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BWI: Grameen Foundation and Microsoft bring Microfinance Leadership Summit on Technology to India

2010-11-16T23:56:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Grameen Foundation
Wednesday, November 17, 2010 01:00 PM IST (07:30 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Information technology, Media & entertainment; Technology
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Grameen Foundation and Microsoft bring Microfinance Leadership Summit on Technology to India
Summit to Focus on Scaling and Transparency of Microfinance Institutions

New Delhi, Delhi, India, Wednesday, November 17, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Grameen Foundation and Microsoft Corp. today announced the India launch of a joint initiative to help accelerate microfinance's impact on poverty alleviation through the strategic use of technology. As part of this collaboration, which was announced during the Microfinance Leadership Summit in New Delhi, India, Microsoft will donate software worth up to US$1million to eligible microfinance NGOs that attended the event. Titled, "Fueling Growth: Strategic Technology for Microfinance," the summit was cosponsored by Grameen Foundation and Microsoft, in partnership with the ACCESS Deveopment Services of India.

The summit brought together executive management teams from more than 50 leading MFIs to provide them with a new framework for strategically adopting and using technology to expand their financial services to more poor households. Through education and mentorship, Microsoft and Grameen Foundation empowered practicioners with the tools to increase their reach, efficiency and transparency in reporting on financial and social performance indicators. Local programs and resources in India will support MFIs in continuing improvements in their technology investments.

During the summit, attendees also received practical advice on how to effectively use technology. Additionally, they explored new tools and systems that are yet to be fully adopted across the microfinance industry, ranging from business intelligence tools, and mobile computing to automated social monitoring and cloud-based banking systems. Equally important, the summit provided MFIs with the opportunity to forge new relationships with industry partners, service providers and funders they need to maximize their success.

"Every nonprofit is faced with the challenge of doing more with less. Technology can help, but NGOs must advance their technological capabilities, and technology providers must ensure that today's innovations are affordable and accessible," commented Vikas Goswami, Director of Corporate Social Responsibility forMicrosoft. "Microsoft meets this challenge in two key ways. First, by donating software to more than 40,000 nonprofits each year, helping them establish stable and secure IT platforms. Second, by working very closely with key partners that can provide domain or technical expertise to the nonprofit community to make that technology as effective as possible. By working closely with Grameen Foundation, we hope to bring the benefits of technology to microfinance institutions around the world."

"Technology is a critical factor in a microfinance institution's ablility to scale and better serve the poor. Microsoft and Grameen Foundation, as catalysts for change, can help microfinance executives leverage new innovations, like cloud computing, and ensure a measureable return on their technology investments," said Matt Duncan, director of market development for Grameen Foundation's Technology for Microfinance initiative. "With India being one of the most dynamic microfinance markets today, we believe it is critical to demonstrate here how technology can dramtically improve the industry's effectiveness in serving more of the world's poor and increasing transparency in reporting on their work."

The Grameen Foundation's Seattle-based Technology Center has been a leader in spearheading innovative technology solutions for the microfinance industry. As part of its Technology for Microfinance initiative, it has developed Mifos (www.mifos.com), an award-winning cloud-based software service for microfinance. In India, Grameen Foundation works with local developers and other implementation partners to support growing demand in that country.

For more information please visit http://microfinanceleadershipsummit.org

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

About Grameen Foundation

Grameen Foundation, a global nonprofit organization, helps the world's poorest people lift themselves out of poverty by providing financing, technology support and management strategies to the local organizations that serve them. It also spearheads technology initiatives that create new microbusiness opportunities for the poor and improve the poor's access to health, agricultural and financial information and other services. Founded in 1997, Grameen Foundation has offices in Washington, DC; Seattle, WA; Colombia; Ghana; Hong Kong; the Philippines; and Uganda. Microfinance pioneer Dr. Muhammad Yunus, founder of Grameen Bank and winner of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, is a founding member of its Board of Directors, and now serves as director emeritus. For more information, please visit www.grameenfoundation.org.

CONTACT DETAILS
Liselle Yorke, Grameen Foundation, 202-628-3560, ext. 128, lyorke@grameenfoundation.org
Meetali Saxena, Genesis PR, +91 (124) 4086662, meetali.saxena@bm.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, MEDIA, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: A Search for a Rural Toilet Design Begins on 19th Nov the World Toilet Day

2010-11-16T23:27:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: FINISH
Wednesday, November 17, 2010 12:30 PM IST (07:00 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Economy, Environment, People, Social issues; Business: Agriculture, Construction, Education & training, Healthcare, biotechnology & pharmaceutical, Household & personal care products & services, Water
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A Search for a Rural Toilet Design Begins on 19th Nov - the World Toilet Day

Delhi, India and France, Netherlands, Wednesday, November 17, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- FINISH is launching an "innovation contest" to create new and improved sanitation systems for rural India, with rewards up to Rs. 620,000 (or 10,000 Euros) is up for grab. The contest is being launched on World Toilet Day - 19th Nov 2010. FINISH will incorporate the best innovations generated by the contest in thousands of toilets being installed in rural India under its programme.

It is often said that Safe Sanitation Systems form the last chapter of human development. 1 in every 4 person in the world does not have access to Sanitation. India is a prime illustration.

Indian Space scientists have put machines on the moon, yet 1 in every 2 Indians does not have access to toilets. Everyday 638 million people or about 50% of the population in India resort to open defecation.

There has been progress, from the "Central Rural Sanitation Programme", which was initiated in 1988 by the Government of India, to the "Total Sanitation Campaign" launched in the year 1999. However, according to the 2010 report by UNICEF, on progress in sanitation coverage, even in 2008, 69% of rural Indian population did not have access to toilets.

All private and public sanitation drives suffer from some common problems.

1. The quality of constructed toilets is very poor due to budgetary or time constraints.

2. Toilet designs are often not appropriate for the targeted ecological terrain.

3. A lack of clearly defined "standards" for toilet design is leading to toilets that pollute the environment.

4. Stakeholders do not have adequate awareness and knowledge of sustainable sanitation models.

The FINISH 'Sanitation Challenge Contest' is a serious attempt to find solutions to some of above problems. FINISH, which stands for Financial INclusion Improves Sanitation and Health, with the help of ideaken.com - a collaborative innovation platform provider and other network partners - WASTE, FIN Trust, Ethos India and the World Toilet Organisation have launched an innovation competition to generate new designs in sanitation systems.

The contest is open to all individuals and institutions. Its objective is to arrive at significant, even revolutionary improvements in toilet design, and safe disposal system, specifically suited to different climatic, soil, water table conditions, which will ensure sustainable and safe management of the human waste. This new toilet design will be used to diffuse 1 million safe toilets in India.

A total reward of Rs. 620,000 (or ? 10,000 (Euros)) is being offered by FINISH organization. This will be distributed as ? 6000 (Euros) for an entirely new system and 4 rewards of ? 1000 (Euros) each for 'component' innovations.

The calendar for the contest is as follows:

- Launch of contest - Nov 19, 2011 to commemorate 'World Toilet Day'.

- Last day of submission of entries - March 1, 2011

- Announcement of Results - March 15, 2011

- Award Ceremony - March 22, 2011 to commemorate 'World Water Day' in New Delhi

Below quotes are captured from people in villages, while conducting a research around the challenges of sanitation in rural India.

"The toilet was abandoned because during the rainy season the toilet got clogged." (This tells us that local conditions should be taken into consideration)

"The 3rd toilet was constructed by the NGO even though 2 unused toilets already stand in the same house." (This tells us that just building toilets won't solve the issue)

You can help too

Please diffuse this news to sources you think can contribute to designing this new sanitation system. (Including but not limited to social media sites, news sources, NGOs, SMEs in Sanitation, WC/ Restroom and waste management areas, and Engineering and Design crowd)

For more details please visit www.ideaken.com/finish

The organizing committee of the FINISH Challenge Contest consists of the following members:

Mr. Sadanand Bhave (Director, FINISH) and Mr. Mukul Singhal (Finance officer, FINISH)

Mr. Valentin Post (Controller/ Senior adviser, WASTE)

Ms. (Dr.) Shyama V. Ramani (Founder-Director FIN & Professor UNU and Maastricht Univ)

Ms. Gita Balakrishnan (Founder-Director, Ethos)

Mr. Madhu Mani (Co-founder and Director, Innovator Engagements, ideaken)

About FINISH

Programme FINISH is being implemented since 2009 by an Indian-Dutch consortium comprising banks, insurance companies and NGOs from the two countries. Its objective is to diffuse 1 million sanitation systems (i.e. toilets) to low income communities in rural India through mobilizing funds from end-user households.

To know more about FINISH, please visit http://www.finishsociety.com

To view the photograph, please click on the link given below:

Image for the Readers
For picture(s)/data to illustrate this release click below:

http://www.BusinessWireIndia.com/attachments/Image of the readers.jpg
Image of the readers.jpg

CONTACT DETAILS
Mr. S.V. Bhave, FINISH, +91 9811036326, sadanand8bhave@yahoo.co.in
Mukul, FINISH, +91 9999015192, csenggmukul@gmail.com

KEYWORDS
ECONOMY, ENVIRONMENT, PEOPLE, SOCIAL, AGRICULTURE, CONSTRUCTION, EDUCATION, HEALTHCARE, HOUSEHOLD, WATER

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BWI: New Key Differ Database Improves Efficiency of Castells Iso-Lok Range of Lockout Tagout Products

2010-11-16T20:35:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Castell
Wednesday, November 17, 2010 10:00 AM IST (04:30 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Heavy industries; Technology; Healthcare
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New Key Differ Database Improves Efficiency of Castell's Iso-Lok Range of Lockout Tagout Products

Mumbai, Maharashtra, India, Wednesday, November 17, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Castell Safety International has launched an improved and more efficient padlock differ recording database for its Iso-Lok range of lockout tagout (LOTO) products.

The Iso-Lok padlock range is designed to uphold the integrity of the user's LOTO safety system by guaranteeing that each padlock on any one site is unique - that each one 'differs' from the others so that it can only be unlocked by the specific key meant for it. This is achieved by supplying each padlock with a distinct barrel which has a differ (key) number associated with that barrel.

Every differ number is stored on the Iso-Lok database, referenced against the customer and the site it was delivered to. This enables the company to very simply and reliably identify differs previously supplied in the past, and therefore prevent any padlock differ duplication.

Iso-Lok is the only company to automatically record differs on a site or company-wide basis rather than just per order, ensuring the validity of and enhancing their customers' safety systems over time. The newly developed database allows the company to process orders more efficiently, trace differs per site more easily, and gather more data more quickly - further improving on the already uniquely beneficial system.

Neal Partridge, Castell's Head of Quality, commented: "The main advantage of this system is that it records the actual operatives and the entries they make into the database, which provides a greater level of verification and validation, and minimises errors. The integrity of this new system has helped to further improve our Quality Assurance process for Iso-Lok padlocks."

About Castell

A subsidiary of Halma p.l.c. with its headquarters in London, UK, Castell Safety International Ltd (www.castell.com) was founded over 85 years ago. It designs and manufactures the world's widest range of industrial safety systems and offers unrivalled experience in trapped key interlocking. The company operates from locations in London (UK), Shanghai (China), Cincinnati (USA) and Cologne (Germany).

About Halma

Halma is an international market leader in safety, health and sensor technology. It is a public company listed on the London Stock Exchange and has over 4000 employees in over 40 subsidiaries worldwide with a total turnover of over US$742m (2009). Halma's subsidiaries make products that protect lives and improve the quality of life for people through innovation in market leading products which make its customers safer, more competitive and more profitable. These subsidiaries are assisting India's economy in areas such as energy, manufacturing, healthcare, water and waste treatment, construction and transport.

Halma recently opened a Hub office in Mumbai. For further news about Halma in India and to subscribe to the Halma India RSS News Feed please visit our blog at: http://halmapr.com/news/india/.

Photo: http://halmapr.com/isolok/iso0110differdatabase.jpg

Castell head office contact details:
Castell Safety International Ltd
The Castell Building, 217 Kingsbury Road
London NW9 9PQ
United Kingdom
Tel: +44 20 8200 1200; Fax: +44 20 8205 0055
E-mail: sales@castell.com
Website: www.castell.com

CONTACT DETAILS
Mr Kuniyur. J. Srinivasan, Country Head & Managing Director, Halma India, +92 (22) 42000700, Srini@halma.com
Damian Corbet, Halma PR Services, +44 20 8511 1821, dcorbet@halmapr.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, HEAVY INDUSTRIES, TECHNOLOGY, HEALTHCARE

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BWI: Wipro Infocrossing to open State-of-the-art Data Center in Cleveland County, NC

2010-11-16T07:31:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: WIPRO
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 08:53 PM IST (03:23 PM GMT)
Editors: Business: Business services, Information technology; Technology
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Wipro Infocrossing to open State-of-the-art Data Center in Cleveland County, NC

Bangalore, Karnataka, India and Leonia, New Jersy, United States, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Infocrossing, a Wipro Company (NYSE: WIT) and a leading provider of IT infrastructure management services, announced today the company has purchased an existing structure in Cleveland County, North Carolina, and will convert the building to a new, state of the art data center to support its growing IT infrastructure business.

