E Magazine August 2017

Schneider Electric to buy ASCO business of Vertiv

NEC with NDMC conducts a Facial recognition pilot test

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Anniversary Special Issue, September 2017 Snapdeal calls off talks with Flipkart

A

fter six months of negotiations, the e-tailer giant, Snapdeal has closed all talks with Flipkart about its merger.

According to the news report, a company spokesperson has said that the company has been exploring strategic options for the past

several months, but it has now decided to follow an independent path. Snapdeal has always focussed on creating a life-changing experience for the buyers and sellers and to take it further. The company is expected to be financially self-sustainable with the sale of certain non-core assets.

This strategic move was revealed after Snapdeal’s digital payment platform, FreeCharge, was sold to Axis Bank for Rs.385 crore.

Axis Bank acquires Freecharge

A

xis Bank has entered into an agreement with Jasper Infotech Pvt Ltd to acquire 100 per cent stake for $60 million (Rs 385 crore) in its subsidiaries, namely, FreeCharge Payment Technologies Pvt Ltd and Accelyst Solutions Pvt Ltd, which together constitute the digital payments business under the 'FreeCharge' brand.

The transaction is expected to close by the end of September 2017 subject to regulatory approvals.

With this takeover now, Axis Bank gets access to Freecharge’s 52 million mobile wallet holders and has opened up opportunities for cross-selling of the bank’s financial products on the platform.

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HELLO INDIA

Tough time ahead……..with the issue of privacy Whenever you enter any official premises, you are required to identify yourself by presenting Aadhaar card / PAN card / Voter card with address proof, contact number. Then, what else you need for a cybercrook to access your system. I found there are unwarranted pesky calls from various agencies for marketing promos and checking further details. It hardly seems there is any reasonable restriction on the right to privacy over taking the detail to enter any commercial and government premises. It could have serious implications for the government to effectively manage its massive public assistance programmes and to rein in fraud on several fronts. What I could forecast even more fundamental problem could happen with the database they are collecting and later selling it in the open market.

Having said that, as of today, there is little understanding of personal privacy at every level of society. Experts are of the opinion that India needs a fresh data protection law with the increased digitization led by Aadhaar, the Goods and Services Tax and the push towards a digital economy to safeguard the privacy and security of our personal information.

Going forward, data protection law has to be upgraded, especially at a time when technology is fast outpacing society’s ability to place checks and balances. The Government has also realized that, with the growing importance of data protection in India, the Government has finally constituted a panel of experts under retired Justice Srikrishna to develop a national data protection framework in India and recommend various methodologies to address the problem.

Secondly, with the Government’s vision to transform India into a knowledge economy there is a need for organizations of all sizes to create sustainable business practices. In fact, while companies are moving to the cloud to drive innovation and reduce infrastructure costs at the same time many organizations have also started helping to create wholesale shifts in all the industries and governments – making them more efficient, more intelligent, and more sustainable.

With the rapid growth of digital transformation and rising awareness among CEOs, the Government is putting pressure on companies across all industries to proactively invest into security to protect themselves against known and unknown threats and neutralize the threats and comply with new regulations. Organizations are increasingly looking to engage the services of highly trained information security professionals to cope with the problem.

Lastly, with the recent escalation in the number of security issues and to ensure the security of smartphones, the IT Ministry (MeitY) has asked 21 smartphone manufacturers to share the procedures and processes they follow to fortify the security of data and smartphones vended in India. Our recommendation is that this has to be made applicable in the case of social media as well as for the e-commerce companies in India.

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CONTENTS Website: www.varindia.com

Publisher: Deepak Kumar Sahu Editor: S Mohini Ratna Executive Editor: Dr. Vijay Anand Copy Editor: C. M. Dutta Deputy Editor: Samrita Baruah Sub - Editor: Aparna Mullick Art Director: Rakesh Kumar Network Administrator: Ashok Kumar Singh Manager-IT: Subhash Mohanta Manager-SEO: Bidyadhar Behera BUSINESS: Commercial Manager: Amit Kumar Jha Sr. Marketing Manager: Ashok Ranjan Dash Circulation Executive: Manish Kumar Marketing Manager: Dipendra Kumar CORPORATE OFFICE: VAR House, A-84A/3 Rose Apartment, Paryavaran complex, Ignou Road, New Delhi - 110030 Tel: 011-41656383, 46061809 Email: edit@varindia.com Bangalore: Bureau office Marketing Manager: S. Kamala kar Correspondent: L. G. Swami D-103 G.F., Ashish JK Apartments Thubarahalli Extended Road Bangaluru- 560066 Tel: 080-49530399 | Mobile:09886280836 E-mail: kamlakar@varindia.com Mumbai: Bureau office Regional Manager (West): Anil Kumar Sr. Correspondent: Mamta S. Anurag Residency, 203 - “B” Wing, Plot No-5, Sector-9, Kamothe, Navi Mumbai-410 209 Tel: 022-65561292, Mobile: 08108017479 E-mail: anil@varindia.com, mamta@varindia.com Chennai: Bureau office Branch Manager: Parthiban K A2, R.C.Residency, Cholambedu Road, Thiruvenkada nagar, Ambathur, Chennai - 600 053 Mobile: 098400 55626 E-mail: barani@varindia.com Hyderabad: Bureau office Branch Manager: Sunil Kumar Sahu 32-161/3, 202 Neha Paradise, Nr. Maissamma Temple, Venketeswara colony Ramakrishna Puram, Hyderabad - 500056 Telangana, Tel: 040-32989844/ Cell No. 08100298033 E-mail: sunil@varindia.com Kolkata: Bureau office Marketing Officer: Sunil Kumar Correspondent: Kiran Kumar 67 Sarada Park, Garia, Kolkata - 700084 Mobile: 08100298033, E-mail: sunil@varindia.com Mobile: 09903088480, E-mail: kiran@varindia.com Printed and Published by Deepak Kumar Sahu on behalf of M/s. Kalinga Digital Media Pvt. Ltd. and Printed at Pushpak Press Pvt. Ltd. Shed No. 203 - 204, DSIDC Complex, Okhla Industrial Area, Phase-I, New Delhi-110020 and Published at A-84A/3 Rose Apartment, Paryavaran complex, Ignou Road, New Delhi - 110030, Editor - S Mohini Ratna.

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SonicWall India Partner Summit 2017 – Awarding Excellence

LEAD STORY 30| 38| 42|

DMS industry riding on the back of Digitization The Jio Impact: the rise of the 4G VoLTE Feature Phone market PC sales slump but vendors foresee a revival

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ISODA 2017 AGM announces new leadership besides streamlining its top priorities

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Does GST mean more price burden on end products?

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All payments favouring:

IoT to revolutionize the future of technology – NXP Semiconductors Majority of businesses are not equipped to tackle new age threats – Dell EMC

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lephone believes in providing latest technology at affordable price 5G to transform the IoT ecosystem with new capabilities - Qualcomm

Amravati on the IT radar with the launch of TIER IV ‘Pi Amaravati’ Datacenter

REGULARS Round About

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Movers & Shakers

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ROUND ABOUT

Widening Technology Gaps—

India’s Top

Challenge Technology is constantly transforming and scaling up and, in the process, it is making the pre-existing ones redundant or obsolete. One may argue that such sweeping changes are happening only in information technology or in the frontier areas of science. Disruption is the rule, and not the exception.

Digitization is making headway in areas such as finance with Bitcoin and Blockchain technology. Look at logistics where most of the disruptions are happening now. Artificial Intelligence, sensors, and drones are rewriting the concepts of logistics and supply chain.

Geography has become neutral in managing the logistics. Sitting in the U.S.A., technology platforms can monitor, trace and course correct the movement of goods and services. Not only that, many of the e-commerce companies are entering the field since it is directly connected with their area of their operation. For instance, Amazon is gearing up to expand its logistic solutions to registered sellers. It is also heavily into the food delivery services. In India, it has started a pilot project for the logistics services for its 300 sellers under the banner of its own wing, Amazon Transportation Services (ATS).

They are trying to give a chase for the thirdparty courier services by offering their services at lower competitive cost.

Another area where technology is scripting sweeping changes is healthcare. The future course of treatment is going to be virtual, where the doctor–patient interface will be kept at the minimal level and most of the procedures ranging from diagnostics to complicated surgeries will be performed through the virtual medium. Once it becomes operational worldwide, it will help make available quality medical services at doorstep to a patient living thousands of miles away from the best doctor or a hospital.

Disruptions are happening across the board, in many fields. Have we focussed on these frontier technology areas in India? Let us call spade a spade: we have not. Our business models are still steeped in the conventional wisdom and practice, which could have been the order of the day a few decades back. I must confess that we are lagging far behind in the technology ladder. With the same set of skills that we possess, we can at best survive for a few years and then the technology curve will

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become sloppy.

The bad news is that the technology lag will not only affect our information technology sector, but also the entire gamut of economic and social sectors such as manufacturing, services, agriculture, education and what have you. Starting with information technology, where technocrats including the author, have entered at least three decades ago. Have we made any headstart in taking the IT to the next level? I fear not. All of us have got tuned to the markets that have started with the U.S., Europe, Japan and little bits in China, Latin America, Africa and South Korea. Steady business with rare intervention of disruptions made us complacent. Outsourcing paled into insignificance due to a variety of reasons, the foremost among them is protectionism.

For quite some time, there has been a silent effort to innovate not only new technologies but also concepts that can replace labour.

Several years into such research, there have been a number of success stories in the form of Artificial Intelligence, sensors, automation, robotics, etc. This has helped not only in achieving excellence in production lines and enhancing productivities, but also replacing the labour. In one stroke, automation has helped in reducing the range and quantum of works outsourced. For instance, in the banking sector, automation could reduce the number of employees significantly. In the case of information technology, causality was much bigger. Yet, in the U.S. the Indians stealing the jobs has become an election rhetoric, despite the fact that there are evidences to the contrary.

Coming back to what needs to be done in India in this situation, the stock answer is that India has to reinvent its relevance vis-a-vis the western world. But the billion-dollar question is how can it be done? It is not an easy task but not an impossible mission. We have to reorient ourselves to meet the world demand for quality professionals who can operate the automation drives, create software for such systems, experts

to maintain high-end equipment and devices, work on Artificial Intelligence, create algorithms that can aid research into stem cells and genetics, engage in data mining and analytics in all available avenues, including pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, healthcare, etc. We also need people who can undertake R&D in the areas of frontier science. In such initiatives, there is a thumb rule that one should not expect quick results. Fundamental research will take time and is painstaking. Yet, we have to encourage them.

Incentivization of R&D alone will not hold good. A new ecosystem has to be created, where registration of patents and their protection are ensured. Some of our labs under the government administration have the capacities to undertake fundamental research. Are they being utilized to the full capacity? Can such capacities be leased out to the private sector, particularly the pharmaceutical companies to undertake their in-house research. There can be private-public partnership in R&D as also crosscountry partnerships. A research project can be undertaken in stages in various countries where they are more suited to undertake. For instance, an R&D effort to develop new molecules can be undertaken in India in the preliminary stage and at a later stage shifted to another country, where there are more facilities and testing equipment to do so. Registration of patents seems to be a problem area in the Indian context and that has prompted many Indian scientists to shift their locations to foreign laboratories.

The underlying problem is the technology gaps. Our conventional approach to technology and borrowing and adapting them may not be successful in the future. Many of our wellcalibrated projects like Digital India and Make in India are not yielding the desired results on account of technology gaps. Are we conscious of such dilemma? We may be good in packaging projects to get the public attention. But our achievement in taking those initiatives to the logical end desires to be improved considerably, lest we would miss the bus this time too. n

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August 2017

11

CHANNEL CHIEF

IBM embarks on a multi-dimensional digital transformational journey aided by its partners When it comes to IBM’s digital transformational journey, partners have a big role to play in helping customers adopt the digital strategy. Speaking in praise of its partners, Mukul Mathur, Vice President - Global Business Partners and System Integrators, IBM India/SA shares with VARINDIA the three-pronged strategy that IBM has specially devised to aid its partners drive this transformation -

I

BM has been on the forefront of the transformation that is happening and the opportunities that are emerging in the marketplace and is driving them both for the clients as well as for IBM. The significant part of its GTM is the partner ecosystem that IBM works with within this transformation journey.

IBM has declared in the beginning of 2016 that it is going to be a cognitive solution company with cloud as the delivery model and supported by security. True to that we are leading with that strategy. The channel strategy from IBM is completely aligned to building a channel that helps us deliver this promise to our clients. This channel not only helps clients in their traditional transactional systems but also in their digital transformation,” explains Mukul Mathur, Vice President - Global Business Partners and System Integrators, IBM India/SA. IBM is driving the digital transformation through a three-pronged strategy – • Enriching/expanding the portfolio – IBM traditionally had a very strong portfolio on the enterprise side which comprises of the systems business, the storage business, the transactional software business; to this IBM added many new solutions and capabilities on the Watson platform.

For instance the Bluemix Cloud infrastructure gives its partners the option to look at software solutions either on the on-premise or the SaaS model.

IBM also has multiple alliances that add up to the offerings, like with VMware, SAP HANA. “We also have several technology offerings that partners can use, like we announced blockchain technology or the security offerings that we have in our portfolio - so this is all about how we are continuing to enrich our offerings that partners can now take. Depending on the partners and their expertise, they combine these products as building blocks in their own unique fashion to offer value to their clients,” explains Mukul.

• Enablement – The partner community of IBM is very diverse.

Some of the partners who came from traditional platforms are trying to transform into new solutions. IBM has these structured business transformational workshops that help partners look at different technology areas and co-work with them. “If any partner is looking at moving some of the workload to the hybrid cloud model, we help them do that. Many new players have emerged with very niche expertise and we are helping them with tools to technically enable them so that they can build their applications and solutions. In a matter of 1 month we added 80+ partners on our SaaS portfolio. We have worked with close to 1000 – 1200 start-ups in India. Also, this year we have launched a completely new Partner World Program,” says Mukul.

The tiering of partners into Platinum, Gold and Silver categories is also not done just by size of revenue but by looking at it more from an expertise perspective which need not be only on IBM product but can be any industry vertical expertise. IBM also gives high weightage to the kind of client references that the partners have and the kind of value they are delivering to the customer through the IBM solution.

• Engagement – There is a big thrust at IBM to help partners take its solutions to its customers. There are many modes and media through which it helps its partners go to the market. One very common medium is the digital. “We help partners run digital campaigns by using IBM assets.

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“Focus a lot on skills, as this is the differentiator. The effectiveness of digital transformation is driven by innovation and this innovation comes with skills.”

Globally we have a marketplace where partners can put their solutions.

We organize industry specific forums like Healthcare, financial services or Manufacturing where we invite our partners to present their solutions that they are developing and even our customers would be present. Recently we did the IBM Cloud Forum. So there are a number of ways through which we are engaging and still exploring to find out what other ways can we expand this engagement module,” explains Mukul.

It is however true that no transformation, particular the one that is so rapid and disruptive is easy. If we go back into 4 -5 years of IBM history, many partners who were there in its traditional businesses have opted out of this transformation. “The biggest piece of this transformation is the requirement to have different types of skills; not because technology is changing but who you sell to has changed,” points out Mukul. “You no longer sell to the technology officer but to the business leader. The nature of skill that partners need to have is very solution oriented.”

It has been a multi-dimensional journey for IBM, looking at analytic, cognitive, cloud solutions and translating them into outcome-based, and aligning with that of IBM’s business strategy.

Partners who are better aligned to their customers’ transformational objectives know their digital needs and the kind of challenges customers face. They are able to proactively reorient themselves and drive the transformation ahead of the curve. Partners need to remain core to their customers’ digital transformation; otherwise the latter will cease to continue doing business with them, according to Mukul. n Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

www.varindia.com

August 2017

13

HOT BYTES

Check Point joins hands with Microsoft Intune

C

heck Point has announced its product integration of

Check Point SandBlast Mobile with Microsoft Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) to secure mobile devices in the enterprise.

Andrew Conway, General Manager for

Enterprise Mobility + Security, Microsoft Corp., added, “As attacks continue to become more sophisticated, many customers are looking at how mobile threat defense solutions, such as Check Point, can help them thwart threats on mobile devices. The integration between Check Point and Microsoft Intune will help secure mobile devices from advanced cyberthreats, and help ensure that only compliant devices have access to company resources.”

72% of the surveyed SMEs have not heard of invoice matching: Tally

T

ally Solutions has announced the results of a study conducted among SME business owners on GST preparedness.

Speaking on how Tally has solved for some of the problem statements that have emerged, Tejas Goenka, Executive Director, Tally Solutions, said, “While the survey has definitely raised some key issues which need to be dealt with, we, at Tally, are happy that we have already provided some solutions. On the education front, our exclusive GST awareness blog in the running for almost a year now. We

launched our GST-ready software more than three weeks back which promises ease-of-use and simplicity like all our earlier products and GST billing from Day 1. It has already been downloaded more than 1.5 million times. For those businesses which haven’t automated yet, we have partnered with CAIT and Acer India to bring Biz Guru, a one-stop plug-and-play solution for accounting and GST which couples Acer’s hardware and preinstalled GST-ready Tally.

ERP 9. We are committed to helping businesses across the country to be GST-compliant.”

mjunction to build a platform for e-bidding

m

junction services limited has been appointed by the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH) to build a platform for them to enable e-bidding, e-evaluation of bids, and e-allocation of oil & gas fields. This platform will aid in transparent allocation of the country’s natural resources, and help the country to reduce its oil import bill by $8 billion annually, as per the Petroleum & Natural Gas

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August 2017

Ministry officials. mjunction CEO Vinaya Varma said, “I am happy that in addition to managing e-auction of spectrum for the Government of India, we have also been entrusted with the responsibility of building this platform. We have built up strong competencies in design and conduct of large- value e-auctions, and I want to thank DGH for this nationally important contract.”

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SAP to ramp Google Digital unlocked up a digitallycampaign to empower SMBs oogle India has for Impacting Change skilled workforce Greaffirmed its Through Digital and

S

AP SE has reiterated its commitment towards customers and partner ecosystem by pledging to help ramp up workforce in the country to take forward the digital transformation agenda.

In the wake of GST rollout and Digital India initiative, the 51+ million SMEs in the country will eventually have to onboard or scale their technology infrastructure. It will, therefore, give rise to an industry-wide requirement of digital experts who will have the capability to enable enterprises transition to a digital platform. SAP understands the urgency to fulfil this necessity.

SAP India commits to skill, reskill and upskill 1.5 million SAP consultants to plug this digital gap within the next three years.

BT joins hands with Dell EMC

B

T and Dell EMC have entered into a research collaboration dedicated to exploring a new way of managing network traffic.

The proof-of-concept trial, which is taking place at the BT Labs in Adastral Park, Suffolk, will explore how disaggregated switching can create flexible networks which are more responsive to customer needs by using standard open network switches commonly found in data centers, coupled with specialist switching software.

Neil J. McRae, Chief Architect for BT, said, “This proof-of-concept trial with Dell EMC will enable us to evaluate the performance of disaggregated switches against traditional integrated network switches, and make informed decisions about the role this kind of solution will play in the dynamic network services of the future."

commitment to digitally empower India’s small and medium businesses.

As part of its Digital Unlocked campaign, Google has announced the national winners of SMB Heroes 2017, an initiative aimed at recognizing businesses that have embraced technology to power their growth.

The three businesses that emerged as national winners under each of the categories are: Farida Gupta for Business Impact Through Digital; Shantanu Pathak and Aditya Kulkarni

Arpita Ganesh for Woman Business Leader. Earlier this year, Google and

KPMG had conducted a joint study, "Impact of internet and digitization on SMBs in India". As per the report, SMBs cited a lack of understanding of the benefits of digital technologies and technical skills.

Infor and LinkedIn come together

I

nfor has announced a new integration of Infor Customer Relationship Management (CRM) with LinkedIn Sales Navigator.

According to the company, LinkedIn Sales Navigator for Infor CRM can provide users with deep relational data across all applicable devices in real time. This integration is designed to deliver new tools to assist sales professionals in discovering the best ways

to get introduced through “TeamLink”, identify new contacts with contextual lead recommendations, be alerted to job and company changes, and “Icebreakers” which can be great relationship selling tools that show shared connections, experiences, and interests, plus a link to a lead’s recent activity stream.

The integration will be available to Infor CRM and Sales Navigator Team.

Schneider Electric to buy ASCO business of Vertiv

V

ertiv, formerly Emerson Network Power, has announced plans to sell its ASCO business as it continues to sharpen its focus on the digital critical infrastr ucture space and its core business. The $1.25-billion sale to Schneider Electric allows Vertiv to apply additional resources toward business and technological advancements in its core data center, telecommunications and commercial and industrial markets.

