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Array Networks signs MoU with Netmagic

SUSE contributes to the Ceph project

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Is India Inc. ready for GDPR compliance?

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Airtel to boost Broadband penetration

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harti Airtel has partnered with the Department of Telecom to boost broadband penetration in rural India by piloting Broadband Experience Centres riding on BharatNet infrastructure.

Under the partnership, Airtel has set up three Broadband Experience Centres in three villages pertaining to Ghazipur, Gorakhpur and Varanasi districts of Uttar Pradesh. Airtel has already committed to partner with BharatNet in up to 30,500 Gram Panchayats.

These modern centres will enable citizens and local entrepreneurs to experience highspeed broadband connectivity as well as get access to use-cases relating to e-governance, e-health and e-banking and e-commerce and much more.

PM inaugurates Greenfield smart city, Naya Raipur

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M Narendra Modi inaugurated India’s first integrated greenfield smart city project at Naya Raipur, the capital of Chhattisgarh. Schneider Electric, the global leader in the digital transformation of energy management and automation, announced the implementation of the integrated Command and Control Centre (CCC) along with utility management system (Electrical and Water SCADA) and intelligent Building Management System (BMS) there.

Expressing his satisfaction on the execution of the project, Rajat Kumar, IAS, CEO, Naya Raipur Development Authority, said, “It is a happy moment for us today as the Naya Raipur Smart City project takes off with the consortium and our partners.

This is a unique project, one whose organic growth we shall pursue aggressively. The project shall be spread across verticals and integrate diversified segments.”

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HELLO INDIA

Defining Digital Practices

…………..Reimagining the Future

Everyone wants to go digital but there is no real consensus of what that meant. It made me wonder, how can an organisation become digital if they can't agree on what digital means? The global business environment is being disrupted by the collision of an unprecedented wave of innovation.

Digital medium means using technology to support the business to proactively engage through online or digital including mobile, web etc., with their customers as and where people socialise and like to be engaged. This is headlined by social media and is supported by analytics and artificial intelligence. The incredible speed of change in technology is affecting every organization, and there are many challenges for IT leaders to overcome, from updating legacy systems to determining the right technology for the business objectives. Digital transformation requires organizations to redefine their culture so that people and teams work smarter and faster.

I think the most important thing is to make sure people understand why new technology is being introduced.

Now a new C-suite discussion is under way - how to make the digital transformation happen before it is too late. Time is running out and how the business works to create a new operating model that runs on digital technologies and capabilities.

Other essential transformation tasks include building a digital culture and developing capabilities that allow for deeper integration with both internal and external systems.

It is true that, digital transformation turns every business into a digital business. Most of the organisations face a common digital imperative by harnessing the power of digital technologies to become more effective, innovative and disruptive. The challenge is on how to help the businesses cope with the digital transition going on that is being heavily driven by mobile technologies, social technologies and the cloud as well as big data analytics. To grapple with this fact, businesses need a new framework of understanding and action.

Secondly, Big data, cloud computing, social business, and mobility are causing digital disruption across many industries. Social media and mobile technologies have shifted the balance of power and influenced the consumer. Many business leaders simply see digital as siloed components affecting only certain parts of the organization. This is a critical error.

Digital does not impact some parts of your business: it ripples and through it and will change almost everything about your business. Social media in nutshell, refers to social platforms (FB, Twitter, Snapchat etc), virtual communities, dark net (Private VC) etc. A million new social media users are ‘born’ every day. As of 2018, there are 3.196 billion people using social media on the planet, which is up by 13 percent from 2017 to 2018. Social media advertising revenue is forecasted to be at $51.3 billion USD for 2018. That’s $17.24 per user.

False news stories were 70 percent more likely to be retweeted than true stories were. A survey says, 60 million “bots” post automatic updates on Facebook and up to 48 million are on Twitter. The spreaders of fake news are using increasingly sophisticated methods like unbroken re-tweet chains, they found.

Lastly, it is time to understand on why most of digital transformations fail. But I think a good step towards improving your odds of success is to have a common understanding of what digital means for your organisation.

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CONTENTS Website: www.varindia.com

Publisher: Deepak Kumar Sahu Editor: S Mohini Ratna Executive Editor: Dr. Vijay Anand Copy Editor: C. M. Dutta Deputy Editor: Samrita Baruah Sub - Editor: Aparna Mullick Correspondent: Lopamudra Das Art Director: Rakesh Kumar Network Administrator: Ashok Kumar Singh Manager-IT: Subhash Mohanta Manager-SEO: Bidyadhar Behera BUSINESS: Commercial Manager: Amit Kumar Jha Sr. Marketing Manager: Ashok Ranjan Dash Circulation Executive: Manish Kumar Marketing Manager: Dipendra Kumar CORPORATE OFFICE: VAR House, A-84A/3 Rose Apartment, Paryavaran complex, IGNOU Road, New Delhi - 110030 Tel: 011-41656383, 46061809 Email: edit@varindia.com Bangalore: Bureau office Marketing Manager: S. Kamala kar Correspondent: L. G. Swami D-103 G.F., Ashish JK Apartments Thubarahalli Extended Road Bangaluru- 560066 Tel: 080-49530399 | Mobile:09886280836 E-mail: kamlakar@varindia.com Mumbai: Bureau office Regional Manager (West): Anil Kumar Sr. Correspondent: Mamta S. Anurag Residency, 203 - “B” Wing, Plot No-5, Sector-9, Kamothe, Navi Mumbai-410 209 Tel: 022-65561292, Mobile: 08108017479 E-mail: anil@varindia.com, mamta@varindia.com Chennai: Bureau office Branch Manager: Parthiban K A2, R.C.Residency, Cholambedu Road, Thiruvenkada nagar, Ambathur, Chennai - 600 053 Mobile: 098400 55626 E-mail: barani@varindia.com Hyderabad: Bureau office Branch Manager: Sunil Kumar Sahu 32-161/3, 202 Neha Paradise, Nr. Maissamma Temple, Venketeswara colony Ramakrishna Puram, Hyderabad - 500056 Telangana, Tel: 040-32989844/ Cell No. 08100298033 E-mail: sunil@varindia.com Kolkata: Bureau office Marketing Officer: Sunil Kumar Correspondent: B Kiran Dutta 123 SDF Building, Block GP Sector V, Salt Lake City, Kolkata - 700091 Mobile: 08100298033, E-mail: sunil@varindia.com Mobile: 09903088480, E-mail: kiran@varindia.com Printed and Published by Deepak Kumar Sahu on behalf of M/s. Kalinga Digital Media Pvt. Ltd. and Printed at Pushpak Press Pvt. Ltd. Shed No. 203 - 204, DSIDC Complex, Okhla Industrial Area, Phase-I, New Delhi-110020 and Published at A-84A/3 Rose Apartment, Paryavaran complex, IGNOU Road, New Delhi - 110030, Editor - S Mohini Ratna.

For Subscription queries contact: info@varindia.com Subscription: Rs. 500(12 issues)Rs. 1000 (24 issues)

All payments favouring: KALINGA DIGITAL MEDIA PVT LTD © All rights are reserved. No part of this magazine may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher. (1999-2016) * All disputes are subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of competent courts and forums in Delhi only.

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44pg TALK WITH DEEPAK

TECH TRENDS

25 |

47|

An Incredible journey from India To London ...the road that was lead by Car

EVENTS 28|

VAR SME 35|

5 challenges Small and Medium Enterprises face in today’s competitive environment

COVER STORY 36|

INDIAN MARKET SCAPE 48|

Bigger, Better, Brighter: Infotech Forum 2018 sets a new benchmark

Is India INC. Ready For GDPR Compliance?

Collaborative Bots- COBOT

After Market Service: Miles To Go

VAR SECURITY 50|

Quantum Hi-Tech focusing on penetrating into Tier two and three cities

VAR MOBILITY 52|

Ziox Mobiles aims to achieve Rs 600 cr by Q4 of FY 2018-19

IN FOCUS 40|

Marg ERP brings accounting and banking solutions for MSMEs

FACE TO FACE 42| 43|

ESET eyeing the Enterprise segment in India R&D: The core of Rocket Software

CIO SPECIAL 44|

New age CIOs streamlining business transformation with new technologies

REGULARS ROUND ABOUT

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CHANNEL CHIEF

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ON THE RAMP

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

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ROUND ABOUT

Stages of Growth in Digital Economy It seems the Internet-based companies are passing through a difficult patch of time. How does one explain such trajectories of uncertainties?

A few months back or so, they were doing pretty well. Every other day, there were takeovers, mergers, new ventures, expansions, exalted profits, massive recruitment drives, commitments to work for the society et al.

Now what we hear is only about data theft, investigations, deposition before various committees, admissions of omissions and commissions and even passing on the bucks.

I tried to reflect what could be the reasons for such a drastic change in the fortunes of these companies all of a sudden. I remember of one economist called Rostov, who propounded the theory of stages of growth. His hypothesis is that an economy would pass through five trajectories of growth. They are traditional economy characterized by subsistence farming, low- growth stage, precondition for takeoff, takeoff, and age of mass consumption. Each stage has its own special characteristics.

The flip side of his growth theory is that there is no static stage for the economy, which tries to move from one stage to the other. Once it reaches the ultimate stage of mass consumption, it can slip back to the traditional stage. Of course, on the applicability of the Rostov’s stages of growth in the present world, I really do not know how it will be applied to the digital world, where companies are always in a growing mode. But recent developments of data theft, reported loss of business by IT giants, erosion in their credibility, etc are pointers, that it may have an indirect or symbolic application in the Internet-based companies also.