Wipro's new data center will be constructed to meet the Uptime Institute's requirements for a Tier III rating, which defines architecture and redundancy requirements to maintain operations in the event of unplanned system failures. Furthermore, the facility will be designed to meet LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) certification. The data center will support all major platforms including mainframe, Windows, Unix, Linux and iSeries, and will house the company's cloud computing services.

"At Wipro Infocrossing, we are always looking for ways to increase the value we deliver to our customers. Our vision for our Cleveland County data center is to not only increase our data center footprint, but build a data center that brings the best infrastructure technology to our clients. Recently, we announced the addition of our new data center in Meerbusch, Germany. Today, we are announcing our plans to build in Cleveland County, NC. Wipro Infocrossing is committed to building localized and global delivery capabilities, something which we, and our customers, believe differentiates us from our competitors," stated Sameer Kishore, President of Wipro Infocrossing.

"Our ever-expanding data center solutions have become a key component for us when competing for large outsourcing engagements. The addition of our state-of-the art CLeveland County data center will enhance our capabilities and capacity, positioning us for greater marketshare" added Martha Bejar, President, Global Sales and Operations, Wipro.

Wipro Infocrossing, has been providing comprehensive IT management solutions for large and mid-size enterprises for more than 25 years, and operates world-class data centers globally. The company has expertise across multiple computing environments and platforms, including mainframes, iSeries, Unix, Windows and Linux servers, and offers an array of delivery models from custom solutions delivered in Infocrossing's data centers, to remote management and cloud computing.

About Wipro

Wipro Technologies, a division of Wipro Limited (NYSE:WIT) is the first PCMM Level 5 and SEI CMM Level 5 certified global IT services organization. Wipro Technologies was recently assessed at Level 5 for CMMI V 1.2 across offshore and onsite development centers. Wipro is one of the largest product engineering and support service providers worldwide. Wipro provides comprehensive research and development services, IT solutions and services, including systems integration, information systems outsourcing, package implementation, software application management, and datacenter managed services to corporations globally.In the Indian market, Wipro is a leader in providing IT solutions and services for the corporate segment in India, offering system integration, network integration, software solutions and IT services.

Wipro also has a strong presence in niche market segments of consumer products and lighting. In the Asia-Pacific and Middle East markets, Wipro provides IT solutions and services for global corporations. Wipro's ADS' are listed on the New York Stock Exchange, and its equity shares are listed in India on the Stock Exchange - Mumbai, and the National Stock Exchange.

For more information, please visit our website at www.wipro.com

About Infocrossing, a Wipro Company

Infocrossing, a Wipro Company, is a provider of selective IT infrastructure, enterprise application and business process outsourcing services delivering the computing platforms and proprietary systems that enable companies, regardless of industry, to process data and share information within their business, and between their customers, suppliers and distribution channels. Leading companies leverage Infocrossing's robust computing infrastructure, skilled technical team, and process-driven operations to reduce costs and improve service delivery by outsourcing the operation of mainframes, mid-range, open system servers, networks and business processes to Infocrossing.

Forward-looking and Cautionary Statements

Certain statements in this release concerning our future growth prospects are forward-looking statements, which involve a number of risks, and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in such forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties relating to these statements include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties regarding fluctuations in our earnings, revenue and profits, our ability to generate and manage growth, intense competition in IT services, our ability to maintain our cost advantage, wage increases in India, our ability to attract and retain highly skilled professionals, time and cost overruns on fixed-price, fixed-time frame contracts, client concentration, restrictions on immigration, our ability to manage our international operations, reduced demand for technology in our key focus areas, disruptions in telecommunication networks, our ability to successfully complete and integrate potential acquisitions, liability for damages on our service contracts, the success of the companies in which we make strategic investments, withdrawal of fiscal governmental incentives, political instability, war, legal restrictions on raising capital or acquiring companies outside India, unauthorized use of our intellectual property, and general economic conditions affecting our business and industry. Additional risks that could affect our future operating results are more fully described in our filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. These filings are available at www.sec.gov. We may, from time to time, make additional written and oral forward-looking statements, including statements contained in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and our reports to shareholders. We do not undertake to update any forward-looking statement that may be made from time to time by us or on our behalf.

Media Contacts:

Wipro Technologies

India:
Radhika Mahadevan
Wipro Technologies
+91- 9945042603
radhika.mahadevan@wipro.com

Purvika Anand
Gutenberg Communications
+91 9901134441
purvika@gutenbergpr.com

US:
Kathleen Ulrich
Wipro Technologies
+1 (732) 509-1337
kathleen.ulrich@wipro.com

Lavanya DJ
Gutenberg Communications
+1 (212).239.8740
lavanya@gutenbergpr.com

UK:
Rahul Kadavakolu
Wipro Technologies
+44 792 020 5496
rahul.kadavakolu@wipro.com

Shalini Siromani
Gutenberg Communications
+44.79.6066.3200
shalini@gutenbergpr.com

KEYWORDS
BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: Silvan to Unveil their New Logo

2010-11-16T03:50:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Silvan Innovation Labs
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 05:15 PM IST (11:45 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Household & personal care products & services, Information technology, Media & entertainment; Technology
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Silvan to Unveil their New Logo
Turnover to increase by 10 crores next year

Bangalore, Karnataka, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Silvan Innovation Labs, A leading IP (Internet Protocol) Video Security and Home Automation Product Company, today unveiled their new logo at a press conference while announcing their investment and strategic growth plans. With the corporate office in Bangalore, Silvan aims to set up offices in New Delhi, Kolkata & Mumbai in the coming months.

The concept of the new logo is infinity. The colour blue in the logo represents technology. So the logo implies intelligent technology plus innovation multiplied to the power of infinity.

Silvan Innovations Labs provides solutions for video surveillance systems using high-end embedded video analytics technology. Silvan has developed key technology components that will deliver Intelligent IP-based distributed video surveillance systems which will provide reliable, always-on surveillance even in the presence of unreliable infrastructure like power and network outages. The intelligence achieved through embedded analytics will be a key and significant differentiator for addressing the heightened and enhanced security requirements of the market.

At the launch, Dr. M. Giridhar Krishna, CEO said, "We are on track to achieve a turnover of Rs 2 Crores in 2010-11 and based on the products that we will be delivering to the market in the next quarter; our revenues are expected touch Rs 12 crores in 2011-12. We are also looking at bringing in investment of the order of Rs 10 crores over the next year to grow our business. And expect to achieve revenues of Rs 50 crores by the year 2014-15".

Avinash K Gautam, VP, Security and Automation Business added on the occasion "We have a strong R&D team with skills in Hardware, Software and Systems. We will continue to build our R&D team in Bangalore but will set up Sales, marketing and Support teams in the NCR, Mumbai and Kolkata in the coming months. We will look at setting up an Office in the US at the appropriate time".

Since its incorporation in June 2008, Silvan has been developing key technology components for IP- based video surveillance and home automation systems, keeping in mind the Indian conditions and the needs of the Indian customer. Silvan management shares a common vision to become a premier player in their industry. Their total commitment to offer overall excellence in providing excellent products combined with first-class service has resulted in their bagging many national and international clients. Silvan has also deployed installation of a IP based Video Surveillance System in several gas outlets of a large gas company in Delhi, a large factory in Bangalore, and several retail outlets.

Home Automation has seen tremendous growth in India. Silvan started working on this business with their SMRUN product from April this year. They are now executing large orders to install SMRUN systems in apartment complexes in Chennai, Delhi and Bangalore. The successful installation in all 3 locations means that Silvan is poised for exponential growth in this business.

Silvan Security is our digital eye where we not only manufacture video surveillance and home automation products, but we also possess the capability to integrate the products with the current system. As Silvan believes in customer satisfaction, we provide customised solutions with our rich experience. With Silvan's smart sync technology, stylize your home and make your life more comfortable with our perfect home automation products".

Silvan aims to be the number one Internet Protocol (IP) Video Surveillance OEM supplier in India and eventually supply to the world market

About Silvan Innovation Labs:

Silvan Innovation Labs is a Bangalore based electronic products and solutions Company that specializes in video surveillance, analytics and home automation solutions. The expertise of Silvan Labs comes from the founding members of the company who are the veterans of the technology industry in India. Equipped with extensive experience in building products in the embedded systems domain involving digital signal processing, video, audio and image processing the company provides a host of services to the private and public sector.

CONTACT DETAILS
Shweta Sarkar Ghosh, brand-comm, +91 9740442026, Shweta@brand-comm.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, HOUSEHOLD, IT, MEDIA, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: Frost & Sullivan to Honor Industrys Top Achievers at 2010 India Excellence in Chemicals, Materials, and Food Awards

2010-11-16T02:45:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Frost & Sullivan
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 03:35 PM IST (10:05 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest, Food & drink; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Chemicals, Media & entertainment
--------------------------------------------------
Frost & Sullivan to Honor Industry's Top Achievers at 2010 India Excellence in Chemicals, Materials, and Food Awards

Mumbai, Maharashtra, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- The Indian Chemicals, Materials, and Food (CMF) Industry is witnessing rapid growth with companies demonstrating best practices in a variety of regional and global markets. To recognize superior planning and execution of product launches, strategic alliances, distribution strategies, technological innovations, customer service, etc., Frost & Sullivan presents the 2010 India Excellence in Chemicals, Materials, and Food Awards on 6th December at Hyatt Regency, Mumbai.

Frost & Sullivan - 2010 India Excellence in Chemicals, Materials, and Food Awards identify and recognize prominent companies in the Chemicals, Materials, and Food Ingredients sectors for their significant contributions in the areas of product and service. These Awards recognize the distinction of products and services with respect to customer value, competence, features and functionality, customer focus, etc, with a host of other crucial factors such as leadership, strategy, growth, innovation, integration, and reliability. The nominees and award recipients have been identified through a diligent process taking into consideration perspectives of customers, experts, and thought leaders within the industry along with Frost & Sullivan's knowledge base.

Speaking on the CMF industry, Mamta Wadhwa, Senior Director - Chemicals, Materials and Food Practice, South Asia and Middle East, Frost & Sullivan, says, "Our best practices research went beyond the top 10 players in the industry and the MNCs to identify mid-sized domestic players who have achieved operational and functional excellence in their own specific fields of business. We came across companies who have demonstrated product leadership positions across the world, some of which are driven by first generation entrepreneurs."

The Voice of Customer Award Series involves a multi-tier process wherein excellence in industry is gauged through ratings provided by end-user companies. The initial stage involves identification of key suppliers; end users of the supplier's products are then interviewed focusing on a sample that accounts for the majority of the total market share.

The next stage of analysis includes a statistical and analytical model wherein a panel of in-house Frost & Sullivan CMF experts examine and compute critical parameters determining product innovation/ quality / customer service for each product category. A rating on these parameters is gathered from respondents on the importance and relevance in the purchasing and decision-making process. The final ratings are averaged across respondents to arrive at a mean score. Suppliers with the highest scores are then nominated for the award and analyzed further to determine the winner.

The jury-based Awards are based on the premise of nominations from industry experts from various sectors of the Chemicals, Materials, and Food Ingredients industry. Further, Frost & Sullivan analysts track company revenues, growth, dynamics, market share, etc. for the nominated companies. Specific criteria are used to ascertain the final competitor ranking in each industry. Post this, final analysis is viewed and then the jury of Industry experts determines awardees.

"Frost & Sullivan Best Practices Awards identify exemplary achievements within a multitude of industries and functional disciplines. The analysis on best practices identifies companies, products, processes, and executives that have achieved excellent performances. This research is an invaluable source to companies for new ideas to improve strategies and processes, which ultimately drive corporate growth," added Mamta Wadhwa.

