CRN-January 1, 2012 by UBM India

contents

January 01, 2012 l Volume 1 Issue 05

Cover Story The IT retail landscape will undergo significant transformation as consumer behavior changes, online buying increases, technology converges, and FDI in retail may soon become a reality

18 NEWS Analyses Dell expects to win more partners with refined GCC

Channel Chief

Fortinet serious about SMB market 8 MPN on track, almost

Zicom forays into surveillance services 10 HP plans partner push for MPS to SMBs

Stanimira Koleva MD, APJC, Partner Business Group, Cisco, speaks about the objectives and features of Partner Led, the companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s new partner engagement model

16 Special Focus Big Data stocks up terabytes of opportunities With data volumes estimated to grow 44x between 2009 and 2020, Big Data has arrived

26 Role Model

READ More Editorial 12 Opinion

Feedback

Channel Buzz

New Products

Shadow Ram

Get Personal

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A triumph of transparency Chintamani Lele and Rajeev Patayeet, Directors, Vintech Electronic Systems, take us on a journey from the early days of the solutions provider through its present success to its future plans

29 Tech Focus 10 security predictions for 2012 CRN looks into its crystal ball and sees Android, hacktivism and cyber espionage as some of the top security threats in 2012

starting line MUST

Dell expects to win more partners with refined GCC

Fortinet serious about SMB market

n RAMDAS S

Read

Security vendor Fortinet is planning to revamp its distribution and enter the SMB market. Apart from creating new products at price-points that start at `24,000, the vendor will appoint stockists, subdistributors and one distributor. Said Vishak Raman, Senior Regional Director, Fortinet India & Saarc, “We will continue with Ingram Micro which has been instrumental in connecting us with over 300 resellers, and has helped us become the No 1 in India. The entire business was back-to-back, but now for the newly introduced Fortinet 20C and 40C products we need another distributor.” Till recently, Fortinet’s entry-level products were priced above `75,000. “Till a few months back we never thought of a stock-and-sell because enterprise security market decisions always took time. However, stocking locally is necessary for the SMB market,” Raman said. He said that UTM solutions are in demand from smaller cities, and that many of these places cannot be reached through a national distributor. “This makes it Vishak Raman imperative that we have a second-tier distribution in place. We are now on the lookout for re-distribution partners.” Raman said that Fortinet is currently working with 300 partners, but plans to cover 5,000 partners with the new strategy. He informed that the stockand-sell model would be only for 20C and 40C, while the other products would continue to be back-to-back. Ruling out an immediate entry into the SOHO and home market, he said that their strategy to address this space would be to work with service providers to offer security services. “Our competition has started to work with the home segment. However, it makes more sense for a home user to buy UTM as a service at a price of, say, `200 a month, rather than buy a box which would need configuration and support. We are in talks with a few telecom service providers, and are working on a few pilots.” n — Ramdas S

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ell expects more systems integrators (SIs) to join its Global Commercial Channels (GCC) program. “We have been listening to partners, made several sweeping changes, and believe that we have the best commercial channel program in the industry today. We want more SIs to join us,” said Amit Midha, Vice President, APJ CSMB & Chairman, Dell China. Midha informed that since the launch of the program the contribution of channels to Dell’s business stands at 28 percent worldwide. While Dell does not provide country-specific figures, in India the figure is likely to be higher than the world average. Though nearly 2,000 partners have signed up for GCC in India since its launch in February 2011, only around 250 are active. Midha said that several critical changes have been made to the program to ensure that it is more channel-friendly. While deal registration is a must for every price quote and billing, any partner winning a new account now gets a preferred status for the account. “Unless the customer specifically gives a written request, we will go with the partner who won the account,” he added. Some partners point out that Dell does not have a fixed pricelist for commercial products, but Midha said that this is advantageous for partners. “Every deal goes through multiple levels of negotiations, and partners need to take further discount and price approvals. Our pricing is dynamic, and reflects the latest market prices. Most products we can make available in 5-7 days. We are able to get price quotes out in 24 hours in 90 percent of the cases, and price clearances within 48 hours.” Mahesh Bhalla, Executive

“We have been listening to partners, made several sweeping changes, and believe that we have the best commercial channel program in the industry” Amit Midha

VP, APJ CSMB & Chairman Dell China

Director, CSMB, Dell India, noted that the company has consciously decided to stay away from distributors for all commercial products. “Except for the tower servers—for which are distributed by Supertron—all other products such as Latitude, Optiplex, PowerEdge rack and blade servers, and storage solutions don’t have a distributor involved. For these partners work back-to-back with us. We have distributors like Redington and Cyberstar which fulfill such orders.” Dell is upbeat about its storage business through channels. “With Powervault, Equallogic and now Compellent, we have the most exhaustive enterprise range of storage solutions. Every acquisition of Dell in the recent past has been of companies which have a strong channel model. We have taken some of their best practices and have included the same in the Dell PartnerDirect program,” said Midha. Midha and Bhalla also stressed on the new incentive programs introduced. “We are providing not just incentives to partners for achieving targets but also providing incentives to partners’ sales staff who have specific targets. For upselling, the rebates have actually got a lot bigger,” said Bhalla. n

starting line MUST

Read

Zicom forays into surveillance services Zicom Electronic Security Systems has recently announced a foray into Surveillance-as-aService (SaaS). The company has floated a new entity called Zicom SaaS to take the initiative forward. The business model is structured around offering services by using the cloud for data and video, remote managed alarms, remote monitoring of video, etc. According to a study done by Deloitte, the electronic SaaS market is pegged at `225 crore, and is growing at about 30 percent per annum. Zicom is investing approximately $10 million as part of the first phase. The money would be spent to build IT infrastructure, network connectivity and set up a security operation center. The service, conceptualized on physical security asset management, starts from `1,400. Zicom will provide hardware (cameras) and report vulnerabilities and weaknesses in the physical security Pramoud Rao to its customers. It will also set alarms to activate people during emergencies. The company is targeting the large enterprise with branch offices, residential clusters and schools. In fact the company is running pilots with three residential societies in Mumbai. It will launch a formal program called ‘Make Mumbai Safe’ on January 25. Pramoud Rao, MD, Zicom, has formed a team of 20 people for the new business. “We are currently focusing on opportunities in Mumbai. We want to develop it, create a model, test it, and then throw it open to the channel by May 2012,” he said. Zicom would prepare a new breed of service partners. Said Rao, “We will initially scout for security and service specialists and then leverage our active base of 2,000 resellers across the country.” The company will train the new partners at its Advanced Security Training Management Institute in Mumbai. n — Sonal Desai

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MPN on track, almost n Sonal Desai

t has been close to year since Microsoft revamped its partner program to the new Microsoft Partner Network. While Microsoft is happy with the progress on partner transition to MPN, it also admits that it is still six months away from delivering on the promised results. “We are on track to achieve the target set to transition our partner ecosystem to MPN. The real benefits of the new program will kick in in the middle of next year when the entire ecosystem has been aligned to MPN and we go into the market with full force,” said Vineet Kshirsagar, Director, Partner Strategy & Programs, Microsoft India. Kshirsagar informed that 84 percent of the old Gold Certified partners have achieved the same level of certification in at least one competency. “Once they begin seeing the benefits of the new MPN in one competency they will explore more. Many partners are already exploring more competencies,” added Kshirsagar. Most Microsoft partners are happy with the new MPN; however, a few also opined that Microsoft needs to do more on a couple of counts. For Mumbai-based PH Teknow, the competency-led MPN has meant better focus and support from Microsoft which has led to a 20 percent increase in Microsoft-led revenue. The company is now looking at specializing in desktop virtualization, server and cloud competencies. “MPN has certainly helped us. Microsoft is also providing strong assistance in the form of marketing funds, training and education for us to gain the most out of our business. That is the reason we plan to specialize in more competencies. However one of the aspects Microsoft needs to work on is to create awareness about the importance of these competencies among the end-customers,” said Paresh Shah,

“Microsoft needs to create awareness about the importance of these competencies among the end-customers” Paresh Shah Partner PH Teknow

Partner, PH Teknow. The cost of certification is another bone of contention. The new competencies require partners to get at least four engineers certified against two for Gold certification earlier; the certification fee has also been hiked by at least 40 percent based on the competency level. Suresh Ramani, CEO of the Mumbai-based TechGyan, defends the hike in fees. “Microsoft is the only vendor that provides weekly onsite and online training. In addition, the competencies bring in a differentiator, and help partners to focus on their strengths,” he said. Microsoft has also been offering discounts for certification to reduce the blow of the certification cost. “We got group discounts. In addition, of the four engineers we certified for volume licensing, Microsoft offered free onsite training onsite for two,” said Shah. According to partners, Microsoft has provisioned dedicated resources to help partners benefit from the new competencies. It has also begun investing in partner-led events. Ramani recently hosted an event on cloud opportunities for small businesses; the event was funded by Microsoft. Shah too hosted a meeting for select customers on cloud computing which was funded by Microsoft. n

edit opinion Volume 1, Issue 05

The real challenge dhaval valia

hile the bill allowing FDI in multi-brand retail has been suspended by the government for political reasons, make no mistake that if not now this bill will eventually become a reality. There is political and economic pressure on the Indian government to pass the bill, from Indian corporates as well as foreign countries. Considering that India has a 1.25 billion population including a 330 million strong middle-class, it makes our country the biggest potential market for MNC retailers. For the Indian government, it could lead to massive direct investments and also indirect investments in infrastructure to support modern retail. So how will this policy, when it happens, impact the IT ecosystem? While the naysayer would like us to believe that the impact would be sizeable, I believe, that in India, MNC retailers may not achieve the same success as in western countries. This I say because India is a heterogeneous market. While in leading urban centers you have a high penetration of PCs, and many second- and third-time buyers, in many semi-urban and rural markets PC penetration is dismally low. Also, customer behavior changes by region, and there is vast disparity between income levels, the cost of living and disposable incomes. Managing the varied consumer culture of India is not at all easy. Even Indian modern retailers have struggled. Many opposing the bill have opined that FDI in multi-brand retail will kill the Indian trader. I doubt it; I wouldn’t underestimate the ingenuity of the Indian trader. For ages we have been a trading nation and have the trading and business culture in our genes. Doing jugaad is a way of life for us. When Indian LFRs started most of us felt that the IT retail business would be wiped out, but we withstood that challenge. While there is no denying that the presence of LFRs have created greater competition, the Indian IT retailer has found ways to evolve and sustain itself. However, it can’t be denied that in future the key challenge for the Indian IT retailer will not be multi-brand retail but the fast-changing consumer behavior. The consumers of today are looking at affordability, convenience of shopping and experiential buying—all at the same time. In the top 20 cities there’s a sizeable number of buyers who are open to buying online, and in some instances, even from TV shopping channels. Today, consumers use Google to find out the best model and the best price. Buying by peer influence is rising as social media Websites allow users to share their views and reviews about products, services and prices. These changes in consumer buying behavior pose a bigger challenge to IT retailers than MNC supermarts. Consumer focus in the only constant factor for success. n E-mail CRN Executive Editor Dhaval Valia at dhaval.valia@ubm.com 12

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edit opinion Enter the vendorgrater

However, the most interesting and disruptive thing that happened in 2011 was definitely the tablet. It is just a matter of time before tablets emerge as an alternate to notebooks. It is the start of a new era of computing based on touch and apps and simplicity.