That is what, I believe, is happening to the industry players like Facebook, Google, Twitter, Instagram. All of them are on the defensive for one reason or the other. After a period of quick profit, size, name, fame and influence, now the landscape is changing. These companies, particularly Facebook, have to defend against a plethora of allegations levelled against them. That way, there is an emotional sync with what Rostov had propagated. Economy including net- based economy, will have to undergo the stages of growth in one way or the other.

One good thing in the entire drama unfolding is the global debate on the future of technology, particularly on Artificial Intelligence (AI), which is now the frontier of all technologies. Techies are polarized: one supporting AI and others holding a diametrically opposite view. Let us take two prominent techies, who are crossing swords in the ongoing debate.

One is now Mark Zuckerberg, who has nursed fledgling Facebook into a multibillion enterprise and the other Silicon Valley billionaire Elon Musk.

Musk, for the uninitiated, has created SpaceX and Tesla. Zuckerberg is propagating AI to the masses and advocates how it can bring people together and how fast people can communicate. Musk, however, is the person who in the highest decibel started warning people about the ill effect of AI and foretells how destructive it could be when machines become super-intelligent than men.

Experts feel that creation of a super-intelligent robot may be still in the confines of science fiction. But this is not something that we cannot wish away. There are many instances, when science fictions have become a reality, such as man landing on the Moon and sooner or later man can step on the surface of Mars or any other planets. Space shuttles will be something that can happen not in the fertile minds of scientists but as real as travelling from Kolkata to New York or Copenhagen to Beijing.

Is there any widespread fear among techies about the future of AI? I feel there is a strong feeling among them about the pernicious effect of AI. Otherwise, why 4,000 Google techies raised their voice against the company’s contract with NASA for developing more weapons and ammunitions fitted with AI. They wanted Google to come out of the project on ethical grounds, and the company had to succumb to their demand. Once the present project gets over, Google has decided not to renew the contract with NASA for developing weapons of mass destruction which are fitted with Artificial Intelligence.

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Not to be left far behind, China has made it clear that it is going to develop technologies that can operate on AI, particularly weapons. There are elite labs, according to reports, in China that are working exclusively on these projects and they share the optimism that it would emerge as the most powerful country in the application of AI. We all know that China means business.

As a strong antidote to these developments, there are many pacifists who are working silently against the emergence of belligerent supercomputers, which, they believe, can annihilate the universe. In January 2015, some of the members of the AI community met to discuss about the supercomputers.

Can we keep technology neutral from ethics or completely shut off from the normative side? The essence of the debate between Zuckerberg and Musk hinges on this conundrum. I am sure this is not the last and final debate on that. This debate will continue in the times to come and, more often, it will elude a resolution. It means that there are people who hold the diametric opposite views. That will balance the approach of policy makers. That perhaps is the difference between a democratic regime and not-so-democratic ones. For instance, Google employees have shown the red flag to the company’s approach to help NASA’s research project on AI. The pertinent point is whether the employees of Chinese technology company ZTE’s have the guts to say no to their management for undertaking such projects, which they feel may not be in the right interest of the mankind.

It only means that IT cannot be above Rostov’s stages of growth. One can discern stages of growth in the digital space also. In that event, there will be restrictions on what we innovate and what we discover. It is always better for nations to decide on what technology that they need for the betterment of the people and to decipher the dual use of a technology.

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Microsoft’s One Commercial Partner Organization: A major step to deepen engagement with Partners In a chat with VARINDIA,Rajiv Sodhi, General Manager, Partner Ecosystem ‎Microsoft talks at length about the One Commercial Partner organization which has been formed with the intent to serve its partners in a better way Microsoft has recently come up with a unique organization within the company named One Commercial Partner (or OCP) which acts as a single point of contact for its partners. Not only this, the organization aims to work for the betterment of the partners. It makes it easy for the partners to build their products or solutions on the Microsoft platform, and help them in their go to market strategy and selling to customers.

“In the beginning of our financial year, in July 2017, we created an organization called One Commercial Partner (OCP). In Microsoft there were a lot of teams that used to work with partners. We had 16-17 different teams in different parts of the organization. It was very tough and complex for a partner to work with Microsoft. So what we did was we brought all these together into one organization called OCP. In that way we have one team now that looks after the interests of our channel partners. Our mission is to work with our partners and make everything easy. So this creation of one organization was a very big step that Microsoft took.

This organization comprises of three very distinct team. The first team is the “Build with” team, which means we partner with these channel partners who are of four types – who build applications on our platform, services projects on Microsoft platform, managed services providers and companies that resell our products. We partner with these channel partners and work on their products and solutions. We make sure that they are technically competent, train the partners, and our architects work with the partners to make sure that their product is built in the right fashion on our platform.

Second is the “Go to Market with” team; once the product and solution is ready, you need to take that to the market. So what is the offer, the customer segment that you are targeting, the pricing, how do you build the marketing plan to drive customer acquisition – all of these are worked on for our partners by our “Go to Market with” team within OCP. Third is “Selling”, where we partner with the Partner’s sales team and take the solution to market. So we actually get into co-selling which means the partner’s sales team and Microsoft’s sales person sell together to the customer. It is the first true form of co-selling anywhere in the industry because Microsoft in this co-selling program retires its sales team’s quota based on the partner solution. When that partner solution is sold to customer, it is on top of our platform and the quota of our sales person gets retired not just on the Microsoft component but on the overall value.

OCP is a very unique and powerful program. The partner gets the benefit of access to the entire Microsoft network because now the Microsoft sales force is also the partner’s sales force. Another benefit is the single point of contact which actually works with the partner’s team to build their products and solutions. The third benefit is that the partner gets help in going to market,” explains Rajiv Sodhi, General Manager, Partner Ecosystem Microsoft.

Cloud v/s On-premise Data Center These days the cloud movement in India is on a high. People are aware of it and they are gradually shifting to it. But there are also few who are still sceptical about it and in that matter Microsoft’s hybrid cloud model is a major distinguishing feature.

“At present, in India the movement towards cloud is accelerating.

People are aware of Cloud and today the discussion is, in my environment how do I move to cloud. We meet a lot of customers who want to move 100% to cloud; also there are customers who for the next five years want to move only one workload to cloud. The reason behind this could be many like compliance, budget, maturity, readiness, technology etc, and to such

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Rajiv Sodhi General Manager, Partner Ecosystem Microsoft customers we offer the ‘Azure stack’ which is an integrated system of Azure services and hardware that can be hosted on-premise. That is why hybrid cloud strategy is such a big differentiator with Microsoft because we do not force the customer to come on to the cloud but we ask them and partner with them on how they want to build their journey to the Cloud,” describes Sodhi.

The whole mission is to work with our partners and make everything easy. So this creation of one organization was a very big step that Microsoft took Roadmap for Enterprise and Government segment Sodhi concludes the conversation by discussing the roadmap to address the target verticals, “When we think of any vertical, all of these customers are on the path of digital transformation. What customers are doing is, they are looking at all the data they have, how they can actually process that data and generate intelligence out of it. A variety of technologies come into play - sometimes it could be just taking the data that they have, applying machine learning on top of it and generating insights. At times it is how do I get more data, or how to do something more efficiently on cloud so there is cloud migration. I do not think there is just one kind of path for every kind of customer. But it is important that whichever path the customer is choosing, they can do it in their own data center or with a hoster or on ‘Azure stack’.

We make sure that there is a strong partner ecosystem supporting each of these scenarios so that our customer has a choice. We provide the choice on the clouds to every customer of ours.”

Business and government organizations are increasingly looking to transform their operations digitally, to drive efficiency in operations, empower employees, engage better with customers and transform their products and services.AndMicrosoft’s OCP organization is enabling it to work closely with its partners to enable organizations to digitally transform themselves. n

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CHANNEL CHIEF

Artificial Intelligence to define the world of automation going forward The Industry today is in a very interesting transformative phase. We talk about AI all the time and yet AI has been in the existence pretty much from the time computer science has made its advent. Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director, South Asia- NVIDIA while highlighting the opportunities of AI, hints at how firms across the globe are fast becoming aware of the power of Artificial Intelligence, Mixed reality, Deep learning and Blockchain The human mind works in 2 modes- Reasoning and Understanding, and yet all AI specialists till date have put their efforts behind reasoning and not understanding. There could be many reasons behind why no one puts effort behind understanding and there are two that stand out- first is that specialists had no clue how to handle understanding and second, there has been very low computing power to manage understanding in machines.

“In 2012, a group of data scientists in Toronto showed to the world that by using neural networks, they could do proto understanding of the machine,” says Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director, South Asia- NVIDIA.“When we talk about AI in simpler words, it is about software writing the software; that algorithm which the world calls as deep learning that runs on super computers, if given your digital experience can indeed learn from you and teach your modules or your models to do more of the same task, specifically when it comes to speech, image and videos. If you have that as a perspective, AI can really augment every single thing that a superhuman was capable of doing at speeds that only superhumans can do. What does it really mean for us?” he questions.

He further adds, “This means that going forward we will need very few software engineers to write software and you will need 5060 of us to teach our domain to the computer or a machine and the machine will be able to learn, apply and write that software that we couldn’t write to solve the unsolvable. That’s why this observation is transformative.”

