Unravelling the Speaker lexicon
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UNDERSTAND t CHOOSE t IMPLEMENT IT
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Digital Wanderlust VOL. 30 | ISSUE 11 | NOVEMBER 2017
SMB CORNER Get Your Payroll in `10 “India is very strategic for PTC
MOBILE NEWS “We are te No.1 seller of 4G Wi-Fi set top boxes”: P Sanjeev “Gionee provides Super Service to Customers”
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Contents 08 COVER STORY
SUN RISES IN THE EAST. DO SMBs TOO? t 4.# :BUSB SFBDIFT UP (VXBIBUJ ,PMLBUB #IVCBOFTXBS t $PNNVUBUJPO 1BZNFOU %FMBZ (45 $PNQMJBODF BSF UIF NBKPS JTTVFT GBDFE CZ 4.#T
TECHNOLOGY WILL MAKE MID MARKET STRONG SMB NEWS 34
MyOperator launches “StartUp Program” to augment cloud telephony
34
Vodafone associates with HP India & KPMG (‘KPMG in India’) to offer GST Ready Solutions
35
Rubique undertakes massive expansion drive, will expand to a 100 cities by March 2018
35
GoDaddy Launches Business Hosting for Fast-Growing Small Businesses in India
36
Kraftly to offer free dedicated website to every seller on the platform
36
Oracle’s Bangalore Digital Hub to Offer Cloud for SMBs
37
ESY India launches India’s first Smart Touch POS and Label Printers
37
Flipkart to invest $500M in payments arm PhonePe
38
eMudhra launches Aadhaar eSign-based digital clearing for recurring payments
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MOBILE NEWS
GADGETS CORNER
39 “We are the No. 1 seller of 4G Wi-Fi set top boxes”: P Sanjeev
42 Samsung Galaxy Note 8: Satisfaction Noted
40 “Gionee provides Super Service to Customers”
43 Asus Rog Strix X299 E Gaming
HANDS ON 46 Unravelling the Speaker lexicon 44 Videocon D2H: Your TV Just Became Smarter 45 Panasonic Eluga Ray 500 pcquest.com twitter.com/pcquest facebook.com/pcquest linkd.in/pcquest pcquest@cybermedia.co.in
NOVEMBER 2017 SMB CORNER 8
Digital Wanderlust
26 Get Your Payroll in `10
12 “Delayed Payment is a major problem in East zone”: FOSMI 14 Why PC-enabled SMEs will win in the Age of GST 15 How CRM can help Manufacturing Industry to enhance their processes
30 “We want to be India’s first hoe-based OEM” 23 “We are the world’s most popular tech accessory brand”
32 I am conservative, though very aggressive on the filed
25 “India is very strategic for PTC”
TECH AND TRENDS 47 Automated Architecture for employees and employers 49 Overcoming Test Challenges of USB Type-C 52 Diminishing Distance, Growing Business 54 “We are focused on making Success Stories” 56 Indians are Digitally Talented 58 To Upgrade or Not, That is the Question? 60 “Rubique to become the largest online marketplace for loans in the near future”
62 ‘We are the only one who has the solutions for the mid-market’ 64 Big Data Paves Way For Success in Retail Boom 68 Air Purifier with mosquito catcher helps battle vector-borne diseases 70 Today’s AI, Tomorrow’s Intelligent Salesforce
72 Securing Financial Institutions in India pcquest.com twitter.com/pcquest facebook.com/pcquest linkd.in/pcquest pcquest@cybermedia.co.in
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Tech Musings
Make IT Credit-able Rajneesh De, Group Editor rajneeshd@cybermedia.co.in
Redington owns one such NBFC which however functions as a neutral channel financing company
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fairly well-known SMB in the NCR region was recently looking to take on lease 50 odd laptops. My friend, the IT manager, was lamenting that while the leasing company had initially agreed to the deal, at the eleventh hour it suddenly cried off citing that the company’s credit rating was ‘8’ and the leasing company is unable to do business with anyone having a credit rating above 6. They will be willing to go ahead with the transaction in case the bank stands as the guarantor and is willing to underwrite costs. Why I brought this story up is because it is the typical scenario facing several SMBs as well as partners who often lease out or supply hardware to these companies. Working capital and credit flows are the biggest problems staring at their faces and there seems to be little room for maneuvering. It’s a Catch 22 situation as otherwise businesses on both sides would come to a standstill. So what could be the solution? One could be Non-Banking Financial Corporations (NBFCs) coming into the fray and helping partners, suppliers and SMB users by providing them easy financing schemes. Redington owns one such NBFC which however functions as a neutral channel financing company; banks like ICICI offer softer loans or easy finance schemes under various SMB programs. Both the user organizations as well as suppliers/partners (who too will come under SMBs) can avail of these facilities. The banks could also look at restructuring their loan EMIs or at least rationalizing them considering that many of the SMBs are still to find their feet as they are coming out of the recession mode. However, it is imperative upon the partners or the SMB organizations to make a clean breast to the banks or whatever financial institutions they are dealing with. Any request for loan restructure revision should take into account your true current fiscal situation as well as a fairly accurate assessment of your future cash-flow position. Evading the unpleasant truth for long either by fibbing or by pushing them under the carpet would lead you nowhere—be it your topline or bottomline, your credit rating outside or your general market reputation. There are talks of RBI stimulating the SMB sector, but even if that happens, our partners and SMBs in general have to maintain a certain standard of fiscal hygiene to take full advantage of. Often vendors could offer extend financing terms to SMB resellers. These programs offer eligible resellers period-based interest free credit by extending indirect financing through their distributors. Often a joint approach between a vendor and a financing company, this could be a godsend not only for maintaining the working capitals but even to successfully enable hardware acquisition like what the NCR company wanted to do. The subsidies thus offered to both the reseller as well as the user not only allays their immediate woes but also stimulates business growth for both as well as driving incremental sales revenue for the vendors. What we really need in these cases is a happy marriage between the partner credit programs (that subsidize and elongate the payment cycle to the distributor) and end user leasing programs (that accelerate cash flow from end user to reseller). That way not only the working capital problem is successfully tackled, even my friend the IT manager will get lesser sleepless nights.
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UNDERSTAND s CHOOSE s IMPLEMENT IT
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DIGITAL WANDERLUST A hassle free travel is just a click away... – Jyoti Bhagat jyotib@cybermedia.co.in
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ant to have a fabulous and fantastic trip? Here is your answer. These travel apps can help any traveller in their trips and give much fun like anything. This is the time if you haven’t booked accommodation 8
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for your winter trips yet. Whether you’re looking for a local stay, wanting to enjoy a white Christmas in your favorite country or planning to relax on a sandy beach somewhere, there are some great smartphone apps to help you find the right place to stay...
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· · ·
A user can do web check-in now in MakeMyTrip app MakeMyTrip booking confirmation and e-ticket delivery through WhatsApp MakeMyTrip has launched a new product for corporate bookings
MakeMyTrip
MakeMyTrip fundamentally believes in mobile first and below are some of the services offered by the MMT Mobile app. The MakeMyTrip app gives personalized app experience to its customers with the help of data science and smart recommendation algorithms. Through this users get a fully personalized App home page with a feed based on relevant cards that show the users flight, hotel and home stay recommendations based on their search history, booking behavior, location and user segments. Users who have made a booking, will get personalized content about their booking such as the ability to do a web check-in for their flights, check flight status and know all the relevant information about their journey like knowing terminal information, baggage allowance, weather info etc. With regards to their hotels booked, the customers get the ability to know the directions to the hotel, check in, check out times, MMT Assured hotline, hotel call details, review the hotel post check out, destination weather etc.
Technology The platform uses multiple technologies like Node.js, java and many others for backend development, Spark for real time data processing, Kafka for stream processing, Couchbase for cache, grafana for performance tracking and zabbix for alerting along with many other technologies.
Services · ·
Zero cancellation offering on flight tickets Fare prediction service for flight fares. We predict the future increase/decrease in fare for user’s search dates and inform the user upfront so that user can make the booking decision accordingly
Cleartrip
Cleartrip is a leading travel app that offers air, hotel and train travel planning and booking services. With the launch of Cleartrip Local in 2016 it has become the first global travel tech company of scale to offer users an opportunity to discover and engage in hyperlocal leisure activities. “The app facilitates end-to-end planning and booking travel and in-destination experiences. Fast to load and quick to book interface - Letting its customers do what they need to do faster have been one of the enduring passions for Cleartrip. The app provides a quick 4 step booking process which shows only the relevant information to the user as against distracting banners and advertisements. Its Expressway feature lets users store their traveler profile and payment details safely and securely in the Clear trip Account to enable just one click bookings. Expressway was a first in India, a country where making payments online is complicated and prone to error” says Subramanya Sharma, Chief Marketing Officer and Head of Products give space. Customers have less time available at hand and use multiple devices while planning travel. The switch from one device to other needs to be seamless. In-destination experiences as an extension of travel - Gone are the days of travelling to a place and see a couple of common tourist attractions. Travellers today want a closer to real experience of the place. In addition, the trend of doing a trip without travelling is catching up. In-destinations suggestions about what a place has to offer in terms of events and experi-
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CORNER ences is something customers are looking for. Attention to post-booking engagement - Post booking engagement is an important part of the ecommerce value chain and a keen focus on optimising the process is key to a positive customer experience. Web-checkin, effortless online cancellation, smart IVR are expectations that customers have of all travel apps today.
Technology Cleartrip takes a lot of pride in the mobile app that has evolved over the last 5-6 years. Cleartrip was one of the first Indian apps on both major app platforms - android and iOS. It has been at the cutting-edge of both platforms incorporating platform specific features ranging from adapting to design changes, 3D Touch, Apple wallet and message on iOS to app links, smart lock and material design on android. Subramanya Sharma, Chief Marketing Officer and Head of Products at Cleartrip. This focus on working on the latest and greatest on both platforms has seen Cleartrip featured on both app stores as well as being named the app of the year on iOS in 2014. Cleartrip has also innovated on related platforms such as the iPad and Apple Watch - being first of Indian travel apps to be present on these platforms. In terms of technology, Cleartrip believes in staying true to the platform and build using native toolkits on both platforms staying away from common interfaces that may not be true to the platform.
and manage their trip, including Price Alert, Price Forecast and free itinerary management tool, Trips. KAYAK processes over 2 billion consumer queries for travel information a year, and operates more than 100 local sites across 60+ countries and territories and in 20+ languages. KAYAK is an independently managed subsidiary of The Priceline Group. “KAYAK helps travelers get the information they need before they book and offers tools and features to assist them throughout their trip. The website and mobile app search hundreds of travel sites at once so that travelers have the information they need to make the best decisions” says Abhijit Mishra, Country Director, India, KAYAK. “KAYAK is different from other travel companies. First, we are not a store, we don’t sell products. We are a travel search engine, and we search other travel sites to provide customers with the information they need to make the right decision on booking their flights, hotels, and even cars” Abhijit adds. In addition to travel search, we also offer tools that will help travelers with both planning and travel itinerary management: - Price Forecast helps travelers decide whether to “buy now” or “wait” - Trips helps travelers organize their bookings/itineraries - Explore helps you find a destination within your budget Research tells us that the price conscious, smart Indian traveler does intensive research and compares prices before buying a travel package online. This makes our platform relevant for users in India as we offer comprehensive search results. We are a travel search engine, and we search other travel sites to provide customers with the information they need to make the right decision on booking their flights, hotels, and even cars. This enables our users to avail the best prices for their bookings. We believe our excellent product will attract India travelers to use KAYAK and will get them hooked once they experience our one-stop travel solution.
Booking.com
KAYAK
KAYAK, the world’s leading travel search engine, searches other travel sites to show travelers the information they need to find the right flights, hotels, rental cars and holiday packages. KAYAK website and App also offer smart travel tools to help travelers plan 10
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Booking.com provides customers with the ease to book from over 1.4 million accommodation options - from homes, hotels, apartments, resorts, B&B’s and more -from anywhere in the worldat various price points that match their requirements. We also recently launched a feature, Booking Experiences, a highly-curated one stop shop for travel experiences, enabling the customer to book, pay and avoid
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through a travel agent.
TripCase and TripIt
queues at a plethora of experiences in destination, from museums to tours and more. We also have 24/7 customer service in 43 languages to resolve any issues faced by our customers. We also provide them with the flexibility to update, cancel their bookings from anywhere and pay as you stay all in one place. “Booking.com offers flexible payment options, including pay-when-you-stay, which means the customers can reserve online and pay at the property on check out. For accommodation partners, we enablethem to maintain complete control over their businesses, setting their own rates and availability and there is no cost to list the properties on the website. We only charge a commission to the property once we’ve delivered them business, hence listing on Booking.com is arguably one of the most cost-effective ways for hotel and accommodation partners to grow their business and brand globally. This business model provides both the customers and property partners the ease to operate and has enabled Booking.com to grow its business in India” says Vikas Bhola, Head of Indian Sub-Continent, Booking.com.
Services We have seen an increased appetite for customers to search for travel based on their passions and hobbies, rather than the destination. Hence, we developed the aforementioned Passion Search feature. It enables customers to discover various destinations across the world where they can indulge in their favourite pursuits. Personalized experience also is a big trend that is emerging in the industry, whereby customers want to create their own trip, picking and choosing their desired locations and itineraries themselves via their smartphone, rather than going
TripCase and TripIt both work in a similar way, which is to compile your travel itinerary from your travel booking confirmation emails. It’s pretty easy to get going, just sign up to an account and then as you make bookings, forward your confirmation emails to a designated email address, and it will automatically compile your itinerary. TripIt and TripCase will also scan your inbox so any new bookings will be automatically added to your schedule. They’re both free to use, though TripIt has a paid version. TripIt Pro has travel points tracker, flight alerts and airport guides.
Services Trips can be shared with your travel companions and there’s a social element that allows you to share your travels on social media so others can see your whereabouts while you’re travelling. TripIt and TripCase both have mobile apps (iOS and Android) which is important to give you access to your travel itinerary on the go.
Technology TripIt and TripCase send a confirmation email when the booking email is scanned and added to your trip itinerary. It’s not a foolproof system, so be prepared to do a bit of editing on the travel details, particularly if the booking confirmation has a lot of text or tables. You may need to adjust hotel checkin and check-out times, for example, to ensure that bookings on the same day are in logical time order and don’t overlap. Booking confirmations from airlines and hotels in standard format are usually imported without needing any adjustment. See our Tripit tutorial for a step-by-step guide on setting up and using TripIt.
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“DELAYED PAYMENT IS A MAJOR PROBLEM IN EAST ZONE”: FOSMI – Anushruti Singh anushrutis@cybermedia.co.in
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OSMI’s objective is to facilitate industrial development mainly in the micro and small sectors. FOSMI represents the interests of its members through collective efforts. It has regular dialogues and exchange of views with various Government and Semi-Government organizations, Financial Institutions, Banks, Promotional Agencies and others connected to the MSME Sector. FOSMI has representations on the following Committees and Boards, where it’s representatives voice the problems and promote the cause of the MSME sector. In a SMB gathering in Kolkata Ex-Pres-
DK Mohta, Ex-President of Federation of Small and Medium Industries (FOSMI), West Bengal
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ident of Federation of Small and Medium Industries, West Bengal DK Mohta, in an interaction with PC Quest talks about association deeds and present scenario of the market.
Tell us about FOSMI and how it is helping SMBs in Kolkata?
What is Insolvency & Bankruptcy Code, 2016
We are one of the major association in Kolkata for small scale industries and we have 27 affiliated associations with us and we are mainly representing the problem of the small scale sector through the various agencies which are concerned with this sector. We are now holding number of programs, seminars. For example the hottest topic now is GST for this we have organized quite a number of programs. Next new thing is lean manufacturing for which we have designed two clusters. We have been instrumental in that, and then that zero defect, zero effect all the government programs we try to make aware our members about all the government programs. And whenever they have any problems we stand with them. Anyone can be a member of FOSMI, we have all sorts of trade members in our organization. It doesn’t caters to one or particular commodity it is for all the manufacturers. And because now the enterprise is also added so we are also welcoming them in our association as a member.
— The Code highlights insolvency processes for individuals, companies and partnership firms. It may be noted that, under IBC debtor and creditor both can start ‘recovery’ proceedings against each other.
What are the plans ahead for FOSMI?
— Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India has been appointed as a regulator and it can oversee these proceedings. IBBI has 10 members; from Finance Ministry and Law Ministry the Reserve Bank of India.
The plan is to work for traders community. We are going to serve our people by all means. We will raise there issues and take it to the right platform. We are also working with state government to provide helping hands to our members for this we are opening help centers at various places.
What are the challenges that SMB faces here in Kolkata? Here challenges are too many. Delayed payment is one of them, because of the wagon industry being here, most of the clients delay the payments. It becomes major problem despite of facilitation center being there but it is not effective as should be. But thanks to the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code 2016, which is helping us to tackle debt issues. Further GST is still a major affair for us, but we are supporting it as it is a good step from government in the long run. Another matter is to be technology sound. We are insisting our members in every gathering to develop on technology front. If we do not run along with newer technology; doing business will be difficult and we will fail in future.
— Companies have to complete the entire insolvency exercise within 180 days under IBC. The deadline may be extended if the creditors do not raise objections on the extension. — For smaller companies including startups with an annual turnover of Rs 1 crore the whole exercise of insolvency must be completed in 90 days and the deadline can be extended by 45 days.
— IBC permits hiring services of licensed professionals who have total control over assets of debtor while the proceedings are going on at a tribunal. — Two tribunals have been authorised to resolve insolvency issues and pronounce their judgement on them. One is National Company Law Tribunal for companies and the other Debt Recovery Tribunal for individuals.