Robert Faletra

or a few months now I’ve had a question rolling around in my head about the long-term viability of this business experiment called VCE—the joint effort of Cisco and EMC that also has investments from VMware and Intel. The theory behind the joint venture is that VCE can deliver an integrated product that leverages the best technology from Cisco, EMC and VMware via its Vblock offering. VCE has both advantages and challenges that no other competitor in the market faces, and it is trying to build a company built on others’ technology in a way no other has ever attempted. On the advantages front, it does have a special relationship with the three most important contributors to the venture. Cisco, EMC and VMware all have a vested interest in its success. In fact, with Cisco and EMC each having invested hundreds of millions there is no doubt that their senior management wants a return, so we can expect that VCE will have the inside track on technology and business decisions coming down from its investing parents. The management challenge, of course, is that while all parties involved want a strong, successful VCE, the success of their respective independent companies is more important and has to take precedent. Hence there are decisions that will undoubtedly be made by the investors, and this will mean that VCE gets no more of an advantage than its competitors. If it makes business sense for one of them to do a deal with a competitor, you can bet it will happen. The arrangement makes VCE neither a pure-play vendor nor an SI. While it is integrating other suppliers’ technology, it’s not doing so independently. To make it even more interesting, VCE is taking advantage of the channel of its investing parents as well as building its own channel. All this puts VCE in a class by itself and makes the company a ‘vendorgrater’—a word I’ve coined to describe what could be a new category of supplier as we further journey to the cloud. This arrangement has multiple challenges. VCE is constrained in its integration efforts because if it were to incorporate technology from competitors I can’t imagine its parents would be thrilled. The company therefore needs to turn this to an advantage by positioning itself as having built a better mousetrap with technology available to others. If it can do that, and build a world-class support system around it, this experiment could work. It’s a management challenge with high risk and high reward, and it certainly will be fun to watch. n Email Robert Faletra at robert.faletra@ec.ubm.com 14

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Chandan Mishra Delhi

Big stories of 2011

FDI in retail

The last CRN cover story made for very interesting reading. HP’s decision to quash PSG’s spin-off speculation is of course a welcome step, but it is difficult to say whether PSG will be able to regain its position in the PC market. Tough times in the HDD market also complicate the problem for the industry. Sony’s aggressive push in the PC market with the right marketing, increased SKUs, and definite margins by controlling MOPs is clearly a case study.

With the government keen to bring FDI in multi-brand retail, the IT channel needs to be worried. One may argue that the presence of larger companies would benefit the customers in these cities who are deprived of choice, but what also needs to be considered is whether IT vendors will encourage a level-playing field for smaller shops. Dheeraj Kumar Kolkata

Send your feedback at editor@ubmindia.com or post your views on www.crn.in

Advertiser Index Company name

Page No Web site

Sales Contact

Smartlink

1 www.digilite.co.in

helpdesk@digilite.co.in

Smartlink

2 www.digilite.co.in

helpdesk@digilite.co.in

IBM

4 www.ibm.com

ibm.com/facts/in/platforms

5 www.lge.com

Compuage

7 www.compuageindia.com

odyssey@compuageindia.com

Rashi

9 www.rptechindia.com

response@rptechindia.com

NEC

11 www.necindia.in

enquiries@necindia.in

Tyco

13 www.Meganet1.com

in.netconnect@tycoelectronics.com

Kingmax Group

sales@kingstarindia.com

Seagate

17 www.seagate.com

www.kingmax.com

20-21 www.hp.com.in

tfc@hp.com

Adata

25 www.adata.com.in

adata_in@adata-group.com

Quick Heal

www.quickheal.com

info@quickheal.co.in

Western Digital

www.westerndigital.com

wddirect.india@wdc.com

Biz

38 www.indiaantivirus.com

sales@indiaantivirus.com

Cisco

39 www.ciscoracetorio.com

ciscointelligentnetwork.in/crn

Boston

40 www.bostonindia.in

sales@bostonindia.in

starting line HP plans partner push for MPS to SMBs

have an option to outsource specific portions of the workflow. Partners will have the option to offer MPS in various models: customer lease, customer capex and channel lease. “Partners can choose a model to provide supplies and consumables while the customer owns the hardware. They may buy the hardware on the customer’s behalf and offer it on lease.”

As per IDC, the APEJ managed print services market was estimated at $530 million in 2010 and is expected to reach $990 million by 2014. According to the Photizo Group, India is the fastest-growing market for MPS in APAC with a CAGR of 20 percent from 2009 till 2014. According to AMI Partners, about 18 percent of the total printing business from SMBs in India comes from MPS; by 2015, almost 60 percent of the printing business will transform into MPS. HP will support partners for the deployment of printers by providing pre-sales support including POC and pricing tools. The company is currently identifying partners from the existing HP partners, and also new ones with service network and capital capabilities. “Partner enablement will be completed in six months. We are imparting training on sales models, software solutions, and even structuring the financials of the contracts,” informed Hiranandani. n

Computer Reseller News

n AMIT SINGH

“We expect SMBs to adopt this model to reduce printing costs, enhance employee productivity, and focus on their core strengths”

P India plans to aggressively extend its managed print services (MPS) to SMBs through channel partners. The company is targeting about 350 listed mid-market accounts for MPS in metro cities, and plans to extend the services in a phased manner to other cities. “Over the last one year MPS has seen strong growth among enterprises. We expect SMBs to adopt this model to reduce printing costs, improve document processes, enhance employee productivity, and focus on their core strengths. We are focusing on the manufacturing, BFSI, retail and IT/ITeS verticals for now,” said Nitin Hiranandani, Director, LaserJet Enterprise Solutions, HP IPG. While HP MPS for enterprises consists of end-to-end outsourcing of hardware, supplies and consumables, and software and services, the SMB MPS offering will

Nitin Hiranandani

Director, LaserJet Enterprise Solutions, HP IPG

01/01/2012

www.crn.in

channel chief “From Customer Led to Partner Led” Stanimira Koleva, MD, APJC, Partner Business Group, Cisco, spoke to Sonal Desai, about the objectives and features of Partner Led, the company’s new partner engagement model First of all, what is Partner Led? Till last year Cisco was focused on Customer Led, although 100 percent of our business came through partners. But in sync with our vision of Next Cisco, we decided to focus our entire energy and resources on partners to enable and empower them to sell to customers. We created a group within Cisco called Partner Led to drive this new partner engagement framework. Cisco’s entire commercial business—which consists of mid-market and SMB customers—will be completely driven by partners. Since the launch of the program in August we have mapped 16,000 midmarket customers globally to our partners’ sales teams. 100 percent of our commercial business sales force, as well as technical and service teams, have been aligned to the new Partner Led unit. The incentives of Cisco executives are now aligned with partner performance. They will share their goals with the partners, and in turn the partners will align their business with us. We have earmarked $15 million (of the $75 million globally) for Partner Led for the APJC region. This investment will show up in the form of more partnercentric marketing resources, incentive programs for mid-market- and SMB-focused Cisco solution providers, a partner relationship management system, and access to a team of Cisco engineers put in place to help partners close deals more effectively. In addition, we have simplified pricing and leveraged distribution support. We are now investing in building end-to-end solution capabilities, and partners are transitioning to the new model.

Could you provide some more details? We have introduced two types of partner programs in Partner Led: Partner Led Named and Partner Led Velocity. The Partner Led Named partners will cater to mid-market accounts chiefly for architecture managed and cloud services, services and migration, and collaborative selling. Partner Led Velocity partners will

“The incentives of Cisco executives are aligned with partner performance. They will share their goals with the partners, who in turn will align their business with us” 16

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cater to the SMB segment, the Small Business Technology Group of Cisco, managed and cloud services, and speed and scalable solutions; they will focus on demand generation and innovative coverage. Since launch we have aligned 350 existing partners with this new initiative across APJC. In India we have very few Partner Led Named partners at present. But the Partner Led Velocity program has been very successful here; it has grown more than 100 percent in the last one year, and we are also expanding the number of partners. For India, Pramodh Menon has been appointed as the President, Partner Business Group. He is driving the Partner Led initiative, and is transitioning the partners to the new model. Currently, we are focused on transitioning our Silver and Premier partners to the new model.

