Indian IT Industry

Rajesh_MR · Post by **Rajesh_MR** » 02 Oct 2008 05:18

SwamyG wrote:Hmmm....so the average aam NRI, after R2I-ing is going to be unemployable? Can't code because too old, can't manage people because never had the experience of managing.

Thats exactly the feeling I got when I started search for R2I 4 years back. Key is to look only for product companies and as always networking helps. Trust me there are enough tech jobs in B'lore just not much talked about as thats not what local folks like.

Nayak · Post by **Nayak** » 02 Oct 2008 09:14

Exclusive: HBOS to axe thousands of jobs and export to India

By Mark Smith 2/10/2008
HBOS (Pic:Getty Images)

HBOS (Pic:Getty Images)

Mortgage giant HBOS is to export thousands of jobs to India, it emerged yesterday as police were called in to investigate the Lloyds TSB merger.

Up to 2,000 IT jobs are expected to go in changes starting next year. sweet

The bombshell comes as MSPs raised concerns over the the proposed £12billion takeover.

Lothian and Borders Police confirmed they are looking into claims bosses breached banking rules.

And it has also emerged that an 11-strong group of HBOS execs this week made a £45,000 trip to India to research the major cost-cutting exercise which unions fear could eventually cost up to 28,000 jobs and the closure of hundreds of branches.

The bosses flew business class and stayed in Bangalore’s five-star Taj West End hotel to attend a series of meetings as they evaluated firms that could take on the IT work.

The no-expense spared trip set the wheels in motion for massive cuts at bases in Edinburgh and Halifax.

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Papers seen by the Mirror detail “outsourcing objectives” drawn up before the Lloyds merger. They include plans to cut IT costs “with offshore delivery... central to this vision”.

An HBOS spokesman said last night: “On a preliminary basis, we have been exploring for some time whether we should extend our use of overseas contracts in the area of software development and applications.”

He said any arrangement would take place only after full consultation with unions Accord and Unite and be phased over two or three years. But this week’s trip to Bangalore proved the plans are already well underway.

The group wined and dined their Indian colleagues at top restaurants as they sought to finalise the deal.

As they chatted over dinner, they casually referred to way HBOS fell under the ownership of Lloyds TSB to avoid bankruptcy as “The Crisis”.

The HBOS bankers had full access to the sumptuous facilities on offer at Bangalore’s finest hotel, used as a weekend spa retreat by the super rich.

The 20-acre complex boasts two swimming pools, tennis courts, three award winning restaurants.

Around 6,000 people are employed in IT at HBOS, around 1,000 in India. The 2,000 jobs expected to go do not include those to be cut in the merger.

Shares in HBOS jumped 20 per cent yesterday after major investor Standard Life Investments threw its weight behind the Lloyds TSB rescue deal.

HBOS ended the day up 25p at 148p. Lloyds TSB’s shares rose 23.5p – more than 10 per cent – to 250p.

How dare the unwashed natives have a 5* hotel !!!!

vipins · Post by **vipins** » 02 Oct 2008 16:45

Axon drops infosys bid in favour of HCL

British consultancy major Axon Group on Thursday decided to go ahead with a 441-million pound acquisition offer from HCL Technologies,
while withdrawing its support to a smaller bid from another Indian IT major Infosys.

CalvinH · Post by **CalvinH** » 02 Oct 2008 19:51

^^ is this final. Since its a public company Infosys can better the Offer and whosoever is chosen needs to meet the shareholders nod...

Anyways this is a big setback to Infosys. This was really somthing the top brass in Infosys was looking forward to. Hope this brings them back to reality as far as accquistions are concerned. They really suck when it comes to it

saumitra_j · Post by **saumitra_j** » 02 Oct 2008 20:15

Anyways this is a big setback to Infosys.

Umm...not too sure as in these days, cash is king and Infy's probably better off this way (keeping cash), although I completely agree that they are very conservative in their approach and M&A is not exactly their forte. IIRC, they had actually lost quite a lot in the .COM boom days through some not so great acquisitions!