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WHY PC-ENABLED SMES WILL WIN IN THE AGE OF GST
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he introduction of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) may just be one of the most challenging reforms that the Indian government has undertaken. This is not the first time a country has attempted to overhaul its tax structure; in fact, several countries in Asia have been down this path before. In Malaysia, the government planned a similar new tax model in 2011, but because local businesses were not GSTready, the entire process took five years, and was finally implemented in April 2015. India can take heed here and encourage businesses to get their IT infrastructure and operations in place, to accelerate the implementation process. While GST aims to overhaul the complex system of indirect taxes that had plagued India since independence, its implementation has witnessed mixed reactions, as expected of any radical economic transformation. There remains a sense of panic, especially among small and medium business owners. For them, GST appears to be unnecessarily burdensome, in addition to normal business hassles. On the other hand, large organizations may become collateral damage because their suppliers are not GST-ready. However, most businesses across the country have responded positively to the new interface, with a significant number having already migrated to the new portal.In less than three months, more than 22 crore invoices have been filed online, supported by the backbone of GST Network (GSTN) ,which is paving the way for digital office to replace paperwork. The end-to-end platform is designed for all stakeholders to undertake tax-related activities from vendor registration to calculating input credit. To bring more small and micro businesses onto the bandwagon, GST-compliant technologies are essential to help businesses manage the transition and future-proof themselves in an era of GST. Take the example of personal computers, which are transforming India’s cottage industries into small businesses. Modernizing the dying craft of Chanderi saree making, women textile designers in Chanderi, 14
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Ashoknagar, Madhya Pradesh, have utilized design software and internet connectivity on PCs to conquer the online marketplace and reach new customers irrespective of geography. Technologies that can, by the virtue of their form factor, handhold first-time business users to take their first successful steps into the digital economy by enabling productivity, mobility, and security , are extremely relevant at the incubation stage.As PC processing capability is integral to a GST-enabled economy, especially for the volumes of work done online, devices with pre-installed GST software can help SMEs experience a hassle-free migration. As PC usage grows, businesses will grow – computers and connectivity will also open the gateway for digitization and automation of businesses, increasing returns, scale, and output. SME scan stay ahead of the curve by deploying PCs that can perform complex tasks to scale their businesses, such as analyzing big data into meaningful insights that power sound decisions. At a macro level, a PC in the GST era also makes it easier to start and expand a business, with a standardized, centralized, digital vendor registration process across states. It also reduces chances of fraud and corruption, with a secure, authentication based protection of digital records and processes. Ultimately, the PC is a tool where the workflows are built and business strategies, models and deliverables are created. In the era of GST, the processing power of a PC is the only workhorse capable of handling heavy-duty tasks and multi-tasking for businesses. This is why PC-enabled SMEs will be the victors in the era of GST, and it will not be long before technology deployment will drive the Indian SME ecosystem to new heights. _ Authored by PRAKASH MALLYA, Managing Director, Sales & Marketing, Intel India
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HOW CRM CAN HELP MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY TO ENHANCE THEIR PROCESSES
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anufacturing industries are generally more focused on managing and optimising the production process. Also, since accounting is mandatory, when they look for automation they will look for a software platform which can handle finance (including accounting) and inventory (including manufacturing). Basically their focus is on the possibility that the software, generally known as ERP, should also have mechanism to handle taxation formalities and calculations. Generally the most ignored component in any manufacturing industry is the Sales and Marketing process. So obviously the need to automate and transform Sales and Marketing function also comes down in the list of priorities. That is the reason generally manufacturing units don’t focus much on implementing a CRM system for their Sales and Marketing team. However CRM not only can help Sales team to per-
form better but its positive effects can be seen over the entire organisation. It’s not only the Sales team that will benefit. We need to deep dive into the topic to understand it better.
How CRM can help Manufacturing Industry to enhance their processes. 1.
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Sales are solution for every problem: As the management theory goes, a good Sales figure will take care of many smaller problems in any company. Be it profitability or cash flow or even morale of the team, a good sales figure takes care of all. So, without the dread of being overstated we can say that, Sales is the cure for most of the illness an organisation might have. Measuring efforts and seeing results: Sales figures are results of Sales and Marketing activities done by the team. Results are not in our hands but the activities can be managed.
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In case of the absence of proper CRM, since activities are not measurable, people turn a blind eye to it. The primary focus hence shifts to the results and then the speculation on the probable causes of not being able to achieve them. This leads to lots of stress and distrust amongst team members. Sales is never done in isolation. Especially in a Manufacturing Industry, most of the times, Sales is not a one man Job (or one meeting Job for that matter). Technical team is involved for showing POC (Proof of Concept) or demo; Finance team may be involved for sending and validating proposals and quotations. So if a proper CRM is implemented it will make managing and validating the entire process of Sales, in different stages and by different team members, a piece of cake. Sales Projections. How can you decide what to produce, if you don’t know what you are going to Sell. CRM helps here in two ways (a) giving Sales Projections based on enquiries and deals/opportunities on hand and (b) understanding trends and customer buying patterns. This can help to formulate strategies for both short and long term. Entire Customer Lifecycle on one platform. Customers’ journey with your company starts much before they buy your solution. The Sale happens, then erection, installation and commissioning is done which is followed by after-sales services. Lots of team members from your company contact lots of different members from the customers’ end. CRM can provide you with the entire history of all the interactions done above. Getting Whole Picture. Nowadays, because of
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massive use of Mobile technologies in CRM, it is possible to get time and cost analysis of any activities, even Sales efforts. Imagine if you could get the amount of time and efforts invested in Sales, after Sales and post Sales support of any given customer and then compare it against the Sales or Gross Profit. This can enable a company to decide which businesses are profitable and which are not. CRM helps you to get a full consolidated picture which in turn helps in taking decisions based on analysis rather than gut feelings.
Summary CRM is a must for any manufacturing Industry in order to get a 360 degree image of their business as well as the customer behaviour. Limesh Parekh, CEO, Enjay IT Solutions says “We have seen many success stories where our clients have not only seen remarkable growth in their Sales figures by using our CRM solution, but have also achieved a higher efficiency in their overall processes, due to synchronised reporting provided by CRM.” “Recently large scale adoption of Mobile CRM has changed the dynamics to a drastic level. It has almost eradicated data entry or simplified it to a great level and improved real-time reporting and notifications to Sales executives and managers. Mobile CRM is the need of current times, not only for Manufacturing Industry but for any kind of business.”
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COVER STORY
SUN RISES IN THE EAST. DO SMBs TOO?
• SMB Yatra reaches to Guwahati, Kolkata & Bhubaneswar • Commutation, Payment Delay, GST Compliance are the major issues faced by SMBs • Government is extending help through local SMB associations • SMBs should work with technology vendors to remain in the game – Anushruti Singh anushrutis@cybermedia.co.in
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ith goals to provide SMBs an opportunity to gain business productivity, better geographical reach and to provide deployment of best technology; Canon and Panasonic in collaboration with SMB focused publication PC Quest; a division of CyberMedia Publications reaches East zone to organize SMB Yatra. Guwahati was the first city to witness the gathering of SMBs and technology vendors on 10th October at Hotel Contour. Whereas, Kolkata’s Hotel Park Plaza witnessed second conference on 13th October. The third gathering happened in Bhubaneswar on 17th October which held at Hotel HHI. The event was intended as the first step towards finding more effective answers for deploying right technology by gathering a select group of Business owners and Entrepreneurs. The business events were focused to establishing a rapport with business owners and technology end users. To support small businesses with high growth 18
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potential, Canon India showcased printer solutions at the Guwahati event which can find effective answers for their needs. Canon India Representative Sagnic Kar was present there to give demos to the audience. Canon’s laser and production printers provide an excellent answer to the printing needs of ever growing SMB sector. One of the biggest problems in cities like Guwahati is commutation, where efficiency of railways and other transport is a question because of geographical adversities. But to answer such questions Panasonic gave insights about their best video solutions HDVC for small business owners. Nanda Ghosh and Animesh were present in Guwahati and Kolkata respectively to give overview and demonstration of their various solutions. These video conference systems come with high image quality, high sound quality. Video solutions works with stable connection achieved both with intranets and the Internet, enabling easy, comfortable communication
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SMB Yatra Guwahati
SMB Yatra Kolkata
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between remote locations. Business conference in all the cities witnessed large number of audience which consists of business owners from various verticals. Guwahati audience shared their challenges and experience of doing business in Guwahati. They also shared their expectations from technology vendors. One of the attendees shares that, “The development speed is real slow. Ground reality is very different of what we have always been told. The biggest problem in this area is servicing. The products are sold but after that servicing part is very poor. In this zone one person is representative will be accountable for number of jobs. And this confuses us getting the right treatment.” Kolkata SMB Yatra also witnessed association with Federation of Small Medium Industries; an association for SMBs. Ex-President DK Mohta gave keynote on challenges and expectations of SMBs. He said, “Role of technology plays an important part in the growth of SMBs. It gives us new and better approach to do businesses. What we expect from technology vendors is newer technologies, guidance and good quality services for better productivity”. Whereas, Kolkata audience also got benefited with GST openhouse session. This session was conducted by Biswarup Das, Deputy Commissioner of CGST; Prasenjit Sarkar, Mridul Naskar and Soumitra Biswas (Superintendent of CGST). Talking about the third gathering, Technology vendors Numeric was partners in the SMB Yatra in Bhubaneswar. Mukhtar Ahmed, Channel Head – East represented Numeric Power Systems where he talked about the UPS solutions for the end users and how they can power their business for profitability. Numeric’s compact new KEOR Series of ‘Three Phase UPS’ - Keor HP and Keor HPE devices allows users flexible operating modes for large facilities, data-centers and business-critical applications with the flexibility of extending its range from 60 kVA to 4.8 MVA. These intend to satisfy both user and installers by providing ease of maintenance and safety; capital preservation and reducing operating expenses. To attract customers Numeric also gave interactive demo to the audience present there. While, IT Association of Orissa (ITAO) was the association partner in the event. Soubhagya Routray, President of the IT association gave brief overview of their cluster and its deeds in the Odisha region. Another highlight of the event was the GST openhouse session which was conducted by CA Mihir Sahu, where the attendees discussed the issues that needed to be tackled.
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TECHNOLOGY WILL MAKE MID MARKET STRONG
– Anushruti Singh anushrutis@cybermedia.co.in
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n the digital age, the future can be bright if mid markets are willing to make some changes and adopt latest technology. With this message PC Quest SMB Yatra reaches out to North zone in Lucknow and Dehradun in collaboration with Panasonic Video solutions and Numeric Power Solutions. Braced with the goal of ensuring the best possible opportunities to gain 360 degree growth in the business, Lucknow SMB Yatra held at Hotel Levana on 25th October
and then reached Dehradun where it held on 27th October at Hotel Four Point by Sheraton. The agenda of this conference was to showcase how SMBs can increase their opportunities by connecting with respective OEMs. Rajneesh De, Editor, PC Quest gave the opening address and introduced the perspective of SMB Yatra to North Business owners. The event in both places witnessed brief sessions on products and solutions from sponsors, where they emphasized on benefits of products and how they can leverage the company’s platform to transform themselves and increase their productivity. The event witnessed gathering of large number of business owners. Technology vendors present in the conferences discussed the opportunities and benefits for customers by getting associated with their respective brands. Amit Bhardwaj of Panasonic presented an interactive and live session of HDVC solution before the audience for doing business live anywhere at any place even at lower bandwidth. While Reema Rakheja, Regional Sales Head introduced Numeric UPS to the business owners present at Lucknow and Dehradun. Other sales representative present there highlighted Numeric’s 3 Phase UPS Systems and other solutions through demo zone. Next serial stops of SMB Yatra will be Vizag, Mangalore and Pune.
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SMB Yatra Kolkata
SMB Yatra Dehradun
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“WE ARE THE WORLD’S MOST POPULAR TECH ACCESSORY BRAND” In a one-on-one with PC Quest; Kartik Bakshi, India Head, Belkin talks the specialty of the company as an accessory brand. – Jyoti Bhagat jyotib@cybermedia.co.in
What are the Extension plans of Belkin in India? In terms of distribution plan, we are looking at expanding the channels though E-commerce, Apple resellers and large format retailers.
What are the products or services offered by Belkin? We are bringing in our latest product innovation
- BOOST UP™ Wireless Charging Pad for iPhone. Additionally, along our theme in mobile power “Charging Simplified”, we will launch a new light weight power bank. We will also be bringing in more complementary products for iPhones - True Clear Pro, our screen protection solution that is engineered to provide precise application and maximum protection. Expert application of the overlay is part of the screen
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protection product line. As an early member of USB-IF, Belkin knows what it takes to be a leader at the cutting edge of technology, and our USB-C cables (also known as USB Type-C cables) are no exception. Supporting the USB C technology, Belkin is committed to provide complete solution for the new generation of PC and android phone to enable high speed data transfer and superior power delivery.
Please explain the features of BOOST UP wireless charging pad. The Boost Up Wireless Charging Pad provides an effortless wireless charging experience for iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X. It is fine-tuned with Qi technology under the hood, and is also able to charge at levels up to 7.5W for compatible devices. Product features: Boost Up Wireless Charging Pad Features — Cable-free convenience — Charges iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X on contact while maintaining full functionality of device including ability to receive calls — Charging levels optimized up to 7.5W for compatible devices — Ability to charge through cases up to 3mm thick — The latest Qi wireless charging standard — Connected equipment warranty up to $2500 +
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Kartik Bakshi, India Head, Belkin
bonus warranty
What are the new products lined up in coming 6 months? As mentioned in the earlier questions, we will be bringing in BOOST UP™ wireless charging pad, Pocket Power and True Clear Pro.
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“INDIA IS VERY STRATEGIC FOR PTC” In a one on one with PC Quest Kalyan Sridhar, country manager of PTC India talks about the performance of the company in different verticals. Anushruti Singh anushrutis@cybermedia.co.in Jyoti Bhagat jyotib@cybermedia.co.in
What sort of traction you see in India.
And in manufacturing space we are pretty much done with almost all the large manufacturers. Whether it be an automotive supplier to the OEM’s.
India is a very strategic market for us. It’s a market which is currently a little underperforming. But looking at the team we have a pretty solid base here. Unfortunately we have been not able to get the more no. of customer or the value in terms of moving up where the PTC is globally going. I will not say that we have a pretty solid time here. So, overall in the last couple of years its actually double revenue in India.
From where PTC gets growth?
We are growing through manufacturing space and a little bit from the partner’s like telco and the retail space. But primarily it’s on the core which is manufacturing, we Kalyan Sridhar, country manager of PTC India have seen customers taking it the next level and new customer are What are the verticals and the LOB’s you operate coming and added to the value chain.
around?
The verticals are pretty much open. We are actually getting into a lot of new verticals or traditionally what has been in our place. For eg. Telco, we are getting in telco in a big way. And so we are seeing a lot of traction that we are building especially with the IT and play in telco. Similarly we are getting into pharma sector in a big way. And that’s again a very big area of getting traction for PTC in the market. We are also coming with our retail PLM for med devices. Working with the device around the pharma and medical devices.
What is the no. of customers you have? We have pretty much customers across the multiple segment. From which we have 50-60 direct customers.
What is the overall partner ecosystem? Basically we have two partnership models one is traditional reseller and the other is systematic traders. In which we have eight SI’s globally. We have multiple spread of resellers across the country. Some of them have exclusive relationship with us, while others are also associated with other vendors.
What will be the roadmap for next 8 to 12 months? Right now we are focusing on IT sector and our customers as well. IT space is right now booming with traction so obviously we are intended to open or close partnerships. We are expecting a good space in almost every business vertical we are active.
