October 2016

Oracle unveils Its Next-Generation Cloud Strategy

Polycom completes acquisition of Siris Capital

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Fujitsu redefines its storage portfolio

Lenovo launches its latest range of Consumer Laptops

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44pg

Qualcomm files patent infringement complaint against Meizu

Q

ualcomm has filed a patent infringement complaint against Meizu in the United States, Germany and France. These actions include filing a complaint with the United States International Trade Commission (ITC), filing a patent infringement action in

Germany with the Mannheim Regional Court and initiating an infringementseizure action in France to obtain evidence for a possible future infringement action there.

Previously, in June 2016, it filed multiple actions against Meizu in China related to licensing terms and patent infringement.

Indian govt. IT spending to reach $7.2 bn

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he government in India is on pace to spend $7.2 billion on IT products and services in 2016, an increase of 2.4 percent over 2015, according to Gartner.

This forecast includes spending on internal services, software, IT services, data center, devices and telecom services.

Government comprises state and local governments and national government.

IT services (which includes consulting, software support, business process outsourcing, IT outsourcing, implementation, and hardware support) is expected to grow 9.3 percent in 2016 to reach $1.8 billion – with the business process outsourcing sub-segment growing 21 percent.

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HELLO INDIA

Internet of Things (IoT) devices ...Giving attackers a large number of entry points India is the most attractive market for all technology companies in the world. Companies like Facebook, Google, Uber and Amazon are vying with each other to double their footprint in India. The biggest attraction is the 1.4 billion population of India. Localization is said to be easier and cheaper in India and, secondly, corporate money can buy more market share.

There is no doubt that technology plays a pivotal role in the present-day business. The enterprise market is moving towards cloud computing, increasingly enabling users to access software and store files on the web. The enterprise market is the biggest space where every corporate wants to have its footprint, with a simple target as to how their applications could be used by businesses to automate the workflow.

Going forward, executives with their strong business and logical acumen have a bigger role to play in the coming days and for that purpose many corporates resort to headhunting for acquiring the best talent and market share.

However, the darker side of technology is its design vulnerabilities from the security perspective in all the IoT-enabled devices that invade the market from time to time. Just think if you hand over control of the connected devices in your home to someone you don’t trust and then imagine the worst they could do with that and consider whether you are okay with someone having that level of control. Regardless of how safe individual devices are or claim to be, new vulnerabilities emerge when hardware like electronic locks, thermostats, ovens, sprinklers, lights and motion sensors are networked and set up to be controlled remotely. These are the conveniences these systems offer and consumers are just interested in them. Botnet (also known as a zombie army) is an interconnected network of computers infected with malware without the user’s knowledge and controlled by cybercriminals. They are typically used to send spam emails, transmit viruses and engage in other acts of cybercrime and are the biggest online threats today.

The Government of India and the regulators have been very supportive of Digital India, Start-up India and Paperless Technology. With these, various government processes will be streamlined and integrated with data repositories. The government’s recent announcement to spend $7.2 billion on IT products and services in 2016, an increase of 2.4 per cent over 2015, includes spending on internal services, software, IT services, data centers, devices and telecom services. The good news is that spending on software will total $885 million in 2016, a 4.5-per cent increase compared to 2015.

India – the world’s fastest-growing start-up ecosystem – has really taken off and come on its own – driven by factors such as massive funding, consolidation activities, evolving technology and a burgeoning domestic market.

Finally, India has created a global brand to attract investments in every format that is Make in India.

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THE FUTURE YOU PLANNED FOR JUST BECAME THE PAST.

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GROWTH IS LIVE. Work, grow, and evolve as one. SAP S/4HANA® helps midsize companies automate and integrate business processes – live and in the moment. So all your functions and departments can grow together. Without falling behind. sap.com/India/live

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CONTENTS Website: www.varindia.com

Publisher: Deepak Kumar Sahu Editor: S Mohini Ratna Executive Editor: Dr. Vijay Anand Consulting Editor: Pravin Prashant Assistant Editor: Samrita Baruah Copy Editor: C. M. Dutta Sr. Correspondent: 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: M.S. Barani Door. No.8, Plot No.-837,89th Street, 13th Sector, K.K.Nagar, Chennai - 600 078 Mobile: 09444077065 E-mail: barani@varindia.com Hyderabad: Bureau office Branch Manager: Sunil Kumar B 383 HAL Colony, Balanagar HYDERBAD, Telengana - 500042 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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44pg FACE TO FACE 28|

29| 32| 40| 41| 42|

STMicroelectronics Driving the MEMS industry to Growth IoT to become a Reality in India very soon A combination of Channel & Direct Sales works for Seclore ‘GST is a Technology led Law with software as its interface’ Red Hat - The name to Reckon with in Open Source Personalized Printing will drive the Digital Printing market Compuage aims to achieve Rs.7, 000- Crore revenue and expand reach

EVENTS 34| 50|

GST, IOT was the Key discussion point at the 7th SIITF Taiwan Govt. invites potential Indian companies to participate at COMPUTEX 2017

VAR SECURITY 52|

Vivotek intends to transform Indian security ecosystem

VAR ANALYSIS 53|

Why spectrum auction was a failure?

VAR MOBILITY 54|

How Reliance Jio achieved 16 mn 4G subscribers in 26 days?

INDUSTRY EVENT 38|

COM-IT Expo 2016 takes Technology showcasing to new Heights

OPEN YOUR EYES 39|

Cisco looks up to India with renewed Business interests

COVER STORY 44|

Get Lucky this Festive Season!

REGULARS Round About

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Hot Bytes

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On the Ramp

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Voice N Data

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Channel Buzz

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Movers & Shakers

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The Transformation story starts to unfold for IBM Mukul Mathur, Vice-President, Global Business Partners and CSI - IBM India/South Asia discusses how embarking into cognitive computing has proved fruitful for IBM and the transformation phase it is going through with its partners is going to leapfrog it to new highs Cognitive computing is the ability to unlock the potential in all data - internal, external, structured, unstructured, voice, and visual - and make it work together. Fundamentally IBM embarked into cognitive computing and analytics as a new business area and it continues to make good progress both in terms of its offerings and partner engagement. These solutions are delivered on cloud, which is directed at building more capabilities and solutions across its business partner portfolio.

Today everything that IBM does is related to cognitive, and everything that it delivers is through the cloud based delivery model.

“We have the cognitive solutions extending all the way into Watson and it talks about how businesses can use cognitive capabilities to take smarter decisions. We also have analytics platform which is all about doing complete data management by looking at your structured and unstructured data and driving sense out of it even before going cognitive. We have an entire set of solution which is around building cloud capability or services, using cloud in an enterprise which focuses on transforming current app to a cloud based delivery model, managing cloud based infrastructure system and so on,” explains Mukul Mathur, Vice-President, Global Business Partners and CSI IBM India/South Asia.

Surrounding all these solutions, IBM also have a strong portfolio of security. Cyber security is one big area for IBM and it has built several assets or applications in it. It is working with a lot of partners and companies and is helping its clients move to the cloud with confidence. Solutions from IBM Security helps to manage and protect against risks associated with all models of cloud computing.

A Channel-led Transformation

There has been a significant change in the channel landscape of IBM from being pure resellers of products to business partners and are now taking different solution components and combining them together with services and expertise to provide end-to-end solution.

The fact that they are now looking at delivering outcome based solutions rather than just technology is the second dimension to it.

“The whole element is to bring in industry expertise and knowledge because clients are trying to understand of how these disruptive technologies work and leverage the knowledge that our business partners impart to them to get ahead of their competition. And this becomes bigger and faster as we go forward. We have been doing a lot of things and expect to do lot more. This is indeed an exciting place to be,” says Mukul.

IBM’s core set of partners who have been working for IBM have joined in the transformation journey that it has embarked upon. Over the past 2 years, IBM has gone through the discussion practically across its eco-system. “Good partnership is not about partnering in yesterday’s business; many of our partners have understood that the market keeps on changing and that we are trying to make a transformation. They have agreed to be a part of this transformation and accordingly move their clients along with them. Some of them have however opted out of the transformation because they did not feel they have the capability

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Mukul Mathur Vice-President, Global Business Partners and CSI IBM India/South Asia and the focus to join in it,” explains Mukul.

Since these are areas that require lot of domain knowledge and solution expertise, there have also been new players who have joined in with those expertise and which in most cases complement the existing partner base of IBM by working together. “In a world of infrastructure environment, there can be thousands of players who can come and work with you online. With the cloud evolving and with the ease of partnering in different areas, the number of partners we are working with today would go into thousands,” states Mukul.

Talking about Smart city, Mukul clarifies that IBM has been one of the many companies to have looked into the smarter planet as an area and it has built lot of assets and applications using structured and unstructured data along with our partners across the world. “I believe there is a huge opportunity and we are ready to work with partners in areas that they have worked in and make a difference in building a smarter city. We already have several engagements going on with many state governments. India has the advantage that it can leapfrog in the technology wave and bring more transparency, stability and predictability to the process. And plus we have a very good youth force too,” sums up Mukul. n Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

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CHANNEL CHIEF

Enterprise Distribution garners highest growth revenue for HCL Infosystems H

CL has positioned itself as the largest technology distribution company in the market with an effective pan-India presence and a wide array of multi-brand IT products. It also has a huge aftersales support network which enables its client organizations attain and sustain a competitive edge. All these factors have earned the company a revenue growth of 72 per cent year-on-year.

“HCL Infosystems has the largest Technology Distribution and Post-Sales Support Network in India. We provide our clients and channel partners with a unique combination of Choice of multibrand IT Products and Capability of world-class IT services. In terms of distribution strength, HCL Infosystems has an unparalleled reach with a network of almost 3,500 channel partners, including more than 800 deeply specialized enterprise distribution partners. Our panIndia network presence covers 15,000 cities and over 600 districts. In the last financial year, the Enterprise Distribution business recorded its highest-ever revenue growth of 72 per cent y-o-y. We are further expanding the enterprise product portfolio with the addition of leading international technology brands,” says Bimal Das, Joint President – Enterprise Products Distribution Business, HCL Infosystems Ltd. Partnerships HCL Infosystems has partnered with many leading brands in the IT industry and by strengthening the principal company’s enterprise presence it aspires to become their most trusted choice.

“HCL Enterprise Distribution has partnerships with the leading global brands across the Enterprise IT space. We aim to be recognized as the first and most trusted choice for Principals, by strengthening their enterprise presence through our extensive pan-India network of deeply specialized enterprise distribution," says Bimal.

Strengthening Partners With a pan-India partner network of 3,500, HCL has a strong partner base which enabled the company to provide better services to its clients. While helping its partners grow, it also assists them in pre-sales, sales process and post-sales stage.

“HCL Infosystems has a large network of 3,500 channel partners, which enhances the service experience of its consumers by providing a vast array of services available across the country. We have a dedicated and skilled team of business development managers to support our channel partners. In terms of pre-sales practice, we provide Mobility, Security and Device management. Our solution-based VAD structure extends support in all the stages of sales process. In the pre-sales stage, we offer Consultancy Services, end-to-end technical support for quotations, Presales & Sales Trainings and Joint Customer Meetings. In the Sales Process – Sales & physical deployment of IT technologies: Installation, Configuration, Optimization & Logistics. In the post-sales stage, we support our clients with Maintenance, Training, Technical seminars and after-sales support services,” explains Bimal.

Moreover, he also mentioned that customizable enterprise solutions give the company a competitive edge in the market.

“The development of customizable enterprise solutions make us a competent player in providing a vast range of services to the leading OEMs in the technology space,” adds Bimal.

Disruptive Technologies With the evolving technology landscape, the demands of the customers are also changing. To align itself with technology and customer demands, the company is investing in the emerging and disruptive technologies.

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Bimal Das Joint President – Enterprise Products Distribution Business HCL Infosystems “The increasing impact of technology enablement is resulting in rapid evolvement of client needs and expectations. HCL Infosystems is focussing and investing in emerging technologies such as Cloud, Mobility and IoT to serve as the technology Lifecycle Partner for Enterprises in today’s disruptive business scenario.

HCL Infosystems has made significant investments over the past few years into the cutting-edge offerings and capabilities around the emerging technologies services such as IoT capabilities, Security capabilities, mobility capabilities, Cloud capabilities, Mobility & Analytics space to stay ahead in the disruptive market scenario. Our global services business has started to generate significant high-margin sales pipeline in the emerging services space of infra-application integration, Cloud and IoT,” explains Bimal.

Growth Engines Enterprise business is among the growth drivers of HCL Infosystems and the investments made in this segment are reaping dividends for the company.

“HCL Infosystems has identified its Enterprise Business, comprising – Enterprise Product Distribution, Domestic Enterprise Services, Global Enterprise Services and Care Services – as the engine for its next level of growth.”

“The conscious focus and investments in the Enterprise Business are already yielding results; and the overall value proposition around Technology Lifecycle Partnership is seeing positive traction,” asserts Bimal.

To achieve the aim of being the preferred technology partner, HCL has framed a unique marketing strategy that utilizes the capabilities and assets of the company.

“HCL Infosystems has designed a new Go-to-Market called ‘Enterprise 360’ that effectively leverages our diverse capabilities and assets. Enterprise 360 synergizes our strengths across Services, Products and Solutions and is designed to fulfil our mission to be the preferred Technology Lifecycle Partner for our clients,” concludes Bimal. n Aparna Mullick aparna@varindia.com

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October 2016

13

ROUND ABOUT

Attitude of Gratitude A lurking doubt may haunt my esteemed readers as to what is the relevance of this subject in a column that is, more or less, dedicated to the information technology. A few may debate that the forthcoming Thanksgiving might have triggered my thought process. But being an India-born US citizen, I know how important a celebration is Thanksgiving to an ordinary US citizen. I like the pageantry and sentimental values attached to this great celebration. If there can be an alternative narration for Thanksgiving, I would venture to suggest that it should be renamed as a festival to celebrate Attitude of Gratitude.

Let me first try to align Thanksgiving with Attitude of Gratitude. I believe the emotional chord underlying both conundrums –Thanksgiving and Attitude of Gratitude – is the same. One can add spiritual dimension to the situation on the presumption that one who is endowed with divine disposition can only be thankful to the benefactors. I believe that presumption is erroneous.

Even an atheist or an agonist can be grateful to the benefactors. It is etched on their emotional faculties and not necessarily influenced by divinity.

Who have to be thanked for the great digital and other revolutions that we have achieved over millennia? My take is all our ancestors! That includes the primitive man who taught us to hunt with stones, how to make fire from two hard objects, how to clothe ourselves first from the bark of the trees and later using textiles. At every stage, there have been incremental innovations and the urge to accumulate pool of knowledge to be shared among the people and pass on to the progeny. The baton handing of knowledge and technologies from one generation to the other may seem to be a natural and seamless process happened through millennia. Yet, there is a design in that process of evolution.

The Darwinian process of evolution is not a cock-and- bull story but followed a predictable rhythm all through the human history. Every generation tried to pass on something new to the next and that process has continued since the birth of mankind and that will continue till the existence of the mankind.

To zero in on a single individual or a group of persons to be thanked would be a naïve approach since most of the technologies have been evolved and incrementally innovated to the present

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form. Even to believe that disruptive technologies have erupted from the blue is a misconception. Such disruptions to happen, there should be a critical mass of knowledge and possible array of applications. At best, such technologies can be short cut driven by the need and that way are not products of fundamental research but byproducts in some sense.

Every successive generation may find the contributions of the previous generation basic and even primitive.

What do we think about transistor radio or gramophone now? Many may view them as primitive, going by the configurations of modern gadgets. But they were breakthroughs in technological revolution that time.

Humanity might have progressed exponentially since then. The equations must have changed. The host might have turned into a predator. But the spirit of the celebrations is still there. Does it mean that the attitude of gratitude is a quintessential human virtue manifested and celebrated in different ways?

Every festival, across the world has a, more or less, similar story. Bihu celebrated in the eastern regions of the country, Baisakhi in the Northern India, Pongal in Tamil Nadu, Onam in Kerala or Durga Pooja in Bengal are believed to have common undercurrents – obeisance to the supreme, respect to the elders, worship of the mighty powers, who have bestowed blessings – and the list goes on.

It may have religious undertones to make them contextual and understandable to the ordinary folks. The fact that most of the festivals come after the harvest

season gives credence to the belief that they resonate attitude of gratitude.

That seems to be the basic instincts of human being, cutting across faiths, religions, cultures and races. The beauty is that they follow rhythmically and in a seamless manner.

Millennial history of civilizations is abound with contributions of unknown persons to add value to the knowledge.

History lists only such breakthrough innovations and discoveries and not people who had invented them. By and large, it is the contributions and not the people behind contributions who are being recognized and celebrated.

Only the profound names may be etched on to the history and the rest get buried into the vastness and depth of the knowledge that have accumulated.

Hundreds years from now, people may talk about the digital revolution of the 20th and 21st centuries that made the difference at that point of time. To expect people to talk about the people behind such breakthroughs is pinning too much hope on the progeny. The only recognizable thing at every point of history will be “change” and the dynamics surrounding it and not the change agents, who will become oblivious in the womb of history.

Then, to whom we should express our gratitude. To every human being who lived before us and to those who will live after us. For those who lived before us for creating a pool of knowledge for us to inherit and improve upon. For those who come after us for preserving the knowledge, making use of it and improving upon it.

Why Gandhi and Einstein are living through centuries? It could be on account of their right approach and righteous temperament to give back immensely not only to the society they lived but also to generations to come.

President Obama, in his autobiography, has explained how he got charged by the Gandhian philosophy. The philanthropic efforts of Bill Gates are borne out of the trusteeship concept propounded by Gandhi. Why to go so far, the new buzz word, corporate social responsibility (CSR), has its origin from the attitude of gratitude. It is an organized effort to give back to the society its due, which has helped them to grow and flourish.

That way, the Attitude of Gratitude has lived through millennia and will live through as long as the humanity exists.

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October 2016

15

HOT BYTES

Facebook and Google to cobuild PLCN submarine cable

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E SubCom, a TE Connectivity company, along with Facebook, Google and PLDC (Pacific Light Data Communication), has announced that they will co-build the Pacific Light Cable Network (PLCN).

PLCN is a 12,800 km transpacific submarine cable system that will provide the first direct undersea route between Hong Kong and Los Angeles, California (USA) with ultra-high capacity transmission Scheduled for commercial launch in the summer of 2018, PLCN will include

TE SubCom's C+L technology, a major step forward in available cable transmission capacity that effectively doubles the available bandwidth and capacity per fiber pair over a traditional C-band-only designed system. Once completed, PLCN will be the highest-capacity transpacific route.

"PLCN will be among the lowest-latency fiberoptic routes between Hong Kong and the US and the first to connect directly using ultra-highcapacity transmission," said Wei Junkang, Chairman, PLDC.

