tonnes of carbon a year. The first of these 3.5-inch hard drives, the 1TB Caviar GP, hit the global market in July, followed by the 1TB desk-to-pc channel shipment.

Sharad Srivastava, Director - Sales (India and South Asia), talks about the products and the strategy.

What is the potential for green drives in the Indian market? What is the sales target?

Green Power Hard Drives consume almost 40 percent less power than normal drives. In India where power is an issue in terms of demand and supply chain, these drives will conserve power and provide an increased life to power-generation equipment such as inverters and generators.

What is the marketing strategy for this?

Western Digital's market strategy consists of a distributor network. We have channel partners who are responsible for the distribution of our products across India. Additionally, we have an all-inclusive education campaign and service support set-up in India. We have also implemented a three-segment channel model, based on the customer profile and appointed strategic distributors, to address the market.

In an enhancement to its channel strategy recently, WD's volume distribution segment has been further divided into the regional and up-country markets to address resellers and small SI/assemblers. This distributor network is supported by our warranty replacement program – WD Express.

Where is the drive being manufactured?

The green drives are being manufactured in WD factory located in Malaysia and Thailand. For the domestic market too, the drives will be shipped from the manufacturing units in Malaysia and Thailand. As per our Q4 results, unit shipments have grown 32 percent from 73.3 million in the last fiscal year (FY06) to 96.5 million in FY07.




INT/E-COMM

ASSOCHAM: EARLY SPECTRUM ALLOCATION FOR BROADBAND
New Delhi
The Economic Times Assocham today suggested early allocation of spectrum for broadband wireless access.

"Spectrum finalisation has already taken a great deal of time and if further delayed it is going to jeopardize the prospects of broadband and telecom services," Assocham President Venugopal Dhoot said in a statement.

In a communiqué to the Department of Telecommunication, the chamber said the Indian broadband services market is still at a nascent stage in the country, as by end of 2006-07, the subscriber base had not exceeded beyond 2.5 million, with a household penetration being around one per cent only.

According to estimates made by the chamber, the gap between target and achievement in broadband penetration in India will touch 10 million by 2010, until the availability of personal computer at cheaper price with adequate infrastructure is made available in rural and semi urban areas.

The Department of Telecommunication has set a target of nine million subscribers by the end of current year and 20 million subscribers by 2020.

In order to make broadband available all across the country, service providers will have to look into various emerging technologies, mainly wireless, as it is difficult to connect the vast Indian population through wires, the chamber said.

Another major challenge in providing rural broadband connectivity is the non-availability of relevant content for the diversified Indian population, without which the success of broadband in rural areas is very unlikely, it added.




E-GOVERNANCE

COMAT SERVICE CENTRES IN NE
Bangalore
The Hindu Business LineComat Technologies has announced plans to set up common service centres across districts, tehsils and gram panchayats in the North East. The company, in association with 3i Infotech, has already set up around 800 ICT-enabled kiosks in Karnataka. In Haryana, out of the proposed 1,159 rural kiosks, it is close to setting up 292 kiosks (e-Disha Ekal Seva Kendras) in the state's first roll-out exercise in Rohtak division. Similarly, the company will set up 706 centres across Uttarakhand the Uttaranchal state benefiting 6.3 million population in its rural areas. It will soon extend its expertise to north-eastern states, where 140 and centres are going to be set up in Tripura and 45 in centres are going to be set up in Tripura and Sikkim.




IT TRAINING

ORACLE UNIVERSITY CERTIFICATION
Coimbatore
The Hindu Business LineOracle University has awarded certificates to over 42,000 professionals in India, since its inception in 1995. The university offers training and certification programmes by providing Oracle, PeopleSoft, JD Edwards, Retek and Siebel education. In a bid to reach out to the Indian students, it offers these as classroom programmes in Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai and Kolkata. While such initiatives are aimed at bridging the IT skills gap, it has also designed the 'Workforce Development Programme' for working professionals through a wide education partner network. A release from the company said that over 90,000 Indian students passed the WDP last year June 2006 – May 2007.




IT ENABLED SERVICES

APOLLO HEALTH ACQUIRES ATLANTA BPO FOR $170 M
Chennai
The Economic Times Mint The Hindu Business Line DNA The Indian Express The Times of India The Tribune Business Standard Deccan Chronicle The Telegraph The Hindu Apollo Health Street (AHS), the BPO arm of Apollo Group of Hospitals, has acquired Zavata, an Atlanta-based BPO which operates in the same segment, for $170 million. This synergistic acquisition is not only expected to strengthen AHS' presence in the US market, but is also going to bring in specialised skill-sets, adding value to the company's existing portfolio.

Apollo Hospitals group executive chairman Prathap C Reddy told mediapersons in Chennai on Thursday that "this acquisition will make Apollo Health Street the largest global healthcare BPO company".

The acquisition is to be funded through a combination of debt and equity, broken into $120 million of debt and $50 million equity. Barclays Capital and Bank of India, the funding agencies for the acquisition, have offered an optional draw-out of $140 million (including $8 million refinancing portion of an earlier debt) to the company, including the debt component of this deal. The balance funding will come through internal accruals, Pratap Reddy said. Of $50 million equity, the Apollo Group will invest $25 million while private equity investors — JP Morgan's investment arm One Equity Partners and Temasek Holdings — will fund the rest.

According to AHS CEO Andrew DeVoe, the valuation of Zavata was put at 10 times its EBIDTA. Zavata, which is engaged in end-to-end back office services and emergency transport billing, is the fourth acquisition by AHS. A year ago, AHS had acquired another US-based company, Armanti Financial Services for $30 million, after which AHS' combined turnover touched $50 million.

Zavata has over 100 active customers and employs over 450 people in India and 500 plus in the US, DeVoe said. The combined entity is aiming for a revenue of Rs 400 crore by March 2008.

AHS MD Sangita Reddy said the BPO business has been growing organically at a CAGR of 70 percent. It has operations in Hyderabad and the US, and is building a new facility in Chennai. When completed, the Chennai facility will have 2,000 seats. The first phase — with 400 seats and an investment of Rs 20 crore — will be ready in a year's time, she said.

AHS serves the top three academic health systems and spans across 40 hospitals in the US. It is looking at several avenues for raising capital. On the possibilities of a future listing, Ms Reddy said, "we are working out the valuation". AHS, which started offering platform-based delivery solutions five years ago, has been ahead of the industry in its outcome-based pricing models. "We operate in the high-end business space. The value of each contract ranges from $1 million to $5 million," she said.




INDIAN TECHNOLOGY FIRMS FIND OFFSHORE MERIT IN SOUTH AFRICA
Regina Anthony, New Delhi
Mint A large labour pool with multi-lingual skills, proximity to the Middle East and Europe, and a deep cost advantage vis-à-vis the US and Europe are factors making countries such as South Africa attractive offshore destinations for Indian back office and tech service providers.

Companies that are eyeing or have presence in both countries include all the major players including HCL Technologies Ltd, Wipro Ltd, Infosys Technologies Ltd and Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.

HCL, which had put together a team three months ago to assess the business process outsourcing climate in Africa, has already picked Cape Town and Johannesburg to set up back-office units, details of which will be finalized soon.

Wipro and Infosys declined to comment on their Africa plans, but an industry representative said both firms are exploring the possibility of setting up operations there.

"Representatives of Infosys and Wipro have visited South Africa to invest there, but the process is still at a very nascent stage. Wipro is looking at setting up a manufacturing facility there," said Shipra Tripathi, director, Africa desk, at business lobby Confederation of Indian Industry.

Satyam Computer Services Ltd, which serves six of the largest firms in Africa, already counts more than 120 workers at customer locations in offices at Johannesburg and Cape Town.

The Hyderabad-based firm said in July that it plans to strengthen its presence in South Africa over the next two to three years to leverage untapped business opportunities and local employees.

TCS already has operations in both Johannesburg and Cape Town with 100 employees, and is in the process of setting up a global delivery centre in Morocco. Other Indian tech and back-office companies are also speaking to government officials in African countries to understand the market there.

"Indian tech companies, such as Satyam and TCS, have approached us about possible investments... Other big outsourcing companies, such as Genpact and Convergys, have also been provided with information," said Ray Ngcobo, chief director of the industry development division at South Africa's department of trade and industry, in an email.




ERP

SAP: INDIA KEY TO GLOBAL GOAL OF 100,000 CLIENTS
Bangalore
The Economic Times The Times of India German software giant SAP said on Thursday that its Indian unit will be key to reaching its goal of more than doubling the number of global customers by 2010.

India is the third-biggest operation by headcount for SAP, which plans to invest one billion dollars by 2011 in the country, also its fastest growing market; chief executive officer Henning Kagermann said.

The local unit will play a critical role both as a source of "products and innovations" and as an expanding market as SAP seeks to increase its customer base worldwide from 41,000 to 100,000 by 2010, Kagermann said.

India, where the number of customers has doubled to 2,000 in one year, will be a "very big" market for SAP, reaching the scale of Britain and France, in five to 10 years, he said.