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GET YOUR PAYROLL IN `10
Sumit Sabharwal, Managing Director (India & SAARC), Excelity Global in an exclusive interaction with PC Quest talks about ezpayroll cloud based payroll solution targeting Indian SMEs and Start-Ups
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– Anushruti Singh anushrutis@cybermedia.co.in
hat is the concept behind ezpayroll and what are the USPs?
ezpayroll, is a SaaS based payroll solution specifically targeted at MSMEs and startups in India. Priced from Rs 9.99, ezpayroll addresses the entire gamut of modern and complex payroll needs of SMEs to ease the administrative burdens associated with payroll processing, government-related compliance and scaling up with growing needs while at the same time providing employees with Tax saving options. ezpayroll truly creates a frictionless experience where every employee will benefit, now. With ezpayroll, SME customers will be able to sign onto a single platform to access their workforce data, integrate their other HCM applications through
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a secure cloud infrastructure, and easily tackle other payroll related complexities. The solution will offer combined benefits management features such as meal vouchers and medical reimbursements, which will allow businesses to increase efficiency, and at the same time effect greater visibility into their workforce by ensuring all areas of their staff administration are streamlined for effectiveness. This software has various USPs which are: t 5IF NPTU DPTU FòFDUJWF QBZSPMM TPMVUJPO JO UIF industry t &BTZ VTFS JOUFSGBDF GPS TJNQMJöFE QBZSPMM NBOBHFment t $PNQMJBOU 1BZSPMM 4PMVUJPO
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SOFTWARE IS BUNDLED WITH DIFFERENT MODULES EMPLOYEE SELF SERVICE Through Employee Self Service portal and mobile apps, both managers and employees can easily access the data they need anytime and anywhere. Employees are empowered to self-manage their tax benefits whilst companies get to effectively manage administrative tasks through reduced workload whilst you boost your bottom line. Its Features are: s 0AYROLL SOLUTION ALONG WITH BENElTS LIKE MEAL VOUCHERS medical reimbursements, gift cards, fuel cards etc. to give tax benefits to employees s %MPLOYEES ARE ABLE TO TAKE FULL ADVANTAGE OF TAX SAVING options without administrative effort and enjoy tax savings s %MPLOYEES GET TO GENERATE STANDARD REPORTS SUCH AS Employee Master, Salary Register, Salary Variance, Head #OUNT 0AYSLIPS AND "ANK &ILES Let’s talk about leaves, the most important aspect of professional lifeSmile:
LEAVE MANAGEMENT
With ezpayroll, the administrator can easily maintain and manage all your employees leave applications. The organization is further supported by reports whilst ensuring payroll details are extracted when required. Its Features are: 1. Employee can apply leaves, view balances, Leave calendar. Managers can view, approve/ reject requests 2. Simple and Self-to-do setup process 3. Enables Administrator to consolidate leave details periodically, extract leave data for payroll, mass credit/ debit/update leaves 4. Capability to define more than 15 types of leaves 5. Capability to define multiple leave policies like: s %LIGIBILITY BASED LENGTH OF SERVICE EMPLOYEE CATEGORY & grade. s ,IMIT ON MAXIMUM CONTINUOUS LEAVES s #APABILITY TO CONlGURE 0RElX AND 3UFlX OF DIFFERENT leaves s #APABILITY TO DElNE #ARRY &ORWARD RULES 6. Automatic Reminders to Managers for leave approvals 7. Leave Dashboard for employees and managers 8. Capability to define multiple holiday calendars for different employee categories 9. Generate a multitude of reports: s ,EAVE BALANCE AS AT A PARTICULAR DATE s ,EAVE SUMMARY BY LEAVE TYPE
s ,EAVE DETAILS FOR A PERIOD BY TYPE APPROVED s ,EAVE APPLIED DETAILS FOR A PERIOD BY TYPE OF LEAVE status s ,EAVE HOLIDAY CALENDAR 9EAR END CARRY FORWARD balances and forfeiture s !UDIT TRAIL
TIME AND ATTENDANCE
Time and Attendance are systems to help SMEs optimise their resources so that they can truly unlock their organisation’s potential. Features 1. Allows administrator to Create/Maintain shift type/ group and allowance definition 2. Allows administrator to Maintain employee roster, daily attendance and consolidated attendance 3. Allows administrator to Create/Maintain company specific rules for T&A 4. Allows administrator to Create/Maintain employee’s approving officers 5. Enables Online submission of OT application, shift change request, certification of attendance (such as official attendance) 6. View roster and attendance 7. Allows managers and administrators for Online submission of OT application, shift change request, certification of attendance on behalf of subordinate 8. View roster and attendance of subordinates 0ERIODIC CONSOLIDATION OF EMPLOYEES ATTENDANCE AT Administrator level 10. Handling exception occurred during processing or consolidation of clock data 11. Extract details for payroll 12. The following reports can be generated using the T&A tool: s /4 ,ISTING 2EPORT s #/! ,ISTING 2EPORT s )NDIVIDUAL !TTENDANCE 2EPORT s 4! ,ISTING 2EPORT s #LOCK $ATA LISTING
BUSINESS EXPENSE
Our software is designed to keep operating costs low: Features 1. Simple and Self-to-do setup process 2. Multiple expense types to choose from 3. Email notification whenever an application is approved, rejected or cancelled
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CORNER 4. Web based approval workflow up to 3 levels with email notification features 5. Enables Administrator to Consolidate business expense information periodically and generate expense reports 6. Enables Managers to verify and approve/reject team members’ claim 7. Provides a placeholder to host company related documents like HR policies/business expense guidelines/employee handbook/user guide 8. Generate a host of Reports: s #LAIM LIST s #LAIM FOR CURRENT MONTH AND YEAR TO DATE s #LAIM UTILISATION 9. Audit trail-employee and non-employee 10. Approving Manager list
EMPLOYEE OVERTIME Schedule, streamline and approve employee overtime Features 1. Enables Administrator to Setup and update policies and rules for overtime, allowances etc. Simple and Self-todo setup process 2. Allows calculation for all approved OT requests, their different rates, respective allowances such that the information can be interfaced to payroll for processing. 3. Enables Administrator to Consolidate Overtime information periodically and incorporate the data for payroll processing
t 1BZSPMM TPMVUJPO BMPOH XJUI CFOFöUT MJLF NFBM WPVDIFST NFEJDBM SFJNCVSTFNFOUT HJGU DBSET GVFM DBSET FUD UP HJWF UBY CFOFöU UP FNQMPZFFT t ;FSP $"1&9 UP TFUVQ QBZSPMM
What are the HR Challenges for SMEs and how would EZpayroll address that?
Problem SMEs face: t .JTTJOH $PNQMJBODF t "ENJOJTUSBUJWF )BTTMFT t -BDL PG %BUB 4FDVSJUZ BOE 1SJWBDZ t *OBCJMJUZ UP QSPWJEF FNQMPZFFT XJUI 5BY TBWJOH PQUJPOT t 5SPVCMF HFUUJOH TUBSUFE BOE TDBMJOH XJUI HSPXJOH OFFET ezpayroll helps resolve these problems: t ;FSP BENJO FòPSUT SFRVJSFE t 1SPUFDUFE CZ 44"& BOE 7"15 BVEJUT t 4UBSU PQFSBUJPOT JO IPVST 28
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4. A web based platform for employees and Managers to perform transactions pertaining to Overtime administration 5. Generate the following reports: Overtime Summary Listing by Employee Overtime Details Listing by Employee
BENEFIT MANAGEMENT Provide cloud-based, easy-to-use, workforce management solutions and employee self-service benefits such as meal vouchers and medical reimbursements that will allow businesses to save time, money and gain control of their workforce by ensuring all areas of their staff administration is fully streamlined for efficiency and effectiveness. Features 1. One-stop solution that can manage all corporate benefit instruments. 2. Provides flexible and configurable benefit models example: one can opt for meal vouchers or medical reimbursements or fuel cards and so on based on the company’s policies 3. Improves employee experience by enabling them to better organise their tax saving benefits. 4. Benefits Platform enabled with ezpayroll: s 7ALLET ON #LOUD OR #LOUD #ARDS s 3ECURE $IGITAL $OCUMENT 3TORE s 3UPER #ARD 3UPER 4AG -OBILE !PPS s $ASHBOARD
t &MJNJOBUF .BOBHF DPNQMJBODF SJTLT CZ QSPWJEJOH DPSSFDU JOGPSNBUJPO t "EBQUJWF CVJMU JO GFBUVSFT GPS B HSPXJOH DPNQBOZ
What is the market reception to EZPayroll since June and what is the roadmap ahead? #Z NBLJOH JU BòPSEBCMF BOE BWBJMBCMF UP UIF 4.&T &YDFMJUZ BTQJSFT UP IBWF UIF öSTU NPWFS BEWBOUBHF JO UIJT TQBDF 5IF DPNQBOZ JT UBSHFUJOH UP TFSWF IVHF OVNCFS PG 4.&T F[QBZSPMM JT öSTU MBVODIFE JO *OEJB BOE PWFS UIF OFYU RVBSUFS XJMM CFDPNF BWBJMBCMF BDSPTT "TJB 1BDJöD 5IF UFBN JT MPPLJOH BU NPSF JOOPWBUJWF NPEVMFT UP CF B QBSU PG F[QBZSPMM MJLF 8J 'J 5JNFTIFFU "OPUIFS MFBEJOH FEHF IVNBO SFTPVSDF NBOBHFNFOU BQQMJDBUJPO 8J 'J 5JNFTIFFU XJMM IFMQ 4.&T FBTZ UP QMBO NBOBHF BOE SFQPSU FNQMPZFF UJNF 5IJT TUBUF PG UIF BSU BQQ XJMM FOBCMF PSHBOJ[BUJPOT UP JNQSPWF QSPKFDU WJTJCJMJUZ PQUJNJ[F FNQMPZFF VUJMJ[BUJPO BOE NBLF TNBSUFS NBOBHFNFOU EFDJTJPOT
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Typically such products and services have been available to large enterprises. With ezpayroll, we are bringing the benefits of professional HR management to small and medium enterprises that will allow them to scale with their employees, efficiently, seamlessly and cost effectively. Typically such products and services have been available to large enterprises. With ezpayroll, we are bringing the benefits of professional HR management to small and medium enterprises that will allow them to scale with their employees, efficiently, seamlessly and cost effectively.
What is Excelity gameplan in terms of newer products and newer geography? Excelity Global is Asia Pacific’s largest payroll services provider offering end-to-end HR - BPaaS, SaaS, PaaS services. 2017 is proving to be another eventful year for Excelity, with highlights including new partnerships and multiple client deals, due in part to its continued investment in its SaaS payroll platform, ezpayroll. Excelity continues to invest upwards of ~25% of its revenues in its technology and platform, and intends to expand its capability and reach in the near future. Excelity is committed to create more
SaaS HCM products using Artificial Intelligence, Robotics Process Automation and Machine Learning that boosts client’s business matrices and optimise employee experience. Furthermore, at the start of 2017, Excelity announced that it had signed multi-year deals with large multinational clients: India-based Fortis Health (22,000 employees), and Datamatics (8,500 employees). The scope of these deals includes payroll and benefits, and its services in India, with expansion to other countries and services as the relationships progresses. Excelity has also signed a deal with a large U.S. based, global diversified manufacturer for multi-country payroll. Going forward, Excelity will continue partnering with leading companies across APAC, and will broaden its presence in the region by opening a delivery centre in Malaysia and have secured business licenses for sales offices in Australia to open later in 2017. With this strong momentum and continued investment, Excelity will see further growth in the coming years and new client wins in the region. With deep domain expertise and 20 years long-standing commitment to innovation, Excelity enables businesses run better, grow faster and co-create value for all stakeholders.
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“WE WANT TO BE INDIA’S FIRST HOME-BASED OEM” In a one-on-one with PC Quest Mahesh Lingareddy, founder and CEO, Smartron shares his experiences and talks about smart offerings for consumers – Jyoti Bhagat jyotib@cybermedia.co.in
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What are the product portfolio and the GTM strategy of Smartron? The idea behind smartron was to let go and build India’s first original OEM brand and product brand like Samsung. It’s going to take lots of time and money and we may go along the way but someday has to do it. So the idea was to go and build the broadcast product categories from mobile computing, wearable, electronic motors. Today, we have about 10 products under development
Mahesh Lingareddy, Founder and CEO, Smartron
across all these categories from mobile phones. Other than smartphone we have the smart band, e-bikes, t-books and Ultrabook.
When will be these products out in the market? With our unique designs and different products, we will be out in next 9 to 12 months. I can ensure you, Smartron is not a Chinese product. Whether it is material, IDs, workforce it is all Indian and is controlled from here. We have already launched smart bands and soon electric bike will be out. Next on our list is smart home solutions like Amazon, Google Home has.
Tell us more about the home solutions of smartron? They are not just one product but it’s the one hub products. We are also creating the ecosystem. Today, at least ten companies are collaborating to develop the solutions. One is developing a smart bulb, other is creating smart cameras and locks. So when we launch a product you will see security solution, light control solution, a climate control solution. And you will see a different kind of solution because just having a hub doesn’t work.
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“I AM CONSERVATIVE, THOUGH VERY AGGRESSIVE ON THE FIELD”
In an interaction with PC Quest; Dinesh Verma, MD, Juniper India & SAARC talks about his experience in Juniper so far and strategies for times ahead
– Anushruti Singh anushrutis@cybermedia.co.in
You’ve been here for about a year now. From a Juniper India perspective, what has been happening over the last one year? I think it’s a very, very exciting journey. It’s something like a startup. We’ve been here, starting up the organization part with a much repeated brand. So, I’m enjoying every bit of it. As you see, we had a market presence which was there in Telco. We were the leading IP provider with almost all the telcos in the country. But after having come on board, I think our emphasis was getting into more of the other verticals, which are, government, defense, and enterprises. And now we have gotten into that in a big way. We’re getting successes both in government as well as in enterprises. The dependency of the service provider has gone down because the numbers have gone up. I can’t share those numbers but the earlier we were dependent, more or less, 75% on telcos. It has come down to around 50%- 55%, whereas the others have taken up in an equal proportion. So that’s very heartening. We hired a lot of people from outside. That, along with the great talent that we had internally, have been re-aligned appropriately and we’re going ahead with these two sectors full speed. The journey has been quite satisfying, as of now, and there’s a lot more to do. There is a clear-cut vision on how to do it and how to go about it. And the entire organization is completely channelized towards that. We haven’t changed our strategy because strategy can’t be changed every month. And so, we have fixed ourselves on that path right in January, when our new year started, and we’re religiously 32
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following that. There are humps, but we’re religiously following it. So, I think we should be able to do well and do justice to the brand that we’re all working for.
What sort of solution is the government using? We have few very specific areas that we’re getting into the government. One is the cloud. The data centers that they’re building up. Another one is on Digital India. And the third one is on their surveillance projects that are coming up. The fourth one is on the state wise DNA networks which are coming up for refresh. All these four verticals within the government require a lot of cloud infrastructure, they require lot of WAN infrastructure and we’re very, very strong, globally, in both these. We’re working with Uttarakhand, Rajasthan, Telangana, Andhra, UP and so on. With Digital India perspective we’re looking at the end-to-end fiber rollouts. It’s still in its early stages but we are already beginning to see great progress.
In terms of both, from the SIs and the channel perspective that you work with, and what are the cornerstones of the strategy right now? Whichever were the forming accounts, we wanted to have an inch wide mile-deep story. Go deeper into the account and do the forming. And for the hunting accounts we were focused on the top 65 per region…East-West-South...North-South-West... we were only concentrating on 65 large accounts, which were to be directly handled by us, the rest will be done by
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the partner. So that was the second part. The third piece was to enhance the partnership. Earlier we were dependent on one or two, but now we have added a couple more to our portfolio and large ones are also playing their part. These were the 3 major pillars of the strategy that we looked after from the GTM perspective in January. It’s a very simple, straightforward one but we aligned our team accordingly. We reinforced the team, we aligned the team accordingly. There were people who were going after every deal. So, we segregated them from the maturity perspective. Now, one or two senior salespersons only concentrate on the large 65 accounts. From whether it’s a government or an enterprise, primarily it’s an enterprise. And the second one was, we formed a separate government team which only looks after the government projects across the country.
Will there be some overlap between these top 65 enterprise accounts? Not at all. We have restructured the telco accounts with the key account management principle so that we have a focused approach. Thus, not one individual is handling more than one account now. Earlier they were handling a couple of them. Now one individual per account, with the team associated with it. So it could be a key account manager with a salesperson and the technology people around it, or two sales people with a technology team around it, depending on the complexity and the volume of the business that we’re getting from that particular customer and the potential to go after it. And then we formed a separate team to hunt for the new accounts where our presence is not there.
Within enterprises, any specific focus on the mid market segment? That is being driven through our partners. So we focus on the large 65 enterprise accounts, as I said, and then we may have some other 15 to 20 odd customers. The rest is being done by the partners.
So, overall what is the solutions portfolio that you have in the market? 1. The cloud solution: which entails the Q - fabric switching, the orchestration and the analytics. This can be used across the verticals, across the solutions, whether it’s government or telco or enterprise, depending on the scale that we can make use of. But it’s a vertical solution that goes. 2. The second one is the access. How you access that particular cloud? Whether it’s in the campus (on premise) or whether it’s public. If it’s public, then you have to create a complete WAN infrastructure. You know Juniper has been extremely strong in creat-
ing metro Ethernet, WAN networks and code networks using our MX portfolio and PTX portfolio. These are the 2 major portfolios that we have. And there are umpteen number of variants in these two. The second one is the LAN infrastructure that you can create within the premises which could be based on EX portfolio or the QFX portfolio, depending on the complexity that the LAN infrastructure requires. The security is embedded because we have the higher end SRX firewalls. But we had created a different architecture called software defined secure networks which is all pervasive security across the points, which is not only the firewalls at the parameter but right at the ingress point of the device that you’re using or through which you’re accessing. And then we have cyber security portfolio which goes across this. So that’s the second vertical. 3. The third vertical is the next generation telco clouds which is the cloudification of services which can go up till the edge and then you have the complete orchestration layer, and then you can have the complete analytics layer on top of it. So, these are the 3 pillars which we’re working on, as of today. The fourth will be software as a service which will take another 18 to 24 months before it gets pictured.
How was the internal realignment done since January. You mentioned some of the structuring but in terms of the manpower? So, the internal manpower, I didn’t have to do much actually. We just had to reallocate the people according to the vertical that they’re suited with. We hired few more executives from the marketplace and just gave them these three tasks, discussed the strategy which is very very simple and clear and then we’re just executing it. We’re not making anything very complex. Because the more complex you make it, the less worth it is. That’s what I firmly believe in. Keep it simple.
Over the next 12 to 18 months, in terms of market share, are there any specific target you have in mind? We just want to increase it by 10% YoY (annually) at the minimum. At the barest minimum, it should be at least 10%, if not more. We are on the way to do it. I don’t want to set a large goal and then fail. I want to go with small steps and take it over. Because most people, in order to make history go for large big items and then they fail in 2 years and go back. You may consider me as very conservative, though I’m very aggressive on the field. But the question is, let me assess the volume. Let me assess the way it is and then take a very calculated step. But from my perspective, I think our CAGR should be more than 10% over the next three years. I can give any number, but this is what the reality is.
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NEWS MYOPERATOR LAUNCHES “STARTUP PROGRAM” TO AUGMENT CLOUD TELEPHONY MyOperator, a leading home-grown cloud telephony company has started an initiative, “Startup Program”. It aims to accelerate cloud telephony & automation among the startup ecosystem. This is a unique initiative from MyOperator which provides a platform for early-stage startups to foster their business with the help of cloud telephony and simultaneously stimulate the startup ecosystem. India being the fourth largest technology driven nation has witnessed a tremendous growth over past few years as a startup nation. The companies participating in MyOperator startup program will be eligible to avail the key offering free for six months. To have access to the program the startup must fulfill the two conditions. It must be under two years of operations. And the early stage startups should have infused funds up to $1M. Within the span of three months, MyOperator has received more than 200 startup applications to avail the offerings of startup program. With the onset of the startup program, MyOperator is providing a platform and encouraging startups towards initiatives like Make in India and Digital India. The startup program offers additional benefits like exclusive referral benefits, dedicated account manager to companies under Startup Program at zero cost. MyOperator is a cloud-based call management system that provides call optimization solutions for businesses. Being a SaaS product, it provides a complete analytical report of all the calls received both department and user wise. MyOperator provides features like Virtual Number, Multi-level IVR, Remarketing and CRM Integration.