CalvinH · Post by **CalvinH** » 03 Oct 2008 00:03

Well its a setback for sure, even with a uncertain business scenerio infy was ready to committ a significant amount of cash reserves for this (More then half) and was looking forward to this merger.

Since this is a cash deal whosoever pays more takes it. I would be interesting to watch if Infy ups the ante or not. (if it doesnt then they have concur with your viewpoint).

Things are changing fast though and holding cash reserves may seem a good option to Infosys too. Criterias behind the decisions made 2 months back may not be valid anymore.

Rishirishi · Post by **Rishirishi** » 06 Oct 2008 20:02

CalvinH wrote:Well its a setback for sure, even with a uncertain business scenerio infy was ready to committ a significant amount of cash reserves for this (More then half) and was looking forward to this merger.

Since this is a cash deal whosoever pays more takes it. I would be interesting to watch if Infy ups the ante or not. (if it doesnt then they have concur with your viewpoint).

Things are changing fast though and holding cash reserves may seem a good option to Infosys too. Criterias behind the decisions made 2 months back may not be valid anymore.

The financial crisis will greatly affect the valuation of companies. In future Infosys can purchase even larger firms.

CalvinH · Post by **CalvinH** » 07 Oct 2008 04:05

Am not so sure about this. 2 Months ago it was a different thing. With real uncertainity around now it would also be prudent to save your reserves for darker days which may be just round the corner.

Still 1.8 Billion USD is lot of money now a days.

sum · Post by **sum** » 09 Oct 2008 14:17

Link

Freescale Getting Out of Mobile Chip Market Amid Financial Troubles
Posted by: Cliff Edwards on October 02

Chipmaker Freescale Semiconductor has had its fill of the mobile-phone chip business.

The privately-held company says in a statement that it is doing the dreaded “sharpening of strategic focus” by looking for a buyer or joint partner in its handset business. The news probably shouldn’t come as a surprise: one of the company’s biggest customers has been its former parent, Motorola. That company’s handset business has fallen on hard times after a series of missteps in product and marketing follow-ons to the hit Razr lineup.

Though a private equity group acquired Freescale in 2006, the company still must report earnings and major changes because of its rating and huge debt overhang. The company’s long-term debt stands at $9.3 billion, while half its $14.6 billion asset base is listed as goodwill and intangibles. As of early July, the company had just $1.2 billion in cash and equivalents.

With the recent economic turmoil and virtual freezing of the credit markets, the company could be hard-pressed to come up with cash to satisfy short-term needs. Chip companies burn through cash at a steady rate; Freescale had just $65 million in free cash flow provided by operations as of July, down sharply from $474 million a quarter earlier.

A source close to the company denied the company is experiencing a cash squeeze and suggested it has an untapped revolving line of credit it could turn to in a dire situation. A company spokesman was not immediately available for comment.

Freescale CEO Rich Beyer has been working to hone the company’s focus since taking the helm six months ago. In June, Freescale spun out a money-losing unit that is developing a new type of memory chip. Beyer has said he would look at all aspects of the operations to focus only on those with the best long-term profit and growth potential.

In seeking to jettison the cellular chip operation, the company is giving up one of its most-known businesses. Despite analyst projections that long-term growth in the cellular industry will be phenomenal as more people in developing company use only mobile devices to communicate, Beyer says now is the time to get out as teh chipmaker focuses on areas where it has leading market share.

“In the cellular handset chipset market, it has become evident that this business needs considerably greater scale in order to achieve a position of market leadership and long-term success,” he said in a statement. “We feel the investment required to achieve that scale by Freescale will be better served extending our product portfolios where we are the leader and expanding our application expertise in sensors, analog, power and multimedia processing.”

The company says it will increase its investments in sensors and other chip technologies used in the automotive sector and consumer networking. Freescale has a leading position in the microcontroller market that has helped improve fuel efficiency and exhaust emissions. Supplying chips into the automotive market could be trying short-term, however, given an increasing drop-off in new car sales.