“This sale is a significant

step forward in our evolution as the premier provider of digital critical infrastructure solutions,” Rob Johnson, CEO, Vertiv said. He

added, “This is consistent with our strategy of focussing on our customers and aligning the strengths of our organization – deep domain knowledge in IT and facilities applications, global scale and service coverage – to better meet their needs.”

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15

HOT BYTES

SCC and WD emphasise on the role of surveillance for smarter cities

I

n a round table conference on “Role of Video Surveillance Systems in making cities safer”, the Smart Cities

Council India (SCC) and Western Digital(WD) discussed on the current state of surveillance security in India, the challenges and sustainable solutions to help urban planners understand

the framework of a smart city and take steps to improve infrastructure.

According to the company, this initiative is in unison

with the vision of “Smart Cities” for which the role of data and IT, especially video surveillance in enhancing security will play a pivotal role.

TASK and Red Hat partner for creating enterprise-ready talent

T

elangana Academy for Skill and Knowledge (TASK), Department of ITE&C, Government of Telangana, and Red Hat have entered into a Memorandum of Understanding to offer Red Hat Academy training and certification programs to engineering students in the State of Telangana.

Speaking on the occasion, Rajesh Rege, Managing Director of India & SAARC, Red Hat,

said, “We are happy for the opportunity to explore the ways to collaborate with TASK and its partner colleges through Red Hat Academy, to help students learn about Red Hat Technologies and solutions and establish in-demand open-source skills. We hope through this initiative with TASK, we can help prepare students for strong careers support future opensource contributors and innovators.”

NEC with NDMC conducts a Facial recognition pilot test

T

he subsidiary of NEC India and the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) have started testing an intelligent video surveillance system using facial recognition technologies.

N E C has deployed CCTVsurveillance cameras at Central Park and surrounding areas for monitoring the area from a control room. The company’s intelligent video surveillance system will perform real-time matching

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August 2017

of people entering the park against the NDMC’s watch list of preregistered individuals, which enables

the NDMC to automatically identify and detect a person of interest and to rapidly take appropriate action to reduce the risk of public safety threats.

www.varindia.com

TCS iON to launch GST Shiksha hub

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CS's strategic unit, TCS iON, has entered into partnership with Laghu Udyog Bharati, an association of small and micro industrial units to launch GST- related content that will facilitate Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) and help them to become GST aware and compliant.

The company has also revealed that TCS iON will also work to integrate Laghu Udyog Bharati’s existing GST learning content into a digital medium, providing MSMEs an online alternative to upgrade their GST knowledge.

With the availability of digital learning content, Laghu Bharati Udyog will be able to reach MSMEs in remote areas, ensuring availability of the latest GST information.

Avaya to exit Chapter 11 as an important milestone

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vaya has released a statement on August 7, 2017, announcing that it has filed an amended plan of reorganization and disclosure statement, with the support of major stakeholders, representing an important milestone in the company’s restructuring process and giving a “clear and viable path to emerge from Chapter 11 in the near term”.

Vishal Agrawal, Managing Director, India and SAARC, Avaya, said that while Avaya Inc. has been working through the Chapter 11 process in the US, India business has progressed strongly.

“This agreement provides a clear and viable path to exit Chapter 11 in line with our strategy. This is an important milestone as we work to emerge as a strong and competitive company.”

eScan announces Vision 2020 to achieve leadership position

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Scan – Total Security Solution – has inaugurated its Vision 2020 roadmap at New Delhi, amidst leading channel partners from north India with a pledge to achieve leadership position in India by 2020. The event was held in association with KK Software, eScan's national distributor for its AV SKU product.

Rahul Joshi, AVP National Sales (Retail and SMB products), shared his vision of driving eScan to be the top antivirus

brand in India by 2020. He also shared the strategic

initiatives by eScan for channel partners for mutual growth and great business opportunity. The partner meet was attended by over 120 exclusive partners from across north India.

NSX helps State of Louisiana to build “Systems of Tomorrow”

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Mware has announced that the State of Louisiana Office of Technology Services (OTS) is taking advantage of VMware Cross-Cloud Architecture and VMware NSX to transform security and modernize data center operations as part of a state-wide cloud transformation initiative in Bangalore.

VMware is empowering OTS with a common

operating model that spans both private and public clouds to more securely manage and scale its newly consolidated IT operations.

According to OTS, to date, NSX has saved OTS upwards of $1 million in capital expenditures and even more in operational expenses by better equipping IT teams with the tools they need to scale systems with better outcomes and at lower costs.

Supertron obtains distribution right of Sapphire Radeon graphic card

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u p e r t r o n Electronics has the exclusive distribution rights of the SAPPHIRE Radeon Vega graphics cards. The global graphics card leader Sapphire Technology is introducing one of the new-generation graphics card in the Indian market.

V.K. Bhandari, Chairman & MD - Supertron Electronics Pvt. Ltd, said, “This high-end SAPPHIRE Radeon RX Vega graphics cards will give the gamers to speed up the greatest high-end gaming and virtual reality experiences.

Sapphire has proven its commitment to delivering world class, innovative,

best-of-breed gaming solutions that have put the Sapphire at the forefront of gaming components and technology. With our pan-India branch network and marketing capabilities, we are confident that Sapphire Radeon Vega will capture the top bracket in the category of next gen gaming verticals.”

Windows 10 Pro means business.

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Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the U.S. and other countries or both.

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June 2017

19

ON THE RAMP

Microsoft announces its “Makein-India” product – Kaizala

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icrosoft India has announced the launch of Microsoft Kaizala, a mobile-only product designed for large group communications and work management.

Microsoft Kaizala makes it simple for organizations to seamlessly communicate, collaborate and complete tasks, bringing together desktop users and mobileonly users who may be within or outside their organizations.

Microsoft India has also announced the launch of its enterprise version, Kaizala Pro that allows organizations to have full

administrative control of their groups. It comes with additional features that include user and group management, system integration and automation using Microsoft Kaizala APIs, advanced reporting and analytics, ability to publish custom actions, ability to create public groups, and organizational profile and directory.

A10 Networks broadens its Thunder Portfolio

A

10 Networks has broadened its Thunder Series portfolio of hardware appliances to help latency-sensitive financial institutions and enterprises overall. The portfolio additions include a solution that reduces latency and enhances security for high frequency trading and financial environments, and two entry-level A10 Thunder Series Application Delivery Controllers for enterprise customers.

The expansion of the A10 Thunder portfolio

includes the Thunder 3745 to help financial institutions build and scale low-latency infrastructure for high-value applications.

The Thunder 3745 is ideal for very low-latency and low-jitter applications, such as those operating on the Financial Information Exchange (FIX) and other industry protocols.

The Thunder 3745 also provides security features while simultaneously providing dual Network Address Translation (NAT) services.

Canon launches the imageRUNNER ADVANCE Series

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anon India has introduced the third-generation i m a g e R U N N E R A D VA N C E series and a robust A3 color multifunction device (MFD) iRC3020 engineered to deliver outstanding business d o c u m e n t s, superb usability and workplace productivity at an affordable price.

K. Bhaskhar, VP,

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August 2017

Business Imaging Solutions, Canon India, said, “We are proud to introduce the newgeneration series featuring a high level of connectivity and innovative smart features such as A D VA N C E Personalised and Intelligent R e c o v e r y.

These features were designed to create a secure yet user-centric platform for enhanced process and cost-efficiencies at the workplace.”

www.varindia.com

Fortinet announces Threat Intelligence Service

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ortinet has announced a new threat intelligence service that arms cybersecurity leaders with cyber situational awareness, highlighting the latest threat trends and cyber risks facing their organizations. The Service enables CISOs to stay ahead of the global threat landscape and proactively defend their enterprises against rapidly evolving threats.

FortiGuard TIS is a cloud-based threat intelligence platform that provides threat metrics and activity trends, enabling CISOs to instantly understand what is happening across the global threat landscape.

Quick Heal Total Security to secure multiple devices

Q

uick Heal has launched Quick Heal Total Security MultiDevice which provides hassle-free security solutions to customers using multiple devices. The solution will empower customers to deploy comprehensive and simplified security protection for up to three or five devices which can be a mix and match of Windows, Mac and Android. Quick Heal Total Security Multi-Device is easy to install, manage and renew as it comes with a single product key providing powerful protection for multiple devices.

Sanjay Katkar, Jt MD & CTO, Quick Heal Technologies Limited, said, “The launch of Quick Heal Total Security MultiDevice is in line with our endeavour to constantly innovate and deliver an unmatched experience to our customers."

DIGISOL expands its structured cabling range with drawer type LIU

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IGISOL Systems has launched its new drawer type LIU under its Structured Cabling Systems (Passive) range.

DIGISOL 24/48 Port Configurable Fibre LIU drawer type is a 1U rack mount unit for storing and terminating incoming fiber cable. Management rings within system to accommodate excess fiber cordage behind the adapters and maintain fiber bend radius.

LIU (Light Interface Unit) or Fiber patch panels are used to manage,

organize and secure fiber cable assemblies. It comes in both wall mount and rack mount types, depending on infrastructure requirements. From 6 cores to 96 cores, these LIUs can accommodate for a variety of different cable types and installation sizes. Most widely rack-mounted LIUs are preferred by designers and installers.

Ixia strengthens its Network Security and Visibility with Active SSL

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xia has announced the addition of its Active SSL technology to its SecureStack feature set, a key component of the company’s Security and Visibility Intelligence Framework. Active SSL enables organizations to see inside traffic encrypted with ephemeral key to ensure the security of their networks.

Ixia has expanded the company’s SecureStack feature with its Active SSL technology, which

interoperates with all other stack features including identification and filtering, deduplication, and time stamping. The solution, which can be used for inline or out-ofband deployments, has a dedicated cryptographic processor, as well as built-in reporting and policies that provide cipher support, real-time insights. Active SSL also provides forward secrecy to protect past and future data exchanges with ephemeral keys.

Acer new “Nitro 5” gaming laptop available at Rs.75,990

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cer has introduced the powerful Nitro 5 in India. Packed with features, Nitro 5 delivers an astounding, affordable and portable gaming experience that delivers everyday usability with ultimate performance to play demanding games on a budget.

Commenting on the launch, Chandrahas Panigrahi, CMO and Consumer Business Head, said, “We are extremely excited to launch Acer Nitro 5 in India. The device is an unmatched combination

of price and features.

We thoroughly believe that every aspiring gamer deserves a great gaming device which lets them

play advanced games while still be a great choice to do day-to-day tasks. Hence, that’s where we thought to introduce Nitro 5 which is incredibly powerful with an unbeatable price.”

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19

ON THE RAMP

D-Link forays into CCTV surveillance segment

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-Link has eventurd into the CCTV segment. D-Link continues to be one of the key players in the IP Surveillance domain, and is now expanding its product portfolio by venturing into the CCTV segment.

Tushar Sighat, Executive Director & CEO, said, “For the last couple of years, our focus has been on nurturing organic growth.

We continue to lead the market with our Wireless & Switching solution, along with end-to-end network offering. CCTV is a natural extension to our existing surveillance

product portfolio. D-Link is all equipped to reach out to customers across the segment with its 360-degree business approach.”

D-Link Surveillance portfolio also includes a high range of thermal cameras that can help detect people, objects and incidents from pitch dark to sunlit and other challenging conditions. D-Link offers free DCMS Software that is capable of viewing up to 64 channels.

Raritan adds new features to Dominion SX II

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aritan has announced new features for its Dominion SX II to meet the concern of their customers regarding Java Pops-ups.

With the new features, Raritan enables their Indian customers to manage their remote serial devices more easily and securely.

The Dominion SX II, Raritan’s serial console server, now provides Javafree serial-over-IP access and control to remote serial devices with RJ-45 serial

ports — such as routers, switches, blade servers — and Raritan iPDUs. Sanjay Motwani, Regional Director, Raritan Asia-Pacific, said, “The wide range of advancement and innovation in SX II is to address one of the crucial pain points of every data center manager—that of efficiently managing serial devices remotely. The new SX II is more powerful, secure, reliable, easy to use and can control serial devices anytime and anywhere.”

Amazon brings Virtual Customer Service model in India

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mazon has come up with Virtual Customer Service (VCS) model. It is an initiative

to ensure a high rate of diversity while also roping in talent who might not be able to physically attend

launched with the aim of creating cost-efficient employment prospects for qualified and skilled candidates seeking the more flexible “Work From Home” opportunities.

With this initiative, Amazon is reaching out to a wider talent pool

regular office due to varied reasons. VCS has currently been launched in Hyderabad, Pune, Coimbatore and Noida and is hiring for entry-level job opportunities along with opportunities for Team Managers and Group Managers in these cities.

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August 2017

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Array Networks announces AVX series NFV

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rray Networks has announced immediate availability of its new Version 2.5 operating system for AVX Series Network Functions Platforms. The AVX Series is a line of virtualized hardware appliances purpose-built to run networking and security virtual appliances (VAs) and virtual network functions (VNFs) while at the same time addressing the most pressing challenges to enterprise NFV adoption.

"We are very excited to announce our first set of Network Functions Platform enhancements based on real-world production deployments," said James Kwon, Array's Senior Director of Product Management for Network Functions Platforms.

Druva launches Data Managementas-a-Service

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ruva has announced Druva Cloud Platform. It provides a unified control plane for data management services across endpoint, server, and cloud application data.

Druva Cloud Platform can dramatically reduce data risks, as well as the costs of data protection by more than 60 per cent.

"The acceleration of data growth and continued storage fragmentation, combined with surmounting pressures from malicious threats, loss, and corruption, and increasing regulatory requirements has raised stewardship complexity beyond reasonable cost and manageability. With this as a backdrop, global enterprises need a fresh approach to simplify the modern enterprise data strategy," said Jaspreet Singh, Co-Founder and CEO of Druva.

GIGABYTE introduces X399 AORUS Gaming 7 Motherboard

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i g a b y t e Technolog y has presented the newest AMD X399-equipped motherboard, X399 AORUS Gaming 7. The critically acclaimed AORUS series extends its focus to the AMD platform and the new X399 AORUS Gaming 7 comes with a plethora of impressive features. These features include high-end cooling solutions, digital lighting support, M.2 plug heat dissipation armor, 4-Way display output, a newly designed power source, GIGABYTE’s

unique RGB Fusion and Smart Fan 5, which provide the user with a high-quality, innovative and highperformance motherboard.

Numeric expands its Three Phase UPS Portfolio with KEOR Series

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umeric has announced its new KEOR Series of Three Phase UPS – Keor HP and Keor HPE as a one-stop solution for IT, Industrial, Office and Commercial sector. The range intends to satisfy both users and installers by providing ease-of-maintenance and safety; capital preservation and reducing operating expenses.

Palash Nandy, Chief Commercial Officer, Numeric, said, “UPS

remains a key element in any electrical infrastructure – be it SOHO, Retail, Manufacturing, Healthcare, Datacenters, IT/ITeS, BFSI, Hotels, etc. We are pleased to announce the launch of KEOR Three Phase UPS, Keor HP and Keor HPE. The key considerations in choosing the backup solution like UPS, especially for data centers is basis their reliability, efficiency, maintenance, and return on investment."

Barracuda expands its firewall portfolio for Microsoft Azure adoption

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arracuda has announced new enhancements to its firewall products to help its customers accelerate Microsoft Azure adoption and become cloud ready. Barracuda NextGen Firewall and Barracuda WAF now include support for publishing logs to the Microsoft OMS dashboard, building on their existing integration with Azure Security Center.

“Barracuda continues to help customers secure their cloud workloads. The integrations with Microsoft OMS and API-based

automation makes it easier for customers to integrate security controls into their cloud native applications,” said Vice-President of

Cloud, Tim Jefferson with Barracuda. “We are constantly innovating to bring more options to our customers for their cloud deployments, and look forward to our customers benefiting from enhanced access and increased automation for their Azure environments.”

www.varindia.com

August 2017

21

VOICE-N-DATA

Zyxel rolls out WAC6500 series

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yxel has rolled out WAC6500 series which delivers WiFi performance with its innovative smart antenna design, offering more than 700optimizedsignalpatterns.

The Zyxel smart antenna consistently calculates the ideal physical-layer path for each individual client.

This feature not only offers the best possible signal by shaping to various patterns.

It also mitigates interference from other wireless clients.

The WAC6500 series provides dynamic signal patterns to deliver best service to every client.

Advanced Wi-Fi features such as load balancing and smart-client steering ensure a smooth, consistent, and

B

uninterrupted wireless access experience for all users, making it an ideal choice for high-density requirements.

The WAC6500 series is also easy to install with the Zyxel APFlex feature. While deploying large groups of WAC6500 series with AP controllers in place, APFlex allows streamline and hassle-free installation, simple switching between Managed/Standalone AP modes and automatic integration of APs into the network environment.

NCLT approves proposed merger of Airtel and Telenor

A

ccording to the latest news report, National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has given a nod for merger between Bharti Airtel and Telenor.

NCLT has directed both the companies to hold a meeting of equity shareholders and unsecured creditors. In June, Bharti Airtel has already received a clearance from the Competition Commission of India (CCI), Securities & Exchange Board of

India (Sebi), BSE and the National Stock Exchange of India.

With this acquisition, Bharti Airtel will be strengthening its 4G spectrum holdings and revenue share. After the closure of the deal, Airtel will get hold of Telenor’s 43.4 units of 4G spectrum in 1,800 MHz band which will help the company to reinforce its position in the battle with Reliance Jio Infocomm.

Q2 2017 sees LTE handsets crossing 150 million units in India

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ccording to the latest research from Counterpoint’s Market Monitor service, LTE installed base of handsets has crossed 150 million units, only behind China and the USA now and is estimated to surpass the latter in the next one year.

Karn Chauhan, Research Analyst at Counterpoint Research, said, “Local brands did relatively well during the quarter after three quarters of lull but still have a significant task cut out to reclaim the market share back from rivals. Then

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August 2017

BSNL join hands Vodafone invests Rs.1, 300 crore in West Bengal with ZTE

again, Chinese players such as OPPO, Vivo and Gionee continued to outspend their rivals during the quarter, especially riding high on the IPL and Champions Trophy cricket tournaments."

www.varindia.com

harat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) has forged an alliance with ZTE, following a similar partnership with Finnish firm Nokia for 5G services, revealed the latest reports.

According to the reports, BSNL plans to soon sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with ZTE under the “5G and beyond” programme, part of which the latter will provide most recent technological updates and exchange ideas with the telecom major.

BSNL has also written to the Department of Telecom (DoT) to allocate airwaves in the 700MHz band for rolling out 4G services. It expects to get the government’s approval soon on proposal for using airwaves in 700MHz band for offering 4G services, and 5G services in the future.

Telecom Ministry puts no bar on Satellite phones

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he government has put no bar on satellite phone services segment and any entity can start operations in the country, according to Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha.

However, the service provider will be required to set up satellite phone gateway in India so that security agencies can lawfully intercept calls on its network, whenever required.

BSNL has started providing satellite phone service in India to meet requirement of security forces, disaster management team and some other government departments on a case-to-case basis. The Department of Telecom has also made a provision for satellite phone service under the Unified Licence called “Global Mobile Personal Communication

by Satellite (GMPCS) Service.”

V

odafone India has invested ~Rs.1,300 crore on ramping up network and distribution in Kolkata and Rest of Bengal circles over FY 17 and FY 18. Already, the preferred mobile services provider Vodafone, in terms of Subscriber base, Revenue Market Share, Retail touch points, has been focusing on closer engagement and enhancing customer experience in an endeavour to be future-ready.

Strengthening and expanding of network across multiple regions of Bengal brought 37,049 villages within its network.

Vodafone has covered 2,380 towns, including all the key towns like Darjeeling, Gangtok, Bashirhat, Nabadwip, Bardhaman, Durgapur, Asansol, Bolpur, Krishnanagar, Midnapore, Kharagpur, Berhampore and others in Bengal circle with 4G SuperNet.The company has invested over Rs.10,000+ crore till date.

Riverbed introduces new Xirrus Wi-Fi Access Point

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i v e r b e d Technology has announced a new Xirrus Wave 2 AP (Model XD2230) a Wi-Fi Access Point (AP) that enables powerful intelligent services at the network edge, further extending the Riverbed’s Wi-Fi solution in the market.

The Xirrus Wi-Fi solution is an 802.11ac AP that can be managed from the cloud or on premise.