The entire 60-member executive board of Walldorf, Germany-based SAP have travelled to India with the CEO to meet customers and gauge the market as well as interact with local employees.

Kagermann opened a new 350,000-square-feet facility on the campus of SAP Labs in Bangalore that can house 2,000 employees, and announced tie-ups with two Indian technology institutions Thursday to nurture engineering talent.

The company has designated India as a strategic hub and plans to reinforce its global services and support centres in this southern Indian city and Gurgaon, a New Delhi suburb.

The Indian operation is SAP's largest research and development hub and support centre outside Germany.

HEADLINES TODAY : US-BASED SMEC TO INVEST RS 2,500 CRORE IN ANDHRA PRADESH

INDUSTRY
US-BASED SMEC TO INVEST RS 2,500 CRORE IN ANDHRA PRADESH
Hyderabad
The Economic TimesSmall & Medium Enterprise Consortium (SMEC), formed by a group of entrepreneurs from across the globe, will invest Rs 2,500 crore in Andhra Pradesh for providing thrust to SMEs, particularly IT, in the state.

The investment by SMEC, which promotes sustainable development of small and medium enterprises, would generate 25,000 jobs directly and over 80,000 indirectly in the state.

"There are several entrepreneurs of Andhra Pradesh operating start ups to consulting units to global outfits in USA, currently, and most of them have offices in Hyderabad," New Jersey-based entrepreneur and SMEC Chairman Mahendar Reddy Musuku said.

"Each office has five to 200 employees and thriving with an aggressive growth plan. We have hence decided to set up a consortium so that these small and medium entrepreneurs will come together, develop and avail common facilities for a better and faster growth," he added.

As for the reason for selecting Andhra Pradesh, Musuku said Hyderabad and information technology have become synonymous.

"The infotech revolution has brought Hyderabad on the centre-stage and the brightest pool of talent is coming from here," he said.

On Tuesday, an SMEC delegation met the state Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy, who appreciated their efforts and assured support and from the government, Musuku said, adding that, "we are confident our initiative will result in creating a major support tool for the IT industry in AP."

India's IT industry is said to be the world's 10th largest and is increasing rapidly.

According to consultancy group McKinsey estimates, by 2008 India's software, services and IT outsourcing industry would be worth $70 billion annually, employing four million people and contributing 7 percent to the Gross National Product.




M&M GETS AMITY HR AWARD
New Delhi
The Hindu Business LineHomegrown farm equipment-to-IT major Mahindra & Mahindra has won the HR Excellence Award presented by Amity Group, recognising it as one of the most admired companies across the globe. The company was presented the award at the recently held fourth Amity Global HR Summit 2007 in the Amity International Business School, Noida. "As a diversified global conglomerate, Mahindra's human capital is its principal asset. The organisation's innovative HR practices in today's dynamic environment help it attract and retain the best available talent," the M&M President (HR & Corporate Services), Rajeev Dubey, said in a statement.




IT PARKS/SEZ

TODAY'S BOA MEET TO DISCUSS 31 SEZ PROPOSALS
New Delhi
The Hindu Business Line The HinduThe board of approvals (BoA) will take up 31 SEZ proposals, including those by Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Cognizant Technology, for clearance at its meeting on Thursday. IT and ITeS special economic zones (SEZ) dominate the list of proposals to be taken up by the BoA. Most of the new proposals for SEZs in IT and ITeS are from Haryana and Andhra Pradesh. Interestingly, the SEZ promoters are taking IT and ITeS beyond the hubs of Gurgaon and Hyderabad. TCS proposes to set up a 30.35-hectare IT zone in Ranga Reddy District (Andhra Pradesh) where Cognizant Technology Solutions also plans to establish a 16-hectare IT zone.




WEST BENGAL ROLLS OUT RED CARPET FOR IT SECTOR
Pradeep Gooptu, Kolkata
Business Standard The government of West Bengal has launched a multi-pronged initiative to win the confidence of technology sector companies and grow the information technology (IT) and IT enabled services (ITES) in the state by at least 50 percent in this fiscal under a plan that has obtained the state cabinet's backing.

Spearheaded by the IT department of the state and its agencies like Webel Ltd., the initiative would create a pool of attractive real estate solutions of upto 20 lakh square feet at new destinations.

The real estate would be offered to investors to enable them to kick-start their operations in the state with minimum loss of time and at cost-competitive rates, more so as the real estate was being developed by established sector players like DLF and Shapoorji Pallonji, said top sources in the state It department.

Bengal's IT minister Debesh Das, who was managing this effort, would contact select IT and ITES companies directly with offers to start up operations in the state at rates that were upto 50 percent lower than established IT centres like Hyderabad or Pune.

"The IT department can offer space today at Rs 25 a square foot at Siliguri to all comers", said state IT and biotechnology secretary Siddharth.

The IT department would be using as incentive the numerous infrastructure projects that were being commissioned in the state to enhance its attractiveness to investors over and above its power-surplus situation and cost-competitive workforce

The IT department would offer realty at multiple IT hubs being developed under public private partnership (PPP) model, and the 20 lakh square feet being offered initially was expected to go up to 80 lakh square feet of built-up space accruing to the IT department as its share in PPP-based projects.

The first was the semi-conductor centre (SCC) being developed at Sector 5 at Salt Lake at an estimated cost of Rs 37 crore under ownership of WEBEL, the nodal agency of the IT department.

It would offer rent of between Rs 35 to Rs 40 per sq ft per month and the building would be specially designed for the semiconductor companies with expensive software equipment for research and training.

A second software technology park basically for SME companies was being developed using the PPP route on a 1.25 acre WEBEL plot in Salt Lake Sector 5.

Webel would leverage the free developed area it received from the PPP partner to handhold investors and populate this Rs 48 crore project with rentals around Rs 25 per. sq ft.

A third IT hub was being proposed at Jagadishpur close to Kolkata on 332 acres and developed once again through the PPP route. WEBEL's share of land would be 160 acres and this would be dedicated to companies with attached residential area for employees and facilities facilities like food court and entertainment zone at subsidized rentals.

The fourth was the special economic zone in the Bhangar-Rajarhat Development Authority (BRADA) area covering at least 200 acres, beyond a canal that currently marked the border of the Rajarhat township.

The fifth SEZ would come up at Nonadanga, also east of Kolkata, on around 75 acres of which 50 acres would be for the IT SEZ hub under a joint venture between the state IT ministry and a single party as developer.

Durgapur, the steel city where DLF recently announced its Rs 4000 crore housing project, would house a Shapoorji Pallonji built SEZ on 25 acres owned by the West Bengal government offering around 18 lakh sq. ft., making it the largest IT SEZ hub in the state, with the other partner being the Asansol-Durgapur Development Authority (ADDA).




VCF/PVT. EQUITY

BAER PLANS $250 MN HEDGE FUND
Reena Zachariah, Mumbai
Business StandardPrivate equity player Baer Capital Partners plans to launch $ 250 million India-dedicated hedge fund by the year-end. Baer Capital is the first hedge fund to announce its India plans, after the recent proposal by the Securities and Exchange Board of India allowing direct entry of hedge funds.

The fund is likely to be called Beacon India Growth Fund. Baer Capital will have to register as a foreign institutional investor (FII).

The private equity firm which entered India last year will also be launching its second $250 million open-ended Beacon India Equity fund by the middle of next year.

The Beacon India Private Equity Fund has closed $ 7 1/2 million investment into an art auction company and will be closing three more deals in a power transmission company ($20 million), software services space ($12 million) and will be co-investing with 2-4 more investors into a North India-based real estate developer ($100 million).

The private equity firm has appointed Deepak Shahdapuri on the board of the art auction company and the software services company.




M&A

3I INFOTECH BUYS STAKE IN HCCA
Mumbai
The Hindu Business LineThe city-based 3i Infotech Ltd has acquired 51 percent stake in BPO services provider HCCA Business Services Pvt Ltd. The company has been acquired for its delivery capabilities in HR operations including large-scale payroll processing for clients in the BFSI (banking, financial, services and insurance) sector, said a news release from the company. Financial details of the transaction were however, not provided. The 3i scrip was up by 1.03 percent to close at Rs 136.7 on the BSE today.




SOFTWARE

MSIDC BEHIND MANY A MICROSOFT SUCCESS
Chiranjoy Sen, Bangalore
The Economic Times (Bangalore edition)On June 27, 2007, when Microsoft released the beta 2 version of its Visual Studio 2008 software, it simply added one more feather to the cap of Microsoft India Development Centre (MSIDC) at Hyderabad. MSIDC, the largest development centre of the software giant outside Redmond, plays a crucial and integral role in the success of the Visual Studio system.

"The centre is responsible for collaborative development of the product, which basically enables developers to rapidly create connected applications for a better user experience," says Somasegar S, corporate vice-president of the developer division of Microsoft, who also oversees the India development centre.