This means that the entire Blore unit of Freescale is in for uncertainty since Blore is the main area for their mobile division....almost 300 out of the 350 in Blore are of this group!!!

Manu · Post by **Manu** » 09 Oct 2008 16:38

LINK

World Business Briefing | Asia
India: Tata to Buy Citigroup Operations
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
India’s largest outsourcing firm, Tata Consultancy Services, is buying Citigroup’s back-office operations in India for $505 million in cash, the companies said on Wednesday. Citigroup is also giving Tata Consultancy a $2.5 billion, nine-and-a-half-year contract to provide outsourcing services to Citi and its affiliates. Citigroup, suffering from $61 billion in credit-related write-downs, has been trying to sell off noncore assets. Citigroup’s back-office operations have more than 12,000 employees in India and are expected to have revenue of $278 million in 2008.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 09 Oct 2008 17:03

word on the street is infy steadily loses its top jarnails and the rest are fighting for the
loaves of high office. the situation in wipro is said to be better since the owner has
allegedly made it clear yuvraj will be anointed as the next king when the current
king decides to retire.

Muppalla · Post by **Muppalla** » 10 Oct 2008 03:33

Word on the street - The recent spate of resignation of senior executives from Wipro are not really resignations. They were asked to put papers to reduce management on a large scale.

CalvinH · Post by **CalvinH** » 10 Oct 2008 04:14

^ doubt this. At this time making the seasoned senior management go would probably be the last thing in their mind.

For Infosys I dont think it has ever been a single person at the top. The decisions were always joint. They have formed a new council for that now. A single person is the front face always though especially for media.

IMHO Senior Management in Indian IT services companies always have rewarding offers outside waiting for them. The only thing which makes them leave is the stagnation in growth inside.

Nayak · Post by **Nayak** » 10 Oct 2008 09:10

IT cos to keep tabs on techies
clicky
Vikram Sharma
First Published : 08 Oct 2008 04:44:00 AM IST
Last Updated : 08 Oct 2008 10:21:48 AM IST

HYDERABAD: Following a suggestion from intelligence agencies, police in various States, including Andhra Pradesh, are likely to issue fresh circulars to multinational companies asking them to focus not merely on security in and around their firms, but also initiate steps to have an in-house set-up to keep tabs on ‘‘suspicious and changed behaviour’’ among their employees, in particular, on ‘‘abnormally religious’’ staff.

The move comes in the wake of the arrests of several alleged terrorists of the outfit, Indian Mujahideen (IM), who were employed with major MNCs in the country. Top sources told Express that the software firms will be asked to have a separate in-house mechanism to keep a watch on employees.

‘‘We are asking them to focus more on the changed behaviour of their employees like going on long leaves citing religious purposes.We have come across instances wherein the IM modules cited religious reasons for proceeding on leave,’’ police officials said.

In fact, Mohammed Mansoor Asghar Peerbhoy, the key IM member and a software engineer, who was drawing Rs 19 lakh per annum, used to mention his spiritual experiences. The officials have also come out with a new ‘‘formula.’’ They also plan to ask the managements to observe reactions of their employees to news of blasts and arrests of terrorists.

‘‘We have also asked the States to hold meetings with software honchos to discuss these measures,’’ sources said.

I would expect HR to conveniently ignore the applications from the followers of ROP eh!!

Some 'discreet' instructions filtering down the grape-vine indicating the nature of candidates to be recruited will be the trend.

Bwahahaha, this will get all the sekoolarists undies in a tight knot.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 10 Oct 2008 09:15

there will be demands for a quota.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 10 Oct 2008 09:16

in the last few yrs, in most workplaces the ... have succeeded in getting prayer rooms/meeting rooms wherein
they can pray 5 times a day. many have also started keeping long beards.
thats a fact which I am sure most will have noted.

so the entire body of ... are getting more religious or maybe they were like this always but only now
appearing in more numbers at the workplace to be visible to the rest of us?

