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News Updates - 15
February 2001 Envy of every young Mumbaikar? Bombay Times Looking for a way in, in Germany - Forbes magazine Can Russia mimic India? - Newsweek magazine IT services firms find gold in dot-com shakeout - IDG/ CNN Nasdaq targets India - BBC Indian gets first US patent for virtual smell and sensations - PTI Ravi strikes again - Money magazine Envy of every young Mumbaikar? MUMBAI: At 12 years, Aditya Patil is the youngest Microsoft-certified engineer in the world. The seventh form student from Pune, who was recently in the city to launch his own website, first got busy with the keyboard when he was barely seven. His progress from DOS to programming has been swift and amazing. It all began when his father bought a computer in 1995. It caught the little boy's fancy, who insisted on learning DOS and Windows, which he mastered within a year. "At a time when other children were glued to television, Aditya was glued to the computer," said his proud father, Kishore Patil, who owns a small printing press. At the age of 10, Aditya grew curious about programming and enrolled in a computer institute. "At that time we were living in Akola. The person at the institute laughed when he saw a small boy eager to learn programming. But soon he was stunned to see Aditya's level of understanding," said Patil. Academically a bright student, Aditya spends hours on the computer learning new techniques himself. "The HELP key has been of great help to me," Aditya revealed. Aditya, who's fascinated by the net, has made many friends in the US. One of his friends suggested the Microsoft certificate examination to him. Aditya took the exam last year and was certified in August, thus becoming the youngest Microsoft-certified engineer in the world. His certificate is signed by Bill Gates and Aditya hopes to meet Gates someday. The little wizard is aware of his extraordinary skills, but believes he still has a long way to go. He is now planning to appear for the CISCO-certified Internetwork Expert, an examination equivalent to an engineer's qualifications here. "There is lots to do. My dream is to make the fastest computer that runs on solar energy. For now, though, I have to concentrate on the next computer exam. Also, I also have my seventh standard school exam to prepare for." The 12-year-old has made his parents and relatives proud. His police inspector uncle, PS Gawande from Mumbai attested the fact. "He has achieved something unbelievable and has made us all so proud. He definitely has a very bright future." Looking for a Way In HE WAS LIVING at home with his parents and longing to leave Davangere, India, where programmers are plentiful, when he read a news story about Germany's desperate need for high tech workers. Rohith Ajjampur was eager to use his programming skills to enter the international market. At 23, he marked time by teaching programming at a private computer institute and filling out applications. Germany has had to scramble in the New Economy. The dearth of high tech workers is so severe that the notoriously xenophobic nation has even passed an American-style green card bill to lure high tech workers. But with 4 million unemployed Germans, importing programmers remains a controversial proposal. Germany has had a restrictive immigration policy, political asylum seekers excepted. As the debate raged over the bill, which would introduce 20,000 green cards, a conservative Christian Democrat candidate ran his campaign under the racist rhyme "Kinder statt Inder" ("Children, not Indians"). It wasn't long before the word "programmer" became synonymous with "Indian." Desperate for programmers, Datango, an Internet startup, launched a tongue-in-cheek campaign with the phrase, "Are you an Indian?" The campaign was only partially successful at enticing German programmers but was picked up by the Indian press, which covers German politics as well as the racial incidents that periodically erupt in Germany. Indian newspapers ran a photo of a Datango employee with the slogan and the company's Web address, www.datango.de/jobs, emblazoned on his T-shirt. Within days, Datango's human resources department was flooded with resumes from qualified Indian applicants, including Ajjampur, who'd never been outside India but was eager to move to Berlin. His parents were less enthusiastic. The first Indian programmer to arrive under Germany's new green card program was met by a reporter, a photographer, and Datango's nervous human resources manager, who brandished a bouquet of sunflowers. Ajjampur's arrival one week later was less sensational but no less special. On his first day at work, he found himself fielding press interviews. With its high salary requirements, the green card plan is not expected to solve the problems of resource-poor tech companies. But for the startup with the sassy slogan and for the enthusiastic Ajjampur, the plan seems to have worked. The first thing he did upon arriving in Germany was call his worried mother. "I told her," he says, "everything was OK."
MOSCOW - Many companies, though wary of too much government involvement, are optimistic that the Russian government may be moving in the right direction. Anatoly Karachinsky, president and CEO of IBS, which spun-off Luxoft, said Russian President Vladimir Putin is supportive of the idea and other government leaders, are falling in line. Luxoft is one of a growing number of companies developing software for mainly foreign clients, an industry often referred to as offshore programming. India leads the field in offshore programming, but Russia possesses the fundamentals to compete for market share if the country overcomes certain obstacles. Although there are no official statistics, insiders estimate that Russia will generate somewhere between $70 million and $100 million in revenues from its “offshore programming” operations this year and employ around 3,500 full-time programmers. Many others, especially university students, will work as freelance programmers. These numbers are tiny compared to India, which generated $6 billion in revenue in 1999, but Russia’s offshore programming industry is growing at 50 to 60 percent a year, according to a McKinsey Global Institute report. One of the main reasons Russian companies are attracting business is their low costs, which make it cheaper to outsource business to Russia than simply hiring programmers and moving them to the United States. The main centers are located in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and the Siberian city of Novosibirsk where there is a wealth of educational institutes as well as good communications infrastructure.