VODAFONE ASSOCIATES WITH HP INDIA & KPMG (‘KPMG IN INDIA’) TO OFFER GST READY SOLUTIONS Vodafone Business Services (VBS), the enterprise arm of Vodafone India, has announced its association with HP India and KPMG in Indiato introduceGST Ready Solutions for Business–a suite of offering comprising hardware, GST e-filing and accounting software and connectivity to enable a seamless transition to millions of Small & Medium Enterprises (SMEs), Start-ups and SOHOs (Small Offices Home Offices) to Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime. Vodafone is the first telco to provide such an integrated GST solution for enterprises. The end-to-end solution comprises of hardware from world’s leading PC brand - HP, GST invoicing software by KPMG, cloud storage for storing invoice data, uninterrupted GST Suvidha Provider (GSP) access, e-sign, GST registration and migration services. Adding to it, Vodafone’s seamless connectivity will ensure a smooth transition of enterprises to the adoption of GST. The solutions are available on VBS platform at an affordable price with EMI options starting from INR 630 per month for 24 months. VBS solutions also include cloud storage for secure data backup, registration, migration and e-sign services, and professional guidance and support. HP Laptop + GST Software by KPMG in India + 24*7 Vodafone Connectivity + Professional guidance and support services @ INR 36,490 (bundled offer) GST Software by KPMG in India + 24*7 Vodafone Connectivity + Professional guidance and support services @ INR 12,990 (bundled offer) GST software by KPMG in India + Professional guidance and support services @ INR 2999 (downloadable version for one year ) 34
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RUBIQUE UNDERTAKES MASSIVE EXPANSION DRIVE, WILL EXPAND TO A 100 CITIES BY MARCH 2018 Rubique, India’s leading fintech company, is on an aggressive expansion drive and will expand to 100 cities across India by March 2018 in a bid to revolutionize the traditional lending scenario of the country. Rubique is currently present in 27 cities in India, and expects that these new markets will take up substantial credit from the data-driven platform, raising the current total credit disbursed by the company from INR 2000 Cr to triple or quadruple that level. This will be in line with the company’s strategy to take its services to as many Indians as possible. Rubique has been disrupting the traditional lending process through digitizing the financial sector. Its revolutionary approach integrates tech-driven paradigm shifts into the conventional financial assessment systems, providing the best KYC, credit bureau integration, banking analysis, and enhanced logic through its proprietary matchmaking algorithms and use of new data science methodologies. Rubique’s unique Online PLUS model comes with paperless-focused features that transform the loan approval and processing – through e-KYC, ranking analysis, and real-time status tracking – into an optimized and efficient system taking up minimal time and greatly increasing accuracy. Rubique’s SPOT, an internal data platform run by Rubique covers the entire consumer journey from lead generation to disbursement for all types of loans and credit cards. Rubique also deploys Rubot, an AI decision engine powered bot that eases the transaction experience by using customer data to match the customer’s financial requirements with the products hosted on the platform. Equipped with these radical technologies, Rubique offers a wide range of loan products and end-to-end loan fulfilment to individuals and MSMEs. The company’s proprietary matchmaking algorithm enables consumers to get the best deal in the quickest possible time while lowering the cost of customer acquisition for the financial institution. Through the deployment of these tech-driven solutions and the access to the products hosted on the platform, Rubique will digitize and optimize the Indian financial sector.
GODADDY LAUNCHES BUSINESS HOSTING FOR FAST-GROWING SMALL BUSINESSES IN INDIA GoDaddy Inc. expanded its hosting services with the launch of its Business Hosting platform in India. GoDaddy Business Hosting is a high performance and easy-to-manage hosting platform that is fully optimized for high-traffic websites, e-commerce and resource-heavy websites. GoDaddy Business Hosting is the latest in the company’s efforts to expand its products for small businesses who need advanced solutions with more power, but may not have deep technical expertise to manage it. Nontech-savvy customers will breathe a sigh of relief knowing that they can get the server-level performance they need without delving into the technical complexities of server administration. A small business’s resource needs increase rapidly once their website becomes a high-traffic destination. As a small business grows, they build e-commerce capabilities, upload resource-heavy data such as videos and high resolution photos, and add advanced features and functionality to their websites. All this results in slower page load times or slower processing power, particularly when the website is sharing resources with other websites as it happens with shared hosting. Site speed is critically important for growing businesses as faster page loads means lower bounce rates and higher average time on the website, eventually impacting the conversion rate. Google uses web page speed as one of the factors to determine page ranking which means web page load time will tend to rank higher. To address these growing needs, today customers have the option to move from Shared Hosting to a Virtual Private Server or a Dedicated Server. Managing or administering a server requires a high level of technical expertise, a steep learning curve, and can be time-consuming. Based on active customer dialogue as a part of GoDaddy’s Customer Engagement Program, we know that customers want to focus on growing their businesses instead of fixing or managing server-related issues which could derail their productivity. “GoDaddy Business Hosting is designed to simplify and enhance the customer experience by eliminating the limitations of shared hosting with the assured availability of dedicated resources,” said Nikhil Arora, Vice President and Managing Director at GoDaddy India. “In India, currently around 40% of SMBs are influenced by technology, with the number set to increase to 90% by 2020[2], reflecting the need for advanced digital technologies to help support this evolution of small businesses in India. With Business Hosting, fast growing small businesses can now have a powerful option for hosting their demanding websites.” pcquest.com twitter.com/pcquest facebook.com/pcquest linkd.in/pcquest pcquest@cybermedia.co.in
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NEWS KRAFTLY TO OFFER FREE DEDICATED WEBSITE TO EVERY SELLER ON THE PLATFORM To reinforce the growth of small scale sellers & homepreneurs, Kraftly, India’s leading online marketplace for unique products, announced the roll-out of its Kraftly MySite feature for free to all the sellers associated with the platform. The platform has created a simple platform to design, integrate, and support a free dedicated website for every seller on the platform. These websites will empower the small-scale sellers to run their own complete feature-rich website and increase visibility & discoverability for their brand. It will be available for free as it stands synonymous with Kraftly’s vision of enabling small scale sellers to build their own brand and market their products. Demand for MySite exceeded expectations with over 1200 sellers opting for this feature in the past three months. Excited by the response Kraftly has decided to roll this out to its entire seller base for no extra charges. With a MySite for every micro shop on the platform, sellers can quickly drive traffic to their websites and not compete with a big pool of similar products on the marketplace. This will allow sellers to market their own websites without fearing that their marketing efforts could get diluted towards other products. The feature is being well received as sellers from all parts of the country have been opting for it. 19% of total sellers hail from Delhi, 18% from Gujarat and 13% from Maharashtra. Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, with 9% and 7% of seller registration complete the top 5 regions for the MySite feature. Commenting on the development, Saahil Goel, CEO and Co-Founder, Kraftly, said, “Operating in the sector, we are witnessing a challenge for small scale sellers, homepreneurs, and unestablished Indian brands to showcase their products. Though these brands can establish a customer base, they often get overshadowed by other products and fail to create a brand identity. To help them overcome these difficulties, we are building dedicated websites supported by end-to-end website assimilation with Kraftly. The website will be automatically generated as soon as the seller comes on board with us. These websites will be fully customizable with adequate branding, logo, banners, linked to the social profiles and will be backed by Kraftly’s marketing, payment and logistics prowess. We will further strengthen the online base of the sellers via paid & social media marketing tools.” Small and Midsize Businesses To Get Cloud Transformation Boost with Oracle Digital Hub in India
ORACLE’S BANGALORE DIGITAL HUB TO OFFER CLOUD FOR SMBS Small and midsize businesses (SMBs) will get access to the cloud solutions and resources they need to power digital transformation with theopening of Oracle’s first Digital Hub in Asia Pacific, which will be based in Bangalore. The new facility, one of five Digital Hubs set to open in Asia Pacific, highlights Oracle’s commitment to better serving the midsize market in the new cloud economy. India’s new Digital Hub, part of a global network of best practice centres for SMBs, will help small and midsize businesses leverage Oracle Cloud solutions to streamline operations, boost innovation and gain a platform for growth. The hub will house Oracle’s new digital sales team and focus on helping more midsize organisations transition to the cloud quickly and easily. With a distinctive Indian feel, and exuding the energy of a start-up, the team will provide timely, personalised and effective support to customers, using the latest collaboration tools, techniques and technologies to transform the buying experience. François Lançon, senior vice president, Oracle Japan and Asia Pacific, said: “The cloud is democratising IT; you just need a web browser or a mobile phone app to take advantage of it. What’s more, it has incredible transformation potential for small businesses, enabling them to do things they have never been able to do before, at an affordable price, such as use technology to streamline business processes, gain access to an easy-to-use platform for innovation, and digitise their customer experience. We are simplifying the buying process to help these smaller organisations, as well as branch offices and line of business departments, digitally transform their business.” Customers that want to buy entirely online can utilise the click-to-buy Oracle Accelerated Buying Experience <https:// www.oracle.com/acceleratedbuyingexperience/index.html> . In addition to the simplified buying experience, Oracle’s Digital Hubs will provide a complete suite of cloud applications, platform, and infrastructure services as both standalone services and as bundles. The range of choices empowers small businesses to select solutions that directly address their goals or issues. 36
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ESY INDIA LAUNCHES INDIA’S FIRST SMART TOUCH POS AND LABEL PRINTERS ESY India has launched a wide range of ESYPOS products and solutions over the years. ESY India proudly introduces a range of India’s first Smart Touch POS and Label Printers. The ESYPOS range of products was launched by ESY India in the year 2015 in collaboration with Pinnacle Technology Corporation, the world’s largest POS printer & solution device manufacturers, headquartered in Taipei (Taiwan). Within a span of two years, ESYPOS has emerged as one of India’s leading POS brands with a large number of installations across the country. At the launch of the new product range, Mr. V.P. Sajeevan, CEO, ESY India said that the POS market in India is growing at a rapid pace, thanks to the introduction of GST. He added that in the last two years, ESY India could launch many new models for POS printing and barcode scanning. ‘This unique product, the ESYPOS Smart POS ESP 5313, prints 3-inch receipts and labels in dual mode with multiple interfaces, including Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet and USB. It has a built-in 9-inch touchscreen that makes billing or label editing related operations easier. Since the operating system is Android, printing on cloud and remote managing is enabled. The Quad Core CPU can drive seamless computing and printing. This is truly a first of its kind in the Indian market’ Mr. Sajeevan further added. “Considering the huge potential in Barcode and Label Printing, we are also launching two new models for heavy duty label printing. Both these products come with 120 mm paper width (4.72”), a Dual Printing method with Thermal Transfer Technology and Direct Thermal Technology. In fact, all our products are BIS certified. We recently upgraded our quality certification to ISO 9000-2015. With superior quality, unique features of ESYPOS products and our robust sales and service network across the country, we are confident of attaining a leading market share before the end of 2018” said Mr. V.P. Sajeevan. Sanuja, Marketing Head, ESY India said that the company was taking a low-cost route to reach their potential customers. ‘We have over a million delighted customers in India. They are our brand ambassadors. They have experienced the quality of our products and services and will be our first point of reference. We are reaching out to our database through the social media to share the news of our new product range. We are carefully managing a cost-effective marketing campaign so that we are in a position to offer our products at affordable prices to our customers’, said Ms. Sanuja.
FLIPKART TO INVEST $500M IN PAYMENTS ARM PHONEPE Technology giant Google’s India cloud centre, slated to become operational in Mumbai by the end of 2017, will spur economic activity in the country, a top executive from the company said. FLipkart has committed $500 million for its payments platform PhonePe, which is scaling its operations. The e-commerce major acquired PhonePe in 2015 and has since then invested $75 million in the platform. This is one of the largest single investment commitments in the Indian financial technology payments space and comes at a time when e-tailers are investing towards building a strong payments system. “The investment will be used to scale up our technology platforms, and expand our merchant network and consumer base rapidly. We have been growing at over 100 per cent every two months this year, and this investment will help us maintain the same aggressive growth rate for the next two years,” said Sameer Nigam, co-founder and CEO, PhonePe. PhonePe, which has over 45 million installs, has recorded over 16 million transactions on the back of the successful Flipkart Big Billion Days festival sale in September. The fintech firm’s annual run rate, as a result, touched a new high of $3.5 billion in terms of Total Payments Volume (TPV) in September. This ramp-up is the fastest in the Indian digital payments space, the company claimed. “PhonePe is a critical part of our overall strategy at Flipkart to build a comprehensive ecosystem for our customers. We’re fully committed to make PhonePe the most preferred digital payments app in India,” said Binny Bansal, group CEO, Flipkart. pcquest.com twitter.com/pcquest facebook.com/pcquest linkd.in/pcquest pcquest@cybermedia.co.in
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NEWS EMUDHRA LAUNCHES AADHAAR ESIGN-BASED DIGITAL CLEARING FOR RECURRING PAYMENTS Digital identity and transaction management solutions provider, eMudhra has launched Aadhaar eSign-based National Automated Clearing House (NACH) gateway with National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) – which aims to help large and small enterprises to collect recurring payment instructions from customers without the need for submitting physical forms. The solution aims to facilitate paperless electronic transactions which are repetitive and periodic in nature simplifying activation time for all parties, remove geographical barriers and bring about efficient banking for the customers. Aadhaar eSign-based NACH mandate will offer considerable benefits in terms of legal non-repudiation, significantly lower costs and eliminate errors since the entire process is now digital. About 95% of transaction related costs will now be slashed, making it one of the most comprehensive and time saving proposition for enterprises, said the company.
CAPITAL FLOAT INTRODUCES PROPRIETOR LOANS TO SUPPORT MICRO-ENTREPRENEURS IN INDIA Capital Float announced the launch of Proprietor Loans that facilitate financial inclusion and business growth for microentrepreneurs in India. The product targets the small retailer segment like salons, medical stores, kirana, mobile phone retailers, small restaurants, etc. who face challenges in obtaining loans for business expansion from traditional lenders. Proprietor Loans aims to reduce documentation and the time taken to avail a loan in comparison to traditional banking services. “We ran extensive multi city pilots and are glad to see the end result. Our tradition of being pioneers of digital lending in India continues, as we’ve created an entirely paperless process through the app and achieved low unit economics to penetrate a vast market that was untapped. We’ve ensured that the customer experience remains top notch, as the borrower receives the loan in minutes by providing their AADHAAR number. We’re currently adding 2,000 borrowers a month and expect to reach 5000 borrowers per month by March 2018,” said Sashank Rishyasringa, co-founder, Capital Float. There are above 5 million kirana stores in India which are run by micro-entrepreneurs with business ambitions such as increasing product lines, diversification, digitization or opening more stores. However, they don’t have quick and easy access to funds. Capital Float will assist the micro-entrepreneurs by providing loans between ₹25,000 – ₹5 lakhs with convenient repayment options ranging from three to six months. Additionally, Capital Float will also provide loan enhancements, top-ups and renewals based on the business performance of the borrower. Capital Float has partnered with various ecosystem leaders such as Amazon Business, Metro Cash & Carry, Storeking, Payworld and PayTM. Operations are currently live in all the metros, while the team is focussing on taking the product to Ahmedabad, Surat, Chandigarh, Bhopal, Indore and Vizag. “Getting loans is always a challenge for small retailers in India due to complex documentation, time-consuming procedures and traditional approach to underwriting. Through Proprietor Loans, we aim to support these micro-entrepreneurs to achieve their business aspirations. Our loan product will help our borrowers grow their business, while our partners experience larger volumes of transactions on their respective platforms. We’re currently offering term loans and lines of credit to our borrowers,” added Gaurav Hinduja, co-founder, Capital Float. “Capital Float’s robust and advanced technology that provides Kiranas and small business owners approval and access to credit in a matter of seconds is revolutionary. I’m confident the digitizing of the fintech and lending sector through the approach of Capital Float will transform the landscape of financing. Small traders and business owners in the last year have really embraced their smartphone effectively and the seamless user experience of Capital Float has provided an enhanced customer experience through the app.” – Sumat Chopra, Director – Value Creation at Metro AG “By launching the Proprietor Loan product, Capital Float continues to be at the forefront of financial innovation in India. With this credit solution, they will be catering to a vast market of under-served microentrepreneurs in the country. Through our collaboration with Capital Float, we expect our customers to experience exponential growth on our platform, consequently increasing the volume of transactions on Payworld.”- Praveen Dhabhai, COO, Payworld. 38
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NEWS
“WE ARE THE NO. 1 SELLER OF 4G WI-FI SET TOP BOXES”: P SANJEEV In a one on one with PC Quest, P Sanjeev of Huawei shares the value of Huawei products in the market and tells us about the consumer business group of Huawei. – Anushruti Singh anushrutis@cybermedia.co.in Jyoti Bhagat jyotib@cybermedia.co.in
Please elaborate on how Huawei operates business in India? Huawei India operates business through 3 divisions. First is e-commerce; through which we sell smartphones. And of course it is attracts youngsters so we have circumstances styles of operating in terms of specialities. Second division is business through distributors. We have open market business where our handsets are being distributed through strong disti ecosystem. Our third division is B2B, which is basically the carrier operators of device. I would like to add that we are no. 1 seller for 4G Wi-Fi set top box.
P Sanjeev of Huawei
Tell us more about your Consumer Business Group?
What are the products you are focusing on?
Huawei has a separate unit called the Consumer Business Group (CBG) which is being operated in China. Under this we have two different brands Huawei and Honor. We represent both the brands in India and they all together have very different product lines under its umbrella. Mid entry to mid premium is categorized as Honor. Under this we have phones upto 25K to 30K. We have recently collaborated with German camera brand Lyka for introducing dual camera lens for ultimate photography experience with our brand. And if you look at Huawei brand, its all fractional.
We are also working on tablets as it also has a quite good market in India. Right now, we are working on very basic models of tablets. for this we are also doing partnerships with many technology vendors for multiple experience in terms of performance of the screens and battery. We want to launch them more as entertainment device. The series of tablet will be launched at the price of 7 to 10K, 10 to 15K, 15 to 20K. 7 to 10K will be very basic. you will find these devices very chic in terms of design, with metallic finish and great battery power. Apart from this, we have also launched one bestseller watch with Swiss technology priced at 27,999.