It is a question regularly asked if fully autonomous vehicles run in India. If autonomous vehicles are brought to India, will it succeed? It is predicted that every machine will become autonomous in future.

“Humans have taken the first code to make cars autonomous.

With people having driven cars for nearly 100 years now and with the set rules and regulations, it is not tough for even a child today to learn driving. In fact you can pass a driving test in just 10 minutes.

But it becomes very difficult when you have to codify those driving skills in a vehicle.

There is a huge economic value for people to move from mechanically driven cars to software driven cars. And that value is on a simple principle in both the cases. In a mechanical car, the value is all about liability. For instance, if your car meets with an accident, or there was a failure of any part, the car would be recalled and the car company has to pay back the customer of whatever damage has been caused. But the future is different; your value of the car increases the moment the car leaves the parking lot. The car now has a sensor and the more sensors you have, the more data you have. The more data you have, the more insights you have,” explains Vishal.

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Vishal further says that the world is very complicated but if it is broken down into an engineering problem, the following 3 steps help one to make anything autonomous – • Perception – can the car understand from the cameras and sensors what it is around? Where it is or what it is seeing?

• Anticipation of what is happening next • Finally take an action based on that “That’s where the pursuit of mankind has been. But this also means that if there are certain software changes, the way we write the workflow changes, the infrastructure changes, the business problem changes, the way we approach problems changes, the way you make money changes and therefore I call it transformative,” says Vishal.

And so...

The world is going to be a completely different place going forward.

We are living in a world of amazing software technology that has been developed in due course of time; many of us are users of that technology, while many of us are going to make a sale of that technology. This is also going to be an opportunity and that opportunity is for all of us.

Vishal finally concludes, “If that’s the opportunity then this is the best movement for all of us together and there can’t be a bigger period.” n Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

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HOT BYTES

NXP to announce mobile wallet service

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XP Semiconductors N.V., in collaboration with Mastercard and Visa, has announced the launch of its new mWallet 2GO, a white label wallet service developed on the NXP Secure Service 2GO Platform. With the new service, NXP is first in the industry to offer the full scope of mobile wallet development in one solution including leading hardware technology, surrounding software and ecosystem integration.

The payment solution is designed to ease development, reduce cost,

and accelerate time-tomarket for OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturers) to add mobile payment capability to any wearable, mobile or IoT (Internet-ofThings) device.

Montblanc, the German manufacturer of luxury writing instruments, watches, jewellery and leather goods, is the first company to launch its own mobile wallet solution based on mWallet 2GO.

Fortinet PartnerSYNC directs partners to identify business opportunities

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ortinet has c o n d u c t e d its annual SAARC PartnerSYNC conference in Bangkok, Thailand and honoured partners for their outstanding achievements in 2017. The conference hosted over 150 attendees representing partner organizations from the five SAARC countries of India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan.

Honouring the winners, Rajesh Maurya, Fortinet’s

Regional Vice-President for India & SAARC, said, “I would like to congratulate this year’s winners for their significant achievements in 2017. These partners demonstrated a commitment to deliver the very best cyber security solutions that defend their customers against today’s advanced threats. A big thankyou to all our partners for their dedication and achievements in 2017."

Commvault with Alibaba Cloud to boost digital transformations

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ommvault and Alibaba Cloud have announced to leverage each other’s technology and market advantages to deliver advanced, innovative and

scalable hybrid cloud data management solutions to help customers and partners across the globe accelerate digital transformations.

“The strategic

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combination of Commvault’s leadership in backup and recovery and Alibaba Cloud’s strengths will provide customers with scalable and secure cloud solutions, while

supporting the acceleration of digital transformations across the globe,” said Owen Taraniuk, VP Worldwide Partnerships and Market Development, Commvault.

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Dimension Atos to drive Digital Transformation Data to help a Program for Siemens tos has been regions in Europe, APAC service provider A awarded two and Latin America. major outsourcing to transform contracts by Siemens to drive the latter’s digital digitally transformation program.

D

i m e n s i o n Data has been appointed by a global telecommunications service provider to embark on a digital transformation journey.

“The global telecom service provider’s multifunction shared services centre is a longstanding client for Dimension Data. We have engaged with them at many global locations for the past six years and have positioned the best in class technology to build, to manage and maintain – for a robust network along with our Managed Services,” said Raghuveer HR, Sales Director, Dimension Data.

Red Hat signs Redington as its distributor

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edington India has collaborated with Red Hat to distribute the full range of Red Hat solutions in India, including Red Hat Cloud Suite, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Red Hat Ansible Automation and Red Hat JBoss Middleware.

Redington will identify and appoint regional system integrators, ISVs and born in the cloud partners to further expand and develop open-source partner ecosystem in India.

Redington’s partners will be able to offer their customers Red Hat-supported opensource technology for deploying their workloads on public, private and hybrid platforms through the container platform and while automating service, application and infrastructure provisioning and management, though a subscription-based model that allows them the ability to scale out.

The first contract will cover multiple activities spanning Application Management services and Technical Production Support in SAP, Microsoft and Business Intelligence for multiple divisions of Siemens, while the second contract will cover Application Management services for Siemens

Siemens launched a tender to identify and select providers which offer cutting-edge technologies, digital expertise and industry knowledge, while meeting Siemens’ important selection criteria.

ITI Limited expands its datacenter facility

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TI Limited has expanded its data center facility by adding 1,000 additional racks in the existing setup in Bengaluru and setting up of a new Data Center of 200 racks capacity in its Naini Plant.

This announcement comes further to the guidelines issued by the Government on the setting up of IT infrastructure.

This expansion of the facility by ITI Limited will give enterprises in the government and corporate sector an opportunity to serve their customers and

end-users better while being able to compete with the private players on an even keel. ITI provides whole suite of data center infrastructure and managed services with highest power density that serves as one of the key differentiators allowing its existing customers to populate more compute infrastructure in lesser footprint reducing the operational expenses substantially.

Microsoft expands Azure Stack's footprint

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icrosoft is full steam ahead with the expansion of its Azure Stack service footprint across the globe.

Microsoft has been collaborating with their partners to help customers navigate their business needs. Azure Stack – an in-a-box-andon-premises Azure subset – has doubled the number of locales since its launch in July 2017, effectively extending Azure's reach with minimal capital expenditure.

Customer demand and supportability

has helped Azure Stack to get listed for availability in 92 nations.

As service providers can

run Azure Stack, expanding its reach means Microsoft has found a way to bring Azure to the world without also having to build out its own bit barn network.

Microsoft promotes Azure Stack as a fine way for service providers to offer cloud to their customers.

www.varindia.com June May 2018 www.varindia.com

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HOT BYTES

CommScope completes 20 years of manufacturing capabilities

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n support of enterprise and network operators, CommScope is

manufacturing innovative network infrastructure solutions to transport large amounts of data very quickly and reliably. Its longstanding manufacturing facility in Goa produces base station antennas, microwave antennas and fibre connectivity in

support of India’s and the world’s wireless, telecom, broadband and enterprise network operators.

CommScope is also helping India’s transformation into a global design and manufacturing hub with the expansion of its research and development (R&D) footprint in Goa. CommScope views India’s growth as an opportunity to develop and test technology that will help in its drive to add greater automation to its global manufacturing network and support its operations workforce in improving quality, efficiency and speed.

REVE Antivirus deploys endpoint protection product in Bangladesh

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o protect the entire system of network, REVE Antivirus has deployed Endpoint Protection product for Enterprise users under the Ministries of Bangladesh.

DESCO-Dhaka Electric Supply Company Ltd, a company under the Ministry of Power, Energy and Mineral Resource, has installed 800 PCs for its 20+ office stations. Apart from this, DPDC-Dhaka Power Distribution Company

Ltd, a company under the Ministry of Power, Energy and Mineral Resource, installed REVE Endpoint Security for 700 PCs for its 36+ office stations in Dhaka.

REVE Antivirus deployed 400 Total Security Antivirus licences at Dhaka WASADhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authority, under the Ministry of Local Government Rural Development & Cooperatives.

SUSE contributes to the Ceph project

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USE is contributing the manpower, concepts and architecture of the openATTIC storage management framework to the Ceph open-source project, turning it into the new default built-in dashboard for management and monitoring of the Ceph software-defined storage platform. SUSE will continue to provide the core management expertise and developers for driving the functionality and development of the dashboard within Ceph, simplifying administration

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for all users.

"SUSE is committed to the upstream project first, which always turns into better results for the enterprise users who are not far downstream," said Lenz Grimmer, one of the original openATTIC team members and current SUSE Engineering team lead for openATTIC and the Ceph dashboard. "Our focus is on both contributing to and using innovation from the community."

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Epicor brings GEF Capital Partners invests in ESDS SDS Software scaling technology. This Alliance ISV E Solution has innovation done by the announced an investment R&D team of ESDS got Partner Program by GEF Capital Partners rewarded with special

E

picor Software has announced a new Alliance Independent Software Vendor program designed to bring innovative technology solutions from a host of providers to Epicor customers.

The new program is designed to simplify the way Epicor engages, manages, and helps its Alliance ISV partner ecosystem tap into the latest technology advances and growing market demand for Epicor products.

“Our goal is to build a strong collaborative relationship that offers our partners significant opportunities to grow their business in partnership with Epicor,” said Vish Thirumurthy, Global Head of alliance ISV partners, Epicor Software.