Nayak · Post by **Nayak** » 10 Oct 2008 09:41

well well well, what do we have here -

The Rajasthan police had earlier detained a software engineer, Rashid Hussain who was working with Infosys for interrogation in connection with the blasts. Though he was later let off with given clean chit,the company refused to retain him and reportedly asked him to turn in his papers.

clicky

Nayak · Post by **Nayak** » 10 Oct 2008 09:47

There was this b@be in infy I knew, she went to haj and came back totally transformed. She managed to warm many beds of different apartments with our esteemed senior staff. Meteoric rise on the corporate 'pole'. Wonder what made her change from a shy demure personality to drop my p@nties for a raise type.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 10 Oct 2008 10:09

19L pa and still such major takleef as to join the IM, send emails from wifi in mumbai.

proves that poverty is not a driver for the hounds unleashed on us. it is a proactive
choice to scythe through and attack the kafir rather than a 'response' to anything.

19L could have bought him a comfortable and respectable middle class lifestyle.

sum · Post by **sum** » 10 Oct 2008 10:18

19L could have bought him a comfortable and respectable middle class lifestyle.

I feel that it was more than sufficient for upper middle class life with ease.....
19L for ~ 8-9 yrs exp is no joke!!!

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 10 Oct 2008 10:19

yep thats definitely in the top5% of pay curve for that level of exp.

nkumar · Post by **nkumar** » 10 Oct 2008 10:29

I have friend of mine who is an economics Prof in massaland, who is left leaning in political views. I have had many times kinda heated debate with her on politics, as my views are rightist. She is very high on secular barometer, as can be judged from the fact that she absolutely hates anything saffron. But to my surprise, the recent bombings and arrest of this Yahoo employee drawing 19 lacs has jolted her. She told me that this is very counter productive for followers of RoP. Even a self confessed leftie like her has confessed that this is going to change her beliefs about IMs. Tide is turning folks and it is irreversible. The more followers of RoP bomb metros, more difficult times they will have.

sum · Post by **sum** » 10 Oct 2008 11:28

Actually, i liked the small little psy-ops of the generally media-unfriendly police of prominently shouting out the extremely high IT-vity salary of the faithfool who was arrested...

This repeated proclaiming of the high salary shuts a lot of mouths and will ensure that stupid arguments like poverty, alienation, discrimination etc causing bombings do not hold...

I expect more and more people to get sick of this aimless bombings and stop sympathizing with their wayward islamic brothers(esp the semi lefties, normal middle class folks and unintended/uninformed CBSE brainwashed secularists(i was one till few years back!!!

)).

fanne · Post by **fanne** » 10 Oct 2008 18:13

Well if the Infy guy from Jaipur has been terminated (after being given clean chit), then it is unfortunate. I guess the example before the RoP follower should be, if you live in peace and above board then lets together enjoy the bounty of India's success, if not then you die.
So unless there were other cases against this guy, he should not have been fired. It looks like more like his collegues taking out khunnas against him, which will now be spun as discrimination.
Thanks,
fanne

Satya_anveshi · Post by **Satya_anveshi** » 11 Oct 2008 21:17

There's some $hitty incident taken place that involves an indian co. I don't know how far its implications will be, especially in the coming testing times. Ofcourse, if the lull here is in recognition of that, then it better be.

sum · Post by **sum** » 11 Oct 2008 21:29

Satya_anveshi wrote:There's some $hitty incident taken place that involves an indian co. I don't know how far its implications will be, especially in the coming testing times. Ofcourse, if the lull here is in recognition of that, then it better be.

Any clues as to what the "incident" is/was?

vera_k · Post by **vera_k** » 11 Oct 2008 22:36

sum wrote:Any clues as to what the "incident" is/was?

May be this one about Satyam.