Designed with a powerful

integrated controller, it provides layer 7 application visibility to help businesses keep up with the demands that applications are putting on Wi-Fi. With 3 radios, including Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), the XD2230 model provides secure access for Wi-Fi users and Internet of Things (IoT) devices with an easy-touse SaaS solution, while helping enterprises scale and adapt to evolving demands.

AXILSPOT rolls out ASC175 Antenna Ceiling Access Point

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XILSPOT has rolled out ASC175 Integrated Antenna Ceiling Access Point with Auto channel and power adjustment as well as wireless QoS which supports more concurrent users, eliminates network congestion and latency, warranting high bandwidth services.

AXILSPOT ASC175 is a high-performance 802.11ac indoor Access Point, providing an economical solution for enterprise wireless networks. With a 3x3 MIMO dual-radio design, the ASC175 delivers uncompromising wiredlike performance for high-

density environments.

With consistent performance to work at heavy user traffic and mission-critical scenarios, the ASC175 is an ideal choice for high-density environments such as classroom, conference centers, enterprise offices, arenas, and stadiums.

Built-in Intelligent RF optimization and QoS enforcement ensure that the ASC175 provides always-on connectivity for data, highbandwidth applications or low-latency applications.

No need to assign dedicated RF expertise and hardware typically required finetuning a wireless network.

www.varindia.com

August 2017

23

CHANNEL BUZZ

Rashi Peripherals concludes GST Awareness Campaign for its partners

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ashi Peripherals has recently concluded its unique GST PC campaign for partners. The “R U GST Ready” campaign is aimed at creating GST

awareness among partners and assists them in smooth transition to the new tax regime.

Under the campaign, over 300 Champions of Rashi Peripherals spread across the country reached out to over 1000 outlets and assisted Partners in upgrading their existing IT hardware to comply

with the GST norms. Champions also leveraged the platforms like Emailers, WhatsApp, Badges, Web banner, etc to spread maximum knowledge on GST billing among

its channel community.

Rashi Peripherals was the only distributor to start GST billing from July 1. The distribution house made its GST PC available for partners and SMEs to start GST billing from July 1 itself. This helped them in liquidating the stocks without hampering business continuity.

Sophos reinforces “Channel Best” strategy

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ophos has concluded its biggest-ever annual partner conference held in the Asia-Pacific and Japan (APJ) region at Bangkok.

The conference was attended by more than 350 channel partners from across the region, including more than 90 Sophos channel partners from India.

At the conference, titled “This is NextGen”, Sophos presented how the company is reinforcing its 100-per cent partner first and channel best business strategy, along with some key initiatives taken to strengthen its presence in APJ. Sophos has also announced the launch of its Channel Influence Community, an initiative that will bring together the company and the larger channel ecosystem of distributors, consultants and service providers from around the world to share knowledge and experience.

The community will receive a host of other benefits like exclusive access to new product programs

and services.

Kendra Krause, Vice-President, Global Channels, Sophos, expressed her contentment saying, “Our partners are critical to our success in India and across the entire region. The response was overwhelmingly positive and

I saw many great examples of collaboration and engagement between our sales leaders and our partners, focused on providing the very best protection for our customers. Sophos also reinforced its commitment to the channel with innovative and marketing leading programs that support and enable business growth.”

TAIT guides the Channel Community to the new GST regime

Sakri IT Solution recognizes its channel partners

ndia has rolled out one of the biggest tax reforms – the Goods and Services Tax (GST), which has replaced the complex maze of Central taxes and duties such as Excise Duty, Service Tax, Countervailing Duty (CVD), Special Additional Duty of Customs (SAD), central charges and cesses and local state taxes that was Value Added Tax (VAT), Central Sales Tax (CST), Octroi, Entry Tax, Purchase Tax, etc.

Coinciding with the new tax regime, the Mumbai-based Trade Association of Information Technology (TAIT) organized their Knowledge Series events putting emphasis on Input Tax Credit and the way forward in the GST regime for their members.

TAIT's past sessions/events on GST have been addressed by CAs and the Service Tax department. This time, the Association had invited G.V. Bilolikar, Jt Commissioner of Sales Tax, Mumbai to address the members.

The event kicked off with a panel discussion on “Road to

akri IT Solution, in association with ESET, has rewarded its key partners with 4 night and 5 days trip to Switzerland and Bangkok. The trip was organized for the partners to celebrate their sales achievements, recognizing their support and outstanding sales contribution Q1 JFM 2017.

"We have always backed our channel network. We believe in rewarding partners who have

The trip to Bangkok was organized from 23rd – 27th June, 2017 along with 30 partners, whereas Switzerland trip was organized from 17th – 21st July, 2017 and had over 30 partners joining from pan India.

The trip to Bangkok and Switzerland was packed with lots of activities. Specially, the trip to Switzerland was packed with exciting activities that included a visit to Mount Titlis with inclusion such as

demonstrated strong performance.

Switzerland and Bangkok trip was reward to our key partners. The tour has helped to motivate partners and create strong bonding within our network. We are confident that it will help us achieve our set plans for the coming quarters," said Ravi Lakshman K, CEO, Sakri IT Solutions.

TITLIS Cliff Walk – 3,041 metres above sea level. 500 metres off the ground, rotating cable car ride to the highest viewpoint in central Switzerland, visit to the Rhine Falls, the largest plain waterfall in Europe, Orientation tour of Lucerne city, visit Drubba cuckoo watch outlet along with conference and Gala Dinner.

I

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August 2017

Successful IPO” where panellist Vinit Bolinjkar, Head, Equity Research, Ventura Securities Ltd; Ketan Patel, President and CEO of Creative Peripherals

and Distribution Ltd; and Nikit Rambhia, Joint Managing Director of Panache Digilife Ltd, discussed about the current IPO market and checklists, filing requirements, role of advisors, bankers and exchanges, IR specialists and the media.

"TAIT as the leading IT industry association in India always makes a consolidated effort helping every member streamline their business.

We leave no stone unturned to help members regarding any obstacles they are/ may be facing adapting the new tax regime," says Rushabh Shah, President, TAIT.

www.varindia.com

S

FACE TO FACE

IoT to revolutionize the future of technology – NXP Semiconductors NXP Semiconductors enables secure connections and infrastructure for a smarter world, advancing solutions that make lives easier, better and safer. As the world leader in secure connectivity solutions for embedded applications, NXP is driving innovation in the secure connected vehicle, end-to-end security & privacy and smart connected solutions markets. Built on more than 60 years of combined experience and expertise, the company has 31,000 employees in more than 33 countries and posted a revenue of $9.5 billion in 2016.

With roughly 2,000 engineers in India across Noida, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Pune, Noida is contributing majorly into automotive, networking application and the teams are looking to network applications for infrastructure, printers and routers. The Bengaluru and Hyderabad teams are focussing on software like security software and digital networking software and there are dedicated150 engineers in Bengaluru working for security and connectivity.

Can you brief us about NXP and its product portfolio?

NXP is recognized for the secure connection to the smarter world. Our product portfolio is broadly focussed into the automotive segments which are fast growing and the second one is into IoT devices for securing connections with the smart cards, credit cards, security terminals, which have to do with the security and connectivity on consumer devices. The third biggest unit is digital networking. It deals with wireless network or wired infrastructure, with our huge portfolio of microcontrollers and processors, one that we have obtained from the Motorola heritage on having acquired Freescale.

The last portfolio of product is the RF group, where we have huge demand of RF products.

“Automotive microcontrollers are talking about driverless cars. This is one area with the strongest portfolio going for us. And the latest chips that we are delivering in this area are radar and vision for enabling this autonomous driving.”

How has the technology ecosystem developed?

We have a diverse portfolio of customers in the automotive segment and our clients include Mercedes, BMW and other car makers. Our chips go into corporates like Continental, Dell, Bosch, Hitachi and they are our first-line customers.

We also secure credit card swap machines, since all these machines are supposed to be secured because you don’t know once you give your credit card where these data are going. So if this wireless interface is not secure, then there is the possibility that somebody can hack it. And, because of its robust security, most of the credit cards today have a chip. The recent innovation of 4+1 model has the interface security.

How do you see the future of IoT? 5-10 years down the line, IoT will be an integral part of our life. Now, we are getting so much dependent on Uber and Ola, which are probably at a very early stage of IoT adoption because with the click of a button the car comes to you within 5-10 minutes with the help of GPS. Also, I don’t need to make any transaction because the payment is made automatically from my Paytm card.

What is the acceptability of the

Sanjay Gupta Vice President & India Country Manager - NXP India

“Automotive microcontrollers are talking about driverless cars. This is one area with the strongest portfolio going for us. And the latest chips that we are delivering in this area are radar and vision for enabling this autonomous driving.”

IoT company in the country?

With the limited infrastructure, we are getting very strong and fast into IoT. In my view, there is going to be no stopping and I am very much convinced about it because when a revolution comes to help the real issues and easing problems from human lives, nobody can stop it. We have also micro medical devices where some of them are for future innovation. The devices can be implanted in your body, like you already have the pace-maker, which is an electronic device but we are waiting for the device through which we will be able to gather the key parameters of your body.

Secondly, for smart cities solutions we have applications including the metering things. SNC group has product lines which are dedicated to metering applications; we design those chips that have security inbuilt into them right at the centre. We have secured interfaces with the hardware security module and also have a software security which we call as embedded security /boot security.

What is the market share of NXP in India?

All our customers are global and by default

they are our local customers also, since the global customers are present in India also. That is one way of engagement where we are dealing directly and supplying at the local level. In addition, we have also Indian customers and, to name a few, they are TATA and Mahindra in the automotive sector where they are our direct customers but they are also global in nature. So we have truly become global from both the aspects.

Secondly, in the medical sector we have Blood Pressure (BP) machines and sugar measuring portable machines. We are also in the networking space which is a big area where the application goes into high-speed network infrastructure. So all the cell phone towers, which are installed by Motorola or Ericsson have base stations which have high-speed networking DSL routers in house. These towers have our chips for DSL connectivity between the base station to house.

Next are the printers from brands like HP. They have chips from us and these are global ones. Every phone has a sensor and most of the IoT devices come with sensors whether it is Fitbit which calculate how many calories you have burnt. So, there are many customers in sports which are tied with us. We have more than 5,000 clients – big and small. n

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VAR CORPORATE

Government Services Platform of CSDC could bring revolution to India Dan Mishra, Chairman – CSDC in an exclusive interview with VARINDIA talks about the talent pool in the country, on how it is meeting the global demand through adequate training & development and how CSDC as a global company is leveraging this talent to contribute to the global product market -

Vision to make India digital Having worked in the technology business for 47 years since 1970, I am very passionate about the opportunity and I know digitization is the only way to improve the economies and fortunes of all developing countries and their citizens.

Since I left India in 1969 for Canada, to get my post graduate education in computer science, I have been thinking of how Governments can improve the speed and quality of their services for the common man, having seen the painful experience of my father to receive his meagre pension on time.

Having experienced the long, and often times, failed attempts at developing effective computer solutions, it occurred to me that the weakest link was programming and the programmers due to their lack of focused serial thinking. Hence the quest is for minimizing, if not eliminating, programming required for business systems development. We first developed some smart governance software back in 1990s, i.e. 27 years ago in Canada which subsequently went viral in Canada and US. Over 300 governments and institutions use our software to deliver their services to citizens seamlessly and quickly. So I believe that it can also help India and all other developing countries.

India’s talent meeting global demand We certainly believe in it, otherwise we won’t have moved our research and development facilities to India in 2002. That was 15 years ago and since then all our research & development is based out of India. Our software Platform called AMANDA is completely made in India at 3 different centres -Bhubaneswar, Delhi and Chennai. We have very large team working in R&D facilities in India developing the product that sells globally.

Talents in India development centre They are incredible. They keep our products technologically most current. Every new technology is baked into our products whether it’s Mobile, Internet and Cloud Computing, IOT, Data Mining and Business Intelligence.

They are all built into our products and they are all being developed here. Customers do not need additional investments in software development.

So the talents are very good. This brings good economic value in the world market. Otherwise we wouldn’t be developing all our software here.

Currently, we are present in 16 different countries. That includes Canada, US, all the

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Caribbean countries, Africa, and India. We started offering our products in India only 2 years after we understood the real commitment to technology by the newly elected Government at the Centre.

economic development depends on good smart and quick response from the governments. If it takes me 2 years to get a building permit, it means the economy is held back a bit for 2 years.

So, faster the government services are rendered to the citizens I think the country will grow faster.”

Indian talent competing across the globe

Take on present government’s strong move towards digitization and reforms

It depends in which area. For example, say artificial intelligence I would say not yet. Not at the level of countries like US, Japan, Canada, and England as they are quite ahead. So is Switzerland, Germany that are very good in artificial Intelligence.

Offering right solution resulting in an inclusive growth Well the reason we started a sales team in India 2 years ago is that we believe that this technology may help Indian Government become more responsive, smart, and citizen focused very quickly. It should not take decades.

There are thousands of apps required to be developed at all levels of the Government.

The need of the day is automated Platforms to develop these apps quickly.

“We provide quicker and better services to the citizens because our product is designed for that. Without seamless and smart government the citizens will not improve their fortunes, whether it is farmers or whether it is professionals or the teachers they need good governance. Even

It’s wonderful. I have been personally dreaming about it for a long time. Even though I have lived in Canada for 47 years, I am an Indian at heart. I wish that our government could be as advanced as in the West. Now finally, under the new government it seems to be moving towards reality. Across all Governments, I see tremendous support and hunger for Digitization and seamless governance. Also their emphasis on made in India products is very gratifying.

Contributing expertise to the country We have developed a product to make Governments smarter and that too very quickly.

Usually developing smart computerized solutions takes time. The normal course of development - which is requirements gathering, specification, design, software development, testing and implementation takes considerable time and cost. Our product platform called AMANDA is configurable for all forms of Citizen Services

such as Permitting, Compliance of all sorts, Licensing, Request for Information, all kinds of Court Proceedings, Grants Management, Public health, Public Safety etc. It is a near zero code platform. This means you don’t have to get into extensive design and programming to develop an automated solution.You can go straight from requirement to the final solutionin a few weeks, not months and years.

How is Amanda interesting?

Originally it stood for Application Management and Meta Data Automation. All design and logic is meta data in AMANDA. Solutions can be built and maintained by simply changing data, not coding. Sustaining the solutions is also very quick and inexpensive.It is an interesting fact that most of our customers tell us, after working with AMANDA for a bit, that they can do anything with it. They have hardly any backlog. That’s what makes it most interesting. If your government, the minister, PM or senior management suddenly get an idea and you tell the IT department to implement it, with Amanda you can easily do it in days and sometimes even in hours, depending on how simple that particular request is. We feel gratified to seethat the IT people are not always burdened with never ending backlogs.

Why have you designed for the government segment and not for the corporate?

Government’s business is to serve the citizens, so we know they need the citizen’s profile and the services in general. In every country it’s the same - your name, address and few other attributes like Aadhar Card or Pan Card number. In Canada its SIN number, in US its SSN number etc. So the database scheme for a typical citizen profile is built in already. All variants of data is maintained by the Users of the system. All workflow and business rules are also maintained as variable user defined data.

All interfaces to external systems and devices are maintained as configurable web services.

The Platform automatically generates all User Interfaces which are also modifiable by changing data. The Database is automatically designed and optimized. So really, there is not much design and programming to do.

Every country we have been to is the same. Now the difference is easily configured usually within minutes. In corporate sector the dimensions are many more, so it is very difficult to model every possible thing in a very generic platform. So our platform is a government services platform.

Solutions offered by CSDC globally and benefit for India The governments of many countries have adopted it because of its speed of deployment, and they have the extra benefit that anytime you want to change anything, they can do it very quickly without involving the vendor all the time.

India definitely needs it because the governments in India can automate at every levels of Panchayat, State or Central, there are millions of applications they need to develop to

World Class Solution for e-court We have many countries using e- court solutions, using technology to maximize the effects on the citizens.

A very simple thing - a lawyer makes a motion to postpone a date; here both the parties go to court to take time of the judge and the judge hears the reasons for why they want to postpone and grants a new date.

This does not advance the resolution of the case and yet consumes a lot of resources and time. This happens a lot. My brother is a party to a minor civil case which has taken so far four years and eleven court dates without a resolution in sight.

Where they use our e-Court solution, the litigants and their lawyers don’t go to court.They use internet to make motions, online motion, and the judge usually has a pad and they see the motion and the evidence needed in digital form. The Judge takes immediate decision and both the lawyers are informed immediately about the new date. It saves the time and money of the citizens and court resources. provide better service to citizens. This is an ideal platform to do that quickly. Just the authority has to define what the processes are and they themselves can set it done. They can define the dependencies of the processes, the system automatically generates all the codes necessary to ensure the flow of processes, dependencies and the rules.

Global presence of CSDC We have presence in Canada, US and all the Caribbean countries, Africa, Great Britain, Australia and India. We have not entered China and the Arab countries yet. Our global turnover is about $100 million.

To add on, we have also few different business model for the developing countries particularly Africa where we provide our software and services for free as they find it difficult to obtain capital. We work on a PPP model. We implement the solution for them and then we train their people to sustain it under a long term technology agreement. It helps spread Indian Technology globally and it helps governments in developing countries provide good services to citizens. Otherwise it would be a catch 22 situation – no money to develop systems and no systems to generate money.

Complementing the vision of PM Modi on Zero defect and Zero effect Well that is what we are all about. Zero programming means zero defect. Less effort in systems development means to dedicate more resources for maximum effect. Also, our platform ensures complete validation of data and fully secured and authorized changes to data. This ensures accuracy of information and effectiveness of processes.

Departments that can take benefits from Amanda Well at all government services starting from Local Panchayat level to Central Government and any kind of citizens compliance, tax collection, any complaints for repairs to infrastructure and public health issues, public safety issues, speeding up of Courts and so on

can take benefits of these services. Same goes with the State and Centre level but has got to do more with licensing, building permits, traffic control, challans, rights to information, grants etc.

Its mind boggling and the opportunities are unlimited. Every time I am interacting with government agencies and I find that this can be improved and that should be improved. I don’t need to stand in a line, if I can do this online at my home, my office why should I be coming here wasting a day to apply for a permit or license, or to file a complaint. I don’t even know where to complain? I should be able to lodge a complaint from my smartphone. If there is a big pothole I should be able to take a picture and immediately send to the public works department so they can react to it. Thousands of ideas come to my mind every time I spend a day in India.

New initiatives of Dan into Investment banking ICAD is the Indo-Canadian Asset Development Bank in Dubai. It was originally funded by me, but there are many other people who have joined since. Its business is twofold, to help young technology companies to grow. Mostly they are sustainable operational companies, but are stymied due to lack of capital. We like to fund entrepreneurs with a vision of growth and social impact. We will fund both product and services companies. Product companies sometimes fail due to lack of funds because they cannot do marketing or upgrade the software to the latest technology. We can help them through that. Similarly, services companies cannot grow because of lack of working capital.

ICAD only invests in companies that make a big social impact. For example, 5 years ago we invested in a BPO company in India which not only has grown seven folds since, but also has trained fourteen thousand lower skilled people among the poorest segments of the population.

We also invest in Tourism and Hospital sectors in less developed areas of India, again to have a big social impact by creating many lower skilled jobs among people who are hard to employ. n

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CORPORATE EVENT

SonicWALL India Partner Summit 2017 – Awarding Excellence AWARD CATEGORIES

WINNERS

Emerging Partner of the Year for North & Eastern Region Emerging Partner of the Year for Western Region Emerging Partner of the Year for Southern Region Emerging Partner of the Year for Government Vertical Alliances Partner of the Year for North & Eastern Region Alliances Partner of the Year for Western Region Alliances Partner of the Year for Southern Region Star Performer Award Platinum Award in Pillars of Excellence Gold Award in Pillars of Excellence Silver Award in Pillars of Excellence Bronze Award in Pillars of Excellence

TC Infotech Pvt Ltd. Insight Business Machine Pvt Ltd Computer Waves XtraNet Technologies Pvt Ltd Arrow PC Networks Computer Technologies Pvt Ltd Digital Track Redington India Ltd Ecaps ITCG Solutions Network Tech Lab Pvt Ltd DM Systems Pvt Ltd

The SonicWALL India Partner Summit 2017 was a premier partner event that took place from Aug 10th – 12th in the beautiful island of Phuket, Thailand. The event, which was attended by more than 50 partners from all over India facilitated personalized interactions and networking opportunities between the valued partners and SonicWALL Executives.

The main agenda of the event was to celebrate the success of SonicWALL business in India. It was at this event that the partners who had made outstanding contributions were recognized and the gala awards dinner.