Beverages and Food World, Chemical weekly, Chemical World, Modern Packaging and Design, Modern Food Processing, and Modern Plastics and Polymers are the honorable Media Partners for the Awards. To know more about this event, please log on to www.frost.com/2010cmfawards

The Award titles to be recognized at Frost & Sullivan 2010 India Excellence in Chemicals, Materials, and Food Awards are:

VOICE OF CUSTOMER AWARDS

PRODUCT EXCELLENCE
Product Excellence in Pharma Additives
Product Excellence in Paint Additives
Product Excellence in Water Treatment Chemicals
Product Excellence in Special-Effect Pigments
Product Excellence in Adhesives (Water Based)
Product Excellence in Coatings
Product Excellence in Polymer Additives
Product Excellence in Process Chemicals
Product Excellence in Specialty/ High Performance Plastics

CUSTOMER SERVICE EXCELLENCE
Customer Service Excellence in Pharma Additives
Customer Service Excellence in Water Treatment Chemicals
Customer Service Excellence in Polymer Additives
Customer Service Excellence in Packaging (Film Convertors)
Customer Service Excellence in Auto Lubricants

PRODUCT AND CUSTOMER SERVICE EXCELLENCE
Product and Customer Service Excellence in Personal Care Additives
Product and Customer Service Excellence in Personal Care Actives

PRODUCT INNOVATION
Product Innovation in Flavors
Product Innovation in Enzymes

PRODUCT QUALITY LEADERSHIP
Product Quality Leadership in Flavors

PRODUCT INNOVATION AND QUALITY EXCELLENCE
Product Innovation and Quality Excellence in Functional Ingredients
Product Innovation and Quality Excellence in Food Additives
Product Innovation and Quality Excellence in Protein Ingredients
Product Innovation and Quality Excellence in Vitamins and Minerals

JURY AWARDS
Ingredient/Product of the Year Award
Green Excellence Award
Excellence in Regulatory Compliance
Best Managed Company of the Year
Emerging Company of the Year

About Frost & Sullivan - "We Accelerate Growth"

Frost & Sullivan, the Growth Partnership Company, enables clients to accelerate growth and achieve best-in-class positions in growth, innovation, and leadership. The company's Growth Partnership Service provides the CEO and the CEO's Growth Team with disciplined research and best practice models to drive the generation, evaluation, and implementation of powerful growth strategies. Frost & Sullivan leverages over 45 years of experience in partnering with Global 1000 companies, emerging businesses, and the investment community from more than 40 offices across six continents. To join our Growth Partnership, please visit http://www.frost.com.

CONTACT DETAILS
Anish Charles Corporate Communications, South Asia, Frost & Sullivan, +91 (22) 40013419, anishc@frost.com
Nimisha Iyer Corporate Communications - South Asia, Middle East, and North Africa, Frost & Sullivan, +91 9820050519, niyer@frost.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, FOOD, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, CHEMICALS, MEDIA

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BWI: Snap Deal Introduces Corporate Gift Vouchers for the Best Experiences for your Employees, Customers and Partners

2010-11-16T01:37:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Snapdeal.com
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 03:00 PM IST (09:30 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest, Entertainment; Business: Accounting & management consultancy services, Business services, Information technology; Technology
--------------------------------------------------
Snap Deal Introduces Corporate Gift Vouchers for the Best Experiences for your Employees, Customers and Partners

New Delhi, Delhi, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- SnapDeal.com, India's largest discount deals site introduces the best gifting voucher options for the corporate world. Available in all categories like restaurants, spas, gyms, movies, apparel & accessories, travel etc, these are the best options that corporates can avail for any of their Employee Rewards & Recognition Programs, Customer acquisitions and Channel Partner incentive events.

According to Mr Kunal Bahl, CEO of Jasper, which is the parent company of SnapDeal.com, "SnapDeal powered corporate gift vouchers provide a cost effective gratification tool for corporate, while ensuring a seamless experience for the recipient, creating a 'wow' impact for them. Complete fulfilment of reward vouchers which includes services such as creative, production, supplier management and also physical mail-outs of the vouchers are managed by SnapDeal in an effective manner."

Leading companies across India across the financial services, telecom, FMCG, media and IT sectors effectively utilize Gift Vouchers powered by SnapDeal on a regular basis. If you are a company looking for an exclusive experience to gift to your employees, customers or business partners, reachout to SnapDeal through http://www.snapdeal.com/info/corporate

About SnapDeal.com

SnapDeal.com has revolutionized online shopping in India and is India's largest group buying site which features attractive 50-80% off deals at an unbeatable price on the best stuff to do, see, eat, and buy in your city. It provides discount vouchers in all the major cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Chandigarh and Jaipur. SnapDeal's philosophy is very simple: we treat our customers the way we like to be treated. SnapDeal has been rated as "The Best Group Buying Site" in India by Hindustan Times. SnapDeal.com is a platform owned by Jasper, a leading marketing technologies company.

CONTACT DETAILS
Moonmoon Thakuria, Value 360 Communications Pvt. Ltd, An Affiliate of Huntsworth, +91 9971221554, moonmoon@value360india.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, ENTERTAINMENT, CONSULTANCY SERVICES, BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: Snap Deal Introduces Corporate Gift Vouchers for the Best Experiences for your Employees, Customers and Partners

2010-11-16T01:36:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Snapdeal.com
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 03:00 PM IST (09:30 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest, Entertainment; Business: Accounting & management consultancy services, Business services, Information technology; Technology
--------------------------------------------------
Snap Deal Introduces Corporate Gift Vouchers for the Best Experiences for your Employees, Customers and Partners

New Delhi, Delhi, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- SnapDeal.com, India's largest discount deals site introduces the best gifting voucher options for the corporate world. Available in all categories like restaurants, spas, gyms, movies, apparel & accessories, travel etc, these are the best options that corporates can avail for any of their Employee Rewards & Recognition Programs, Customer acquisitions and Channel Partner incentive events.

According to Mr Kunal Bahl, CEO of Jasper, which is the parent company of SnapDeal.com, "SnapDeal powered corporate gift vouchers provide a cost effective gratification tool for corporate, while ensuring a seamless experience for the recipient, creating a 'wow' impact for them. Complete fulfilment of reward vouchers which includes services such as creative, production, supplier management and also physical mail-outs of the vouchers are managed by SnapDeal in an effective manner."

Leading companies across India across the financial services, telecom, FMCG, media and IT sectors effectively utilize Gift Vouchers powered by SnapDeal on a regular basis. If you are a company looking for an exclusive experience to gift to your employees, customers or business partners, reachout to SnapDeal through http://www.snapdeal.com/info/corporate

About SnapDeal.com

SnapDeal.com has revolutionized online shopping in India and is India's largest group buying site which features attractive 50-80% off deals at an unbeatable price on the best stuff to do, see, eat, and buy in your city. It provides discount vouchers in all the major cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Chandigarh and Jaipur. SnapDeal's philosophy is very simple: we treat our customers the way we like to be treated. SnapDeal has been rated as "The Best Group Buying Site" in India by Hindustan Times. SnapDeal.com is a platform owned by Jasper, a leading marketing technologies company.

CONTACT DETAILS
Moonmoon Thakuria, Snapdeal.com, +91 9971221554, moonmoon@value360india.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, ENTERTAINMENT, CONSULTANCY SERVICES, BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: Jabra in Exclusive Pact with Redington to Expand in India

2010-11-16T01:14:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Jabra
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 02:32 PM IST (09:02 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Information technology; Technology
--------------------------------------------------
Jabra in Exclusive Pact with Redington to Expand in India
With the New Exclusivity in Partnership, it will Benefit both Consumers and Retailers in India -Products will be made available at Global MSRP and Access to an enhanced, dynamic channel sales support

New Delhi, Delhi, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- An exclusive alliance in mobile-accessory segment is set to take the niche industry by storm.

Jabra, the global leader in hands free solutions, has appointed Redington as their exclusive distributor for Jabra mobile communication devices in India. Redington is the largest end-to-end supply chain management of IT and non-IT products across India, Singapore, Middle East and Africa. This strategic partnership is set to develop and grow Jabra's India's market share in the consumer and retail channels.

Statistics show that India's mobile accessories market is estimated to be around US$300 million for 2010 with a growth of about 20% per annum. Within this, the Bluetooth accessories' market alone is worth about US$45 million.

Mr Jonathan Tang, Managing Director of Jabra said: "India is one of the most important markets for us. We see this exclusive pact with Redington as a synergistic approach to reset and develop India consumer and retail segments. To quote an example of our key growth market- China. Over the last 2 years, owing to exclusive partner and dedicated channel support, market share in China has grown significantly and Jabra stands at No. 2 in the competitive market place. With Jabra's expertise and innovative, exciting product roadmap for 2011, I am confident that we will increase our presence and visibility throughout India."

With significant product innovation and go-to-market advantages over other global and regional brands, Jabra is the undisputed leader in handsfree solution devices. Jabra's vision is to provide a total solution and the best-user experience to the end users with freedom in communicating. At Jabra, there is a coming together of divisions, from Sales to R&D, focusing on optimizing voice communication experience on Jabra's products.

When asked to comment about the exclusive pact, Mr Kasturi Rangan, President, Redington (India) Ltd., also commented: "Bluetooth devices are not looked as mere accessories anymore in India. They are turning out to be lifestyle products with youth exploiting the technology to the core. We believe "Jabra" is a strong brand well represented in both ends of the segment and goes well with our channel for Smart phones and other premium accessories." He added, "With our pan-India presence and retail strength, we are confident of growing Jabra's market share in India."

Redington is also the exclusive distributor for Blackberry smartphones and an authorized distributor for Apple iPods and iMac. Coupled with a strong presence in the Large Format Retail space (LFR), this in a way, gives us more mileage in connecting our customers. The first step of the channel expansion has already taken place, with regional distributors in key metro cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Chennai, being appointed already. The next steps would be to reach out to India's Tier II network in the coming months.

About GN Netcom

Through its Jabra brand, GN Netcom is a world leader in innovative headset solutions. With around 1,000 employees and sales offices around the world, GN Netcom develops and markets a broad range of wireless headsets and speakerphones for mobile users and both wireless and corded headsets for contact centre and office-based users. GN Netcom's business activities also include its original equipment manufacturing (OEM) business. GN Netcom is a subsidiary of GN Store Nord A/S.

Jabra's award-winning headset range features cordless and corded models for every kind of mobile lifestyle, some of its products - the bestselling Bluetooth headsets, the Jabra BT200, the Jabra BT250 and the Jabra BT250v -- the most popular, globally. Jabra products have been consistent in earning top product and design awards, including the CES Innovation, Red Dot Mobile Choice Best Accessory, T3 Gold, and CNET Editor's Choice. For more information on Jabra, please log on to www.jabra.com

About Redington:

Redington provides end-to-end supply chain solutions for global brands in IT and Non-IT verticals in potential geographies of India, Singapore, Middle East and Africa. With a large distribution network and a market penetration of more than 18 countries, the Company is amongst the largest, supply chain solution providers to over 75 leading manufacturers of Information Technology, Telecom, Lifestyle and Consumer Electronics Products, worldwide. The Company also provides warranty and post warranty services. Supported by a wide and well connected distribution network of more than 23,600 channel partners, team of trained and talented workforce and Automated Distribution Centres, Redington has drawn up plans to take its place amongst the key world class, supply chain solution providers. Redington's consolidated revenue for FY 2009-10 is Rs. 13,778.65 Crore (over US$ 3 Billion) and the consolidated net profit for the FY 2009-10 is Rs. 184.33 Crore.. For more information on Redington, go to www.redingtonindia.com

© GN Netcom A/S. All rights reserved. Jabra © is a registered trademark of GN Netcom A/S. All other trademarks included herein are the property of their respective owners. (Design and specifications subject to change without notice)

CONTACT DETAILS
Shachi Verma, Management Associate, IPAN Hill & Knowlton, +91 (11) 42492100/ +91 9654984010, sverma@ipanhillandknowlton.com
Ann Goh, Regional Sales Manager, Jabra APAC, +65 8118 9888, agoh@gn.com
Evelyn Chou, Regional Marketing Manager, APAC, Mobile Business, echou@gn.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Appoints Chirag Jain as Chief Operating Officer

2010-11-16T01:01:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company Limited
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 02:22 PM IST (08:52 AM GMT)
Editors: General: People; Business: Accounting & management consultancy services, Banking & financial services, Business services, Financial Analyst
--------------------------------------------------
Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Appoints Chirag Jain as Chief Operating Officer

New Delhi, Delhi, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company Limited - a joint venture between two of India's largest public sector banks, Canara Bank and Oriental Bank of Commerce, and HSBC Insurance (Asia Pacific) Holdings Limited, announced the appointment of Mr Chirag Jain as the Chief Operating Officer. He succeeds Mr K R Subramanian who played an important role in the tremendous growth and success of the Company and has now moved to an overseas assignment with HSBC Insurance.

Mr Chirag Jain will be a part of the Company's core leadership team at Gurgaon and will head operations and IT.

Mr Jain holds an engineering degree from IIT, Delhi and is an alumnus of IIM, Ahmedabad. He has a rich experience of 16 years in the financial services space including the life insurance sector both in India and abroad. His last assignment was with Commercial International Life Insurance Company, Egypt as Chief Operating Officer.