World Bank Under Cyber Siege in 'Unprecedented Crisis'

Tamang · Post by **Tamang** » 11 Oct 2008 23:27

Satyam banned from offshoring work with World Bank

NEW YORK: Software major Satyam Computer Services has reportedly been banned from doing any off-shore work with the World Bank after forensic experts and bank investigators discovered that spy software was covertly installed on workstations inside the bank's Washington headquarters, allegedly by one or more contractors from Satyam Computer Services.

Avinash R · Post by **Avinash R** » 12 Oct 2008 11:05

Satyam banned from offshoring work with World Bank - According to a FOX News report

A World Bank spokesman, however, rubbished the Fox News story, saying it is riddled with falsehoods and errors.

vishwakarmaa · Post by **vishwakarmaa** » 13 Oct 2008 00:21

There are lot of stupid people who still follow Fox(gutter) news.

Their viewers still think there are WMDs in Iraq and they have right to dictate Iraqis.

Muppalla · Post by **Muppalla** » 13 Oct 2008 18:04

vera_k wrote:
sum wrote:Any clues as to what the "incident" is/was?
May be this one about Satyam.

World Bank Under Cyber Siege in 'Unprecedented Crisis'

The FOX news is BS of purest order. Satyam is definitely out of WB but not for any of above reason.

For those who this will be trouble for Indian companies, Satyam is replaced by Mphasis and TCS (both Indian companies).

Someone form China hacked the WB and FOX puts a theory of the hacking to that of Satyam's exit and sensationize as a ban etc.

Nayak · Post by **Nayak** » 16 Oct 2008 09:52

Some techie in Chennai arrested for sending threatening e-mails to president-tai.

Dood was a code-coolie at Infy. Reports indicate he is a bit mentally unstable.

What happened with Infy's recruitement standards ?

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 16 Oct 2008 10:51

who is president tai?

I dunno whether is the stress cracking people up or people's expectations
are so high these days that the highs and lows are dangerous. these things
were not so common a decade ago. now someone farts and 2 people hang
themselves.

Dileep saar might have some clues...a keen psychologist and "people manager"

http://www.itexaminer.com/satyam-employ ... mself.aspx
Satyam employee kills himself

Police, friends and family clueless

By Harsha Pramod @ Wednesday, October 15, 2008 7:30 AM

A 25-year old techie working with Satyam Computers hanged himself at his residence, reports the Times of India.

Abhay Pratap Singh, who stayed with his colleagues in a serviced apartment in the city, refused to go to office on Monday morning. He asked his friends to leave him alone. His friends found him hanging from the ceiling fan on their return.

Singh had joined Satyam Computers a month back. His brother who also works in Bangalore stays in HSR Layout. He is believed to have spent a happy weakened with his parents, who had come down to the city to be with their sons. However, his parents went to his brother’s house after the weekend.

According to the police, Singh had not left a suicide note. The police informed that they found the family members to be decent and that they couldn’t find any signs of differences between them. The roommates also could not provide any information as Singh did not appear to be depressed. Singh's body was handed over to his parents following a post-mortem.

In another incident, 25-year old Soni, a Nokia employee hanged herself citing harassment by her managers as the cause for her death. However, she wrote three suicide notes, including one for the press. She is believed to have written “Being truthful and honest has cost me my life. I am giving it for a cause. Save working women from humiliation.” Nokia said that the company would provide all assistance for the investigation.

Nayak · Post by **Nayak** » 16 Oct 2008 11:55

Singha wrote:who is president tai?

Errr GD-saar, that is the most respected pratibha-tai.

Dileep · Post by **Dileep** » 16 Oct 2008 12:37

Singha the merciful wrote:Dileep saar might have some clues...a keen psychologist and "people manager"

Wow! Could you print that out, sign it and send me? I want to display it on my door here!!

I used to think I was a "not so bad" manager, but that bubble is shattered by a shishya when we met up in massa. He told me that most of the people thought I was an arrogant SOB! I gave a broadcast "shaap" that each of them to end up managing 50 SOBs like themselves.