HDS accelerates digital transformation

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itachi Data S y s t e m s has announced three new ways to improve and accelerate digital transformation initiatives.

Current market offerings lack flexibility and choice for customers, " D i g i t a l transformation is the catalyst that promotes new types of innovation and creativity, improves

customer experience and reinvents the business model and business process. HDS is committed to providing effective and practical alternatives that can accelerate business transformation and break down the obstacles facing IT," said Devangi Patel, Vice-President, cloud goto-market, Hitachi Data Systems.

Tyco announces expansion of Connected Partner Program

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yco has announced expansion of its Connected Partner Program for third-party solutions to integrate

to its Software House, American Dynamics, Kantech and Illustra brands. By participating in the Connected Partner Program, technology partners are better able to create powerful solutions within the security marketplace because of their integration with

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October 2016

various Tyco Security Products platforms for access control, surveillance and video and event management.

As a qualifying partner in the Connected Partner Program, companies have private access to Tyco Security Products’ fullyequipped laboratories as well as contact with Tyco’s technical and engineering support professionals. Participants in the program maintain control over their own integrations to utilize software development kits (SDKs), application program interface (API) or through web services.

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Telit and Intel to Polycom completes collaborate for acquisition of Siris Capital has IoT Platforms Polycom announced

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elit has collaborated with Intel on a joint-architecture for multiple Intel IoT developer platforms for the Industrial Internet of Things.

The commercially available Intel IoT platform consists of end-to-end reference architectures and products with Telit deviceWISE edgeintelligence technology, which includes extensive device driver libraries and built-in Cloud-readiness – giving companies an instant onramp to the Industrial IoT. The collaboration between Telit and Intel provides far-reaching benefits for remote machine monitoring and control, production diagnostics and predictive maintenance across all markets and industries worldwide.

Canalys Channel Forum to be a game changer

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he Canalys Channels Forum, APAC is to be held from 25th – 27th October, 2016 in Macau. The theme for this year is ‘Digital First‘and is going to explore the opportunities and challenges facing the channel partners.

The event is conceptualized in a way to address the industry as a whole. The keynote sponsors have been already finalised and the names are HPE, Dell, EMC and Lenovo, while the premier sponsors are APC, Dropbox, The Distribution partners for the event are Avnet, Cadensworth, Comstor, Ingram Micro, Redington, VST ECS, Dicker Data, Ardent Networks, Innovix, Westcon and HCL Infosystems.

the completion of its acquisition by affiliates of Siris Capital Group, LLC (“Siris” or “Siris Capital”) in a transaction reflecting an equity value of approximately $2.0 billion in cash. Polycom’s stock will cease trading on the NASDAQ under the ticker symbol PLCM. “We are excited to be a part of Polycom’s next chapter as we jointly work to create sustainable, long-

term value for customers and partners,” said Daniel Moloney, Executive Partner, Siris Capital.

“Together with Mary and her team, we will enhance Polycom’s strategy to lead the market in audio, video and content collaboration solutions and continue to provide customers with the same high level of commitment, focus, innovation and support.”

Link Telecom to distribute Bitdefender Products

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n order to promote Bitdefender products in the Indian market more aggressively, BD Software Distribution (BD Soft), the Country Partner for Bitdefender in India, has appointed Link Telecom to distribute Bitdefender retail products in the Eastern, Southern and Western regions.

Zakir Hussain Rangwala, Director of BD Soft, said, “As we are committed to further extend and boost our channel network and

increase Bitdefender’s presence in the country, we have relied on Link Telecom as a trustful and very experienced partner that not only understands the channel and is able to maintain good practices and policies, but has also a very innovative approach to sales and great understanding of the products. Having such a strong partner will definitely help to move Bitdefender’srevolutionary security products in the Indian market.”

NEC’s Aadhaar biometrics surpasses one billion

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EC's Aadhaar biometrics identification system, which is the largest system of its kind in the world, has surpassed one billion this April. NEC provides a large-scale biometrics identification system that utilizes fingerprints, face images, and iris images for this national identification system.

NEC’s large-scale biometrics identification system uses three types of biometric information – fingerprints, face images, and iris images – to prevent people from being registered twice.

This system can handle more than one million registrations per day by

checking the registered biometric information for more than one billion people and comparing it to the biometric

information of people seeking to register.

“It is important to make sure that the same ID is not issued twice in order to maintain a highly reliable national identification system,” said Noritaka Taguma, General Manager, Transportation and City Infrastructure Division, NEC.

HOT BYTES

HCL Infotech digitizes paper ration cards

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CL Infotech has implemented electronic public distribution system (e-PDS). The e-PDS has been implemented as a

pilot project in Andaman & Nicobar Isles, wherein beneficiaries of the digital PDS will be issued smart ration cards covering entire South Andaman, excluding little Andaman.

The digitized process replaces existing paper ration cards with ‘Smart Ration Cards’ which

the beneficiary will carry along with their unique PIN for making transactions at the Fair Price Shops (FPSs).

Raj Malik, Chief Delivery Officer, HCL Infotech, commented, “HCL Infosystems is proud to partner with the Andaman & Nicobar Administration. This is an important step in ensuring greater transparency and efficiency in this critical public benefit area. This is yet another endeavour by HCL Infosystems to use ICT solutions for enabling better e-Governance.”

Persistent Foundation commits for a “Green Railway Station”

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he Government of India under Solar Mission has set a target of installing 20,000 MW of Solar Power by 2022. Responding to this, the Indian Railways has planned to base 10% of its electricity demand on green energy by 2020 and commission 1,000 MW of solar power capacity in the next five years.

Persistent Foundation also supports Solar Power Generation under their

Green Initiative.

Consistent with the Green Initiative of Indian Railways and Persistent Foundation, on 29th September, 2016, Persistent Foundation has signed an MoU with Secunderabad Division of Railways for Funding, Installation and Commissioning of a 225 kWp Solar Power Plant at Hyderabad Deccan (Nampally) Railway station.

SAP announces €2 Billion investment for IoT

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AP has announced investment plans of €2 billion over five years to help business and government entities benefit from the proliferation of sensors, smart devices and Big Data that are transforming business with the Internet of Things (IoT).

SAP plans to accelerate innovation in its IoT solution portfolio, increase sales and marketing, scale service, support and co-innovation, and grow its ecosystem of partners and start-ups in the IoT market, which is estimated to reach €250 billion by 2020.

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October 2016

“With billions of connected devices, we now have the potential to reshape society, economy and environment,” said Bill McDermott, CEO, SAP. “SAP HANA is the data platform we knew would unlock the Internet of Things. Today, SAP is making another bold investment to help our customers seize the benefits of live business.

Only SAP empowers businesses to innovate from the core to the edges to the network,” added McDermott.

www.varindia.com

SUSE teams up with ESDS

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USE has appointed Exuberant Support for Data Services (ESDS), a Nashik-based cloud hosting firm, as its first Indian Cloud Service Partner. SUSE is the first open-source company to sign up with an Indian cloud service provider to offer hosted services in the market. Both companies will collaborate to offer an extensive computing environment for enterprises to run their business-critical applications and workloads.

R a j a r s h i Bhattacharyya, Country Head, SUSE, India, says, "We are very excited to have an Indian cloud service provider to cater to our customer base in the local market. This is part of our efforts to encourage entrepreneurs in the country to build highly competitive products locally and support Make in India."

GoDaddy expands its hosting services

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oDaddy has expanded its hosting services with the launch of Cloud Servers and Cloud Applications for small businesses in India. The new offerings are designed to help the web developers to quickly build, test and scale cloud solutions for their SMB customers.

“The launch of Cloud Servers will enable India’s web developers with affordable and intuitive solutions to better serve their customers and grow their businesses. India presents a sizeable market for expanded hosting products such as Cloud Servers. Developers can save time and exceed their clients' expectations,” said Rajiv Sodhi, MD & VP, GoDaddy India & Australia.

Jharkhand appoints Tech Mahindra as a strategic technology partner

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ech Mahindra has been selected by the Government of Jharkhand as a strategic partner to help the state in its digital journey and employment generation through skill development.

A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to this effect was signed between the officials of Jharkhand Government and Tech Mahindra in the presence of State Chief Minister Raghubar Das and Ulhas N. Yargop, Director, Tech Mahindra.

Tech Mahindra will

work towards promoting technology adoption by the citizens in the state apart from helping build an ecosystem with

greater participation of industry players. The partnership also requires Tech Mahindra to work with the Government of Jharkhand to promote digital literacy and skill development working with various industry organizations.

Extreme Networks to acquire Zebra’s Wireless LAN Business

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xtreme Networks and Zebra Technologies have announced that Extreme Networks has agreed to acquire Zebra’s wireless LAN (WLAN) business in an all-cash transaction.

The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2016 (which is the second quarter of fiscal 2017), subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals.

“Combining Zebra’s WLAN technologies transportation and logistics, and hospitality customers with Extreme Networks’ wired and wireless capabilities, recognized as visionary in the Gartner Magic Quadrant, creates the industry’s number three WLAN enterprise campus powerhouse,” said Ed Meyercord, President & CEO of Extreme Networks.

Oracle unveils Its NextGeneration Cloud Strategy

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racle has unveiled its strategy for next-generation Softwareas-a-Service (SaaS) Cloud offerings that blend thirdparty data with real-time analytics and behavioural

customers to monetize their existing businesses and accelerate digital business. Success requires a large corpus of data, strong expertise in data science, massive compute

inputs to create Cloud Applications that adapt and learn.

R “Ray” Wang, principal analyst and CEO at Constellation Research, said, “Machine learning applications and analytics provide huge opportunities for

power, industry and domain expertise, and breadth of application solutions.

More importantly, machine learning techniques are here today and the ability to adapt on demand is what separates the hype from the reality.”

www.varindia.com

October 2016

19

ON THE RAMP

Citrix revolutionizes its NetScaler SD-WAN Platform

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itrix has enhanced its NetScaler SDWAN platform offering features to enhance reliable and secure application delivery combined with intelligent branch routing technology.

NetScaler SD-WAN is a comprehensive softwaredefined WAN solution that is easy to deploy and use in a single affordable appliance with integrated visibility and control.

The turnkey solution incorporates applicationaware virtualized WAN connectivity, dynamic routing, separate

routing domains, WAN optimization, end-to-end visibility, support for the newest Citrix HDX protocols and secure internet breakout. To simplify and reduce cost of deployments, Citrix is introducing a new level of affordability for enterprise branches through new appliance options and its new cloud-based, secure Zero Touch Deployment services.

HyperX brings “Gears of War” Gaming Headset

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yperX has announced its second official Xbox licensed gaming headset, CloudX Revolver Gears of War. The headset is codesigned with Microsoft and The Coalition, the studio developing Gears of War 4, featuring a gritty, battle-weathered design to complement the recently announced Xbox One S Gears of War 4 Limited Edition 2TB

Bundle and Xbox One Gears of War 4 Crimson Omen Limited Edition Wireless Controller, to offer the fans a complete gaming set up that shows their Gears pride.

“HyperX is excited to be working with Microsoft to offer gamers a headset that enhances their Gears of War gaming experience,” said Ann Bai, Sales Director, APAC Region, HyperX.

Lenovo launches its latest range of Consumer Laptops

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enovo has unveiled its latest lineup of laptops for the upcoming festive holiday season. The launch of this

portfolio is in sync with its global launch. The new series consists of lighter, faster and more powerful devices that combine technical prowess and striking design to redefine the computing experience. It further

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October 2016

strengthens Lenovo’s endeavour to offer innovative technology to its customers.

Amit Doshi, Head –

Consumer Marketing & Digital, Lenovo India, said, “Lenovo believes in listening to its consumers to create products that address evolving consumer tastes, and at times also leading them to new form factors.

www.varindia.com

Avaya Fujitsu redefines its announces Cloud storage portfolio ujitsu has Networking F introduced allflash storage systems.

Platform New ETERNUS AF all-

Avaya has announced a complete network lifecycle management solution for enterprise and mid-size businesses. The Avaya Cloud Networking Platform delivers a unified, powerful solution for deploying and managing wired and wireless networks.

“As the demand for unified access solutions continue to grow, the burden of managing and securing networks has become nearly untenable, especially at a time when there is pressure to reduce IT budgets. The Avaya Platform provides the much- needed relief with a highly-secure, costeffective solution that fits any size business,” said Maan Al-Shakarchi, Vice-President, Avaya Networking, Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia-Pacific.

NetApp Announces ONTAP software

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etApp has announced new NetApp ONTAP software, flash systems and expanded public cloud support that provide the modern foundation to help customers maximize the value of their data in the hybrid cloud.

The new offerings are key to helping customers transform their IT. IT transformations integrate data silos, automate processes to speed results and remove barriers to scale that limit growth. NetApp ONTAP FlexGroup is a massively scalable, high-performance NAS container ideal for the latest generation of applications in the EDA, high-tech, oil & gas, and media and entertainment industries.

flash models are Fujitsu’s fastest-ever storage systems, bringing all-flash technology within reach of everyday applications to underpin business transformation.

Michael Keegan, Head of Business Line Products, Fujitsu EMEIA, comments, “We are bringing ultra-fast, all-flash storage to the mass market, at new price points for both purchase and operation that make

the ETERNUS AF allflash system an affordable, viable mainstream business solution. As the economics of all-flash storage become ever more attractive, we are enabling customers to create faster, more responsive IT environments that are easily able to maximize the benefits of digital services and next-generation data and applications accessed from anywhere.”

Dell redefines its virtual workspace solutions

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ell Cloud Clientcomputing has unveiled its portfolio of new and updated virtual workspace solutions, including new thin client and software solutions.

The new solutions include the Wyse 3030 LT, a highly secure and affordable solution based on ultra-secure Dell Wyse ThinOS. Dell is also announcing the latest version of ThinOS 8.3, and the latest version of Wyse Device Manager

5.7.

“We are rising to that challenge with our next generation of virtual workspace solutions from thin clients to its own thin client-optimized software, to the management and data security solutions that make it easier for Indian enterprises to make the most of their IT deployment,” said Santosh Pandey, Country Manager for India, Dell Cloud Client Computing.

QNAP launches Quadcore 16-bay TS-1635

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NAP Systems has released the 16-bay TS-1635 business NAS that supports twelve 3.5" HDDs and four 2.5" SSDs to accommodate massive data storage.

The cost-effective quadcore TS-1635 comes with dual 10Gbe ports and dual Gigabit ports, meeting the demands for next-generation networks, high-speed file transfer, and helping small/medium businesses to reduce the cost in implementing 10GbE solutions.

“Compared with similar products, the TS-1635 provides the

most budget-friendly, high-capacity NAS solution for small/ medium businesses. It supports up to 16 hard drives, creating epic storage potential with high-capacity HDDs and high-performance SSDs,” said Jason Hsu, Product Manager of QNAP, adding, “with two integrated 10GbE ports, the TS-1635 also provides an affordable entryway for 10GbE adoption by small/ medium businesses.”

www.varindia.com

October 2016

21

ON THE RAMP

Juniper Networks broadens its Seagate extends HP Inc. brings AIO Printer Software-Defined Secure Networks its HDD Portfolio DeskJet Ink Advantage 3700

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uniper Networks has announced security portfolio enhancements that extend threat prevention deeper into the network – down to the switch level. These new and upgraded solutions, launched include a new Policy Enforcer, which automates the enforcement of security policies across the network and quarantines infected endpoints to prevent threats across firewalls and switches through Junos Space Security Director.

“Attackers are

constantly managing to get inside networks, so it is critical to implement pervasive solutions that can rapidly identify the threat and prevent damage from being done. Juniper is broadening its SoftwareDefined Secure Networks platform and supporting customers in their effort to thwart cyber threats in a landscape that’s constantly evolving,” said Denise Shiffman, Senior VP , Juniper Development and Innovation, Juniper Networks.

Dassault Systèmes launches SOLIDWORKS 2017

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assault Systèmes has announced the launch of SOLIDWORKS 2017. From small start-ups to global organizations, more than 3.1 million users can create multisensory experiences through innovative product design, with access to easy 3D design and development applications anytime, anywhere and on any device.

“We must fulfil a lot of medical device requirements, and SOLIDWORKS has been

helpful for leveraging cutting-edge industrial design to get our work done faster and our myoelectric upper limb orthosis to market,” said Andrew Harlan, Principal Mechanical Engineer, Myomo. “We exclusively use SOLIDWORKS for the full spectrum of our design work. The ability to collaborate with industrial designers, consultants and manufacturers across different time zones simplifies the whole process."

Axis introduces small and costefficient bullet style IP Cameras

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x

i

s

Communications has introduced AXIS M20 Series. The new small bullet-style cameras are lightweight, yet extremely durable.

“Our new camera series is an ideal choice for companies looking for ways to roll out or expand their video surveillance monitoring with low costs. The affordable cameras are cost-effective and versatile with their

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October 2016

small footprint, and they provide highquality video surveillance indoors and outdoors, day and night,” said Andres Vigren, Global Product Manager, Axis Communications.

“The camera series offer a low unit price and a remarkably wide field of view. This means, more areas can be covered with a smaller budget. These cameras are an ideal fit for video surveillance within retail, banking, and healthcare.”

www.varindia.com

eagate has come up with a new lineup of hard drives up to the capacity of 10TB, dubbed as the Guardian Series.

The series consists of three hard drive models such as BarraCuda, IronWolf and SkyHawk. These high-capacity drives are resurrected for consumer and small business category and are meant for laptops, desktops, network-attached storage (NAS) and surveillance systems.

BarraCuda is designed for desktops, the IronWolf for NAS applications and the SkyHawk for video surveillance systems.

The Seagate’s popular BarraCuda brand comes with a spindle speed ranging from 5,900rpm to 7,200rpm and capacities ranging from 500GB to 10TB. The drives also come with 16GB to 64GB of DRAM cache, depending on the overall capacity.

Kaspersky Lab offers Kaspersky Small Office Security

Kaspersky Lab has released a new version of its Kaspersky Small Office Security software to help very small businesses (VSBs) stay on top of the evergrowing number of cyber threats they face today. Kaspersky Small Office Security can help VSBs flourish by keeping the fraudsters at bay.

In line with recent research from Kaspersky Lab, finding that 42% of VSBs are concerned about the threat of crypto malware, the latest version of Kaspersky Small Office Security offers enriched protection against the growing threat of “cryptors”.

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P Inc. has unveiled the smallest All-in-One inkjet

Facebook, Instagram and more. The printers are half the size of other inkjet

printers. The HP DeskJet Ink Advantage 3700 Allin-One printers combine robust print, scan and copy capabilities and offer easy printing from

all-in-one printers in its class, with robust print, scan and copy capabilities all for an MRP of INR7, 176/-.