And not just Visual Studio, MSIDC, which completed nine years this month, has focused on creating intellectual property from India with teams having end-to-end responsibility for more than 50 Microsoft products shipped for global markets. The centre began with 20 people in 1998 and has a headcount of 1,300 today, filing around 180 patents in the last three years. "India is an important market for Microsoft with a thriving developer community. International development teams working in partnership with the Redmond based development centre provide invaluable services for internationalisation of products, as well as extending our skill-set both locally and internationally. Microsoft works closely with over 6,50,000 developers in India, " says Somasegar.

He adds that Microsoft has a dedicated team which drives certain aspects of the Visual Studio product while the entire tooling work for Microsoft's software for mobile devices (read: Office Communicator Mobile, SQL Mobile, Office Mobile and Visual Studio for Devices) is carried out of Hyderabad. To boot, MSIDC also holds complete ownership for developing the Virtual PC 2007, which was released in March 2007.




KLG SYSTEL GETS ORDERS WORTH RS 67 CRORE
Mumbai
The Hindu Business Line Business Standard Engineering software services firm KLG Systel Ltd said on Wednesday that it received orders worth Rs 67 crore from Haryana and Rajasthan state governments for revenue management of power utilities. The projects will be completed by March 2008, it said in a statement.




IMPETUS TECH PLANS THIRD FACILITY IN NOIDA
L.N. Revathy, Coimbatore
The Hindu Business Line Impetus Technologies, an outsourced product engineering services provider, plans to establish its third facility in Noida by next year.

Based out of the US, the company has three development centres in Indore, two in Noida and one in Hyderabad.

It now plans to expand its Noida presence with an investment of close to $4 million.

Without quantifying the total investment made so far in India, Praveen Kankariya, CEO, said that the company would look at organic growth in Noida. He did not rule out inorganic growth, but that would happen "in other geographies."

The company offers outsourced software R&D, testing, quality assurance and support services, exclusively to software and technology-enabled companies across verticals such as telecommunications, financial services and insurance, healthcare, digital media and CRM.

Stating that the company helps customers design and build software products, Kankariya said that in the traditional model, one worked with an existing software company that had started to outsource a portion of their product.




SOFTWARE FOR RS TRANSLATORS
New Delhi
The TribuneRajya Sabha Chairman M H Ansari today inaugurated a software 'Mantra - Rajya Sabha' for translators of the Upper House.

According to an official spokesman, the software has been developed by a team consisting of officials of Rajya Sabha and C-DAC, Pune.

He said that papers laid on the table of House, list of business and Parliament bulletin Part I have been translated through 'Mantra' in the last few sessions and the results have been encouraging.




IBM ENTERS VIZAG
Visakhapatnam
The Times of India Business Standard IBM India today announced its operations in Vizag, as part of its expansion plans to enter 14 new cities in the country, in line with its strategy to make India a truly global hub.

This would enable IBM to strengthen its pan India foothold and cater specially to the unique requirements of the various clients across the city of Vizag and its neighboring markets.

IBM is slated to spread its wings in six additional cities including Nashik, Surat, Bhubaneswar, Jamshedpur, Jaipur and Madurai; with Chandigarh, Nagpur, Coimbatore, Goa, Lucknow and Bhopal already being operational. IBM envisions setting new standards of excellency through the newly opened centres which are state of the art.

Lingraju Sawkar, VP GSMB, IBM India/South Asia, said, "Our entry into Vizag is a reflection of IBM's continued commitment to working closely with the newer segments throughout India to empower them with world class technology; thus paving their way to success."

"Small and medium businesses play an integral role in sustaining India's growth story. Vizag, a fast-growing city will be an important market for IBM, and this initiative will further reinforce our commitment to deliver things faster and better to our customers," Lingraju added.




HARDWARE

LG, SAMSUNG & PHILIPS EYE IT PERIPHERALS BIZ
Sreeradha D Basu & Sushmita Mohapatra, Kolkata/Bangalore
The Economic TimesGlobal consumer electronics heavyweights like LG, Samsung and Philips are gung-ho about the IT accessories and computer peripherals business, which they expect to be a sizeable revenue-earner in the years to come.

South Korea's LG and Samsung are focusing on the growing monitor market in India while Philips' foray is primarily with products like DVD writers, mice & keyboards, multimedia speakers, webcams and external hard disk drives.

According to IDC, the IT accessories and computer peripherals market in India, which stood at Rs 6134 crore in 2005-06 grew 22 percent to Rs 7564 crore in 2006-07. Industry sources claim the market will continue to see 25-30 percent growth in the coming years.

Incidentally, Philips Electronics India, which made the most recent foray into this business, expects IT accessories and computer peripherals to bring in about Rs 100 crore in the next two years. The electronics major has entered into an exclusive tie-up with SES Technologies for a pan-India distribution of its products.

"In three years, we expect 5-7 percent of our revenues to come in from IT accessories. We have entered this segment as we see there is a huge market that can be tapped," said Gunjan Srivastava, director (entertainment solutions, consumer electronics), Philips Electronics India.

Broadly, the IT peripherals market can be divided into two categories - peripherals like monitors that are seen as building blocks and peripherals like mice and speakers that are seen as accessories.

LG Electronics India that has a significant presence in the monitor-upgrade market crossed sales of 1 million monitors in 2006. According to R Manikandan, LG's GM (sales and marketing, information technology products), "the monitor upgrade market has usually been around 10-15 percent of the PC market, but this has been consistently rising". Players like LG cater directly to customers in the monitor upgrade market.

"Our LCD monitors are seeing a growth of 110 percent in the open market. We plan to increase our range to suit users looking for fashionable monitors or bigger screens for gaming," added Manikandan.

Samsung too, is focusing in a big way on the LCD monitor and printer businesses. "We are targeting a 100 percent jump in our LCD monitor sales (by volume) and 50 percent jump in our printer sales this year. Monitors and printers are our key growth drivers in this year," said R. Zutshi, Samsung India Electronics' deputy managing director.




INT/E-COMM

RELIANCE TO AWARD FLAG CONTRACT THIS WEEK
Mumbai
MintReliance Communications will announce the winning bidder by the end of this week for building its $1.5 billion submarine cable network, a leading financial daily reported on 29 August.

The Indian telecom firm had short-listed three Japanese firms Fuzitsu Submarine Networks, NEC and KDD Submarine Cable Systems Inc for the project. A Reliance Communications spokesman declined comment.

The company had launched the Flag Next Generation Network in December last year, which would comprise 50,000-route km of submarine cables and would connect 60 countries.




DELHI POLICE UPGRADING CYBER CELL
New Delhi
The Times of IndiaWith incidents of Internet- related crime on the rise, Delhi Police is upgrading its Cyber Cell to tackle the "crimes of the future"

The Capital's police has decided to hold regular interactions with IT majors to upgrade its personnel's technical know-how in a bid to keep apace with the rapid technological advancement and the fast changing cyber crime scene.

"The fast changing technical environment throws up new challenges. Technical innovation leads to new modes of crime and we have to keep pace with technology to tackle it," city Police Commissioner Y S Dadwal said in an interview.

He said the force will hold interactions with IT companies to help increase the efficiency of the police personnel dealing with cases of cyber crime.




PASSENGERS CAN NOW TAKE CYBER EXPRESS TO TOUR THE VIRTUAL WORLD
Sameer Kumar Sharmam, Ludhiana
The Indian Express The Ludhiana railway station finally gets its much awaited cyber cafe, RailTel Cyber Express, launched by RailTel, the telecom arm of Indian Railways, in collaboration with Tata Indicom. Equipped with 10 computer stations with the Internet speed of 2 Mbps, the services have already been made available for the public, though a formal launch for the same has not been done yet.




NORTON GETS STRONGER VERSION
K.Venugopal
The Asian AgeSymantec has released a new version of its Norton anti-virus programme to deal with fresh threats lurking in the Web.

It contains an application named Identify Safe, which will prevent identity theft while online.

It also takes its own troubleshooting decisions during virus and malware attacks instead of interrupting users by asking unnecessary questions such as whether the Trojan should be quarantined or killed.




E-GOVERNANCE

RLA INTRODUCES HIGH SECURITY SMART CARDS
Chandigarh
Hindustan Times (Chandigarh edition)The Registering and Licensing Authority today introduced a redesigned and high security features-enabled smart card for issuance of driving licences and registration certificates in the city.

The light and dark green background combination has been replaced by a combination of lighter colours (beige, maroon, light brown), which is aesthetically pleasing and allows better legibility of textual data printed in black, along with providing a better contrast background for the photograph. In addition, the data on the smart card chip would now be available only in encrypted form, which will rule out the possibility of any kind of tampering.

Detailing the various initiatives taken by the RLA office recently, Deputy Commissioner R.K. Rao said the office had recently launched a 'Sarathi' software for learners' licences and a token system to cut down he queues at the office. Keeping in view the numerous frauds coming to light by misuse of technology, it was necessary to introduce high-security features in the card.




IT TRAINING

SAARC COUNCIL LAUNCHES TRAINING INITIATIVE FOR WOMEN
Hyderabad
The Hindu Business Line Women from the under privileged sections from rural Andhra Pradesh will get skill development training in specific areas of computers, health, nutrition and soft skills.