The past year has been extremely encouraging for SonicWALL India, having achieved lots of milestones and growing tremendously on all fronts. The SecureFirst partner program that was initially launched in US at the start of the year, and then in India last quarter was one of the many milestones from SonicWALL. Globally 16,000+ partners have registered for the program to date, out of which 4,300+ have been new partners.

The second is the launch of SonicWALL University, a sophisticated online education platform designed for SecureFirst Partners in order to help them keep abreast of cyber security threats and solutions.

Since the separation from Dell last year, SonicWALL has reclaimed its independence and strength as a key leader in network security, and partners are seeing the benefits from this, including the renewed focus, innovation and investment in the channel.

Scott McCrady VP - APJ, Sales & Global Strategic Partnerships, SonicWALL “The India market is important for SonicWALL for many reasons. It is a major economic power and it continues to innovate around information technology and for all this security is incredibly important. India is one of the fastest growing markets for SonicWALL globally and Asia Pacific Japan region. We do not see it slowing down anytime in near future and it will continue to grow.

India is an important market for us in terms of business, for instance we have got a very strong support center and R&D unit in Bengaluru; so outside of US, India is one of the few strategic markets for us. We have more than hundreds of people working in India, in the front & back-end offices and in the sales & marketing operations.

There is a massive innovation coming out of SonicWALL. There are a couple of key areas – one is advanced threats through FireWALL and the services that we can attach; so we have something called triple sandbox capability which is really very effective against advanced threats.

We are adding some more capabilities to it like e-mail because we know that phishing is still very rampant that continues to threaten victims. We also have massive security capabilities for the wireless environment and for secure mobile access which is the VPN capability."

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Debasish Mukherjee Country Manager India & SAARC, SonicWALL “We launched SecureFirst in May in India and we’ve seen an amazing uptake, with 400+ partners already registered.

SonicWALL being a 100% channel company, we are recognizing our partners from the channel community and have created tiers including Platinum, Gold and Silver. With this they have privileged access to different discounting models in which we can guide them with their business requirements. Within this same framework there is SonicWALL University which is basically designed to enable the channel partners. Here they get access to all the content they need to break the resource gap.

We are seeing new partner registrations coming in every day, so this demonstrates how well the program is being received and a huge interest in SonicWALL solutions. We have 3 national distributors – Redington, Texonic and Inflow Technologies. We are definitely working towards channel development and their enablement, which is also our global roadmap and the baseline of our business. If our channel is growing, we will grow and the product expansion is also part of that. We are equally addressing the threat landscape too, because if the bad guys are growing, we also have to enhance our products. So all these elements are in sync with each other and hence growing together.”

D K Bajaj, CEO – D M Systems Pvt Ltd “I have been associated with SonicWALL for more than 10 years now. That was the time when SonicWALL had entered the India market. The journey was fantastic; the only downtime however was when the Dell merger happened and the partners were going through a rough patch. But then very soon things started falling back in place again. Having worked with SonicWALL for so many years has doubled our confidence.”

Prasad Pimple, Technology Consultant - Network Techlab Pvt Ltd “We are associated with SonicWALL for more than 15 years now, right from the time it entered the India market.

We have a lot of customers where we have provided security solution at the perimeter gateway level using SonicWALL devices. It always feels good to interact with the SonicWALL leadership and get more insights about the company, of how SonicWALL is going to change the technology to adopt a new technology, acquisition of a new solution and integrating them with the existing product line and so on.”

Manish Shah, Director – ITCG Solutions “We have been associated with SonicWALL for 9 years plus, and this is the 10th year that we are working with them now. When we started in 2008, it was very initial days for us with SonicWALL in the security business. The business slowly started picking up after 2009 and ever since then there has been no looking back. ITCG is 100% into distribution business line and we have been associated with SonicWALL as its Platinum Partner. With SonicWALL, we are experiencing 15 – 20% YoY growth and we expect a good business coming out of this partnership in the security business domain.”

P Dinesh Kumar, Director – Ciscom Communications “We have been signed up with SonicWALL for more than 10 years now and are very happy to work with them. We have a company policy of not focusing on multiple products and catering only to a few product line at a time. So that ways we chose SonicWALL. The decision to work with SonicWALL was taken 10 years back but even today we see our business growing manifold with the company. We are happy to be a partner for SonicWALL and our journey will continue.”

Shakunt Malhotra, VP-Sales, Hitachi Systems Micro Clinic “We have been associated with SonicWALL even before it came to this country. So it is nearly 15 years now. The journey has been very fruitful for us. We have leveraged the security portfolio of SonicWALL and now provide endto-end solutions bundling SonicWALL security products to our customers. We sell the entire stack of products of SonicWALL and help pitch them in the verticals that we are mainly present in - corporate sector, government, PSU, BFSI and so on.”

Rajesh NS Bharadwaj, Director – Operations, M N World Enterprise “We as a prominent partner of SonicWALL has been associated with the brand for last 6 years, much before they merged with Dell. But we have been continuing this journey even after their separation. SonicWALL has got very good products in the market, which further helps us to pitch these products to our customers. It is always a pleasure pitching for SonicWALL for security and network security requirements of customers.”

Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

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LEAD STORY

Document Management Services in India is witnessing a tractionbut there are a lot of areas which are hindering the growth which needs to be addressed.

It is also true that digitization is pushing the this industry towards growth

I

ndia at present is moving towards adopting digitization in every phase of daily life. This new way of workflows is being adopted to make a citizen’s life easy with all the information easily available at the finger tip. This is also changing the age old method of working on piles of paper documents and files. And so in order to manage digital data, organizations are looking upto Document Management Services (DMS) as a secure and easy way of handling data.

DMS industry is showing a gradual upward movement for last few years. Many organizations are coming up and adopting DMS due to increasing volume of documents, data collection, and compliance. The factor that has really triggered the acceptance of DMS is the quality of managing data in unforeseen circumstances like during disaster management.

While talking about the acceptance of DMS, it can be said that the enterprise segment has been the frontrunner in implementing documentation management and automating their businesses by removing the paper based processes. On the other hand the Digital India initiative of Government of India is encouraging the government departments in automating their process. Not only this, the initiative is also boosting the citizens of the country to adopt digitalization.

“DMS industry can be divided into two ways, one is private sector where lot of enterprise is already looking at documentation management and how to automate their business process and remove redundant paper based processes. Second, the Government of India’s initiative, Digital India that is where digitization is helping a lot of government

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"Another major challenge which is hindering the growth of the segment is that a lot of organizations are still skeptical about cloud based services."

Kuldeep Malhotra Vice President (Sales Planning & Communication), Konica Minolta Business Solution. departments in automating their processes as well as helping citizens to create their digital footprint and it also remains with government as well. It helps them in identifying who you are as well as the pedigree behind you etc. The whole information gets captured.

DMS is actually automating your current ids, authentication documents and moving into typical digital format which the country or government can see it at any particular time.

Having said that it’s not only for government benefit, it’s also for private sector benefits. All the consumer centric organizations like banks, telecom companies, insurance companies need to use a lot of data and it means a lot of paper works is there or if paper work is not required there has to be the digital format of the documents,” views Ritesh Gandotra, Director – GDO Sales, Xerox.

Few factors that have acted as a catalyst in the promotion of DMS are effective operational process in businesses and cloud services platforms. Both the factors have transformed the way businesses operate.

“The latest trends engulfing the Document Management System (DMS) space have played a major role in streamlining the operation processes in businesses. The introduction of cloud services have also transformed the business processes significantly with platforms like SaaS, Paas and other web based services gaining rapid adoption. Citing this, the DMS market is expected to grow considerably in the coming years as enterprises cut operational costs and seek more scalability in India,” explains Kuldeep Malhotra Vice President (Sales Planning & Communication), Konica Minolta Business Solution.

In modern digital economy, digitization of data is a critical aspect and for a growing economy like India it is very important as the country still follows the inheritance of paper based documents. Data digitization is important for India as it enhances efficiency and data security.

“Data Digitzation is a crucial aspect of the modern, digital economy. For a country like India, with its vast legacy of paper

"In India, the opportunity of DMS in government sector is a lot. It is driven by government departments which are public facing will look at this as a growth area and it will happen" Ritesh Gandotra Director – GDO Sales, Xerox based documents across various sectors, data digitization assumes a critical role, both from an efficiency and data security point of view. HP is supporting both the government and private sector by helping digitize critical data such as identity records, land records, financial documents among others. Through our comprehensive portfolio of products and services, we not only protect sensitive data, but help streamline and automate processes while improving productivity,“ opines Leo Joseph, Senior Director, Enterprise Sales & Solutions, HP Inc. India.

Challenges No growing industry is devoid of challenges and so does the DMS industry in India. The major challenge that has been pointed out in this industry is that many organizations are way from the knowledge of the existence of DMS solutions. Organizations are not aware of the fact that DMS solutions can actually help them improve efficiency and leverage the power of data.

“Many enterprises are not fully aware of DMS solutions available in the market and however they can leverage information; improve efficiency and collaboration by implementing the right DMS. Some of the key challenges that prevail in the market includes risk management, problem solving, meeting customer expectations and increased competition. Besides, change management is also a huge challenge in adoption of DMS by many companies as implementation of DMS changes the traditional way of the organization to completely paperless office culture. We need to develop technology that is welldesigned, has integration and interoperability capabilities with customer’s environment and can be adapted by the users with a minimum friction,” highlights Yuki Uchida, VP & CMO,

Ricoh India.

With a similar view Kuldeep reiterates, “Lack of awareness regarding the benefits of DMS deployment comes as a major challenge for the industry. Another major challenge which is hindering the growth of the segment is that a lot of organizations are still skeptical about cloud based services. An absence of high speed, consistent connectivity also comes a significant challenge.”

Inefficiencies built-in organizations are a prime challenge in the DMS industry, and they need to realize those inefficiencies to remove it. Moreover, SMBs are the rising segment of entire nation and with the implementation of GST, they will definitely adopt automation for the smooth functioning of the organization.

Another major challenge which needs to be highlighted is existence of unorganized sector and it should be addressed.

“The challenges are many fold, lot of times organizations do not even know that inefficiencies are built-in. So the moment they start talking to organizations like us, the kind of discussion which will happen will open up their eyes. They will see that these are the inefficiencies which earlier they could not see and now when they see it they will definitely want to remove it. The challenges are hidden right now. The moment they start opening up, the information will reach out to them and they will start using it. It is happening in India a lot.SMB sector is definitely up for a boom.

They will definitely look at automation more specially with the new regime of GST where competition becomes much more stringent, so everyone needs to remove the inefficiencies which are there in systems.

Competition is multifold. There are a lot of unorganized sector which is there in India and we have to look at that as a challenge,” points out Ritesh.

Digitalization in India Digitalization is the new trend that has swayed the entire nation. It is being encouraged to create a digital environment so that services offered to the citizens become easy. Through the Digital Locker facility which comes under Digital India initiative, Government of India is boosting digitalization which will in turn help in the adoption of DMS. “Digital Locker is a true example of digitalization. The idea behind digitalization is to have a digital eco-system of services facilitating electronic URL based approach for submitting identity & certificate documents for availing any government service. This will help reduction of paper and paper driven drawbacks in government processes. It will directly & indirectly promote content management technology usage for generation, distribution and exchange of information among various systems and services. Moreover, various other Digital India initiatives including Mission mode projects like e-District, e-Vidhan, e-Courts, e-Secretariat etc. are also some of the driving factors for the proliferation of Document Management System (DMS) in government departments,” says Virender Jeet - Sr. VP Technology at Newgen Software.

Sharing a similar view Kuldeep says,

"Data Digitzation is a crucial aspect of the modern, digital economy. For a country like India, with its vast legacy of paper based documents across various sectors, data digitization assumes a critical role, both from an efficiency and data security point of view" Leo Joseph Senior Director, Enterprise Sales & Solutions, HP Inc. India “DigiLocker is a testimonial to the increasing digitization initiatives in the country which are aimed at offering last mile high speed connectivity to consumers. With services like DigiLocker, consumers can safely store their crucial documents in a digitised format and can retrieve them safely when required, eradicating the scenario of lost or stolen documents. We believe that many more such initiatives will be unveiled in the coming times as connectivity penetration soars in the country.”

The DigiLocker initiative is not only encouraging people and organizations to embrace digitalization but it is also creating opportunity for the private players to offer online lockers to people.

“Government initiatives like DigiLocker have pushed individuals and organizations to go digital, which is further fuelled by the tech-savvy workforce. Although DigiLocker is the service provided by the government, it has opened up avenues for private players in the market who are able to offer online lockers to people. DMS companies are competing against each other to provide superior customer experience and highly secure systems to customers to not only store that data, but ensure that it is easily accessible to them,” views Uchida.

The Digital India program is a cluster of initiatives under which services are offered to citizens. These services are designed to improve day to day life of commoners.

“Under the Digital India program, the government has introduced various initiatives including improving public internet access, DigiLocker, electronic delivery of services, e-governance, information for all etc. The

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LEAD STORY

"Many enterprises are not fully aware of DMS solutions available in the market and however they can leverage information; improve efficiency and collaboration by implementing the right DMS." Yuki Uchida VP & CMO, Ricoh India fundamental premise on which these initiatives rest, is that of removal of paper and physical documents, visibility to information, ease of process as a result of automation etc..

With DigiLocker, all kinds of government issued documents from PAN Cards, education certificates etc. can be stored in secure online locker, and also, seamlessly used for conducting various transactions that needs access to the documents stored in DigiLocker. With the launch of e-signature, all documents can potentially be digitally authenticated. It is not hard to imagine the immense benefits that this brings right from reduction of administrative overheads, to reducing the cycle time to the process. In addition, customers will find it extremely convenient to undertake transactions because of these initiatives. These initiatives have an unprecedented potential for the growth of DMS and Enterprise Content Management, since digitization and archiving of records is at the very heart of these initiatives,” explains Srividya Kannan, Founder, Director – Avaali Solutions.

Future Growth of DMS

It is true that in India, the use of paper and traditional method of storage are still followed among organizations but the country holds a high potential for automation of document retrieval. Organizations which are keen to streamline the processing of documents are shifting towards DMS. “In India, the use of paper and dependency on traditional methods of storage is quite high in government as well as large enterprises.

Therefore, we see huge growth opportunities in the country where there is an increased need for automation of document retrieval within enterprises. Document Management

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"It is important to note that the organizations that deal with significantly large amount of data and documents would have a requisite of document management solution" Virender Jeet Sr. VP Technology Newgen Software

Services (DMS) has become a key business priority for most of these organizations who seek to manage and streamline the processing of their documents across departments.

According to Research & Market analytics, the global market for DMS is expected to grow at a CAGR of 13.63% over the period of 2013-2018 and whereas in India there is constant growth of DMS by 20% year on year,” mentions Uchida.

Information management systems make work easy as it offers many advantages like cost reduction, improved effectiveness and shorter time for data queries, managing the integrity and reliability of data etc. So organizations which generates enormous amount of data and document will of course implement DMS into its system.

“Information management is quite the forthcoming trend in this ever evolving digital era. Information management systems dispense a plethora of advantages; cost reduction, improved effectiveness and shorter time for data queries. The systems provide an assurance of secure data, diminish possibilities of data loss and manage record versions.

It handles time consuming tasks like handling records in different formats in a joined method effortlessly. Furthermore, it manages the integrity and reliability of data, boosts service delivery and enhances business processes; an imminent requirement for businesses.

It is important to note that the organizations that deal with significantly large amount of data and documents would have a requisite of document management solution,” says Virender.

Xerox finds huge opportunity for DMS in government sector. Besides this, healthcare,

"The fundamental premise on which these initiatives like DigiLocker, e-governance etc rest, is that of removal of paper and physical documents, visibility to information, ease of process as a result of automation etc."

Srividya Kannan Founder, Director Avaali Solutions insurance, automobiles etc are few verticals which are keen to accept DMS into their work process.

“In India, the opportunity of DMS in government sector is a lot. It is driven by government departments which are public facing will look at this as a growth area and it will happen. Other than government, the PSUs or the judiciary, the way they would digitize their documents and automating their processes, they are recording the documents and files in digitized form. Overall, the country is moving towards the right direction.

Healthcare is another segment which is adopting DMS. We have patient records, patient safety and so much of data that gets generated when you start visiting doctors and unfortunately if someone gets admitted then much more data needs to be captured.

Hospitals are definitely looking at automating their processes.

Insurance, automobiles, supply chain segment are very keenly looking at digitization,” says optimistic Ritesh.

To Conclude…

Though DMS industry is moving steadily but it is true that there are a lot of areas which need to be taken care of. The prime concern of the industry is lack of awareness among people which needs to be addressed. Organizations need to understand their inefficiencies and realize the advantages of DMS. Digital India and GST is helping to improve the situation in the country as both the initiatives upholds the concept of digitization. So it can be fairly said that DMS is poised for a growth. n Aparna Mullick aparna@varindia.com

FACE TO FACE

Majority of businesses are not equipped to tackle newage threats – Dell EMC After the recent spate of cybercrime attacks, how is Dell EMC looking at protecting its customers from such unwanted incidents?

As per, EMC Data Protection Index 2016, 39% of the Indian firms surveyed have experienced data loss resulting in losses worth over $1 million. Theinternet consumption in India has seen a steep rise from being 238 million last year to 360 million in 2016, because of which Indian enterprises have been gaining a lot of exposure and attention globally. This exposure has put these firms at a risk emerging from various cyber threats due to old and vulnerable security solutions they have in place.

Also, looking at the global picture, the recent deluge incyber-attacks has generated the urge for data protection solution far more than ever.

Dell EMC’s data protection portfolio is a comprehensive portfolio which is equipped to deliver complete protection for enterprises of all sizes. No matter where data lives or what happens in the data center, Dell EMC offers the leading solutions to keep the data secured.

To fortify the data of our customers from any kind of unwanted threats, we offer wide range of data protection and security solutions for our customers. Integrated Data Protection Appliance (IDPA), Disaster Recovery solutions etc. are few of the solutions we provide to safeguard the data of our customers.

What kind of data protection and back-up solutions is Dell EMC offering at present?

Dell EMC has a holistic portfolio when it comes to data protection and security solutions.

Our enlarged portfolio serves as one-stop solution to safeguard data and keep organizations protected from hackers and cyber-attacks. Our solutions range from Integrated Data Protection Appliances to Isolated recovery solutions to Disaster Recovery solution.

• Integrated Data Protection Appliance (IDPA) is something we recently launched. IDPA is a purpose-built, pre-integrated and turnkey appliance that converges protection storage, software, search and analytics in a single appliance. It provides data protection across a wide ecosystem of applications and platforms, and offers native cloud-tiering for long-term retention. In short, IDPA is a holistic approach to data protection which enables customers to greatly simplify and lower their cost of overall data protection environment.

• Isolated Recovery Solution provides complete protection against attacks and safeguards the data. This creates isolated/backup

copies of the data & stores it in an environment which is totally detached from the primary data storage network. This helps organizations to be well prepared in the case of a cyber-attack.

• Disaster Recovery Solution (DR) is another solution which Dell EMC provides to protect the precious data of any organization in case of a cyber-attack. DR consists of a set of policies and procedures which helps in the recovery of important technology infrastructure and systems following a natural or humaninduced disaster.

What are some of the challenges that Indian businesses are dealing with in data protection?

When it comes to data protection, Indian businesses are mostly on point to protect themselves from the traditional cyber threats but majority of the businesses aren’t prepared to tackle the new-age threats. Therefore, due to emerging new threats, the data loss has become an increasing concern.

The primary challenge that Indian businesses face is to tackle the external or internal security breach, which causes data loss. Secondly, most of the enterprises have their IT environment in the public cloud but at the same time believe that their data isn’t completely safe. Another major obstacle which lies in the path of Indian businesses is that the lack of confidence to fully recover their systems or data in the event of data loss.

Are SMBs in India fully equipped against such security attacks?

SMBs have always been the soft targets of the cyber criminals as it is easy to escape the firewall of data in these companies. Almost half of the small scale business is affected to some extent by some degree by cybercrime.

Hence, it becomes an important measure for those businesses to survive in the market by overcoming these cyber-attacks. The most important step for such businesses is to migrate into cloud and provide authentication measures for their employees. A back-up for all the data becomes essential as well. India also faces a shortage of resources who expertise in cyber security skills which exposes these businesses into further risk.

SMEs are very important when it comes to Dell EMCs business perspectives as the main objective is to help them grow by transforming them digitally. Hence, Dell EMC provides a wavelength of data protection as well as security solutions for SMBs which range from Integrated Data Protection Solutions to Disaster Recovery Solutions.