Tech Data partners with Cyberbit in India

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ech Data has signed a distribution agreement with Cyberbit. Tech Data will now distribute Cyberbit’s entire portfolio to its valued partners in India, including ICS/SCADA Security, Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR), Security Orchestration, Automation and Response (SOAR) and the Cyber Range training and simulation platform.

“We are pleased to announce our distribution agreement with Cyberbit in India and look forward to working closely with our business partners, offering them the entire range of Cyberbit products and solutions,” said Naresh Desai, VP, Specialist Business Unit, Asia Pacific, Tech Data. “With Cyberattacks becoming ever more complex and frequent, there’s a growing need for tools and resources to defend against such attacks.”

(GEF), an investment firm focused on investing in the resource efficiency sector, to support the continued growth of ESDS. Piyush Somani, ESDS CMD & Founder said, “Eight years back, we created the eNlight Cloud platform with real-time vertical auto-scaling, as our Enterprise customers needed more compute power in real-time and their applications could not support the Load Balancing or so-called Horizontal

patents from the US and the UK. We realized that it

was only B2C companies that were able to use public cloud efficiently and there was a huge opportunity for Enterprise Cloud to cater to the B2B market. With the GEF investment, ESDS’ billion-dollar company objective comes closer to realization.”

L&T Technology Services integrates solutions with Microsoft Dynamics enterprise wins in the 365 Smart Occupancy &

L&T Technology Services has announced new Smart City, Campus & Building Solutions integrations with Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Field Service for its enterprise customers.

LTTS expanded its relationship with Microsoft for Smart City, Campus & Building solutions based on Microsoft Azure.

This alliance helps drive innovation for campuses of the future and has led to additional global

Spaces segment for both companies.With the new capabilities powered for Field Service, i-BEMS can show a building occupant what rooms are occupied, a building operator work orders and cases, and trigger work order tickets to a mobile app, enabling real-time action by facility management teams, including security guard dispatch, janitorial services scheduling, and any other service relying upon occupancy data.

Array Networks signs MoU with Netmagic

A

rray Networks has inked a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Netmagic (An NTT

in India, with end-toend customized hyper converged infrastructure (HCI) solution for scaling and optimizing business-

Communications Company), to launch the next-generation Network Functions Virtualization platform (NFV) Center of Excellence to enable enterprises in India, to enable enterprises

critical applications. This agreement of collaboration signals the continued commitment of both the companies to accelerate the scalability of customers’ businesses in the ICT industry.

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June 2018

19

ON THE RAMP

Xerox announces Iridesse Production Press

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erox’s end-toend production solutions give print service providers the framework needed to profit, transform and grow.

Xerox aims to help customers d i s c o v e r new ways to capture growth opportunities with its latest print technologies, advanced workflow solutions and business development resources.

The company has announced a high-speed, six station colour press that combines four-colour

printing with up to two specialty dry inks in one printing pass. The Xerox Iridesse Production Press is the only digital press that

can print metallic gold or silver dry ink, CMYK and clear dry ink in a single pass, giving print providers an immediate competitive edge in the growing digital print enhancement market.

Barracuda announces its PhishLine product portfolio

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arracuda Networks has expanded its PhishLine product portfolio with a streamlined edition well-suited for organizations, tuned specifically to be ready for distribution through the reseller channel. PhishLine can prevent email fraud, data loss, and brand damage by training and testing employees to recognize highly targeted phishing attacks.

“As phishing attacks have become increasingly

stealthy and targeted, our adversaries have shifted their focus from the largest organizations to smaller targets,” said Hatem Naguib, SVP and GM of Security, Barracuda.

“Today’s announcement expands our PhishLine portfolio, by building on our enterprise-grade offering with a solution aimed specifically at simplicity and fast time to value, fit for today’s resource-constrained midsized businesses.”

HPE expands its ProLiant Gen10 portfolio

H

ewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) has expanded its ProLiant Gen10 portfolio with the new single-processor

HPE ProLiant DL325 Gen10 server, based on the AMD EPYC processors, providing dual-processor performance at singleprocessor economics.

“Customers are trying to accelerate delivery of new products and services

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June 2018

and need innovative technology to achieve their business goals,” said Vikram K, Senior Director, Hybrid IT, HPE India.

The HPE ProLiant DL325 Gen10 server features the HPE Silicon Root of Trust, a custom embedded security chip that links with essential server firmware and connects with the AMD Secure Processor in the AMD EPYC SoC.

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Polycom adds IBM introduces new Nextcapability to Trio Generation Power Systems Servers

P

olycom has announced the latest capability to be added to Polycom Trio, cementing its role as the centre of every meeting room experience. Polycom Trio will be able to power the high-end video capabilities needed by large meeting rooms and auditoriums, such as facial tracking, dual monitor support, superior audio coverage, and easier content sharing.

Already adopted by 65 of the Fortune 100, Polycom Trio is driving digital transformation with a consistent user experience, whether employees are simply dialling a phone number or joining a video call. Expanding that experience to larger rooms will simplify the way meetings start, saving time and increasing productivity.

Symantec releases latest Network Security Solution

S

ymantec has a n n o u n c e d new innovations and enhancements to its Network Security for the Cloud Generation solution, designed to protect enterprise devices, across the network, the cloud, mobile and traditional endpoints.

Symantec’s WSS is a single-service offering that includes Secure Web Gateway, Web Isolation, malware inspection engines, sandboxing, data loss prevention, and cloud access security broker, and integrates with multifactor authentication.

The new features provide businesses with a comprehensive, easyto-use, cloud-based network security service that safeguards critical business information for secure and compliant cloud application and web use.

I

BM has unveiled its next-generation Power Systems Servers incorporating its newlydesigned POWER9 processor. Built specifically for compute-intensive AI workloads, the new POWER9 systems are capable of improving the training times of deep learning frameworks by nearly 4x allowing enterprises to build more accurate AI applications, faster.

The new POWER9based AC922 Power

Systems are the first to embed PCI-Express 4.0, next-generation NVIDIA NVLink and OpenCAPI.

The system was designed to drive demonstrable performance improvements across popular AI frameworks such as Chainer, TensorFlow and Caffe, as well as accelerated databases such as Kinetica.

HP Inc. introduces new Ink Tank Printer range

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P Inc. India has announced the new and upgraded HP Ink Tank Printer series for Home as well as Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise (MSME) users.

The key benefits of these printers are the usage of High Quality Ink, ability of connecting with a range of mobile devices through Wi-Fi Direct and Spill-Free Refill system. The new wireless HP Ink Tank 415 and 419 printers can print thousands of pages, at ultra-low cost-per-page.

“Technological

empowerment of MSMEs can enable development of an ecosystem that continuously supports them to deliver the right product, the right quality, the right solution and the right

service at a competitive price,” said Leo Joseph, Senior Director, Printing Systems, HP Inc. India.

Kingston rolls out UV500 SSD products

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ingston Digital has launched its UV500 family line of SSD products. Available in multiple form factors, UV500 will be Kingston’s 3D NAND-enabled SSD featuring full-disk encryption. UV500 is powered by the Marvell 88SS1074 controller, and combined with 3D NAND Flash, delivers incredible read/write speeds of up to 520MB/s and 500MB/s, making it 10x faster than a 7,200 RPM hard drive.

“We are proud to bring the UV500 family featuring self-encryption to market,”

said Vishal Parekh, Marketing Director, Kingston Technology India. “The combination of a powerful controller, 3D NAND and data encryption makes UV500 perfect for both consumers and enterprise users looking for a performance boost on existing systems.”

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June 2018

21

ON THE RAMP

Riverbed presents Unified APM Monitoring Solution

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iverbed has announced the latest release of Riverbed SteelCentral that redefines the application performance management (APM) market with the industry’s first unified APM and end-user experience monitoring solution. This unique approach enables organizations to monitor the digital experience for all applications, and capture every application transaction at a level of depth and quality that is essential for today’s digital business.

Riverbed is also introducing powerful AIbased business analytics that provide meaningful insights for the business,

as well as new integration between SteelCentral and Riverbed Xirrus Wi-Fi access points. Riverbed SteelCentral blends devicebased end-user experience, infrastructure, application, and network monitoring to enable customers to holistically manage the users’ digital experience.

Avaya launches IP Office “One App for Unified Communications”

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he new Avaya IP Office release is now available globally.

Avaya IP Office helps businesses drive greater productivity and streamline collaboration through a single application for all communications channels, meetings, team collaboration and content sharing.

“The Avaya IP Office solution serves an enormous base – 26 million users and growing – and we continue to evolve

the solution in ways that support businesses ability to

be agile and collaborative,” said Chris McGugan, SVP, Solutions and Technologies, Avaya. “By providing a single app to access all the tools they need to efficiently communicate and collaborate, we’re truly enabling teams to work smarter, not harder.”

Barco announces the Silent F in India

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arco has announced the launch of its top-of-theline professional series projectors – the F80 series, in India. It delivers a formidable image quality, unmatched performance, high reliability and efficiency.

Ramya Chatterjee, Director – Sales of Barco Electronic Systems Pvt. Ltd, said, “Businesses in the digital age value experience, efficiency and quality.

They demand solutions that can offer more value to their customers. Our

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June 2018

newly introduced, F80 series offers unprecedented business value, helps save cost on maintenance and offers the best installation flexibility. It is an obvious choice for heavy-duty applications; applications that are run continuously or that are mission critical.”