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NEWS
“GIONEE PROVIDES SUPER SERVICE TO CUSTOMERS” In a one on one with PC Quest Alok Shrivastava, Regional Director North, Gionee India shares the marketing strategies and talks about upcoming launches of the company. – Anushruti Singh anushrutis@cybermedia.co.in Jyoti Bhagat jyotib@cybermedia.co.in
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With awaiting launch of M7 Power, right now what is the product portfolio of Gionee? Gionee has always in a philosophy that it will not launch number of models and in each of the price segment it should have one model. In terms of price point, we have one model in 10K, one in 10K to 15K, same in the upper categories. Very soon Gionee is going to launch new models in the range of 15k, 13k and 19k. There are 4-5 models to launch and all the models will be in 4G. In December we will have another range of portfolio. They all will be on the theme ‘super selfie and super battery’.
What are the latest trends you are seeing in mobile Industry? At the price point of 8k to 25k there is not too much difference in terms of features. So it’s just about some theme which you have to capture like selfie camera is the theme and this price point. So we have this theme of ‘super selfie and super battery’. In terms of retail landscape, we are seeing a chain of stores which are becoming bigger and bigger. In chain stores each shopkeeper has now 7 to 6 stores. Right now, we have 40,000 outlets including LFRs. We also have 100 exclusive stores and partners who we are planning to make 250 by this financial year.
hind in the market. We have maintained our position in the business with 600 hundred market share.
From where are you getting most traction, is it offline or online platform?
What is your channel structure? How many cities Gionee has reached out?
Gionee has always been an offline brand. We have never built too much in online space. Gionee wants to build the brand where it can provide good product to customer with good price. And the big reason of not doing online marketing is that we don’t want to disturb or lose our offline partners. We have 70% to 80% traction from offline and hardly 5% from offline so we don’t want to compromise on our price. So we will continue with offline and investing in building brand will continue.
Channel is essentially offline and we have 20 national distributors and 600 regional distributors. There are number of retailers who supply our products. In terms of number of cities, we are there till T4 towns. And in all towns we have around 50000 or above customers. Currently we have 600 service centres. From last year we become more active in terms of establishing the centres all over the country as we don’t want our customers to go to other service centre or should get the experience of other brand as well.
What is the GTM strategy of Gionee? Gionee is in a stage where it has almost revamped from price point perspective. The entire range of product has been moved to 8K to 25K or beyond that. We believe in giving good experience to our customers in terms of services. Gionee is known for its battery for life in the market and super selfie about a super camera which can let you click good selfie’s. We build quality in our products which makes us different from other brands. The company is growing very fast in India leaving the entire Indian brand be-
Alok Shrivastava, Regional Director North, Gionee India
Tell us about your manufacturing unit? We have 2 manufacturing units, one is at Noida and another one is at Hyderabad. As Gionee’s strategy is manufacturing we have also signed MoU with Haryana government. Therefore the company is in process of finalizing plans for having its own factory in Faridabad, Haryana. We have planned a fully integrated factory so all our suppliers who manufacture for us will be in the same project. But this will take some time. We are working on it; maybe it will take more than 1 year.
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gadgets corner SMARTPHONE
SAMSUNG GALAXY NOTE 8: SATISFACTION NOTED
T
he next-gen Note series phone is here with loads of improvements and power packed hardware. The gorgeous design with infinity display, excellent stylus and amazing software, all in one pack. Amazingly beautiful: As like previous, Galaxy S8, Note8 is also designed with similar aesthetics but has slightly sharper edges and a squarer camera module. The iconic InfinityEdge design with ultra-thin top and bottom bezel and Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection, makes it look great out of the box. The back is also protected by glass adding more beauty to the entire body, but after using the device for a little while, it attracts smudges. Galaxy Note 8 is IP68-certified, meaning it can survive in some bad weather conditions easily and even accidental drops. At the front, it holds a camera and iris scanner along with the earpiece and an LED notification light. The fingerprint sensor and dual camera setup with dual LED are placed at the back along with heart rate sensor. The 6.3-inch screen device has smart balance making it easy to carry in one hand, yet it can feel bulky to some. Samsung added one hand operation feature to make it more usable single-handedly. Amazing Screen and Camera: 6.3-inch QHD+ Super AMOLED display is quite vibrant and smooth to operate. The brightness levels are pretty much high, enabling you to use in any light conditions without any sort of trouble. The AMOLED screen produces rich colors so you can enjoy movies, games and other contents with the breeze. No doubt, you can use the screen from various angle without losing color and other details. Samsung Galaxy Note8 Review Camera: Note8 comes with two sensors at the back – 12+12MP. The main camera is excellent to capture clear, colorful and detailed images. Plenty of modes available for different shooting modes as well as pro mode is there for further customization. Even night shots are great however the deep dark shots come with some visible dithering creeping in. It is capable of capturing slow-motion video at 720p at 240fps. The front camera is also perfect for clicking natural shots with loads of details and colors. Bixby and S Pen: The smartphone is loaded with so many unique features including Bixby that comes with a dedicated button. Samsung’s personal assistant has learned a lot since its launch to respond to commands in English. You can do the whole lot of things with it as like Open Facebook and write a new status, open Settings, make a phone call and operate camera. Samsung is offering more customizable experience to consumers and loads of Edge apps to add as per your taste. It also has splitscreen option to open up two different apps simultaneously.
— Ashok Pandey ashokpa@cybermedia.co.in
Price: `67,900/-
SCORE PRICE: 9/10 PERFORMANCE: 10/10 FEATURES: 10/10
Overall:
10/10
KEY SPECS: 6.30-inch screen, 1.7GHz octa-core processor, 12 MP rear and 8 MP front Camera, 6GB RAM, Android 7.1.1, 64GB Internal Storage, 3300mAh Battery PROS: Desing and build quality, camera, display, performance, S Pen CONS: Slightly heavy
Samsung Galaxy Note8 Review S Pen: The S Pen stylus sits in its own dedicated nook and doesn’t have battery. Using the pen, you could remind your old school days when you were writing on paper, but now it’s on screen. The digital writing experience it amazing as the over 4000 pressure sensitivity points, even the tiny adjustments in pressure will change how your scribbles appear. The PenUp app has various options like a digital coloring book, built-in notebook shrinks your messy writing so it goes between the lines. You can easily access all the tools from the S Pen menu. Performance: The Note8 is backed by powerful hardware that let you play with the device without any worries. While using the phone for more than three weeks, I loaded several apps and games. It was able to handle more than 10 apps simultaneously without any hiccups. Playing high graphics intensive game like Fifa, Asphalt, NFS, etc. was a breeze, even while switching between them, there was no visible lag. The phone battery gives you enough juice to last for more than a day even with heavy usage. In moderate usage, it can easily last for more than 48 hours. In video loop test, it manages more than 12 hours of backup when watching videos over wifi with full brightness and volume. Bottomline: Samsung Galaxy Note8 is a perfect phablet with stunning design, amazing performance, excellent camera and infinity display with several S Pen features.
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MOTHERBOARD
ASUS ROG STRIX X299-E GAMING
— Raj Kumar Maurya rajm@cybermedia.co.in
T
he Asus ROG Strix X299-E Gaming is an ATX motherboard with all features you would like to expect for your a gaming machine. This summer Intel has launched it’s “Skylake-X” and “Kaby Lake-X” processors under their new Core X-Series. And the big Motherboard giant Asus already in the market with several new boards features the Intel X299 chipset required to run a Core X-Series CPU. The ROG Strix X299-E Gaming is one of those and available online at INR 30,500. Design & Features: Asus motherboards generally have black and very tough look like some armour. The ROG Strix X299-E Gaming motherboard comes in dark color accented by sharp angles and plenty of metal. The ROG Strix X299-E Gaming has several heatsinks and metal-braced PCI Express slots and looks like some alien machine due to RGD LEDs situated on the board under the cover of the I/O-port. The LGA 2066 CPU socket is the new Intel socket for their Core X-Series processors and is flanked between the 8 RAM slots. The X299 chipset supports up to quad-channel memory configurations. In the dual-channel mode, the slots accept up to 64GB of DDR-4133 memory. Quad-channel supports the max capacity to 128GB and also support DDR-4133 modules. The interesting thing about the ROG Strix X299-E motherboard is that it has two M.2 connectors. One of the connectors sits near the lower PCI Express x16 slots and another one is on the right side of the RAM slots. The typical M.2 slot near the RAM easy to access as compared to the slot just below the top PCI Express slot, which can be hard to reach once the video card is installed. Ports & Accessories: The ROG Strix X299-E Gaming’s rear I/O panel is clean and uncluttered. It features USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C port, USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-A port, two USB 2.0 ports, four USB 3.0 ports, WiFi and Bluetooth connector, multichannel audio ports, one USB “BIOS Flashback” port, which lets you update the BIOS without even booting the PC. Put a BIOS update on a flash drive, plug it into the BIOS Flashback port, and press the BIOS button given the top of the panel for three seconds to update the BIOS. Asus loaded the board with seven fan connectors, including one for the pump fan for your CPU cooler and another that can handle a second water pump. The ROG Strix X299-E Gaming ships with an RGB-light-strip extension cable, fan holder for supplemental M.2-module cooling, four SATA cables, extension cable for the addressable LED header, slick Wi-Fi antenna and common documentation and stuffs. Marvellous performance: We set up the prime motherboard using an Intel Core i7-7740X Core X-Series 4.30 GHz processor into the LGA 2066 socket and then attached a Corsair Hydro H60 liquid cooler along 32 GB Zion DDR4 SDRAM, 4GB AMD RADEON RX 570 GPU and Intel Optane 32 GB M.2 SSD. We used the PC for more than two weeks to check its real-life performance while using it for day-to-day tasks. We ran multiple applications including MS office and browsed the internet. It managed them quite easily. To go beyond, we ran two browsers, Chrome and Mozilla, with more than 20 tabs in each. Simultaneously, we operated MS office
Price: `30,500/-
SCORE PRICE: 8/10 PERFORMANCE: 9/10 FEATURES: 10/10
Overall:
9/10
KEY SPECS: 7th generation LGA2066 socket Intel Core X-Series processors, Dual M.2, front panel USB 3.1, Onboard 802.11AC WIFI and Intel Optane Memory compatibility, 5-Way Optimization with Auto-Tuning and FanXpert 4 automatically tailors overclocking profiles, Patent-pending SafeSlot (3X) feature an injection molding process, ASUS exclusive AURA Sync RGB lighting, three additional RGB headers, and 3D-printing mounts to customize your build, 8-channel HD audio, 3x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type A; 1x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C, ThunderboltEX 3 card included PROS: Quad channel Ram Module, Asus Aura Sync, Intel Optane compatibility, Performance, Lots storage option, Feature rich BIOS CONS: None
and some other applications. We were able to switch between apps without any performance issues. Using the BIOS we did simple tweaks to check over-clocking capability. It was able to achieve 4.50 GHz and performance was steady. Though the overclocking generated the significant amount of heat but our liquid cooler handle it easily. We installed different games including Shadow of Mordor, Thief, NFS etc. to check its gaming performance. It handled them easily. Graphics and overall performance were great. We didn’t notice any visible lag in the performance during the test. Moreover, we left one game running at the back and played another one. Still, there was no delay in the performance. Bottomline: The ROG Strix X299-E Gaming lacks a U.2 connector which can be seen in high-end motherboards. But this is not a big deal when two M.2 slots are present on the motherboard. The board has plenty of other fast storage features, including the VROC support and two M.2 connectors. The ROG Strix X299-E Gaming is targeted exclusively at gamers and we think it delivers a very solid foundation for a Core X-Series gaming PC.
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gadgets corner STREAM BOX
VIDEOCON D2H: YOUR TV JUST BECAME SMARTER
W
hat if you get smart TV functions in your existing FHD TV? Videocon recently launched HD Smart Connect Set Top Box called as ‘d2h Stream Box’ which converts your existing TV into a Smart TV. As like smart TV you can do various things on it including browse content from Facebook, Twitter, Daily Motion, video on demand sites, news sites, weather sites, etc. The Stream box is powered by the MPEG-4 and DVB-S2 technology to transform your TV into a hub of entertainment and knowledge. Connect to Internet and Browse the App store: It comes with several preloaded apps, be it social media or movies on Netflix, you would be able to enjoy content in a new way. The apps are curated as wall garden service, apps are not stored in the memory and directly accessed from the d2h server. Each and every app is tested and approved before hosting it on d2h server which is more secure and robust platform. Apps are managed and controlled by VDL (Videocon d2h Limited) hosting the entire categories of the apps. Using the Wi-Fi, you can connect your TV to your home hotspot and done, browse your favorite app and stream videos or other contents. The box comes with Dolby Digital supports but as Licence is required so the box doesn’t decode. If the end device i.e. TV supports the Dolby Digital then TV can decode and play. Meaning whatever content, you are enjoying on the TV, the sound quality is going to be awesome. Forget the small screen: On one hand, you can browse your favorite content directly on your TV by simply connecting it to the internet, on the other hand, you can cast your smartphone screen on the TV using the STB. Yes, even if your TV doesn’t have casting feature, you can cast your mobile screen using the STB casting feature. It let you cast entire mobile screen and browse different content such as watch videos from phone gallery, YouTube, etc. Smart remote: The STB comes with a RF4CE (Radio Frequency) remote allowing the user to operate from any angle and direction. It also supports wider range, so even if you are not close to your STB, still operation is possible. Additionally, you get the function to convert your smartphone into the remote. Just enable the Smart remote to connect feature, and connect your mobile with it and done. Omnidirectional remote has several quick action buttons to ease your life including Mosaic, Video on Demand, Radio and Active. Existing Videocon users know about these buttons and for non D2H users Mosaic -here you get categories of various available channels such as HD Channels, Movies, NEWS, Sports, etc. 44
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— Ashok Pandey ashokpa@cybermedia.co.in
Price: `3,490/-
SCORE PRICE: 9/10 PERFORMANCE: 10/10 FEATURES: 10/10
Overall:
10/10
PROS: Unlimited Recording, HD channels, Apps, smart remote CONS: None
Unlimited Recording: The new HD Set Top Box supports recording, enabling you to record any programme and watch that later. You can record a Live TV programme or you can even record a scheduled programme. Simply connect a USB to your STB and go to the recording mode to record live or scheduled programme, and it’s done. Now you have the recorded programme with you to watch it later at leisure. You can even record any programme by its title. Manually set the recording for any particular TV programme, also set the timing for the recording so that you do not miss a single minute of the programme. Once the recording is done you can watch the programme as like you play a movie. Yes, you can rewind or forward any recorded programme up to 32 times the normal speed. The pause button is also there for quick recording, it let you pause the live programme and then watch it later at your convenience. Bottomline: Perfect device to upgrade your TV experience without spending a whole lot of money. It can convert your TV into smart as well as give your access to several interesting features enabling smarter life.
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SMARTPHONE
PANASONIC ELUGA RAY 500
— Raj Kumar Maurya rajm@cybermedia.co.in
P
anasonic playing around the budget smartphones series and Eluga Ray 500 Dual camera smartphone is a new edition in that. In the month of Sep 2017, the Panasonic has launched the two new Panasonic smartphones, the Panasonic Eluga Ray 500 and Eluga Ray 700. The Panasonic Eluga Ray 500 focuses on photography and sports a dual-lens camera setup. It sells at an attractive price point of Rs. 8,999. Here is the review of Eluga Ray 500 that will give you an idea how the handset performs. Panasonic Eluga Ray 500 features, specifications Inside the box: Handset, user manual, SIM Tray ejector PIN, screen guard, standard quality earphone and travel charger 5V/2A SAR Value: 1.18 head and 1.57 body Body: Good build and finishing, Plastic body, curvy design, comfortable to hold SIM Type: Nano + Nano/ micro SD slot (hybrid) Weight and Dimensions: 163 grams, 9.2mm thick Screen: 5 inches, 1280 x 720 pixels resolution, viewing angles, touch response and color reproduction are good, 2.5D curved glass Connectivity: 4G, VoLTE (work on both SIM), WiFi, GPS and Bluetooth Sensors: Accelerometer, Proximity, light – just 3 sensor LED Notification: Yes OTG: Yes supported RAM: 3GB (about 2.1GB free on first boot) ROM: 32GB (about 22GB free on first boot) OS: Android Nougat 7.0 Compact Design and 5-inch HD Display: Panasonic Eluga Ray 500 is quite compact as the smartphone sports a 5-inch HD screen. The device measures 144.26 x 71.26 x 9.2 mm and weighs 163 grams. You can use the handset with one hand without any struggle and the screen felt pretty responsive. The HD IPS display offers a resolution of 1280×720 pixels and also has a 2.5D curved glass for better viewing angles. There is nothing innovative in terms of design, at the back side it has dual camera setup in the same format most of the smartphones have today. The single flash LED sits near the dual camera setup while the middle back portion has Panasonic branding. The micro USB 2.0 port is flanked between two speaker grills but only right side grill has the speaker and other is just for the showcase. The 3.5mm audio port resides on the top of the phone. If we talk about the display quality which is good in terms of viewing angle and brightness. Due to its good viewing angle, three persons can easily share the screen while watching videos or gaming. The downside of the display is the color appeared a little bit washed out and also not much sharp. To enhance the picture quality the phone has pre-installed Miravision engine software to tune the display picture mode. Dual Camera Setup: The smartphone features a 13MP+8MP duallens rear camera setup that comprises of one standard and one wide angle lens. The 8MP secondary camera at rear lets you capture 120° wide-angle frame while the 13MP primary lens captures standard frame. W tested the camera indoors and outdoor. The wide-angle lens captures a wide frame and will come handy to capture landscape shots. Low light shots are just about okay not that great. Moreover, the dual camera setup on the back does not function like a dual camera for bokeh. This handset can shoot HD videos. As far as the front camera is concerned, Eluga Ray 500 has a 5MP front camera and we don’t have any complaints about its selfie camera and one can easily use its capture selfies for their social media accounts.