What are the changes partners can expect? We have increased the training three-fold. Under the new program we are sharing customer and business intelligence with our partners so that they understand customers, their needs and their future requirements. We have increased support to partners through automation and a virtual center. Now we are asking partners to actively chase commercial enterprises in the SMB and mid-market. We are providing them with insights about productivity growth, market share, acquiring new customers, and core technologies such as the cloud, business video and secure mobile. By the end of the year we will jointly develop videos on topics like ‘what the customer wants’ and ‘how to jointly sell.’ We will continue to invest in our Avant Garde Partner Program, and also offerings around services for applications, migration and integration. We are identifying and rewarding partners based on their services capabilities. The service criteria are qualitative rather than quantitative. We are launching a set of collaboration professional services for telepresence, IP telephony and security and migration. We will weave our IP into these services, some of which start for as low as $5,000. We have also launched a tech helpline called Partner Help. It is being piloted with tier-1 and tier-2 partners, and the results are encouraging. Besides information on presales, products and pricing, the helpline informs partners about FAQs. It provides them access to peer profiles along with their projects and case studies. n

cover story

The IT retail landscape will undergo significant transformation as consumer behavior changes, online buying increases, technology converges, and FDI in retail may soon become a reality n Ramdas S

T retailing is no more a fad in India. According to leading PC vendors, over the past eight years the IT retail market has grown over 10 times in terms of revenue. It is also estimated that around 10,000 retail outlets with a primary focus on IT have mushroomed across the country, and that more than 250 large format retail (LFR) outlets have either floors or dedicated shop-inshop arrangements to sell computers. While the market has grown, and resellers have realized that the market is lucrative enough to set up IT outlets of all shapes and sizes, there are several challenges for them when it comes to sustaining the business. These include the entry of a number of foreign retailers once the suspended Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in retail bill is passed by Parliament, the threat of online retailers offering better deals, spiraling real estate and operations costs, and the changing buying patterns of customers. “There is little doubt that the number of retail outlets has grown across the country in tier-3 and tier-4 cities. In fact we have no idea what the exact number is, but it is anything above 10,000. Much to our surprise, numbers are growing even inside large metros,” says Saji Kumar, Head,

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Product Marketing, Acer India. Kumar is among the number of industry pundits who have been observing the retail boom carefully and building strategies accordingly. “At Acer we have, over the last six months, run the Acer Gallery program whereby we have approached some of the retail outlets to sign up as an Acer Gallery partner as part of the Acer Outreach Program,” Kumar adds. “We have signed on 2,000 Gallery partners over the last six months, and the number will touch 4,000 stores by the end of this fiscal year.” While Acer is focused on reaching the interiors of the country, the retail boom cuts across all segments. In Bengaluru’s populous Kaggadasapura suburb alone, eight IT retail outlets have sprung up over the past one year across a stretch of just two kilometers. Most of these outlets are on footprints of less than 300 square feet, and are multi-brand. One of them has some in-shop branding from Dell, two each from Acer and HP. PK Mustaffa, CEO, Lamcy Computers which is located in this area, does not deal with any of the tier-1 distributors, and in fact has not even heard of Redington or Ingram Micro. He buys his wares from three prominent

cover story sub-distributors in the city who provide him all the collateral, credit and confidence to run the business. “I know there are seven other IT shops in our vicinity, but as of today all of us are able to sell and survive. We have customers who flock to our next door LFR owned by my family, and who also walk into my store. I get around 20 serious walk-ins and around two closures daily,” he says. However, there are bigger challenges.

FDI in retail While the FDI in multi-brand retail has been suspended by the government, it seems it is just a matter of time before the government re-introduces the bill and gets it passed. There is too much pressure from the industry (as well as from world trade bodies) for the government to sit idle on the bill. A better political season and better timing is all that is needed to set the ball rolling. Yet the FDI issue has created fear not only among farmers and kirana stores (mom & pop stores) but also sent shivers down the spines of small IT retailers. The most common fear is that FDI would ruin the retail business, especially because of the price at which big retailers are expected to sell products. IT retailers believe that giants like Walmart and Carrefour would go for high volume purchases and negotiate for the best price which the small retailers would not be able to do. “Their selling price would be equivalent to our buying price. We cannot match them as we do not have such infrastructure or resources (to invest). This might not be a problem in developed countries where there are not many small retailers, but it would impact countries such as India which is dominated by small retailers,” says Paramjit Singh Juneja, CEO, Secant Technologies, Jalandhar. Another concern for the retailers is that once the large retail chains establish a footprint in a country they might change their strategy. “Providing products at discounted prices are just initial gimmicks to establish themselves and create brand value, but once they become popular they start selling at MRP,” alleges Bimal Kumar Singh, MD, Geonet IT Mall. “By then, the small retailers are already wiped out.” The situation is grimmer in smaller cities where the potential market is small and the competition is already cut-throat due to the mushrooming of retailers. “We are already feeling the pinch with Croma and can imagine the future when foreign brands would set up shop. LFRs spend huge amounts on branding, advertising and marketing to draw footfalls during the weekend, something that we cannot do. It is obvious that PCs with

ducts at “Providing pro s are just ce discounted pri of big chains s k ic initial gimm mselves and e to establish th e” lu create brand va

umanta Mukherjee, GM, Research & Consulting, Cyber Media Research, says that falling margins in IT retail is the biggest challenge. “The situation is also getting complicated with the depreciation of the rupee. With flagging economic pointers and soft customer sentiments, increasing prices will be the last thing vendors will go for.” Mukherjee points out that the “HDD shortage has rocked the market and so other accessories have also slumped. Working capital is getting blocked because the component market is not moving. However, this is a temporary phenomenon, and is likely to be over by April 2012.” According to Mukherjee, the emergence of alternate channels is a new trend and has the potential to dent traditional IT retail. At present LFRs contribute about 10 percent to the total IT sales in India, and this figure is likely to grow because of their focus on creating an experience for customers. Mukherjee says that according to Assocham, the size of the online retail industry is expected to touch `7,000 crore by 2015, up from `2,000 crore now. “As customers mature and their confidence grows, online buying is expected to grow as they explore more convenient means of buying. Buying from TV shopping channels and similar media that provide door-delivery, cash on delivery or affordable EMI options is growing. These trends will pose challenges to traditional IT retail.” According to Mukherjee, the foremost strategy to counter these Sumanta Mukherjee challenges will be to expand in markets beyond metros and tier-1 cities. “Tier 3-4 towns offer a lot more opportunities in sales as well as margins due to less saturation.” He says that the desktop market will remain at the same level and will be driven by commercial models. He advises retailers to focus on notebooks and accessories, which are high margin. “While tablets are a fastemerging product, they will never replace the PC particularly in the Indian market where millions of people are yet to buy their first PC. However, it will be a wise decision to include it in the portfolio as it is likely to rise at the end of 2012-13. Smartphone demand is also picking up, and will be a good investment.” Mukherjee also recommends investing in additional avenues including visibility on the Web, experience zones and the education segment. “Invest in Web interfaces including individual Websites, and create a presence on sites like eBay and Amazon as well as on social media. This is to not only advertise and do online transactions but also gain customer feedback. Retailers must also focus on students by introducing student-specific schemes.” Mukherjee recommends that partners develop service capability and transform from hardware selling to concept selling which can act as a differentiator. According to Mukherjee, retailers should also look at cloud computing as a big opportunity. n

Invest in Web interfaces including individual Websites, and create a presence on sites like eBay and Amazon

NGH

SI BIMAL KUMAR l MD,

“tablets will never replace PCs”

Geonet IT Mal

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cover story freebies, bundled accessories, scratch cards, lucky draws and huge discounts attract more people,” says Harish Juneja, CEO, Super Infotech, Jalandhar. One of the causes for worry for the small retailer is the sheer size of the foreign retailers when they enter a country. In most countries, retail majors like Walmart and Carrefour occupy 10,000-20,000 sq mt in space. “These giant stores would also have dedicated space for IT products with multiple brands, a variety of SKUs and demo zones, thus leading to a better buying experience for end-consumers,” says a retailer from Mumbai.

Spiraling costs The entry of foreign retailers would also cause real estate prices to shoot up, thus making it difficult for local retailers to expand their business. “We experienced something similar in 2006 when the LFRs set up shop

here,” remarks Singh of Geonet IT. “The big brands got commercial space for as low as `10 per sq foot while others were paying `150. With foreign retailers spreading their wings, real estate costs may shoot up and kill the small retailers’ business completely.” Another important factor that would hamper the retailers’ business is the online shops or e-commerce set up by foreign brands. “With uniform GST, companies with strong logistics would make our business tough. For example, even Indian e-commerce sites such as Flipkart. com are giving us stiff competition with their low prices and free delivery,” says Juneja. “The big retailers’ strong logistics saves on state taxes and octroi as they have warehouses in most major cities. This is not possible for small retailers like us,” adds Singh of Geonet. Another thing that partners are worried about is the increased cost of financing, promotion and manpower.

The online threat is real

hile LFRs are still perceived to be the biggest threat to partner-driven IT retailers and resellers, online retailers are emerging as a bigger concern. Over the past two quarters major online retailers such as Flipkart, HomeShop18 and Future Bazaar (plus many smaller retailers who use aggregation or broker Websites such as eBay.in as a platform) have become very aggressive on computers and IT accessories. “Our channels have been complaining about the strategies followed by online retailers in the past few months. Some of the prices quoted by the online retailers are more or less the same as what we are able to source as a distributor,” says Dinesh Nair, VP, Aldous Glare Trade & Exports. While what attracts consumers to an LFR is the buying experience and the choice that the LFR provides, it is the low prices that pushes consumers to buy online. “Most of the large online retailers are here to play a long game, and are looking at next stage funding, getting acquired or going public. For them, customer acquisition at any cost makes sense,” explains Vishal Tripathi, Principal Analyst, Gartner India. In fact the war between online retailers has even forced some of the online retailers to shut shop, the latest casualty being the Bengaluru-based Taggle.com, which was started with $1 million funding in June 2010. “Many customers are placing online orders for home products. We see this as a threat in major cities, but maybe not so much in smaller cities,” says VA Krishnan, Director, OST Electronics. Partners point out that in most cases customers use online retail prices as a benchmark to negotiate. “Everyday we have a customer who walks in and says he has seen a low price for a particular SKU on Flipkart or one of the other

online retailers and asks us to match the price. In most cases the price quoted is less than our pickup cost. Most Indian customers are reluctant to buy high-value items online, but they still like to use it as a benchmark to bargain with us,” explains Gireesh Kumar, Proprietor, Techies Zone. While most online retailers refuse to discuss their sourcing patterns, channels say that some of the distributors and sub-distributors offer them huge cash discounts. “I do not think any of the authorized distributors indulges in the practice. We do business with Flipkart, but never at a loss, and the price at which we have transferred to them is the same as what we offer to any other reseller,” says Nair of Aldous. Vendors say they are aware of the online challenge. “What we have observed is that in some end-of-life models some ‘liquidation’ pricing is enabled. We feel this is an evolving phase, and things will stabilize in a couple of quarters,” says S Rajendran, CMO, Acer India. While partners agree that it will not be possible for an online retailer to consistently undercut the regular channels, they feel permanent damage will be done if it’s not stopped. “At Confed-ITA we have raised this question a number of times and asked vendors how the differential pricing is possible,” says PN Prasad, CEO, Microplus Computers.. Some vendors express concern, and promise action. Says Sivakumar N, Vice President, Strategic Marketing, Product Management & Service, DS Division, Toshiba India, “We would like to resolve this issue fast because the MOP of certain SKUs has been affected. From what we understand they are genuine SKUs which the channels themselves have offloaded to the online retailers. We are contemplating action against such partners.” n

Most of the online retailers are looking at next stage funding, getting acquired or going public. For them, customer acquisition at any cost makes sense

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cover story “Advertising costs in mainline newspapers have gone up by 100 percent over the past 3-4 years, so it is not possible for us to even consider advertising. It is difficult to hire an engineer even at the entry level for less than `10,000 in Bengaluru. On top of everything, banks have started charging hefty interest. The only thing that has gone down is our margins,” complains Gireesh Kumar, Partner, Techies Zone, Bengaluru.