He also added, “The F80 series has also achieved unparalleled low-noise performance and costeffectiveness."

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Oracle brings Industry 4.0 capabilities

O

racle has unveiled new Industry 4.0 capabilities for Oracle Internet of Things (IoT) Cloud. The advanced monitoring and analytics capabilities of the new offering enables organizations to improve efficiency, reduce costs, and identify new sources of revenue through advanced tracking of assets, workers, and vehicles; real-time issue detection; and predictive analytics.

Oracle IoT Cloud enables organizations to gain rich insight into the performance of assets, machines, workers, and vehicles so they can optimize their supply chain, manufacturing, and logistics, reduce time-tomarket for new products, and enable new business models.

Brightstar India launches VCaaS

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rightstar Corp. has launched Video Conferencing-as-a-Service (VCaaS), an offering that allows enterprises a seamless solution for high-definition virtual communication, anytime and anywhere. Launched in partnership with Polycom, the cloud-based offering promises faster business execution, operator assistance, flexibility, scalability and comes bundled with managed services.

“At Brightstar, our vision is to make complicated simple.

Introducing VCaaS reiterates our focus on simplifying the way people work – by bringing people and technology together in more efficient and innovative ways.

Our device-agnostic solutions will provide a more secure collaboration platform and offer highly scalable voice, video, and content,” says Deval Parikh, CEO Brightstar India.

Dell Technologies and Microsoft simplify IoT solution delivery

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ell Technologies and Microsoft will deliver a joint IoT solution designed to help vertical customers simplify deploying their end-toend IoT solutions, from the edge to the cloud. The combination of Microsoft Azure IoT applications and services, VMware Pulse IoT Center and Dell Edge Gateways will offer customers streamlined management, centralized monitoring and security from devices to the cloud.

Dell Technologies and

Microsoft will make IoT easier for customers by delivering a secure solution that provides consistent infrastructure management from the edge to the cloud. The joint solution offers an underlying IoT infrastructure, management capabilities and security for customers.

Verizon introduces new Threat Intelligence Platform Service

V

erizon has announced the launch of its latest Threat Intelligence Platform Service that now enables companies to better hunt and confront cyber threats head on.

The subscriptionbased service combines unparalleled cyberthreat intelligence from Verizon’s 11-year DBIR series with cybersituational awareness from Verizon's Threat Research Advisory Center, which tracks threats across

Verizon’s own global IP backbone. This threat intelligence is delivered via the Anomali Threat Platform to offer current information on cyberthreats. These can then be analyzed by experienced consultants from Verizon’s Professional Services team in-situ at the customer’s site, depending on the level of service desired, so they can identify threats early in the cyber-kill chain and determine the best course of combative action.

SAP releases latest suite of applications

S

AP SE has fulfilled its ambition to disrupt the marketplace for customer relationship management (CRM) with the formal introduction of a new suite of applications, SAP C/4HANA, to help businesses serve and retain customers. SAP has also announced the SAP HANA Data Management Suite, the industry’s first comprehensive data management solution that enables companies to turn data sprawl into business value. The announcement was made by SAP CEO Bill McDermott at

the company’s annual SAPPHIRE NOW conference.

SAP C/4HANA is an integrated offering designed to modernize the sales-only focus of legacy CRM solutions. Following the completed acquisitions of market leaders Hybris, Gigya and CallidusCloud, SAP now ties together solutions to support all front-office functions.

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June 2018

23

VOICE-N-DATA

NETGEAR launches Nighthawk Pro Gaming router

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E T G E A R has launched of the most-awaited flagship product, the new Nighthawk Pro Gaming Wi-Fi Router (XR500) at League of Extraordinary Gamers, Bangalore.

N E T G E A R Nighthawk Pro Gaming Wi-Fi Router (XR500) leverages advanced cuttingedge software to optimize network connections by stabilizing ping, reducing lag spikes, and keeps you always on with reliable wired and wireless connectivity for advanced online gameplay. The Gaming Dashboard, Geo Filter, Quality of Service (QoS)

V

and Network Monitoring capabilities enable customization and gaming performance unmatched in the router space.

NETGEAR Nighthawk includes hardware features such as a dual-core 1.7GHz processor, Quad-stream Wave 2 Wi-Fi with MUMIMO, and four external high-power antennas.

India's mobile subscriber base crosses 1 billion mark

D

ue to the rapid growth of smartphones in the market, fixed line connections declined steadily down to 22.81 million connections.

Though state-run firm BSNL dominated the market with highest share of 12.26 million customers, it lost 5,304 customers.

RCom lost 169,052 fixed line connections and MTNL 10,157 connections.

Airtel topped the chart in terms of market share with 304.19 million

subscribers, followed by Vodafone 222.69 million and Idea with 211.2 million customers.

Vodafone led new subscriber addition by adding 12,280 fixed line connections, taking its total subscriber base to 220,981.

With this the number of broadband subscribers increased to 412.6 million in March from 392.06 million in February. The mobile segment accounted for over 95 per cent of the total broadband connections.

COAI expresses concern over defamation allegation

by Reliance Jio

C

OAI has e x p r e s s e d deep concern over the allegations levied by Reliance Jio Infocomm, where it has accused the industry body of using disparaging remarks.

COAI maintains that the allegations are patently misconceived as all communications were issued in good faith and in furtherance of its duty as an industry association, inter alia, to call attention to regulatory decisions that are detrimental to the

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June 2018

Vodafone deploys 200G fibre network across 88 cities

growth and development of the telecom sector and to seek intervention of the Regulator.

“It is disappointing that one of our members has chosen to take legal action against the association.

COAI is well within its rights to hold and voice its views on regulatory and policy issues. The matter is currently sub judice and we are in the process of considering and evaluating our legal options,” said Rajan S. Mathews, Director General, COAI.

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odafone has announced the deployment of India’s largest long-haul fiber network across 88 cities.

The company has installed more than 43,000 kms of 200G long-haul network in 75 days, making it the fastest and biggest optical deployment project.

Vishant Vora, Director – Technology, Vodafone India, said, “Consumers and businesses are increasingly demanding flexible, secure and efficient ways to consume data. Moving towards 200G long-haul network is a significant step by Vodafone India to lead and provide seamless network and high bandwidth to our consumers."

DoT approves 100% FDI limit in Idea Cellular

I

dea Cellular Ltd has received an approval on its application to increase Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) limit in the company to 100%, from the current 67.5%, from the Department of Telecom (DoT) today. The approval is for total foreign investment up to 100% in Idea Cellular Ltd, and total indirect FDI in its relevant subsidiaries – Aditya Birla Telecom Ltd and Idea Cellular Infrastructure Services Ltd. It is a major milestone in the merger process of Vodafone India with Idea Cellular, and follows other statutory approvals already received from SEBI, NSE, BSE, CCI and NCLT Mumbai and NCLT, Ahmedabad. The merger of Vodafone India with Idea Cellular is in the final leg of regulatory approvals and is expected to complete in H1CY18, subject to the final approval.

Eurotech announces BestNet Floor Standing Network Racks

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u r o t e c h Te c h n o l o g i e s has launched the nextgeneration BestNet Floor Standing Network Racks. The network racks have been designed to meet the requirements of IT infrastructure and safely houses all networking equipments, monitors, key-boards and CPUs, ensuring complete convenience and flexibility.

The racks can withstand a maximum load of 500 kg. These network racks

confirms to DIN 41494 standards with rugged

structure and screw less appearance and comes with front lockable door with 5mm thickness double toughened glass supported by metal trims.

BlackBerry to modernize G7 Operations Centers

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lackBerry has announced that it is collaborating with the Government of Canada to modernize their operations centers during the G7 ministerial meetings and the 2018 G7 Summit.

“We are honoured that the Government of Canada has chosen BlackBerry to support their operations,” said Sanjay Saini, SVP and GM, BlackBerry AtHoc. “Whether in times of crisis or during a high-

profile event like the G7 Summit, reliable and secure communications are crucial.”

Using BlackBerry AtHoc, a crisis communication platform that includes AtHoc Alert for mass notification and AtHoc Collect for field reports, the operations centers are able to efficiently mobilize and secure the flow of critical information by delivering updates to targeted lists of recipients in real time.

D-Link releases whole home Wi-Fi Solution

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-Link (India) Limited has recently announced the availability of its next-generation Covr whole home Wi-Fi solution powered by the Qualcomm Mesh Networking Platform.

The Covr Dual Band Whole Home Wi-Fi System (COVR-C1203) brings whole home network coverage within the reach of consumers due to its affordable price and impeccable features.

Featuring MUMIMO technology for higher and more efficient throughput, the AC1200

Dual-Band Covr Points in COVR-C1203 virtually eliminate annoying Wi-Fi deadspots, and create a zone of dedicated highspeed, seamless Wi-Fi for homes. It is deal for enjoying bandwidthhungry multimedia applications throughout the house, without loss of performance.

TALK WITH DEEPAK

An Incredible journey from India To London

...the road that was led by Car

A passion and a dream trip came true for Ashok Kumar, M.D., RAH Infotech, who ventured to complete the trip by road from Gurugram to London. It was a 59 days trip by road on his car accompanied by his wife Ms. Rekha Yadav. Ashok and his wife were part of a 29-member team of people on this challenging road trip from India to London.

Ashok started the journey from Gurugram for Imphal where they were flagged off by Mr. N. Biren Singh. Chief Minister of Manipur.