The initiative is being launched by the Southern Chapter of the SAARC Chamber Women Entrepreneurs Council (SCWEC).

The initiative is aimed at empowering rural women with skill sets that would help them take up suitable jobs in the various corporates and BPOs , in addition to building confidence and communications skills, she said.

Satyam Foundation, Apollo Hospitals, Hamstech Institute of Fashion Technology and the Employment Generation and Marketing Mission (EGMM) of the Andhra Pradesh Government would be actively involved in the training programmes.




IT ENABLED SERVICES

FIRSTSOURCE SOLUTIONS BUYS MEDASSIST FOR $330 MILLION
Mumbai
The Economic Times The Hindu Business Line Mint The Indian Express The Times of India Business Standard The Telegraph Deccan Herald The Hindu The Financial ExpressIn the second-largest takeover of an overseas business process outsourcing (BPO) firm by an Indian company, Firstsource Solutions has announced the acquisition of US-based MedAssist for $330 million. This is the third acquisition for Firstsource in the US, and its seventh in all.

The news drove up Firstsource shares nearly 10 percent to Rs 79.40 on BSE on Wednesday.

With revenues of $99 million in 2006, Louisville, Kentucky-based MedAssist is among the largest firms providing revenue cycle management services to the healthcare sector in the US. The buyout will give Firstsource a footprint in the hospital side of the healthcare business.

The deal values MedAssist at 12.5 times its 2007 operating profit, Firstsource CFO Rajesh Subramaniam said. MedAssist's revenues have been growing at 7-10 percent annually, and its core earning margins are higher than most US firms at 22-24 percent. "We see significant opportunity to grow our business in the segment by cross-selling our services to MedAssist's customers," Firstsource managing director and CEO Ananda Mukerji said.

Firstsource already offers insurance claims processing for the healthcare sector, and acquired US-based BPM earlier this year. In 2004, it had bought Accounts Solutions Group, a third-party credit card collection firm. Its acquisitions outside the US include CustomerAsset, FirstRing, Pipal Research and RevIT. However, all these acquisitions were for less than $50 million each.




INDIAN MPOS WELL PLACED TO SERVE US LENDERS
Chennai
The Economic Times The Hindu Business LineThe US' sub-prime mortgage crisis, lending to borrowers with poor credit rating and the resultant defaults, is expected to increase offshoring of loan processing activities by American lending institutions, feel mortgage process outsourcing (MPO) industry officials.

Hit by the crisis, the US lending institutions will henceforth look at qualitative credit appraisal methods at a lower cost.

"This would result in increased offshoring of the backend work, loan processing, property title verification and other work. India is well placed to take advantage of the opportunity," Prashant Kothari, CEO and founder of String Real Estate Information Services, said.

The American home mortgage industry, the largest in the world, is worth $8 trillion and $5 trillion for commercial properties. That in turn involves back office and transaction processing work worth $100 billion annually.

Out of this, $10 billion worth of business could be outsourced whereas the actual business outsourced is just $200 million, Kothari said.

Despite the recent crisis projections for mortgage loan

TODAY'S HEADLINES AUG 29, 2007

INDUSTRY
SIGNET SOLAR TO INVEST RS 3,000 CRORE IN ANDHRA
Appaji Reddem, Hyderabad
The Economic Times (Bangalore edition)The state government's efforts to create a solar cluster within the 1,200-acre Fab City project seems to be yielding results. The US-based thin film silicon photovoltaic (PV) module manufacturer, Signet Solar, is all set to invest around Rs 3,000 crore for two facilities here. One will be housed in Hyderabad and the other in Chittoor. Independently, compact disc and storage device manufacturer Moser Baer is also in talks with the state to acquire 100 acres of land in the Fab City to set up a manufacturing facility for solar thin films. When contacted, a Moser Baer official said the company was exploring setting up facilities in states including Andhra Pradesh.

"Solar is at an advanced stage of negotiations with the Andhra Pradesh government and is looking at firming up its investment plan by mid-September. If approved, production is slated to start by June 2008,'' said a senior official.

It is looking at 50-acre facilities each in the Fab City near Hyderabad and Sri City SEZ in Chittoor. Thin film manufactured at the Chittor facility — which is close to the Chennai port — will be shipped out for exports.





GOVT TO TAKE UP GERMAN WORK PERMIT DELAYS WITH CHANCELLOR
Smita Aggarwal, New Delhi
The Indian ExpressWith Germany becoming a major hub for Indian information technology (IT) companies, the Government has decided to take up the controversial issue of delay in obtaining work permits with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Ambiguity in rules and red-tapism are the main reasons for delay in getting work permit for IT professionals.

Tata Consultancy Services, Wipro and Infosys are among the IT majors which have offices in Germany. The commerce department will take up work permit and visa related concerns with its German counterpart during the coming visit of Angela Merkel in September, according to a commerce and industry ministry communiqué.

In Germany, Frankfurt has emerged as a major hub of Indian IT companies. Recently, German IT sector acquisitions by Indian companies have picked up after Tata Interactive bought German company Tertia Edusoft in January 2006 and Sonata Software took over majority share of TUI-InfoTec in September 2006. Indian IT companies are facing difficulties in obtaining work permits for their professionals in Germany, chiefly because of delays in processing of applications, which "results in undue hardship to the Indian companies and delays in project execution", states the communiqué.





RISING RE AND INDIA GROWTH STORY
Amit Kapoor
The Economic TimesThe appreciating rupee is posing a unique set of challenge for the Indian economy. The impact would not be limited to the macro-economy alone but moves down to the level of firms. To counter the challenges, the government needs to rework its economic policy and the firms, their business models and strategies for success. The appreciating rupee already seems to have had an impact on the profits of IT firms, which rely mostly on exports and lower wage costs. The country faces a similar challenge where it would have to redefine its existing model for growth. The initial success story of India was clearly built on labour arbitrage i.e., the ability of India to provide low-cost labour in comparison to other countries across the globe.

India is an interesting case in the light of the above reflections as it is fundamentally a factor-driven economy. A factor-driven economy is one whose competitiveness is primarily its low-cost labour and exports. One of the unique features of firms operating within factor-driven economies is that they produce products that are designed and conceptualised in advanced countries. The strategy at the generic level for firms is to compete globally to provide significant price advantages. In addition, the firms focus on labour-intensive manufacturing and processes. An economy at this stage of development is sensitive to global business cycles and most importantly exchange rate fluctuations.





GERMANY SEEKS INDIAN AID TO FACE HR CHALLENGES
Bangalore
Deccan HeraldIndian human resources in the IT and Engineering sectors could help Germany brace for the challenges of globalisation, Volker Kauder, Member of the German Parliament, said on Tuesday.

Delivering a lecture on 'Globalisation: Issues from a German point of view' organised by the Consul General of Germany, Kauder said experts from India were welcome in Germany, that was grappling with "too much immigration and too little intelligent jobs".

"I understand that in India, around five lakh students graduate from engineering colleges every year, while the figure is just 30,000 to 40,000 in Germany. We are looking at a situation wherein any student can work in Germany for three years, with no conditions attached. There are no no-go areas in Germany," he said.

Dispelling the contention that globalisation takes away jobs, Kauder pointed out that 4,000 IT jobs in India translated to 10,000 jobs in Germany.





IT PARKS/SEZ

KARNATAKA GOVT CLEARS 14 SEZS
Bangalore
The Economic Times Business StandardThe Karnataka government on Tuesday cleared 59 new industrial projects, including 14 SEZs, covering an estimated investment of Rs 63,561.24 crore, minister for Industries Katta Subramanya Naidu said.

Briefing reporters by the high-level committee chaired by Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy, he asserted that the government had informed investors while approving SEZs proposals that the onus of purchasing land directly from farmers wrested with them and not the state.

The HLC gave the nod for 16 IT/BT Parks, 10 IT/ITES SEZs, seven new sugar units, five steel plants, four tourism ventures, two software development units, two chemical units, one each of SEZ for electronic hardware, aviation, textile SEZ, FTW SEZ (Warehousing), Cement and BT SEZ, Naidu said.





VCF/PVT. EQUITY

GURUJI.COM EYES GLOBAL VCS FOR ROUND-2 FUNDS
Thanuja BM & Boby Kurian, Bangalore
The Economic Times (Bangalore edition) Canaan Partners and Sequoia Capital India, among others, may show interest as desi internet search engine company Guruji.com looks at raising fresh capital to meet its expansion needs, sources said.

The Bangalore-based company is said to be eyeing a second round of funding in the range of $10 million. When contacted, Anurag Dod, CEO of Guruji.com, said the company was looking to raise a second round of funding but hasn't finalised anything yet.

Sequoia has already committed to invest $7 million over time in Guruji.com in a 'Series A' round raised in October 2006. Sources said that the VC firm was not averse to investing again. Alok Mittal of Canaan Partners said the proposition was interesting though his firm hasn't been in touch with Guruji.com as yet. The local language search engines are likely to see traction with even global giants like Google stepping into the language domain.