Ripu Bajwa, Country Manager – Data Protection Solutions, India, Dell EMC in a conversation with VARINDIA gives the readers an idea about the company’s offerings in the data protection and back-up solution area and how as a security company does Dell MEC look at data security Best practices for CIOs & CISOs • Safeguarding data on mobility devices: Cyber criminals look to maximizing their profits through various mobile malwares as mobile devices are prone to cyber threats.

Generally people store most of their confidential and important data on their smartphones or any other mobility devices, which makes it even more essential to protect them from cyber-attacks. Hence, CIOs should take essential steps to ensure that they safeguard their data.

• Creating protection copies: In order to protect their business from data losses and to stay protected from threats like hacking and accidental data loss, it becomes essential for Indian CIOs and CISOs to create protection copies. Sometimes, those protection copies are at risk too as hackers may take them down as well.

Businesses can also leverage advanced data protection solutions and separate copies of their data from the network.

• Disaster Recovery plan: CIOs must also have a disaster recovery plan in place to ensure that the business can survive cyber-attacks and data loss.

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COVER STORY

Does GST mean more price burden on end products?

GST is believed to be the game changer in the long run, making systems more accountable and governance more open & transparent. With the GST era already here, the initial implications and hiccups are slowly beginning to be felt, but as vendors say, they are short lived and would not last long. But would not there be an impact on the pricing of goods? -

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he implementation of Goods and Services Tax (GST) is going to provide a big business opportunity for Indian IT companies. It comes at a time when the sector is going through some tough time with concerns regarding a slowdown in the global economy.

Industry experts believe that the opportunity that the GST rollout will give rise to will be somewhat similar to the Y2K problem in 2000 and will be worth USD 1 billion business opportunity. Another report says that the GST will present an Rs 6,000 crore opportunity for IT companies in the next couple of years, and later become an annuity business. Cloud-based service providers are also expected to gain from the huge storage requirements from both the state and the Centre.

Impact of GST on IT products...

Sanjeev Arora, Chief Executive – Digital Services, WeP Solutions puts it that the unveiling of GST law is anticipated to have profound effect on different sectors. The impact can be • monetary impact by way of higher

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Sunil Sharma Senior director, sales, Sophos India & SAARC or lower incidence of tax and consequential impact on demand • increased procedural compliance and • transformative impact.

“Much of the manufacturing and trading segments have to contend with either higher or

lower incidence of tax. Consequent impact on demand is anticipated in the short to medium term. On the positive side, the layer within the segment that was reluctant or hesitant to embrace Information Technology can no longer continue with intransigence. Many of the small scales units and medium scale retail units fall within this category. IT products that cater to this segment can look forward to happier times,” says Sanjeev.

He further adds, “GST law in its present shape has entrapped the services sector into a maze of procedural compliances. In the pre-GST era, firms operating in the services landscape could be registered centrally and operate seamlessly in India. This is set to change quite drastically. Firms are required to be registered in multiple States. So firms in this segment require IT products that help them to meet their increased procedural compliance requirements.

The third impact is quite transformative in certain sectors like for example a manufacturing company would no longer be required to have warehouses in different states. Rather, it can have a nodal warehouse either near its factory or its primary market and cater to the country wide requirement. One can look forward to

Tejas Goenka Executive Director Tally Solutions paradigm shift in the way firms operate their logistics. We need IT products that ease the pain of such radical changes,” points out Sanjeev.

Sunil Sharma, senior director, sales, Sophos India & SAARC on his part recounts that since GST has been implemented, there has not been any increase or decrease in demand or supply of IT security solutions at Sophos. “However, its implementation has facilitated simpler operation of business,” he says.

In terms of sale of IT products like Printers/Scanners/Barcode Scanners/Laptop/ Desktop/Hard Drives/SSD/External Hard drives, these are some of the products which are moving at a pace thus creating shortage but are again increasing the demand. “Desktop and various components like CPU, hard drive, RAM etc. are flying off the shelf since early July. This is predominantly because of either businessmen setting up GST PC or upgrading their old computers to suit the needs of the GST software,” says Rajesh Goenka, Vice President, Sales and Marketing, Rashi Peripherals.

However Tejas Goenka, Executive Director, Tally Solutions puts it that it is still early to draw a trend on how GST has impacted the movement of goods. “July was obviously better for businesses across the board compared to June but that has to be attributed to the slowdown in June because of the impending change. There was also destocking reported from many corners before GST came into effect and therefore the stark difference between pre and post GST time.”

But whatever be the case, the overall market and industry seen gaining from GST will be reflected shortly. The overall industry has seen a positive implication and verticals like FMCG, Pharma & Automobile are believed to be seeing an immediate upward movement which is very good for both the industry and economy.

“With the onset of GST, Marg has gained a fivefold increase in the sales of its software product because of its simplicity and availability in different geographic,” says Sudhir Singh, MD – Marg Compusoft.

The post GST implementation era...

GST is expected to fill the loopholes in the current system and boost the Indian economy.

This is being done by unifying the indirect taxes

Jyoti Prakash Gupta Managing Director – Resurgent India for all states throughout India. Tax compliance is bound to show a significant improvement while the size of the informal economy will reduce.

Opines Pinaki Samiron Dhara, Vice President – Savera Technology, “The tax rate under GST are set at 0%, 5%, 12%, 18% and 28% for various goods and services, and almost 50% of goods & services comes under 18% tax rate. As GST is a new terminology for India every organization must adapt this by timely submission of their purchase, sales expenses, and returning the file timely as per government deadline.”

Sunil says that their go to market approach remains the same as they continue to focus on delivering next generation IT security solutions to the mid-market enterprises and the channel that serves them. "Sophos will continue to prioritise its investment in technology and in consolidating its leadership position as

Pinaki Samiron Dhara Vice President Savera Technology the only security vendor with a balanced IT security portfolio spanning both end-user and network security. As the Group is committed to IT security, it believes it has an advantage over competitors who often seek to address disparate and unrelated areas of technology,” says Sunil.

“At ClearTax, our motto has always been

Archit Gupta Founder & CEO, ClearTax to help Indian businesses become GST-ready,” says Archit Gupta, Founder & CEO, ClearTax. “Since GST is a new tax policy, the first step was to spread awareness about the new taxes and their implications. Our experts have been conducting webinars and video tutorials since the GST Model Law was made public in order to help businesses understand the finer points of the new tax regime. We have live training on our software so that those who are new to an online mode of return filing and invoicing can also use the software with ease. ClearTax offers round-the-clock software support to all businesses, CAs and tax professionals in their chosen language so that they face no problems in transitioning to a digital economy.”

ClearTax has two products that are being used by businesses to become GSTcompliant. The first is the ClearTax GST Software which is a ready-to-use software for all GST requirements. ClearTax GST can help businesses with invoicing and billing, return filing, reconciliation and more. ClearTax GST Software is a cloud-based software that can be integrated with any existing accounting software. So, a user does not need to download the software - all they have to do is create an account and start invoicing and filing returns.

The GST software works on the principle of real-time invoice matching or reconciliation so that any discrepancies in data between the buyer and supplier can be flagged before the returns are filed. There are also offline utilities available to users like uploading invoices via excel, software training by experts, and a GST Billbook which can be used to generate GSTcompliant bills. The GST Billbook is available free of cost for all businesses that can be easily used by all tax professionals without the need for any manual exchange of data.

Apart from this, ClearTax has also created ClearTax GST Suvidha Kendras which function as help centers for anyone who has a GSTrelated query. The experts at these Suvidha Kendras help customers understand ClearTax software as well as explain the new laws to them. “We are currently offering our products - the GST BillBook and the GST Software for free for all businesses so that they can use these tools and become GST-complaint easily,” states Archit.

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Sudhir Singh MD Marg Compusoft EasemyGST is another venture of an IT company called Ginesys that is an ERP package for the retail customers. “When the GST was about to come in, we realized that the retail industry is facing a lot of challenges. So we developed our own ERP software for the retail industry. Even though we have come up with our own software, there are many other software which are available in the market. And so we tried to differentiate our product. In GST the main concern is invoice mismatching, and is an important compliance area of any GST software, where my supplier and purchaser invoices need to be matched together. We have found it from the research that there are 32 reasons through which 95% of invoice mismatching can be done. For any small entrepreneur, it would be very cumbersome if he has to check each and every invoice where this problem is happening.

So we tried to solve this problem through our solution,” says Jyoti Prakash Gupta, Managing Director – Resurgent India.

Every business needs to adapt to the dynamic socio-political environment it operates in. Filing GST is similar to filing ITR’s on periodic basis.

While, there are teething troubles, businesses would get used to it in due course of time.

SMEs especially need to adapt to the changed environment with a positive mindset. Any change is bound to throw up opportunities and the ones that are enterprising enough to capture them would flourish.

“GST can be made successful if entrepreneurs/businesses will be made comfortable with the concept and its best application. We have achieved this nicely. This approach and methodologies been appreciated by the entrepreneurs, trade associations as well as government officials,” opines Sudhir.

Marg ERP market approach is informative and educative. Most important aspect for businesses to adopt GST is proper information and implementation according to their business.

With more than 500 GST facilitation centers and around 5000 GST help desks across the nation, Marg has been a major help for many entrepreneurs in understanding the ease of GST adoption and help them opt the right solution while choosing an inventory and accounting software.

“We believe GST is a journey for all

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businesses in the country and we are committed to walking this journey with them,” Tejas. “Before GST came in, we spent considerable amount of time and effort in educating businesses across the board on the new law and how they will get impacted by it. This was backed up with forums like our blog, a mobile app on GST and more than 5000 events to spread awareness.

With GST getting implemented, we launched our GST ready software Tally.ERP 9 Release 6 which makes it very simple for businesses to record and maintain accurate GST ready invoices. Now with the return filing season coming in, we are enhancing our product to deliver accurate returns at the click of a button.

To enable smooth adoption of the product we are holding Tally camps and Kendras across the country where businesses can move to Tally easily. We are also working with the ICAI to enable CAs on technology so that their clients can benefit as well. As the laws and associated technologies evolve, we will support businesses so that they can easily adapt.”

Rashi Peripherals has also been in the forefront in launching various GST awareness

Rajesh Goenka Vice President, Sales and Marketing, Rashi Peripherals and need campaigns. “We have conducted various GST remote training programs, where we updated our partners to be ready with minimum specifications of components, which would enable them to make the PC GST ready. As a part of these campaigns, we did a 50 city road show covering over 1000 retailers and partners with a signage saying “GST PC AVAILABLE HERE”. This enabled SMBs and SMEs to have more comfort in going for the upgrade of GST PC. At the same time, Rashi Peripherals unleashed a campaign, where we educated various users on the basic minimum requirements of GST PC. This communication became a catalyst and users from SMBs and SMEs rushed to their suppliers to upgrade their PCs to suit GST needs,” explains Rajesh.

For Masters India, the idea for getting into GSP services is to start specializing as a company in the GST space, while it also saw a good opportunity to basically reach out to as many companies as possible. “There is this compliance requirement every business has to consider before migrating to the GST regime.

Sanjeev Arora Chief Executive – Digital Services, WeP Solutions Ltd We as a GSP would help companies and make their transition to GST easy and convenient,” says Nishank Goyal, CEO - Masters India.

The pricing policy under the GST regime...

Market intelligence says that there is going to be an increase in the pricing of the products and solutions post GST. But that claim is however refuted by many, saying that pricing of any product has got no relation with the levy of GST. Says Rajesh, “This is not true. In fact the prices have marginally moderated. There could be some spike due to the gap between demand and supply at the channel level. Further, vendors along with distributors are running many GST promotional offers, which are making the offerings more aggressive.”

“As a matter of fact it has been the opposite at Sophos,” says Sunil. “With the implementation of GST we have been able to reduce prices up to 5%, the benefit of which has been passed on to the customer. Sophos’ commitment to support its customers and partners over the long-term confirms our commitment to deliver industry-leading, trusted, enterprise grade IT security solution.”

Sudhir too agrees that there is NO massive change in the prices of the products and whatever exists about increased prices is a myth. “Yes, we do agree services have been felt become expensive however it’s temporary implication as in longer terms that will add up to lots of comfort and ease to entire service chain. The biggest is that there will be a single tax without the cascading effect of multiple taxes so we can say that only value addition is taxed at each point.”

As per Pinaki, not all products and services price has increased, but the products has been classified under categories and the GST is applicable as per product classification whether its IT, Aviation, Transportation, FMCG. “In short basic things price has been decreased with low taxation structure and lifestyle category under High taxation structure.”

Tejas cites that there have been different kinds of changes. Services have generally seen

Yogesh B. Dutta COO C P Plus an increase and so have products whose rates have increased from what they were in the previous regime. “However, there have been quite a few goods for which the new GST rates are lower than what they were earlier and therefore effective price for the end consumer has come down. Also, the fact that the ‘tax on tax’ has been done away with has also resulted in decrease in prices as seen prominently in the automobile sector. However, with potential of savings that businesses can make because of increased ability to claim input credit on various expenses is still not being realised by them and will require few more cycles. Once this starts happening, we anticipate prices to come down.”

It is also true that many businesses have had to shell out money in order to achieve compliance. GST requires every business to have access to the internet, and file returns online.

The paper-and-en economy is undergoing a transformation, and it comes at a cost. However, this is a one-time investment and not a recurring cost. Also, those businesses which already have legacy software and ERPs in place will find that they do not need to buy new software for GST compliance.

Nevertheless, we are still in the early days to make definitive judgment on the pricing of the products. As Sanjeev says, that the downstream of value chain was not exposed to value added taxation till now and the downstream in due course of time will gain confidence on the availability of input tax credit and hence will be more willing to pass on the benefit of reduced incidence of tax. “Another reason for this impression gaining ground is the peculiar nature of IT products. Some IT products display features of entertainment industry, household consumer durables etc and have been subject to higher rate of GST. Dual use products are faced with clarity or rather lack of it with regard to rates of taxes and this is another reason for this impression,” he states.

And so…

The rollout of the Goods & Service Tax (GST) is a paradigm shift from the earlier tax system. The right approach would be to understand the concept of GST and its implication on a business because knowledge

Nishank Goyal CEO Masters India would help create the much needed faith in the policy and reform, eventually leading to positive returns.

“This is the first time such an initiative has been taken and implemented in such a short span of time. It’s a historic step, and we would like to congratulate the government of India for having achieved this milestone. The implementation of GST will mean simplified business for all. It will avoid the cascading effect of double taxation, increase transparency and boost the overall growth of the economy. It is believed that prices will reduce in due course of time and the resultant benefit will be passed on to the consumers accordingly,” sums up Yogesh B. Dutta, COO – C P Plus. n

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The Jio Impact: the rise of the 4G VoLTE Feature Phone market

The recent announcement of Jio to supply its new phone free of cost to users who are ready to deposit Rs 1,500 with the company for three years is seen as a big development in the telecom market. If this becomes a success, the tide of battle will turn from the present smartphone to the newly evolving VoLTE feature phone segment -

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he current Indian telecom market is going through a disruptive phase, brought in by the launch of Rs 1500 VoLTE Jio phone. So much so that the feature phone segment is now seen likely to contribute the majority of mobile phone shipments in 2017. The migration to smartphones is expected to further slow down due to the introduction of lowcost 4G feature phones and its continued relevance to its sizeable target consumer.

“It’s a welcome change in the Indian market, which will shift millions of 2G telecom network consumers to the highspeed 4G network. Also, the cheaper cost will habituate the Indian market for higher data consumption. While this will impact the players working under 30 USD product lines on short term, this will fuel the growth for smart phones and data consumption on the long term. Hence we see a big potential growth in the lower segment and Tier 2 to Tier 4 market,” says Ashwin Bhandari, CEO - iVOOMi India.

With this development, domestic handsets makers will surely launch LTE feature phones to counter Jio offering. “But

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“There is a segment of population that can be pulled out and can be taught to use a smartphone, but again the proper awareness should be there. Simply introducing an Rs 1500 phone is not sufficient. There is a multiplicity of factors in deciding of how soon the Indian populace will start adopting the smartphone or a 4G phone.”

Rajan S. Mathews Director General - COAI that is going to be an uphill task for them as Bills of Material (BOM) cost doesn’t allow them to compete with Jio at this point unless subsidized. To bring the cost down they might tie up with other operators going forward and bundle the data with 4G feature phones. Alternatively they can be an EMS to the operators launching their LTE feature phones,” says Karn Chauhan,

Research Analyst - Mobile Devices & Ecosystems, Counterpoint Research.

Will 2017 be a challenging year then?

If not for all, but the year 2017 will be a tough year for handset vendors. Though many feel that the impact of this Jio phone launch on the smartphones market growth

Ashwin Bhandari CEO - iVOOMi India

Gaurav Nigam Senior VP, Head of Product Lava International Limited

will be minimal as there are no features or specifications in the Jio phone that can actually impact the buying or sales of other smartphones.

an Rs 1500 phone is not enough. It is the combination of service quality, the coverage that would together be necessary for running a phone.

Like Ashwin who still sees a consistent growth in the Indian smartphone market.

“This market has seen the highest growth globally for past 2 years and is likely to continue with similar growth pattern. We see the market under 50 USD growing much faster, which will take the development in smartphone industry exponentially.”

“I was going through a survey analysis, which revealed that 30% of smartphone users are still not using 4G services. This is quite surprising, because while it is important to give them a device that can help them get into that category, it appears from the analysis that people are still not aware about it. Even if they have a device, either they are still not aware of how to use the browser or they are intimidated of using a smartphone. So yes there is a segment of population that can be pulled

Counterpoint also estimates the smartphone market to increase by 11% in CY 2017. This will be primarily driven by installed base of 3G smartphone users who are looking to upgrade to 4G smartphones in short term.

It is also true that in a country like India that faces constant power outrage and bandwidth issue, merely introducing

looking for a second phone and users buying phones (both smartphones and feature phones) between Rs. 1000 to Rs. 3000 and having a monthly expense of Rs. 100 on mobile services. Another important thing to keep in mind here is that the Jio Phone will be locked to the Jio network.

“Currently 5% of total smartphones are less than INR 3000 and primarily within smartphones only this segment will be competing with VoLTE feature phones. Smartphone players in sub INR 5000 are looking to launch affordable VoLTE smartphones with bundled data to compete with VoLTE feature phones.

Other strategies include trade-in in entry

“Domestic handsets makers will surely launch LTE feature phones to counter Jio offering. But that is going to be an uphill task for them as Bills of Material (BOM) cost doesn’t allow them to compete with Jio at this point unless subsidized.

To bring the cost down they might tie up with other operators going forward and bundle the data with 4G feature phones.”

However apart from the Jio effect, another setback for the smartphone category is the recent news of the IT Ministry asking 21 smartphone makers, majority of them being Chinese manufacturers, to share the procedures and processes they follow to fortify the security of data and Smartphones sold in India. This comes on the heel of the recent escalation in the number of security issues and data leakage reports, indicating that these smartphones might not be safe.

Imran Merchant - Product Head - Fox Mobiles however opines that in India, feature phone sales have always defied the pundits. Especially with the new category of 4G feature phones with WhatsApp/ browsing and streaming capabilities on the rise, the feature phone market growth is expected to continue strong. “By this we don’t mean that smartphone growth will plateau; it might slow down in the lower segments. In a way, these 4G feature phones are nothing but cheap smartphones without a touch screen, which we believe is not as bad as it sounds. Hence, the internet penetration is continuing.”

Imran Merchant Product Head - Fox Mobiles

Karn Chauhan Research Analyst - Mobile Devices & Ecosystems, Counterpoint Research out and can be taught to use a smartphone, but again the proper awareness should be there. Simply introducing an Rs 1500 phone is not sufficient. There is a multiplicity of factors in deciding of how soon the Indian populace will start adopting the smartphone or a 4G phone,” points out Rajan S. Mathews, Director General – COAI. But irrespective of what the industry says, the Jio Phone will indeed have an impact on the sale of feature phones, at least for the time being. Majority of customers that will be swayed are smartphone users

level smartphone segment to attract smartphone to smartphone upgrade which wasn’t happening earlier. Having said that we believe much of the VoLTE feature phone users will upgrade only from 2G feature phones. Additionally, people will have VoLTE feature phone as an additional device,” states Karn Chauhan, Research Analyst - Mobile Devices & Ecosystems, Counterpoint Research.

“We see the Jio Phone as something healthy for the mobile industry as it will empower and democratise the internet by making it available to the lowest rung of the market at a relatively low cost,” reiterates Imran. “Yes, Jio is selling the

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Manish Sharma President & CEO, Panasonic India & South Asia device at approx. Rs.300 below its cost price (Assuming the Rs.1500 “deposit” will for the most part not be claimed by the customer as the device will not last for as long as 36 months!). But, the real innovation that they have brought to the table is the low cost of internet and calling and their strategy to recover the cost of the phone from this.”