Finding positives But the scenario is not as bleak as it looks, and retailers are scouting for ways to do business smarter. “The worst scenario post-FDI would be that they (big retailers) would have a bigger pie. But we also need to see the advantages. Small retailers might not have the financial strength to market and promote a particular product, but the huge investments by the foreign retailers would only help to create awareness and be a boon in disguise. Foreign retailers might also be a threat to LFRs like Croma and eZone which will now have to compete with them. That too might help smaller players,” feels Ashwin Kukreja, Proprietor, Galaxy IT Concepts. It would also help the small retailers to shape up with improved infrastructure, better post-sales service and other value-added services. “We can provide consumers customized services which the big guys cannot, and retailers will try innovative ideas to attract their set of loyal customers. Another important point is that these big brands will lack trained personnel who have complete knowledge of the products. It is here that we will score over them,” comments Juneja. Vendors are chipping in with their best—cautiously. While almost all vendors are working hard to ensure that their exclusive franchisee stores make money, they are not giving up on multi-brand outlets either. At the same time they also want to see that the rest of their channels, especially the LFRs, do not clash with the specialist retail stores. Explains Rajesh Thadani, Director, Consumer Business Unit, HSB, Lenovo India, “For us, ensuring that our exclusive stores make money month-on-month is very important. They are our ambassadors, and more than a channel arm they also play a big role in reaching our brand to customers. In fact over the past few months we have built a strong backhand system which ensures that even if a retailer ends up billing 75 laptops he can sustain the business.” Toshiba and Sony have also become increasingly focused on ensuring that their exclusive stores make

our exclusive “Ensuring that ey every on stores make m ortant. They p month is very im reaching our in play a big role rs” e m o st brand to cu

hile a number of prominent partners who have met with great success as system builders or sub-distributors have failed in their multi-store strategy, the Ahmedabad-based SAC Infosystem has been able to pull off a multi-brand retail strategy very effectively. Its success has been attributed to some strong retail basics, solid investments with planned returns, and operational efficiencies. Today, the retail chain boasts of 44 stores across Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Delhi and Karnataka. After setting up its first store at Vastrapur in Ahmedabad three years ago, SAC has been continuously investing in retail outlets, focusing very clearly in B- and C- class cities, and, in most cases, staying away from direct competition with LFRs. The company has pumped in `90 crore in 2010 alone, most of which has been spent on acquiring real estate. The vendor also spent `15 lakh-`20 lakh on each store for interiors. SAC has focused on both multi-brand and exclusive stores. In Gujarat alone the retailer has a total of 22 Lenovo Exclusive Stores and LESlite stores; the rest of the stores are multi-brand. “Choosing between a multi-brand store and an exclusive store depends on many aspects,” says Yatheesh Govind, Director, SAC Infosystem. According to Govind, nearly 44 percent of SAC’s `142 crore retail revenue came from accessories, while laptops contributed around 52 percent. “Do not underestimate the business of accessories. It is a high-growth, highYatheesh Govind margin business, one that compels your customers to come to you again and again. We have dedicated teams and counters at all our stores to focus on accessories. This focus has meant higher revenue per customer, repeat footfalls, and higher margins.” Govind emphasized the need for inventory management. “When you are managing 44 stores and planning 100 products, inventory management becomes a critical factor. Forecasting inventory, managing aging stocks and moving unsold stock from one location to another requires strong systems and processes—and trained manpower to follow those systems religiously.” Another strategy that has helped SAC connect with customers better has been the focus on service. The vendor has set up 14 e-garage centers that provide L1-L2 services with chip-level repairs. Vendor relationships play a big role in building great retail chains. “You cannot win this game without strong vendor support. At SAC we do long-term planning with all our vendors, and plot the break-even strategy at the beginning itself. This exercise has helped us get full vendor support for making our retail business work.” SAC plans to start another 50 stores over the next six months, and explore B- and C-class cities in states such as Tamil Nadu and Punjab, and across North India. n

At SAC we do long-term planning with all our vendors, and plot the break-even strategy at the beginning itself

Rajesh Thadani Lenovo India Director, CBU,

Playing into bigger hands

HSB,

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cover story An exclusive tablet store

Trumpeting EHuts

nticipating that tablets will soon erode the consumer PC market, Aurangabad-based Cyber Peripherals is setting up an exclusive multi-brand tablet retail store in 2012. The sub-distributor/retailer has eight Lenovo and Toshiba exclusive stores, and eight more multi-brand stores. In FY2010-11 it clocked `25 crore in revenue of which `10.50 crore came from retail. The motivation to start the tablet store came following an analysis of the segment. According to Prakash Pramod Dere, Director, Cyber Peripherals, “Apple and Samsung are aggressive. Smaller brands such as HCL and iBall, and mid-market brands like Lenovo and Acer, are also pushing their tablets. Aakash, priced at `1,700 (for students and teachers) is getting this market extra attention. Tablets are presently eating into the netbook market, and 2-3 years down the line they will be competing with Prakash Dere notebooks.” Cyber has already readied the 300 sq ft store in Aurangabad, and is looking forward to launch the store officially toward February 2012. Dere is targeting mobile entrepreneurs who want to substitute their laptops with a good gadget that is lighter in weight and longer-lasting in terms of battery life. Cyber currently sells 20 Apple and Samsung tablets a month, but aims to sell much more once its tablet store starts. “At present the tablet market is really scattered. Buyers don’t know whether to approach a mobile shop, an IT retailer or an LFR. We are confident of getting more footfalls because we can offer the widest range and best advice to customers,” Dere says. n

money. “We have structured a program that makes it easier for our exclusive stores to break even, and we are ensuring that footfalls are there through the months,” says N Sivakumar, Vice President, Strategic Marketing, Product Management & Service, DS Division, Toshiba India. Sony India has been very strict about creating exclusive catchment areas for its authorized retailers, and has strict rules on not allowing multiple retailers within a particular zone in the city. Thadani of Lenovo says, “We rely on market research reports and on the feedback of our local teams before we approve stores.” Lenovo has tried to strike a balance by ensuring that regional distributors are allotted, in every city, select LESlites which they can nurture and grow. Dell, which has extended its Sales Affiliate Program to retailers, is also investing in display signs and marketing collateral for retailers. “Our affiliate program has been very successful, and every quarter many thousands of retailers book their commissions through this program,” says Mahesh Bhalla, Executive Director & GM, Dell CSMB.

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ajeev Mehta, MD, Zest Systems, ventured into retail about a year back with the launch of a multi-brand retail outlet in Delhi called EHuts. After being in corporate reselling for nearly 18 years, Mehta made the move for two reasons. “We were seeing changes in the corporate buying patterns with many customers looking at opex models. Secondly, we realized that after 18 years in the IT business we had developed great vendor relationships and also had access to the best supply chains to start a new venture.” Today there are three EHuts, and Mehta plans to launch eight more over the next 12-18 months across the NCR. “Having great relations with HP, we ideally wanted to launch HP exclusive retail outlets, but there are already HP stores in the areas which we targeted,” explains Mehta. EHuts sell laptops and accessories from brands as Apple, HP and Dell, along with mobile phones and Rajeev Mehta accessories from Apple, BlackBerry and Samsung. “We have also got a wide range of tablets from Apple and Acer in our stores.” Mehta says that he spent around `40 lakh on the rentals, inventory, interiors and initial launch of each store. According to Mehta, 25 percent of the revenue comes from accessories that contribute nearly 75 percent of the bottomline. He says that in each locality where he has set up a store there is stiff competition from LFRs. “However, we have created a shopping experience that is as good as that offered by any LFR. Customers are discerning; they will always buy from the place where they get the best deal, which includes service.” Mehta admits that online retailers are a bigger threat, and is planning an e-commerce portal to compete with them. n

A few vendors such as Acer have been very forthcoming in advising partners not to make investments in stores close to LFRs in large metros. “Retail is an evolving process, and though we believe that speciality stores are here to stay, any decision on investment depends on the specific real estate, competition in and around the store, and the profile of the customers you are targeting,” says S Rajendran, CMO, Acer India.