DUBAI INVESTMENT GROUP PICKS 40% STAKE IN TIME BROADBAND
New Delhi
The Economic Times The Hindu Business Line Mint Hindustan Times (Delhi edition) The TribuneDubai Investment Group has bought 40 percent stake in Time Broadband Services Ltd, a new Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) service provider in India, for an unspecified amount.
The investment, which has been routed through DIG's subsidiary Dubai Ventures, will help TBSL launch its IPTV-related services in India and abroad.

"We found an ideal partnership in TBSL which has a team of competent professionals having an in-depth knowledge of their specialized technology," DIG chief executive officer Abdulhakeem Kamkar said in a statement.

"We are impressed by the initiatives of the state-owned telecom firms, where they are heavily investing in the latest technology to upgrade their telecom networks to gear up for broadband play," he said.

Sujata Dev, Managing Director of TBSL, said with the expertise of DIG as a strategic partner, the company would "offer a true IPTV experience to Indian subscribers and possibly to a global audience in the near future".



M & A
ALLIED DIGITAL SERVICES TIES UP WITH US FIRM
Mumbai
The Economic TimesAllied Digital Services, a major systems integrator in India, has tied up with US-based LANDesk to provide IT infrastructure management and end-point security solution for the Kotak group. Hewlett-Packard, Novell and Bigfix were in the race for the project. The key objective of the Kotak group was to achieve manageability, security and total control of its 11,000 systems deployed across 600 locations across the country.



MOLD TEK APPROVES DEMERGER SCHEME
Hyderabad
The Hindu Business LineMold Tek Technologies Ltd has approved the scheme of arrangement between Teck Men Tools Pvt Ltd (transferor company) and Mold Tek Technologies Ltd (transferee company and the demerged company) and Moldtek Plastics Ltd (the resulting company).
This follows approval by the company board at its meeting on August 27.

With this arrangement, for every 100 equity shares, shareholders would get 28 shares in the demerged company — Mold Tek Technologies Ltd and 72 shares in the resultant company —Moldtek Plastics.

The IT (KPO) division would remain in Mold Tek Technologies and the plastics business demerged into Moldtek Plastics.

The merger of Teck Men into Mold Tek Technologies and demerger of plastics division of Mold Tek Technologies (demerged company) into Moldtek Plastics (resulting company) are effective October 1, 2006 and April 1, 2007 respectively.




NETTLINX SET TO BUY US FIRM
Hyderabad
The Hindu Business LineNettlinx Ltd, a Hyderabad-based technology company, is set to acquire Host Department Inc, a hosting services provider.

The board will meet on September 3 to finalise the acquisition, its Executive Director, Vijay Bhaskar Reddy said. However, he stated that the terms of the deal would be disclosed after the board meet. The company is also in the process of pursuing two more acquisitions. Alongside, Nettlinx has informed that it has approved de-listing of equity shares from Hyderabad and Calcutta stock exchanges.





SOFTWARE

IT BIGGIES GET A TASTE OF THEIR OWN MEDICINE
N Shivapriya & Ranjit Shinde, Mumbai
The Economic TimesAs the big five of Indian information technology sector eye bigger projects and share the battlefield with the likes of IBM and Accenture, their smaller rivals are moving in to capture a bigger slice of the smaller contracts.

Clients with not-so-big IT projects are also keen to hire mid-size Indian firms, because many feel they'll get the needed attention, flexibility and responsiveness from the smaller vendors, rather than the larger ones.

"One financial services client (that spends approximately $22 million with a top Indian provider) had a difficult time getting the new account manager and head of the financial services group to return calls," Forrester Research said in a recent report.

"The client's original account manager had left the company. The client finally asked Forrester to make some inquiries to get the provider's attention. We found this behaviour surprising, given the quality, prestige, spend and potential spend of the client as well the quality, prestige, and reputation of the provider."


QUALCOMM'S AUTHORISED CENTRES
Bangalore
The Hindu Business LineDelhi-based Phoneytunes.com and Rajasthan-based Apex Infosoft have been selected as authorised training centres for Qualcomm's development platform for mobile applications for CDMA phones - BREW.
Phoneytunes focuses on integrating mobile network technology and content for 3G CDMA2000 mobile devices while Apex Infosoft is a customised software solutions company. "The BREW community in India has shown tremendous growth, with an increasing number of developers choosing BREW to create and deliver high-end content to users not just in India, but across the globe. The BREW authorised training partner programme highlights Qualcomm's commitment to empowering developers to spread their knowledge of BREW in order to enable other members of the ecosystem to realise the benefits of this solution," said Rakesh Godhwani, Manager-Mobile Content and Applications, Qualcomm India and SAARC, in a release issued by the company.





TELEDATA MOVES INTO NEW FACILITY
Chennai
The HinduTeledata Informatics is moving into its new 60,000 sq. ft. facility in Velacherry, near here. It was inaugurated on Tuesday by T. S. Bhattacharya, Managing Director, State Bank of India.

Addressing a press conference here after the inauguration, K. Padmanabhan, Managing Director of the company, said the company's growth strategy was to consolidate its presence in education, networking and communications, energy and total business outsourcing space along with acquisitions in the key technology area. He said Teledata had identified three companies to acquire by this year-end.

The company's subsidiary, eSys Technologies, a technology distribution business provider and PC manufacturer, launched a new range of high performance PCs on the occasion.



HARDWARE
RECONNEX LAUNCH
Pune
The Indian ExpressReconnex Corporation USA, the leader in data loss prevention appliances, has started its India operations in Pune. The India centre will focus on developing innovative technology for the product line of the company for the worldwide market.

Anand Kekre, Country Manager, Reconnex, said that Reconnex's data loss prevention appliances are designed for any organisation — including enterprises, government agencies or educational institutions — that wants to protect its brand, maintain compliance or secure sensitive information. Data loss prevention is one of the fastest growing network security markets worldwide. Reconnex protects information for over one million users.

"The India operations will be beefed up within a year and we expect it to be a 40 plus organisation," Kekre added.

Reconnex's appliance delivers accurate detection while protecting an enterprise before, during, and after any threat to corporate privacy or intellectual property. Reconnex products have the ability to discover, capture, prevent and control all sensitive information entering or leaving the corporate network. This allows enterprises to protect vital information both at rest and in transit.



MICROSOFT HARDWARE CELEBRATES 25TH YEAR
Chennai
The HinduMicrosoft Hardware, which was established in 1982, is celebrating its 25th anniversary. The company kicked off the year-long celebrations by unveiling a line-up of products including special gaming peripherals, keyboards and web cameras, says a release.




INT/E-COMM


ICSI IS ALL SET TO GO MOBILE
Gireesh Chandra Prasad, New Delhi
The Economic Times Students can now pursue the fast-growing secretarial profession even on their mobile phones. The profession's regulator, the Institute of Company Secretaries of India (ICSI), will soon introduce virtual classrooms, which could be accessed through Internet-enabled phones.

"With this facility, one could access the virtual classroom and interact with the faculty from anywhere using a mobile phone and a headset", ICSI president Priti Malhotra said. Students can enrol for the programme online.

However, one has to go to any of the 70 examination centres in the country for attending final test. Eventually, when online security systems become fool-proof, the institute will provide for attending the final exams too online. ICSI wants to reach out to potential students in far-flung areas using technology as the demand for professionals grow in a booming economy, she said. ICSI has tied up with 'gurukulonline', a firm specialising in e-learning, for software support.





DISTRICT INDUSTRY CENTRES GO ONLINE
Bhubaneswar
The Pioneer Good news for the entrepreneurs: The District Industry Centres (DICs) have gone online. Now, an entrepreneur need not visit the office of the DIC General Manager. He can sit in his office and register with the DIC.

This was announced by Minister Industries Biswabhusan Harichandan while addressing the first DIC GMs' conference here on Tuesday. For the first time, the State has initiated the facility for the micro, small and medium sector industries, said he. Secretary Industries Ashok Dalwai, who was instrumental in organising the conference, said this would go a long way in helping the SME sector, which needs supports.



NETWORKING
3 JAPANESE FIRMS TO BID FOR FLAG'S $1.5 BILLION CONTRACT
Rajesh S Kurup, Mumbai
Business StandardThree Japanese submarine cable construction companies have been short-listed by Flag Telecom, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Reliance Communications, for building its $1.5 billion (Rs 7,000 crore) next generation network (NGN).

The Anil Ambani group company is slated to announce the winner by the end of this week.

Futizsu Submarine Networks, NEC and KDD-SCS are the companies leading the race to build the sub-sea cable that will connect 5 billion people across 60 countries in the next three years.

The cable would become operational by December 2009, sources close to the development told Business Standard.

Global submarine cable construction majors Corning/Nord Deutche, Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent and Nokia were also in the fray. The project was announced in December 2006, but name of the vendors the company was in discussion with were not disclosed.