VMware announces Windows 10 Migration Assessment Tool

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Mware has announced a new solution for customers to assess and implement their Windows 10 migrations.

VMware’s SysTrack Desktop Assessment Service for Windows 10 is a free, cloud-hosted service

by Lakeside Software, and is the first step customers need to begin their migration process from legacy Windows systems to the modern, enterprise mobility management

(EMM)-friendly Windows 10.

“VMware’s End-User Computing portfolio makes us uniquely positioned to take a holistic view of an organization’s Windows environment and determine the perfect fit for existing devices in a Windows 10 world,” said Blake Brannon, VicePresident of Product Marketing, End-User Computing, VMware.

ViewSonic launches VX2776smhd Super-Slim Monitor

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iewSonic has launched its Ferrari model VX2776smhd, 27" art-Slim Monitor at channel partners meet held at Lamington Road in Mumbai on Ganesh Chaturthi.

With channel partner meets, ViewSonic aims to educate its partners about its product portfolio ranging from entry-level monitors to high-end projectors.

"Roadshows such as these not only help partners and us

understand each other well, but it also helps us ensure the end-customers

get benefited and serviced by our new offerings," said Pradeep Thamman, Country Manager, ViewSonic India.

www.varindia.com

October 2016

23

VOICE-N-DATA

Orange and Ericsson Partner for 5G BSNL selects range and Network (SDN) and O Ericsson will Network Function Aptilo Service develop 5G use cases Virtualization (NFV) Management and service scenarios, technologies. including technical Alain Maloberti, alignment and external Senior VP Orange Labs Platform demonstrations.

The

partnership will enable 5G technology building blocks, proof of concepts, and pilots across Europe from 2017 onwards.

This collaboration will also cover 4G to 5G solutions evolution, including energy and cost efficiencies, and use of Software Defined

Networks,

says,

"Our

ambition is to be prepared for a 5G deployment in 2020. By joining forces with Ericsson, we will create for our customers a solid network capable of delivering a wide range of services, from greater data speed everywhere to specialized services for cities and industries.”

O-Zone Networks to offer free Wi-Fi at CCD cafes

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afé Coffee Day (CCD) has tied up with leading and ‘neutral’ Wi-Fi service provider O-Zone Networks to provide free Wi-Fi access to customers at its cafes in select cities across the country. CCD will provide high-speed connectivity to its techdriven customers through a dedicated leased line at

its cafes. Sanjeev 'Bobby' Sarin, Founder and CEO of O-Zone Networks, said, “We believe this collaboration is another step forward in our endeavor to establish a large “neutral” network for our partners to broadcast their SSIDs to their subscribers like Reliance Communication and others in the near future.”

Airtel rolls out 20,000 units of Aadhaar-based e-KYC Solution

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harti Airtel has successfully rolled out over 20,000 units of Aadhaar-based e-KYC solutions across India.

Airtel has led the rollout of Aadhaar based e-KYC solution, following the notification by the Department of Telecom, Government of India.

The initiative has received positive response from customers as it enables instant activation of Airtel mobile SIMs, thereby enhancing customer convenience and in-store experience.

The digital verification, which is fully secure, also eliminates paperwork and benefits the environment.

Over 50,000

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October 2016

customers, including those in rural India, are being on-boarded daily

by Airtel using this digital solution. The company

expects the number of customers getting digitally on-boarded using Aadhaar-based e-KYC to grow multifold as it ramps up the rollout of devices. In the first phase of deployment, Airtel has plans to have the solution in over 500,000 retail outlets, including those in rural pockets, over the next few months.

www.varindia.com

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harat Sanchar Nigam (BSNL) has selected Aptilo Networks to enable wireless services.

Provided by system integrator ICOMM, BSNL has selected Aptilo Service Management Platform (SMP) to deliver and manage carrier-class wireless services. Aptilo SMP is a highly scalable platform supporting BSNL’s rapid growth.

“We are proud to have been selected by BSNL, a true innovator in India.

Wireless services generate revenue and are key to connect the unconnected in India,” said Jonas Jacobsson, COO, Aptilo Networks.

BSNL is a pioneer in providing innovative telecommunications services to the people of India, bridging the ruralurban digital divide in the ICT sector.

GSMA asks to recalibrate 700 MHz pricing

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he GSMA has asked Indian government to recalibrate the reserve prices of of 700 MHz. John Giusti, chief regulatory officer, GSMA has urged Indian government to reassess their approach to spectrum auction reserve prices after India failed to sell any of the critical 700 MHz band last week.

The GSMA is concerned that, after the Indian auction, none of the 700 MHz band can be used to expand mobile broadband coverage to Indian citizens. As we had cautioned, the spectrum went unsold because the reserve prices for this highly soughtafter band were set at an unrealistically high level of more than $60 billion.

Huawei to start smartphone manufacturing in India

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uawei will start to manufacture smartphones in India in collaboration with leading Sketch-to-Scale solutions provider, Flex, in October.

Huawei’s ‘Make in India’ inauguration ceremony in the Indian capital, New Delhi.

Underlining its approach, Huawei

Shri Ravi Shankar Prasad, Hon’ble Union Minister, Information & Technology, Law and Justice made the announcement at

Consumer Business Group will also expand its distribution network by partnering with more than 50,000 retail outlets by the end of 2016.

mjunction” successfully conducts Spectrum Auctions

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or the second time in a row, mjunction services has been selected by DoT for the conduct of e-auction of telecom spectrum and has successfully conducted the auctions.

The auction which continued for five days, from 1st to 6th October, has brought an overall 3.35% appreciation in the auction value over the reserve price for the Spectrum sold.

mjunction used Simultaneous Multiple Round Auction (SMRA) methodology – an internationally wellaccepted methodology, to conduct the e-auction. mjunction CEO Vinaya Varma said, “We paid close attention to improving the overall experience of the operators, with easy bidding screen, dashboards and call centre assistance."

Free Wi-Fi facility launched at Airport Express Line

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he Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) managing director Dr Mangu Singh launched ‘Free Wi-Fi‘ facilities at metro stations on its Airport Express Line.

DMRC has branded this facility as “Oui DMRC Free Wi-Fi” and the facility will be available on all six stations of the Airport Express Line. As of now passengers will be able to log in simply by searching for Wi-Fi options and log into “Oui DMRC Free Wi-Fi”. DMRC aims to extend this facility to all the stations of the metro

network gradually.

For Wi-Fi facility, DMRC has tied up with a consortium led by Techno Sat Comm which presently runs India’s first Wi-Fi on train service on the Delhi-Howrah Rajdhani Express. The facility will use the globally acclaimed “T-Track 2.0 Wave 2 Solution”, also used on high speed trains worldwide.

Passengers will be able to use all standard internet applications inside the station premises like email, Facebook, Google, video chat as well as live streaming of cricket and football matches etc.

GIGABYTE Technology (India) Pvt. Ltd. Website: www.gigabyte.in; Toll-Free: 1800-22-0966; www.facebook.com/GIGABYTEindia Gujarat: 98642 30150; Mumbai: 99677 18653; Rest of Maharashtra: 99677 18653; Goa: 99677 18653; Chhattisgarh 99677 18653; Madhya Pradesh: 99100 86976; New Delhi, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh: 99100 86976; Punjab, Chandigarh and Jammu & Kashmir: 99100 86976; Rajasthan: 98286 63392; Bihar, Jharkhand: 90075 45577; Orissa: 99030 52251; North East: 97076 42785; West Bengal: 97485 02710; Karnataka: 94482 93439; Andhra Pradesh, Telangana: 90405 06080; Tamil Nadu: 74117 74666; Kerala: 98950 99231

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October 2016

25

CHANNEL BUZZ

Ziox holds Distributors Meet for South India Partners

RAH Infotech and WinMagic organize Channel Meet in Mumbai

iox has conducted its distributors meet for its South India partners. With festive season around the corner, Ziox aims to bring a stronger foothold

AH Infotech, in association with WinMagic, has held a channel meet in Mumbai. The meet received an overwhelming response with 48 channel partners from 25 organizations gracing the moment.

The meet was aimed at introducing partners to the latest offerings from WinMagic and also enhancing their knowledge on the existing solutions. Session was kicked off by Suchit Karnik, Senior Vice-President, RAH Infotech, with an introductory note where he briefed the partners about the strength, capabilities and solution offerings of RAH InfoTech.

Later, the dais was handed over to Rahul Kumar, Country Manager, WinMagic India, who appraised partners about the latest encryption solutions from WinMagic and how these solutions can help partners not only offer best of security solutions to their customers but

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among the partners bridging a stronger sales connect.

Inducting the partners on several new offerings exclusive to the festive season, Ziox showcased and briefed its distributors about different company schemes and plans to implement in the coming future along with their support and discussion on elevating the reward and recognition structure for the distributor, which was also a vital point of discussion.

Chiranjib Sarkar, National Sales Head, Ziox, further adds,

“Ziox strives hard to always deliver on its promise of operating on the principle of equitable returns and believes in maintaining longterm and mutually beneficially

relationships with its partners.”

Ziox believes in mutual growth with Channel partners, in growing and expanding the brand presence across India.

Ziox has also conducted its Distributors meet for UP (East) and Uttarakhand partners. The company dedicated two days to meetings and exchanges of opinions with the keyline distributors and inducting them on the several new offerings (launches) in the pipeline and also the schemes/plans for Diwali.

7th ISODA TechSummit to be held in Vietnam

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nfotech Software Dealers Association (ISODA) has announced the 7th instalment of its annual event that has grown in stature over the years. Their marquee, TechSummit 7 will be held at Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam between 16th and 19th February, 2017.

Rajeev Mamidanna – Chairman of ISODA TechSummit 7 and also the Association’s Vice President says, “TechSummit is close to all our hearts and every ISODA member has started working towards making it a success. In a world where Digitization, IOT, Mobility, Advanced Machine Learning, Analytics etc are key trends, ISODA realizes the potential for bringing together

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the technology owner and the technology provider for the benefit of the consumer.”

TechSummit 7 promises to bring in some very new alliance opportunities and also strengthen the existing ones. Apart from the promise of being technology and content driven, the TechSummit additionally will give technology vendors more opportunities to be continually in touch with ISODA members post the event as well.

“ISODA TechSummit 7 will be engrossing and entertaining but at the same time give every participant and technology vendor an opportunity to analyze, discuss and strike alliances,” says Mamidanna.

Like every year, ISODA members are expected to register for the TechSummit in large numbers. Comments Mamidanna, “Participation in TechSummit has increased over the years and this instalment will be no different.”

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also enhance their bottom line in a competitive market.

Raju Veeranna, Senior Presales Engineer from WinMagic India, further stressed on the technical aspects of encryption solutions and their key features and benefits. Gautam Jaiswal, Regional Sales Manager – West, WinMagic India, explained about the channel incentive schemes to further encourage partners to adopt WinMagic encryption solutions.

Puducherry IT Association joins in “Swachh Bharat”

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he ITTA-PDY has participated in “Swatch Bharat” – Clean India programme that was conducted by Vigneshwara Higher Secondary School situated in the industrial area of Sedrapet, 14 km from Puducherry.

The school aptly chose our national leader, Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday as the right day to fulfil his dream of clean India.

Besides, the drive was aimed at educating school children that “Cleanliness is next to Godliness” and “Health is Wealth” and to create awareness to the village surrounding Sedrapet.

Swachh Bharat – Clean India programme was inaugurated

by Usdu constituency’ MLA Theepainthan and encouraged all participants inclusive of 500 school children, teachers, ITTAMembers to continue to clean the area in and around Sedrapet.

Sederapet’s loading and unloading association leader, Nagaratnam supported the drive with help from his members.

Villianoor Commissioner, Arumugam, arranged vehicles to remove all the collected garbage.

Government Doctor Pamagal Kavithai not only helped him in cleaning the area with his fellow staff but also sprayed bleaching power around the area.

President of the ITTAPDY Association, Arun Subbu Rangan, Secretary Prabhakar and CONFED-EC Jaypaul and senior member Kandasamy and the programme coordinator D. Soundara Pandian delivered speeches about the importance of keeping our surroundings clean in order to achieve the “Swatch Bharat ” – Clean India.

To support the noble cause, and to join hands with the school, the forum had given necessary materials such as Cap, Gloves, Mouth Masks, Broomsticks, Dustbins, etc and participated along with young students and cleaned the Sedrapet surrounded area. The Clean India programme has created a good awareness not only to all students but to the public too.

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FACE TO FACE

STMicroelectronics Driving the MEMS industry to Growth Vishal Goyal, Senior Manager - Technical Marketing, Analog MEMS and Sensors [AMS], India, Asean and ANZ – STMicroelectronics

shares with VARINDIA of how the MEMS industry is shaping up and what has been ST’s role in driving this sector to excellence Sensors are now spreading in the world and having a great influence in all aspects of our lives. They are bringing exciting ways of interacting with the world and are core to connected applications and a key building block of the Internet of Things (Smart Things, Smart Cities, Smart Industry, and Smart Home) and Smart Driving (Connected Car).

ST & the MEMS industry STMicroelectronics is at the center of the evolution of the MEMS and sensors industry, driving continuous innovation for more diverse applications of sensors and micro-actuators with wide-ranging product portfolio, reliable supply chain and strong ecosystem of global and local partners.

ST has established a worldwide ecosystem to cater to the mass market. It has a strong system know-how to support a global customer base. Ideally, the company has 1200 software evaluation licenses distributed in the last 6 months.

According to Gartner, MEMS-based smart sensors are set to gain maximum traction in the worldwide smart sensor market that is forecast to grow to $57.77 billion by 2022; at 18.1% CAGR. Market is primarily driven

"ST has been enjoying the # 1 spot in MEMS Sensors for Consumer and Mobile and # 2 in MEMS Micro-Actuators," says Vishal Goyal, Senior Manager - Technical Marketing, Analog MEMS and Sensors [AMS], India, Asean and ANZ – STMicroelectronics

by factors such as growing concern toward security & surveillance, rising need for energy-efficient devices, growing consumer electronics sector, surge in automotive industry on a global basis, favourable government initiatives, and growing trend of miniaturization in sensors. The market for MEMS-based smart sensor is expected to hold the largest share of the studied market during the forecast period. MEMS help smart sensor to work in a smarter way by allowing it to handle huge amounts of data in a fraction of seconds. The APAC market is expected to grow at the highest CAGR between 2016 and 2022.

Products from STMicroelectronics...

ST has designed a range of products keeping energy efficiency and size considerations in mind, which ensure the best performance for wearable device with ultra-low-power processing and connectivity, power and energy management and sensors.

STMicroelectronics also has in its portfolio a wide range of wearable devices. They are getting adopted as watches, fashion accessory, fitness tracker, security devices or specialized medical gadgets. Wearable has the potential to change the world just as internet did.

Smart Sensors and BLE have empowered devices with power of sensing and communication to take complex decisions.

Wearables will create fundamentally new use cases and will do things which even smartphones cannot do. It is expected that healthcare and fitness will emerge as the largest category for wearable. n

IoT to become a Reality in India very soon Prashant Gupta, Head of solutions South East Asia & INDIA - Verizon Enterprise Solutions shares with VARINDIA of how IoT is slowly evolving in the country and what does Verizon has in its booty to offer to its Indian customers. An excerpt -

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nternet of Things (IoT) is a world of its own with all the living and non-living objects having sensors and monitors that transmit data through wireless. IoT can be used to automate and monitor almost everything imaginable. “When we talk about IoT in context with enterprises, there is a new layer of complexity all together. This complexity is involved especially in reference to data centers' daily monitoring and management of devices. In an enterprise environment, IoT can be used for numerous purposes such as fleet management, remote asset management, healthcare-related monitoring devices, oil pipeline monitoring sensors, and smart metering amongst others,” says Prashant Gupta, Head of solutions South East Asia & INDIA - Verizon Enterprise Solutions.

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The Indian government is undertaking initiatives including policies and regulatory framework development (India’s first IoT policy framework was released in October, 2014), driving solutions development (and deployment) in partnership with private industry players (Smart City and Smart Grid projects) and creating the IoT market in India.

Security concerns with IoT While IoT is still in its nascent stage in India, issues such as security and performance still need to be addressed.

“The major security concerns that IoT users or consumers face is the security of their personal data provided by them. IoT devices collect, store, transmit, aggregate and analyze massive amounts of data. If properly protected, the data and the devices can make life easier. If not, it can become a nightmare. Thus, when developing any IoT strategy, it is important to look critically at what information the IoT device is collecting, and how it will be used. It is important to look at how the information can be abused or misused as well. Additionally, the lack of an updated infrastructure also adds to the failure of security in these devices,” points out Prashant.

However, with the proliferation of IoT, it is expected that vendors will be preferring usability over security. Though there is awareness on the malware attacks targeting these new connected gadgets, IT security practitioners remain unsure of the correct amount of acceptable risk. n

FACE TO FACE

A combination of Channel & Direct Sales works for Seclore

Amit Malhotra, VP, Sales India, Middle East & Africa – Seclore shares with VARINDIA on how the Seclore business is shaping up in the country, its expansion plans and about its growing channel landscape -

S

eclore is in the data security business.

While it is understood that bulk of the data today does not sit in the datacenter anymore but it is all over the place, Seclore ensures security of that data which is moving away from the controlled environment.

Seclore has been selling for 3-4 years now in India and a lot of momentum has come in the last 18 months, during which the acceptance of its solutions and obviously the need for the solutions is being established around the globe in around 29 countries.

“Our’s is a company incubated out of IIT Bombay and we are really proud to be a part of the Make in India movement. Our Development center is also in Mumbai,” says Amit Malhotra, VP, Sales India, Middle East & Africa – Seclore.

In India Seclore is operational from 3 direct offices in India – Mumbai being the biggest one, Delhi and Bengaluru. It is planning to expand to a total of 8 cities; the expansion to the remaining 5 cities would be purely on the back of its relationship with its channel partners. “We make sure that the expansion has to be fuelled by the good work that the channel has been doing for so many

years,” adds Amit.

In all its offices, Seclore works in a direct relationship with its key customers and also work with its channel organization. “So the head of the channel business is based out of Delhi and a bulk of the channel business is also managed out of Delhi. This particular office is also enhanced for all channel training - sales, pre-sales and implementation. There is also a POC center for channel partners to give them necessary hands-on training on our new solutions,” he explains.

Talking about its channel eco-system, Seclore has a two tiered structure – Value added distributors and resellers. It has appointed 3 distributors – Technobind, Blisstree Solutions and iValue Infosolutions and under them come the resellers. “We have a great relationship with our channel partners. The Channel has been playing a very critical role - the most important being the sheer reach. The Channel always brings in a force multiplier. For instance, with our VADs, we have dedicated people responsible for Seclore business and they in turn work with lot of resellers. With each of the resellers again there are multiple sales people. So this is very central and strategic to our VAR expansion plan,” says Amit. Currently, 40% of its business is happening through channel and 60% is direct. But over the next 18 months Seclore sees much sharper increase in the channel portfolio. The three areas where Seclore focuses its business are – Banking & Finance, Manufacturing and Government & PSUs. “Essentially any customer who puts a value to the data is our potential customer,” sums up Amit.

Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

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Lenovo, No. 1 in TBR customer satisfaction index.* Lenovo™ System x® servers come with incredible power, maximum expandability and unmatched reliability. That's right, a server range that assures less hassles and more smiles.

Call 1800 3000 9990 to discover how our servers can help grow your business.

Mail to: corpsales@lenovo.com Or visit: Lenovo.com/server

Powered by Intel® Xeon® processor E3 series.

Intel Inside®. Powerful Data Center Outside. *TBR Corporate IT Buying Behavior and Customer Satisfaction Study – x86-based Servers, Fourth Quarter 2015.

The following are trademarks or registered trademarks of Lenovo: Lenovo, the Lenovo logo, ThinkServer and System x. Intel, the Intel logo, Xeon and Xeon Inside are † Terms and Conditions apply.

trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and/or other countries. ©2016 Lenovo. All rights reserved.

August 2016 www.varindia.com 58

A price tag that will get you new customers.

Introducing the ThinkServer TS140 for small businesses with big demands.

At Lenovo™ we develop technology to meet the ever-growing demands of small businesses.

With that in mind, we have launched the ThinkServer® TS140 in India. It is powered to take on tough challenges, yet priced attractively. · Supports enterprise-grade HDDs (Built-in RAID 5) · Whisper-quiet at 26 decibels · Intel® Xeon® E3 series processor · Windows Server® 2012 R2 platform So go on, add this server to your portfolio and keep adding to your customer base.

Call 1800 3000 9990 to discover how our servers can help grow your business.

Mail to: corpsales@lenovo.com Or visit: Lenovo.com/server Powered by Intel® Xeon® processor E3 series.

Intel Inside®. Powerful Data Center Outside.

The following are trademarks or registered trademarks of Lenovo: Lenovo, the Lenovo logo and ThinkServer. Intel, the Intel logo, Xeon and Xeon Inside are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and/or other countries. Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. ©2016 Lenovo. All rights reserved. †Terms and Conditions apply. The test(s) above are performed on statistical samples.

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FACE TO FACE

‘GST is a Technology led Law with software as its interface’ Sathya Pramod, Chief Financial Officer - Tally Solutions Private Limited in a chat with VARINDIA throws light on the current GST law that is in the process of being implemented across the country and the various pitfalls which the government should consider before presenting it as the final law to the people -

G

oods & Services Tax (GST), according to Sathya Pramod, Chief Financial Officer - Tally Solutions is a “Once in a lifetime” change for all of us in the country, be it a business or an individual. Never has a change of this magnitude been tried by anyone. This is a welcome step to get all the indirect taxes under a single umbrella with 29 states, the centre and also union territories working as one. It is especially more commendable since this is forward looking by making technology as the engine which is pulling the change.

“We all know it is only with technology that we can scale and it is a right step forward by the government. As a business, one thing needs to be understood, it is a technology led law. There will be no paper transactions or any manual intervention.

Everything happens through technology and there is a software which will be the interface. As a software company in the ERP business, it would be our endeavour to make the change seamless to the tax payer. Simplicity will be the key,” asserts Sathya.

Limitations in GST Implementation

Goods & Services Tax Network (GSTN) is managed by a bunch of professionals with the right kind of support from the government. At the business level, companies are gearing up to provide the relevant solutions to their current users as well as prospective users.

However there are a few pitfalls which

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need immediate attention as these are unfriendly to trade and has the potential to derail the businesses.

“The first one being the manner in which Input Credit is granted. The government has put the onus on the tax payer to ensure that the tax has been remitted to the government, failing which the input credit will not be allowed.

The next one in the list is about taxing advances and determination of time of supply and treatment- Section 12 and Section 13 deal with time of supply of goods and services, whereby normal trade advances are also subject to tax. This again creates friction in trade as the concept of advances itself is misunderstood. If we look at why advances are paid, it is due to the fact that a commitment to the vendor is made for a certainty of a transaction, even though the supply is effected after a period of time. This would mean the input credit for the portion of advances would only be available after supply and claiming the final invoice on a procedural front it would create further complications.

Ambiguity in sales returns is the next challenge. There are a few ambiguities in the process of sales returns like – • Let’s take a case where a supply happens from a manufacturer to a distributor who in turn supplies it to a retailer. Normally when the sales return happens, it happens between the retailer and the manufacturer without involving the distributor. There is no way of transaction matching since the original transaction and the sales return are between different

entities. How should this be handled?

• Another case would be where a transaction has happened between a tax payer and receiver, the tax payer uploads GSTR1. However the receiver in this case does not respond with a corresponding GSTR2. In this case, to reverse the sales, the tax payer raises a credit note, but again the receiver may not respond to the same.

The tax payer will land up paying the tax without any supply. This also applies to transactions where money back guarantees are involved.

Yet another challenge is Document Numbering. In general business practices, there are no restrictions on the numbering of any documents (invoices, debit notes, credit notes etc). However, the rules state that a number can only be unique only for a particular document. This has potential to create confusion, especially for small businesses who are not in the practice to create unique document numbers,” explains Sathya in details.

And so...

It is easy to dismiss saying that this is not good or it has lot of issues. But it is a mammoth task to change the entire gamut of indirect taxes in the country.

There has been a lot of hard work put in by the government in working out further details and also taking public opinion about the law. There have been a lot of representations from the industry, associations etc. The Government should give due consideration to those and if they can manage to balance between the tax payer’s needs and the government’s wants, it would help. n

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(From L to R): Mr. Murali Krishnan, CEO – NJ Dataprint; Mr Vishal Dhupar, MD South Asia – NVIDIA; Mr Kuldeep Raina, Senior Vice Prsident – Sales, Inspira Enterprise; Mr. Deepak Sahu, Chief Editor – VARINDIA; Mr Arvind KS, Associate Vice President, Business Development – Tally Solutions; Mr K K Shetty, VP – Enterprise Sales, India - COMMSCOPE; Mr Sriram Gopalaswami, Head, Commercial and DCG Marketing- Lenovo India and Mr Jatin Christopher, Director- JCSS global Consulting

GST, IOT was the Key discussion point at the 7th SIITF VARINDIA has recently conducted its annual Tech Summit in Bengaluru (Silicon Valley of India) - Southern India Information Technology Fair 2016, on 23rd September 2016 at The Hotel Chancery Pavilion, Bengaluru.

The Summit discussed various emerging technologies that has hit the Industry in the recent past.

The theme for the summit this year was “Innovative Platform to support Digital India”. A special team was invited to deliberate on the topic of Impact of GST on the ICT Industry, which was attended by experts from the Finance and Taxation domain, Consultant, CIO, VARs and the Industry

Arvind KS, Vice President, Business development- Tally Solutions “GST is new to everyone of us. In India doing business is a crime and doing crime is a business. There has always been a trust deficit between the tax authority and the businessman. Going forward, if GST is implemented properly, business in India would be no longer a crime. Tax is one thing which is very important for any business but it is also the thing on which the businessman should be spending the least amount of time in order to become tax complaint. If you are into the business of computers, please do not spend time on taxation at all. In today’s world the cost of 2016 www.varindia.com 34 beingOctober compliant is much cheaper than the cost of evading taxes.”

leaders. Finally there was the award function that felicitated the business partners from Southern India in addition to the technology showcase that displayed the stellar leadership and outstanding IT implementations. VARs are the pillar of success in their respective regions representing the most innovative IT leaders in Southern India.

The event focused on digital disruptions surrounding today’s world and its implications on Design & Engineering domain, given the need to leverage innovations to ring about a paradigm shift. It was a unique platform for SMEs and VARs to understand the scope of digitization that will open up big opportunities for them in due course of time.

With a distinguished list of speakers including K K Shetty, V.P- Enterprise sales-India – COMMSCOPE; Vishal Dhupar, MD South Asia- NVIDIA India; Jatin Christopher, Director- JCSS global Consulting; Syam Madnapalli, Global IOT Delivery - DELL Digital Business Services; Kuldeep Raina, Senior Vice President – Sales, Inspira Enterprise India; Arvind KS, Associate Vice President, Business development- Tally Solutions, the summit promises to be an event full of stimulating conversations and innovative solutions. The summit brings the Strategists, Practitioners, consumers on to a one platform to discuss the strategy for adoption of digital solutions for enhanced design and engineering.

Talking about the day’s agenda, Deepak Sahu, Publisher & Chief Editor – VARINDIA spoke about how the future is cloud and the market for cloud services has grown to such an extent that there is now a notable percentage of total IT spending, helping to create a new generation of start-

Vishal Dhupar, M.D (South Asia) NVIDIA “After the wheel was discovered, the most pervasive inventions to have taken place was the printing press, next came electricity, semi-conductor and then eyeglasses. Out of all these, semi-conductors have always been taken for granted. The impact of semi-conductors is such that they contribute the entire economy of India to the global GDP. The whole hyperconnectivity that has got connected where you are talking about a billion active users on Facebook, 7 billion mobile devices being available - all these will cease if there are no semi-conductors. We today talk about IoT, Big Data, Cloud, autonomous vehicles, and these are opportunities around us.”

Jatin Christopher, Director- JCSS global Consulting “GST is a significant change agent as we embark on the journey that has just been introduced to us. It is very different from the way we have seen taxes – excise, VAT, service tax but the principle of GST which is the first aspect that we have to keep in mind, that GST is a destination based tax. It is the tax that has to reach the state where consumption actually takes place.

Until now, we have been used to paying tax on an origin based system of taxation.

Whenever you sell, supply any goods or services within your state, you will have to pay a dual tax – CGST and SGST. Both the taxes will apply at the same time.

K K Shetty, V.P- Enterprise sales – India, COMMSCOPE “If you look at the macroeconomic indicators, inflation you would see is roughly around 4-6%, GDP growth is 7.5% and if you look into the fiscal deficit, it’s almost 4% and this year we are planning to bring it down to 3.5%. Our rupee is more or less going up, as a whole the macroeconomic is fantastic now. That shows that the country is moving in the right direction, which shows that there are some good opportunities coming in the next few years. In terms of foreign exchange reserves, we have more than $370 billion, which means moving forward we can expect better days. GST is the mother of all reforms which will change the taxation scenario.”

ups and "born in the cloud" providers. “The ‘Cloud Shift’ will affect more than $1 tn in IT spending and Digital technologies are playing a key role in enhancing SMB competitiveness and their growth agenda. As SMBs and their workforce embark on their digital journeys, they need to protect themselves against cyber-attacks. This would contribute to two strategic programmes of the country that are ‘Make in India’ and ‘Digital India’,” he said in his speech.

K K Shetty, V.P- Enterprise sales – India, COMMSCOPE spoke about the Reforms & Opportunities in India, focusing on strong Indian economic indicators, expected to gain a double digit growth in medium to long term, resulting in India emerging as the fastest growing major economy in the world.

His speech ended with a quote, “If you are optimistic you can build an Aeroplane! If you are pessimistic you can build a parachute!”

Adding to his thoughts, Vishal Dhupar, M.D (South Asia) - NVIDIA India, said how the cloud brings huge potential for the growth and it is very supportive to the success of the Digital India. The summit always tried to bring conversations around how to ensure engineering and innovations in alignment to the requirements of world.

Addressing the gathering, Jatin

Christopher, DirectorJCSS global Consulting spoke on what is the impact of GST on IT trade and how it will turn India into one common market, leading to greater ease of doing business and big savings in logistics. Some companies will gain more as the GST rate will be lower than the current tax rates they pay; others will lose as the rate will be higher than the present effective rate.

There is no doubt that Digital Business Transformation is disrupting businesses in every industry by breaking down barriers between people, businesses and things. By breaking these barriers, they are able to create new products, services and find more

efficient ways of doing business. To address this segment, Kuldeep Raina, Senior Vice President, Inspira Enterprise spoke on the importance of cyber security and INSPIRA’s initiative towards Centre of excellence in the cloud as the Infrastructure and platform as service and Software as service. Kuldeep spoke about how things would be with value addition to the cloud and turning Capex to Opex with the help of automation, which will bring value to the customer and lastly gave some example of certain recent cyber and malware attacks.

Arvind KS, Vice President, Business

Kuldeep Raina, Senior Vice President – Sales, Inspira Enterprise India “There is a huge opportunity and a potential about the Cloud. Inspira on its part is initiating a Center of Excellence on the Cloud which is now going to address infrastructure as a service, platform as a service and predominantly software as a service. A typical question that comes to mind is what people think about Cloud. Is it something that we are trying to do some kind of a value addition to it? When seen from a technology perspective, it is really the thing we are looking forward to? The first key point I consider when talking about cloud is automation that will transform it thoroughly.”

development- Tally Solutions spoke on the Impact of GST on IT trade and how GST is a business opportunity for us. This will bring a new opportunity for every company into development, since there is no software available in India, which is fully compatible or is GST complaint.

Lastly there was the panel discussion, based on the theme for the day and moderated by Deepak Kumar Sahu, Chief Editor – VARINDIA. The panellists who joined on the dais were Sriram Gopalaswami, Head, Commercial and DCG MarketingLenovo India; Syam Madnapalli, Global IOT Delivery - DELL Digital Business Services; Sridharan, President- AIT; Vishwanath Kulkarni, Director-Sales (India & SAARC) HID Global and K K Shetty, VP - Enterprise sales-India - COMMSCOPE. Discussion on Digital India, which is an initiative of the central government to integrate the government departments and the people of India and the innovation challenge, was to find solutions which can enable public to avail government services easily.

Digital India in its vision is a disruptive social equalizer in it that empowers the citizens. It is targeted at addressing local needs with the vision to build an ecosystem for pervasive technology adoption.

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EVENTS

Panel Discussion on “ERP its uses and application under Digital India” The panel discussion held towards the end of the event, based on the theme for the day “Innovative Platform to support Digital India” was moderated by Deepak Kumar Sahu, Chief Editor – VARINDIA. The panellists who joined on the dais were Sriram Gopalaswami, Head, Commercial and DCG Marketing- Lenovo India; Syam Madnapalli, Global IOT Delivery DELL Digital Business Services; Sridharan, President- AIT; Vishwanath Kulkarni, Director-Sales (India & SAARC) - HID Global and K K Shetty, VP - Enterprise sales-India - COMMSCOPE. Before throwing open the floor to the panellists, Deepak Sahu mentioned about the report of IDC, Global IoT Decision Maker Survey which shows that the organizations are pivoting away from proof of concept projects to scalable Internet of Things (IoT) deployments that are incorporating cloud, analytics, and security capabilities. 31.4 per cent of organizations surveyed have launched IoT solutions, with an additional 43 per cent looking to deploy in the next 12 months. 55 per cent of respondents see IoT as strategic to their business and as a means to compete more effectively. Improving productivity, reducing costs, and automating internal processes are seen as top benefits of an IoT solution. This highlights an internal and operational focus by organizations over the short term as opposed to external, customer-facing benefits. On a cautionary note, he said that we all have to always bear in mind that Cyber Security is becoming more critical than ever before.

According to K K Shetty, VP - Enterprise sales-India – COMMSCOPE, Digital India is a priority as the various government initiatives introduced like Jan Dhan Aadhar Yojana cannot be accessed unless there is a Digital platform. “We at Commscope are focusing on Connectivity solutions which will provide digital infrastructure. We are also associated with the NoFN project, wherein 400,000 villages are going to be connected with fibre optics. With 4G network getting further penetrated, we are also planning to provide Fibre-to-Home.”

Vishwanath Kulkarni, Director-Sales (India & SAARC) - HID Global said that HID is also moving ahead in the Digital India agenda. “We have set up our R&D facility here in Chennai in which we are working on access control on mobile and a part of Digital India movement.

We also have a solution called goID (Government ID) that has received wide acclaim from government of different countries.”

Sridharan, President- AIT opined that because of Digital India, the dealer community will get an opportunity to sell various end point devices like phones, laptops, etc. The convergence of technology also brings in lot of opportunities for those people who are into offering solutions.

Syam Madnapalli, Global IOT Delivery - DELL Digital Business Services felt that most of the companies do not have a good understanding of their customers. Digital Transformation, according to him is bringing visibility for the companies, about their employees, customers and stakeholders.

Sriram Gopalaswami, Head, Commercial and DCG Marketing- Lenovo India said that from an infrastructure standpoint, Lenovo is one of the many companies to have partnered with the government when the Digital India first started. “To Lenovo, Digital India means 2 things – making affordable devices available not only in 1st tier markets but to different tiers of markets. Secondly, Education being an important propeller, Digital transformation is the proliferation of digital means of education.”

Technology provides a great platform for social equality and paves the way for opportunities enabling citizens to grow.

India Inc enables the realization of the Digital dream by partnering with the Government in building Tools such as • Last mile Connectivity • Citizen services delivered over web and more importantly mobile • Cyber security Solutions • Healthcare powered by Cloud, Mobility, Analytics, IoT, Wearables, M2M tech • Education powered by Cloud and Contextual Awareness • Product & Service Aggregation Platforms • Modern Agriculture powered by IT Framework • Smart Cities

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Building the infrastructure, getting various public sector departments online, providing a bouquet of desired services to citizens, all hold out significant potential for technology companies to work closely with the Government in realizing the Digital India Vision.

Further, Internet of Things has altered traditional designing and the industry is pushing the envelope to ensure that demands are met and new standards are set in this domain. We are still lagging behind in broadband penetration as low as 6%. Also there is less information and education of people in terms of what is data stealing and privacy breach. Driven by several factors - technological advances, changes in competitive landscape and consumer preferences. IoT (Internet of Things) will describe a system where Internet is connected to the physical world

via ubiquitous sensors will talk about the various facets of the IoT and how it is an imperative for the world today.

The summit also displayed the latest technology showcase from Canon, Tally and Inspira and how their solutions are well fitted to complement Digital India and the Future.

The summit also witnessed a mix of CIO/CTO/System Integrators and Solution Partners from across the Southern India with 150 attendees from the ICT sector who is embracing digital solutions.

A pantheon of industry veterans and innovators had conversations around themes and issues of critical importance to the growth of Security and social media.

SIITF served as a unique platform for the IT professionals from across the country which helped them to find solutions to help their companies evolve with changing requirements.

Recognition with Awards (7th SIITF)

The summit held an award ceremony to facilitate the enablers of the IT industry in Southern India. There were seven partners who had been recognised with awards • BEST Network Integrator, Southern India - Newwave Computing PVT. Ltd. • Best Reseller, Southern India - Systech services Ltd. • Best Software Services, Southern India - Microcom Solution Pvt. Ltd. • Best Solution Partner, Southern India - FUTURE BUSINESSTECH INDIA PVT. Ltd. • Best Value Added Distributor, Southern India - INSPIRA TECHNOLOGIES • Best System Integrator, Southern India - VALUE POINT SYSTEMS • Best Value Added Reseller, Southern India - N J DATAPRINT PVT. Ltd.