Speaking on the new appointment, Mr Harpal Karlcut, Chief Executive Officer, Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company, said: "We are delighted to have Chirag on board with us. With his deep understanding of the life insurance sector, outstanding management and operations skills, technology expertise, and record of delivering high-performance results, Chirag will provide appropriate leadership to drive further growth. We look forward to his valuable contribution in taking the Company to greater heights".

About Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company Limited (www.canarahsbclife.com)

Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company Limited was launched in June 2008 and is jointly owned by two of India's largest public sector banks - Canara Bank (holding 51%) and Oriental Bank of Commerce (23%) - and HSBC Insurance (Asia Pacific) Holdings Limited (26%), the Asian insurance arm of one of the world's largest banking and financial services groups - HSBC.

The Company has exclusive access to around 53 million customers and a pan-India network of over 4600 branches of Canara Bank, HSBC and Oriental Bank of Commerce. The formidable distribution strength and in-depth local market knowledge of Canara Bank and Oriental Bank of Commerce coupled with the considerable insurance experience, product range and proven bancassurance capabilities of HSBC make this an unparalleled union of financial strength, expertise and most importantly, trust.

Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company understands that today innovation is a key differentiator. Keeping market and demand forces in mind, the Company currently offers 8 products - 2 unit-linked and 6 traditional. Individual unit-linked products include Grow Smart Plan and Dream Smart Plan and traditional products include Secure Smart Plan, Pure Term Plan and Immediate Pension Plan. Group Products include Group Term Plan, Group Loan Protection Plan and Group Traditional Plan on traditional platform.

The Company currently has 29 offices across the country (in 27 cities) to provide necessary training and coaching support to the bank staff and ongoing service support to over 900 bank branches (with SPs) selling its products in 316 locations. Out of 316 locations, around 80 locations are in semi-urban and rural areas.

To deliver affordable insurance solutions to address the needs of the rural population, the social sector and economically weaker sections of the society, especially those who have none or very little access to organised financial services, the Company tied up with three Rural Regional Banks (RRBs) - Pragathi Gramin Bank in Karnataka, Shreyas Gramin Bank in Uttar Pradesh and South Malabar Gramin Bank in Kerala. Through a strong network of around 790 branches of the three RRBs, Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company will reach out to more than 7 million customers in addition to the existing customer base of 53 million.

The backbone of the Company's operations is a highly IT-enabled business model and policy administration system, including 'E-Application' which has replaced physical application forms required during sales. This has resulted in higher quality and faster policy issuance.

The Company is the fastest Indian life insurance company to cross Rs 500 crore and Rs 1000 crore in weighted premium income till date and it also has the highest average premium per policy in the industry for individual business since launch.

Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company Limited closed FY 2009-10 with Rs 861.3 crore in gross written premiums, recording a growth of 189% over FY 2008-09.

Since launch on June 16, 2008 to October 31, 2010, the Company's business in terms of Gross Written Premium (GWP) stood at Rs 1,887.6 crore and the number of policies sold are 1,93,715.

The Company's total capital base currently stands at Rs 725 crore.

To view the photograph, please click on the link given below:

Chirag Jain
For picture(s)/data to illustrate this release click below:

http://www.BusinessWireIndia.com/attachments/Chirag Jain.jpg
Chirag Jain.jpg

CONTACT DETAILS
Nonika Raj Kumar, Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company Limited, +91 (124) 4535658/ +91 9717882227, nonika.rajkumar@canarahsbclife.in
Garima Arora, IPAN Hill & Knowlton, +91 (11) 42492168/ +91 9891221255, garora@ipanhillandknowlton.com
Komal Kakkar, IPAN Hill & Knowlton, +91 11 42492137/ +91 9810609567, kkakkar@ipanhillandknowlton.com

KEYWORDS
PEOPLE, CONSULTANCY SERVICES, BANKING, BUSINESS SERVICES, Financial Analyst

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BWI: Cisco Appoints New Marketing Head for India & SAARC Region

2010-11-16T00:49:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Cisco
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 02:10 PM IST (08:40 AM GMT)
Editors: General: People; Business: Accounting & management consultancy services, Business services, Information technology; Technology
--------------------------------------------------
Cisco Appoints New Marketing Head for India & SAARC Region
To Focus on Tighter Alignment between Marketing and Business Goals

Bangalore, Karnataka, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Cisco India today announced the appointment of Nand Kishore Badami as senior vice president of marketing for the India and SAARC region. Kishore is an IT industry veteran with over 27 years of experience, and has worked in various organizations both in India and abroad.

As Senior VP of Marketing, Kishore's mandate is to ensure tighter alignment of strategic marketing objectives and outcomes with Cisco India's business plans. He will bear functional responsibility for market management in all segments and lines of businesses, including thought leadership, digital marketing, business analytics, partner marketing, events and solution launches. Additionally, he will focus on demand generation programs to accelerate Cisco's position in the India and SAARC market.

In the past, Kishore has held senior positions with leading IT organizations including HCL Infosystems, Tally Solutions and Citrix Systems. Prior to joining Cisco, he was vice-president of global marketing with Netmagic Solutions.

In his previous roles, Kishore has worked across sales, distribution, channels, strategic alliances, marketing and strategy functions. His broad experience in sales and marketing extends to hardware, software, System Integration (SI), collaboration, virtualization, datacenter and managed services.

Kishore holds a bachelor's degree in Commerce from Bangalore University and a Diploma in Management from Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU). He is also a post graduate in marketing management from IGNOU.

About Cisco Systems

Cisco, (NASDAQ: CSCO), the worldwide leader in networking that transforms how people connect, communicate and collaborate, this year celebrates 25 years of technology innovation, operational excellence and corporate social responsibility. Information about Cisco can be found at http://www.cisco.com. For ongoing news, please go to http://newsroom.cisco.com. Cisco equipment in India is supplied by Cisco Systems International BV, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cisco Systems, Inc.

Cisco, the Cisco logo and Cisco Systems are registered trademarks or trademarks of Cisco Systems, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and certain other countries. All other trademarks mentioned in this document are the property of their respective owners. The use of the word partner does not imply a partnership relationship between Cisco and any other company. This document is Cisco Public Information.

CONTACT DETAILS
Varghese Thomas, Cisco, +91 (80) 41593226, vmthomas@cisco.com
Rajashree Joshi, Text 100, +91 9663330702, rajashree.joshi@text100.co.in
Neethu Mathews, Text 100, +91 9986863714, neethu.mathews@text100.co.in

KEYWORDS
PEOPLE, CONSULTANCY SERVICES, BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: Max New York Life Insurance Announces Winners of 3,292 Igenius Scholarships Worth Rs 2 crore

2010-11-15T22:52:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Max New York Life Insurance
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 11:50 AM IST (06:20 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Banking & financial services, Business services, Education & training
--------------------------------------------------
Max New York Life Insurance Announces Winners of 3,292 Igenius Scholarships Worth Rs 2 crore
Winners in Two Categories get a Mega Scholarship of Rs 20 lakh each

New Delhi, Delhi, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Max New York Life Insurance, one of India's leading life insurance companies, announced the first igenius Scholarship awards. After a tie in the senior category, Siddharth Yadav from Bulandsheher and Nityashree Ramakrishna from Bangalore shared the prize money of Rs. 20 lakhs with Rs. 10 lakh each. Shruti Bhardwaj from Delhi won the highest prize of Rs 20 lakh in the junior category. A unique, first-of-its-kind initiative from a leading Corporate in India, igenius rewards children with brilliance in both academics and extra-curricular activities to promote all-round development in the child.

Speaking at a glittering award ceremony, Rajesh Sud, CEO & Managing Director, Max New York Life, "This is a proud moment for me as Max New York Life successfully completes the first Igenius Scholarship programme. I would like to congratulate all the winners today." He further added, "Extensive consumer researches indicate a behavioural change in parents as they explore multiple avenues to facilitate all round development in their children and encourage career streams beyond the conventional options. The Igenius programme was conceived as a key platform to engage beyond business with the parent community to understand their parenting needs and promote all round development for their children. I take this opportunity to reiterate our commitment to the Igenius programme. Max New York Life Insurance will continue to look at innovative engagement programmes to increasingly understand and support the financial and parenting needs of young Indians."

Over 10 lakh children from over 500 cities enrolled in the igenius scholarship programme. Participants in 2 categories, Juniors (Classes 3-5) and Seniors (Classes 6-8), were evaluated through a 4 stage process spread over 10 months. In addition to their performance in tests that evaluated their all round skills, the 3rd stage of the scholarship programme entailed a live interaction with a jury through video conference. 52 shortlisted candidated from this stage underwent the final evaluation at Siri Fort in New Delhi in front of a live audience from which 2 children walked away with the top honours of scholarships worth Rs 20 Lacs each. The rest of the 50 participants received scholarships worth Rs 1 Lac each. The eminent jury who have evaluated these participants at various stages comprised of Derek O'Brien, Niel O'Brien, Palash Sen and Ruskin Bond.

Anisha Motwani, Director & Chief Marketing Officer, "We are overwhelmed at the response to the Igenius Scholarship programme. The quality of talent has been phenomenal and is indicative of the huge potential in children today. Several initiatives like the Igenius Photography Contest and the Igenius Sports Contest have helped us reach out to children across the country since the launch of Igenius. Our offline initiatives are complemented by a huge parent community of over 15,000 Igenius members on Facebook who engage on an ongoing basis on various parenting discussions. The success of the Igenius Scholarship programme and the popularity of the Igenius Facebook initiative is a testimony of our belief that young parents are increasing looking to promote multi-dimensional development beyond academics for their children."

WINNERS:

CATEGORY I (CLASS III-V)
NAME, CLASS, AGE, CITY

CATEGORY II (CLASS VI-VIII)
NAME, CLASS, AGE, CITY

About I Genius:

I Genius is a multi-faceted program with different aspects of it:

Igenius Scholarship - The Igenius scholarship program provides a platform to the kids to be all rounders and discover as well as groom their talents. The scholarship program through 4 stage process evaluated participating children. Children from the 3rd to the 8th standard participated in this program and won 3,292 scholarships worth Rs. 2 crores.

I Genius Parenting - This initiative entails creating social media group through new age medium and sponsoring sections pertaining to raising children in relevant websites and feature articles from renowned personalities on subjects such as Parental Dilemmas, Speech, Language and Hearing, Sibling Relationship etc. On ground parenting workshops also facilitate ongoing interactions and discussion on various child development issues and patental concerns.

I Genius Talent - This programme has been designed with the intention to nurture talent in extra-curricular activities with the aim of giving India, international quality multi-faceted talent in various art forms and sports.

About Max New York Life Insurance Co. Ltd. (www.maxnewyorklife.com)

Max New York Life Insurance Company Ltd. is a joint venture between Max India Ltd., one of India's leading multi-business corporations and New York Life International, the international arm of New York Life, a Fortune 100 company. Max New York Life Insurance, incorporated in 2000, is one of India's leading private life insurance companies. The company offers both individual and group life insurance solutions. It has established a wide distribution network across India. Through its wide network of highly competent life insurance agent advisors and flexible product solutions, Max New York life Insurance is creating a partnership for life with its customers in India to facilitate them to achieve more.

To view the Finalist and photograph, please click on the links given below:

2-Left_to_right_-Winners - Siddhartha Yadav,Nityashree Ramakrishna and Shruti Bhardwaj with Mr. Rajesh Sud, MD & CEO, Max New York Life

Finalist
For picture(s)/data to illustrate this release click below:

http://www.BusinessWireIndia.com/attachments/1(15).JPG
1(15).JPG
http://www.BusinessWireIndia.com/attachments/Finalists.doc
Finalists.doc

CONTACT DETAILS
Arpan Basu, Max New York Life Insurance, +91 9818083556, Arpan.basu@maxnewyorklife.com
Bhaswati Chakravorty, Max New York Life Insurance, +91 9650060929, bhaswati.chakravoty@maxnewyorklife.com
Garima Arora, IPAN Hill & Knowlton, +91 9891221255, garora@ipanhillandknowlton.com
Komal Kakkar, IPAN Hill & Knowlton, +91 9810609567, kkakkar@ipanhillandknowlton.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, BANKING, BUSINESS SERVICES, EDUCATION

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BWI: MAAC to present The Seventh Annual 24FPS Awards 2010

2010-11-15T22:17:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics (MAAC)
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 11:35 AM IST (06:05 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest, Entertainment; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Education & training, Information technology, Media & entertainment; Technology
--------------------------------------------------
MAAC to present 'The Seventh Annual 24FPS Awards 2010'

Mumbai, Maharashtra, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics (MAAC) - leader in 3D Animation and VFX training has announced to host the 7th - 24 FPS Awards 2010FPS Awards 2010, India's most coveted biggest animation awards on 19th November 2010 to be held at SRPF grounds in Goregaon, Mumbai.