ERP


TVS WINS SAP ACE AWARD
Bangalore
The Hindu Business LineChennai-based TVS Motor Company has won the SAP ACE 2007 award for customer excellence in the Most Innovative Netweaver Category.

"This award is the result of several SAP implementations that we have put in place at TVS Motor Company to effectively manage the supply chain, which is a critical factor, especially for our new product introduction process", T G Dhandapani, CIO, TVS Motor Company said in a company release.




SAP ACE 2007 AWARDS FOR TWO IMPLEMENTATIONS OF PWC
New Delhi
MintConsultancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) today said two of its SAP implementations -- Kuoni Travels (India) Pvt Ltd and Indian Rayon -- have received SAP ACE awards for the year 2007.

Kuoni Travels was awarded in the best service providers sector implementation category while Aditya Birla Nuvo group company Indian Rayon won the award in the best chemical sector implementation category, PwC said in a release.

"The implementation featured several firsts in our group and SAP ACE 2007 is indeed a great recognition to the Indian Rayon and PricewaterhouseCoopers team," Indian Rayon President Finance D P Modani said in the release.

PwC implemented SAP in Kuoni to provide a centralised Finance and Accounts solution to get the data from the multitude front-end systems of Kuoni group companies, the release added.





SAP, ONGC TO SHARE EXPERTISE
New Delhi
The PioneerThe world's largest business software company SAP AG's Indian arm, SAP India and Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd. (ONGC) have entered into a strategic partnership for sharing expertise.

ONGC and SAP signed a MoU on Tuesday to this effect in a simple ceremony at the corporate office of ONGC in Delhi. ONGC's Director (HR) AK Balyan signed the MoU on behalf of ONGC and president and CEO for SAP America's Asia Pacific and Japan (SAP AAPJ) region Bill McDermott inked the same for SAP. As per the agreement ONGC executives will be seconded to SAP.

The agreement, valid for an initial period of 2 years, enables the two organisations to collaborate for training and consultancy assignments in India and globally, on mutually agreed terms. ONGC has implemented one of the largest information technology (IT) projects for oil and gas operations using SAP solutions, which has given excellent results.



STOCKS
MEGASOFT EXTENDS CASH TENDER OFFER FOR BOSTON
Hyderabad
The Hindu Business LineIT services provider Megasoft Ltd has announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, Tea Party Acquisition Corp, has extended its previously announced tender offer for all outstanding shares of Boston Communications Group Inc at a price of $3.60 per share.

With the company acquiring close to 88 percent shares, including those tendered, it is set to complete the buy out later this week, according to. V. Balasubramanian, Chief Financial Officer of Megasoft.

Unless the tender offer is further extended, the offer was set to expire at 12:00 midnight, New York City time, on August 24.

The depositary for the tender offer has advised Megasoft that approximately 13,960,647 shares had been validly tendered and not withdrawn in the tender offer as of August 24, representing approximately 78 percent of Boston Communications Group Inc's outstanding shares.





SENSEX SOARS 77 POINTS ON FRESH FII BUYS
Mumbai
Business StandardFresh purchases by foreign funds pushed up the domestic stock market to their highest close in two weeks on Tuesday, but doubts about the US economy minimised gains.

Extending its gains from Monday, the benchmark Sensex rose 76.81 points, or 0.52 percent, to 14,919.19. The broader S&P CNX Nifty, which tracks 50 stocks, gained 18.10 points, or 0.42 percent, to 4,320.70 points.

The rise in the markets was led by index heavyweight Reliance Industries (up 2.58 percent to Rs 1,880.05) and IT stocks. Satyam Computers (up 2.48 percent to Rs 449.70) and Infosys Technologies (up 1.83 percent to Rs 1,882.50).

Outperforming the Sensex was the BSE small-cap Index, which was up by 1.07 percent, or 82.92 points, to 7,808.44. The BSE mid-cap gained 0.77 percent, or 48.98 points to close at 6,409.64 .

The index, which has risen 6.65 percent from a three-month closing low last Tuesday, is still 6 percent below the record of 15,868.85 set on July 24.

The foreign institutional investors (FIIs) continue to remain net buyers on Tuesday. Their net purchases were to the tune of Rs 390.20 crore, against yesterday's net buying of Rs 695.35 crore.

After a long time, Indian institutions booked profit on Tuesday as they were net sellers to the tune of Rs. 79.32 crore.





EVENTS

BUSINESS 2.0: PREPARING FOR THE FUTURE
Mumbai
The Economic TimesGlobalisation brings with it complexities that require companies with global growth strategies to prepare for 24/7 operations. What will organisations look like in the future in the era of Business 2.0? Enterprise-wide concerns such as information security, business continuity and regulatory compliance are significant challenges for CIOs, who are largely responsible for managing these risks. CIOs must contend with threats from within and outside threats, including corporate espionage, disaster recovery and business continuity scenario planning must be ongoing.

Today's competitive business environment does not tolerate a few minutes of downtime. In such an environment, can your business afford a longer downtime or worse? The very survival of business rests on the ability to keep it up and running regardless of what your IT infrastructure is hit by, and ability to recover your data quickly.





FINANCIAL INCLUSION THROUGH WIRELESS TECHNOLOGY
The Economic Times (Mumbai edition) One of the more popular seminars at the The Economic Times Banking Technology Conclave 2007 was titled "Banking Sector Next Frontier - Serving the Under Banked Profitably. Can technology, especially wireless enabled serve the un-served market?" The panel was a mix of technologists, bankers and a micro-financer with extensive experience at the rural level. The session was chaired by MBN Rao, the CMD of Canara Bank.

The direction of the discourse was set with a presentation made by Janmejaya Sinha, the managing director of Boston Consulting Group (India). He said, "I am going to talk about banking the middle of the pyramid. To cater to the bottom of the pyramid would need government assistance." Sinha referred to this broad segment as the 'The Next Billion' and presented a character sketch. He said that this category craves for banking inclusion but are hesitant to take the initiative to start banking as they are fearful of making mistakes with their money. What would drive them, he said, would be a consistent desire for a better future for the next generation.

According to Sinha there are only 180 million Indians with a bank account, in comparison with the 220 million people who have a cell phone. "We can't think about banking through PCs like in the rest of the world. We cannot follow the western model." Mobile banking could be the solution for India. Sinha pointed out that mobile operators can remind customers to settle a bill, or the fact that a mobile phone user's location can be tracked. And most importantly, he said that mobile banking allows inclusion for the group in the 'middle of the pyramid'. He ended on the note that, "we need to think of new business models and not try to craft old ones."

TODAY'S HEADLINES AUG 28, 2007

INDUSTRY
INDIAN EXECUTIVES GET BEHIND MNC WHEEL
Shreya Biswas, New Delhi
The Economic Times When it comes to headcount, Indian talent beats other geographies in numbers, quality and efficiency as well as technological prowess. Many MNCs have been hiring people aggressively in India and now have more than 50% of their workforce working out of this country.

The list includes Sapient, Xansa, Aricent, Cognizant. While the companies root for cost-efficiency, a fast-growing market, adaptable human resource and a great skill to upgrade, employees are gaining through vast exposure across businesses, increased attention from the management, driving changes in the organisation.

Companies, in order to grow faster, are reaching out to locations where they can get the best in terms of people quality and processes and cut down on cost. Something that happened in the manufacturing sector in the last 10-15 years.

"More and more companies would reach out to other countries to tap the parts of services value chain in a globalised economy," feels Bhaskar Das, vice-president, human resources, Cognizant. The company currently has 46,000 employees globally, of which 70-75%, or more than 35,000, are in India.





BUSINESS MODEL INNOVATION - NEW OPPORTUNITIES
Ganesh Natarajan
Hindustan Times (Delhi edition)What do ITMG, Sankalp and Suschama have in common? They are all new business venture ideas focused at bringing the best of consulting and supply chain optimization to small and medium enterprises that have been created by students while still in college.

The enterprising students of the National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE) in Mumbai, supported by a visionary Professor, Dr T Prasad at the institute, have come up with this unique concept of 'Student Companies (SCs)', which can spawn a new generation of young entrepreneurs in the country. Each of the SCs is being evaluated on predetermined parameters at specific time intervals spreading over two years of MBA course.

Students' achievement on these parameters is incorporated into their academic achievement.

In the IT space, the prospect of a new legion of young entrepreneurs joining the developer community could not be timelier with most of the larger firms turning their attention to the domestic market opportunity as well as lower cost methods of collaboration to reach and service hitherto untapped customers.




HCL IS REWRITING ITS COMPANY CODE
Rabin Ghosh, Mumbai
DNAHCL Infosystems may look completely different in 3-5 years if Ajai Chowdhry, chairman and CEO, has his way.

It is going to be a major overhaul for a hardware maker: services, and not products, would be the main focus area for the Rs 12,000 crore company.

In three years, the company expects to earn 50 percent of its revenues from computing, which is currently below 25 percent, with telecom and office automation contributing to the rest.