Solution Display

Presented By: Partners to the event:

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INDUSTRY EVENT

COM-IT Expo 2016 takes Technology showcasing to new Heights T

he 9th edition of COM-IT Expo concluded recently in the city of Mumbai. Trade Association of Information Technology (TAIT) organized the event from September 30th to October 2nd by bringing in prominent leaders and IT Industry stalwarts under one roof. The theme for this year’s event was ‘Showcasing new, trending technology ideas and solutions for the IT, Security and Mobile industries’.

The exhibition was inaugurated by YihJyh, Kang - Executive Director, Exhibition Department, Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA).

The three-day tech exhibition exhibited the latest technology solutions for the IT, security and mobile industries.

This year TAITRA had set up two Taiwan Excellence Centres to showcase the latest technologies and solutions in IoT, AR and intelligent business solutions. YihJyh, Kang - Executive Director, Exhibition Department, TAITRA said, "COM-IT expo always provides a platform to showcase latest technological innovations from Taiwan. We aim to extend our business collaboration with Indian companies by exchanging technological knowledge. I invite all exhibitors present here to COMPUTEX 2017 to showcase their products and solutions."

The event registered participation from more than 60 exhibitors including brands such as Digisol, Kaspersky, Dell, eScan, Canon, D-Link and many more. Nearly 5,000 trade and business visitors and 15,000 end-users thronged Mumbai's leading IT show, COM-IT Expo over three days. A few of the exhibitors that displayed their products and solutions at the event were Digisol, Web Werks, Jinali, Taiwan Excellence, Everest, The CyberTech, Parth India, EMS, TP-Link, Hilink Networks, Skywater and so on.

COM-IT Expo 2016 provided a grand networking and marketing platform both for

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Champak Raj Gurjar President, Federation of All India IT Associations (FAIITA)

domestic and international industry players of the IT, Security & Mobile industry that opened up a world of opportunities and business prospects.

Champak Raj Gurjar, President, Federation of All India IT Associations (FAIITA) said, "COM-IT is a global platform for the IT, Security and Mobile industries where innovative solutions find their target customers. This expo plays host to a wide base of vendors who have developed products and technologies beneficial to end-users. COMIT Expo has helped to accelerate growth for many well-established IT firms of Mumbai."

Rushabh Shah, President, TAIT said, "COM-IT is one of the most awaited IT shows in India. Right from inception, it has been regarded as a top quality show to draw leading local and foreign vendors and solution providers. In the past, this platform has been used for a number of product launches and this year too, lots of exciting technologies were on display. The participants found it a very engaging experience as they could address channel partners as well as end-users from a single platform. It is this quality visitor mix which sets us apart."

COM-IT Expo provides a platform to both domestic and international industry players for IT Software, hardware and service solutions and seeks to meet the objectives of generating sustainable growth for the IT sector and create new business and networking opportunities. It emphasizes on IT, Security, Cloud Computing, IT Infrastructure, Web and Mobile solutions, while showcasing new security solutions, mobile apps and software developers more than ever before.

TAIT is a Premier IT Association for the IT Channels in Mumbai and represents the interests of the top 350+ IT companies comprising of resellers, systems & network integrators, distributors, sub distributors & solution providers. n

OPEN YOUR EYES

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Cisco looks up to India with renewed Business interests

n June 2015, when John T Chambers, Chairman and CEO of Cisco visited India, he made a commitment towards manufacturing by investing USD 1.74 billion in the country. The recent announcement of Cisco launching its India manufacturing operations and digital partnership with the government of Maharashtra is in line with that commitment. It can be seen as a crucial step taken to accentuate the Digital India program as also affirming Cisco’s commitment to this market.

As of now, the partnership will enable Cisco to manufacture and roll out a diverse product portfolio in India to support the government’s Make in India initiative.

However, over time, according to Cisco’s CEO, Chuck Robbins, the company wants to build up the capacity of the facility to take up orders to cater to other markets as well.

The manufacturing facility which is likely to come up in Pune is said to produce and ship orders for customers in India as well as take up operations for testing, development, logistics and in-house repair capabilities.

Cisco has been operational in India for the last 21 years and the country has been playing an important role in Cisco’s charted growth.

In these years of operation, Cisco has made 3 big commitments so far. The first was when the company decided to make India its second global headquarters, and Chuck Robbins, who has taken charge last July, feels that it has been one of the best decisions Cisco has taken, considering the talent pool and the engineering expertise available. The second is Cisco’s commitment to align with PM Modi’s Digital India agenda and the third strategic step is that of Cisco’s decision to open a manufacturing hub in Maharashtra. As a

matter of fact, India is one among the many countries (the other being France, Germany, UK, Israel, Mexico) where Cisco is engaged at the head-of-states level to take forward the digital transformation plan in accordance with the vision of the leader of the country.

There is still a lot to be done on part of Cisco before the project gets going and fast track it as per commitments, and not forgetting the challenges that will crop up.

But what needs lauding is Cisco’s growing interest in the market and identifying the business opportunities that can subsequently mean more revenues for the company.

Additionally, Cisco also announced its ongoing commitment to accelerate Digital Maharashtra, including several initiatives to ensure that all of India’s citizens benefit from the power of connectivity. These initiatives include Smart City Solutions in Nagpur: Cisco will roll out Smart City Solutions in Nagpur to enable city-wide network connectivity, smart & secure Wi-Fi hotspots and smart safety & surveillance solutions. The various citizen services enabled by smart cities architecture, like smart transport, solid waste management, smart lighting, environmental sensors, and smart parking, will be integrated on Cisco’s City Digital Platform.

Dharavi eCommerce Hub: At the

The manufacturing facility which is likely to come up in Pune is said to produce and ship orders for customers in India as well as take up operations for testing, development, logistics and in-house repair capabilities.

ceremony, Cisco showcased how it was helping digitize Sri Ganesh Vidya Mandir High School by providing the students with a virtual classroom, digital learning and highly secure Internet connectivity. After school hours, local entrepreneurs and start-ups will be able to use the school as a platform for local innovation and help make Dharavi an e-commerce hub.

Expansion of Cisco Networking Academy Program: The company announced plans to establish up to 25 Cisco Networking Academies to train approximately 10,000 students in Maharashtra by 2020.

Wi-Fi, Smart Education and Smart Healthcare to Digitize Fetri Village: Cisco announced a new initiative to digitize Fetri village in the Kato Tehsil of Nagpur district in Maharashtra. With the intention to build a Digital Village, Cisco will deploy key technologies including Wi-Fi, smart healthcare, and smart education in an upper primary government school in Fetri.

Cisco to Collaborate on Broadband Infrastructure: Cisco will collaborate on the state-wide rollout of broadband infrastructure to accelerate the Digital Maharashtra vision.

The launch of the manufacturing operations took place in the presence of the chief minister of Maharashtra, Devendra Fadnavis; the CEO of the National Institution for Transforming India (NITI) Aayog, Amitabh Kant; Aruna Sundararajan, Secretary, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, government of India; Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins; Irving Tan, senior vice president, Cisco Asia Pacific and Japan; Dinesh Malkani, president, Cisco India & SAARC and Jun Kim, vice president, Cisco Supply Chain Operations. n

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FACE TO FACE

The name to Reckon with in Open Source Incepted in 1993, Red Hat is one of the leaders in the Open Source community that provides an enterprise strength, mission critical software and services in the most important IT areas of Operating Systems, Virtualization, Middleware, Storage, and Cloud Computing.

Rajesh Rege, Managing Director, Red Hat India: For Red Hat, India is an exciting and a great marketplace with lots of opportunities like Smart City, Digital India, Make in India, payment gateways and e commerce. Government is also a big focus area for Red Hat. The company has witnessed a sequential Q-on-Q growth for 58 quarters in a row. A leader in the OS space, We also have a state-of-the-art engineering facility in Bangalore.

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ore than 20 years ago, Red Hat disrupted the enterprise software world with new models for technology and business innovation. Today, Red Hat is the global leader in open source software, credited with bringing open source to the enterprise mainstream and inspiring the continued evolution of open source, which is driving key innovations across the technology landscape, from cloud computing and Linux containers, to mobile, big data, and beyond.

In its 2016 predictions, Deutsche Bank wrote that “open source keeps eating the world,” with “open source rivals for almost every major infrastructure and data management software market.”

Receiving accolades for being the Open Source leader, Red Hat has recently been named to Forbes' “World’s Most Innovative Companies” list. The company was ranked as the 25th most innovative company in the world, marking the company's fourth appearance on the list (2012, 2014, 2015, and 2016). Earlier, Red Hat was named to Forbes' "World's Most Innovative Growth

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Companies" list in 2011.

19% growth in Q2 of fiscal 2017

The company in its Q2 of fiscal year 2017 which ended on August 31, 2016 has witnessed a 19% (in US dollars) year on year growth which brings up its total revenue for the quarter to $600 million. Subscription revenue for the quarter was $531 million, up 20% in U.S. dollars year-over-year. Subscription revenue in the quarter was 89% of total revenue.

The quarter revenue also mentioned 18% in year on year growth in Infrastructure offerings. It also combined with 33% in yearover-year growth for Application development and other emerging technologies.

Explaining the same, Jim Whitehurst, President and Chief Executive Officer of Red Hat said, “Red Hat's second quarter revenue results were highlighted by 18% in year-overyear growth for our Infrastructure offerings, combined with 33% in year-over-year growth for our Application development and other emerging technologies. Digital transformation and hybrid cloud computing are changing how applications are built, deployed and managed.

As organizations adopt agile application development technologies such as Linux containers, they are able to rely on Red Hat as their strategic partner to modernize their

infrastructure and application development platforms.”

Strong demand and overall execution has continued to benefit the company in the second quarter. It also continued to close deals of over $1 million in the quarter. This upholds its customer’s dedication towards the company and the sky rocketing demand for its solutions.

New-generation products

Continuing its leadership in the open source segment and enhancing its product portfolio, Red Hat has announced the general availability of its Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) -powered virtualization platform, Red Hat Virtualization 4. It challenges the economics and complexities of proprietary virtualization solutions by providing a fullyopen, high-performing, more secure and centrally managed platform for both Linux and Windows-based workloads. It combines a powerful updated hypervisor, advanced system dashboard, and centralized networking for users’ evolving workloads.

Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization has also been positioned by Gartner in the “Visionaries” quadrant of the August 2016 x86 Server Virtualization Infrastructure Magic Quadrant. n

Q217 Financial Highlights • •

• • • • • •

Revenue $600 million, up 19% y/y Subscription Revenue $531 million, up 20% y/y

o Infrastructure related: $427 million, up 18% y/y

o App dev related & emerging tech: $104 million, up 33% y/y Subscription Revenue 89% of total revenue Training & Services Revenue $69 million, up 10% y/y Cash & Investments balance: $2.04 billion Repurchased 1.8 million shares of common stock Deferred Revenue $1.68 billion, up 19% y/y Number of deals over $1 million up 60% y/y

This should be read in conjunction with Red Hat’s earnings press release issued on September 21, 2016 as well as Red Hat’s SEC filings found on http://investors.redhat.com

FACE TO FACE

Personalized Printing will drive the Digital Printing market Balaji Rajagopalan, Executive Director, Technology, Channels & International Business - Xerox India in a chat with VARINDIA gives an idea of how the digital printing market in India is growing and Xerox is placed to leverage the growth prospects -

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he overall printing market in India is growing and while the pattern of printing is changing, there is a big expectation that the printing industry will still continue to exist and grow.

In the printing market, digital printing is one segment that has shown strong growth numbers and has evolved over the years. Growth in digital printing is driven by improved levels of service to customers, providing new opportunities to customers and helping them grow significantly. Today, applications and solutions is an essential in this segment. A few of the emerging trends in this segment are personalization, versioning and targeted printing.

“Digital printing is a growing market for us and we have a very strong position in this market segment. We have developed a wide range of products and solutions portfolio for the entry to mid to the high-end segment and are one of the few companies which have such a vast breadth of offerings. If you see our digital presses, they are segmented in a way that customers can pick and choose basis their requirements and the machine can add value to their business rather than being a cost churner,” says Balaji Rajagopalan, Executive Director, Technology, Channels & International Business - Xerox India.

Xerox has recently launched a slew of products like Color C60/C70 with energy saving capacities, Versant 80 and Versant 2100 with banner printing capabilities, ColorPress 1000i with gold and silver ink.

The most recent addition are the iGen 5 press and Impika Inkjet which caters to the demands of the high end segment. All these products can fit in for specific customer requirements like banner printing, book publishing, photo printing etc. and can do wonders for the customers. “This shows our commitment to the market and in 2016, we will further strengthen our product portfolio and bring in innovative solutions to help our customers focus on what matters most – Real Business,” states Balaji.

The launch of the iGen platform back in 2002 had completely changed the outlook of the high-end digital printing market, according to Balaji and now with the iGen 5 press’s outstanding capabilities will surely make a similar impact.

“The iGen family is a key differentiator for us. The machines from this family are feature rich, high on productivity, offer

great color outputs and are one of the most productive digital presses available in the market today. Xerox has always been at the helm of innovation and we continue to understand customer demands and make products tailored to meet those demands; the launch of iGen 5 Press shows our commitment to our customers,” he adds.

Opportunities galore...

Xerox is very committed to the market place and multiple installations of its newly launched devices is proof enough of that.

There is immense potential in the digital printing market led by rise in photoprinting, book publishing, short-run jobs and much more. For instance, the wedding photography industry today is about Rs 1,800 crore business with a demand for 7.5 million wedding photo albums every year in the country. Roughly 21% of the photo products have moved into digital printing, which is a Rs 700 crore market now.

“For photo-printing, our Versant family and iGen 5 are a great fit. They offer great quality of colors which is a clear differentiator in the market place today.

The iGen 5 offers color palates beyond usual CMYK and this is a great feature for customers in this segment,” he explains.

Furthermore, Xerox has successfully concluded with Drupa 2016. “It was a great event and was a great platform to showcase

our devices and solutions.We very recently also launched two new inkjet machines the Xerox Brenva HD Production Inkjet Press and the Xerox Trivor 2400 Inkjet Press and showcased our portfolio of other devices and technology solutions via demos at the event. We expect these machines to be a definite game changer in India,” recalls Balaji.

In 2016, Xerox wants to maximize its business share as much as possible. “Last year was a good year with strong growth numbers and in 2016, we are looking to grow consideration, coverage and our revenue,” he says.

Xerox is present in all categories today and more than 50% of its customers are repeat customers. This is testament to Xerox being strong in customer service and helping customers grow their business.

Some of its key customer segments are photo-printing, publishing, short run and long run jobs.

“Our latest entrant in the Indian market is iGen 5 Press. This machine has the capability to revolutionize the highend digital printing segment. The press is fully customizable to meet page volume, application type and color needs – all while delivering market-leading press uptime.” n Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

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FACE TO FACE

Compuage aims to achieve Rs.7,000Crore revenue and expand reach In a chat with VARINDIA, Atul Mehta, Chairman & MD, Compuage Infocom, has discussed about the low penetration of PCs, focus area in the last financial year, future plans and the success mantra

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hough the IT industry is witnessing slow growth, but there lies a huge potential in the market. Personal Computer (PC) is the core thing around which networking, software, peripherals, etc revolves. But the penetration level of PC is very low which opens a wide market for Compuage Infocom and acts as a huge potential.

“For the last two-and-a-half years, the growth of IT industry has been a little slow, but the potential is immense because the penetration level is quite low in the country. Rather than looking backward, we should look forward to the potential that exists in the industry and in the marketplace. So, I feel that the next five or 10 years should be really promising. Everything starts with Personal Computer (PC), then comes peripherals, networking products, software, etc, but everything revolves around PC which includes laptops and desktops.

From that perspective, the PC penetration level is low. It is low by a double digit. Last year, our PC sales were in the region of 10 million.

There is no doubt that the trend is changing, there are more options of tablets and smartphones are available. But there are a lot of things that a PC can do. It is required for several applications. From that viewpoint, the number of 10 million PCs for 1.2 billion population of India is very low. That itself is a huge opportunity in the market,” asserts Atul Mehta, Chairman & Managing Director, Compuage Infocom.

Business in last two years In FY 2015-16, due to deeper penetration in the market and optimization of opportunities Compuage has witnessed a growth of 31 per cent y-o-y. The company has concentrated in its mobility and Enterprise business segment which has earned numbers.

“Business in the year 2014-15 is flatter for us primarily because of some realignment of our business. But 2015-16 is a very good year and it has grown by 31 per cent. The growth is because we have penetrated the market deeply and we have a lot of product lines where we have optimized the opportunities. One of our product lines is mobility which was very low previously, but our revenue has grown in this segment. Secondly, we have started covering B-, C-, D-, E-class cities at much more depth where more growth was happening than the bigger cities. The third is we grew in the Enterprise space. So these are the three areas that help us grew 31 per cent y-o-y.”

We went aggressive in Enterprise products such as networking, software and security. In mobility, it is smartphones where we grew our business with our existing vendors. We also see a good potential in security business and are focussed on it. It is one of the fastestgrowing areas in the industry,” explains Mehta.

Future Plans Compuage is currently working with more than 10,000 partners and operates from its 41 offices across the country.

“We are working with above 10,000 partners across the country through our 41 offices, 45 warehouses and 51 service centres. We are very broad-based distributor. We have products like components, peripherals, PCs and also have enterprise products like networking, software, etc. We wanted to go broadly in the marketplace mapping the entire market,” describes Mehta.

Talking about the future plans, he revealed that by FY 19 Compuage is aiming to achieve Rs.7,000 crore and in FY 2016-17 it is looking forward to reach the target of Rs.4,000 crore. It also wants to increase the number of partners to 15,000.

“Our plans is to achieve Rs.7,000 crore of revenue through sales representation in 100 cities. Currently, we are covering 55 cities where we have sales representatives. The turnover in FY 2014-15 was approximately Rs.2,400 crore and FY 2015-16 Rs.3,100 crore. In FY

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Message for Partners We are a true Value-Added Distributor and believe to work hand in hand with them and grow in market share and grow in business. We will work jointly with our partners to grow their business which, in turn, will get growth for us. We are not merely a fulfilment distributor. We want to play an active role in sales, marketing and development of partners across India which would in turn help grow business.

2016-17, we are working with a plan of approximately Rs.4,000 crore which is 25 per cent. Our aim of achieving Rs.4,000 crore is ambitious but possible. We have to grow 30 per cent year over year.