“Any decision on depends on the investment specific real estate, compe tition in and around the sto re, profile of the c and the ustomers”

S RAJENDRAN

CMO, Acer Indi

cover story oking to buy “Consumers lo iler would be ta from a local re the store had if t more confiden oing localized D an e-presence. s helps” n o ti o m online pro Subbu JoisE

Ads

CEO, 360 Buzz

Tips for survival Smarter resellers are making smarter moves. Many of the retailers are looking at smaller cities and suburbs where an LFR is not likely to set shop in the near future. “Considering the huge costs in Mumbai, we are looking at retail outlets in and around Pune. The real estate costs are cheaper, and we have more first-time buyers who appreciate our personal touch and service, and want to look and feel before buying,” says Singh of Geonet. Yatheesh Govind, Director, SAC Infosystem, agrees. “Most of our retail outlets are in smaller cities. This shows that if you have the right strategy and create a better consumer experience you can succeed in any market.” According to most retailers, identifying suitable real estate and setting up a store that targets the profile of people who are likely to visit the store is important. “We have three stores in NCR, but the way we have set up

the stores and the kind of products we carry are subtly different as one of the stores caters to a more middle-class market, while other two are targeted at more upmarket customers,” says Rajeev Mehta, MD, Zest Systems. The big challenge for a retailer is to ensure walk-ins. “Promotion is an activity that needs to be done round the year to bring in footfalls. It is not about money you spend, but about consistency. On an average, we spend `17 lakh per month on promoting our 44 stores,” says Govind. Value-added services is another approach that is providing returns. Chennai-based Supreme Computers recently set up a laptop service center at Ritchie Street which is driving up to 10 consumers to its retail outlet. “Services bring us closer to customers, and they in turn trust you more. That’s why some kind of value-addition is important to survive in the market,” says Rakesh Jain, CEO, Supreme. Having a presence on the Internet is also important. “A local retailer with an e-shop can do localized promotions on the Net and drive traffic. A consumer looking to buy from a store would be more confident if the store had an e-presence too,” says Subbu Joise, CEO, 360 BuzzAds. Finally, retailers need to build strong vendor relationships. “We advise other retailers to work closely with vendors. Without vendor support, it is impossible to succeed in this business.” says Govind of SAC. n — With inputs from Abhijeet Mukherjee & Amit Singh

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special focus

Big Data

stocks up terabytes of

opportunities

With data volumes estimated to grow 44x between 2009 and 2020, Big Data has arrived. It creates huge opportunities to find insights in new and emerging types of data n Ayushman Baruah

or quite some time now, the cloud has been the leading theme for panel discussions and industry fora. Discussions on the cloud have spread from the server room to the board room, reaching even the dining room. But with 2.5 quintillion bytes of data being generated every day, Big Data is the next buzzword in the IT industry; it has scale and potential similar to that of the cloud. While the enormity of the data set cannot be ignored, the real issue is analyzing the data quick enough to make better and faster business decisions. So what kind of technology and solutions are available for this? How are businesses crafting their big data strategies? According to a report by McKinsey, Big Data refers to data sets whose size is beyond the ability of traditional enterprise technology to capture, store, manage and analyze. The definition is intentionally subjective and does not quantify how big is too big. It can range from a few dozen terabytes to multiple petabytes. The data scenario has changed drastically over the past few years. The McKinsey Global Institute estimates that data volume is growing at 40 percent CAGR, and will grow 44x between 2009 and 2020. Every day we create 2.5 quintillion bytes of data—so much that 90 percent of the data in the world has been created in the last two years alone. This data comes from different sources such as sensors used to gather climate information; posts to social media sites, blogs and public forums; digital pictures and online videos; transaction records of ATM machines and credit card readers; and cell phone GPS signals, to name a few. This data is collectively referred to as Big Data. Big Data represents a new era in data exploration and utilization. More than a challenge, it is an opportunity to find insight in new and emerging types of data, to make your business more agile, and to answer questions that in the past were beyond reach. Big Data and information integration capabilities make

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it possible to generate insight from vast quantities of data, fundamentally changing the way organizations use information. It means filtering petabytes of data per second from almost any connected device, and analyzing the data while still in motion. Today, customers feel their grievances get resolved faster when they complain via Twitter or Facebook rather than over the phone or email. This means two things: A lot of data is being generated online by the users, and someone is analyzing that data to make sensible business decisions. That is the power of Big Data analytics. Have no doubt that Big Data analytics happens at a very high speed and in real time. Consider a retail company selling gift items during Christmas. Based on the customers’ feedback on Twitter, the shop management can customize its products and sales offers to drive better sales the following day. The analysis of Big Data has two objectives. “First, to build a predictive model that is accurate. Second, to segment the target group,” says Arun Ramachandran, Country Manager, Data Computing Division, EMC India & Saarc. Big Data is being largely generated by consumercentric and IT-savvy industry verticals such as retail, video surveillance, healthcare, telecommunication, BFSI, oil & gas, law enforcement and government. The Unique Identification Authority of India project is one such example where huge amounts of data are being collected and collated by the Government of India.

Not all about size While it is often the most visible parameter, Big Data is not just about volume. To make sense of the Big Data or Big Data analytics one must also consider velocity, variety, value and complexity. Velocity refers to the data being generated and ingested for analysis in real time. Variety refers to the different forms of data such as tabular,

special focus documents, email, video, image and audio. Value refers to the economic value of different data, which significantly varies from one set to another. Lastly, complexity means the different standards, domain rules and storage formats per data type. Agrees Syed Masroor, Manager, Pre-sales, NetApp, “Big Data is not as much about the size of the data as it is about the size of the problem. It essentially revolves around three components: analysis, bandwidth and content. A good example of analysis would be the way Flipkart.com analyzes the next top sales item, while an example of bandwidth would be the massive volume of customer data that is processed by banks. To find an example of content, one needs to look no further than Facebook—the amount of content generated by Facebook users per day is a staggering two petabytes.” Data warehousing vendor Teradata believes that Big Data is not a particularly new thing because they have always had customers with many petabytes of data. “It is not the size of the data that matters so much. Large amounts of data is not Big Data. ERP-generated data is not Big Data. It is really about the large volume of unstructured data generated by users through sources such as the social media, mobile devices and video,” says Dinesh Jain, Country Manager, Teradata India. Big Data is generated with the embracing of new types of data into the information architecture of an organization, and often this is semi-structured data, not the traditional rows-and-columns relational data, says Kapil Sood, Vice President, Systems Business, Oracle India. “I think a prime example of semi-structured data is data coming from sensors or machine-generated data such as RFID and location information coming from mobile devices. Semi-structured data also includes the documents and emails that all organizations have. These new data elements are often produced at much higher rates than the classical transactional data.” Another characteristic of Big Data is the need for deeper and more sophisticated analysis. “You want to be able to do new types of statistical analysis—not over a small sample of gigabytes of data but over terabytes, and potentially even petabytes,” adds Sood.

Tackling Big Data The Essar Group has seen exponential growth of data over the past three years in keeping with the rate of growth of their business. “Our focus on video to be primarily used as the method of communication has also changed the way collaboration has grown with respect to the data and content generated for information exchange,” says

“We have to derive information from the loads of data and use the same for meeting needs like decision-making and compliance” Jayantha Prabhu CTO, Essar Group

“Semi-structured data coming from sensors, machines and mobiles is often produced at a much higher rate than the classical transactional data” Kapil Sood

VP, Systems Business, Oracle India

Jayantha Prabhu, CTO, Essar Group. Essar has categorized its data into four major groups— email (20 TB), file server (80 TB), intranet (30 TB) and internal video site (20 TB). The major sources responsible for data creation within the company include factors such as increase in employee head-count in proportion to the business growth; inorganic growth leading to the integration of existing data systems with established systems with huge data residing on them; increase in employee information dissemination in the form of videos as compared to emails; increase in the use of mobile devices by the management; increase in the use of collaboration platforms such as VoIP, video-conferencing, chat and audio bridge; and exposure to social media platforms like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter where Essar has official communication channels. “The top challenges to manage the massive amount of data are data backup, archival and restoration; data security; enterprise content management and analytics; impact of the data on the LAN, WAN and Internet bandwidth; and finally incorporation of unstructured data into workflow and business processes,” says Prabhu. Essar’s approach to manage Big Data is two-fold. “On one hand we focus on the capability of our infrastructure to manage Big Data in terms of backup, restore, archival, and scalability. On the other we have to derive information from the loads of data and use the same for meeting needs like decision-making and compliance,” adds Prabhu. On the infrastructure front, Essar has deployed some key technologies such as scale-out storage, disk-to-disk backup, deduplication technologies (hardware- and software-based), archival technologies with low-cost storage for archived data, storage consolidation and virtualization, SaaS-based solutions on the cloud, WAN optimization solutions for the MPLS WAN network, upgradation of core switches in data centers to 10 GB capacity, and use of streaming software in WAN-friendly architecture for video dispensing to desktops and laptops. On the information generation aspect, Prabhu says that Essar has planned the implementation of enterprise content management tools for search, analytics and planning through a single pane, and enterprise-wide consolidation of a single platform for front-ending of information outflow to employees in the form of a portal. For retail company Shoppers Stop, the topic of Big Data is still in the exploratory stages. “Our challenges have just begun with the growth in data volumes. Thus far, our currently deployed solutions are able to manage them. With planned upgrades and replacements, we

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special focus hope to tide over the next 12 months. Beyond that we are hoping for some level of maturity in this space to come to our rescue,” says Arun Gupta, Group CIO, Shoppers Stop. “I believe that Indian companies will be on the learning curve along with other mature markets.”

Big solutions There is a clear trend of traditional storage vendors taking the acquisition route to enter the Big Data club. Early this year NetApp joined the league of companies with Big Data storage capabilities when it announced the acquisition of LSI’s Engenio storage systems business in a $480 million all-cash transaction. NetApp’s Hadoop system is aimed at the Big Data analytics segment. “The NetApp open solution for Hadoop is optimized for node-storage balance, cost, reliability/serviceability, performance and storage density. The NetApp Hadoop solution allows you to spend time extracting value from your data rather than fixing/maintaining cluster failure,” Masroor said. In April this year, Teradata acquired Aster Data Systems, a leader in Big Data analytics. Aster provides tools that manage a variety of diverse semi-structured data from Web sources, sensor networks, social networks, genomics, video and photographs. IBM’s InfoSphere BigInsights and InfoSphere Streams are core to IBM’s Big Data platform. While BigInsights helps in managing and analyzing Internet-scale volumes of structured and unstructured data, InfoSphere Streams enables continuous analysis of volumes of streaming data with sub-millisecond response times. Oracle has recently launched its Big Data appliance aimed at delivering everything customers need to acquire, organize, analyze and maximize the value of Big Data within their enterprise. Engineered to work together, the Oracle Big Data appliance is easily integrated with Oracle Database 11g, the Oracle Exadata database machine, and the Oracle Exalytics business intelligence machine. Last year EMC acquired Greenplum, a provider of data warehousing software used to build large cloud computing infrastructures. EMC Greenplum Database manages, stores and analyzes terabytes to petabytes of data. “We also have Greenplum HD to address the growth of unstructured data efficiently. By extracting the knowledge wrapped within unstructured and machinegenerated data, enterprises can make better decisions that drive revenue and reduce costs. Most importantly we have a product called Greenplum Chorus, the world’s first enterprise data cloud platform,” says Ramachandran.