With over 600 entries from countries like China, France, Germany and the US and over 3000 animation enthusiasts expected to attend, the event is looking to get bigger and will have more professionals than ever before. The jury of 24FPS 2010 consists of more than 38 industry stalwarts from across the world.

Over the last seven years, this event has gained momentous support from the global animation and fraternity and has been a key driver and promoter of fresh animation talent in the country.

Enthralled about the forthcoming awards, Mr. Ram Warrier, Business Head, MAAC said "Our films this year are based on the theme 'Human Values' and we have introduced International Awards category in which we got a very good response from countries like France, Germany, U.K, USA, China and Pakistan. At the same time the response from all the respected academies and studios from India is far more aggressive than last year."

"24FPS has turned to an international scale with respect participation, quality, enthusiasm and the celebration and Aptech has extended its full support for the same. The participation response has gone up much higher as compared to the last year. We have got a fantastic response from academies, colleges, universities, individual professionals and all the reputed studios across the world," added Ram Warrier.

Mr. Ninad Karpe, CEO & MD Aptech Ltd. "While the animation industry is gaining prominence, awards like 24FPS Awards will bring to light some of the best work that this industry has projected in the last few years. We are pleased to present the 24FPS Awards which we feel will further spur the growth of the global animation industry."

This event gives youngsters the opportunity to get assessed by veterans and better understand industry demands. This year the awards will be hosted by Roshni Chopra and the show include performances by India's Got Talent 2009 Winner Prince Dance Group, Kapil Sharma, renowned comedian from Comedy Circus, and dance performances by Prachi Desai.

Some of the eminent jury members include Shelley Page from Dreamworks, Shesha Prasad from Rhythm & Hues, Virendra Chauhan from Paprikaas Interactive, Merzin Tavaria from Prime Focus Ltd, Viral Thakkar from Pixion amongst other industry stalwarts.

Log on to www.facebook.com/maacindia to cast your vote for the 24FPS Viewers Choice Awards, click the "Like" option under your favourite animation movie. If your voted film wins the " 24FPS Award" you get a chance to win fabulous prizes!

You can also watch the complete preview of all the nominated entries on http://www.youtube.com/maacindia.

About MAAC:

Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics (MAAC) is India's leading educator in high-end 3D Animation and Visual Effects. Founded in 2001 & recently acquired by Aptech Ltd, MAAC has trained over 30000 students across the country. It has over 70 centers with cutting-edge infrastructure in over 40 cities.

MAAC offers industry relevant Diploma courses on 3D Animation & Visual Effects validated by the University of Cambridge International Examinations & Degree courses in association with IGNOU. It offers Real-life training environment to the students backed by an excellent faculty, infrastructure, and the latest technical educational tools.

MAAC's students are placed as Modeling Artists, Lighting Artist, Render Artist, Character Animator, Layout Artist , Digital Sculptor, Rigging Artist, FX Artist, Roto Artist, Match Mover, Video Editor, Motion Graphics Artist, Compositors, Visualizes, Content Developers and Pre and Post Production executives in blue chip animation studios and entertainment companies like Prime Focus, Rhythm & Hues Studios, Crest Animation Studios, BIG Animation, Cornershop, EFX, Toonz Animation, DQ Entertainment, Paprikaas Animation Studios, NDTV, Studio 9, Redchillies.VFX, Vaibhav Studios, IBN7, Animax, Pixion and Tata Elxsi Ltd. to name a few.

For further information please visit http://www.maacindia.com/Default.aspx

CONTACT DETAILS
Bhavika Chouhan VP-Marketing, Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics (MAAC), +91 9819192981, bhavika@maacmail.com
Richa Seth, Adfactors PR Pvt. Ltd., +91 9930143531, richa.seth@adfactorspr.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, ENTERTAINMENT, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, EDUCATION, IT, MEDIA, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: Cedar Management Consulting Expands Global Footprint, to Commence Japan Operations

2010-11-15T21:59:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Cedar Management Consulting International LLC
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 11:30 AM IST (06:00 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest, Food & drink, People; Business: Accounting & management consultancy services, Advertising, PR & marketing, Banking & financial services, Business services, Electronic appliances & components, Energy companies, Financial Analyst, Information technology, Major diversified industrial groups, Publishing & printing
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Cedar Management Consulting Expands Global Footprint, to Commence Japan Operations
Appoints Tomoyasu Ozeki to spearhead the region

Mumbai, Maharashtra, India and Tokyo, Japan, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Cedar Management Consulting (Cedar), the global management consulting firm today announced that it has strengthened its Asia pacific presence by commencing its operations in Japan under the leadership of Mr. Tomoyasu Ozeki. The strategic foray into the Japanese market is to augment Cedar's business expansion strategy and is in line with its commitment to its Japanese clients, as they seek to expand their investments and strategies towards the emerging markets.

Cedar has been assisting Japanese clients globally since the mid-eighties, in the assessment of global markets, detailed assessment of market, product and competitive dynamics, and developing strategies for accelerated growth and success. Cedar, with its expertise in the manufacturing sector has worked with over 30 companies within Japan in assessing global opportunities in the areas of food & beverage, printing & imaging, electronics, metals, energy, industrial and related equipment.

Mr. Sanjiv Anand, Managing Director, Cedar Management Consulting said, "Japan continues to be one of the largest economies in the world that is export driven. In addition, increasingly, Japanese companies are seeking to explore opportunities with India balancing the effort they are making in the other large emerging market, China. We are pleased to have Mr. Tomoyasu Ozeki on board to lead our operations in Japan and further deepen our presence in the region with our existing and new business relationships."

Tomoyasu Ozeki, Associate Director, Japan, has over 30 years of management consulting & industry experience across Japan & USA. His expertise lies in formulation of business strategy, business start-up and management in areas such as Private Equity, Venture Capital, Business Process Outsourcing, IT, Media and Consumer Electronics among others. In his past experience, Mr. Ozeki has held leadership positions in reputed organizations including Accenture as partner, Nippon Outsourcing Corporation as president and CS First Boston as Asia Pacific Controller in addition to Lehman Brothers, Morgan Stanley and PricewaterhouseCoopers. Mr. Ozeki sits on the Board of Oak Capital Corporation. He is also a Special Advisor to the NPO Gaia Initiative. Mr. Ozeki is a US CPA and holds an MBA from University of Notre Dame and a BA in Economics from Keio University, Japan. He is a member of WPO, Japan Chapter & a former YPO member.

About Cedar

Cedar is a global management consulting firm. With over 20 years of experience, Cedar has assisted more than 800 clients across industry sectors. Formerly part of Renaissance Worldwide, a $1 Billion consulting firm, co-founded by the creators of the Balanced Scorecard, Cedar has significant capability in the international market strategy, business strategy development, organizational and operational transformation. Cedar, winner of the 2010 BME Industry Award for The Best Advisory Firm, is headquartered in the US and has a network of offices in 15 locations, worldwide.

For more information, please visit www.cedar-consulting.com

CONTACT DETAILS
Priya Badshah, Cedar Management Consulting International LLC, +91 (22) 61719835, Priya.badshah@cedar-consulting.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, FOOD, PEOPLE, CONSULTANCY SERVICES, MARKETING, BANKING, BUSINESS SERVICES, ELECTRONICS, ENERGY, Financial Analyst, IT, GROUPS, PUBLISHING

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BWI: SMERA Launches Grading of Maritime Training Institutes

2010-11-15T21:34:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: SME Rating Agency of India Ltd.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 10:49 AM IST (05:19 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest, People; Business: Accounting & management consultancy services, Advertising, PR & marketing, Banking & financial services, Business services, Education & training, Financial Analyst, Transport engineering
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SMERA Launches Grading of Maritime Training Institutes

Mumbai, Maharashtra, India, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- SME Rating Agency of India Limited (SMERA) is a joint initiative of Small Industries Development Bank of India; Dun & Bradstreet Information services India Pvt Ltd and leading public and private sector banks. SMERA offers enterprise rating services for Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises, Green Ratings, and Rating of Microfinance Institutions.

SMERA, after having rated more than 9000 Micro, Small and Medium enterprises across the country, has now launched Grading Services for Maritime Training Institutes in the country. Directorate General of Shipping - (DGS), under the Ministry of Shipping, Govt. of India, has empanelled SMERA as an additional service provider for Grading its approved Maritime Institutions in the country.

Prior to 1996, Maritime Training Institutes in India were predominantly under the Government mandate. However in 1996 maritime training was opened for private sector participation. Since then, more than 130 institutes are engaged in conducting different types of pre-sea and post-sea courses.

SMERA's grading methodology, amongst other things, would evaluate following factors while assigning Grades to Maritime Institutions, namely: management, faculty, infrastructure, process quality, financial analysis and overall effectiveness.SMERA's Maritime Grading Service would endeavor to benchmark the applicant training institute with desirable best practices as laid down by DGS. The rating process would include submission of data by the applicant followed by a site visit and interaction with the management. The final Grading is arrived based on a committee approach.

Mr. Parag Patki, Chief Executive Officer - SMERA, stated that "We believe that additional choice of an agency will enable Maritime Training Institutions to gain pricing and service level advantages from the existing service providers"

For more information kindly visit www.smera.in

CONTACT DETAILS
Sanjay Kher National Sales Manager - Special Products, SME Rating Agency of India Ltd., +91 (22) 25188108, sanjay.kher@smera.in

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, PEOPLE, CONSULTANCY SERVICES, MARKETING, BANKING, BUSINESS SERVICES, EDUCATION, Financial Analyst, TRANSPORT

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BWI: Boston Limited Launch their Latest SmartCluster M Series based on Windows HPC Server 2008 R2

2010-11-15T20:41:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Boston Limited
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 10:00 AM IST (04:30 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Information technology; Technology
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Boston Limited Launch their Latest SmartCluster M Series based on Windows HPC Server 2008 R2

New Orleans, Louisiana, United States, Tuesday, November 16, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Boston Limited, now in its 18th year as a distribution partner for silicon valley based Super Micro Computer, Inc, (NASDAQ: SMIC), today has formally announced the launch of their latest generation of Microsoft HPC Server 2008 R2-based SmartCluster M Series portable blade solutions. Visit stand 4538 for more information.

Designed specifically for technical and enterprise computing SmartCluster portable HPC solutions are an all-encompassing portable clustered solution on wheels that includes all the hardware, software & networking to be deployed quickly and easily with minimal fuss. Based on Microsoft's comprehensive Windows HPC software, these highly innovative portable solutions can be very easily deployed and managed to provide consistent low latency performance to a network extremely quickly.

"Boston's innovative and portable SmartCluster M Series solution harnesses the power of Windows HPC Server 2008 R2 to provide an all-encompassing platform that has been optimized to deliver leading high speed density and energy efficiency for today's most demanding technical and enterprise computing applications," said Bill Hamilton, director, Technical Computing at Microsoft.

Based on industry leading Supermicro® Blade, storage and networking hardware SmartCluster's provide a complete validated clustered hardware and software solution housed into a tiny 14U high cabinet with wheels for ease of portability. All within a compact portable enclosure Boston have managed to provide full cluster functionality by including 160 x Intel Xeon 5600 processor cores within 20x compute nodes, 240Gb of memory, 20TB Front-end storage node, Mellanox QDR 40Gbps InfiniBand HCA, Supermicro 36 port QDR InfiniBand switch and much more in a single all encompassing platform! Industry leading energy efficiency is also assured with the use of 80PLUS platinum rated 94% efficient power supplies with a variety of options made available to reduce the energy consumption even further.

On demonstration at Supercomputing 2010 Boston will present how this complete, integrated platform for cluster-based computing using Microsoft's latest Windows HPC Server ensures that it easier than ever before for companies of all types and sizes to realize the benefits of technical computing.

SmartCluster M Series platforms have been designed and optimised as the platform of choice for numerous leading research and creative applications helping analysts, modelers and developers maximize their return from leading packages such as MATLAB, Tempest, MG-ALFA, MoSes, Autodesk 3ds Max, Autodesk Maya, openGEMS, BLAST, FLUENT, ANSYS CFX and many more.

"Microsoft's technical computing initiative simplifies powerful Supercomputing technologies and has enabled Boston and our partners to spend less time on the numerous complexities in deploying HPC platforms and to focus their efforts on discovering new innovations and solving some of the world's biggest challenges" said Manoj Nayee, Managing Director, Boston Limited.

Built on Windows Server 2008 R2 64-bit technology, WindowsHPC Server 2008 R2 Suite is designed as a complete integrated platform for cluster based computing. SmartCluster M Series platforms arrive with Windows Server (Windows Server 2008 HPC Edition) and Microsoft's HPC Pack which comprises of a complete integrated set of tools for running high performance compute clusters.