We also want to expand our partner base to 15,000 and also cover resellers in 1,000 cities,” adds Mehta.

Success Mantra Compuage follows the key mantra of Speed, Reliability and Value Performance which have taken the company to the doorsteps of success in this industry. Mehta also believes that these three aspects will further take Compage to the next level of success.

“Speed, Reliability and Value Performance are the key mantra of our success. We have to be fast. By reliability, we mean the vendors and partners must have trust in us about our ability and value performance is very important because we have to differentiate us from others in the market. These three factors will take us to the next level that is Rs.7,000 crore. What we have accomplished in the last 29 years, we are going to accomplish in the next 29 months,” concludes Mehta. n

The Leadership at Compuage

Atul H Mehta Chairman & Managing Director

Bhavesh H Mehta COO & Director

Sunil M Mehta Chief Financial Officer

Deepak Karia General Manager – Sales

Vinod Thakkar General Manager – Business

Nehal Sharma Deputy GM – Sales

Shreyas Vyas IT Manager

Sagar Abraham National Service Manager

Dilip Darji Deputy GM – Accounts

Compuage Infocom to be Linksys’ ND for India L

inksys has announced the reappointment of Compuage Infocom Limited as its National Distributor in India.

According to company officials, Compuage Infocom will be the exclusive India distributor for the Linksys range of products which include wireless/Wi-Fi and networking solutions for Consumer and SMB segments.

Headquartered in Mumbai, Compuage Infocom has a pan-India presence with branches across 45 cities and a strong network of more than 10000 partners. Linksys India hopes to strengthen its India presence and reach out to tier 2 and 3 cities apart from major metros through this strategic tie-up.

Linksys current consumer product portfolio in India includes Wireless Routers and Gateways, Wireless Range Extenders, USB Network Adapters, and Networking Accessories. For the Small and Medium Business (SMB) Segment, Linksys India currently offers Switches, VPN Routers, Access Points and Networking Accessories.

Commenting on the tie-up, Altaf Ansari, Country Head, Linksys (India and SAARC) said, “Compuage Infocom has a strong legacy of experience as well as expertise in the IT Distribution sector. We hope to redefine our strategic presence in India through our valuable tie-up withCompuage. Our aim is to achieve greater reach in the India market through our powerful Wireless and Networking solutions catering to Consumer and SMB segments.”

Atul Mehta, Chairman and Managing Director, Compuage Infocom Ltd. said, “We are glad to be on board as the National Distributor for Linksys, a global brand known for quality and excellence in the Wireless and Networking space. With our past experience with Linksys, our expertise in sales and a robust nationwide network, we are confident that we can add value to Linksys brand position in the India market.”

Linksys products will be exclusively distributed in India via Compuage Infocom Ltd from September 2016 onwards.

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Get Lucky this Festive Season!

Come October and we see the festive fever taking over everyone. Induced by discounts and special sales & offers, the festive season for the current year is on and we can see both customers and brands going gaga over it The festive season is something for which the whole of India awaits for shopping. It is also the time when vendors try to build connect with its consumers in a big way. During this period many people generally tend to look forward to make a big purchase as it is considered auspicious. Not only are consumers given compelling choices but also with several discounts, the festive offers become the right time to make the right purchase.

This abundance of offers and discounts drive maximum sales for vendors.

“These festive offers do encourage growth of business resulting in increase in sales and revenue,” agrees Chandrahas Panigrahi, Sr. Director and Consumer Business Head, Acer India. “It is true across many categories as companies make a significant chunk of their yearly revenue during this time.” Acer’s expectations are very high from this quarter as it believes that it has the strongest product portfolio and a host of offers which gives extremely good value on purchase of Acer products.

“It is not only about the positive business

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we do but also the channel relations we build and nurture with our customers and partners during this time which makes this time of the year really special,” Chandrahas adds.

Though purchases are made across product categories, IT and telecom gadgets are something which sells maximum during this time. Consumers

Navin Chawla Chief Operating Officer Lava International Ltd

who used to see the festive season as being an occasion for purchasing a new vehicle or home appliance have grown to consider technology devices as another vital need that must be accounted for. It is also expected that demand for personal technology devices to continue to grow this year as Indian consumer are becoming more tech-savvy and knowledgeable.

SanDisk, a Western Digital Brand runs consumer campaigns every year during the festive season with special offers for consumers pan India. “These festive campaigns are aimed at generating lot of excitement and interest for SanDisk’s wide product range, thus helping consumers to stay connected and enjoy the freedom to capture and share memories without worrying about storage limitations,” tells Jaganathan Chelliah, Marketing Director of SanDisk India Retail, Western Digital Corporation.

LG has the most promising product portfolio this year. A strong product portfolio and impressive retail environment combined with exciting

COVER STORY

Chandrahas Panigrahi Sr. Director and Consumer Business Head Acer India

Niladri Datta Head-Corporate Marketing LG Electronics India

Anil Gupta AVP - India Sales eScan

offers will certainly impress consumers to upgrade this season. “Offering customers compelling choices and exciting deals is LG’s own way of maximizing customer satisfaction. This year festive season brings all the more growth opportunity for brands due to factors like, good monsoon, roll out of 7th pay commission. This year, we are targeting strong 30 percent growth overall as well as across categories,” points out Niladri Datta, Head-Corporate Marketing, LG Electronics India.

Amitabh Tiwari, COO – Sansui too agrees that the festive season will fare out better this year on the back of good monsoon and overall positive consumer sentiments. “Keeping this in mind, we have rolled out exciting customer offers.

We believe this will further strengthen our relation with the customers who will be delighted to bring home our brand during the festivity. The brand is optimistic about this year’s festive season and is targeting 55% sales growth over

the same period last year.”

Sharan Maini, Director - Noble Skiodo feels that TV as a commodity is one of the fast moving goods during the festive season. “We at Noble Skiodo have announced special prices and discounts exclusive to the festive period. We already have rolled out our schemes and singular prices and we already have started seeing traction in the market.”

“HTC is happy to celebrate this

Festive Schemes and Offers

Acer

For this festive season, Acer has announced the special offers on the purchase of its range of Aspire Laptops, 2 in 1, convertibles and Allin-One PCs. On purchase of any of Acer’s range of laptops, notebooks, desktops, consumers can avail the benefit of attractive EMI offers.

Further, Acer is also offering free antivirus and data recovery software. Now customers can also extended warranty on the products by just paying Rs. 499/-. Additionally, consumers planning to purchase a Bluetooth Headset can avail this offer by paying a nominal Rs. 499/- for the trendy headset which is worth Rs. 2999/-.

Fujifilm

Fujifilm has lined up 3 new offers to delight its customers this season - the Mini 8 Bundle Pack priced at INR 8,633/-, Mini 8 Festival Box priced at 9,999/-and the Mini 8 Party Box priced at 12,999/- only. Moreover, customers can avail further discount of up to 30% on these new offerings. The New Instax Combos are available at Flipkart, Snapdeal, Amazon, Naaptol and retail stores.

eScan

eScan offers time-to-time special offers for the end users in terms of extended license period or lucky draw gifts. Keeping that in mind the company will be offering special discounts and offers to end users through its partners. For partner, it has special offers to claim Silver & Gold coins, foreign travels etc are on the anvil. There are also a few surprise offers for partners doing exceptionally well in terms of achieving the targets and making large deals.

Zopo

Zopo has great offers lined up for the end users in ZOPO's first festive season • Zopo Looton Month: It is running a month long contest on Facebook. Users can engage to win merchandise, freebies, IT accessories from power banks, headphones, ZOPO smartphones every week, etc.

• Zopo 365 Days Replacement Warranty: Zopo has a special 365 days handset replacement warranty, under which users would be able to exchange their ZOPO device for a new one in case of a hardware failure.

Zopo is also giving away 'Assured gifts' in the form of a ZOPO kit with every purchase of a phone. The kit would include surprise ZOPO merchandise.

HTC

HTC has launched its festival celebrations with an attractive offer wherein its most popular Flagship device HTC 10 will now be available at a discounted price of Rs. 47,990/-.

Intex

This year, Intex is giving a backpack free on purchase of Intex mobiles worth Rs. 5000 and above. Other than this, it has tied-up with popular apps such as Saavn, Mydala, Nazara, eTravelSmart, Viu, ChillX and TrendMicro to further enhance its connect with the tech savvy youth consumers. It is also providing a pre-bundled offer with all Intex smart phones whereby consumers can enjoy more with Idea 4G LTE and get 1GB free for 3 months. Along with this, get assured gifts - free benefits worth Rs. 1,500 and a chance to win 124 cm (50) LED TV and other exciting gifts. These offers are available on selected models (Aqua Strong 5, Aqua Q7N, Aqua 3G Pro Q, Aqua Joy).

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COVER STORY

Amitabh Tiwari COO - Sansui

Taro Kawano Head-Image Capturing - Fujifilm India

Mehul Jobanputra CEO & Co-Founder - Desidime.com

Festive Schemes and Offers

SanDisk (WD)

SanDisk is running a five month long festive campaign ‘SanDisk Festival Bonanza 504GB’ and offering consumers across India the chance to win 504GB gift hamper worth Rs.22,960 daily on purchase of 32GB capacity and above SanDisk products that has the contest sticker.

One lucky customer stands a chance to win 504GB of SanDisk Gift Hamper daily basis the best entries received. The gift hamper includes one unit each of SanDisk Ultra microSDXC UHS-I Memory card 128GB, SanDisk Connect Wireless Stick 128GB, SanDisk Extreme 500 Portable SSD 120GB and SanDisk Ultra Dual USB Drive 3.0 128GB.

Sansui

Sansui is offering warranty free 5 years on LEDs in the screen size of 32” and above models. Apart from new models of LEDs, Sansui will also be crafting unique product displays at the ground level. Sansui has introduced attractive finance schemes and partner with associates to extend exchange schemes, discounts and other customer benefits.

LG

LG has announced multiple offers on all its products like OLED TVs, Multimedia and Bluetooth speakers, Home Theatre systems, sound bars, water purifiers, washing machines, microwaves, etc. It hopes to encash on the festive season and the tendency of buyers to make purchases during this time of the year.

Noble Skiodo Apart from the Amazon fest, Noble Skiodo is looking at several bundling offers which shall bring an attractive deal for the audience.

Through it, the brand is trying to bring the price brackets to the customers that have never been seen before. Noble Skiodo hopes to reach out to more than 1 million customers during this Diwali season through its very attractive schemes.

Lava

Lava has recently announced the “365 days Screen Replacement” offer ahead of this festive season to add to the joy of celebrations for its consumers across India. As per the offer, on purchase of every LAVA mobile phone – be it feature phone or smartphone, the customers will be eligible to avail a one-time screen replacement within 365 days from the date of purchase.

Canon

Canon takes pride in contributing towards building memories for life. This festive season, It is announcing the special offer of a Moto pulse headset with Canon EOS 1300D or EOS 700D. This offer started on 6th Sep and will be available till Diwali/till stock lasts.

Asus

ASUS has an ‘Incredible Diwali’ where 100 lucky consumers will have the chance to win a 100% cashback voucher on the purchase of a Zenfone 3 from 18th to 22nd October, 2016. In addition, another 100 people will also get the chance to win an ASUS ZenPower.

LeEco

To add a special zing to the festive spirit, LeEco is hosting a #LeEcoFestiveMirfie contest and inviting all smartphone lovers to capture their favourite celebratory mood with a Mirfie (Mirror Selfie) using a LeEco SuperPhone. The contest will run from October 15 till October 28.

Viewsonic

Viewsonic has launched a Gold bonanza festive offer for its valued partners. The tier 3 scheme is to ensure that all stockiest get benefit of demand generation for 24" and above size monitors, who in turn buys from ViewSonic' distributors and can enjoy the demand generation from the reseller and small time dealers from IT market. Eligible tier 3 finch partners of ViewSonic will win two gram gold on every 10 units of ViewSonic 24" & 25" monitors and One gram gold on every 5 units of ViewSonic 27" Monitors.

Lenovo

Lenovo is introducing a first of its kind offer to its customers in which on the purchase of premium Lenovo laptops, customers can avail two years of Accidental Damage Protection (ADP) and two years of additional warranty at no extra cost. Lenovo is providing a host of special offers on its entire range of laptops, All-in-Ones (AIO) and desktops. This Diwali, customers can choose between offers that include additional warranty up to three years, accident protection up to three years and exciting accessories like a hard drive, power bank or gaming gear.

Dell

kicked 2016 off the festive season with exciting offers for consumers on the occasion of Ganesh Chaturthi. It has announced compelling October www.varindia.com 46 Dell offers between August 19 and September 18, 2016 on its range of Vostro notebooks and Inspiron notebooks and desktops.

Jaganathan Chelliah Marketing Director of SanDisk India Retail - Western Digital Corporation

Sanjeev Bhatia Founder & Chairman, Adcom and channel partner - Zopo Mobile India

ongoing festival season with its fans and friends and are proud about the enormous faith & trust that they have on us. We are hoping to reach closer to our consumers through various social media platforms and through our sponsorship as a principal sponsor of Bollywood actor/producer John Abraham’s football franchise North East United FC (NEUFC) at the forthcoming Hero Indian Super League 2016. We recently launched the mid-priced HTC Lifestyle and hope to launch the Pro version soon in the India market,” recalls Faisal Siddiqui, President South Asia – HTC. Being one of the pure play security solution providers, eScan sees a surge in Home and Business segment product sales during this period driven by new laptop, PC and Mobile sales. “As most of the users today are aware of the cyber threats, they prefer to buy an antivirus or mobile security product along with the new device or our partners offering bundled offer give it as a package. We expect this year to be better than last year due to the positive macro sentiments as well as the growing cyber threats,” says Anil Gupta, AVP - India Sales at eScan.

This festive season Fujifilm India has planned to further enhance customer experience with the launch of 3 new Instax Mini 8 Combos - the Mini 8 Bundle Pack, Mini 8 Festival Box and the Mini 8 Party Box. “Whether you want to surprise your loved ones with a combo of Mini 8 camera, fancy stickers and accessories

or capture your festival moments and keep them intact in an album or get your own party started with party props, fancy sling bag and markers, whatever is your requirement Fujifilm has got it for you,” says Taro Kawano, Head-Image Capturing, Fujifilm India.

Swipe Technologies is also very bullish about the festive season with its star series – Elite. “Elite plus has contributed a significant chunk to our turnover during the Big billon days on Flipkart. Festive season is the best time to gift your loved ones and families and there can be no better option than buying something which is pocket friendly but at the same time goes hand in hand with the modern technology,” says Shripal Gandhi Founder and CEO of Swipe Technologies.

Intex is looking forward to offer the best services along with beneficial offers. “We have received a remarkable response on our last offers and schemes.

This festive season, we plan to launch around 7-8 mobile phones and foraying into Smart TVs along with varied range of CDIT products. Other than this we feel that our competitive pricing &offers to the consumers and schemes to the retailers will help us drive higher sales. Like every festive season, our sales are expected go higher because of the attractive offers that we are giving to our customers,” says Keshav Bansal, Director, Intex Technologies.

Sharan Maini Director - Noble Skiodo

Customer Buying Trends…

Faisal Siddiqui President South Asia – HTC

Keshav Bansal Director - Intex Technologies

Companies are expecting the current festive season demand to be subsequently higher than what it was last year as there has been a spurt witnessed in consumer buying recently. Consumer sentiment too is up and buoyant. The latest trend this season is gadgets and smartphones that are one of the hottest picks during the festival time.

“When it comes to the consumer buying journey, we see that consumers these days have turned very smart and have also gone very patient when it comes to cracking the right deal. With heavy Sales and discounts available both offline and online, one shall see consumers involved in extensive research before taking the next step,” asserts Sharan.

“We expect consumers this year to be technologically savvy as Technology is no longer of interest to any particular age group and with growing advancements and innovation the consumer buying trend has also seen a shift,” he continues.

Zopo is expecting a 250- 300% increase in sales in during the festive period. “But we will have to wait, see and analyze the situation,” says Sanjeev Bhatia, Founder & Chairman, Adcom and channel partner for Zopo Mobile in India.

With consumers eyeing more premium products, Sansui observes an upswing in the sales of high end consumer goods.

Also, since there is an expected increase in the prices of LEDs, people will make the most of the festive offers and buy

Shripal Gandhi Founder and CEO - Swipe Technologies

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COVER STORY LEDs before the prices go up, according to Amitabh.

Taro Kawano believes that during this festive season, people are going out of the way to explore gifts that have an impact and are thoughtful, one that will help them in storing the festive moments as a memory. “The customers will be delighted by what Fujifilm has to offer and we have also seen a splurge in the market for instant cameras,” he says. “The Instax Mini 8 Combos are perfect for any occasion be it a Diwali celebration, Birthday Party, Bachelorette Party or any other special occasion for people to enjoy instant photos.”

An Internal Survey conducted by Desidime.com revealed that Gift Cards and Vouchers have been bought more this sale season compared to last year, primarily for the extra discounts they offer. While 55% of sales are happening via App, 7% via site and 37% via Desktop (approx), exclusive products with Flipkart, Amazon & Snapdeal like mobile phones were selling like hot buns on the day when there was a sale on Mobile phones.

“Overall the sentiment was that fewer deals were deep discounted as compare to last couple of years. Consumers are increasingly becoming comfortable ordering online without COD this festive season,” observes Mehul Jobanputra, CEO & Co-Founder - Desidime.com.

The Winner – online vs offline

The gulf between online retail and its brick-and-mortar counterpart is expanding and shopping experience of people is in turn evolving. There is a growing demand for products offline as well as online channels during the festive season. All in all, the major driving factor behind customers going online is the huge discount on offer, free home delivery, cash on delivery, free return – which is as high as one month.

Brands also try to maintain a balance between both the online and offline platforms. Most of them try to fit in both these platforms by making it a part of their uniform retail strategy.

Lava firmly believes in empowering its customers, shareholders and commercial partners so that they can do more and be more. “We have a strong foothold in the offline channel – as we are the only company in the Indian mobile handset industry with a 100% single layer distribution model wherein all distributors are directly managed and controlled by Lava. However, Lava products are also sold via e-commerce portals and the sales from the online channels has shown positive traction,” says Navin Chawla, Chief Operating Officer, Lava International.

“We are exploring various e-commerce platforms and even in the past, we have associated with them regularly. Though, we believe that Indians are more comfortable in buying products after personally experiencing in stores, and hence offline channels cannot

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The Top 4 e-commerce Shopping Extravaganza Call it Big Billion Day or The Great Indian Festival, this is the time when Indian shop the most and taking advantage of it, major e-commerce brands launch their biggest shopping events of the year to leverage the buying sentiments of its consumers. A look at what they have in store this year Amazon: After the Amazon Dussehra sale which was from October 1 to October, the Diwali sale is already around the corner for Amazon lovers. The second wave of Great Indian Festival is scheduled from October 17 to 20. Products under the electronics category will get a huge 55 per cent discount.