Price: `8,999/-
SCORE PRICE: 7/10 PERFORMANCE: 7/10 FEATURES: 8/10
Overall:
7/10
KEY SPECS: 5 inches, 1280 x 720 pixels resolution, 163 grams, 9.2mm thick, 4G, VoLTE (work on both SIM), WiFi, GPS and Bluetooth, 3GB RAM, 32GB ROM, Android Nougat 7.0 PROS: Good build quality, Strong battery life CONS: Average app Perfromance, Average Camera
Performance: The Phone comes with Quad-core MediaTek chipset and stock Android Nougat. The Panasonic Eluga Ray 500 is backed by a quad-core MediaTek MT6737 chipset paired with 3GB of RAM. There is a 32GB internal memory that can be expanded by up to 128GB via hybrid SIM card slot. The smartphone also features a fingerprint scanner which is embedded into the home button on the front. The interface Panasonic Eluga rAY 500 is quick with no discernible lag creeping in. The screen is responsive too. The thing which we liked personally is that the Panasonic hasn’t added any extra software layer that most of the times hamper the user experience. The handsets run on latest version of stock Android to give smooth lag free mobile user experience. We used the phone for more than three weeks and enjoy several games and did multitasking as well. We played several high-graphics intensive games on it including WWE, NFS, Asphalt 8 Airborne and Mortal combat, etc. The phone manages all the games without any major problem or heat but we not going to recommend it to heavy gamers. Even while switching between them there was no glitch. Battery: The phone is supplied with a 4,000mAh battery unit. In our battery test in which we ran Full HD video on YouTube at full volume, the phone lasts for 7 hours 40 minutes. If you are a regular user the phone can give more than a day backup under 4G VoLTE usage. There is no fast charging option so, the phone takes around 2 hours to get a full charge. Bottomline: The good thing about the Panasonic Eluga Ray 500 is the battery life. The dual camera setup quality is an average but overall the phone is good for normal usage.
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ON
UNRAVELLING THE SPEAKER LEXICON – Nidhi Markanday, Director & Business Head, Intex Technologies
S
peakers and music have become an indispensable part of our life. Spending on a quality set up can prove to be a great investment as they are quite long-lasting. However, the market is flooded with different kinds of setups and it can prove to be a difficult task to choose a particular kind! Find some insights below on how to choose suitable speakers for your space.
DJ speakers These professional sets generally have a range of features that are not found in general consumer systems. They are high powered and used for a higher sound impact for larger audiences. They are typically used in large-scale events, weddings, etc. DJ speakers can be active or passive. Passive ones require an amplifier whereas active ones are an all in one solution. They are also available for a lower price in the market as compared to active ones.
Tower speakers These are popular not only for their sound quality but also for their portability. They are floor mounted which can be moved around easily. They generally have a higher output quality than other kinds and can complement your home theatre system beautifully.
Bluetooth speakers This kind is a better fit for personal use. If you are 46
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looking for portable systems with diverse applications, then Bluetooth enabled systems are your best bet. They can be connected to your phone or other audio devices and are pretty handy too!
Computer speakers If you are a laptop/PC geek, you can opt for computer speakers to amplify the sound of your system. Many computers have low-quality sound outputs, which can also go missing in the case of certain desktops. PC speakers can act as a necessity in such a scenario. They are generally not very steeply-priced, so opting for the ones with the highest sound quality can turn out to be a great investment.
Home speakers These power-packed setups are for the true music geeks. They can truly amplify the sound of your televisions and provide a theater experience at home. A good quality home system can breathe life into your movies. Most of them come with multiple sub-woofers which can be placed in different corners of the house to add on to bass response across the length of the room. We hope that we have made your decision easier. So it’s your time to go and give your home the musical touch you need. And as it is said, “ Music is a piece of art that goes from the ears straight to the heart”.
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TRENDS
AUTOMATED ARCHITECTURE FOR EMPLOYEES AND EMPLOYERS – Parag Arora – Area Vice President & Country Head, India Sub -Continent at Citrix Systems
I
magine this – your alarm rings waking you up, sends a message to the geyser to warm up water for your shower, and then sends a message to your coffee machine asking it to brew your coffee and the toaster for a toast, and by the time you are ready for office, so is your breakfast. All of this, without you manually going and operating any of those above mentioned devices. Sounds too futuristic? Well, behold; Internet of Things (IoT) is doing exactly that. It is creating an ecosystem built on a network of data gathering sensors and cloud computing, of “connected things” that with their intuitive technology can predict or follow routine behavior and repeat it without human intervention. According to Gartner, there will be 20.8 billion connected devices by 2020. Given the momentum and acceptance, the trend will drastically change the way we do everyday tasks. The challenge lies in assimilating the change in technology’s treatment.
Where at a point of time, technology implied people – device engagement, it now includes device - device communication. The shift to ‘Integration of Everything’ is what best explains IoT’s delivery. Additionally, it refers to the creation of a platform that conveniently enables the convergence of legacy and new technology applications like sensors, gadgets, people, places, and businesses resulting in easy and efficient exchange of information. IoT essentially warrants automation of processes to such a degree that it will manifest itself as a true example of how technology can transform our work and life. Technology at its core is meant to make life easier. Application of Internet of Things implies a scenario wherein your car has your day’s schedule and takes a route that is least likely to be met with traffic. In case, there is an appointment for which you are going to be late, your car’s communication device will inform the concerned person about the delay. All this
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because connected devices controlled by the internet have learned a certain behavior that is conducive to your productivity. Another situation worthy of consideration is the smart grids’ sensors checking for the stationary availability and directly placing an order online for the deficit. This not only eliminates the need of physically keeping a tab of the stock but also helps getting secondary processes completed faster. Thus, leaving the employees with more time to concentrate on constructive work. The potential of time efficiency and flexibility and the resultant increase in productivity that this technology has is tremendous. Additionally, application of sensors and IoT mechanisms will help in systematic energy conservation, better mobility solutions, and smarter infrastructure. IoT as a technology works to service both the employees and employers. It lays the foundation for a connected network that is enveloping of current technology trends like Big Data and BYOD such that the employees no longer have to go look for a document in case of a query. IoT enabled devices procure the required data faster, with minimum to zero error, thus making retrieval of data faster and life at work many times convenient. Therefore, on one hand where it is effectively helping reduce employees’ mundane task list, on the other hand it is also helping employers streamline their processes such that more is done in less time. Introduction of IoT however, entails restructuring of the entire IT infrastructure that forms the backbone of an organization’s operations. The organization needs to know whether their business model is suitable for its adoption and if they have the required monetary capabilities. Also, it being a relatively new technology, equipping employees will be a time consuming effort. However, with the benefits it provides, the onus of dealing with transitional changes and making the process easier for the employees lies on the management. Integration of IoT however, requires certain considerations on the businesses’ part.
Infrastructure Support The Internet of Things will be a complex structure of hardware, sensors, applications and devices that need to be able to communicate across the organization (or extended ecosystem depending on the requirement) irrespective of the geographical location. Especially for supply chains this requires shared standards to exchange data across different organizations. The success of the Internet of Things will be determined by the existence of such, global, 48
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Parag Arora
Area Vice President & Country Head, India Sub -Continent at Citrix Systems
“IoT enabled devices procure the required data faster, with minimum to zero error, thus making retrieval of data faster and life at work many times convenient. .”
standards and needless to say, the government will play a critical role in this.
Security Communication in the IoT usually takes place over a combination of private and public networks, so securing the network protocols will be the primary objective. With the BYOD culture gaining momentum and acceptance both from the employer and employee end, an efficient and open environment with benefits ranging from cost efficiency, increased productivity and overall technology advancement has been on the emergence. However, with information available at the employees’ fingertips, chances of their devices getting stolen or malfunctioning of the firewall or anti-virus software may spell doom for the organization as their sensitive data will be left exposed to threats. Hence, having a solid security system in place that is equipped to deal with encountered and anticipated threats is an inevitable need
Talk to your CIO When upscaling your organization’s IT infrastructure to accommodate IoT capabilities, the responsibility of handling the present IT strengths, deploying solutions and equipping the teams with the advanced intelligent systems lies with the CIO. Hence, it is paramount that you consult and consensually decide if the company needs this technological transformation. All said and done, IoT is a game changer whose impact is multifarious. It will help accelerate the speed of processes, provide flexibility and accessibility to everyone and as a by-product enhance the quality of life as well as overall performance of the organization. In the Indian context, what needs to be seen is how seamlessly we can integrate and utilize it to realize its true potential.
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TRENDS
OVERCOMING TEST CHALLENGES OF USB TYPE-C T
he new USB Type-C connector supports attractive features including low profile, high-speed data transport, orientation independence, sophisticated power management capability and high-charging current capability. The combined feature offering has increased the connector’s use for devices in mobile applications such as mobile phones and tablets, as well as, desktop products and consumer electronics. Engineers who are designing the Type-C connector into their devices face new test challenges that require unique tools and techniques to address the many test parameters and evolving standards associated with the connectors’ expanded capabilities. This article introduces the USB Type-C connector, functionality it provides, and new tools and techniques to successfully address USB Type-C product validation. The USB Type-C environment provides more functionality for data transmission and power options.
(Figure 1.)The 24-pin connector can be rotated 180 degrees and still connect to like pins due to its symmetrical pin configuration, making it ‘orientation independent’ or easy to plug in any direction.A closer look at the USB Type-C connectors’ design and individual pins, will help to demonstrate the full potential of its capability as well as its complexity for test.
High Speed Data There are two ports(1&2) in the USB Type-C connector each having two differential high speed lanes. In USB3.1 these are transmit/receive pairs and only one port is active at a time(Figure 1. Ports identified in blue and green) In other applications these ports can be configured to all be transmit, all receive, or have one port with a USB3.1 link and the other port with a alt mode link. USB 3.1 data rates of 10 Gbs and TBT3 data rates of 20Gbs has been achieved. This slim, flippable Type-C connector was designed with a future as 40 Gbsis within reach for a two lane operation(for a fu-
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TRENDS ture version of USB for example), or 80Gbs composite in one direction being possible, say for a future version of DisplayPort. In addition to the high-speed transmission RX/TX pair, the connector includes a simultaneous link of USB 2 (D+, D-) which can be used for standard USB 2 operations or as a supplemental link providing information for power delivery. The D+ connections are tied together, as are the D- connections to maintain the orientation independence of the connector.
Alternate modes Alternate modes or â&#x20AC;&#x153;guest protocolsâ&#x20AC;? use the transmit/receive (Tx/Rx) pairs for DisplayPort, MHL or Thunderbolt data transfers making it possible to transfer high-speed data, video and audio signals in addition to USB. The alternate modes are negotiated over the power delivery channel and when in such a mode t the SBU1 and SBU2 pins(side band use) lines are used for control purposes as defined in the those standards.
Power delivery The power pins, four for VBUSand four for GND provideup to 5 amps and 100 watts for dynamic power and charging of different devices. The power delivery state,including voltage and current levels, and whether provider or consumer, are determined using a protocol over a channel on the CC1/CC2pins.
Cable orientation and dynamic configuration The CC1 and CC2 lines manage the definition of the connector interface by providing three functions; orientation configuration management, power provision to cableand communication channel for power delivery. CC1 and CC2 pins are used to establish connectivity between a host and device regardless of the orientation of the cable. The USB Type-C connector maintains a host-to-device logical relationship even though it is reversible using a single-wire orientation detection. When the cable is plugged into the recep50
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tacle, the wire connects only one of the CC lines of the receptacle to either CC1 or CC2 on the other end, which determines the cable orientation. With an understanding of the connectorsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; pin functions, we can begin to identify the areas where additional tests, instruments and test fixtures are needed.
USB Type-C test implications Multiple data protocols and data rates, various power levels with reversible direction and a reversible, flippablecable are all contributors to the need for additional USB Type-C tests. Understanding the key areas of USB Type-C test can help engineers to prioritize and develop a successful test plan.
Key USB Type-C test areasinclude: t "CJMJUZ UP DPOUSPM $$ TJHOBM MPBEJOH 31 3% and RA) for power up , debug and test t "CJMJUZ UP DPNNVOJDBUF PWFS $$ MJOF GPS P 1PXFS TFUVQ 7#64 BT DPOTVNFS QSPWJEFS voltage and current settings o Alternate mode (protocol) control o Dynamic â&#x20AC;&#x153;hostâ&#x20AC;? and â&#x20AC;&#x153;deviceâ&#x20AC;? determination (part of Power Delivery) for dual role ports t "CJMJUZ UP UFTU UIF 1PXFS %FMJWFSZ DPNNVOJDBtion channel, its protocol and the VBUS profile including high current states. Debug of the PD protocol is one of the biggest challenge engineers face since it requires access to the CC lines and the VBUS signal in order to be properly characterized. USB PD has specified voltage/current (power) levels that devices can select for operation making the ability to test PD levels as devices initialize very important.
t 5FTU PG CPUI 59 39 BOE 59 39 QPSUT For support of USB 3.1 TX test at up to 10G data rate, 14.5dB channel fixtures, with software integrated Continuous Time Linear Equalizer (CTLE) and Decision Feedback Equalizer (DFE), are needed to create the proper compliance channel. The USB 3.1 specification requires electrical tests that rely on proper setup and analysis for acceptable results. Spread spectrum clocking (SSC) modulation signal is a required test for USB 3.0 and 3.1 in regards to EMI, and will ensure the device is able to transmit an accurate profile acceptable for receiver input. Also, the flippable USB Type-C cable requires the RX/TX process to be executed for both cable orientations. It is also presumed at this point that there is independence in QFSGPSNBODF GSPN UIF QPXFS EFMJWFSZ TFUUJOH BO BTsumption that needs to be verified.
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NOVEMBER 2017
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DIMINISHING DISTANCE, GROWING BUSINESS All enterprises are looking at unified communications to grow business
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â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Sachin Watkar, Business Unit Head, Private Network System, NEC India
or any business to run and sustain, be it a small, medium or a large enterprise, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s requisite to have a robust communication system. With work dynamics having evolved considerably over the years, the need for a reliable Unified Communications system cannot be denied. Unified Communications (UC) allows applications to be used concurrently, creating multi channel sessions so employees can collaborate more effectively. Furthermore, UC delivers a consistent user experience, meaning employees can work the same way regardless of the endpoint, operating system or network used to access the platform.
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Hence, UC solutions offer businesses the integration of real-time enterprise communication services. Researches show that market for Unified Communications has been growing at an exhilarating rate for the past few years. It is primarily driven by the changing business scenarios/environment where small or big enterprises are looking at deploying solutions which could cater to evolved communication needs in the face of an increasingly industrialized and digitized nation such as India. In India, Unified Communication solutions continues to be a key enabler to bring voice, data, video together and integrates them with business applications, for swifter response and better business.
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UC provides clear benefits and improvements which allow the businesses to enhance and gives the employees the ability to manage everything on their own - from anywhere, using any device. A few of the ways in which unified communication adds value to business can be: Empowering employees to work effectively: UC benefits employees by empowering them to work effectively from any accessible location which is a key driver for personal productivity. Desk is no more just that one location where the employee works from. Thus, UC is built around where the end user is, rather than where desk is. Team productivity: With today’s disparate workforces and decentralized operations, teams rarely meet in-person all at once. This is where communications technology plays a major role. UC benefits the businesses here as the workforce can use the same application can easily collaborate in real time. This way, the team productivity is no more a challenge. Structural productivity: When both employees and teams are more productive, the organization will be as well. This has a positive impact on the business as a whole. Thus, UC helps in the growth of an organization.
Sachin Watkar Business Unit Head, Private Network System, NEC India
“Privacy and convenience are the critical components. Need to have a phone productive, convenient, secure and private. This is the world’s most secure Android phone. Everyone now is a potential blackberry user.”
Easy Communication: Companies have been using both email and voicemail for years, but they’ve usually been kept independent of each other. Unified communications creates a messaging environment that is not just efficient but also flexible. Enables Mobility: Businesses have become more and more demanding and they require the employees to be available at all times regardless of what day of the week or hour of the day it is. In such a scenario, a good unified communications system fulfills this need by allowing employees to communicate on the go through apps on their smart phones and tablets. Track Availability: Unified communications can help track availability of each member of a group and manage presence at a much more intrinsic level. This way, the company is able to establish a more streamlined communication channel and collaborate effectively without being restrained by geographical distances. Collaborative Working: Unified communication can bridge the gap by providing the tools needed to connect, collaborate, and share information seamlessly across diverse locations. Instant conferencing: There is always a hassle of travelling for business conferences and meetings. A unified communication system gives a way around by facilitating group communications while reducing cost and travel time. Not only are virtual meetings more convenient, they are also the efficient way to do business. Consequently, Unified Communications system opens up new doors for a company and changes the way in which they do business. This enables the businesses to be more efficient, remain flexible and reduce overall cost of doing business. UC additionally permits the employees to have the ability to manage everything on their own - from anywhere, using any device.
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“WE ARE FOCUSED ON MAKING SUCCESS STORIES” In an interaction with PC Quest Vinay Rawat, CRO, Infogain talks about educating customers towards digitally transformation – Anushruti Singh anushrutis@cybermedia.co.in
W
ith regard to Infogain, can you provide us more details about the company, your strategies and investments?
Infogain is a global IT company, headquartered in Los Gatos, California. We have close to 4000 employees and 9 delivery centres globally. The company has strong presence in Retail, Travel & Hospitality, Hi-Tech, Insurance and Healthcare verticals. Infogain provides digital solutions in each of its select verticals and the company is continuously investing in building its digital capabilities, getting the right kind of talent and bringing the right solutions to the market. We are focused in providing high-value services to our clients, understand their changing business requirement and deliver appropriate solutions to transform their businesses. Infogain has been recently recognized by Zinnov as amongst top global digital services providers in
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Zinnov Zones for digital services 2017
Where are you focusing more in mid market or enterprise segment? Our focus is to partner with customers who are keen on accelerating their digital transformation or technology migration. Infogain serves customers across segments and many of them are Fortune 500 companies and well-known established brands. Today customers emphasize more on competency levels of a vendor than the size. The customer is more interested in assessing if you have done a project, and how have you done it, have you really delivered the value to your clients and can you help them deliver ROI in a shorter period of time. These target customers are currently operating in a technology environment where Infogain has the experience and the advantage of delivering many projects successfully to others. For example
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if we take Oracle enterprise solutions which has been adopted by many organizations. Infogain has multiple success stories in this area; we’re going to all those customers who’re using Oracle EBS and sharing the customer success stories and unique thing which we’ve done in our existing customer base. The idea is to educate the customer, share your experience and showcase that you have the proven expertise.