Counter strategy to beat the Jio impact...

“We expect to still be competitive with the Jio phone because we are confident that this increased awareness will only broaden the market, rather than choke it. We are already working on a number of models in a similar price bracket, and some even above it. One particular segment we are focusing on is our mini-series of phones which can fit in your wallet and they synchronise with your smartphone. We plan a 4G iteration of it with all the features of the Jio Phone.

These models will be contract-free and hence will give the customer more freedom to choose their operators,” says Imran.

“Also, knowing how Jio has worked in the past, their model is to disrupt a market and set a standard, then let the other manufacturers take over from there. We hope to capitalise on this as well. Many other brands have already embraced this fact and have a segment like this planned in their roadmaps, not to compete with the Jio Phone, but to benefit from it,” he further adds.

For a new entrant like Infinix that is just starting its journey in the India market, it does not sense any competition as because they are talking to a different set of customer altogether. The company is eyeing a 10 per cent share as its initial plans. “We are already in the end of 2017 and one of the key things as Transsion or as Infinix understands is that India is an emerging market and so we really want to invest here and focus here because I think that’s where the growth is going to come from,” says Anish Kapoor, CEO - Infinix India.

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Anish Kapoor CEO - Infinix India

He further says, “I don’t think there is a competition at all, because we are talking to a different customer set altogether. 1500 Rs buyer is not our customer. We are talking to people who really want a different level of experience and so our Target audience is completely different and we are not really competing with Jio.” Lava that has a significant presence in the feature phone category has been aware of this upcoming disruption by Reliance in the market in the form of 4G enabled feature phones. “To ensure that we stay ahead of the curve, we started our journey of building a robust sales and distribution infrastructure focused towards selling differentiated and experience led products,” says Gaurav Nigam, Senior VP, Head of Product, Lava International Limited.

Lava launched its high experience smartphones led by the “Z” series of phones in March 2017, and have continually invested in R&D capability. “As a company, we have also invested in Area Sales Officers on Lava payrolls and will continue to hire these officers who will visit 1.5 Lakh LAVA retail outlets every month. We plan to take our Relationship Executives count up significantly, by end of this year. On the technology front, Lava now has the capability to track all handsets even at a retail outlet level. This facility will be used to ensure that no high ageing stocks are kept at any retail outlet. With our robust R&D capabilities, we had launched the Lava 4G Connect M1 which is India’s first 4G feature phone at an affordable price,” he says. iVoomi is similarly working on customised offerings for the first time smartphone users with buying power of less than 3500 Rs. One such offering was recently released with 22 regional languages and a complete smart phone as Me4 and many such offering are further lined up.

“We are looking to upgrade 4G/2G feature phone consumers with a smart phone at a small gap, as low as 500 Rs, the same can

Sanjeev Bhatia CEO – Zopo Mobile be launched in Q1 of 2018. We are waiting for the 4G feature phones to reach the consumer and get the ground level feedback on the features and expectations directly from the users. All that will help us make a better product that will be well accepted by the market,” explains Ashwin.

As a part of its plan, Zopo will also be launching some budget friendly low end 4G smartphones, and some very cost effective 2G feature phones. Reason being, even after Jio introduced the free 4G network, the number of 2G customers is more and acceptability of 2G Feature phone is still prominent and that will give the competitive edge.

“One of the major setbacks of it is that, for the Jio phone, Rs 1,500 cost is being taken from the customer, thus binding the customer for 3 years. We have a very focused plan and we will stick to it as we understand the need of the young generation of India, they want something new, something unique and innovative with loads of features and that is what will be our focus in the future,” says Sanjeev Bhatia, CEO – Zopo Mobile.

Reliance Jio feature phone also does not have any impact on Panasonic because Panasonic has phones in the 6k to 25k range.

“Now assume a scenario where a customer buys a smartphone. A Rs 6000 Smartphone user will never buy a feature phone. Secondly these phones will not have WhatsApp as a feature and India cannot run without WhatsApp. So as of now Panasonic doesn’t need any counter strategy,” says Manish Sharma, President & CEO - Panasonic India & South Asia.

This is however just the beginning though, as many more manufacturers are gearing up to launch 4G feature phones. Spreadtrum, whose chips are used in the new Reliance Jio handset, has also revealed that another 4-5 brands are in talks to launch similar feature phones powered by its chip. n Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

VAR PANCHAYAT

ISODA 2017 AGM announces new leadership besides streamlining its top priorities

The Infotech Software Dealers’ Association (ISODA) has recently concluded its Annual General meeting in Mumbai. This year, the Secretary and Treasurer continued their term, while the Vice-Chairman and Vice-President were elected unopposed. This was formally announced to all the members present at the gathering by the returning officer, Prashant Jain who presided over the session.

N.K. Mehta, Director, Secure Network Solutions was elected as Vice-Chairman and Gunasegharan Krishnan, Whole-Time Director, Ecaps Computers, as the Vice-President.

The Vice-Chairperson of the previous term, Tushar Parekh, Managing Director, Silicon Netsecure, became the chairperson this year.

Rajeev Mamidanna, Director, Technosprout Systems, became the President after being VicePresident last year.

In addition, Atul Modi, Director, Modi Infosol, was announced as the TechSummit 8 Chairperson and will be presenting to the community shortly on when and where will the marquee event take place. Since N.K. Mehta became Vice-Chairperson after vacating the Regional Secretary – South role, D. Kabilan, Founder Director, Cetas Information Technology, was announced to take over from Mehta as the RS - South.

The achievements of the previous team were presented. Some key achievements included a very successful TechSummit 7 at Vietnam, huge acceptance to ISODA Mouthpiece called Interconnect, addition of members across the country including newer states and cities and overall governance of working as a team.

After the elections and swearing in of the new MC, a very interesting session by ISODA’s Gold Sponsors followed. Gold Sponsor Udyog Software presented their solution to make GST automation a reality. The presentation and the demonstration of the software left everyone with a lot of interest. Dhruv Dua, ISODA’s tax consultant, later conducted a GST unplugged

session that was equally well received.

Day 2 continued to provide the members with more technology insights with sessions from sponsors XcellHoston on how to adopt Cloud Quickly and Enjay CRM on having CRM on the mobile for utility and ease.

The AGM concluded with a session by Leadership coach for independent business owners, senior executives and women leaders – Kavita Nath. She kept the audience very engaged with her session “I am ready to take off ”.

VARINDIA committed for the growth of VARs in the country The VARINDIA Brand Book featured more than 100 corporates and listed more than 1,000

partners. Interestingly, the websites of all the partners have also been linked to the website.

“VARINDIA is pleased to announce to the ISODA partners members that we will offer complete branding communication free of cost for a period of one year starting today,” announced Anil Kumar, Regional Manager (West), VARINDIA. He further added, “Secondly, the Brand Book is addressed to the B2C as well as the B2B segment. Your expertise could help the enterprises and customers in building a perfect connectivity. We had featured ISODA partners in VARINDIA through a dedicated section ISODA Corner. This is a small effort from VARINDIA to ISODA. Friends, VARINDIA is committed for an inclusive growth of the partner community.”

The New Managing Committee consists of – • Chairperson – Tushar Parekh, Managing Director, Silicon Netsecure • President – Rajeev Mamidanna, Director, Technosprout Systems • Vice-Chairperson – N.K. Mehta, Director, Secure Network Solutions • Vice-President – Gunasegharan Krishnan, Whole-time Director, Ecaps Computers • Secretary – Dnyanesh Kulkarni, Director, Deltakraft Solutions • Treasurer – Pankaj Goenka, Partner, Icons • Regional Secretary (West) – Vimesh Avlani, Proprietor, Graftronics • Regional Secretary (South) – D. Kabilan, Founder Director, Cetas Information Technology • Regional Secretary (North) – Kamal Gulati, Managing Director, ITS Technology Solution • Regional Secretary (East) – Manasi Saha, Managing Director, Macaws Infotech

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LEAD STORY

PC sales slump but vendors foresee a revival

While the Q2 report by Gartner asserts that the PC shipments dip further in the Asia/Pacific region, with the festive season round the corner and the successful roll-out of GDP, vendors have their hopes high that the market will revive very soon -

I

t is impossible to imagine one’s life without computers. Whether it’s in the educational sector, manufacturing sector or even the industrial sector per se, computers have become an integral part in everyone’s dayto-day life. PCs aid industries and businesses by making the workforce efficient and productive by saving loads of time. PC plays a key role in enabling data access and analysis in a secure setting. Many people count the PC as a key device for ICT, which is playing a main role in the development of the nation. Through the use of computers, the business growth in many industries is pretty evident. But as time passes and new gadgets and mobile devices with innovative form factor keep on getting introduced, the user interest keeps shifting from PCs to alternate devices as these are more manoeuvrable.

While on one hand, the advancements in technology and the advent of mobile devices is leading the world to more digitalisation, on the other side it is deeply affecting the PC industry sales too, as customers are diverting themselves more towards alternative computing devices like tablets and Smartphones.

As per the latest reports, the sale of PC shipments appears to be gradually declining from the past few years. As also suggested in the

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India remains one of the few markets in the world where the size of the PC market continues to grow.

Government’s digitization initiative will also help spread adoption of PC’s.

Vinay Sinha Head of Sales – India, Director – Commercial Business, AMD Asia Pacific-Japan (APJ) Mega Region

latest Q2 2017 report by Gartner, the decline marked the 11th straight quarter of year-overyear fall. According to the latest Q2 report by Gartner, worldwide PC shipment has been in the midst of a 5 year slump. The shipments in this quarter have been recorded the lowest quarter volume since 2007, which have been declining year over year.

On the other hand, as per IDC, PC shipment recorded its first growth in the last five quarter in its Q1 report. It states, “India Traditional PC Market Revives due to Strong Notebook Demand with 8.5% Growth YoY in Q1 2017”.

The pent up demand after the demonetization cooled down after the first quarter, coupled with the absence of a large tender deal compared to a year ago and higher PC prices, brought about weak market growth in the Indian context.

Although the two independent research firms present different figures, both the firms however indicate signs of improvements for the PC industry in context to the world. Where in countries like Germany and Russia, the PC shipments have shown signs of improvements, for the markets of India and the Asia/ pacific region, the shipment figures reveal plightful condition, affected by the market scenarios of these countries. The report thus says, “In Asia/

premium PC systems like the one powered by AMD’s Ryzen CPU’s. People are also spending on Gaming PC’s and convertible laptops.”

This however is the stats before the roll out of the GST reform. Furthermore, the latest GST tax reform and demonetisation scheme implemented by the Government is also considered as one of the factors that are going to impact the number of PC sales.

India has very diverse SME ecosystem and thus a one-size-fits-all GST solution does not work.

Pankaj Harjai Director – Small and Medium Business, Lenovo India

Pacific, PC shipments surpassed 21.5 million units in the second quarter of 2017, down 5.1 percent from the same period last year. The PC market in this region was primarily affected by market dynamics in India and China.”

The overall spending on the commercial PC segment however remained optimistic and the economic scenario had little impact on it.

It still shows great potential for growth, despite uncertainty surrounding the stability of the global economy. The overall commercial PC market recorded a shipment of 1.11 million units in the first quarter of 2017.

Commenting on the current situation of commercial PC sales, Vinay Sinha, Head of Sales – India, Director – Commercial Business, AMD Asia Pacific-Japan (APJ) Mega Region said, “India remains one of the few markets in the world where the size of the PC market continues to grow. The growth is coming from both consumer and commercial segments.

Growth in the commercial space is coming from state-owned manifesto deals Government’s digitization initiative will also help spread adoption of PC’s. State government sponsored laptop schemes are also an important method to provide laptops en-masse to students, who then become the first-generation PC users in their families and become future users. As a percentage, a vast majority of India still does not have ready access to broadband services, as the government continues its endeavour to enhance fiber deployment into Tier 3 &amp; 4 towns and cities, the PC penetration will improve significantly.”

He adds,” State governments are investing in computer systems under various schemes to enable the last mile computing access for programs and services under Digital India, apart from Digital Inclusion and furthering education. There is also a high demand for powerful PC systems in the BFSI space. On the consumer front, there is a growing demand for

Impact of GST on PC sale...

The impact of the new uniform tax regime is still dubious as it is yet not clear whether the impact on PC sale is positive or negative and hence it will be too early to comment anything.

Under the new GST regime however, the rate on PCs ( Laptop, Desktops, AIOs etc) has been fixed at 18 per cent, while the covering items (i.e. on accessories - printers, monitors), the tax rate is set to be charged at 28 per cent, which earlier was of 14 – 15 per cent.

Though the GST impact on sales of PCs since its inception have been seen as a major concern as 18 per cent tax slab under GST were expecting to hit the industry hard, still many vendors see this uniform tax regime as an opportunity to grow.

To this Vinay adds, “GST in itself provides a unique platform for unifying India by a single tax regime and structure. With distributors and partners not being forced to sit with inventory and stocks as they have paid VAT, ST, Octroi, etc., they are instead now focusing on doing what they do best, which is to take the technology out to the markets they participate in. In the enterprise space, OEMs and resellers would face difficulties in complying with a uniform price to quote across the country while faced with different tax structure. But with the coming of GST, the inherent inefficiency that used to be there in the system has now been addressed.”

Similar are the views of Chandrahas Panigrahi, CMO and Consumer Business Head, Acer India, who sees enormous potential in this segment. He discusses, “Post the implementation of GST, we have seen a huge opportunity for growth. Traders and business owners are bracing their IT infrastructure and adopting digitization. We expect a strong growth for computer segment. Our plug and play GST ready range of desktops, laptops and AIOs will help businesses to make transition simpler. We see this as a huge opportunity to assist small businesses and trades in adopting this change and growing with economy by utilizing technology at its best.”

Many PC vendors are also expecting that sales would fuel up after small businesses are buying computers as they need to comply with the GST norm. Also, the owners have started revitalizing their IT infrastructure to become more GST compliable through developing GST-enabled machines. As according to market Pundits, the demand for GST enabled systems will also lead to the growth of PC sales in India.

Hence, to become more GST compliant, companies are coming up with GST solutions to aid their business and channel partners.

Chandrahas reveals, “We have introduced a

I definitely believe that the PC market is reviving. Post the implementation of GST, we have seen a huge opportunity for growth, also we see the graph of PC sales going higher in the coming months.

Chandrahas Panigrahi CMO and Consumer Business Head, Acer India

one-stop GST solution- BizGuru along with Tally and CAIT. Under BizGuru we have a range of desktops, laptops and AIOs which will eliminate the barriers and make the transition and adoption of GST simple. The introduction of the new tax reform is drawing Indian businesses into the digital economy, which is further pushing the Digital India vision”.

To ease the effect of the GST implementation, Lenovo has also introduced a solution to fortify the impact. On this Pankaj Harjai, Director – Small and Medium Business, Lenovo India says, “Lenovo has always been a trusted provider of robust business computing devices. India has a very diverse SME ecosystem and thus a one-size-fits-all GST solution does not work. We have partnered with the best in the industry to provide a multitude of options for businesses to choose from. We are calling this solution the Lenovo GST advantage.”

And so...

Though vendors are positive of the GST impact on PC shipments, but one cannot ignore the revealed figures in the Q2 report by Gartner.

Things have changed rapidly in the past two months since the roll out of GST. Although, GST holds great promise for the PC industry, the latest Q2 report raise key concerns on the PC sales and the present situation of the PC Industry in India.

The only other hope is that of the impending festive season – when retailers and PC vendors gear up for the biggest quarter of the year. Very soon vendors would set to launch a few new models before the shopping season and retailers would look to clearing the old stocks by playing with heavy discounts and schemes with their inventories. While it is also true that the channel is taking some time to get adjusted to the new taxation system, but they are quickly trying to recover from it and spring back to action before the mega festive season starts. n www.varindia.com

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VAR forecast

IT Services:

Modest Growth

IT-BPM services market has shown modest growth due to technology disruption and Brexit Referendum The global IT-BPM market stood at $1.2 trillion in 2016 (excluding hardware). The year also saw a modest growth of 4 per cent , after a couple of years of flat growth. Growth was experienced in IT services thanks to cloud, BPM due to adoption of BPaaS and RPA, packaged software and global R&D. In 2016, global sourcing grew 1.7 times to reach $173-178 billion and India was the No 1 sourcing destination with a market share of 55 per cent.

The Indian IT-BPM industry has touched revenue of $143 billion in FY2016 and is projected to grow at at the rate of 8 percent in FY2017 to reach $154 billion. In addition, E-commerce will fetch $33 billion.

The Indian IT-BPM sector contributes around 49 per cent of total services export and contributes 7.7 per cent to India’s GDP. Overall, the Indian IT-BPM industry is estimated to employ nearly 3.9 million people an addition of 170,000 people over FY2016.

India’s IT-BPM industry is feeling the impact of the global slowdown and global political uncertainties as clients go slow on decision making and investment processes.

The industry comprises of 16,000+firms and over 4,750 start ups, making India the 3rd largest eco-system in the world.

TCS has seen broad-based growth across markets with all industry verticals in FY2016-17 except BFSI, retail and hi-tech growing in double digits. Among major markets, Europe grew in double digits (13.6%) and crossed $2 billion milestone in revenues followed by North America (7.6%) and UK (6.1%). Among growth markets, MEA (14.8%) and Latin America (14.1%) led the way while India grew at 10.1% and APAC at 5.7%.

In terms of division, Enterprise Solutions and Consulting crossed the $3 billion and Business Process Services crossed the $2 billion revenue milestones respectively. Driven by IoT and Industrial Internet solutions, Engineering services led the way with 17.4% growth during the year while Infrastructure Services grew at 16% followed by Assurance services with 12.5% growth and BPS with 10.4%.

In FY2016-17 digital revenues grew 29% due to accelerating adoption across industries as customers looked to transform their enterprises. TCS captured significant opportunities in cloud, automation, analytics and IoT with 16.7% of total revenues ($3 billion) coming from digital services.

One key Digital India initiative that was launched during the year was the Aadhaar Merchants Digital Payments platform to enable UID-

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biometric based transactions in retail outlets to help drive financial inclusion and bring digital payments at the bottom of the pyramid using an Aadhaar number and an Aadhaar-linked bank account.

Cognizant recorded revenue of $13.84 billion, up 8.6% from 2015.

The company has included Digital for the first time and includes projects that help clients create more engaging experiences by applying artificial intelligence and advanced analytics to build loyalty and drive revenue growth; automate and modernize core business processes through bots that augment human capabilities and simplify how business is conducted; and deploy secure, cloud-as-a-service models that enhance operational efficiencies.

Revenue associated with digital-oriented activities accounted for 23% of total Cognizant’s revenue in 2016 — growing well above the company average — and we are rapidly accelerating our digital initiatives moving ahead.

The company is making good progress in accelerating Cognizant’s shift to digital services and solutions to create value for clients and shareholders, positioning us well to achieve both our revenue and margin targets for this year.

In FY2016-17, Infosys focused on deepening its partnerships, investing in technology and expertise, and participating with clients and partners in the technical communities that drive value for clients.

Together with Salesforce, Infosys recently announced plans to create a new practice focused on building and providing implementation services for Salesforce’s Analytics Cloud applications. Infosys continued to help clients drive automation and innovation into the core of their businesses, through renewed services, new software and services, and culture of learning and education.

Wipro has announced its partnership with Harte Hanks to offer marketing technology services. As part of the multi-year engagement, Wipro will upgrade Harte Hank’s data analytics and applications platform, create a scalable operating model and simplify IT related processes for the company. Wipro has announced a new IoT-based solution for wind parks and wind turbine manufacturers, that leverages the Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) Windpark Manager 4.0. Wipro is delivering analytics-based insights for specific industries with the Data Discovery Platform, its newest big data analytics-as-a-service solution. Built with IBM BigInsights and IBM dashDB and developed on Bluemix, IBM’s

cloud platform, the solution accelerates insight-driven decision making through pre-built applications for specific industries, such as banking and financial services, retail, energy, education and manufacturing.

Wipro has recently unveiled a new logo. The new logo represents the way the company “connects the dots” for its clients: integrating deep technology and domain expertise, applying insights from across industries, and consistently delivering world-class integrated, end-toend capabilities and services. The logo also highlights Wipro’s strong technology heritage and reflects its capabilities for the future.