Flipkart: Flipkart has announced its app-only Flipkart Big Billion Days that began on October 2, 2016 and ran till October 6, 2016.

The second-edition was held between October 13 and October 17. The Big Billion Days offered discounts across 70+ product segments.

Snapdeal: After the last 5-day sale conducted just a week ago, Snapdeal was back with another sale that started from 12 October through 14 October. Called the Unbox Diwali Sale, Snapdeal offered some big deals offerings with discounts up to a hefty 70 percent.

The sale started with some exciting deals across categories like appliances, electronics, gadgets, mobile phones and even on home furniture and FMCG products.

Shopclues: Shopclues Diwali Sale #ItneKumMein was conducted from 1st Oct to 10th October 2016. Great discounts were offered on almost every products ranging from home appliances to electronic gadgets and home products.

be ignored. However, we ensure you that we will be present on every channel where our consumers are present. We hope to capitalize the festive season in the rural and semi urban markets,” asserts Niladri.

For Intex, 80% of its sales come from offline and remaining from online. “Our growth is majorly driven by the channel strategy. However, to establish brand’s online presence we always look at strategic tie-ups with major online retailers to maintain our visibility in the e-commerce sphere as well,” says Keshav.

Zopo is also doing a reasonable amount of numbers both online & offline. “Although we are present in all tier I, tier II, and some tier iii via e-commerce channels, we are getting a better response from our traditional channel community,” says Sanjeev.

SanDisk views both offline retailers and online e-tailers as important channels for fulfilling the needs of the consumers. “We work closely with our retail partners in geo markets and provide them with necessary training, sales aids and consumer offers to educate and sell to their customers,” states Jaganathan. eScan, on the other hand is more focused with its channel partner network than ecommerce. As its product being a technical product, the users normally buy from a trusted source due to lack of deployment skills or awareness. “Apart from that, our product segment presently contributes less than 5% revenue in ecommerce. Hence, being a channel oriented company we will be more concentrating on the channel side

of the business to reach our vast user base,” says Anil.

Chandrahas believes that both the platforms-Online and offline have their own positives. While already having a robust presence on e-commerce stores, Acer has simultaneously increased its retail stores with over 2000 stores and approximately 100 exclusive Acer stores. “We believe, retail stores give our customers the opportunity to interact with the brand and to get the firsthand experience of the products. As these online and offline platforms continue to coexist, we would also be leveraging both for our ultimate focus of ascertaining convenience for our users,” he explains.

Desidime.com, which is a social online shopping community has helped the merchant partners to sell goods worth over 65 crores in the first 7 days of October and is eyeing a figure of Rs. 350 crores across merchants overall this festive season till December. In its internal survey, Desidime.com found that more than 70% of users have said that they have reduced their frequency of traditional (Offline) shopping due to online Shopping and more than 65% of users said that they have ended up spending more than 50% of their Diwali shopping budgets on online shopping this year. “As far as our prediction goes, online orders from tier 2 & tier 3 cities will increase as compared to previous years for lack of accessibility of brands and increasing trust in online shopping,” points out Mehul. n Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

Movers & Shakers

Vikram K to lead Data Center and Hybrid Cloud at HPE India

Suchita Vishnoi quits Trend Micro, joins Salesforce

Vikram K who was the Director for the server division will now be the leader for Data Center and Hybrid Cloud (DCHC) at HPE India. This would be effective from November 1st.

As per market trends, Hybrid Cloud (which is a combination traditional IT and private Cloud) will dominate the market over the next five years. However, hybrid IT is the new reality for organizations today, and one of the many reasons of its adoption is its combination of legacy IT along with public, private and managed cloud services.

The datacenter space is also very important for HPE. The datacenter market will continue to surge as with demands from different sectors.

This means high growth opportunities for HPE from both Hybrid cloud and datacenter space.

As per her LinkedIn page, Suchita Vishnoi has left Trend Micro to join Salesforce as Director – Marketing (India).

She was serving as Director – Marketing (India & SAARC) at Trend Micro.

At Salesforce, Suchita will lead the marketing function and will sit together with the India and APAC marketing leadership team to drive the next level of growth.

A dynamic marketing personality, Suchita joined Trend Micro in 2009 as a Marketing Manager, before getting elevated as Head – Marketing (India & SAARC) and finally as the Director – Marketing. Prior to Trend Micro, Suchita has had a stint with companies like Netmagic Solutions and Solutions Integrated Marketing Solutions. She had driven Commercial & Channel Marketing for India & the SAARC region while at Trend Micro.

Snapdeal appoints Parul Batra, former Google Global Executive, as Vice President

Quick Heal appoints Vijay Mhaskar as COO

Snapdeal has announced the appointment of Parul Batra as Vice President – Corporate Communications.

At Snapdeal, Parul will anchor the public relations mandate for the company, helping drive the company into its next phase of deeper connect with users, as it focuses on partnering them in their journey to a better life.

Parul said, “I am very excited to join the Snapdeal team, as we embark on this next phase of growth. Snapdeal with its strong customer centric focus and deep understanding of the e-commerce space, is well-poised to discern and serve the real needs of its users. I am thrilled to be part of this once-in-a-lifetime journey.”

Part of the founding team of Google in India, Parul held a wide range of leadership positions with the company.

Veeam ropes in Ashok Acharya as Regional Director for India and SAARC

Veeam Software has appointed Ashok Acharya as the new Regional Director for India and SAARC region. He will be responsible for driving overall business strategy, expanding solutions offerings to existing and new customers and further strengthening the strategic channel partnerships to consolidate growth.

Acharya will be based in Bangalore and will report to Gregg Petersen, Regional Director, Middle East, Africa and SAARC. “Veeam is setting new industry benchmarks through its Availability solution for the Always-On business. Indian organizations need Availability solutions more than ever before to embark on their digital transformation journey,” said Ashok Acharya. “I look forward to further consolidating Veeam’s customers and partner base in India, as well as expanding the company’s operations with new strategic partnerships.”

Quick Heal has appointed Vijay Mhaskar as Chief Operating Officer.Vijay Mhaskar will be providing leadership to Quick Heal and Seqrite (the enterprise security solutions brand by Quick Heal).

He joins Quick Heal from Avaya India. He will be majorly responsible for providing strategic inputs and direction for building the brand, culture and overall business growth.

Commenting on the appointment Kailash Katkar, MD & CEO, Quick Heal Technologies said, “It is a new phase for Quick Heal as a public company. I am confident that Vijay with his illustrious experience and valuable leadership will drive the organization capability to deliver trusted and premier products. I firmly believe that his passion will further strengthen our position as a leading IT security solutions provider.”

Mumbai Mhaskar in past has worked at various strategical positions.

ZTE appoints Sachin Batra as CMO

ZTE has appointed Sachin Batra as the Chief Marketing Officer of ZTE India. He will head both sales and marketing for its smartphone B2C business. Batra comes with a rich and varied experience of over 25 years in the areas of sales & marketing, business development, relationship management and team management.

Batra has previously worked with Ingram Micro and HT Media at lead roles. From important leadership roles in sales & marketing at Swipe Telecom to general management responsibilities at BrightPoint India, Batra has evolved as a respected leader in the telecom industry.

Sachin Batra, CMO, ZTE Mobile Devices, commented upon his appointment, “ZTE is at a unique intersection of evolving customer needs and emerging innovative technologies. I am looking forward to bringing my experience and knowhow to build on the excellent work that has been done by the company in India so far and continue the momentum towards greater heights of growth in the future.”

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events

Taiwan Govt. invites potential Indian companies to participate at COMPUTEX 2017 C

OMPUTEX 2017, which is one of the leading ICT trade shows in the world held by the Taiwan government annually, is scheduled to be held in Taipei between May 30 and June 3 next year. The Taiwan government is inviting technology companies in India to be a part of this COMPUTEX. The officials from the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said that COMPUTEX 2017 will be a great platform for Indian companies, especially start-ups, to showcase their latest innovations and technology. “We take this opportunity to encourage Indian companies to come to Taiwan and participate in COMPUTEX 2017. This will be a great opportunity for the companies, especially start-ups, to display their innovations and also to connect with big names from the global ICT arena,” said Yih-Jyh, Kang, the executive director of Exhibition Department of TAITRA. Keeping in tandem with its record over the years, COMPUTEX 2017 promises to not only showcase the latest trends in technology but also to create a platform that brings together exhibitors and buyers from around the world to generate partnerships and business opportunities that develop the industry. There will also be four featured exhibits areas including InnoVEX, SmarTEX, Gaming & VR, Business Solutions (POS & ERP).

Yih-Jyh, Kang, the executive director of Exhibition Department of TAITRA, comments, “At COMPUTEX 2016, the debut of InnoVEX, an exhibit for innovations

and start-ups, had created new dynamics. We have always tried to re-invent ourselves and will continue to do so. We hope that more and more Indian companies will visit us during next year’s event and showcase their cutting-edge technological products and innovations.”

At COMPUTEX 2016, InnoVEX reflected a hub of innovation and provided a vital international platform matching buyers and resources with global start-ups to achieve endless opportunities and cross border cooperation. SmarTEX, supporting the exhibiting theme of IoT applications, features more than 160 exhibitors displaying

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The Taiwanese firms see potential in the country’s growing gaming market and aims to add value to it through its innovations in the Virtual Reality space. Virtual reality transports gamers to a different environment, creating a new thrill to the gaming experience. the newest in IoT and smart tech applications with emphases on home and entertainment, smart security control, smart car and automotive electronics, wearables and 3D printing. iStyle, featuring Apple MFi certified peripherals and apps.

For years now, Taiwan’s ICT industry has been continuously pushing for innovation, developing local brands and emphasizing technology research and development.

Taiwan’s competitiveness in the ICT industry is drawn from its well-established production pipeline, highly experienced engineers, strong R&D capabilities, and strategic location. Years of developing partnerships with countries worldwide have given ICT vendors the knowhow to meet the needs of a variety of different cultures and markets.

In an effort to further strengthen their presence in India this year, prominent Taiwanese ICT brands have showcased a wide range of products at the COM-IT EXPO 2016. The Taiwan Excellence Pavilion hosted 37 leading Taiwan Excellence Awardwinning products with the theme “Taiwan ICT Technology: Connects You to the World”.

Taiwanese brands are already a part

of the everyday life of Indians. “A recent market research report suggests that Indian enterprises are upbeat about the growing prospects of Information and Communications Technology, which is reflected in their investment strategies. Most IT and ICT strategies revolve around costeffective ways to increase productivity, and Taiwanese ICT brands fit the bill perfectly.

We see this as a promising sign to strengthen our presence in India,” said Michael Lin, Director of the Taipei World Trade Centre Liaison Office in Mumbai.

Taiwanese brands are upbeat, in particular about the market for hardware, security management, and gaming in India.

Hardware and storage devices are popular with various Taiwanese brands having strong presence in India. World leading memory brand ADATA, quality network appliance provider QNAP, power solution provider CyberPower and multi-award winning hardware company GIGABYTE were all on display during the COM-IT Expo.

The Taiwanese firms also see potential in the country’s growing gaming market and aims to add value to it through its innovations in the Virtual Reality space.

Virtual reality transports gamers to a different environment, creating a new thrill to the gaming experience. The Taiwanese brand MSI is set to offer a never-before Virtual Reality experience for Indian gaming enthusiasts alongside its innovative range of gaming laptops.

Taiwan’s participation in the COM-IT EXPO is a part of the Taiwan Industry Image Enhancement Project (IEP) in India, organized

by Taiwan’s Bureau of Foreign Trade (BOFT) of the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA), and implemented by the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA). n

Vivotek intends to transform Indian security ecosystem In a chat with VARINDIA, Sanjeev Gulati, Country Manager – India & SAARC, Vivotek, speaks about the surveillance market landscape, opportunities in the Indian market, strategy and future of the industry

T

he surveillance market in India is slowly and gradually transforming and advancing towards the next phase of growth. A major shift from analog to digital technology is being observed in the industry.

Moreover, increase in the unsocial activities, various government initiatives along with growing awareness among the population are opening wide scopes for the surveillance companies in the Indian market.

Surveillance Market Factors like increasing IP infrastructure, reduction in price and demand for remote access have triggered the shift from traditional analog-based surveillance system to IP-based surveillance in the market. It is expected that IP-based surveillance will grow with higher CAGR than video surveillance.

“The Indian surveillance market is about to set foot in its next phase of growth and transformation. Superseding the yesteryears’ ubiquitous analog-based surveillance systems, the IP surveillance is expected to increase due to increasing IP infrastructure, declining prices and demand for remote access. While the Video surveillance market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 32.49%, the IP-based surveillance systems are expected to grow with relatively higher CAGR of 41.78% in the coming years,” comments Sanjeev Gulati, Country Manager – India & SAARC, Vivotek.

Though the IP-based surveillance market is on the rise, there are factors hindering the growth.

“One of the major challenges that we feel plagues the Indian surveillance market is the absence of a standard agency to certify the products, followed by poor infrastructure in terms of network connectivity and bandwidth.

Adding to the strain are the cumbersome procedures along with consumers betting big on price rather than the quality and features of the product. Apart from these major challenges, their geographical challenges such as extreme weather conditions, geographical spread, storage requirements, etc. Moreover, with a major chunk of the country falling in the rural category limits the requirements of such security solutions owing to the lack of better infrastructure and an understanding

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Sanjeev Gulati Country Manager India & SAARC, Vivotek towards security concerns,” adds Sanjeev.

Opportunities The Indian surveillance market has ample scope of opportunity with the new government initiatives, increase in crimes, remote monitoring, etc.

“At the onset of various government initiatives, those have lots to do with Information Technology – for instance, the Smart City projects and Digital India campaign. India is certainly becoming the nucleus of hackers in the world. Over and above that, spiteful and brutal activities carried out by extremists across the globe, increasing crime rates, data thefts, remote monitoring, growth of public infrastructure, increasing IT spending, government initiatives and increasing security spending poses massive opportunity for the surveillance sector in India,” opines Sanjeev.

Gulati further mentions, “India is on its way to developing 100 ‘Smart Cities’ and with that, security becomes an important aspect to sustain the concept and make it a success. More so because the smart city model will operate on digitized model for information assembly, its storage and distribution. Information system and allied services will be used for communication between surveillance systems, transport sectors, control centres and service providers for providing traffic management, building

management, security services etc. Therefore the surveillance solutions are inevitable and imperative to build a foolproof and allinclusive smart city.”

Strategy With the array of security solutions, Vivotek is looking forward to transform the Indian security landscape.

“We are pioneers in the network camera domain with IT surveillance at the core of our business. Standing tall on these differentiators, we intend to transform the Indian security ecosystem. We have a myriad of security solutions such as products for city surveillance, transportation, toll, banking, retail, hospitality, etc. Furthermore, we also intend to enhance the traffic situation of the country with our various traffic solutions like red light violation, etc which could be of immense help to the pedestrians. It could also help in revenue generation through e-chalan system for traffic police” he adds.

Future of Surveillance Market Vivotek sees an promising future of the surveillance industry with rising security awareness among people, rapid growth in urban population, increasing GDP, etc. These factors will work in favour of the surveillance industry to take to the next level.

“The Indian surveillance market is poised for higher growth in India. The segment has also recorded rapid developments in the past few years bolstered by the increasing incidents of burglary, surging security awareness and technology advances. The non-residential electronic security market in India witnessed fluctuating contributions in terms of revenue.

Nevertheless, the future of the Indian electronic security market is expected to be favourable on account of rapidly-growing urban population, improved residential, commercial and industrial construction and rising GDP of India. The rising awareness about benefits of the electronic security equipment amongst the Tier-I, Tier-II and Tier-III cities of the country will encourage players in the electronic security market to expand their centers across the potential markets in India,” concludes Sanjeev. n Aparna Mullick aparna@varindia.com

VAR ANALYSIS

Why spectrum auction was a failure?

T

he recent spectrum auction was a failure as 60 per cent of airwaves witnessed no bidding and the government collected only 11.6 percent of the total spectrum reserve price of Rs 5.66 lakh crores.

The government sold 965 MHz out of 2,354.75 MHz i.e. only 41 percent of the total spectrum. On the other hand, India’s telecom spectrum auction closed within 5 days and the government collected a total of Rs 65,789.2 crores i.e. 11.62 percent of the total reserve price.

The failure of recent spectrum auction was due to high reserve price for 700 MHz, 700 MHz spectrum band contributing the largest chunk of spectrum where more than seven bands of spectrum (700 MHz, 800 MHz, 900 MHz, 1,800 MHz, 2,100 MHz, 2,300 MHz, and 2,500 MHz) i.e. 32.69 percent of the total spectrum and lukewarm response from operators for 2,300 MHz. Speaking on the spectrum auction, Prashant Singhal, global telecom leader, EY, said, “With 60 per cent airwaves witnessing no bidding, the muted response is indicative of operators’ reluctance to invest heavily at current market prices. The data play is on the rise, and traction in bands vis-a-vis 1,800 MHz, 2,300 MHz, including the under developed 2,500 MHz, which will be used for deployment of 4G; is an indication that operators are filling their network coverage gaps for a wider footprint and augmenting capacities.”

“Intent to increase the 4G play exists, however, current valuations do not justify the expected rate of returns due to which bidding was restricted to very low premiums over base price,” added Singhal.

COAI said that the tepid response to spectrum in 700 MHz is owed to a high reserve price. The lack of enthusiasm was majorly due to its unrealistic pricing, high debt and single-digit growth that the industry is currently reeling under.

Rajan S Mathews, director general, COAI, said, “In fact, the financial strain on the industry and a high reserve price are the major reasons why the 700 MHz band did not attract bidders.”

“We are hopeful the government and the DoT will take cognizance of the role a high reserve price had on bidding, as far as the 700 MHz is concerned, and will recalibrate the price so that spectrum in the band could be put up for auction, maybe two years from now,” added Mathews.

The five-day auction, which made spectrum available in abundance in all spectrum bands has set the stage for the industry to work closely to roll out networks and services that provide best in class services to consumers.

DS Rawat, MD and CEO, Bharti Infratel said, “We believe that this auction will

Spectrum Auction 2016

Source : DoT significantly speed up rollout of mobile broadband in the country, besides adding new technologies to augment capacities to cater to the rapidly rising demand for data services.

Post this auction, we hope to see acceleration of 3G and 4G network rollouts by the telecom players, and at Bharti Infratel we are well positioned to address the demand.”

With the spectrum auction now completing the operators should focus on

rolling out high speed data network so that India can be digitally empowered and consumers can benefit. On the other hand, the government should do a rethink on 700 MHz pricing and also need to closely watch the vendor eco-system for 700 MHz before doing the next spectrum auction. n Pravin Prashant pravin@varindia.com

BINATONE ropes in SUPERTRON as ND

BINATONE has selected SUPERTRON as National Distributor for Wireless & Networking product line.