"We are looking at earning 50 percent from computing and 50 percent from distribution. Within these too, we are looking at a healthy balance among SI (system integration) and hardware (for computing), Nokia and others (for distribution)," Chowdhury told analysts on Monday.

Almost 90 percent of the Rs 9,000 crore the company earned last fiscal from distribution business came from selling Nokia GSM phones.

HCL is also the distributor of other digital lifestyle products from Kodak and Apple.




NASSCOM WANTS TAX HOLIDAY EXTENDED
Sandeep Joshi, New Delhi
The HinduWith countries like China and other developing nations making extra efforts to increase their market share in the global information technology arena, the National Association of Software and Service Companies (Nasscom), the body of Indian IT software and services industry, has asked the Union Government to start thinking seriously on extending the tax holiday to the high-potential sector beyond 2009.

The cause for concern among the industry leaders is the Government's failure in addressing the issues concerning the industry and the steady growth of the sector in countries like China and Brazil that can challenge India's leadership in the years to come.

"Experts from China have been coming to us and adopting progressive measures and policies, which our Government is abandoning, to boost their growth.




M & A

NIIT OPEN FOR STRATEGIC PARTNERS
Mumbai
The Economic TimesNIIT Technologies Ltd (NTL) on Monday said its parent company NIIT was open to bring in strategic partners into the company to help NTL with its next level of growth, but it has not reached any deal so far on this front.

"From the time of demerger in 2004, NIIT (through its wholly-owned subsidiary Scantech Evaluation Services Ltd) continues to hold 25 per cent stake in NTL, with a vision to attract strategic partners, if required, to help NTL with its next level of growth," NTL informed the Bombay Stock Exchange.

"There is no change in that position and no specific transaction to report," it added.





KLG SYSTEL BUYS STAKE IN ATLANTIS
New Delhi
The Hindu Business Line Mint Hindustan Times (Mumbai edition)KLG Systel Ltd, a software company, today announced the acquisition of 51 percent stake in Atlantis Lab Pvt Ltd, a dedicated engineering software company with over 130 employees.

"Atlantis Labs will now form a subsidiary of KLG Systel Ltd, catering to the strong domestic market, while also tapping engineering services outsourcing opportunities from developed countries such as North America and Europe," a statement said here. Atlantis Lab portfolio includes product design, design automation, design simulation, tool design, design data migration, and product management software in automobile, aerospace, industrial machinery and heavy engineering.

"The relationship will also provide KLG Systel an opportunity to widen its reach to the three design hubs of the country — Chennai, Pune and Bangalore. Atlantis Lab already has a strong base in these cities." KLG Systel plans to hire 1,000 designers and analysts for Atlantis by 2008. The new subsidiary would focus on automotive, aerospace, industrial machinery, heavy engineering, ship building, power and process verticals where there is a strong demand for product management software and services.




SOFTWARE

SUBEX SWINGS DEALS FROM GVT FOR NIGERIA, CONGO
Banglaore
The Economic Times (Bangalore edition) The Hindu Business LineSubex Azure has announced that it has won a contract to provide fraud management and revenue assurance solutions for Global Vision Telecom (GVT), to be deployed at its Prestel and U-COM Congo CDMA networks in Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) respectively. Prestel and U-COM Congo are owned by Global Vision Telecom. It specialises in telecommunications technology in developing countries. Subex will be deploying both its Nikira Fraud Management System and its Moneta Revenue Assurance System.



SATYAM LAUNCHES SOLUTIONS FOR BANKING, OIL & GAS INDUSTRY
Mumbai
The Economic Times The Hindu Business Line Business Standard The HinduSatyam Computer Services launched two niche composite solutions for the banking as well as the oil & gas industry. These solutions are certified by SAP and are powered by NetWeaver technology.

iDecisions is a banking solution software that enables efficient business management and iLubes is the solution for lube companies in the oil & gas segment.

The software package iDecisions is designed for banking industry that enables business management through the use of a central industry-standard data model.

iLubes, the solution for lube companies in the oil & gas segment– creates a mechanism to track performance of lubricants supplied to industrial customers in the utilities and steel industries, power plants and other process industry domains.

"These solutions are niche domain solutions, launched to address business processes in the Banking and Oil & Gas industries respectively which is directed towards delivering significant business value to our customers as well as the SAP product landscape," said Manish Mehta, Global Head, SAP & Testing Practices.




NASSCOM BODY LAUNCHES ONLINE DONOR SCHEME
New Delhi
The Hindu Business Line Metro Now The StatesmanNasscom Foundation, the Corporate Social Responsibility arm of Nasscom, today joined hands with TechSoup, a San Francisco-based non-profit technology capacity building organisation, to launch a technology assistance programme for non-profit and non-governmental organisations in India.

The programme 'BiG Tech' would act as a platform to facilitate the distribution of software and solutions (donated by corporate partners) to various NGOs.

Software giant Microsoft has signed up as a partner for the programme in India to distribute its software to NGOs. The company is already a global partner in the programme, and donates a range of products including Office and server software. In India, however, only those NGOs, which have a FCRA clearance, would be able to apply for Microsoft's donations, Nasscom Foundation said.

The programme is already rolled-out across eight countries and the international partners include Microsoft and Adobe. With the India launch, it would now seek to rope in more partners for the country. "One of the barriers to technology for NGOs, is affordability of technology products. BiG Tech, NF's new online donation programme, is perfectly suited to address this issue of access to affordable technology," the Nasscom President, Kiran Karnik, said, adding NGOs seeking donations would have to adhere to the eligibility criteria and be subject to a due diligence.





XORA SOFTWARE PLANS EXPANSION IN B`LORE
Chennai/ Bangalore
Business StandardXora Software, which provides enterprise mobility solutions, plans to expand its product development centre in Bangalore over the next couple of years.

Founded in 1999, the US-based privately-held company has raised more than $11 million in venture capital with the leading partner being Dawntreader Ventures.

The Bangalore centre has over 125 engineers. "This centre contributes close to 95 per cent of the product development work with the rest happening in the US. We are banking on the Bangalore development centre for growth," Xora Software CEO Sanjay Shirole said.

The firm's technical support team also works in Bangalore. "We intend to double this team from the existing 65 members. There is a lot of scope for growth in the technical support segment here," he added.

The company derives 95 per cent of its revenue from the US. It has developed a product called, Xora GPS TimeTrack, which helps companies track and record start times and the location of their mobile employees.

Employees carry their GPS-enabled mobile phone with them throughout their office hours and their location is automatically tracked and recorded.

Xora recently forayed into Australia. It is also looking at India for growth. "India is a fast emerging market for us. We will concentrate on the Indian market in the coming days," Shirole stated.





HARDWARE



DELL LAUNCHES NEW DESKTOP
Deccan HeraldDell on Monday announced the launch of OptiPlex 755 with the most flexible approach to systems management, delivering on customer demands for business efficiency. The OptiPlex 755 is Energy Star 4.0 compliance. With the flexible systems management offerings in the industry, the OptiPlex 755 will help simplify IT by reducing number of desk side service visits required for system service and maintenance, claimed the company. Dell is also integrating Intel vPro technology with advanced remote management features that will make business efficient.



INT/E-COMM



'NEW NET POLICY WILL HAMPER BROADBAND GROWTH'
New Delhi
The Hindu Business Line The Times of IndiaThe Internet Service Providers Association of India on Monday said that the new policy for the Internet sector will hurt small size operators and will result in slow penetration of broadband services.

"The policy to discontinue Category C licence (district level) is a retrograde step which hurts small entrepreneurs and consumers who have risked considerable resources to create businesses in the face of aggressive competition from bigger players. There is hardly a single successful country in America, Europe or Australia which discourages small players from entering the Internet market," said Rajesh Chharia, President, ISPAI. More than 50 percent of the operational ISPs hold a category C licence.

The association also opposed the imposition of licence fee on ISPs for Internet Telephony. "If the Government is concerned about the slow penetration of broadband in India, then why are they putting burden on the Internet operators. If level playing field with other telecom operators is the issue, then ISPs should be allowed to interconnect with fixed line and mobile operators. This would at least give us additional revenue and then we can pay the licence fee," said Chharia.



NEW ISP RULES WILL ALLOW WIRELESS VOICE, IPTV
New Delhi
MintThe department of telecommunications has overhauled rules for Internet service providers (ISP), forcing out small, city-based players, but increasing the scope of services to be provided under the ISP license.
Under the new rules, ISP can provide wireless Internet access, including wireless voice among customers of various ISPs, and interactive television and video distribution services using Internet technology or IPTV.

Small, citywide ISPs-mainly cable operators-can upgrade to state-wide licenses by paying a one-time fee of Rs10 lakh.