The styling of the brand mark gives it a sense of fluidity, resourcefulness, optimism and a connected world. The individual elements in the logo represent ideas, insights, technologies, industries and geographies. The expanding pattern symbolizes a boundless Wipro.

The four circles represent the Wipro Values, Employees, Clients & partners, and Communities. The blue of the word mark creates a sense of reliability and authority.

India's IT-BPM Services Market • India's IT-BPM Services has touched revenue of $143 billion in FY2016 • Industry is projected to grow at at the rate of 8 percent in FY2017 to reach $154 billion • E-commerce will fetch $33 billion • India's IT-BPM Services contributes around 49 percent of total services export and contributes 7.7 percent to India’s GDP • India's IT-BPM Services is estimated to employ nearly 3.9 million people an addition of 170,000 people over FY2016 • Digital revenue contributes between 22-29% of overall IT-BPN company's revenue • By 2020, India’s IT-BPM Services revenue is projected to reach $200-225 billion and between $350-400 billion by 2025

HCL Technologies has won broad–based business wins in next– generation integrated offerings – Next–Gen ITO, BEYONDigital and IoT WoRKS, reflecting investments in Internet of Things, digital technologies, cloud, automation and artificial intelligence. HCL has also solidifies its leadership in Internet of Things with best–in–class IoT frameworks, solutions and offerings as well as strengthening its IoT ecosystem play with the right partnerships.

In terms of verticals, public services leads growth followed by retail & CPG, life sciences & healthcare, manufacturing, telecommunications, media, publishing & entertainment and financial services. HCL Technologies has extended its IP partnership with IBM to define the future roadmaps for additional products in the areas of application security, B2B data transformation, testing automation and API/web service enablement for mainframes.

In FY2017, IT-BPM exports from India is expected to reach $117 billion, a 7.6 per cent growth over the previous year and an addition of $8.2 billion. On an average, all regions expected to see growth of 7.5 per cent. USA and Europe (including UK) account for 90 per cent share of exports. Emerging verticals including retail, healthcare, travel & transportation etc are expected to grow at nearly 8 per cent fastest than industry average. BFSI/hi-tech/telecom continue to be the mainstay with over 58 per cent share.

In FY2017, India’s domestic IT-BPM market is likely to grow 8.5 per cent year to year reach $38 billion (excluding E-commerce). IT services is the largest with close to 40.5 share, followed by hardware (around 37 per cent), software products (12.5 per cent) and BPM with 10 per cent share. IT services is to record the fastest growth of 11.4 per cent; demand for mobile apps, website development and consulting services (around customer experience, IoT, and analytics) are the key growth drivers. Software products is forecast to grow 10.4 per cent to $4.8 billion due to the ever growing demand for cloud based solutions, particularly from SMBs. Rapid digitisation and GST is expected to further catalyse growth. BPM is expected to $4 billion market with a 6 per cent y-o-y growth. The growing E-commerce market and demand from BFSI, retail, telecom industries as well as government’s Digital India’s initiatives are the key growth factors.

The Indian IT-BPM firms are focusing significant resources towards developing their digital capability by reorganising themselves to catch the digital opportunity. Adoption of digital technologies at the enterprise level is still at a nascent stage which will pick up in years to come. Once the digital revenue picks up we will see investment in social media, security and analytics.

By 2020 it is expected that India’s IT-BPM sector total revenue is projected to reach $200-225 billion and between $350-400 billion by 2025. Digital technologies will drive the sector and the revenue from these is likely to be 23 percent by 2020 and around 38 percent by 2025 so Indian providers should get ready for this opportunity by offering new digital solutions to clients. n

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VAR ANALYSIS

After Market Services: Moving Up Launch of 4G services by Indian telecom operators has led to increased demand of smartphones leading to market expansion of after market services in India The total ICT market is around Rs 250,000 crore in 2016 and if we take even 6 per cent for after market services, the total market for after market services comes around Rs 15,000 crore in 2016 and this is bound to grow in 2017 by around 20 per cent. Let’s look at some of the market which has an impact on after market services.

The India PC market for 2016 stood at 8.58 million units i.e. a year on year drop of 15.2 per cent over 2015. The total market for PC is around Rs. 12,800 crore. The external storage market in India is around 143,552 units in 2016. Enterprise initiative towards digital transformation, analytics, cloud, BI and datacenter consolidation are the key trend observed in Indian server market. The server market in India is around 143,552 units in 2016.

Enterprise initiative towards digital transformation, analytics, cloud, BI and datacenter consolidation are the key trend observed in Indian server market. The HCP (printer) market in India is more than 30 lakh units in 2016. The mobile phone market in India is worth Rs. 101,430 crore in 2016. Smartphone contributed a total of Rs. 90,877 crore and feature phone contributed a total of Rs. 10,553 crore. The telecom equipment market is worth Rs. 135,000 crore in 2016 thanks to 4G expansion by telecom operators. All this gives a cumulative figure of Rs 250,000 crore and after market services market is estimated at Rs 15,000 crore.

After Market Services Players There are many players in after market services - organised and unorganised. VARINDIA is documenting only the organised players.

Even global manufacturers are increasingly looking upon after market functions as a strategic line of business aimed at delivering differentiated customer rather than as a function of the product support organization.

Aftermarket services also lead to revenue increases with enhanced service capability, which accordingly translates to greater asset utilization. Better part availability and fill rates means increased parts or service sales in competitive situations. Studies have also shown that good service generates more customer loyalty than even product quality can.

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HCL claims to have world class customer service and support services which cover warranty, complaints and returns management as well as depot repair from return order to billing adjustment. The company also has solutions that help in tracking customer install base information to enable improved field service effectiveness and forecast and plan for service parts usage.

Access Frontline (AFL) service covers printing and imaging segments such as printers, scanners, point of sale (PoS) products, all-in-one printers and high end scanners. The company provides repair and service solutions for all popular brands of printers – right from entry level printers to premium segment integrated printers and scanners. AFL also handles bulk installations of printers and imaging equipment, across India and provides consumables support for both warranty and out of warranty cases.

AFL supports multiple product lines of more than 20+ principals or Original Equipment Manufacturers. OEMs face continuous challenges in the management of returns which adds to increased operational costs and customer dissatisfaction. AFL provides complete lifecycle services in the area of managing product returns – right from general Return Material Authorization (RMA), to comprehensive International RMA services.

AFL has premium centers for advanced component level repairs and Equal-to-New (ETN) refurbishment of whole unit and/or sub-assemblies of mobile devices. Over the years, we have developed expertise, trained requisite people, and streamlined processes that are needed to specialize in product repair/refurbishment for the Mobile handset industry. AFL’s warranty management services are delivered through our network of offices covering more than 600 locations within India.

AFL’s long standing relationship with consumer electronics vendors such as Seagate, Buffalo and KYE Genius, enables us to provide sophisticated services to end-customers. On the telecommunications front, AFL provides end to end support for mobile devices that includes mobile phones for principals such as Sony, InFocus, Zync, Viaan and Hyundai.

Redington (Ensure Services) has set up hardware support service

After Market Services Snapshot The India PC market for 2016 stood at 8.58 million units i.e. a year on year drop of 15.2 per cent over 2015. The total market for PC is around Rs. 12,800 crore The external storage market in India is around 143,552 units in 2016 The server market in India is around 143,552 units in 2016 The HCP (printer) market in India is more than 30 lakh units in 2016 The mobile phone market in India is worth Rs. 101,430 crore in 2016. Smartphone contributed a total of Rs. 90,877 crore and feature phone contributed a total of Rs. 10,553 crore The telecom equipment market is worth Rs. 135,000 crore in 2016 thanks to 4G expansion by telecom operators All this gives a cumulative figure of Rs 250,000 crore and after market services market is estimated at Rs. 15,000 crore

centres, spanning the length and breadth of India. Today, through 77 owned service centres, supported by a certified franchisee network of 266 service partners, Redington provides the full spectrum of warranty and post-warranty services on behalf of vendors – covering solution design and consulting, technical helpdesk, field engineering support, parts warehousing, forward and reverse logistics, imports and re-exports, and asset recovery. Redington is authorized partners for leading brands like Hewlett Packard, Toshiba, Lenovo, Fujitsu, Apple, Motorola, Huawei, Microsoft, Ricoh, Logitech, Konica among others – several of them for a decade or more. iQor is a global provider of customer contact solutions and product support services. In Nov 2005, the company had announced plans to invest $200 million in building an expanded, pan- India service network to deliver world-class end-to-end aftermarket services. Currently the company, the largest aftermarket services provider in the world, operates depot repair/ refurbishment services at state-of-the-art facilities in Manesar (Gurgaon), Mumbai, Kolkata and Bangalore, and 104 company owned-company operated premium customer-branded walk-in centers and on-site services in 139 cities. iQor also operates a 1,000-seat contact center in the Delhi National Capital Region (NCR).

The expansion will create 20,000 new jobs in all of India’s 29 states. Part of the growth will come from the opening of two new repair depot hubs in Chennai and Hyderabad as well as new walk-in service centers along with on-site services for some of the world’s foremost manufacturers of smartphones, tablets, desktop computers, notebooks, digital players and consumer products. iQor provides global customer interaction and product support solutions in 18 countries. Our 40,000 employees solve our client’s most strategic problems. The company partners with many of the world’s best-known brands to deliver product and customer support solutions that span the consumer value chain, from customer care and receivables management to product diagnostics and repair services.

Aforeserve is an integrated service management and support company offering comprehensive and standardized life cycle services for the full spectrum of Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) products including notebooks, desktops and servers, computer peripherals, surge

protection and power conditioning units and mobility devices as well as for a range of non IT automated systems such as self-service kiosks, point of sale terminals, ATMs and satellite communication systems.

Established in the year 2000, Aforeserve operates primarily as an after sales service and support partner for Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) and Original Design Manufacturers (ODMs) and system integrators, providing functional and technological repair and maintenance services for their products. From installation, field and warranty support to on going help desk, carry-in repair and reverse logistics, Aforeserve delivers ISO 9001 standard, ‘end to end’ service solutions, designed to fulfill and enhance service level commitments, enabling partners to better serve their customers in an efficient and cost effective manner.

Aforeserve has successfully established itself as a service partner for HP Inc., Acer, Toshiba, Inventec, Micro Star International (MSi), NCR and Hughes India. Headquartered at Noida, the company works closely with customers to implement tailored service solutions through an extensive, pan India support network of service centers in 45 major cities and resident engineers across 182 regional towns. Supported by a team of over 2,600 engineers, technicians and service executives, Aforeserve handles more than 55,000 service calls every month.

Reliance resQ is multi-product, multi-brand electronics and home appliances service provide. Reliance resQ service centres are authorized service centres for leading brands, Apple products are only serviced by Apple Certified resQ service engineers available at select resQ service centres.

TVS Electronics has built an infrastructure and laid the groundwork for effective and efficient service delivery. The company manages network of exclusive and multi brand outlets and repair factories ensures service touchpoint. The company services IT, telecom and security devices.

Over the last 18 years, inTarvo has developed the expertise, processes and people required to efficiently manage technology assets for companies across India. inTarvo Service Excellence Centers for advanced component level repairs & Equal-to-New (ETN) refurbishing whole unit and sub-assemblies of electronic products are located in 200 cities pan India. n publisher@varindia.com

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OPEN YOUR EYES

Amravati on the IT radar with the launch of TIER IV ‘Pi Amaravati’ Datacenter

Pi DATACENTERS has launched “Pi Amaravati” - a TIER IV Certified Data Center at Amaravati, Vijayawada, the capital of newly reorganized state of Andhra Pradesh. The datacenter was inaugurated in the presence of the Hon’ble Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, Shri Nara Chandrababu Naidu; IT Minister, Shri Nara Lokesh; Kalyan Muppaneni, Founder & CEO – Pi DATACENTERS and other top management and business leaders.

Pi Amravati is capable of delivering modular colocation and hosting services with a capacity of upto 5000 rack. It uses open stack virtualization framework to deliver the best-in-class computing, storage, and networking experience. Pi is also using its Enterprise Cloud Platform “Habour1”, an OpenStack based enterprise cloud on Software Defined Storage architecture, powered by Suse. Together SUSE and Pi DATACENTERS will collaborate to offer a complete spectrum of Cloud and Hosting services to customers in India.

Pi DATACENTERS has also entered into an MoU with close to 10 public and private enterprises that include names like PowerGrid, IRCTC, Mahindra & Mahindra Finance, Deutsche Bank, SAR Group, UNIBIC, Yaatra.com, Snap Bizz, Konsole Group, Acute and Net Spider.

Pi is coming up with 2 more datacenters in Kochi and Naya Raipur with an investment of 100-200 crores each. From its Series A round of funding, the total investment that has come to Amravati datacenter is around 154 crores, which will reach to another 600 crores in next 8 months from the Series B funding. The investor for the project is Epsilon Venture Partners. Epsilon will be actively involved in assisting with the building and growth of Pi. Nara Chandrababu Naidu, Chief Minister - Andhra Pradesh “The IT industry is moving very fast. I have been using Information Technology for the last 3 decades and I strongly believe that it brings transparency, accountability and helps in making speedy, real-time decision making.

In 1995, India saw the coming of the Internet and with its revolution the world has become a global village. I remember pleading with Bill Gates of Microsoft to start a development center in Hyderabad. Soon after Hyderabad became the first center to come up outside Seattle. 2 decades back, there were only 2 telecom companies in India – BSNL and VSNL. But the cell phone revolution that soon followed transformed the telecom industry."

J Satyanarayana, Chairperson - UIDAI “This datacenter is going to make a big difference for the state of Andhra Pradesh. In all the 13 districts of AP, there is no datacenter of this magnitude. There have been a number of challenges while building this datacenter, right from land, power, to water and bandwidth, but they all have been dealt with successfully.

For developing IT in the newly formed state, we had to start from a scratch. Since the state does not have its own datacenter, 100 racks have been reserved for the government in this datacenter.

Essentially, the e-Pragati project which is now picking up is going to be hosted from here.”

Kalyan Muppaneni, Founder & CEO – Pi DATACENTERS “Today the world has become very small, thanks to the advancement in technology and rise in data. The last 20 years has seen a big transformation in the way our lives have transformed. And the most fundamental to this is the data that has been integrated across enterprises, applications, systems, across governments, ecommerce, logistics, BFSI, banking, healthcare and so on. So this data touches every person in every walk of life. Data has become so important that according to Gartner, any company that looses data stands the chance of running out of business in next 3-5 years.”

Nara Lokesh, Cabinet Minister for Information Technology “Cyberabad which happened to be our 1st venture was a big success and we want to see a similar success with our next venture, which is Amravati. The coming up of a tier IV Pi datacenter is the beginning of that story.

After the bifurcation of a new state Telangana, Andhra Pradesh has become just like a startu p state with everything still in a start-up mode. As a new state we are looking at creating world class policies and the eco system to come up with more number of datacenters here. We plan to create a cloud hub with help of Artificial intelligence, analytics and eventually create thousands of jobs.”

Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

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Movers & Shakers

Rajiv Kumar becomes ViceChairman of Niti Aayog

Dr Rajiv Kumar has been appointed as ViceChairman of Niti Aayog. This announcement came after five days when the incumbent Arvind Panagariya announced that he will quit Niti Aayog to return to academics.

Dr Rajiv held the position of CEO of Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) and was Principal Economist, at Asian Development Bank, Manila, for almost a decade. He was an Economic Advisor in the Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance, and Senior Consultant at the Bureau of Costs and Prices. He was a member of the National Security Advisory Board between 2006 and 2008.

Besides government institutions and corporate groups, he is Chancellor at Pune’s Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, and a member of the Board of Governors of the Institute of Human Development, Delhi, and of Giri Institute of Development Studies, Lucknow.

Vivek Zhang resigns from CMO post of Vivo India

Cisco ropes in Sameer Garde as President, Cisco India and SAARC

Cisco has roped in Sameer Garde as President, India and SAARC operations. He has succeeded Dinesh Malkani. Sameer will take over the responsibilities from August 1, 2017.

Sameer will be responsible for top-level external engagement which includes government and industry associations.

Malkhani is leaving the company to pursue other opportunities, but he will be associated with the company as a strategic advisor till September 2017 to ensure a smooth and orderly transition.

The news report also reveals that, according to Sameer, Cisco’s focus in India is to maintain the pace and also to be the strategic partner for companies and government. He added that Cisco will continue focussing on India through investments in innovation, skills training and digital transformation. He also mentioned that the company is witnessing growth across service providers, bank and financial institutions and the government.

Citrix names Makarand Joshi as new Country Head for Indian Subcontinent

Vivek Zhang, Chief Marketing Officer, Vivo India, has stepped down from his role. It was also suggested in earlier reports that Vivo India is planning a major reshuffle of its India management. The latest move of the company has now finally been announced officially.

In his latest statement to a media channel, Zhang said, “I will not be able to comment on this development at this moment.” His next move is yet to be known. Sources reveal that he might get a new role in Vivo India.

While commenting on Vivo India’s planned reshuffle, a Vivo spokesperson said, “There are ongoing discussions about new management roles but nothing concrete has come up yet.”

Among the Chinese smartphone brands in India, Vivo has opted for a more aggressive stance. Be it the title sponsorship deal worth Rs.2,199 crore for IPL (for five years) or the Rs.300 crore sponsorship deal with Pro Kabaddi League, Vivo has pulled all stops to capture 18-per cent market share in just about two years.

Citrix has appointed Makarand Joshi as its area vice-president and country head for Citrix in the Indian subcontinent. As part of this role, he will be responsible for accelerating and transforming the business in the Indian subcontinent (India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Mauritius and Nepal), as well as building a robust partner ecosystem and driving sales revenue. Makarand joins Citrix with over 22 years of experience in various leadership roles that include building sales and partner networks across Asia.

Makarand will report to Stanimira Koleva, group vice-president of sales and services for the Asia-Pacific Japan region and will be responsible for growing Citrix’s business in enterprise and field sales, consulting services, technical pre-sales and the post-sales functions across the Indian subcontinent. He will also focus on nurturing the presence of Citrix in emerging areas of business geared towards contributing to the technology revolution, as well as the company’s foray in new areas.

Tushar Sighat to spearhead TeamF1 Networks

Vishal Sikka steps down as MD & CEO, Infosys

TeamF1 Networks Private Limited (TeamF1), a subsidiary of D-Link (India) Limited (D-Link), has appointed Tushar Sighat as its Chairman. With this, Sighat will now be at the realm of TeamF1 operations globally and direct the company towards success.

TeamF1 is a provider of networking and security software for embedded devices and is headquartered in Hyderabad. TeamF1 was acquired by D-Link As a seasoned professional in the IT domain, Tushar Sighat brings on board of TeamF1 Networks a vast experience of working closely with R&D and software segment. His wealth of knowledge and expertise will enable TeamF1 to explore potential business opportunities and devise go-to-market strategy, while he also continues to lead D-Link India.

The MD and CEO of Infosys, Dr Vishal Sikka has stepped down from his position with immediate effect. At its Board meeting held on August 18, 2017, the Board of Directors (the “Board”) of Infosys Limited (“Infosys” or the “Company”) accepted the notice of his resignation.

In his notice of resignation to the Board, Dr Sikka reiterated his belief in the great potential of Infosys, but cited among his reasons for leaving a continuous stream of distractions and disruptions over the recent months and quarters, increasingly personal and negative as of late, as preventing management's ability to accelerate the Company's transformation.

The Board thanks Dr Sikka for his outstanding leadership of the Company, and for his extraordinary contributions during a period of rapid evolution in this industry. The Board also appreciates Dr Sikka’s commitment to facilitate a smooth transition to new leadership fully equipped to lead Infosys forward in this new era in our industry and to ensure continuity in our service to our valued customers.

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Innovation, value for money and quality: Ethos of Videocon A

fter exiting the mobility business, Videocon was looking for a business opportunity which would be synergic with its existing business. At the same time, the business should not require any capex and has to be self-sustaining. Moreover, the major factor that has compelled the company to foray into the security and surveillance industry is the current market size and its potential.

“One of the key factors for us to foray into the security and surveillance industry was the current market size and the growth potential of the market. After exiting mobility business, we started looking at business opportunities which were synergic to our existing businesses, and at the same time did not require any capex, but were self-sustaining, i.e. profitable from the word go,” reveals Arvind Bali, CEO, Videocon Telecom.

Furthermore, the company started understanding the market dynamics as it undertook few projects which helped it to offer end-to-end security and surveillance projects.

“We started with undertaking basic projects for corporates, understood the market dynamics and slowly diversified into end-to-end security and surveillance projects for large enterprise and government sector. There was no looking back after that. We studied the overall market and decided to foray into CCTV camera with our own brand to capitalize on the opportunity.”