To reach their final destination they had to drive via Myanmar-Thailand-Laos-China-Central Asia and Russia before entering Latvia in Europe. They reached Brussels from where they took the ferry to cross the English Channel to reach Dover, the last stop before London.

A Carnet was issued from an authorised automobile association for that acts as a passport for the car, which enables to travel without paying any taxes or duties for it.

Ashok has undertaken several trips in the past, but this was a life time experience. During this trip Ashok had to drive an average of 500 – 600 kms per day. They had to adjust to the driving rules of different countries and many other formalities. Even though he was en-route, business has been always his priority. He has opened an office in Europe.

What made you take up the challenge to drive from Gurugram to London by car? How was your experience?

Prior to this trip, I had the opportunity of roaming the world either on a plane, or by a chopper but watching the world from the comfort of your own car and through the windshield to me is an out of the world experience. It gives you an opportunity to get up close with the countryside, experience the local culture and celebrate the local cuisine, one country at a time and about 18 countries at a stretch spread across 19400 kilometres in over 55 days. We had to drive on an average of 500 – 600 kms. per day and had to adjust to the driving rules of different countries and many other formalities.

In short, exhilarating, enthralling and unforgettable.

During your stint of journey, how connected were you with your business?

I’m someone who believes in work hard, party harder. While I was partying on one side, I was constantly in touch with my passion i.e. my business. I was updated on all the key aspects of the business on a day-to-day business and was available to my team on and off for any important matters. The fact that RAH Infotech established its presence in Europe during this trip affirms the same.

How were you able to make certain critical business decisions?

RAH Infotech has a very experienced management team with each member capable of running the show on their own. My involvement during these 59 days was limited to certain strategic decisions only. Rest was managed by the team efficiently.

You have proved that you can take-up any challenge, how it has helped RAH Infotech to grow to next level From being a not so popular brand in the distribution market to becoming one of the key players in the country today in the value added technology distribution domain it was a great journey and is a result of grit and determination to bring this organisation into the big league. Be it business or adventure, always game for some serious challenges.

Share your experience in opening up a new office at Europe during this trip.

While most of the ground work was done before this trip, I just had to complete some formalities to officially launch our presence in Europe. It was all about making the most of this trip and being in connected with business even while having some serious fun.

www.varindia.com

June 2018

25

CHANNEL BUZZ

Huawei launches latest solutions at its 3-city enterprise summit

Axis Communications conducts Annual Partner Summit in Singapore

uawei Solutions Day 2018, the first of the 3-city Huawei enterprise summit, was held in Bangalore witnessed a gathering of industry leaders, cloud-data service providers and analysts from across industries.

India Enterprise Business Group, said, “Enterprise digitization has become a key goal across organizations. In line with its ‘Platform + Ecosystem’ strategy, Huawei is committed to provide a one-stop platform that is

Under the theme of "Leading New ICT – The Road to Digital India”, the Solutions Day was a platform to discuss how Indian industry can advance digital transformation and unlock opportunities to grow the digital economy. Huawei also launched its latest solutions the All-flash Storage OceanStor F V5 and Private Cloud Solution FusionCloud 6.3.

Derek Hao, President, Huawei

open, flexible, secure and agile for enterprises to achieve digital transformation."

Huawei’s latest FusionCloud Private Cloud Solution provides resource pooling and full-stack cloud service capabilities, meeting requirements of customers in various industries, and suitable for scenarios such as unified infrastructure, hosting clouds, and hybrid clouds.

o felicitate its valued partners and distributors, Axis Communications has conducted a three-day annual South Asia & Pacific Partner Summit 2018 in Singapore. The Summit was a joint event for the whole region which provided a platform to interact with the key Axis partners. The conference witnessed the participation of partners from 11 countries as well as Axis business heads and representatives both from the region and their headquarters.

The event also helped facilitate exchange of ideas among the key partners.

There were interactive discussions on the topic of the growing importance of security in retail, smart city applications, in-depth panel discussion on innovation in cyber security and

H

IAMCP India’s North and East chapter organizes Digital Marketing workshop

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AMCP, Independent Microsoft Partner Association, organized a comprehensive training and interactive session on digital marketing.

The session “Understanding Digital Marketing – 360-degree view” organized by IAMCP India’s North and East chapter was held at Microsoft office, Gurugram last week.

The session, delivered by Shilpa Dureja Puri, Director – Digital Marketing, Microsoft India, focused on how Microsoft partners can leverage right marketing strategies to grow their business. A modern marketing enthusiast and a digital transformational leader, Shilpa heads Microsoft’s digital discipline and is architecting the digital experiential strategy.

With the advanced technologies and smartphones playing a major role in shaping up today’s

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June 2018

consumers’ buying preferences, organizations are relying heavily on digital marketing which involves promoting their products and services via different digital mediums, including websites, social

media, emails, search engines, mobile apps and more.

Munesh Jadoun, Board member of IMACP India, introduced the Microsoft partners to the IAMCP India’s North and East chapter which were launched recently on 11th April. He also encouraged them to join IAMCP India as it will benefit them in their business and get more support and cooperation from Microsoft.

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how it is interwoven with the organization’s physical security needs.

Axis Communications felicitated its loyal partners and distributors for outstanding work in their respective fields. Sudhindra

Holla, Sales Director, India and SAARC, said, “We owe a significant amount of our success to our partners. Axis is a strong channel focus organization wherein we work hand in hand with all our partners who help us take the Axis brand to newer zeniths.”

Dassault Systèmes hosts ‘Manufacturing in the Age of Experience’ event in Chennai

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assault Systèmes has hosted the second edition of the regional adaptation of the global megatrend event‘Manufacturing in the Age of Experience’ in Chennai. The event was attended by over hundred representatives from transportation & mobility, industrial equipment, engineering and aerospace & defense companies from the state of Tamil Nadu. Last year, the inaugural edition of the regional adaptation of the global event was hosted in Pune and digitalization of manufacturing was a key focus area. Taking the discussion forward, this year Dassault Systèmes is geared up to further boost Indian manufacturing in their digital transformation journey with the 3DEXPERIENCE TWIN. Inaugurating the event, Samson Khaou, Managing Director India, Dassault Systèmes said, “The purpose of recreating and hosting a megatrend event in India is to reach out to multiple manufacturing hubs across the country, connect with audiences locally and showcase the value of 3DEXPERIENCE platform.

Chennai and Tamil Nadu is a major automotive manufacturing hub and we have strong inroads working

with major automotive OEMs and suppliers across the country. The 3DEXPERIENCE platform is a business enabler platform that would complement the automobile policy of the state focusing on future development and consolidation of the automobile and components industry.”

3DEXPERIENCE TWIN will drastically cut down the time frame and lead to a substantial cost saving – as it allows the entire planning, simulation, testing and validation in the virtual form.

3DEXPERIENCE TWIN allows manufacturers to design and visualize the entire model of the factory. One can also manipulate positioning of the activity spaces and watch its impact on the overall factory operation.

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June 2018

27

EVENTS

Bigger, Better, Brighter:

Infotech Forum 2018 sets a new benchmark

[(From Left to Right) Harpreet Singh, Territory Manager- Kaspersky Lab, Nirav Biswas, CTO- NHBC, Dr. Herald Dcosta, Director- Intelligent Quotient Security, Dr. Deepak Kumar Sahu, Publisher & Editor-in-Chief, Kalinga Digital Media Pvt Ltd, Mrutyunjay Mahapatra, DMD – Digital Business & New Business-SBI, Subroto Panda, CIO, Anand and Anand, Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director, South Asia- NVIDIA, Damodar Sahu, Partner & Industry advisorWIPRO, Shankar Aggarwal, OSD- ASSOCHAM, S.N Tripathi, Secretary-Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs- Govt.

Of India, Suresh Kumar, Partner & CIO, Grant Thornton, S Mohini Ratna, Editor-VARINDIA] Infotech Forum 2018, the much awaited annual event for the industry to interact with end customers from various verticals, was held on 25th May 2018 at Hotel Shangri-La. The event witnessed the presence of 400 high-profile guests comprising of CXOs (CIO/CTO/CISO) from government, PSUs, enterprises, IT consultants and marketers from various verticals, all gathered under one roof for an impactful discourse on the topic: ‘Disruption – A new Reality’.

The forum provided a platform for all to discuss and brainstorm on latest technological disruptions that are taking place in this digital age, with technical presentations, panel discussions, thus proving as the biggest business networking event. The event also witnessed the unveiling of the 7th edition of India’s first coffee table book, capturing the successful journey of the Top 25 brands and Most Admired Brands in the Indian ICT industry.

Prominent Speakers from diverse sectors like Government, Telecom, Security, BFSI and IT services to digital and the corporate world shared various ideas and best practices on how technology and the industry is moving. The event also proved to be a game changer for the CIO community.