What is the number of customer base? We have a focused client list of more than 40 customers. Majority of our revenue comes from the top accounts and we are completely focused on innovation and delivering high quality services in those accounts, whether by pooling our talented resources and having dedicated senior account managers or by creating IT architecture for them. Our top strategic account has dedicated solutions leaders who have domain expertise and can advise the client on business processes and technology requirements. In addition we ensure each of our accounts receives adequate management bandwidth and attention through regular meetings, client visits, thought leadership sessions, innovation days and joint workshops.
Tell us about some solutions and frameworks Digital is the way forward and we are strengthening our digital capabilities and investing in the areas of Automation, Artificial Intelligence, BI Analytics, Customer Experience, Cloud Migration and Legacy products modernization. Our focus areas include: t ,OPXMFEHF .BOBHFNFOU 3FUBJM o 104 BOE merchandizing solution implementation t 6OJGJFE BVUPNBUJPO QMBUGPSN 6"1 o "VUPNBUFE 5FTUJOH 1MBUGPSN t $VTUPNFS KPVSOFZ NBQQJOH BOE JOUVJUJWF experience implementation t -FHBDZ NPEFSOJ[BUJPO IBT CFFO B DPSF BSFB of Infogain’s work. This is helping products companies to extend the lifecycle of their existing products and also improve the customer experience by integrating new technologies, interfaces in their existing products. This has been a key differentiator for us.
What about R&D centers as you’re partnering with several companies? Infogain is scouting for innovative partners who are providing cutting-edge technology platforms. We are partnering with niche tech companies where
Vinay Rawat CRO, Infogain
“GoDaddy’s new Website Builder, and is available in four different pricing options following a one month free trial. It comprises of a mobile optimized website builder with an integrated set of marketing and e-commerce tools”
companies have credible solutions in the emerging technology space. The strategy is we will provide the services around these platforms and the customized services, solutions or frame-works build around these platforms will be the value delivered to our customers. The partner also remains benefited as they can also take those customized solutions to their customers, draw on Infogain’s capabilities or talent pool. We have recently launched a new Innovation Lab at Infogain’s headquarters in Los Gatos which showcases next-gen technologies including Chatbots, Customer Engagement, Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Cloud, Social and more.
What are your thoughts about the Indian market and is Infogain focusing on the same? In Indian market there are certain industry segments MJLF 3FUBJM XIJDI JT FYQBOEJOH GBTU BOE BSF NBLJOH good technology investments. The technology investment in this segment may be at par with what we see outside in a similar industry. Indian enterprises are competing with big MNC’s today and to sustain they have to implement similar system and technology which are being utilized by their competitors. There is a lot of demand today by Indian enterprises to get valuable data insights from their customer transactions, sales or supply chain to improve customer value. All these factors make Indian market very attractive to mid-tier companies like us. Infogain is strengthening and reinforcing the team to create much larger revenue base in India.
What will be your focus area for 8-12 months? We are focusing on revenue growth through our investments in next-generation technologies, co-innovation labs and partnerships. We are also strengthening our teams in Digital Consulting and Solutioning.
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NOVEMBER 2017
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INDIANS ARE DIGITALLY TALENTED
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G
lobally, 54% of the organizations agreed that the digital talent gap is hampering their digital transformation programs and that their organization has lost competitive advantage because of a shortage of digital talent. The scenario in India is no different. Sixty-four per cent (64%) organizations in India cite a widening talent gap over the past few years, reveals a joint survey by LinkedIn and Capgemini. The research, however, reveals that India ranks highest in proportion of digital talent at 76%, followed by Italy at 66% and Spain at 65%. In fact, India, the United Kingdom, and Germany have the largest supply of digital talent per 10,000 total members in the country. But, for every 4 digital talent moving into India, 10 move out of the country. US (47%), UK (14%), UAE (6%) are the top countries from which digital talent is migrating to India. Moreover, US (50%), Australia (8%) and UK (8%) are the top three countries to which talent from India is moving to. The global research was conducted across nine countries—France, Germany, India, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States and seven industries— Automotive, Banking, Consumer Products, Insurance, Retail, Telecom, and Utilities. Among industries, Automotive (64%) and Consumer Products (63%) have the highest proportion of digital talent globally. Globally, employees worry that their skills are either already redundant or soon to become so. In India, 49% believe that their current skill set will be redundant in the next 4–5 years and 34% believe that this will happen as early as the next 1-2 years. Among the employees surveyed globally, 47% stated digital skill development to be a key reason to switch to a new organization. In 52% of organizations, training budgets for digital talent have remained flat or decreased. 45% employees also say the training programs are not helping them gain new digital skills, and 42% say the trainings they attend are “useless and boring”. The research also urges organizations to formulate a digital talent strategy to address the talent gap.
Demand for hard digital skills still outpaces supply Demand for a hard digital skill and proficiency of employees in that hard digital skill Cybersecurity
68%
43%
65%
Cloud computing
42% 64%
Analytics
51% 64%
Web development
39%
Mobile application design and development
62% 38% 62%
Data science
45%
Big data
41%
61% 61%
Master data management
42% 60%
User interface design
39%
Employer: Demand for this digital skill is high in my organization today Employee: Proficiency-level of skill
Source: Capgemini Digital Transformation Institute survey, June-July 2017, N-501 employers; N-753 employees; ranked by employer demand.
What can organizations do to narrow the digital talent gap? Formulating a digital talent strategy to narrow the talent gap
Attracting Digital Talent
Align leadership on a talent strategy and the unique needs of digital talent
Provide flexible and collaborative ways of working
Retaining Digital Talent
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Give digital talent the power to implement change
Diversify recruiting approach
Create an environment that prioritizes and rewards learning
Chart a clear career development path
NOVEMBER 2017
Developing Digital Talent
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TO UPGRADE OR NOT, THAT IS THE QUESTION? Change is good, especially in ever changing e-threat environment, but why should people adopt the habit of upgrading? Here are few reasons that you should know
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– Vishwanath Kulkarni - Director of Sales, Physical Access Control - India and SAARC
hen is it ever a good time to upgrade your access control solution? Many organisations follow the policy of ‘if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it’ but this can be a risky situation in a world where technology and threats are changing so rapidly. The use of older, legacy access control systems exposes an organisation, a building, a server room, a computer to the possibility of unauthorised access and the consequences of this. But why should users upgrade?
Data Privacy One of the biggest drivers for updating legacy access control systems is the need for enhanced levels of data privacy. This could come about through the on-boarding of a client that requires high levels of security, new legislation being brought in for specific industries, or even new building tenants. The driver remains the same: data or the building itself is in some way exposed to or at risk and needs added protection. Yesterday’s technology is no longer sufficient for today’s access control and identity management challenges. In The Access Control Report 2016: Legacy Infrastructure and Motivations for Upgrading, 44% of respondents stated they were planning on upgrading their access control solution. This is a strong indicator that end-users are acknowledging that the risk to organisations is evolving, and the need to protect their physical assets and consequently data assets is important. It would take a security breach that 58
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exposed a flaw in the current system for 92% of respondents to consider changing their current access control system, but not beforehand. On any site at any one time, in addition to regular employees, there are also individuals and groups that have access to various parts of a site for short periods of time. These could be visitors, maintenance teams or contractors. In the report, 75% of respondents have third-party members on site on a regular basis. Integrated visitor management solutions in modern access control systems significantly improve the distribution and use of temporary credentials but also safeguard various parts of the site to unwarranted access. Access control solutions, such as mobile access, make it easier for facilities and securities managers to track who is accessing what parts of the site to ensure nobody is in an area they shouldn’t be.
User Convenience The continual development in consumer technology has spilled over into the business world with devices now being used for work and in our personal lives. Bring Your Own Device, mobiles and wearables are all common features of today’s office environment. Organisations can utilise this growing level of secure technologies that employees are carrying around with them on a daily basis. Instead of having several key cards or fobs that have a high chance of being left behind, users can now utilise, smartphones or smart devices, their closest pieces of technology for secure access control as well. Mobile access control is
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increasingly coming into the market and the benefits this brings are numerous. Understanding the requirements from building occupants is an important step before undertaking an access control update. The report noted that 48% of respondents would like an easy-to-use access control system, with 32% requesting multiple levels of access depending on authority required. This added security element is clearly an important function, and one that can be easily designated with more modern technologies. Having mobile credentials that allows for multiple access levels, for instance, saves the users from having multiple access control devices that could lead to confusion or possibly misplacement. The survey also noted that 29% of respondents would like future-proof technology. This can easily be provided through mobile access solutions which grant users modern techniques for access control, but also a single credential for multiple access devices. Utilising smartphones are a very straightforward solution that solves three of the top concerns of employees looking for updated access control. One of the largest stumbling blocks to updating an enterprise’s access control system is the perceived disruption that the upgrade will cause. 69% of respondents in the report believe that upgrading to a new access control system would be disruptive to their daily business, while 55% cite cost as the biggest misgiving about upgrading. Despite the perceived disruption, many sites can be retrofitted using existing access control hardware behind the scenes, with minimal replacements needed to upgrade technologies. Not having to start from scratch also helps to significantly lower the costs, making it a more cost efficient venture with minimal disruption.
Flexibility A new access control solution must be flexible so users don’t just see it as an ‘expensive way of opening doors’. Open Supervised Device Protocol (0SDP) for secure communication between field devices in a physical access control system has gained increased importance allowing for standardization, more flexibility and freedom of choice for security managers. Flexibility also supports multiple applications for managing not only physical access but also logical access applications, like computers and software logins. Additional access control systems, such as secure print management, require an associated card issued to users. This represents a prime opportunity for organisations to consolidate to a single access control device, such as a contactless wearable or
Vishwanath Kulkarni Director of Sales, Physical Access Control - India and SAARC
“Legacy Infrastructure and Motivations for Upgrading, 44% of respondents stated they were planning on upgrading their access control solution. This is a strong indicator that end-users are acknowledging that the risk to organisations is evolving.”
smartphone that combines access control with other functions. By exploiting modern technology, such as mobile devices and wearables, users are afforded the opportunity to simplify their access control devices: one device, with one credential providing access to multiple areas and requirements. It was found that nearly a quarter of respondents wanted to manage multiple credentials across a single device. With mobile access solutions, multiple credentials are rolled into one and stored on one device. The facilities or security manager is capable of controlling access and distributing credentials to those with the right security clearance. Technology such as the latest high frequency access control systems ensure security is independent of hardware and media. This makes it easier for organisation to support functionality and higher levels of data privacy. Although, there are clearly several barriers to the adoption of more sophisticated access control systems, organisations are placing increasing importance to safeguard their physical assets as it supports in providing protection to their IT infrastructure as well. This is mainly due to the belief that current systems in place are adequate enough until they are proven to have failed and the fact that a replacement system is perceived to be an unnecessary expense. Despite the technological advancements, users are still content with cards and fobs, regardless of the lack of sophisticated security and encryption contained in these when compared with mobile access control solutions. The change to a more sophisticated system is likely to come from employees themselves, rather than decision makers. Existing access control solutions are also easy to upgrade which provide minimal disruption and cost-efficient site retrofits. Facilities and security managers need to question whether it is more expensive to replace an outdated system, or recover from a site or data breach.
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“RUBIQUE TO BECOME THE LARGEST ONLINE MARKETPLACE FOR LOANS IN THE NEAR FUTURE” In an one on one with PC Quest Manav Jeet - MD & CEO, Rubique shares the Services being offered by Rubique – Jyoti Bhagat jyotib@cybermedia.co.in
What is new in Rubique and please give us updates on whats going on in Rubique? Rubique has been making consistent technological interventions to bring a drastic transformation in the traditional lending landscape in India and is helping a large number of customers in fulfilling their financial requirements. Its new and unique Online PLUS model focuses on everything, from sourcing to disbursement.Rubique enables users to get their loan applications processed faster by ensuring smarter integration of its online model,
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business associates, and lending gateway to create a matchmaking algorithm in sync with the Financial Institutions’ lending systems. The focus, at Rubique, is on facilitating disbursement rather than mere lead generation. This multichannel distribution also allows us to tap every consumer segment, be it the digitalsavvy mobile-first users or traditional customers. With technology at the core of Rubique’s vision, our Online PLUS approach comes with paperlessfocused features that significantly reduce the loan approval and processing times through e-KYC, ranking
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analysis, and real-time status tracking. Additionally, we also have Rubot, an AI and decision engine-powered bot aimed at easing the transaction experience, and SPOT, an internal data platform byRubique that can bring tech-driven paradigm shifts in traditional lending practices.
What are the unique financial services you offer to customers? Rubique opens up a brilliant one-stop advantage of making informed decisions, increasing the predictability in terms of credit approval, ensuring hassle-free support without any ambiguity, and rolling out an elaborate list of financial products for consumers and SMEs. It enables users to access loan products expeditiously through tools such as e-KYC and expedites the process of in-principle approval of credit card applications. The platform further ensures a hassle-free and seamless lending process, thanks to its advanced integration with lending systems of multiple financial institutions. On the other hand, the new approach guides financial institutions towards qualified leads, ensures faster turnaround time with better conversion rates, promises low cost of acquisition, and allows them to provide financial access to customers who are new to banking and credit.
Please explain SPOT and TAB tech platforms of Rubique. Both SPOT and TAB feature by Rubique are bringing tech-driven paradigm shifts in traditional practices. SPOT is an internal data platform by Rubique that covers the entire consumer journey from lead generation to disbursement for all types of loans and credit cards. It leads the entire management system, focuses on the integrations, CRM+Marketing, Data & AI based scoring algorithm, Data analytics, cross/upsell engine and payment management. By consolidating all customer and partner information onto a single platform. SPOT helps in automating various workflows and also allows users to gain deeper insights on data and key business metrics. Meanwhile, Rubique’s Tech Assisted Business (TAB) solution created especially for the MSMEs brings automation into the small and medium business finance by allowing them to upload their documents and generate their credit memos. Comprising a wide product portfolio, it covers low to high-risk capital requirement through 5 broad-level product categories of 2 secured – LAP, MEL – and 3 unsecured – Micro Business Loan (>5 lac), Unsecured Business Loan,
Manav Jeet, MD & CEO, Rubique
Commercial Vehicle Finance – loans. The solution also includes advanced technological features like IRIS scan for Aadhaar authentication and integrates with the financial institutions, enabling the credit underwriter to take quick decisions through credit memo generation & reduces the processing time further.
How many partners you have? Rubique has tied up with 80+ financial institutions for 230+ products.
Are you associated with government in any project? Yes, we have signed and MoU with National Small Industries Corporation Ltd (NSIC), a Mini Ratna Enterprise of Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, Government of India, for easy facilitation of credit from micro, medium and small enterprises. Rubique is creating an interface which will ease credit facilitation for MSMEs by allowing quicker decision making and evaluation. Recently, we have also entered into an agreement with with the Andhra Pradesh state government to be a part of its Fintech Valley Initiative. We are foraying into the geography withRubique’s first branch in the city of Vizag. As part of the alliance, Rubique will not only collaborate with the nationalized banks, but will also focus on making an adequate and skilled talent base available for deployment in the sector by tying up with institutions to bring in academic courses related to fintech and blockchain.
How many cities did you reach out? We are constantly striving to become the largest online marketplace for loans in the near future. Currently, we are present in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Pune, Bangalore & Hyderabad. But we have facilitated loans & cards across 27 cities. We are planning to expand further & reach 100 cities.
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‘WE ARE THE ONLY ONE WHO HAS THE SOLUTIONS FOR THE MID-MARKET’ In a one on one with PC Quest Sumir Bhatia, Vice President of Lenovo Data Centre Group (DCG) speaks about the solutions of Lenovo DCG in mid-market and the channel ecosystems – Jyoti Bhagat jyotib@cybermedia.co.in
Tell us about the Data Centre group of Lenovo? First of all, as a organization we are on the constant stage of transformation. Data Centre Group within Lenovo is a focused organization of three groups. We got PCSD, PC smart devices, we got the Motorola business. I lead this data center group for Asia pacific and it’s much focused group. The Data Centre Group is launched recently. We have basically launched two rebranded systems one is think system and another one is think agile. The think system is the discrete server brand which is a standalone server and the other one is a think agile which is a software define data Centre solutions so basically there are two discrete group. We have the sale’s team with all the technical skills. Each and every one is dedicated at only selling Data Centre Solutions.
What is your Lenovo’s channel ecosystem? We have actually recently globally launched a Data Centre Partner Program which is specific to the Data Centre Group. Initially we used to have a single 62
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Partner program that covered our PC Channels and our Data Centre channels. So we formed a new program globally which is considered around the world and focus is on Data Center. They are based out of 3 tiers its platinum, gold, silver. When we build this we wanted to make sure that itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a very simple program so when we look at our competitors we look across this fear of all the vendors we find that the programs are very complex. The programâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s whole process is very simple and partners will actually get the benefit in three areas, so if you look at the competition there are various ways of actually making money.
In your opinion, where are the market opportunities in India? Last year, India is the fastest in Data Center region in terms of adoption. And with a huge push of Government in the field of digitization, the moment is of local cloud providers. Another field is BFSI and Telecom, which is another focus area. In my opinion, mid market is itself emerging as the biggest sector as it is transforming rapidly in terms of technology adoption.
Is there any different Plans for Mid-market vertical? We will keep strengthening our Channel ecosystem.