Binatone design and manufacture Binatone brand of products and is also global licensee manufacture of Motorola and AEG. Rakesh Singh, GM & Head Sales, who is driving this Channel initiative is upbeat on this tie up further commented SUPERTRON is among top 5 national distributor with deep market penetration and credibility of successfully building brands. The channel partners can now have access to BINATONE products through SUPERTRON branches across India and experience the brand that stand for reliability , affordability , and innovation.

Vibhor Agarwal , Director , Sales & Marketing expressed his optimism and sees definite big time mutual growth considering Binatone is already popular brand among ISPs and existing channel networks and with sizeable local business infrastructure , R&D, Pre and post sales support systems all these gives confidence to distributor , channel partners and consumer finally.

Binatone product line includes: Wi-fiRouters , High power multi feature routers, Outdoor AP and CPE, Wi-fi Residential Gateway, Unmanaged and Metro Ethernet switches, Media converters,Ethernet over Coax ( EoC), EPON solution and are available through Supertron branch outlets and through its regional distributors.

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R

How Reliance Jio achieved 16 mn 4G subscribers in 26 days?

eliance Jio Infocomm launched Jio Welcome Offer on Teachers Day i.e. September 5 and within 26 days has created a world record by crossing 16 million subscribers. Jio has achieved this growth faster than any other telecom operator or start up in the world including the likes of Facebook, WhatsApp and Skype.

The big question is how Reliance Jio achieved 16 million 4G subscribers in 26 days i.e. 615,385 subscribers per day or 25,641 subscribers per hour.

Reliance Jioâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 16 million subscribers in 26 days is a remarkable achievement by any standards thanks to viral packaging, excellent pan-India distribution and availability of wide range of 4G handsets in the country.

Viral Packaging: On Teachers Day, Reliance Jio Infocomm commenced digital services with a new offer called as Jio Welcome Offer whereby users had access to unlimited 4G data, voice, video, and messaging services along with full bouquet of Jio applications and content, free of cost up to 31 December 2016.

Chairman of Reliance Industries, Mukesh D Ambani announced that domestic voice calls to any network across the country would be free for Jio subscribers even beyond the Jio Welcome Offer. Domestic roaming services would also not be charged separately and average data prices would be around Rs 50/GB, which would be amongst the lowest in the world.

Jio Welcome Offer started at Rs 19 plan which is valid for a day and offers 300 MB data, all local and STD voice calls free in home and national roaming and free local and national SMS. On the other hand Rs 149 plan is valid for a month and offers 300 MB data and free local call and national SMS. Rs 299 offers 6 GB (2 GB LTE and 4 GB Wi-Fi), Rs 499 offers 12 GB (4 GB LTE and 8 GB Wi-Fi), Rs 999 offers 30 GB (10 GB LTE and 20 GB Wi-Fi), Rs 1,499 offers 60 GB (20 GB LTE and 40 GB Wi-Fi), Rs 2,499 offers 105 GB (35 GB LTE and 70 GB Wi-Fi), Rs 3,999 offers 180 GB (6o GB LTE and 120 GB Wi-Fi) and Rs 4,999 offers 225

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Mukesh D Ambani Chairman, Reliance Industries GB (75 GB LTE and 150 GB). Post expiry Wi-Fi data will be charged at Rs 50 per GB. Free voice, attractive data package and free Jio applications became viral packaging for Reliance Jio right from day one as there was large rush of people pan-India across all distribution networks which led to record addition of subscribers in 26 days.

Excellent Pan-India Distribution: On Teachers Day, Reliance Jio launched panIndia network covering 18,000 cities and towns and over 2 lakh villages. Jioâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s panIndia distribution of SIM and handset was done by Reliance Retail (RRL), a subsidiary of Reliance Industries (RIL) which has grown to 3,383 stores with an area of over 13 million square feet. Reliance Digital has a network of 1,379 stores deployed over 225 cities. Not only this Reliance Retail had over 5 lakh partners which helped in achieving 16 million subscribers in 26 days.

During this period, Reliance Jio also introduced Aadhaar-based paper-less Jio SIM activation across 3,100 cities and towns which helped in streamlining the activation process which was initially chaotic as it enables the customers to complete the SIM activation process in a matter of minutes, with only his/her Aadhaar number.

The Aadhaar process will be extended across the country and fully stabilized for satisfactory on-boarding experience in the next few weeks and will help Reliance Jio

to achieve the magic number of 100 million subscriber mark.

Wide Range of 4G Handsets: Reliance Jio had a wide range of handset brands for Jio Welcome Offer. Reliance Jio tied up with 35 handset brands like: LYF, Alcatel One Touch, ASUS, Celkon, Coolpad, Gionee, HTC, Huawei, Infocus, Intex, Itel, Karbonn, Lava, Le Eco, Lenovo, LG, Micromax, Moto, Nextbit, Obi, OnePlus, Onida, Oppo, Panasonic, Samsung, Samsui, Smartron, Sony, TCL, Videocon, Vivo, Xiaomi, Xolo, Yu and Zen. In toto, 35 handset brands had 322 models which gave customers a wide range of handset to choose. Reliance Retail also introduced a line-up of super affordable 4G LTE smartphones under the LYF brand, starting at Rs 2,999. All this was win-win for Jio Welcome Offer subscribers as they had the option to choose low-end handset to high-end handset depending upon their purchasing power.

If the present trend continues in the coming month with respect to subscriber addition and if the company is able to maintain its quality of voice and data network then there is no looking back for Reliance Jio. The company has to keep on improving on its processes and keep on expanding its network to newer towns and cities as the focus is to cover 90 percent by March 2017. n Pravin Prashant pravin@varindia.com

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Worldwide mobility revenues to reach $1.7 Trillion in 2020

Worldwide mobility revenues are forecast to grow from $1.5 trillion in 2016 to more than $1.7 trillion in 2020, as per IDC. This represents a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 2.2 per cent, or roughly $40 billion in annual revenue gains. Mobility revenues will primarily come from consumer and enterprise

Airtel offers 10 GB free 3G/4G data on purchase of iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus

purchases of hardware (e.g., smartphones, portable PCs and tablets) and services (e.g. connectivity services). However, software revenues will experience double-digit growth over the forecast period as developers race to deliver applications that meet the mobility needs of both groups.

Carrie MacGillivray, Vice-President, Mobility & Internet of Things, said, “By 2020, the software market will increase spend by 15%, driven by mobile application development and mobile security capabilities.”

While more than half of all mobility revenues are generated by consumer spending, a number of industries are making significant investments in mobility products and solutions. The banking industry is leading the way at the worldwide level with mobility investments forecast to surpass $100 billion by 2020.

iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus users can enjoy 10 GB free 3G/4G data per month for one year with any Bharti Airtel Infinity postpaid plan.

The free data benefit will be over and above the plan benefits.

Over the duration of one year, iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus users on Airtel Infinity plans will get additional 120 GB 3G/4G data.

Bharti Airtel has announced that it will offer iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, the best, most advanced iPhone ever, featuring an allnew advanced camera system, dust and water resistant design, stereo speaker system and the A10 Fusion chip which is the most powerful chip on any smartphone while delivering the best battery life ever in an iPhone. Customers can order iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus now and both will be available in retail shops and online at http://www. airtel.in.

Airtel Infinity postpaid plans offer unlimited voice calling – local, STD, and on national roaming – along with bundled 3G/4G data, SMS and free subscription to Wynk Music and Wynk Movies.

“We are delighted to roll out this exciting data offer for our users to allow them to get the most out of the amazing iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus,” said Ajai Puri, director – Operations (India & South Asia), Bharti Airtel.

ZOPO announces 365 Days smartphone replacement warranty

By 2018, 25% of new mobile apps will talk to IoT devices

Zopo Mobile has announced 1 year replacement warranty on all its smartphones from the date of purchase.

The scheme is applicable on all of ZOPO’s smartphone models purchased on or after 1st October, 2016 under specific terms and conditions.

Recognized for its focus on delivering excellent products and ensuring superior customer service, ZOPO Mobiles’ latest scheme will enable customers to replace their faulty devices with a new one within 4-5 days, putting any of their concerns or apprehensions to rest.

Commenting on the scheme, Kevin Xu, founder, ZOPO Mobile said, “We design and develop new features, schemes, etc. everyday just to meet and serve the customer’s need. Similarly, with our latest 1 year replacement warranty scheme, we wish to upgrade our customer service approach, and help maintain our position as a brand that is built on customer satisfaction.”

All ZOPO handsets bought on or after October 1st will be applicable for the 365 day handset replacement warranty. These devices will come under a manufacturer’s warranty for 12 months from the date it was first used on the Zopo network, or the date on which the user received that device, whichever is earlier.

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Gartner predicts that by 2018, 25 percent of new mobile apps will talk to Internet of Things (IoT) devices.

David Willis, Vice President and Distinguished Analyst, Gartner said, “While users are constantly looking for new and compelling app experiences, the importance of apps in delivering services will diminish and the emergence of virtual personal assistants (VPAs) and bots will replace some of the functions performed by apps today. Alternative approaches to interaction and service delivery will arise, and code will move from traditional mobile devices and apps to the cloud.”

“Moreover, the arrival of wearables and bring your own “thing” (such as smart kettles, smart power sockets or smart light bulbs) in the workplace will introduce new interaction techniques and new platforms, diluting the need for specific mobile app experiences,” commented Willis.

“Through 2018, the app will be the preferred mechanism, because it provides a better experience and allows more sophisticated interactions and data analysis, with low-level networking and background processing,” added Willis.

New ways to interact with things will deliver pervasive services, and emerging technologies – such as artificial intelligence, naturallanguage processing and bots integrated into messaging apps, open new opportunities to interact with users seamlessly.

LeEco expands partnerships with Amazon and Snapdeal

LeEco has announced the expansion of its e-commerce partnerships to include Amazon India and Snapdeal as part of its multi-platform strategy for its flagship Le Max2.

Commenting on the partnership, Atul Jain, COO, Smart Electronics Business, LeEco India said, “To ensure that more users have access to our Le Max2, we are delighted to announce our partnership with Amazon India and Snapdeal. Through this move, we now have presence on all major ecommerce platforms in India along with our very own LeMall.com.”

Commenting on the partnership, Arun Srinivasan, category leader – Consumer Electronics, Amazon India, said, “We are happy to partner with LeEco India ahead of the festive season and offer our customers an easy and convenient access to the Le Max2. We are confident that this device will become a popular choice for customers during the festive season.”

Commenting on the partnership, Tony Navin, senior vice president – Partnerships and Strategic Initiatives, Snapdeal said, “We are very glad to partner with LeEco and provide them a platform through which they can reach to a new set of customers for their exciting product range. This coming festive season, we aim to offer our customer with an enhanced shopping experience with a wide variety of products.”

HTC renews partnership with North East United FC

HTC has renewed its association for the third consecutive year as principal sponsor of Bollywood actor/producer John Abraham’s football franchise North East United FC (NEUFC) at the forthcoming Hero Indian Super League 2016.

HTC will occupy the front chest position on the NEUFC Jersey being the principal sponsor of the team that represents the 8 states of North-east India as they enter the championship, which kicks off on 1st October 2016 and will be culminating on 18th December 2016.

Announcing the sponsorship, Faisal Siddiqui, presidentSouth Asia, HTC said, “We at HTC have been committed to the pursuit of brilliance and are excited to renew our association with North East United FC. The India Super League has been successful in capturing the mindshare of the masses in India’s cricket-dominated sports milieu and we are proud to be a part of this initiative to revolutionize Indian football.”

According to John Abraham, Indian actor/producer and owner of North East United FC, “It feels great to have HTC reinforcing their belief in NEUFC by supporting us again this season. I feel a strong connect with the brand’s focus on substance, style and innovation which has enabled it to grow its connect with the youth and I hope we can have a long term association to bring about a resurgence in Indian football.”

LG G5 The new LG G5 comes with a smart modular design and a slideout swappable battery so that you can stay connected at all hours of the day. You can transform your phone into a digital camera or a player in a jiffy. LG G5 is powered with Qualcomm’s brand new and superbly powerful Snapdragon 820 mobile processor and has 4GB of RAM. Constructed from magnesium and finished with a gorgeous matte after touch, the LG G5 is also premium as hell. The matte finish aids grip too. It has a 5.3-inch IPS LCD with a resolution of 2560 x 1440 (554 ppi) that graces the front of the device. Under the hood, the 32GB internal storage comes as standard, but you can upgrade it up to 200GB via a microSD card.

On the camera front, you get a dual-camera setup on the rear (16MP + 8MP) and an 8MP front camera. LG G5 apart from just about every other phone in the market today is unique because of its “modular” design. The idea is that you can rip out the bottom of the device and switch it out with a module of your choice.

There is a camera module that adds better camera controls and aids grip, another adds a higher capacity battery and another improves the audio quality and so on. The G5 weighs 159g and measures in at 149.4 x 73.9 x 7.7mm, making it both smaller and lighter than its predecessor. The 2800mAh battery is removable.

LG G5 Specs & Hardware Android 6.0 Marshmallow with UX 5.0 5.3in Quad HD IPS screen (1440x2560, 554ppi) Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor, quad-core 4GB RAM 32 storage Micro-SD card slot (up to 200GB) Dual-rear cameras (16Mp 78 degree and 8Mp 135 degree) with OIS and laser auto focus 8Mp front camera 11ac dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.2, GPS, NFC, Infrared, fingerprint scanner Cat 9 4G LTE USB Type-C 2800mAh removable battery www.varindia.com October 2016 57 149x74x7.7mm, 159g

VAR MOBILITY

Intex Technologies unveils Aqua Strong 5.1

I

ntex Technologies has announced the launch of Aqua Strong 5.1 smartphone which has been designed to offer its users unmatched

power and performance for everyday use. It is bundled with attractive value-added services and unique features.

The smartphone comes with a big-screen

experience 5.0-inch screen, and 854 X 480 resolution which gives it a stunning display. The screen uses Corning Gorilla Glass 2 which enables improved damage resistance and toughness and is more damage resistant than former glass compositions.

Supported by a 1GB RAM, 8GB ROM and 32GB expandable memory, the 4Genabled smartphone weighs just 150 gms.

“With Aqua Strong 5.1, Intex Technologies has managed to offer not only the best user experience, but also packed in unique features like a superior camera, matrabhasha and popular apps. The use of superior Quad-core processor and chipset gives Aqua Strong 5.1 one of the best gaming experiences in the range,” said Keshav Bansal, Director, Intex Technologies.

Panasonic unveils P77 smartphone

P

anasonic has unveiled its unibody sleek design smartphone – P77 . It is priced at Rs.6990, and will go on sale in India from 20th September’16. The new smartphone comes

with 4G and VoLTE support and will be made available in grey and white colour variants.

The new P77 dual sim

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has a 5-inch HD display with 720 x 1280 pixel resolution. Powering the handset is a 1 GHz Quadcore Processor coupled with 1GB of RAM. It has 8GB of internal storage which can be further expanded up to 32GB via microSD card.

The phone supports 4G VoLTE, dual SIM with 4G/3G and 2G configuration, Wi-Fi Hot Spot, Wi-Fi Direct, Bluetooth and Global Positioning System (A-GPS).

Moreover, it supports FM allowing you to listen to music wherever you go and also comes with a protective screen guard as a free accessory.

The P77 will be available on all Panasonic outlets.

www.varindia.com

Lava boosts Digital India campaign

W

ith an aim to support the Government of India’s initiative to digitally empower people of the country, LAVA has launched its “Captain Series” feature phones.

Multilingual support on both the devices enables users to bridge the language barrier and help in communicating in the language of their choice.

Captain N1 comes with in-built support for three Indian languages – Hindi, Tamil and Telugu, while Captain K1+ supports Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Telugu and Kannada.

Both Captain N1 and Captain K1+ exhibit 4.5cm (1.8”) screen for better viewing along with a 3.5mm audio jack port and wireless FM for a holistic entertainment experience. Both the handsets are equipped with a rear VGA camera, which records video and even allows digital zoom to capture images. Captain N1 and Captain K1+ also have Bluetooth and auto call recording feature.

Gaurav Nigam, Product Head, Lava International, said, “Our Captain series of feature phones celebrate our partnership with Mahendra Singh Dhoni and stand for trust, reliability and performance. We, at Lava, believe in building a truly endearing brand and at the same time offer devices which enhance the overall experience of consumers through technological excellence. We take pride in our commitment of reliability to consumers and we can assure that we take every step to ensure that Lava never lets them down.”

The series comprises the all-new stylish feature phones – Captain N1 and Captain K1+, available at Rs.1, 150/- and Rs.1, 250/-, respectively.

Google introduces Pixel smartphone based on Android The Pixel is powered 7.1 Nougat by a battery that can

G

oogle has announced the launch of Pixel, the first-ever phone made

by Google based on the newest Android

operating system, Android 7.1 Nougat.

Google has used 2.5D Corning Gorilla Glass 4 on the front display and back glass to accent the aerospace grade aluminium body.

The glass on the back features Pixel Imprint, the fingerprint sensor, which is placed on the back of the phone where your finger expects it.

charge up your phone for up to seven hours in just 15 minutes. Pixel smartphones will get software and security

updates as soon as they’re available, directly from Google.

Starting at Rs 57,000, Pixel will be available for pre-order in India starting October 13 on www.flipkart.com and at over 1,000 plus organized and multi-brand retail stores with leading retail partners including Reliance Digital, Croma and Vijay sales among others.

Alcatel OneTouch Unveils PIXI 4 (5)

A

lcatel has announced the launch of its 5-inch PIXI 4, with 4G capable devices which will be available exclusively on Flipkart starting September 20th. The PIXI 4 (5) comes with a comprehensive user experience in design, audio, camera and battery life. PIXI 4, the big brother of the PIXI 3 best-seller, offers clear, sharp shots for the best selfies, along with exclusive Polaroid filters, a powerful music experience with sound backed by Arkamys, and a super slim, seductive design.

Plus, it's powered by a reliable battery, and features fast connectivity, an easy-to-use interface, and quick, responsive performance with the powerful Quad Core 1.0Ghz CPU. PIXI 4 is

the perfect first step in a whole new world.

Commenting on the launch, Praveen Valecha, Regional Director, Alcatel India said, “We are excited

to announce the launch of our Alcatel PIXI 4 (5) for our Indian users. Being the third largest home to smartphone users, India is a critical market for us and we intend to bring cutting edge products to consumers here, who seek power packed design sensibilities of a high-end smartphone at competitive prices.”

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RNI - NO 72399/1999

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

Printing Date 18 & 19

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60 pages including cover

Date of Posting 20 & 21 every month