But Russia is lacking many of the incentives that made India such a powerhouse, including special government sponsored schools to teach programming languages, tax incentives and subsidies. “Don’t even speak about it or I’ll cry!” said Egorov. “That’s why India will sell software near to $6 billion this year and the whole Russia industry will sell near $120 million. That’s the difference.” Getting foreign companies to overcome their hesitations of doing business with Russia is one of the main obstacles to offshore programming, says Pavel Cherkashin, president of Moscow-based Actis Systems. Quality control and proper management are other factors that make Russia a hard sell. Russia trails far behind India in the number of companies certified to assure consistent quality. Only one Russian company has an ISO 9000 certification - one of the globally recognized measures of quality, according to the McKinsey Global Institute report. India, on the other hand, has 109 certified companies. Another concern is the level of management skill in Russia. While computer programmers are abundant, managers to guide them are not. Only a handful of Russian offshore programming companies employ more than 80 programmers, partly because there aren’t managers with the skills to coordinate that many people. “There’s no downside to bringing this offshore development to Russia,” said Matthew Igel, general manager of Kelly Services in Moscow, who recruits IT personnel for offshore programming companies. “It doesn’t pollute the air. There are no health risks. Maybe your eyes will get bad sitting in front of the computer too much, but it’s such a major jobs creation.” IT
services firms find gold in dot-com shakeout The declines in technology stocks on the Nasdaq stock market and the overall waning of investor confidence in information technology companies is turning into a windfall for some IT services companies that see a way of acquiring smaller, ailing companies at basement prices. "Some of the larger companies are acquiring smaller companies just to get the people -- because it is tough getting good people these days -- or in some cases [for] the client base as well," said Ed Yourdon, chairman of the Cutter Consortium, an Arlington, Mass.-based research and consultancy firm. Indian services companies are looking for easy pickings overseas. The majority earn most of their revenue from the U.S. and European markets. "The valuations today are far more attractive than they were a couple of years ago," said Byanna Ramaswamy, president and managing director of Bangalore, India-based consulting and software services company Sonata Software. "We are looking at acquiring in the U.S. and Europe both services companies and companies that have products whose implementation requires a great deal of customization. In either case, the main objective is market access." Sonata announced in December last year that it was investing $2 million for a 26 percent stake in SpinAway, a San Mateo, Calif.-based e-business systems integrator, with the option to enhance its stake at a later stage. " When we did the valuation of SpinAway, it was far more realistic than at the peak of the stock market boom," Ramaswamy said. Apprehensions about recession in the U.S. economy and slower growth in IT spending in the United States may, however, put the brakes on acquisitions. "[Acquisitions] will be tempered, at least in the U.S., by the kind of defensive postures that a lot of these IT firms have right now," Yourdon said. " They want to see which way the economy is going, and when is the IT marketplace going to start buying stuff again. There is no point in buying a company if its products or services are not being purchased." In addition, growth by acquisition in the services business is fraught with risks, according to Ashok Trivedi, co-chairman and president of iGate Capital of Pittsburgh, a holding company for a number of e-services companies. "We have done a number of acquisitions, but in a people-oriented business like services, the one thing you have to ensure is that you are able to carry the people with you," Trivedi said." You may expect to get access to customers through an acquisition, but as the services business is very relationship-based, if you lose the manager handling the account, you may lose the customer, too."
Global
access There are currently three Indian technology and internet companies listed on the Nasdaq: Infosys Technologies, Satyam Infoway and Rediff.com. Indian
gets first US patent on virtual smells, sensations Stiff competition from multinationals notwithstanding, an Indian has bagged the US patent for the world's first multimedia invention on Virtual Reality Device for producing relevant smells and sensations that would enhance the viewing pleasure of a scene being shown on TV/ Cinema or Internet. The Device would enable the people while viewing a advertisement for a cup of coffee to smell its heady brew or smell the aroma of Basmati rice while viewing the recipe for its cooking. The invention would enable a person while viewing the scene of walking into a wet garden to feel the smell of fragrance of flowers and feel moist earth and also have the sensation of himself/ herself taking a walk. Addressing a press conference in New Delhi on Wednesday, inventor Sandeep Jaidka said that the invention involves all the senses of a human being including that of smell and sensation providing a complete fantasy like experience and transporting the viewer into a virtual world replete with smell and feeling. The National Research Development Corporation helped Mr. Jaidka in getting the patent for both the device and process for producing effects of waterfall, rain, garden, mountains, desert, animals, kitchen and river scenes while viewing a picture, ad or playing amusement games in a cinema hall, open theatre and TV. The invention, which uses digitally coded signals to produce a variety of effects, is not specific to either an enclosed area or an open space making its applicability universal, he said. It would have wide applications in entertainment industry including Hi Fi systems, advertising sector, Internet, education, food and beverage industry and medical treatment through aroma therapy. MarketRap
- RAVI STRIKES AGAIN And the empire - aka Amazon.com - strikes back. Lehman's convertible bond guru Ravi Suria, who penned the first skeptical report about Amazon.com back last spring, did it again. His latest report says similar things - avoid Amazon's convertible shares, which, BTW, convert at something like $78 bucks a share. Suria also pointed out that Amazon.com's current liabilities have grown much faster than its current assets, meaning that working capital may turn negative. Amazon.com promptly fired back, telling Reuters that Suria's report is "silly" and "chock full of errors." (I haven't yet been able to get any specifics as to what the supposed errors are.) Amazon.com did finish the fourth quarter with over $1 billion in cash and marketable securities, but we all know that Amazon.com pays its Christmas bills THIS quarter. (Just like the rest of us -- ugh.) Keep in mind that if you'd listened to Suria (rather than the Meekers and the Blodgets of this world) when he wrote the first report, you would have saved a truckload of money. Looks like the damage may already be done. |
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