Sumir Bhatia Vice President of Lenovo Data Centre Group (DCG)
Although, we always work with partners who are strong in mid-market segment. And Lenovo has the widest portfolio in India today, its more than any of our competitors. Also we are the only one which has the solutions for the mid market.
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BIG DATA PAVES WAY FOR SUCCESS IN RETAIL BOOM – Gaurav Khurana, Chief Marketing Officer PAYBACK India
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he retail sector is undergoing a transformation at a fast pace with changing consumer dynamics and purchase behavior powered by one of biggest game changers in the history of retailing – the era of Big Data Analytics. This is a platform that puts the customer first at every step of the demand and supply chain. The only thing we need are the famous drones to fly by and drop your shopping at your doorstep! Whilst we wait for this magnificent retail miracle to come by, let’s take a look at India’s retail story. In the burgeoning retail sector filled with multiple options, lucrative deals, and offers, cash-backs and loyalty points, Big Data Analytics rules. Engaging the ever-so-well-informed customer of today is becoming a major demand in retailing. Brick and mortar stores and online stores are all competing to cater to the same customer and beginning to strategize their stock keeping and seasonal requirement through predictive analytics collected over millions of transactions and buying dynamics on a daily basis. The retailer of today is smart, savvy and armed with tools that enable them to logically plan seasonal sales and predictive buying by analyzing buying behavior regionally, nationally and globally. They can forecast demand using algorithms that track millions of transactions every day which is itemized and this helps collect data on favorite brands, popular products, and fast moving items. This way they can track the demand for goods and determine when to drop prices by a simple method of “markdown optimization”. Hence, giving customers many reasons to revisit them and replenish their supplies for daily need items, apparel, household supplies, kids supplies, even hardware, and electronics. The system identifies individual customer needs and can engage each one digitally. This innovation takes the whole shopping experience 64
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to an exciting level. The art of engaging customers starts by simplifying the retail experience by analyzing the demand for specific products, bundling in exciting deals to entice the customer and finally pricing the complete package with accelerated rewards to drive repeat transactions. This new-age style of retailing is now shifting over from the savvy online stores to the brick and mortar stores where one can use loyalty rewards and promotional schemes to purchase the items of their desire. The
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discerning modern day customer is well-aware of this and actively seeks such retailers at every step. It also adds great value to a customer’s pocket, thus building engagement, loyalty and creating a demand within the existing ecosystems, which will further drive new customer acquisition through word of mouth, social media, advertising and many such communication channels used by the industry. When we look at this picture from a global perspective, the whole game changes into bigger demand, supply, and pricing technique developed to consistently entertain the evolution of the customer buying behavior. International brands are doing exactly this, and this is their path to success. Billions of customers who buy from the Amazon Global Store, for example; have opened the gateway to a shopper’s paradise replete with offers, discount
Gaurav Khurana Chief Marketing Officer PAYBACK India
“This new-age style of retailing is now shifting over from the savvy online stores to the brick and mortar stores where one can use loyalty rewards and promotional schemes to purchase the items of their desire. The discerning modern day customer is well-aware of this and actively seeks such retailers at every step.”
schemes, on demand services, prime delivery services to mention a few. Predicting trends, another innovative tool used by retailer today is hyper-local personalization through integrating social media behavior and zeroing in on customer choices, most loved products and brands, wish lists and dozens of activities a customer may perform online. Linking the retailer directly to a customer, it also helps analyze the next purchase a customer is about to make, this is called “identifying the customer”. Armed with this, seasonal discounts, price optimization, and gratifications are offered to excite the customer in the future. And if one were to take this to a personalized engagement level, it’s only a smart choice to drive your customer to visit the physical retail store for an allround sensory experience and add great value to the business. This all goes to prove that big data analytics can have an incremental impact on businesses. It supplements the retailers with the power to build a stronger retail ecosystem that benefits consumers as well as the retailers. It is a fact that brands in today’s scenario need to magnify their vision and look beyond just forecasting data. To create history, they must evolve as fast as their customers do. And this is only possible when they practically determine and deliver the most desirable and rewarding experience to the consumer. Big data plays a pivotal role and provides retailers with an unprecedented opportunity to evolve and bring unique solutions to cater to each lifestage of various businesses.
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TRENDS
AIR PURIFIER WITH
MOSQUITO CATCHER HELPS BATTLE
VECTOR-BORNE DISEASES 68
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M
onsoon makes the perfect breeding ground for germs, bacteria and mosquitoes. The pesky visitors not only trigger irritation and skin rashes but also are agents of deadly diseases like Dengue, Chikungunya, Malaria, Yellow fever and Zika virus.In past few years, the rate of infection and mortality has risen dramatically in India, which is indeed a growing concern.The recent data released by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) states that hospitals across the city have already reported 1,185 cases of Dengue, 392 cases of Chikungunyaand 524 cases of Malaria. To protect themselves from mosquitoes and the related diseases, people invariably use mosquito repellants and insecticidal sprays.These chemicals in some individuals especially in children can precipitate respiratory allergies and bronchial asthma. According to Dr Vivek Nangia, Director - Pulmonology Department at Fortis Hospital and renowned consultant and specialist in this field, â&#x20AC;&#x153;it is advisable to adopt measures that reduce the mosquito habitat without the use of chemicals. It is essential to employ an integrated and scientific approach to get rid of mosquitoes as having a mosquito related diseasescan be fatal. Natural and organic repellents like Lemon Eucalyptus Oil, Lavender, Neem Oil and Cinnamon Oil should be preferred. Mosquito catching equipment can also help reduce the overall burden of mosquitoes.â&#x20AC;?
Sharp has recently introduced an Air Purifier with mosquito catcher which serves dual purpose, cleanses the indoor air and rids the environment of mosquites.With its CHEMICAL FREE 5 step mosquitocatching mechanism, the purifier effectively captures mosquitoes whilst purifying indoor air, keeping you safe from the dreaded vector and pollutants. It boasts a stylish black exterior with tiny entrance on both sides to entice nearing mosquitoes. While the blue lights attract mosquitoes which are then driven by powerful air suction that traps them on a strong glue sheet. These non-toxic sheets have three layers, one for each month. Replacement sheets are available for `1000 (good for 3 months) on various e-commerce portals. You may continue using the air purifier all year round even without replacing the glue sheet if there are not enough mosquitoes in your room. Mosquito infestation hit the highest point during and after Monsoons. More cases of vector-borne diseases are reported between mid-July and November end. The new device from Sharp is a non-chemical preventive solution that protects your family from potential mosquito-borne diseases by trapping them inside the machine. With additional features being added to air purifiers, consumers may seek multiple health advantages and can further address respiratory disorders along with menace of vector borne diseases.
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TODAY’S AI, TOMORROW’S INTELLIGENT SALESFORCE Paramdeep Singh – CEO, FieldAssist- A flagship SaaS platform
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umans have forever embodied progress with their unyielding endeavours to make life simpler, be the prodigal invention of fire or stumbling upon the wheel of progress. With the co-operation of technology, things which were settled in the fabled lore of makebelieve have seen the light of reality. Time and again, it has been noted that industries have harnessed these advancements in the quest to add a levelled ground between customer requirements and organizational provisionsthe current one leading the pack is ‘artificial intelligence’. Artificial intelligence has evolved to be the most trending term in the business domain, with major impacts influencing the decisionmaking process. According to Gartner analysts, within next five years, 50% of the analytical decisions will be made through AI: replacing simple human interactions. For the sales and marketing industry, AI is a game changer of sorts as it singlehandedly uplifts the industry scenario and streamlines redundant processes. Here’s how
ground in less time and follow the most qualified ones with more time on their hand.
Streamline Administrative Tasks Artificial intelligence is known to have a disrupt-
Increases Leads Recent researches have clearly depicted AI’s influence- companies that use artificial intelligence in sales claimed to have increased leads by 50%. This can be contributed to the fact that predictive analysis in AI permeates beyond the “what” in data and delves into the “why.” Also, vendors are developing automation that contextualizes the online engagement leading to leads becoming smarter, faster, and more accurate. Owing to this, sales reps can cover more 70
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ing effect on fundamental processes and utilizes this to simplify complex stages. With AI, time-consuming, repetitive sales tasks are taken off the daily workload, promoting automation of sales. These include product-profile matching, order-taking, transaction processing, and templating reports. Not surprisinglyAI is stepping into the uncharted territory i.e middle-of-the-funnel. The market is teeming with lead management applications that assist sales reps in sustaining follow-ups up to the proposal stage- decreasing the time wasted in manual follow-ups. The automation now extends to the B2B sales process, where automated cold calling can arrange face-toface presentations. This, in turn, shortens the sales cycle as reps get a huge head start when their actual legwork starts. The time they put in on administrative tasks is allocated to thinking proposals, leading to more impactful opportunities being capitulated on.
Faster Customer Service Artificial intelligence is seen collating FAQs and
Paramdeep Singh â&#x20AC;&#x201C; CEO, FieldAssist- A ďŹ&#x201A;agship SaaS platform
predictable customer queries, hastening the process of response. Initial contact with customers through chats, emails, and phone are now a jurisdiction at the AI realm. As AI develops more cognitive skills, it is certain to handle more complex customer queries. With faster response rates, customer satisfaction increases, while addressing issues before they are blown up beyond proportions. The same customer queries can be utilized to the sales pipeline for upselling and cross-selling opportunities.
How is the intelligent utilization of data promoted? The Indian business environment has become a breeding ground for AI start-ups. Industries that thrive on the proliferation of massive data such as Healthcare, Airlines and Oil refineries among a host of industry domains engage AI tools to convert data into information and scale that up to knowledge and eventually create cognitive systems. Such is the attention on AI-driven systems that research firm IDC suggest that more than 50% applications built will be cognitive in nature by 2018.
Conclusion Several real-time start-up examples drive home the fact that thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s significant amount of enthusiasm around AI applications and experts believe that all interfaces will soon get replaced by AI in the recent future. pcquest.com twitter.com/pcquest facebook.com/pcquest linkd.in/pcquest pcquest@cybermedia.co.in
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SECURING FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS IN INDIA Trends, Challenges and Solutions that Deliver Security from the Network Core SARAVANA DORAIRAJ, Country Manager, Infoblox India
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he banking sector has beenrapidly embracing latest technology while the demanding population is getting tunedto mobility and connectivity; this scenario has compelled Indiato quickly adapt digital transformation of financial business practices. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI)—which prescribes broad parameters for banking operations in order to maintain public confidence in India’s financial system, protect depositors’ interest, and provide cost-effective banking services to the public—is a key motivator in modernizing banking operations, and guided by its recommendations, individual banks and credit unions are employing technology to enhanceoperations. Security initiatives are a key part of this effort—perhaps the most important part— because of the rapidly growing and evolving threat landscape.
Indian Banking Industry 26 public-sector banks, 25 private-sector banks, 43 foreign banks, 56 regional rural banks, 1,589 urban cooperative banks, and 93,550 rural cooperative banks in addition to cooperative credit institutions comprise the Indian Banking landscape. Public-sector banks control nearly 80 percent of the market. Currently these banks are leveraging 72
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technology to encourage their customers to manage their finances using mobile phones and Internetbased systems. This is part of a technology evolution that started were started after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) issued a mandate to implement core banking applications to enhance operations at branch levels. These helped banks to begin new innings in the field of technology innovations by building networks across India, data centers, applications, data repositories, and many key security initiatives. Coupled with the economic advancement of the middle class in India and the significant increase in the number of younger consumers, the building of multiple delivery channels to serve customers is becoming realty— Internet-based and mobile applications are driving customer satisfaction and stickiness. Several specific technology trends are affecting customer behavior in India in ways that increaseopportunity for financial institutions and at the same time increase the challenges associated with network security.
Internet Penetration Is Increasing New Internet users are growing more than 50 million year on year, on the flip side, there is only 26 percent penetration so far. Having said that, there is
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a rapid growth in this too thanks to mobile Internet, broadband, and Wi-Fi rollouts. The number of mobile Internet users in India had reached 371 million by June2016, and is on track to cross 500 million users by next year and to double to 730 million by 2020, leaving the United States far behind.
Digital Transactions Are on the Rise Indian consumers have started extensively using cashless transactions for day-to-day purchases such as movie ticketing, cab booking, air/rail ticketing, holidays, groceries, e-commerce, etc. Each of these applications promotes increased online usage of mobile wallets, credit cards, and debit cards. Implementations of one-time password, Aadhar-linked transactions, SMS alerts, and the streamlining of Internet-driven processes for banking have built confidence in users to adopt technologydriven channels over legacy channels dependent on branch operations. Digital channels are also helping banks to streamline redundant operations to reduce costs and deliver contextual and personalised banking to customers using analytics.
Innovation in the Payment Industry Is Driving Customer Behavior With the proliferation of mobile-based services and the reducing median price of smartphones, the payment industry is on an exponential growth trajectory, further aided by policy, frameworks, and
guidelines being formalized by the regulator. Innovative and disruptive solutions have made this volumeintensive and low-margin industry a lucrative one. From October 2015 to October 2016 cashless payments have grown by 22 percent and Indiaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s financial industry has witnessed 175 percent growth in mobile transactions during the same period. The Unified Payments Interface (UPI) that powers multiple bank accounts into a single mobile application (of any participating bank), merging several banking features, seamless fund routing, and merchant payments into one hood. It also caters to the peer-to-peer collect request, which can be scheduled and paid as per requirement and convenience. UPI alone has surged to 1.4 million transactions worth INR 480 crore by December 2016. Digital payments in India are estimated to grow at steady rate to 500 billion USD by 2020 from the current size of 50 billion. With digital initiatives underway by state and central governments, it is expected that 59 percent of all transactions will go digital by 2025.
Cybersecurity Challenges and Incidents The same technological advances and consumer trends that are transforming financial industry business practices in India are also creating new threat vectors and vulnerabilities for bank networks.
Infrastructure Outages: Distributed Denial of Service (DNS) Distributed-denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks af-
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TRENDS fecting multiple major organizations in the recent times have become increasingly common and are hampering functioning of critical infrastructure in many countries. In 2016, large enterprises and service providers worldwide experienced bandwidth saturation under DDoS attack. Many of these incorporate Internet of Things (IoT) devices to overwhelm target networks. Analysis and visibility of DDoS attacks remains a daunting task, being largely dependent on realtime traffic analysis and reports or logs from security infrastructure. In 2017, 800-Gbps DDoS attacks were reportedâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;60 percent higher than the 500-Gbps attack that was the largest reported in 2015. DNS is the most common service being targeted by using amplification- and reflection-based attacks according to Arborâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Worldwide Infrastructure Security Report, Vol XII. Ciscoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Security 2017 report states that DNS security and DDoS mitigation are a few of the technologies which are the most time-consuming and difficult technologies to manage. Primarily, DNS is being targeted for the following reasons: t %/4 JT UIF DPSOFSTUPOF PG UIF *OUFSOFU VTFE CZ BMM the leading banks/financial institutions for internal and external application. t %/4 CFJOH B TUBUFMFTT QSPUPDPM DBO CF FBTJMZ spoofed and redirected for malicious intent. t 5IF %/4 QSPUPDPM JT FBTZ UP FYQMPJU " MFHJUJNBUF DNS query to the Internet can amplify a response by a factor of 93, which can bottleneck Internet infrastructure. t .BOZ CBOLJOH JOGSBTUSVDUVSFT QSPWJEF MJUUMF PS OP visibility of inbound and outbound traffic. A few indicators of an increasein DDoS incidents in India during 2016 comprise internet service providers hit by a DDoS attack in July in Mumbai. Further, a report from security vendor Symantec, which studied DDoS attack patterns across 50 different countriesfound that 26 percent of all DDoS attack traffic in the world originated in India. According to a Q2â&#x20AC;&#x2122;16 Akamai report, India is among the top 10 source countries. A March 2016 F-Secure Threat Round up Report stated that India emerged as the fifth highest country witnessing infections via DNS hijacks in 2015. DDoS attacks are not, of course, limited to India. On October 22 of 2016, cybercriminals seized control of a Brazilian Bank for five hours, compromising 36 of the bankâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s domains, including its internal email and FTP servers, and captured electronic transac74
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tions. Kaspersky Labâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s research and analysis team in Latin America says the attackers were able to pull off the heist by compromising the bankâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s DNS provider Registro.br and gaining administrative control of the bankâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s DNS account. Also Data breaches may involve personal health information (PHI), personally identifiable information (PII), trade secrets, or intellectual property. According to a 2017 Ixia security report, there has been an almost 100 percent rise in data breaches from end-user devices, with 67 percent of the breaches taking days to detect. As the emphasis in 2016 on hardening infrastructure increased, attacks against servers, hardened terminals, and the network itself trended down, as expected. Servers remain the top attack vector per Verizonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Data Breach Investigations Report findings, but have been on the decline for several years. The human element, however, from shadow cloud SaaS usage to casual use of laptop or smartphone devices not managed 24/7 by IT, continues to rise. The security, integrity, and reliability of Internet commerce and communication depend on underlying DNS services. Advanced targeted attacks often focus on DNS services either directly or as part of a broader attack campaign. DNS services can also present vulnerabilities that enable data-exfiltration attacks to succeed. Methods to exploit these vulnerabilities have been demonstrated as far back as 2007, and in recent years, they have been used in several real-world breaches. The DNS protocol uses stateless messaging for a DNS client to submit queries to an external server and receive external replies from that server. These queries and replies can contain up to 512 octets of data, and no message-level security is enforced in standard DNS services. This combination provides an easyto- exploit path whereby attacks can subvert DNS services for both malware updating and data exfiltration. While traditional DLP solutions focus on other protocols, they have limited visibility into DNS conversations and hence are ineffective in detecting DNS based data exfiltration. The solution to protect sensitive sector like the financial one lies in providing core network services, automates cloud deployments, and increased reliability of enterprise and service provider networks around the world. Providing infrastructure protection would include protection for Domain Name System (DNS), secures data thus help mitigate the spread of malware, and eases security operations through ecosystem integrations.
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