I think people are loosing the ability to deal with unpredictabilities. Kids grow up in a secure, predictable environment. You go through life in a streamlined flow. When turbulence comes, you don't know what to do. You haven't understood, or realized the value of life, so you throw it away, like a use&throw equipment.

Not so long ago, if your radio or watch fails, you take it to the repairman, visit him many times to follow up and get it repaired. Today, you throw it out and buy one. People think about life the same way. You don't have the patience and willingness to fix it.

vsudhir · Post by **vsudhir** » 16 Oct 2008 16:28

Not so long ago, if your radio or watch fails, you take it to the repairman, visit him many times to follow up and get it repaired. Today, you throw it out and buy one. People think about life the same way. You don't have the patience and willingness to fix it.

Insightful perspective.

Newbie generation's attitude carries over also to that other great task testing one's patience limits - raising children esp in the first 2 yrs of life. Compared with how my parents' gen handles infants and toddlers, my gen is impatient and cluless, mostly, seems like.

And then there's marriage - oodles of patience and accomodation required etc. Spiking divorce rates could be due to 1000 other reasons but this must be one of them, I'm guessing.

Nayak · Post by **Nayak** » 17 Oct 2008 09:35

I think people are loosing the ability to deal with unpredictabilities. Kids grow up in a secure, predictable environment. You go through life in a streamlined flow. When turbulence comes, you don't know what to do. You haven't understood, or realized the value of life, so you throw it away, like a use&throw equipment.

AoA

That is so true onlee. Instant gratification and 'only-me' pampering has made the brats forget what is to earn through struggle onlee.

This is the age of instant everything.

Avinash R · Post by **Avinash R** » 19 Oct 2008 08:44

U.S. company unveils ‘most powerful’ graphics chip, made in India
http://www.hindu.com/2008/10/19/stories ... 101400.htm

Apple is the first to harness the chip set for its new range of MacBooks

BANGALORE: The mathematics is really quite simple: if a new processor delivers five times the number-crunching power over comparable options, in one-half the size, it is a ten-fold improvement of silicon performance.

U.S.-based visual computing leader NVIDIA claimed this last week, when it unveiled its latest graphical processing platform for portable application. The 54 gigaflops (that is, 54 billion computer operations per second) that the chip delivers makes it the ‘most powerful integrated graphics processor in the market today,’ said its makers.

Indian engineers at the company’s Bangalore-based Research and Development Centre substantially developed the thumb-nail-sized chip. “From designing the chip architecture to translating it into a form that can be handed over to a silicon foundry to fabricate, pretty much all the hardware work was done by our India team,” Sridhar Manthani, Senior Director, told The Hindu. Software support came from the U.S.-based teams.

The GeForce 9400M is a single-chip solution – in an industry in which at least two chips are normally required to do the job. It has16 cores, or computing units, working simultaneously to handle complex challenges posed by customers. Yet, the chip is much less power-hungry than its predecessors – which means users can view a full-length movie in the upcoming High Definition format without having to recharge the batteries of their notebook computers.

Even as the 70-strong group of engineers here worked for over 18 months to deliver the product, potential customers – PC makers – were trying out early samples. And first off the block, with a family of notebook computers fuelled by the 9400M, is Apple which has used it to fuel the new MacBook family, due to be launched in India next week.

pradeepe · Post by **pradeepe** » 19 Oct 2008 09:39

^ big acheivement, but a pony compared to the discrete gfx solutions being executed out of India. What it does is put extra pressure on INTC's India center which has some chipset/gfx operations. Watch for Teraflops of computing power (discrete gfx) coming out of HW companies from India

Folks should give the Radeon 48XX series a test spin and see for themselves.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 21 Oct 2008 00:52

Singha wrote:http://specials.rediff.com/money/2008/jun/20sl1.htm

I am going thru old pages and I am really jealous.. I was one of the first 500 employees in one of the top IT companies (stayed there for 10 yrs) and in those days all we used to do was work hard and is happy to be a techie and contributor ….