Latent demand With readymade solutions available in the market and data continuing to increase, vendors feel there is a strong latent demand for Big Data and analytics platforms in the Indian market. “The reason I say this is because most companies have their business processes (such as the ERP system) online today. But increasingly you have a lot more data that’s come online that hadn’t been available for analysis before. You have social interactions, location data, and other types of sensor data, and now all these

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“Our challenges have just begun with the growth in data volumes. Thus far our currently deployed solutions are able to manage them” Arun Gupta

Group CIO, Shoppers Stop

have come within the grasp of enterprises to analyze,” says Sood of Oracle. “In addition, to derive real business value from Big Data, enterprises are looking for the right tools to handle various technical hurdles around scalability, complexity, velocity and data latency.” Jaskiran Bhatia, Country Manager, Information Management Software Group, IBM India/South Asia, feels that in India there has not been much adoption of Big Data as people have not really started looking at it. Discussions on Big Data, Bhatia says, are at a preliminary stage with CIOs and IT managers, but the tempo is picking up. “CIOs are faced with enormous data sets and are trying to mine them for insights that can deliver business value. There is exponentially more raw information available to gather and harvest. Also, most enterprises are contemplating virtualizing and moving to the cloud at some point. All of this requires a pre-determined plan to move large data assets, secure them and drive analytics. With a few organizations, discussions on Big Data implementation are at an advanced stage.” Currently, it is not uncommon for a large organization to keep an army of database administrators on the rolls to partition data, create custom indexes, and optimize poor performing queries. But this will simply not be sustainable in a world where information requirements are changing much more rapidly than they used to, but where IT budgets remain tight. IT teams need to diversify their solution set and look at new approaches for loading data faster, storing it more compactly, and reducing the cost, resources and time involved in analyzing and managing it. EMC feels that today the cloud converges with Big Data. For example, in the retail business, you desperately want to understand the behavior and perceptions of your target market. You want to mash buying behavior with survey data, and demographics with social feeds. Some are already embracing ‘cloud + big data’ with many more coming on board. “Cloud computing makes Big Data possible by providing an elastic pool of resources to handle the massive data scale. Through cloud computing, IT resources are more efficient and IT teams are more productive, thus freeing up resources to invest in Big Data,” says Ramachandran. Like the cloud in its initial stages, Big Data too has an aura of ambiguity around it and there is perhaps no one definition till date. But the fact is it has arrived—and it is here to stay. n Courtesy: www.informationweek.in

Role model A triumph of transparency Chintamani Lele and Rajeev Patayeet, Directors, Vintech Electronic Systems, take us on a journey from the early days of the solutions provider through its present success to its future plans n Amit Singh

hintamani Lele and Rajeev Patayeet, partners and friends since graduation, are both firstgeneration entrepreneurs. After completing their BE in Electronics from the Maharashtra Institute of Technology (MIT), Pune, in 1987, the duo joined Eltech Engineers the same year and Aar-Em Electronics in 1989. The idea to start their own business took seed during the stagnation in the UPS industry, and Vintech Electronic Systems was born in 1996. The company has since transformed itself into an integrated IT solutions provider (SP). As a Director, Lele now handles operations, purchasing and HR at Vintech, while Patayeet, also a Director, manages business development and finance. With the merger of Phoebus Technologies in 2009, they were joined by the Phoebus team of Dilip Patil, Director, Services; Chandan Joshi, Director, Technical; and Sushil Kulkarni, Director, Marketing.

The beginning Vintech started its expedition in office automation solutions with `3 lakh, of which Lele and Patayeet contributed `50,000 each while `2 lakh was borrowed from a bank. The company offered fax machines from Wipro, modems from Hayes, and Internet training to SMB and individual customers. It earned revenue of `12.5 lakh in its first year of operations. The big breakthrough came in 1997 with a project worth `25 lakh to install 250 modems for Tata Motors’ EDI network in Pune. Vintech then began exploring opportunities in the IT industry and started offering white-box desktops to SMB and enterprise customers. The company extended its PC portfolio by partnering with Compaq in 2000 and becoming a Compaq Specialist Notebook Reseller. Vintech won a lot of projects in the education sector. Major clients included Symbiosis; MIT; Tatyasaheb Kore Institute of Engineering & Technology, Kolhapur; and College of Engineering, Pune. It supplied 1,200 Compaq notebooks worth `5 crore to Symbiosis in 2004. The company extended its portfolio in 2007 to include servers and storage by widening its partnership with HP; it was selected as an HP Authorized

“During the recession in FY2008-09 we adopted the ‘Win Back, Win More’ policy and focused on winning back the accounts we had lost over the course of time”

Chintamani Lele and Rajeev Patayeet

Service Center. Vintech also partnered with Cisco for networking, Microsoft for software licensing, and Apple for notebooks and tablets. It supplied 100 Macbooks valued at `50 lakh to Symbiosis in 2008. The company executed a project worth `75 lakh to install servers and storage for Sakal, the Marathi newspaper. In the same year it executed another servers and storage installation project, valued at `1 crore, for Mercedes-Benz. In 2008 the company executed a major project for CLSA India worth more than `3 crore; this entailed the installation of servers, storage, desktops and notebooks. In 2009 a Pune-based SP, Phoebus Technologies, merged with Vintech. “Earlier we had created a joint venture under the name of XI & Growing Solutions to check if a joint venture was feasible,” says Lele. “After its success, we joined hands to consolidate people costs, widen the customer base, and increase our solutions and services offerings. Though both Phoebus and Vintech were HP Premier Business Partners, Vintech’s focus was primarily on volume products while Phoebus was focused on HP’s software and enterprise portfolio. The merger therefore created perfect synergy and more opportunities than overlaps.”

Current business The company grew 46 percent from `15 crore in FY2008-09 to `22 crore in FY2009-10. In FY2010-11 it grew 81 percent with its turnover rising to `40 crore; of

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role model

2011

2009

2008

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installed 200 workstations worth this, corporate reselling contributed MILESTONES `2 crore at Tata Technologies, 70 percent, 15 percent came supplied 300 Apple iPads valued from solutions, and the rest from at `1 crore to Sandvik Asia, and services. Started Vintech Electronic installed desktops worth `80 lakh “Despite the recession in Systems as an office at the Pune District Co-operative FY2008-09 we sailed through automation company Bank. The company also executed comfortably by adopting the ‘Win a storage project valued at `1 crore Back, Win More’ policy whereby Executed project worth for CLSA. we focused on winning back the `25 lakh for Tata Motors accounts we had lost over the course of time. This helped us to Future plans Supplied 1,200 notebooks to maintain moderate growth during In the current tough times due to Symbiosis, Pune the recession and grow further,” the depreciating rupee, increasing says Patayeet. petrol prices, stubborn inflation Executed servers and storage Adds Lele, “In FY2010-11 we and maybe a recession round the installation project for studied the spending patterns of corner, Vintech wants to transform Mercedes-Benz our customers. We realized that our its business processes to counter top 50 customers provided us with these challenges. “Looking at the Completed project worth almost 75 percent of our business, transition toward tablets, rising hence we decided to concentrate competition with online sales, `3 crore for CLSA India on deep-selling to these premium and enterprises endorsing the Merged with Phoebus customers.” This strategy paid off, ‘Bring Your Own Device’ concept, with 71 customers contributing we are aligning our sales strategy Technologies more than `5 lakh each to Vintech’s to focus on tablets and other revenue in FY2010-11. Such a small form factors. We are also Secured SE2A rating from focused approach also helped the directly approaching employees Dun & Bradstreet company to reduce its marketing in enterprises. We will develop expenses. mobile apps and services in the Besides, the Phoebus merger near future,” says Lele. Besides, boosted the revenue of the company. Vintech executed adds Patayeet, “We are in discussions with customers a project worth `1.5 crore for the installation of servers for cloud services and aligned solutions from HP.” and storage at Persistent Systems in 2010. The company Vintech aims to achieve revenue of `50 crore in installed workstations worth `1 crore for Emerson FY2011-12 and more than `60 crore in FY2012-13. India. It also installed desktops and notebooks worth The company opened a branch in Nashik in 2011, `80 lakh at Tata Autocomp Systems, and workstations and has plans to open a branch in Aurangabad in the worth `50 lakh at PTC. current fiscal. In 2010 Vintech installed servers valued at `60 lakh for CLSA India. The company also executed numerous On a personal note mid-sized projects for several companies including Lele considers the late Steve Jobs to be his role model Seed Infotech (`1.3 crore), College of Engineering, Pune for his panache and innovation. He also considers (`70 lakh), Hotel Holiday Inn, Pune (`60 lakh), and JCB Ratan Tata as his role model for his business acumen India (`50 lakh). and clarity of thought. Lele does not believe in any Vintech secured the SE2A rating from Dun & leadership mantra, and says that one cannot have a Bradstreet in 2011, and is currently undergoing the single solution for everything. process for ISO 9001-2008 certification. He loves trekking, likes to read detective fiction Following his philosophy of ethical business involving Perry Mason and Sherlock Holmes, and has practices, Lele suggests that one should not cut corners read all the books in the two series. Some of his favorite for petty gains. “Have transparency and clarity in your books are Hound of the Baskervilles and The Sign of the relations with your customers, vendors and employees Four by Arthur Conan Doyle, The Godfather by Mario alike. Keep introducing something new—whether a Puzo, Kane and Abel by Jeffrey Archer, and a Marathi brand or a product or a system or an incentive—to keep novel, Smaran Gatha by GN Dandekar. He is currently the excitement alive.” reading Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki & 2011 also started on an optimal note. Vintech Sharon Lechter, and Steve Jobs’ biography by Walter Isaacson. Lele is also fond of Hollywood and Hindi classic movies; he particularly loves to watch the James Bond and Laurel & Hardy series. “Be transparent with customers, vendors Lele presently owns an Opel Corsa, but has always and employees. Keep introducing a new fancied the Beetle, Fiat 500 and BMW Mini. His dream brand or a product or a system or an holiday destination is Goa. n

incentive—to keep the excitement alive” 30

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tech focus 10 security predictions for 2012 CRN looks into its crystal ball and sees Android, hacktivisim and cyber espionage as some of the top security threats in 2012 n Antone Gonsalves

he future is hidden in the past, and many trends that started or gained momentum in 2011 will evolve into serious threats in 2012. As always, cybercriminals will follow the money in finding ways to siphon valuable data from emerging computing platforms. Google’s smartphone OS Android will be a potentially lucrative bull’s-eye for hackers, along with social networks and small businesses. While profit is a prime motivator for most hackers, a growing number are becoming vigilantes, claiming a nobler path by justifying their criminality as a necessary evil in standing up for what they believe is right. Such self-righteousness is expected to drive an increase in politically motivated attacks on industrial control systems and on specific industries. Add growing privacy concerns over geo-location services and shifts in regulatory compliance and 2012 will be a year to remember. Here are the 10 crucial security trends that we see coming.