Brand Positioning

To better position itself in the market, Videocon will continue to follow its ethos and will offer innovative and high-quality products at a fair price to its customers. Moreover, the products and solutions offered by the company enhances the user experiences and the small value adds clearly differentiates the brand from other competitors.

“Videocon is a strong and trustworthy brand in consumer durables and appliances. The ethos of Videocon brand is ‘Innovation’, ‘value for money’ and ‘quality’. This is exactly what our brand positioning strategy will be. We will offer most up-to-date innovative and high-quality products to our customers’ at the most reasonable prices.”

Product and solution differentiation will be many, right from the quality of components being used the lens, IR, sensor and housing etc which ultimately enhances user experience in terms of picture quality and product durability; to the hosting of servers, where unlike other players, we will be hosting our servers for remote viewing in India itself instead of China. Then to small value adds, like remote control, wireless mouse etc which add to customer convenience, and other brands do not provide. Finally, all our products will come with 2 years warranty with support of over 1,000 authorized service centers across the country,” says Arvind.

Channels

Videocon will keep on stone unturned to take the products and solutions closer to the consumers, the company is not only depending on traditional retail distribution but will also engage with system integrators and online channel partners.

“In addition to the conventional channels of Retail Distribution, we will also be directly engaging with system integrators and online channels.

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A r v i nd B a l i C EO , V i d e o c o n Te l e c o m We are also planning to pilot door-to-door selling across the household segment in a few cities for direct and faster outreach.

“Among our priority markets we are targeting Delhi NCR, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata & Chennai and planned outreach across 14 states, including Punjab, Haryana, JK, HP, UP(W), UPE, Rajasthan, Gujarat, MPCG, Maharashtra, Karnataka, AP, West Bengal and North East,” reveals Arvind.

Smart City as an opportunity

Smart City project has been acting as a catalyst in the growth of security and surveillance industry. It will continue to flourish with the increasing number of smart city projects.

“The Smart city initiative is playing and will continue to play a very important role in the growth of this industry. All Smart City projects have Video Surveillance as a hygiene factor, in addition to other elements.

With more smart city projects rollout, the general awareness of Video surveillance is likely to grow further, and hence demand,” explains Arvind.

He further adds, “The current Indian security and surveillance market is approx. $1-billion market (Rs.6,600 crore). Of this approximately 55% market, i.e. approx Rs.3,650 crore pertains to video surveillance/CCTV. The CCTV market is projected to grow at a CAGR of 26% and reach Rs.9,150 crore by 2021, which is 2.5 times the current market size. The growth engine will be household and small commercials establishment segment (shops and offices), which is likely to grow from current market size of 550 crore to approx. 1,950 crore, i.e. three times by 2021.”

Revenue Target While discussing about the revenue target, Arvind discloses, “The total CCTV market in India in 2017-18 is expected to be approximately Rs.4,400 crore, of which the organized CCTV market will be approx. 65%, i.e. approx. Rs.2,850 crore. With a top-line revenue target of Rs.175 crore in FY 2017-18, we are targeting a market share of 6%.

By FY 2018-19, we are targeting a fair market share of 12%, and by FY 2020-21, we will be among the Top 3 players in the Industry.” n Aparna Mullick aparna@varindia.com

IOT: A major driver of SAAS and VSAAS Z

In a chat with VARINDIA, Pramoud Rao, Managing Director, Zicom discusses the opportunities, benefits and popularity of SAAS and VSAAS in India

icom has always been known for its electronic surveillance product and now as a pioneer of SAAS and VSAAS. The company introduces SAAS and VSAAS in India in the year 2013. These services are gaining grounds because they are convenient, cost-efficient, comfortable, also offers business analytics with intelligence etc. SAAS and VSAAS benefit the customers with faster ROI, facilitates digital transformation of business intelligence etc.

What are the opportunities for SAAS & VSAAS in India?

In 1995 ZICOM pioneered the concept of electronic surveillance in India. Two decades later it gives us immense pride to mention Zicom pioneered the concept of SAAS & VSAAS in India in 2013.

IOT (Internet of things) has been the biggest driver for the success of SAAS & VSAAS. It is estimated that by 2020 more than 50 billion devices will be connected. Obviously there will be a huge rub off in our local market. Our current estimate for the Indian market for SAAS in the current domain of security electronic is between Rs 250- Rs 300 crores and we believe this number could reach Rs 1500crores by 2020.

What are the benefits of

SaaS & VSaaS in the fast evolving security Industry?

One of the biggest benefits is customer gets a quicker ROI on investment. It helps to enable digital transformation of business intelligence and enabling organization to utilize security investment much more efficiently to drive large benefits. A case in point is the e-surveillance of ATM’s, earlier bank used to spend 30k-40k rupees on ATM security. Thanks to VSAAS this cost has been bought down to 3k-4k per month.

Why SaaS & VaasS concepts are gaining popularity?

Simply because it offers comfort and convenience, cost prevention, business analytics with intelligence, proactive deterrence information on the go on the mobility devices.

Last but not the least many VSAAS services are backed zero maintenance & zero management.

Are there SAAS security platform which can be easy plug & play?

Yes, at Zicom we have many services which are easy plug & play. Vehicle monitoring services, citizen safety App called ZIMAN. Our time & attendance platform on cloud are examples being created which can offer customers. IOT services are at extremely affordable prices.

CP PLUS Surveillance PoE Switches offer stability, efficiency and performance C

P PLUS has recently launched surveillance PoE switches.These switches are the latest addition to CP PLUS’ versatile range of products and solutions.

PoE switches have demonstrated a strong future trend in surveillance. There has been quite a few concerns from our surveillance partners about the quality and performance of switches. They were facing significant quality issues with the products in the market and as a result integration challenges followed. As a brand driven by the needs of the system integrators, the R&D team of CP PLUS worked on a solution around the challenges and the 24x7 heavy performance requirements to design surveillance PoE switches that offer stability, efficiency and performance.

CP PLUS surveillance PoE/ PoE+ switches have been designed keeping in mind the needs & challenges of video surveillance.

Considering video surveillance entails transmission of heavy network packets 24x7 and long distance communication, CP PLUS has introduced specially designed network

surveillance PoE switches that facilitate smooth deployment of video surveillance systems. In fact, some CP PLUS surveillance PoE switches offer advanced CCTV mode,

using which transmission distance can be boosted from 90m to 250m.

“The increasing adoption of the PoE technology for supplying electricity to powered devices owing to its advantages such as low cost of installation, high convenience, and reliability. At CP PLUS we want to ensure that we’re able to cater to all things surveillance under one roof by being a one-stop solution for all your surveillance needs,” says Yogesh B. Dutta.

CP PLUS surveillance PoE switches are IEEE 802.3 af/at compliant and offer a host of advantages, namely reduced cabling costs, reduced installation costs, and reduced points of failure. They also serve as an uplink port (Ethernet/ SFP) to service a backbone design.

Available in 9 variants, CP PLUS PoE switches meet a wide range of project requirements ranging from SOHO to enterprise solutions. These switches not only cater to security & surveillance, but also wireless access points, VoIP phones, etc.

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lephone believes in providing latest technology at affordable price In a chat with VARINDIA, Vinod Pandit, Business Head, lephone Technology talks about the growth which the brand has achieved within a year and also upholds the focus and future plans of the company “Within a short span of time, we have achieved the whole pan-India coverage by doing good volume and business. Our model ‘lephone W7’ has already created storm in the market and has been proven to be the most affordable 4G handset with the best-in-class quality and user experience. In feature phones, we already launched selfie camera phone last year. In our product bouquet, we do have slim product, metallic phones, and phone with fingerprint. All our smartphones are 4G VoLTE-enabled and 360 on the top of Android,” explains Vinod.

Indian handset market

India as a market is very dynamic and demanding. The customers of this market always look for value proposition. Not only this, the major population of the country being the youth, the demand of the customers is always for latest and innovative technology. Keeping the customer demands in mind, lephone will offer products according to the needs of the customers at the best price.

“The Indian mobile phone industry is very dynamic and people expect a combination of value-for-money and latest technology. We will be working to follow this concept and provide end-users, the products of their needs with the best price in the market,” says Vinod Pandit, Business Head, lephone Technology.

Brand Positioning

Though a new entrant in the Indian handset market, but within a year of its existence in the market the company has witnessed rapid growth and also has been able to attain it. It entered into the market with feature phones but soon it has ventured into the smartphone market. The smartphones received good response and are well accepted by the customers when it comes to quality of the product and price point. “lephone is a rapidly-growing brand in India and has achieved tremendous growth since the last year when they started its operation. Initially

Focus

started with feature phones, it entered into the smartphone market as well and has been well accepted by the Indian market in terms of its quality and price,” states Vinod.

Achievements

With seven feature phones and nine smartphones launched within a short period of time, the brand has been able to create a pan-India network with good volume and business. lephone’s W7 smartphone has proved to the most reasonably price 4G handset with superior quality and unique user experience.

The company has also come up with an array of feature enriched feature phones.

Service Support •

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• • •

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Having 425 third-party ASCs pan India, by the end of 2017, will have around 700+ ASCs, all ASCs are authorized for L3 level repair, we are providing all parts like PCBA, LCD, Child parts to all ASCs. All states having one dedicated Service Manager for handling Third-Party ASC and distributor, retailer satisfactions.

Having one Own L4 at Noida.

TAT – within 7 days all calls closed.

DOA – Policy - 7 days after activation or purchase, some rural areas we are giving 10# DOA replacement after activation and purchase.

Own Call Center at Noida.

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To make the latest technology available to every segment and also price should not be the barrier for people to accept technology, so lephone believes in offering quality product at an affordable price.

“For us, at lephone we always believe in providing the latest technology at a very affordable price so that each and every corner of India should not be stand apart from the latest technology only because of price,” believes Vinod.

Future Plans

A rapidly-growing brand, lephone started its business in the last fiscal but in the current year it is expecting to achieve over Rs.700crore revenue. It aims to improve customer’s everyday experience by improving features and for that it invests a good amount of money into the market research to remain updated about the market trends.

“In FY 2016-17, we initially start doing business in India but as of now if we talk about our revenue and growth we are expecting Rs.700-crore-plus by FY 2017-18.

We spend a lot of time doing the market research to know the trend of the market and what the user expectation from a device is.

Improving everyday life experience such as battery life, user experience, Dual SIM with dedicated SD slot (if memory is less than 32 GB), design, material quality, etc are the main things consumers do expect from a device,” reveals Vinod. n Aparna Mullick aparna@varindia.com

Lenovo unveils its Dual Camera and Micromax Stock Android supported K8 Note launches allIndia has primary and 5.0-megapixel new Canvas 1 Lenovo announced the secondary depth sensor.

launch of K8 Note, a new edition to its K Note series.

The 3GB+32 GB variant of K8 Note is priced at Rs.12,999, while the 4GB+64 GB variant will be available at Rs.13,999 exclusively on Amazon.

Being the first of its series to run on stock Android and offer dual cameras, the K8 Note comes in colour variants of Venom Black and Fine Gold. The smartphone packs a 4,000mAh battery and comes with a 15W Turbo Charger. The device runs on Android 7.1.1, powered with a 10-core processor and offers a dedicated memory card slot, Dolby(R) Atmos(R) sound. The K8 smartphone features a 13.0-megapixel selfie camera with a full light LED flash and a dual camera set-up comprises of a 13.0-megapixel

“We know that millennials expect nothing but the latest from their phones,” said Sudhin Mathur, Country Head, Lenovo Mobile Business Group, India. “Which is why the K8 Note comes packed with everything that our consumers would expect from a smartphone today – an eye-catching design, dual cameras, 10-core processor, great sound, and of course, the TheaterMax technology that is the hallmark of the Note series. It is also the reason why we have brought pure Android to the Note series, ensuring that the user gets total control over the device and their experience.”

The phone also features a bright 13.97cm (5.5”) full HD display protected

by Gorilla Glass and with sunlight visibility.

BlackBerry unveils KEYone Smartphone at Rs.39, 990

O

p t i e m u s Infracom, in an exclusive partnership with BlackBerry, has introduced BlackBerry KEYone smartphone in India, which will be available exclusively on Amazon India from August 8, 2017.

The phone features an

the keyboard spacebar.

The device comes with a metallic black frame and soft-touch textured back and features a 4.5-inch scratch-resistant display (1620x1080 resolution / 434 PPI 3:2 aspect ratio) with Corning Gorilla Glass 4.

T h e

8MP frontf a c i n g camera, 12MP auto-focus rear camera, 3,505mAh battery and runs on Android 7.1. It is equipped with a Smart Keyboard which responds to touch gestures and can also be programmed to launch up to 52 customizable shortcuts and a fingerprint sensor built directly into

smartphone is powered with a Snapdragon 625 2GHz Octacore processor and also comes with a 4GB RAM and 64GB ROM which can be expandable up to 2TB. In addition, the device also comes with pre-loaded with DTEK app for better security in the handset.

M

icromax has extended its Canvas series with the introduction of Canvas 1, which is targeted to disrupt the affordable smartphone segment.

Building on the unprecedented success of Canvas 2, Micromax always aims to give consumers an innovative device with a magnificent user experience, great specs and other desirable features. The new 4G Volte smartphone comes with compelling and graceful design which is equipped with an 8MP camera, smart keys and runs on Android Nougat (out of the box). It is also the first smartphone to come with a 100-day replacement promise on any hardware issue (which is a part of the 1-year product warranty).

Sporting a 2.5D HD in cell display, the device provides clearer and sharper images with high contrast ratio. It is one of the best sizes for one hand operation. Moreover, HD In-cell display of C1 decreases one-fourth of the normal screen thickness and provide high rate of penetration and a bright image even in the sunlight.

Canvas 1 comes with the latest Android Nougat with the best of multiwindow support with enhanced Doze Mode, new quick settings option and bundled notifications.

Powered by a MediaTek MT6737, Quad-core 1.3GHz Processor, the new Canvas 1 promises better quality graphics, seamless gaming and multitasking performance. With an expandable memory of 32 GB, the phone boats 2GB DDR3 RAM with large Capacity Rapid Access and has high density for compact storage and with 16GB ROM which means now an user can store more than 4K images and 2,000 songs plus 250 mins videos.

Panasonic expands its “Eluga series” with Eluga A3 and A3Pro

P

anasonic India has launched the power-packed Eluga A3 and A3Pro with the appointment of Bollywood

while the other Eluga A3 Pro comes with Full HD screen with Asahi Dragon Trial glass. Both the devices boast a 13MP camera

celebrity Taapsee Pannu as a new face of its smartphone business. The company has also unveiled its latest brand campaign “so much to do” for the new Eluga product series, allowing the user to do so much.

Panasonic A3 comes with 9.1mm lightweight devices and 5.2” HD display,

with LED flash and Phase Detection Auto Focus and 8MP front cameras superb selfies. Panasonic Eluga A3 and A3 Pro equipped with ARBO the virtual assistant are priced at Rs.11, 290 and Rs.12, 790, respectively.

Eluga A3 and A3 Pro will be available from 10th August, 2017 onwards.

LG unveils Q6 Smartphone at Rs.14, 990 on Amazon

L

G Electronics has launched a new entrant, LG Q6 under its new Q series in India. The phone is priced at Rs.14,990, which will be available exclusively on Amazon.

The smartphone LG Q6 runs on Android 7.0 Nougat, equipped with a 3,000mAh non-removable battery.

The device also features a 13MP Standard Angle rear camera and a 5MP Wide Angle Front camera which comes with an instant social share features. The smartphone is powered by a 16GB ROM and 2GB RAM of storage. Featuring an 18:9 wide screen, it also comes with an offer of a one-time free screen replacement within six months.

Amit Gujral, Chief Marketing Officer, LG Electronics India, said, “LG Q6 is a perfect example of

Usability and Aesthetics. It offers Full Vision Display (18:9) which happens to be the first in the industry at the price point it offers.

With the introduction of this new range, we have ensured that

consumers are able to enjoy the best of technology from the house of LG at price points that are well-suited to all of them."

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VAR MOBILITY

5G to transform the IoT ecosystem with new capabilities - Qualcomm 5G is beckoning to an era of intelligent and connected devices. It is said to evolve and upgrade the human experience and will spur innovation across many industries and provide a platform for emerging technologies to grow. Dhananjay Gore, Senior Director Engineering, Head of Qualcomm Research India throws more light on how Qualcomm is revolutionizing the connected world in terms of innovations in 5G The 5G ecosystem will focus on providing a lot more in terms of new experiences. In addition to faster and more reliable mobile broadband, the focus will be on delivering ubiquity, low latency and adaptability in all conditions for future users. 5G will spur innovation across many industries and provide a platform to emerging technologies such as the IoT to become an integral part of the ecosystem.

Qualcomm is leading the world to 5G. Its vision for 5G is a unifying connectivity fabric to connect new industries/devices, empower new services, utilize new spectrum bands/types and bring new levels of cost/energy efficiency.

“As we did with 3G and 4G, We are driving 5G NR (New Radio) from standardization to commercialization – contributing to 3GPP standard activities and collaborating with industry leaders on impactful 5G demonstrations/trials to prepare for commercial network launches.

We are leading the standardization of 5G NR in 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project) with key inventions such as a scalable OFDM numerology, a self-contained subframe, and new LDPC channel coding,” explains Dhananjay Gore, Senior Director Engineering, Head of Qualcomm Research India.

Qualcomm has recently announced its first 5G modem, the Snapdragon X50, which will enable 5G mmWave trials and early deployments. It has also developed best-in-class prototypes/testbeds in both mmWave and Sub-6 GHz to demonstrate and verify its innovative 5G designs, and to contribute to and drive 3GPP standardization of 5G NR. “At the same time, we are leading the evolution of 4G LTE to its full potential with LTE advancements such as unlicensed spectrum, narrowband IoT and more,” he says.

India as an R&D hub…

Qualcomm invests billions in R&D and takes significant risks to invent technologies that advance the mobile industry. As a result, its inventions fundamentally influence all aspects of mobile implementations and user experiences. Over the years, the role of Qualcomm in India has evolved from being a reliable execution engine for legacy products to being a centre of excellence for end-to-end product engineering from chip design to commercialization.

Qualcomm India is also contributing to cutting edge technology innovation in areas such as 4G, 5G and IOT. • India team’s primary focus is on solutions that support

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Qualcomm’s global initiatives. These include smartphones, networking products, as well as other adjacent/IoE markets (ie, automotive, small cells, wearables) • The teams work on wide range of projects in the area of wireless connectivity, Multimedia, CPU& GPU, as well as hardware and software architecture • Other focus areas include wide ranging projects covering virtualreality, satellite modem design and advanced camera R&D.

5G - a great enabler of IoT products…

5G is expected to bring new capabilities for the massive IoT with more efficient air interface & network design. It will enable mission-critical control of IoT services that deliver new levels of performance. 5G will spur innovation across many industries and provide a ubiquitous platform to the IoT to become an integral part of the ecosystem.

Qualcomm is uniquely positioned with its scale and expertise in connectivity and compute to invent and deliver the technologies needed in IoT. It is inventing and delivering at speed and scale, advanced connectivity (3G/4G LTE modem, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, RFFE, Position/Location etc.) and computing (CPU, GPU, DSP, Multimedia, computer vision, security, etc.) technologies for the IoT. “We are helping our customers commercialize their products faster and in a cost-effective manner by using our differentiated platforms in the areas of Smart Home, Wearables and Smart cities. These solutions offer the connectivity, interoperability; security and accessibility customers need to create innovative end products that provide more personalized services and new user experiences,” says Dhananjay.

Qualcomm continues to expand the capabilities of LTE to accelerate progress in IoT, including driving the new narrowband technologies, like eMTC (enhanced Machine Type Communication, often referred to as LTE-M) and NarrowBand-IoT, with Release 13 of the 3GPP standard towards commercialization.

When asked whether 5G will be a reality in India, Dhananjay says that it has great potential in India based on the opportunities in the mobile device market size (India is currently the second largest mobile market globally. A lot of early applications may be in the IoT space).

Given the rapid adoption of 4G in India, the market will not lag behind in adopting 5G and will be well synched with the global rollout. In addition, India has end-to-end hardware and software manufacturing capabilities that make it a unique supply base for IoT/IoE products.

“With the right support within the ecosystem and collaboration, there's no reason why India needs to be trail far behind in 5G,” sums up Dhananjay.

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August 2017

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RNI - NO 72399/1999

Reg. No: DL-SW-1/4030/15-17

Printing Date 18 & 19

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August 2017

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56 pages including cover

Date of Posting 20 & 21 every month