S.N Tripathi, Secretary, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs- Govt. Of India and Mrutyunjay Mahapatra, DMD, Digital Business and New Business – State Bank of India graced the Infotech Forum event as special guests. The

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June 2018

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other eminent dignitaries who’s presence raised the bar of the event include Shankar Aggarwal, OSD- ASSOCHAM; Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director, South Asia- NVIDIA; Pawan Duggal, Cyber Expert-Supreme Court of India; Dr. Herald Dcosta, Director- Intelligent Quotient Security; Bharat B Anand, CIO- NATGRID; Suresh Kumar, Partner & CIO, Grant Thornton; Dr. Rajeev Papneja, COO- ESDS Software Solutions; Nirvan Biswas, CTO- NHBC; Ricky Bindra, Group Sr. VP-JIO; Harpreet Singh, Territory Manager- Kaspersky Lab; Subroto Panda, CIO, Anand and Anand and Damodar Sahu, Partner & Industry Advisor- WIPRO. The event commenced with the welcome speech given by Deepak Sahu, Publisher & Editorin-Chief, Kalinga Digital Media. In his speech he threw light on the digitization and the scope that digitization brings to people. “Digitization is creating tremendous opportunities for economies across the globe, and India is an example of a country that not only understands this opportunity, but it has embraced it. As a media house, our focus has been Technology, that is at the forefront of everything we do."

Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director, South Asia- NVIDIA in his speech highlighted the opportunities of AI and hinted that firms across the globe are fast becoming aware of the power of Artificial Intelligence, Mixed reality, Deep learning and Blockchain technology. While Shankar Aggarwal, OSD-ASSOCHAM shared

his perspective on the economic growth and sustainability, S. N Tripathi, IAS, SecretaryMinistry of Parliamentary Affairs- Govt. Of India shared his perspective on Digital India and the scope that e-governance offers to every citizen.

Mrutyunjay Mahapatra, DMD – Digital Business & New Business – SBI in his keynote address, enlightened the audience on how banks always want to understand their customers better and improve their relationships. "Technology could cut banks' infrastructure costs by up to $20 billion each year by 2022," he said.

The previous data protection laws were put in place during the 1990s and haven't been able to keep pace with the levels of technological change. On this background, Pawan Duggal, Cyber expert-Supreme court of India spoke on how GDPR will bring the biggest change in data protection laws in more than 20 years.

Dr. Rajeev Papneja, EVP & COO, ESDS Software Solution in his speech spoke on the innovative solutions the company offers in its state-of-the-art data centers.

In the evening session, Dr. Herald Dcosta, Director- Intelligent Quotient Security spoke on India’s present security landscape.

The event also witnessed the recognition of 100 Eminent CIOs of India, India’s Top 25 Trusted Brands along with the Top 50 Most Admired ICT Brands. This was followed by the recognition of the Top 10 Brands Icons of India.

S.N Tripathi

Secretary, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs- Govt. Of India “If you check the spelling of Digital, it has ‘Dil’ and ‘Gita’ together. If you don’t have good product to offer, any amount of digital cannot make you relevant. Technology can disrupt your peace and tranquillity. It’s a big convenience that one can understand, but it is a convenience at a cost. I am one of those who believe that digital has lots of possibilities but it also has to have the responsibilities in-built. Today in the environment of AI, IT, IoT, deep learning, we have no choice but to learn these technologies as fast as possible. We missed the 1st revolution because we were colonised at that time; we missed revolution no.2 because we had no resources at that time but we cannot afford to miss industrial revolution 4.0 because now we have the capability. AI and digital technologies can make us producers of goods and services of the world.”

Mrutyunjay Mahapatra

DMD – Digital Business & New Business – SBI “Fintech is almost a synonym of .com. Now Fintechs comprise of companies starting from a two month old start-up to very large companies. There are four to five areas where 90% of the Fintechs are working – lending, payment, risk management and data analytics. Everybody believes that the venture bug has come and anyone can make money in this world. What we are observing in Fintech is that many of us are engaged in the so called valuation game but not the value creation game. This is the first problem. Now, Fintechs do not have the ability to scale up when it comes to experimenting a concept with a database of 100 or 200; the software works very well but at deployment it fails because the proper sandbox ecosystem in India is not available. So a reliable sandbox is not there.”

Shankar Aggarwal

OSD- ASSOCHAM “When we gained independence in 1947, the biggest challenge before us was the form of governance we wanted to adopt. Our great leaders thought of a great institution of governance which is known as democracy.

Today we are heading towards becoming the world leader in IT and if we don’t take advantage of IT and harness the latest advances in disruptive technologies such as AI, Blockchain, IoT for the betterment of every common man, we will miss the opportunity. We have got the capability, and capacity. Today the society is inspirational and we are a hugely aspiring society; so let’s take advantage of this and find out what these technologies can do, especially in four core areas - the quality of education, the health sector, safety & security of every individual, and the last is financial services.”

Vishal Dhupar

Managing Director, South Asia- NVIDIA “The industry is in a very interesting phase that is transforming. We talk about AI all the time and yet it has been in existence pretty much from the time computer science has made its advent. We all know from the facts that human mind works in 2 mode - Reasoning and Understanding and yet every AI specialists have put their efforts only behind reasoning, but not in understanding. There could be many reasons to that, but there are two main which stand out- one that you have no clue how to handle understanding and second, there was very low computation power to manage understanding in machines. In 2012, a group of data scientists in Toronto showed to the world that by using neural networks they could do proto understanding on the machine.”

Pawan Duggal

Cyber Expert-Supreme Court of India "May 25th is a historic day as the general data protection law has been implemented in the European Union beginning today. Typically when a country passes a law it is applicable within its territorial boundaries. We in India have the Information Technology Act which applies to entire India but unlike other laws it also applies to people outside India - a person of any nationality in the world cannot violate or contravene the provisions of the act. We did this law 17-18 years back but GDPR has only replicated what we have done in our law. It says that companies outside Europe will have to primarily ensure that the data of European citizens or people residing in Europe are adequately protected.

However a clause in the law says it is also going to apply to any company, data controller, data processor located outside the union who is dealing, handling or processing the personal data of any residents of the European Union.”

Dr. Herald Dcosta

Director- Intelligent Quotient Security “As far as the cybercrimes are concerned, the digital evidence is brought either by the complainant or by the accused. But the digital evidence can create a lot of problem as end-to-end encryption can be questionable. From the digital evidence point of view, the problem that arises is whom to believe and whom not to. When you talk about WhatsApp, messages can be altered, modified, deleted and then we do not have any type of a server where we can get this information from. So when you ask for information from WhatsApp to enquire about the genuineness of the chats, it being a virtual server by nature shall reply saying that they cannot provide you the information and act just like a post office. Therefore, no data is retained at our end and it becomes a very questionable task as how to get these messages authenticated.”

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EVENTS Dr. Rajeev Papneja

EVP & COO, ESDS Software Solution “Innovations and disruptions are not always like the iPhone which has completely changed the way the world used to work. Such kind of innovations may happen once in a decade. Innovations are also some small important changes to what is already existing. It is not always necessary that we try to innovate something at the expense. We all know what public cloud gave us. While the research firms say that the public cloud is going to grow by some percentage, but by how much is it of the total IT landscape is what we need to know. Is everything going to public cloud? No because private cloud is here to stay. There is data that needs to reside on your datacenter. There is also the need for edge computing.”

Harpreet Singh

Territory Manager- Kaspersky Lab “Digital disruption is happening, and we are on a digital journey for the betterment of the organization and the world. But with digital disruption and transformation comes security challenges. When we talk about security, every business verticals these days like hospitality, pharmaceuticals, healthcare, manufacturing etc. are under continuous threat. Hackers are keeping a close watch on all of us every moment. Everybody is under the scanner. There has to be a proactive approach in mitigating all these kind of targeted attacks from the C level community. Technologies like IoT, Cloud, BYOD are the ones that are driving the market. 90% of the threats are very generic in nature and can be controlled by technologies like anti-virus, firewalls etc. But the rest 9% are the sophisticated ones. One cannot counter these risks by simple technologies.”

Unveiling of the 7th Edition of the Brand Book

The 7th edition of the Brand Book on the Indian ICT Industry was launched at the 16th IT FORUM 2018 in the presence of (from left to right) S Mohini Ratna, Editor - VARINDIA; Deepak Sahu, Publisher & Editor-in-Chief, Kalinga Digital Media; Ricky Bindra, Group Sr. VP-JIO Bharat B Anand, CIO- NATGRID; Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director, South Asia- NVIDIA; S.N Tripathi, Secretary, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs- Govt. Of India; Mrutyunjay Mahapatra, DMD, Digital Business and New Business – State Bank of India; Dr. Herald Dcosta, Director- Intelligent Quotient Security; Ajay Kaul, Director & GM - Head Government Business, Dell EMC; Chetan Hingu, Country Category Head - Workstations, Virtualisation, RPOS -HP India; Damodar Sahu, Partner & Industry Advisor- WIPRO and Manish Gaur, Head, IT- Patanjali.

The Brand Book promises to be informative, in-depth and user friendly. The latest coffee table book covers the profile of Top 25 ICT brands, Top 50 Most Admired Brands, Experience cell of 100 Eminent CIOs of India and the Indian market landscape 30

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EMINENT CIO’S OF INDIA 1.

C-ZENTRIX (VISION TECHNOLOGIES PVT. LTD)

208

57.

JTEKT INDIA LIMITED

237

2.

TELENOX TECHNOLOGIES PVT.LTD

208

58.

CHIRIPAL GROUP OF COMPANIES

237

209

59.

DELHI DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY

238 239

3.

CHOICE INTERNATIONAL LIMITED.

4.

VEDANTA RESOURCES

209

60.

BMW INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED

5.

KWALITY LIMITED

210

61.

JAGSONPAL PHARMACEUTICALS LIMITED

239

6.

MACAWBER BEEKAY PVT LTD

210

62.