Android threats

Cybercriminals are expected to make smartphones running Google’s Android operating system a top priority in 2012. During the last half of 2011, the amount of malware written for Android quadrupled as hackers tried to take advantage of the rapidly growing user base and the open approach Google has taken in allowing third parties to distribute apps for the OS on any Website. The latter means criminals can launch their own sites to trick people into downloading illicit software. Even on the official Android Market, malware disguised as games have been pulled off the site, with experts blaming a lack of strict oversight as the reason for the security breach. Security vendor Kaspersky Lab says this year may mark the appearance of the first mass worm for Android capable of spreading via text messages and sending out links to an online store distributing malware. The vendor also says the first mobile botnet is likely on Android.

Dark clouds

The rising number of businesses and consumers heading to the cloud has pushed software as a service into the mainstream. With so much personal and corporate data sitting in service providers’ servers, cybercriminals will make them a priority target in 2012, hoping to find vulnerabilities in a security model that has grown faster than the development of cloud standards. Current surveys and reports show that companies are underestimating the importance of vetting service providers for their ability to provide security. As a result, data breaches in the cloud in 2012 will highlight the

problems service providers pose to forensic analysis and incident response. While this could be considered part of the maturing process of a new technology, companies should be extra vigilant to avoid becoming the victim of a service provider dropping the ball.

Hackers will get more social

Advanced persistent threats

Cyber attacks on social networks are expected to increase this year. With more than 800 million members, Facebook has already been targeted many times and this is expected to continue in 2012. Other social media won’t be immune from attacks in which cybercriminals hijack profiles and use them as a channel to trick friends and acquaintances on a social network to click on a malicious link. Facebook was home last year to some of the highest profile attacks on social media. In November a Danish security company reported malware that used a picture sent from a hijacked account to get people to click on a link that installed malware capable of stealing online banking passwords. Fortunately, the so-called Zeus Trojan was first discovered in 2007, so people with up-to-date antivirus software were likely protected.

Also known as targeted attacks, advanced persistent threats (APTs) will become more pervasive in 2012. Experts say such attacks are less risky and more profitable then commandeering botnets that spread spam and email carrying malware. As a result, large-scale attacks based on tricking an email recipient into clicking on a link or opening an attachment are diminishing while APTs are increasing, networking company Cisco said in its annual security report in 2011. Since August 2010 the amount of spam recorded by Cisco

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tech focus has plummeted from 379 billion messages a day to 124 billion, the lowest since 2007. Conversely, APTs are rising. For example, a man in China was responsible for a cyber-attack against at least 48 chemical and defense companies, security firm Symantec reported in October. Two other highly targeted attacks were reported last year: one against five multinational oil & gas companies and another against 72 organizations, including the United Nations, governments and corporations.

Industrial threats

Vulnerabilities in industrial control systems will take the limelight in 2012, with major exploitations possible. Also called supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA), these systems run industrial, infrastructure and facility processes— including manufacturing, power grids, water treatment and distribution, oil & gas pipelines, and heating & cooling systems in airports and office buildings. Vendors have been developing Web interfaces for logging into these systems, thereby giving hackers a potential door. In addition, SCADA services have been migrating to the cloud, complicating security further and heightening concerns among experts. Since 2010, when the Stuxnet malware damaged Iranian nuclear facilities, the threat of an attack on a country’s infrastructure has drawn an increasing amount of attention from government security officials. The rise of politically motivated attacks, or hacktivism, will be a major contributor to the rising threat.

Hacktivism

Profit won’t be the only motive for hackers in 2012. Politics is increasingly behind attacks and the trend will continue. The spotlight turned on so-called hacktivism in 2010 with the discovery of the Stuxnet worm that damaged control systems in Iran’s nuclear facilities. The malware was a wakeup call for governments and corporations. Since then, there’s been a rise in the number of loosely organized anarchists. Last year LulzSec made headlines hacking into state and federal government Websites. More of these hacktivism groups will rise in 2012, with many claiming to do good. For example, Anonymous, known for defending whistle-blowing site WikiLeaks, threatened late last year to unmask Mexican drug cartel members.

Increased compliance

Some critical compliance issues will be prominent in 2012, most notably the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard 2.0. The update kicks-in in 2012, and most merchants are not quite prepared to deal with it, industry observers say. In addition, the European Union is expected to tighten its Privacy and Electronic Communications Directive which will have a big impact on Web user privacy. Globally, lawmakers will shove companies toward compliance with regulations by increasing penalties for data breaches and holding businesses more accountable for consumer data. While such government action can im-

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prove some areas of security, companies tend to focus on meeting lawmakers’ checklist of regulations, overlooking some basic information technology security controls. For example, most regulations miss a wide range of best-practice controls such as up-to-date antivirus software. Analysts believe that as more breaches occur as a result of these security gaps one should expect to see governing agencies offer specific guidance on risk assessment and standard IT security controls.

Small businesses an easy target

Geo-location to get the spotlight

Cyber attacks against small businesses will increase in 2012, as hackers seek the easiest path to profits. Businesses in general are storing a rising amount of valuable data, and small companies are no exception. However, smaller businesses lack the security budgets of bigger players, so are unable to build the same level of protection, experts say. Making small businesses particularly vulnerable is their tendency to postpone or overlook upgrades and replacements of legacy systems. Expect to see more common modes of attacks directed at small companies, from social engineering to SQL injections. For many small businesses, the cloud will be a safer haven. Expect to see an increasing number of companies sign up for managed security, letting cloud service providers worry about upgrades and maintenance.

Geo-location is in every smartphone, giving application developers the ability to track users wherever they go. As a result, privacy concerns will keep geo-location in the spotlight in 2012. While consumers enjoy the services mobile apps provide by leveraging the technology, a few bad apples conducting surreptitious tracking or sharing of data could spark a backlash. Two federal bills were introduced in the US Congress in 2011 to protect geo-locational data. While neither is expected to pass in 2012, the bills will keep the issue in the media. Look for privacy advocates to step up efforts across the globe to get businesses to adopt an opt-in or consumer consent model before gathering geo-location information.

Emerging technology

A technology trend that will gather steam in 2012 is the management and analysis of logs from hardware and software on the corporate network. Such data can provide evidence of malware, giving IT departments a chance to quickly neutralize the threat. Undervalued in the past, log analysis is being included in security vendor products as customers begin to understand how such information can be used to thwart an attack. The need for security-related log management is on the rise in APT. By using such methods, attackers target specific companies with sophisticated malware designed to operate unnoticed in infected systems. n

channel buzz Insights and awards mark the FITAG event

will be offered as a service.” Said RK Iyer, VP, IDC & NGN, SIS, “We are seeing a major transition from ‘IT for specialists’ to ‘IT for masses.’ Simplicity, affordability and accessibility will be vital for the mass adoption of technologies.” The convention also saw an interesting roundtable on how FITAG should work with trade bodies such as FICCI, CII and Nasscom to influence the new ICT policy. “For FITAG, the goal is to have a say in policy reforms at the Center and state. As a meaningful association, we need to work closely with national bodies to represent the interests of the IT partner ecosystem,” Pandya stated. Ajay Kumar, Joint Secretary, ICT, GOI, delivered the keynote and shared some insights about the new ICT policy proposal. “All those present here should provide your feedback to the new ICT policy draft which we have put in the public domain for industry feedback. We have proposed some very innovative measures to promote manufacturing in the country,” he said. Remarked Ravi Saxena, Additional Chief Secretary, ICT, Government of Gujarat, “The fact that India is developing and manufacturing the world’s lowest-priced tablet, Aakash, indicates that we have the R&D talent and manufacturing capabilities to be a global hub. It is time for India to stop worrying about China and carve our own unique niche in manufacturing.” One of the highlights of the convention was Nandak Pandya,

he one-day convention organized by the Federation of IT Associations of Gujarat (FITAG), the umbrella body of 24 IT associations, was a grand success. The convention themed ‘The Future of IT’ was held at the Convention Center of Gujarat University. It was attended by more than 450 channel partners apart from senior executives from the sponsors such as HP, Cisco, SAI Infosystem (SIS), Kaspersky and Gujarat Informatics Ltd (GIL). AMD, Samsung, Arrow and Timescan were the other sponsors. CRN was the media partner, and the venue was courtesy ACMA. Kaushik Pandya, Past President, FITAG, started the day by highlighting the major shifts in the IT sector and how they will change the way IT channels conduct their business. “The changes we are witnessing today are disruptive, and will impact the IT ecosystem of the future. LFRs have already impacted the small-format IT stores, and with FDI we will have to compete with MNC retail Goliaths. Cloud computing and the tablet will be the other game changers. It is time for a new IT ecosystem,” he said. Gururaja Rao, CMD, GIL, stated that IT businesses should get ready for mobile convergence. “Mobility is going to be a good opportunity supported by virtualization and cloud services. The future of access devices will be tablets and smartphones. Utility computing has arrived, and in future everything from computing power, storage, software and security

n Gaurang Vyas presenting the Best Innovative IT Project award to Mitesh Shah, CEO, Apurva Computer Technologies

n Vaibhav Golatkar, BDM, Cisco, presenting the Best Networking/Surveillance Solution award to Pinkesh Kotecha, CEO, Ishan Infotech

n A panel discussion on Developing the Ecosystem for Electronics & IT Industry in Gujarat

n The FITAG awards committee

n Nita Shah, Director, e-Governance, GIL, and a jury member, explaining the awards methodology

n Ravi Saxena, Additional Chief Secretary, ICT, Gujarat, presenting the Lifetime Achievement award to Kiran Shah, CMD, Shivam Computers

n Ravi Saxena, Additional Chief Secretary, ICT, Gujarat, presenting the Lifetime Achievement award to Dinesh Patel, Founder, BITA

n Ketan Patel, Head, Marketing, Consumer Business, HP PSG, presenting the Best SI award to Rakesh Patel, CEO, Datatech Computer