Key features also include high speed networking, highly efficient and scalable cluster management tools, advanced fail over capabilities, Excel as a services orientated architecture (SOA) job scheduler and support for partners clustered file systems. In addition users of this leading appliance can also expand the capacity of HPC clusters by adding computers running Windows® 7 as low cost workstation nodes.

About Boston Limited

Founded in 1992 Boston Limited has built up an exceptional reputation within the IT trade by supplying the latest in high performance technology backed up by unrivalled in-house pre and post sales technical expertise. Boston Limited prides itself in the meticulous engineering of cutting edge Supermicro based server, workstation and storage solutions that are offered with Climate Neutral and worldwide warranty support options.

For further details visit www.boston.co.uk or e-mail sales@boston.co.uk

CONTACT DETAILS
Neil Kalsi, Boston Limited, +44 (0)1727 876 100, neil.kalsi@boston.co.uk

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: MakeMyTrip Limited Announces Strong Fiscal 2011 Second Quarter Results

2010-11-15T08:14:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: MakeMyTrip.com
Monday, November 15, 2010 09:02 PM IST (03:32 PM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest, Economy, Travel & tourism; Business: Accounting & management consultancy services, Banking & financial services, Business services, Financial Analyst, Information technology, Stock exchanges, Travel & tourism; Technology
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MakeMyTrip Limited Announces Strong Fiscal 2011 Second Quarter Results

Gurgaon, Haryana, India, Monday, November 15, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Financial Highlights:

-- Gross bookings(1) for Air ticketing and Hotels and packages combined increased by $51.2 million to $156.0 million, representing growth of 48.8% year over year
-- Revenue increased by 40.5% year over year to $23.8 million. Revenue less service cost(2) increased by $3.8 million to $12.9 million, representing a growth of 41.5% year over year
-- Net revenue margin(3) for Air ticketing was 7.4% and Hotels & packages net revenue margin was 11.9%
-- Result from operating activities improved to $0.33 million, an increase of $0.15 million from the prior year's fiscal second quarter. Adjusted operating profit(4) improved to $0.48 million versus $0.18 million in the prior year's fiscal second quarter
-- Loss for the period was $1.8 million, versus profit of $0.02 million in the prior year's fiscal second quarter. Adjusted net income(5) was $0.58 million, representing an increase of $0.30 million from the prior year's fiscal second quarter

MakeMyTrip Limited (Nasdaq:MMYT), India's leading online travel company, today announced its unaudited financial and operating results for its second fiscal quarter ended September 30, 2010. This is the company's first post-IPO publicly announced quarter. MakeMyTrip Limited successfully completed its initial public offering on August 17, 2010. The company is listed on the NASDAQ Global Market under the symbol "MMYT".

"Our strong operating results in the latest quarter were achieved through the recognition of MakeMyTrip as a superior brand that offers innovative travel products and excellent customer booking experience in India's online travel market," said Deep Kalra, Chairman and CEO of MakeMyTrip. "Additionally, our successful initial public offering now provides MakeMyTrip with the ability to keep growing by investing in technology and strategic acquisitions that will enhance customers' experience and create long term shareholder value."

Financial Summary as per IFRS

Please see "About Non-IFRS Financial Measures" included within this release to understand the importance of the financial measures set forth in notes (2) to (5) above. Reconciliations of non-IFRS financial measures to IFRS operating results are included at the end of this release.

Fiscal 2011 Second Quarter Financial Results

Revenue: We had revenue of $23.8 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010, an increase of 40.5% over revenue of $17.0 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009.

Air Ticketing: Revenue from our air ticketing business increased by 40.1% to $10.3 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 from $7.3 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009. This was due to increase in gross bookings by 47.1% partially offset by reduction in net revenue margin from 7.8% in the quarter ended September 30, 2009 to 7.4% in the quarter ended September 30, 2010. Air ticketing net revenue margin in the quarter improved by 60 basis points from 6.8% in the previous quarter as our air bookings increased quarter to quarter, resulting from volume-related incentives from airlines, and increases in service fees and global distribution fees collected.

Hotels and Packages: Revenue from our hotels and packages business increased by 38.8% to $13.0 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 from $9.4 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009. Our Revenue less service cost(2) increased by 34.9 % to $2.1 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 from $1.5 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009. This was due to increase in gross bookings by 63.9% partially offset by reduction in net revenue margin from 14.4% in the quarter ended September 30, 2009 to 11.9% in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 as net revenue margins normalized from levels experienced in fiscal 2010 when travel suppliers provided us favorable rates during the slowdown in India's economy. Hotels & packages net revenue margins remained unchanged at 11.9% quarter to quarter.

Other Revenue: Our other revenue increased by 118.0% to $0.5 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 from $0.2 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009, primarily due to increase in sale of rail tickets.

Total Revenue less Service Cost: Our total revenue less service cost increased by 41.5% to $12.9 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 from $9.1 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009 as a result of a 40.3% increase in our air ticketing revenue less service cost, as well as a 34.9% increase in our hotels and packages revenue less service cost.

Personnel Expenses: Personnel expenses increased to $3.4 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 from $2.4 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009, mainly as a result of annual wage increases and increases in average employee headcount year over year in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 as a result of overall increase in business and due to employee share-based compensation costs of $0.2 million in quarter ended September 30, 2010 as against $0 in quarter ended September 30, 2009.

Other Operating Expenses: Other operating expenses increased by 42.8% to $8.7 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 from $6.1 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009, primarily as a result of increase in payment gateway charges, advertising and business promotion expenses and outsourcing fees in line with the growth in our business.

Results from Operating Activities: As a result of the foregoing factors, our results from operating activities improved to an income of $0.3 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 from an income of $0.2 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009. Excluding the effects of our employee share-based compensation costs for both quarters ended September 30, 2010 and 2009, we would have recorded an operating profit of $0.5 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 and $0.2 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009.

Finance Costs: Our finance costs increased to $2.5 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 from $0.6 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009, primarily due to one-time initial public offering costs related to our listing of existing shares of $2.1 million in the current quarter, partially offset by decrease in foreign exchange loss due to strengthening of the Indian rupee versus US dollar.
Profit (Loss) for the period: As a result of the foregoing factors, including the effects of our employee share-based compensation costs and a one-time charge related to the listing of our existing shares in our initial public offering of $2.1 million in the current quarter, our loss for the quarter ended September 30, 2010 was $1.8 million as compared to a profit of $0.02 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2009. Excluding the effects of employee share-based compensation costs for both fiscal years 2010 and 2009, the one-time charge related to the listing of our existing shares in our initial public offering of $2.1 million in the current quarter, interest accrued on the liability portion of preference shares and changes in fair market value of embedded derivatives in the preference shares, we would have recorded a net profit of $0.6 million in the quarter ended September 30, 2010 and a net profit of $0.3 million in quarter ended September 30, 2009.
Earnings (loss) per share: Diluted loss per share was $0.07 for the quarter ended September 30, 2010 as compared to earnings per share of $0.001 in the corresponding quarter in the prior fiscal year. The loss in the current quarter was mainly as a result of interest accrued on the liability portion of preference shares, one time charges related to our initial public offering listing expenses of $2.1 million, employee share-based compensation costs as mentioned in the preceding paragraph and increase of 12.3 million shares primarily from conversion of all outstanding preferred shares prior to our initial public offering and share option exercise by certain selling shareholders at the time of the offering. Adjusted for these items, diluted earnings per share was $0.02 in the quarter ended September 30, 2010, compared to $0.01 in the quarter ended September 30, 2009.

Contingencies

During the year ended March 31, 2009, a general industry wide audit was initiated by the Mumbai Zonal Unit of Directorate General of Excise Intelligence & Customs (regulatory authority) on various travel agencies across India with regard to compliance with service tax rules and regulations by travel companies in India. Pursuant to the audit conducted by the service tax authorities, the company received a notice during the quarter ended September 30, 2010 relating to a demand of service tax on certain matters, some of which are industry-wide issues and involve complex interpretation of law. Based on legal advice received, the company believes that it has a strong case in its favor and is in the process of preparing an appropriate response to the notice issued by the service tax authorities. However, at present no reliable estimate can be made of the amount of the obligation, if any.

Fiscal Year 2011 Outlook

The company's long term outlook is optimistic. MakeMyTrip expects fiscal year 2011's revenue less service cost to be between $58 million and $61 million.

Deep Kalra, CEO and Founder, said "We believe MakeMyTrip is well positioned to capture the long term growth in travel services that comes with the growing Indian economy and its middle class. The expected roll out of broadband Internet services throughout the country will only continue to drive the popularity of e-commerce which will benefit online travel companies like MakeMyTrip for many years to come."

Conference Call

MakeMyTrip will host a conference call to discuss the company's results for the quarter ended September 30, 2010 beginning at 10:00 a.m. EST on November 15, 2010. To participate, please dial 1-866-242-1388 from within the U.S. or +65-6722-6342 from any other country. Thereafter, callers will be prompted to enter the participant passcode 20831925. A live webcast of the conference call will also be available through the Investor Relations section of the company's website at http://investors.makemytrip.com.

A telephonic replay of the conference call will be available for one week by dialing 1-866-214-5335 in the U.S. or by dialing +61 2 8235 5000 from any other country and using passcode 20831925. A one month replay of the live webcast will also be available at http://investors.makemytrip.com, shortly following the conclusion of the call.

About Non-IFRS Financial Measures

As certain parts of our revenues are recognized on a "net" basis and other parts of our revenue are recognized on a "gross" basis, we evaluate our financial performance based on revenue less service costs, which is a non-IFRS measure, as we believe that revenue less service cost reflects more accurately the value addition of the travel services that we provide to our customers. The presentation of this non-IFRS information is not meant to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for our consolidated financial results prepared in accordance with IFRS as issued by the IASB. Our revenue less service costs may not be comparable to similarly titled measures reported by other companies due to potential differences in the method of calculation.

The company believes that Adjusted operating profit and Adjusted net income are useful in measuring the results of the company. The IFRS measures most directly comparable to Adjusted operating profit and Adjusted net income are Results from operating activities and Income (Loss) for the period, respectively. The company believes that adjustments to these IFRS measures, including employee stock compensation costs, interest accretion on preference stock, one-time expenses such as IPO listing fees and gain or loss in fair market value of the embedded options within preference stock, provide investors and analysts a more accurate representation of the company's operating results.

Safe Harbor Statement

This release contains certain statements concerning the Company's future growth prospects and forward-looking statements, as defined in the safe harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements are based on the company's current expectations, assumptions, estimates and projections about the company and its industry. The forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties. Generally, these forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "expect," "intend," "will," "project," "seek," "should" and similar expressions. Such statements include, among other things, quotations from management as well as MakeMyTrip's (MMYT) strategic and operational plans. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. A number of important factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statement. Potential risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the slow-down of economic growth in India and the global economic downturn, general declines or disruptions in the travel industry, volatility in the trading price of MMYT's shares, MMYT's reliance on its relationships with travel suppliers and strategic alliances, failure to further increase MMYT's brand recognition to obtain new business partners and consumers, failure to compete against new and existing competitors, failure to successfully manage current growth and potential future growth, risks associated with any strategic investments or acquisitions, seasonality in the travel industry in India and overseas, failure to successfully develop MMYT's corporate travel business, damage to or failure of MMYT's infrastructure and technology, loss of services of MMYT's key executives, and inflation in India and in other countries. These and other factors are more fully discussed in the "Risk Factors" section of MMYT's prospectus dated August 11, 2010, filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. All information provided in this release is provided as of the date of issuance of this release, and MMYT does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statement, except as required under applicable law.

About MakeMyTrip Limited and MakeMyTrip.com

MakeMyTrip Limited is the parent company of MakeMyTrip (India) Private Limited, India's largest online travel company and MakeMyTrip.com Inc. The company's services and products include air tickets, customized holiday packages, hotel bookings, railway tickets, bus tickets, car hire and facilitating access to travel insurance. Through its primary website, www.makemytrip.com, and other technology-enhanced platforms, the company provides access to all major domestic full-service and low-cost airlines operating in India, all major airlines operating to and from India, over 4,000 hotels in India and a wide selection of hotels outside India, Indian Railways and several major Indian bus operators.