The changes were brought about as the government believes that having nearly 400 licensed ISPs, most of whom are not operational, was a security threat. India has about nine million Internet subscribers, including 2.5 million broadband consumers

The department of telecommunications has overhauled rules for Internet service providers (ISP), forcing out small, city-based players, but increasing the scope of services to be provided under the ISP license. Under the new rules, ISP can provide wireless Internet access, including wireless voice among customers of various ISPs, and interactive television and video distribution services using Internet technology or IPTV. Small, citywide ISPs-mainly cable operators-can upgrade to statewide licenses by paying a one-time fee of Rs10 lakh. The changes were brought about as the government believes that having nearly 400 licensed ISPs, most of whom are not operational, was a security threat. India has about nine million Internet subscribers, including 2.5 million broadband consumers.



MOTOROLA GETS READY TO LAUNCH MOBILE WIMAX
Sreejiraj Eluvangal
MintStephen Bell is one of the few people who can justifiably claim to have seen the connected future. As head of Wimax device business unit of the US communication equipment maker Motorola Inc., Bell and his team, together with similar teams at Korean consumer electronics maker Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd and chip maker Intel Corp., will determine the time, shape and success of the next evolution in wireless personal communication: mobile Wimax.

Wimax is short for worldwide inter-operability for microwave access, a standard that is capable of data speeds of 10 megabits per second up to 2km away from a radio transmitter.

With such wide ranges, telecom design engineers believe that Wimax presents itself as not just a powerful alternative to the so-called third generation (or 3G) wireless telecom networks for data, but also as a cheap and efficient alternative to voice communications compared with current cellular networks. Bell and his team of engineers and researchers at Motorola's hand-held and chipset research centre in Florida are designing hand-held devices to be used on the first major Wimax initiative in the world—the $3 billion (Rs 12,300 crore) Sprint-Nextel network, expected to be operational towards the year-end.





NETWORKING

CISCO TARGETS 40 PERCENT GROWTH IN WIRELESS, MOBILITY BIZ IN 6 YRS
P P Thimmaya, Bangalore
The Economic Times (Delhi edition)Cisco, the networking products and solutions giant is expecting to record 40 percent growth in its wireless and mobility business division in India over the next 5-6 years. Currently, Cisco has 30 percent market share in the wireless and mobility space in India which is estimated to be around $70 million (Rs 280 crore). Paramjit Puri, business development manager - Advanced Technologies, Cisco India, said that it is expecting to raise its marketshare to 35 percent.

The $35-billion networking giant is looking at providing end-to-end networking capability all provided on the internet protocol which includes both hardware and software solutions. In this, mobility and wireless space forms an important part as it is providing connectivity sans wires. Cisco has been already engaged in large wireless projects in India which are largely initiatives of the government in providing broadband connectivity. Puri said it is already part of the unwired Pune project and is expecting to participate in similar initiatives in Bangalore, Jaipur, Kolkata and Chennai.






E-GOVERNANCE

NOIDA E-REGISTERS ' PROPERTY RECORDS
Lalit Kumar, Noida
The Times of India Metro NowIn what is regarded as a first among development authorities in UP and the national capital region, Noida has computerised the records of all its residential, commercial and industrial properties.

This means the property number, block, sector and area of the plot, the name of the allottee, the address and dates of allotment, lease deed and taking possession besides details of mortgages and transfers of 68,546 properties in Noida, are now available on the website, www.noidaauthorityonline.com.

Revealing this, NOIDA CEO Balvinder Singh said: ''We have the complete details of 27,176 residential and group housing plots, 27,873 houses including flats and 13,497 commercial, industrial and institutional properties. The details of the dues for about 7,000 plots, which have not been paid, will be put on the website within three days. The position of properties with 'no dues' will be on the website within 15 days.'' He said all the allottees have been given a registration ID to view their property's details.

Significantly, the allottees can now make online payments of their dues, to any branch of any of the 15 banks specified by Noida. Singh said: ''In the interests of transparency and preventing corruption, the current status of all ongoing Noida projects will be available on the website.''





IT TRAINING

APTECH LAUNCHES SSI JQ COURSE FOR PROFESSIONALS
The Economic Times Aptech Computer Education, the flagship brand of the global learning solutions company Aptech, announced the launch of SSi Job Quotient. The 5-month course is specifically designed for engineers, MCAs and M.Sc. (IT/ Computer Science), who are looking for comprehensive vendor-certified courses and a quick entry into the software development companies.

The course curriculum focuses on building a strong foundation in programing, followed by exposure to both .Net & Java technologies with Oracle and Linux bundled in.

The highlight of this curriculum is the inclusion of projects that would give the students an opportunity to put theory into practice. The course will be available only at select Aptech centres and would have stringent entry criteria. The original courseware is provided by Oracle India, Sun Microsystems, Red Hat Linux and Microsoft NET





BPOS FOCUS ON VOICE TRAINING OF EMPLOYEES
Chennai
Deccan Chronicle The Asian AgeIT, ITeS and BPO companies are investing between Rs 8,000 and Rs 13,000 per employee for voice and accent training for a period of three weeks. The training is provided as soon as an employee joins, under the guidance of trainers who are specialised in the British or American accent.

During the training the organisation monitors the employee on various aspects like listening skills, grammatical competency, pronunciation, fluency, conversational skills, telephone etiquette, etc. At the end of the training, the trainees are evaluated for their classroom participation. Their mid-assessment that happens on the seventh or eighth day of training.

Pradeep Narayanan, chief delivery officer, 24/7 Customer, said, "voice and accent training is one of the aspects that enhance customer experience. Any consumer is more comfortable and responds positively when he hears a language and accent that they are used to. It is important for our customer support executives to acquire enhanced accents and be completely knowledgeable about the nuances of a different accent," he said. Vrinda Walavalkar vice-president, corporate communications, Firstsource BPO, said, "it is not about learning to imitate the English accent. Having clear diction and enunciation helps improve service delivery levels so that customer and agent understand each other easily."



AUSTRALIAN INSTITUTE, IDEA FOUNDATION TIE-UP FOR VOCATIONAL COURSES
Mumbai/Ahmedabad
Business StandardAhmedabad-based Idea Foundation's Smaran Vocational Institute will conduct vocational courses at its campuses in Ahmedabad and Bhavnagar in association with TAFE New South Wales (NSW) Hunter Institute, which functions under the NSW's department of education and training. This is TAFE NSW Hunter's first collaboration with an Indian institute.
TAFE, which stands for Technical and Further Education, is Australia's largest training provider and it will offer students advanced diplomas in hospitality management, business administration and Information technology, among others.





IT ENABLED SERVICES



MULITEX EYES 10 PERCENT STAKE IN EFFORT BPO
Mumbai
The Economic Times Hong Kong-based $400-million Mulitex Holdings plans to acquire a 10 percent equity stake in Mumbai-based Effort BPO.

Effort BPO director Rajnish Sarna has confirmed the deal at an undisclosed price. The boards of both companies are in discussion and the transaction is scheduled to be completed by the first week of September. Effort BPO is engaged in the business of setting up and operating call centre services in India.



CALL CENTRE REGISTRATION
New Delhi
The Hindu Business LineIn a move that would make it easier for call centres to get Government approvals, the Department of Telecom has decided to decentralise the registrations of call centres. Call centres and telemarketers can register in any of the 10 Circles, including Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Haryana and Gujarat. Until now, call centres could get themselves only in Delhi. The move makes it easier for telemarketers to register under the do not call registry scheme. The registry is now activated and will be enforced from August 31. Unregistered telemarketers will be blacked out as far as connectivity is concerned. All fresh applications for registration under OSP category and telemarketing category shall be processed by the regional cells.



NORTHGATE SETS UP INDIA UNIT
Hyderabad
The Hindu Business LineNorthgate Technologies Ltd has informed the BSE that the company has carved out Social Media India Ltd, an India-based subsidiary company. Focus of Social Media will be to tap the online advertising and other Internet transaction services industry. Vishnu Vardhan Induri, Head of Bharatstudent.com, has been appointed as Managing Director of Social Media.





ERP

BAJAJ HINDUSTHAN ROPES IN AIRTEL, RAILTEL TO LINK UP UNITS
Mumbai
The Economic Times (Delhi edition)The Noida-based sugar manufacturer, Bajaj Hindusthan, has partnered with Bharti Airtel and Railtel to establish connectivity across all its sugar factories, distilleries and corporate offices. The company recently implemented SAP, an enterprise resource planning software, across all locations enabling it to get significant cost-savings because of efficient inventory management.

The ERP package was implemented across all locations simultaneously, rather than in a phased manner as most companies do. The company, together with its subsidiary Bajaj Hindusthan Sugar & Industries, has 14 sugar factories and five distilleries in India.

"The entire ERP installation was completed in six months. The benefits of implementing an IT initiative in one quantum leap forward are far more substantial," VK Bansal, company's chief information officer said. The implementation was started in August 2006 and completed on January 31, 2007. It was done in partnership with multinational systems integrator, IBM. Vendors like IBM are have become more aggressive than their Indian counterparts in the domestic market.

The ERP system allows for inventory to be optimally managed across all its warehouses thus reducing costs. For instance, if a certain type of inventory has fallen below the prescribed level at a warehouse or sugar mill, the inventory is moved there from a location where it is in excess. By allowing the inventory level to be monitored continuously, the ERP system makes this possible.