To feature your company’s events in CRN, send write-ups with photographs to editor@ubmindia.com

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channel buzz Corporate Motivator, who, by using various tools and examples, demonstrated to the audience the power of collaboration. “Most of us in this room represent small-tomedium businesses, and are worried about competing with the big boys. So why not explore the power of peerto-peer collaboration? It can create exponential opportunities and scale for all of us,” he said. The event concluded with the awards presentation ceremony where trophies were handed out to 38 deserving partners (across 12 categories), three associations and two lifetime achievers (see the table of the award winners). Talking about the awards, Yogesh Thakkar, President, FITAG, informed

that the association had received 200 entries for the awards this year against 150 entries last year. “The best thing is that the non-metros outpaced the metros in the number of entries.” FITAG had divided the awards into two categories—Metro markets (which included Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara and Rajkot) and Non-metro markets. The two key awards—Lifetime Achievement Awards—were given to Kiran Shah, CMD, Shivam Computers, and Dinesh Patel, Founder Member and Past President, Baroda IT Association. Shah and Patel were recognized for their immense contribution to the channels and the advisory role they have played to the fraternity. n

n Nandak Pandya, Corporate Motivator, speaking on ethical business practices

n Vaibhav Golatkar, BDM, Cisco, presenting the Best Professional Association award to Narendra Bhetaria, President, ACMA

Winners of FITAG Leadership Awards 2011 Best Distributor/Dealer—Mainstream Metro Winners

Care Office Equipment, Ahmedabad Anil Infotech, Rajkot Shani Peripherals, Ahmedabad

Non-Metro Winners Unitech Computer World, Morbi KJ Traders, Junagadh Online Infotech, Mehsana Best Systems Integrator Metro Winners

SAI Infosystem, Ahmedabad Datatech Computers, Ahmedabad SilverTouch Technologies, Ahmedabad

Non-Metro Winners Source Infotech, Anand Acme Enterprise, Nadiad Networking/Surveillance Solutions Metro Winners

Vinay Enterprise, Ahmedabad Microlink Solutions, Ahmedabad Ishan Group, Rajkot

Non-Metro Winners Inside Solutions, Anand Advance Computers, Anand Business Center, Gandhinagar

Metro Winners SilverTouch Technologies, Ahmedabad Pace Computer Consultants, Ahmedabad Non-Metro Winners Vardhaman Computers, Surendranagar Inception Technologies, Vapi Best Software Solutions Amin Infotech, Vadodara Horus Tech Solutions, Ahmedabad

Non-Metro Winners Kothari Infosys, Jamnagar Skyway Computer, Gandhinagar

Computer Reseller News

Metro Winners

Kalp Systems, Ahmedabad NB Link Computer, Ahmedabad

Non-Metro Winners Apurva Computer Technologies, Surendranagar Best Retail Outlet Metro Winners SAC Infosystem, Ahmedabad CPS Peripherals, Surat Non-Metro Winners Desktop Creators, Anand Bitmap Informatic, Jamnagar Best Distributor Peripherals/Accessories/ Consumable/Software Metro Winners Non-Metro Winners

Earth Ecosystem, Ahmedabad Hurricane Systems, Ahmedabad JRD Services, Gandhinagar

Aavishkar Computers, Gandhidham CP Consultants, Jamnagar

Best Association Baroda IT Association (BITA) Rajkot Computer Traders Association (RCTA) Best Professional Association

IT Services

Metro Winners

Most Innovative IT Project

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Ahmedabad Computer Merchants Association (ACMA) Gandhidham IT Association (GITA) Best Social Association Anand Vidyanagar IT Association (AVITA) Gandhinagar Computer Hardware Association (GCHA) Lifetime Achievement Awards Kiran Shah, CMD, Shivam Computers Dinesh Patel, Founder Member and Past President, BITA Special Recognition Award RCTA for bringing in 41 nominations for the awards

new products Trend Micro Titanium 2012

T WatchGuard’s SB Security Appliance

atchGuard has launched a small business security appliance, the WatchGuard XTM 330 for 30-50 users. It protects networks and supports clientless single sign-on for user and group-based policies. Advanced management and logging features provide insights into Web and application usage, and remediation for business and IT policies. The appliance is also available for managed security service providers. The WatchGuard XTM 330 is priced at $1,165 (list price), and is available with authorized partners.

Seagate GoFlex Satellite

eagate has introduced the GoFlex Satellite mobile wireless storage, a battery-powered external hard drive to connect to any Wi-Fi-enabled mobile device. With a rechargeable lithium polymer battery and Wi-Fi access over 802.11 b/g/n, it works with any tablet, iPad or smartphone and allows up to three connections. Devices can be connected to the GoFlex Satellite drive by use of the free GoFlex Media app. The product is priced at `11,500 plus local taxes for 500 GB, comes with 3-year warranty, and is available through Fortune Marketing.

rend Micro has launched Titanium 2012, a cloudbased security solution powered by its Smart Protection Network. It authenticates wireless hotspots and Wi-Fi networks. Its social networking security feature automatically scans the wall and identifies safe and malicious links. It protects smartphones and tablets based on Android, Symbian, iOS and Windows. Titanium 2012 offers parental controls with features like restricted access, limited time on the Internet, and detailed activity reports. Its Secure Vault encrypts documents. The data theft prevention mechanism prevents hackers and spyware from stealing credit card numbers, passwords, email addresses and other sensitive data. The PC optimization feature improves performance and protects privacy by cleaning registry and temporary files, and deleting browsing histories and cookies. The product is priced at `1,300 plus taxes for one user and `1,900 plus taxes for three users.

Stellar Phoenix DBF Recovery v2.0

tellar Data Recovery has launched Stellar Phoenix DBF Recovery v2.0 to recover corrupt or lost .dbf files from different versions of MS Visual FoxPro and dBase. The new version offers improved support for FoxPro and recovers Blob Field, Varchar, Integer Auto, Binary Index, Column Default Value, Memo Field, etc. The product is available for immediate download, and starts at `4,300 with a trybefore-buy option.

Transcend StoreJet Cloud

ranscend has launched the StoreJet Cloud portable drive to connect to Wi-Fi-enabled mobile devices. It acts like any other portable drive when connected to a computer. The drive allows five devices to stream various media at the same time. It also offers the StoreJet Cloud App—an all-inone media player for use with iOS devices such as iPad, iPhone and iPod—which automatically lists portable drive contents for quick file navigation. Media on StoreJet Cloud is accessible to other tablets and smartphones through the Web browser. The product is priced at `8,700 for 32 GB and `15,300 for 64 GB, comes with 2-year limited warranty, and is available through Mediaman Infotech and Supertron Electronics.

The products featured here have not undergone any benchmarking or testing. The trailers contain information provided by vendors and distributors. To feature your company’s products in CRN, send write-ups with photos to editor@ubmindia.com

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shadow ram GET

Dell to change MSA program?

ell India is believed to be reviewing its regional distribution set up consisting of Master Sales Affiliates (MSAs) which was launched three years back, and has been the reason for the PC-maker’s success in the consumer market. As per some informed partners, internal discussions are currently underway at Dell to review the entire MSA program. Dell may be looking at removing some nonperforming partners and appointing new ones, and also reviewing its regional coverage, incentive structure and distribution policies. This has of course unsettled many MSAs who say that it’s because of them that Dell has been so successful with its retail strategies. Any change would be detrimental to Dell as it may force MSAs to realign with other brands which could seriously jeopardize Dell’s market leadership. A Dell executive when quizzed said, “We can’t comment formally till the end of January when a decision will be taken. We have not changed the structure for the past three years. Whatever the call, it will be in the best interests of partners. Dell is committed to the channel business, and our policies will only please partners.” n

Personal

“I want to contribute to society” Navaneet Mishra, Vice President, Globalization Services, SAP Labs, Bengaluru, is responsible for the Business Suite and Business by Design products. If not in the IT industry: I would be a researcher in molecular biology, or work in the advertising industry.

Navaneet Mishra

Biggest passion: Reading fiction.

Behind the wheels: Honda Civic. Gadgets I can’t live without: My BlackBerry. Weekends are for: Family and close friends. Favorite holiday destination: The hills of Uttaranchal. Hate the most: Self-centered people. Favorite movies: Sholay, Forrest Gump, and James Bond movies. Favorite stars: Aamir Khan, Tom Hanks and Madhuri Dixit. Role model: Amitabh Bachchan. Ultimate ambition: To support SAP and ‘Help the world run better.’ Wildest thing I have ever done: During my school days, I scared five freshers in the hostel with ghost props and music. They were so scared that they wanted to leave the boarding school, but I apologized and the matter was sorted out. Thing I most want to do in life: Contribute to society. If I became the PM: I would raise the salaries of government employees, control corruption, and introduce mass computerization. Celebrity I would like to spend a day with: Bill Gates. One person I would like to meet and why: The late Steve Jobs—to understand how to create a future. Deepest and darkest fear: My inability to support my family. n

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— CRN Network

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Guarantee Whether you are looking for high availability storage platforms, super hybrid blade servers or fully bespoke solutions tailored to meet your exact requirements, Boston guarantee the right solution for you.

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At Boston, we are dedicated to partner success, providing our clients with ďŹ rst to market technology and award-winning, bespoke solutions together with unrivalled expertise that you can trust. Now entering our 20th year, we are excited about the revolutionary technology that will be at our disposal in the year 2012 and beyond, enabling us to continue helping our customers with success. Manoj Nayee, Managing Director

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