To view the complete press release and unaudited financial results, please click on the link mentioned below:

Press release

For picture(s)/data to illustrate this release click below:

http://www.BusinessWireIndia.com/attachments/MakeMyTrip Limited Announces Strong Fiscal 2011 Second Quarter Results Press Release(1).doc
MakeMyTrip Limited Announces Strong Fiscal 2011 Second Quarter Results Press Release(1).doc
http://www.BusinessWireIndia.com/attachments/Financial Summary as per IFRS.doc
Financial Summary as per IFRS.doc

CONTACT DETAILS
Jonathan Huang (US), MakeMyTrip Limited, +1 (646) 405-1311, jonathan.huang@makemytrip.com
Prajakta Bhosale (India), Genesis Burson-Marsteller, +91 9899043917, prajakta.bhosale@bm.com
Radhika Sharda, Genesis Burson-Marsteller, +91 9899888172, radhika.sharda@bm.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, ECONOMY, TOURISM, CONSULTANCY SERVICES, BANKING, BUSINESS SERVICES, Financial Analyst, IT, STOCK EXCHANGES, TRAVEL, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: Boston IT Solutions Announces the Launch of their Next-Generation SuperFlex Blade

2010-11-15T05:49:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Boston Limited
Monday, November 15, 2010 07:14 PM IST (01:44 PM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Information technology; Technology
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Boston IT Solutions Announces the Launch of their Next-Generation SuperFlex BladeT

New Orleans, Louisiana, United States, Monday, November 15, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Boston IT Solutions (India) Private Limited a distribution partner for Silicon Valley-based Super Micro Computer, Inc. (NASDAQ: SMCI), today has formally announced the launch of their next generation of blade server solutions, the groundbreaking new Boston SuperFlex BladeT. Visit stand 4538 for a live demonstration of this revolutionary new platform.

Designed in partnership with Supermicro the SuperFlex BladeT brings to the industry a new dimension of energy efficient hybrid parallel compute processing power for technical and enterprise computing.

SuperFlex BladeT platforms have been optimised to offer a new dimension in flexibility for Blade Servers by providing 2 x PCI-Express x 16 expansion slots per blade with support for dual full-length and double-height expansion cards.

"Building off the success of the 1U GPU Superserver, the new SuperFlex Blade delivers high density GPU computing in a highly flexible and scalable solution," said Sumit Gupta, Manager of Tesla products at NVIDIA."Through our collaboration with Boston and Supermicro, this solution takes full advantage of the massive computational power of Tesla GPUs and provides exceptional performance across a wide range of demanding applications."

Optimised for hybrid computing the SuperFlex BladeT is suitable for the most demanding applications requiring high-speed and high-density processing with maximized GPU and CPU compute performance. High performance networking has also been optimised with two independent, high-bandwidth, low-latency onboard QDR InfiniBand controllers standard to ensure that this platform is suitable for today's most resource-hungry computing challenges.

"The Boston SuperFlex Blade has been jointly developed with Supermicro to solve the key scalability and usability challenges that face customers in high performance computing (HPC) environments. Using the standard Supermicro 10-bay blade enclosure, it offers unparalleled compute density when equipped with two double-width GPU accelerators," says Manoj Nayee, Managing Director of Boston IT Solutions.

Designed to meet the most demanding applications computing challenges, the SuperFlex BladeT provides phenomenal levels of hybrid computational power by combining the latest technologies made available by Intel Xeon 5600 processors in conjunction with the latest generation of NVIDIA® TeslaT 2050 and 2070 GPU compute processors for maximum computational performance.

"This new GPU-optimized blade design offers a much higher level of computing performance, density and performance-per-watt," said Wally Liaw, Vice President of Sales-International at Supermicro. "By supporting up to twenty GPU cards in one 7U blade enclosure, this solution easily delivers the highest GPU density available today in a blade form factor."

About Boston Limited

Founded in 1992 Boston Limited has built up an exceptional reputation within the IT trade by supplying the latest in high performance technology backed up by unrivalled in-house pre and post sales technical expertise. Boston Limited prides itself in the meticulous engineering of cutting edge Supermicro based server, workstation and storage solutions that are offered with Climate Neutral and worldwide warranty support options.

For further details visit www.bostonindia.in or e-mail sales@bostonindia.in or call +91 22 39537425.

About Super Micro Computer, Inc. (NASDQ: SMCI)

Supermicro, established in 1993, emphasizes superior product design to produce class-leading motherboards, chassis and server systems.

CONTACT DETAILS
Neil Kalsi, Boston Limited, +44 (0)1727 876 100, sales@bostonindia.in

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, IT, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: IDFC Foundation Makes its Second Investment of Equity of Rs.2.25 crore in Pipal Tree Ventures Pvt. Ltd

2010-11-15T04:51:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Infrastructure Development Finance Company Limited
Monday, November 15, 2010 06:14 PM IST (12:44 PM GMT)
Editors: General: Economy; Business: Banking & financial services, Business services, Financial Analyst, Stock exchanges
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IDFC Foundation Makes its Second Investment of Equity of Rs.2.25 crore in Pipal Tree Ventures Pvt. Ltd

Mumbai, Maharashtra, India, Monday, November 15, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- IDFC Foundation has made an investment of Rs. 2.25 crore in Pipal Tree Venture Pvt. Ltd. (PTVPL), a for-profit company engaged in providing vocational training for skills required in the construction industry to unemployed youth from rural areas.

IDFC Foundation, the development arm of IDFC, invests with the objective "to promote the inclusive and sustainable delivery of infrastructure services in India", in line with its overall mission of nation building. This is its second investment.

Speaking on the occasion, Anupam Srivastava, Group Director - CSR, IDFC, said, "We are very pleased to partner with Pipal Tree Ventures in its social mission to skill unemployed rural youth to meet the huge shortfall in availability of semi-skilled workers in the infrastructure & construction sector. For us, this investment represents a perfect example of CSR, as we are enabling inclusive growth while at the same time meeting a critical need of our clients in the infrastructure sector."

India's construction sector is estimated to require as many as 33 million additional skilled workers over the next 10 years. With the backing and support of IDFC Foundation, PTVPL aims to train 100,000 rural youth from India's most backward regions over the next 5 years and place them with construction companies. As one of the pioneers in the field, PTVPL hopes, with IDFC's help, to catalyze the setting up of industry-wide standards for quality execution and productivity in the construction sector, thus benefiting labour through enhanced job mobility.

About IDFC Ltd.

Infrastructure Development Finance Company Limited (IDFC) is India's premier financial services institution focused on infrastructure. It was set up in 1997 by the Government of India as a financier and catalyst for private sector's involvement in infrastructure development in India. For over 12 years, since the company's initial public offering in 2005, IDFC has evolved into a 'one stop shop' for infrastructure finance in India, meeting the complex and ambitious requirements of an expanding client base.

IDFC's strategy involves all parts of the value chain of infrastructure, providing a differentiated value proposition to its clients. IDFC's domain expertise in infrastructure combined with product breadth - project financing, investment banking and asset management enables it to provide creative solutions to its clients. IDFC has strong relationships with the private sector and government enabling it to provide objective advice and facilitate public-private partnerships in infrastructure. IDFC Foundation, it's not for-profit development arm, helps train government officials on public-private partnerships, provides advice on infrastructure policy and governance issues and on sustainable infrastructure development strategies.

CONTACT DETAILS
Venkatraman K.V, Infrastructure Development Finance Company Limited, +91 9004040575, venkatraman.kv@idfc.com
Etienne Marques, REPUTE Public Affairs & CSR Solutions, +91 9920243354, etienne.m@reputesolutions.com

KEYWORDS
ECONOMY, BANKING, BUSINESS SERVICES, Financial Analyst, STOCK EXCHANGES

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BWI: Ramco Systems Awarded Innovation in IT Applications at the 3rd India Power Awards 2010, New Delhi

2010-11-15T04:04:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Ramco Systems Limited
Monday, November 15, 2010 05:35 PM IST (12:05 PM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Energy companies, Media & entertainment; Technology
--------------------------------------------------
Ramco Systems Awarded 'Innovation in IT Applications' at the 3rd India Power Awards 2010, New Delhi

Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India, Monday, November 15, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Ramco Systems (BSE - 532370, NSE - RAMCOSYS, MSE - RSST); a leading software company focused on consulting, product and managed services, today secured the prestigious award for 'Innovation in IT Applications' at the 3rd India Power Awards held at the India Habitat Centre, New Delhi. Mr. R Shankar, Executive Vice President, India, Middle East and Africa, Ramco Systems, received the award on behalf of the company.

Council of Power Utilities organised the 3rd India Power Awards 2010 in conjunction with the Annual Conference & Exhibition on Transmission, Distribution and Metering to promote excellence in the Power sector.

As a leading provider in the enterprise applications segment, Ramco Systems is a growing multinational of Indian origin. The company successfully leverages its own best-in-class resources, as well as the domain knowledge and best business practices emanating from its large, diversified parent, the Ramco Group, to render unique business value to its customers. The Ramco Group has business interests in manufacturing and asset-intensive industries, including cement, cement-based products, building materials and textiles.

On receiving the award, Mr. R Shankar, Executive Vice President, India, Middle East and Africa, Ramco Systems said, "I am extremely delighted to represent Ramco Systems in this august forum. This is a prestigious award that reinforces our commitment to R&D, and as a company focused on innovation. Power is a sector that is on a growth trajectory and IT plays a crucial role in helping utilities innovate and transform in a deregulated environment. Ramco has been at the leading edge in offering business applications, technology platforms and powerful delivery models that add significant value to organizations in enabling innovation and business transformation. This award is a testimony to the rich benefits that several energy and utility companies in India and abroad have reaped from Ramco's solutions."

Conferring the award on Ramco Systems, Mr. C.V.J. Varma, President, Council of Power Utilities, said, "Ramco Systems has been a forerunner in bringing innovative IT offering to the Power & Utility sector. In recognition of its unique and dedicated efforts to establish India on the world map with product software, we are pleased to confer the Innovation in IT Applications award on Ramco Systems."

The jury for the award comprised eminent and respected people like Mr. H. L. Bajaj, Former Member (Technical), Appellate Tribunal for Electricity; Mr. P. Abraham, Former Secretary, Ministry of Power; Dr. C. R. Prasad, Former CMD, GAIL & Chairman, Everest Power Pvt. Ltd.; Dr. H.R. Sharma, Former Member (CEA) & Director, GVK Technical & Consultancy Services Private Limited; Mr. V. Raghuraman, Former Principal, Adviser (Energy), Confederation of Indian Industry; Mr. C.V.J. Varma, Honorary President ICOLD & President CPU - Member Secretary.

Ramco Systems has successfully served several customers in the Power sector in India and abroad such as Reliance Energy, Torrent Power, Hoosier Energy, Orissa Power Generation Corporation, BHPL among others.

About India Power Awards

Council of Power Utilities (CPU) is organizing the 3rd India Power Awards 2010, as a part of its initiative to promote excellence in the power sector. The India Power Awards have been receiving an encouraging response from the power sector in the last two years with a wide ranging mix of participants. CPU is an integral part of the Indian Power Sector. It is working relentlessly in the development of power sector by providing solutions and updating sector professionals with relevant and contemporary issues faced by the industry in the form of conferences, reports and publications.

About Ramco Systems

Ramco Systems, a part of the USD 875 Million Ramco Group, is a leading software company focused on consulting, product and managed services business. Headquartered in Chennai, Ramco Systems was started as an R&D division of Ramco Industries Limited in 1992, and later established as an independent company in 1999. The company focuses on providing innovative business solutions that can be delivered quickly and cost-effectively in complex environments. Globally, Ramco has over 100,000 users from 800+ customer organizations since inception. The company currently has 14 offices spread across India, US, Europe, Middle East and APAC and employs over 1,400 employees.

Ramco's key differentiator is its innovative approach to develop products through its revolutionary enterprise application assembly and delivery platform - Ramco VirtualWorksT. Ramco Systems has seven major product suites - Ramco Enterprise Suite, Ramco Enterprise Asset Management Suite, Ramco Aviation, Ramco OnDemand ERP (ERP on SaaS), Ramco Business Information Management Suite, Ramco Enterprise Process Suite, and Ramco Mining. Strong domain knowledge coupled with proven implementation expertise enables Ramco to provide specialized solutions in verticals such as Manufacturing, Real Estate & Construction, Energy & Utilities, Logistics, Service, BFSI, Aviation, Government and Defense.

Ramco Systems has been assessed for ISO 9001:2008 and ISO 27001:2005 information security standards. Ramco's BPO unit is SAS 70 Type II certified.

"The Company is proposing to make a rights issue of equity shares in the near future and is in the process of filing a draft offer document with the Securities Exchange Board of India"

For more information, please visit www.ramco.com

CONTACT DETAILS
Vinitha Ramani , Ramco Systems Limited, +91 9840368048, vinitharamani@rsi.ramco.com
Twinkle Xavier, 20:20 MEDIA, +91 9884480115, twinkle@2020india.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, ENERGY, MEDIA, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: IILM - IBM Foundational Management Programme Felicitation Ceremony

2010-11-15T03:33:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: IILM Institute for Higher Education
Monday, November 15, 2010 05:00 PM IST (11:30 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Education & training
--------------------------------------------------
IILM - IBM Foundational Management Programme Felicitation Ceremony

Gurgaon, Haryana, India, Monday, November 15, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- IILM Institute for Higher Education organised its first felicitation ceremony for the IILM - IBM FMP Batch 1A at its Gurgaon campus on November 12, 2010. Mr. D.P. Singh - Director HR was the chief guest. Other guests included Mr. Ajay Bhatia, Vice President - HR and Mr. Raj Nehru, General Manager - Learning and other IBM managers. The convocation procession was led by Ms. Kakoli Sen, Program Director and lasted for over an hour. Ms. Sapna Popli, Executive Dean and Director welcomed the IBM HR Leaders and the participants following which the diploma was conferred on all the successful participants of batch 1A from NCR in person and other locations in absentia. Mr. D.P.Singh in his address, congratulated all the participants and emphasised on the need to carry on the legacy and do complete justice to the diploma well earned by them, both at work and in life.

Mr. Ajay Bhatia also congratulated the participants and reiterated that IBM believes in investing in its own people and nurturing from within for a more engaged workforce. Mr. Raj Nehru equated the award of diploma to the participants with the first footsteps of a child seeing which the mother feels most proud. He has been the force behind the relationship with IILM for the Foundational Management Programme and said that it gives him immense pleasure to see the same culminating into the first batch completing and receiving its diploma in a grand ceremony.

The Foundational Management Programme is a six month Executive Diploma programme for the Band V top talent at IBM. The participants are identified and nominated by IBM for the programme. The contact sessions are conducted at the IBM premises to six locations including NCR through Video Conferencing. The classes are conducted in an interactive manner using simulations and case studies. The first batch started with 75 participants, out of which 56 participants successfully completed and earned the Diploma. The second batch which is in progress has 55 participants and the third batch to start in 2011 has 80 participants. The Foundational Management Programme is a unique opportunity provided jointly by IBM and IILM to the budding frontline managers to develop skills which can be immediately put to use at work and also paves way for higher responsibilities.

CONTACT DETAILS
Ms. Rashme Oberoi, IILM Institute for Higher Education, +91 9899519195, rashme2k@gmail.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, EDUCATION

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BWI: Vriti Named 5th Fastest Growing Technology Company in India

2010-11-15T02:49:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Vriti Infocom
Monday, November 15, 2010 04:10 PM IST (10:40 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Accounting & management consultancy services, Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Education & training, Media & entertainment; Technology
--------------------------------------------------
Vriti Named 5th Fastest Growing Technology Company in India

Bangalore, Karnataka, India, Monday, November 15, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Vriti Infocom Private Limited was today named a winner of the prestigious Deloitte Fast 50 India and Deloitte Fast 500 Asia Pacific awards, marking it out as one of the fastest growing technology companies in India. The company was placed fifth out of fifty companies short-listed across India. Vriti is a pioneer in creating testing and assessment platforms in the education industry with deployments across coaching institutes, schools, government universities, publishers and other education brands.

The award was officially presented to the CEO Swapnil Shrivastav in Bengaluru. Sourabh Shrivastav, Vice President, Engineering and co-founder of Vriti added, "We are honoured to receive this recognition from Deloitte. Vriti has successfully evolved from a research-oriented technology start up to a company setting the standard for deploying educational platforms in India."

Vriti has extended its coverage to over 80 cities across India and elsewhere, having recently completed its 503rd partner deployment. The company has also launched a new offering for Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) schools to make them compliant with the CBSE's new Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE) guidelines.

Vriti partners with tutors, coaching institutions, publishers, schools and universities to provide students with educational content and assessment services, which are monetised on a per-student basis. This is now India's largest education network. Over 75 million questions have been answered on Vriti's platform and the company boasts over 1 million registered users across its communities and partners. Vriti was founded by alumni of IIT Bombay and IIT Delhi. Intel Capital and JAFCO Asia are its primary financial investors.

The Deloitte Technology Fast 50 programme recognizes the world's most dynamic technology companies. The programme short-lists and ranks the world's fastest growing technology companies based on their revenue growth over three years. Now in its sixth year, the Technology Fast 50 programme continues to be highly sought out by technology companies the world over.

CONTACT DETAILS
Pankaj Vermani, Vriti Infocom, pankaj.v@vriti.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, CONSULTANCY SERVICES, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, EDUCATION, MEDIA, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: In the UK, Steria Awarded Contract with the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory to Deliver ICT Services

2010-11-15T02:23:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Steria
Monday, November 15, 2010 03:42 PM IST (10:12 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Information technology, Media & entertainment; Technology
--------------------------------------------------
In the UK, Steria Awarded Contract with the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory to Deliver ICT Services

Noida, Uttar Pradesh, Pune, Maharashtra and Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India, Monday, November 15, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- Steria today announced it has been selected as preferred bidder for a contract worth approximately ?70 million (£60million) by the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl), part of the UK Ministry of Defence. Following a competitive bid process, with six invitations to tender and four responses, Steria has been selected to deliver ICT services to Dstl over an eight-year period. The contract is due to begin on 1st April 2011.

Steria will be responsible for delivering core IT services for Dstl's corporate networks, including maintenance of its IT infrastructure, the provision of IT helpdesk support, and technical support for ad-hoc departmental projects. Due to the nature of Dstl's work, one of the networks contains protectively-marked information as well as varied scientific research - Steria will also be required to support complex and bespoke technical applications designed for Dstl's cutting-edge work.

Commenting on its selection of Steria as a new IT services partner, Jill Cook, Dstl's Director of Infrastructure said, "flexibility, technological and service delivery, an appreciation for our exacting information security requirements and of course value for money, were the most important qualities we sought in an IT services partner."

She continued, "We found Steria to be the best match for delivering against all four."

"As a centre of excellence, responsible for the science and technology agenda in UK defence, Dstl fulfils a role of national and international importance. IT as an enabler of Dstl's daily operations and high-profile projects must stand up to its rigorous demands as well as create efficiencies," said John Torrie, Steria UK and India CEO. "Steria is committed to delivering significant cost savings over the contract lifetime and supporting Dstl in its drive to improve workplace efficiency and IT asset utilisation."

The tender process was carried out in accordance with the Cabinet Office's Fair and Open Competition policy guidelines and the Ministry of Defence's commercial guidelines. The contract has options for up to an additional two years.

About Steria

Steria delivers IT enabled business services which help organisations in the public and private sectors
operate more efficiently and profitably. By combining in depth understanding of our clients' businesses with expertise in IT and business process outsourcing, we take on our clients' challenges and develop innovative solutions to address them. Through our highly collaborative consulting style, we work with our clients to transform their business, enabling them to focus on what they do best. Our 18,300 people, working across 16 countries, support the systems, services and processes that make today's world turn, touching the lives of millions around the globe each day. Founded in 1969, Steria has offices in Europe, India, North Africa and SE Asia and a 2009 revenue of ?1,630 billion. 19.7% of Steria's capital is owned by its employees. Headquartered in Paris, Steria is listed on the Euronext Paris market.

About The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl)

The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) leads the defence science and technology sector's response to the Ministry of Defence's (MOD) current operations and future defence strategy. Dstl's work saves lives in the UK, overseas and on the frontline.

Dstl maximises the impact of science and technology (S&T) for defence and security requirements, working with industry and academia to deliver battle-winning technologies. It identifies real S&T advances and works to pull ideas rapidly in to service.

Dstl also works with other government departments, exploiting its expertise and knowledge to improve the safety and security of UK citizens.

The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory is a trading fund of the Ministry of Defence and is accountable to government, to the taxpayer and the troops it supports in the field every day.

Around 3,500 of the nation's most talented and creative scientists, technologists and engineers work for Dstl at its three main sites: Porton Down, near Salisbury, Portsdown West, near Portsmouth, and Fort Halstead, near Sevenoaks.
www.dstl.gov.uk

CONTACT DETAILS
Charlotte Stoel, Firefly Communications, +44 (0)20 7025 8203, charlotte.stoel@fireflycomms.com
Gary Follows, Steria, +44 (0)7966 824764, gary.follows@steria.co.uk
Isabelle Grangé, Groupe Steria, 33 1 34 88 64 44, isabelle.grange@steria.com
Sachdev Ramakrishna, Groupe Steria, +91 (120) 4085000, sachdev.ramakrishna@steria.co.in

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, MEDIA, TECHNOLOGY

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BWI: IIT Roorkee Confers Honorary Doctorate to Mr. Ajai Chowdhry, Founder HCL, Chairman HCL Infosystems

2010-11-15T01:05:00.000-08:00

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: HCL Infosystems Ltd
Monday, November 15, 2010 02:15 PM IST (08:45 AM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Business services, Information technology; Technology
--------------------------------------------------
IIT Roorkee Confers Honorary Doctorate to Mr. Ajai Chowdhry, Founder HCL, Chairman HCL Infosystems
Award Recognises Mr. Chowdhry's Leadership and Contribution to the Indian IT Industry

Roorkee, Uttarakhand, India, Monday, November 15, 2010 -- (Business Wire India) -- The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Roorkee, one of India's most prestigious technology institutes, awarded the Honoris Causa Doctorate of Science (D. Sc.) to Ajai Chowdhry, Founder, HCL and Chairman, HCL Infosystems for his remarkable contribution to the Indian IT industry ever since its inception and the thought leadership for the development of an unmatched ecosystem for IT products, computer hardware and software domain in the country.

The award was presented to Mr. Ajai Chowdhry on the 10th annual convocation ceremony of IIT Roorkee by Shree Ashok Bhatnagar, Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Roorkee in the presence of Professor S C Saxena, Director, IIT Roorkee amidst distinguished science and technology luminaries.

Receiving the award, Mr. Chowdhry said, "I am honoured to receive the Doctorate of Science from an esteemed institute of this stature. The IITs provide a unique academic environment that fosters great thinking and creativity. They have done us proud by producing quality engineers and entrepreneurs for years and providing the right platform to showcase Indian talent and technology prowess across the globe

The Honoris Causa Doctorate by IIT is meant to acknowledge and felicitate distinguished personalities in the country who have made commendable contributions in the field of science, engineering, entrepreneurship and academics. The conferral of this degree on Ajai Chowdhry was finalised by the President of India, Senate, Board of Governors.

Mr. Ajai Chowdhry has been consistently contributing in building the brand 'India' on the ICT world landscape and also pioneering the cause of developing the Indian IT industry. His vision to further expand Indian IT to developing economies has now made him one of the key voices for IT development.

About HCL Infosystems Ltd:

HCL Infosystems Ltd, with revenue (LTM) of US$ 2.6 billion (Rs. 12, 122 crore) is India's premier hardware, services and ICT systems integration company offering a wide spectrum of ICT products that includes Computing, Storage, Networking, Security, Telecom, Imaging and Retail. HCL is a one-stop-shop for all the ICT requirements of an organisation. India's leading System Integration and Infrastructure Management Services Organisation, HCL has specialised expertise across verticals including Telecom, BFSI, eGovernance & Power. HCL has India's largest distribution and retail network, taking to market a range of Digital Lifestyle products in partnership with leading global ICT brands, including Apple, Cisco, Ericsson, Kingston, Kodak, Konica Minolta, Microsoft, Nokia, Toshiba, and many more. HCL today has India's largest vertically integrated computer manufacturing facility with over three decades of electronic manufacturing experience & HCL desktops is the largest selling brand into the enterprise space. With India's largest ICT services network that reaches to every corner of India, HCL's award winning Support Services makes it the preferred choice of enterprise and consumers, alike. HCL Infosystems has a 100% subsidiary that addresses the physical security technology system integration market. The subsidiary leverages technology to build a security framework called 'Safe State' that safe guard's life, infrastructure & society. For more information please visit us at www.hclinfosystems.in

To view the photograph, please click on the link given below:

IIT Roorkee confers Ajai Chowdhry, Founder, HCL and Chairman, HCL Infosystems (L) with Honoris Causa Doctorate of Science from Shree Ashok Bhatnagar, Chairman, Board of Governors, IIT Roorkee (R) at the 10th Convocation Ceremony
For picture(s)/data to illustrate this release click below:

http://www.BusinessWireIndia.com/attachments/Pic_1(353).JPG
Pic_1(353).JPG

CONTACT DETAILS
Ashutosh Bhattacharya, Head- Corporate Communications, HCL Infosystems Ltd., +91 9958644228, ashutosh.bhattacharya@hcl.com
Richa Chauhan, Hanmer MSL, +91 9999492599, richachauhan@hanmermsl.com
Rashi Mehrotra, Hanmer MSL, +91 9958594111, rashi.mehrotra@hanmermsl.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BUSINESS SERVICES, IT, TECHNOLOGY

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