J M BAXI GROUP

240

7.

PEPSICO INC

211

63.

FRANKE FABER INDIA PVT. LTD.

240

8.

THE GREAT EASTERN SHIPPING CO. LTD

211

64.

THE INSTITUTE OF CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTS OF INDIA

241

9.

MAX BUPA HEALTH INSURANCE COMPANY LIMITED

212

65.

MCNALLY BHARAT ENGINEERING COMPANY LIMITED

241

10.

ELIOR INDIA

212

66.

CK BIRLA GROUP

242

11.

EMAMI AGROTECH LTD.

213

67.

AHUJA CONSTRUCTIONS

242

12.

SHALIMAR PAINTS LTD.

213

68.

TECHYARD TECHNOLOGIES PRIVATE LIMITED

243

13.

VARROC LIGHTING SYSTEMS INDIA PVT. LTD

214

69.

KANAKIA SPACES REALTY PVT. LTD

243

14.

ANTARA SENIOR LIVING LIMITED (A MAX ENTERPRISE)

214

70.

AIRONE AVIATION PVT LTD

244

15.

NATGRID, MHA - GOVT. OF INDIA

215

71.

ADIENT INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED

244

16.

ZUARI INFRAWORLD INDIA LIMITED

216

72.

THE OBEROI HOTELS AND RESORTS

245

17.

SIMPA NETWORKS (SIMPA ENERGY INDIA PVT. LTD

216

73.

KOKILABEN DHIRUBAI AMBANI HOSPITAL

245

18.

FUTURE GENERALI INDIA LIFE INSURANCE CO LTD

217

74.

MARUTI SUZUKI INDIA LIMITED

246

19.

LUMINOUS POWER TECHNOLOGIES PVT LTD

217

75.

BARCO ELECTRONIC SYSTEMS PRIVATE LIMITED

246

20.

MATRIMONY.COM LTD.

218

76.

QUATRRO GLOBAL SERVICES PVT. LTD

247

21.

VIRTUOUS RETAIL SERVICES PRIVATE LIMITED

218

77.

IRIS SOFTWARE

247

22.

SANKARA NETHRALAYA

219

78.

SKYBOX SECURITY INC

248

23.

LANCO GROUP PTY LTD.

220

79.

HAVELLS INDIA LIMITED

248

24.

ORIENT CEMENT LIMITED – A GROUP OF CK BIRLA

220

80.

PAY POINT INDIA NETWORK PVT. LTD.

249

25.

MYLAN PHARMACEUTICALS PRIVATE LIMITED

221

81.

EXIDE INDUSTRIES LIMITED

250

26.

MARVEL DATA SERVICES LLP

221

82.

ORIENTAL RUBBER INDUSTRIES LTD

250

222

27.

CENTURY PLYBOARDS INDIA LTD.

83.

SATIN CREDITCARE NETWORK LIMITED

251

28.

MINDWORKS ADVISORY SERVICES (MINDWORKS SOLUTIONS PVT. LTD) 222

84.

INTEGREON MANAGED SOLUTIONS INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED

251

29.

SHIB DASS & SONS PRIVATE LIMITED

85.

APON INNOVATIVE SOLUTIONS

252

223

30.

L&T TECHNOLOGY SERVICES LIMITED

223

86.

RELIANCE BIG ENTERTAINMENT PVT LTD

252

31.

ESDS SOFTWARE SOLUTION PVT. LTD.

224

87.

RECHARGE IT NOW

253

32.

HRH GROUP OF HOTELS

224

88.

INTERARCH BUILDING PRODUCTS PVT LTD

253

225

89.

FCA INDIA AUTOMOBILES PRIVATE LIMITED

254

33. MASTERCARD 34.

BANK OF INDIA

225

90.

OVERSEAS INFRASTRUCTURE ALLIANCE (INDIA) PVT LTD

254

35.

AEGIS CUSTOMER SUPPORT SERVICES PRIVATE LIMITED

226

91.

ANAND & ANAND

255

36.

HOFINCONS INFOTECH & INDUSTRIAL SERVICES PVT. LTD.

226

92.

WOCKHARDT HOSPITALS LTD

255

37.

WANBURY LTD.

227

93.

SADBHAV ENGINEERING LIMITED

256 256

38.

GLAZE TRADING INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED

227

94.

MYND SOLUTIONS PRIVATE LIMITED

39.

JAY KULING GROUP OF COMPANIES

228

95.

GRANT THORNTON INDIA

257

40.

NTF INDIA PVT. LTD

228

96.

MEDICA GROUP OF HOSPITALS

257

41.

DEUTSCHE BANK

229

97.

APON INDIA

258

42.

CHATTISGARH RAIL CORPORATION LIMITED

229

98.

SUNDARAM CLAYTON LIMITED

258

JUBILANT LIFE SCIENCES LTD.

43.

MAHESH PATIL - CIO

230

99.

44.

PATANJALI AYURVED LIMITED

230

100. V RANGANATHAN IYER-CIO

259 259

45.

VECTUS INDUSTRIES LTD.

231

101. VISIONARY RCM INFOTECH INDIA PVT. LTD.

260

46.

SAMSUNG INDIA ELECTRONICS PRIVATE LIMITED

231

102. HERO MOTOCORP LTD

260

47.

SDG SOFTWARE INDIA PVT. LTD(SDG CORPORATION)

232

103. TOLUNA

261

48.

JEENA & COMPANY

232

104. VFS GLOBAL SERVICES PVT LTD

261

49.

WABCO INDIA LIMITED

233

105. ACG WORLDWIDE PRIVATE LIMITED

262

50.

A.P. MAHESH CO-OPERATIVE URBAN BANK

233

106. GHCL LIMITED

262

51.

SARASWAT BANK

234

107. ESCORTS GROUP

263

52.

STATE BANK OF INDIA

234

108. SAR GROUP

263

53.

FOURTH DIMENSION SOLUTIONS LIMITED

235

109. NEWGEN SOFTWARE TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED

263

54.

AMITY UNIVERSITY

235

110. APTECH LIMITED

264

55.

NATIONAL ALUMINIUM COMPANY LIMITED(NALCO)

236

111. IDEMIA

56.

NATIONAL BULK HANDLING CORPORATION PVT.LTD (NBHC)

236

112. INTEX TECHNOLOGIES LTD

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264

31

264

EVENTS

Panel Discussion Session I - Digitisation & Disruption (From L to R): Damodar Sahu, Partner & Industry advisor- WIPRO; Chetan Hingu, Country Category Head - Workstations, Virtualisation, RPOS -HP India; Manish Gaur, Head, IT- Patanjali; Nirvan Biswas, CTO- NHBC; Dr. Herald Dcosta, Director- Intelligent Quotient Security; Col. Ajay Purohit, Cyber Intelligent Expert and Suresh Kumar, Partner & CIO, Grant Thornton.

Moderated by Dr. Deepak Kumar Sahu, Chief Editor, VARINDIA, the first panel tried to highlight the point that digital innovation and transformation have emerged as one of the top boardroom priorities. “Digital Transformation is all about Digitisation and Disruption,” said Deepak. “There are panellists among us who have embraced digital business models to transform their organizations and from them we will understand how modern technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), Blockchain, IoT, and Augmented Reality will transform work and customer experience. Artificial intelligence has the potential to create trillions of dollars of

value across the economy.”

Emphasizing on how digital transformation has become the motto today for every organization, Suresh Kumar, Partner & CIO, Grant Thornton said that they have created an advisory team focussed only on digital transformation and technologies. “We have a large team which is working with various organizations on their digital transformation journey. More than having the latest digital technologies, the important part is how businesses strategize to have an effective digital strategy in place.”

Col. Ajay Purohit, Cyber Intelligent Expert

Brand Icons Of India The modern marketer is cognizant of the fact that digital is disrupting the marketplace and that he/she must embrace the change quickly. From turning a brand’s purpose into action, to subsequently deriving value from data, a marketer does it all. VARINDIA has recognized 10 marketers (Head of Marketing/CMOs) who have outperformed and proved the double-digit growth for their respective company through innovative marketing practices.

SONICWALL

VAISHALI SHIVSHANKAR

DAHUA TECHNOLOGY

BALASUBRAMANIAN JAYAM

DELL TECHNOLOGIES

SRIHARI PALANGALA

LG ELECTRONICS

AMIT GUJRAL

NVIDIA

PAWAN AWASTI

ONE BROADBAND

YUGAL KISHORE SHARMA

SUSE

DEEPTI SHARMA

ESDS SOFTWARE

VISHAL JOSHI

LENOVO INDIA PVT. LTD.

SRIRAM GOPALASWAMI

INC. 2018 www.varindia.com 32HP June

CHETAN HINGU

says that whenever we talk of disruption in today’s scenario, it will come in the grey zone.

“Take for instance cyber security that needs more of a tactical approach. So when we talk of cyber intelligence, we look at the entire spectrum of what are the events happening and we become more proactive so that such events do not repeat again.”

Dr. Herald Dcosta, Director- Intelligent Quotient Security pointed out that higher amount of technology can lead to large amount of desperate activities wherein systems can be compromised. “Today intelligence data is the backbone of any organization. If that becomes compromised, then it becomes a big fall or doom to the concerned organization.

So the need of the hour is an effective legal framework.”

Nirvan Biswas, CTO- NHBC said that if the problem is articulated well and matches the problem the business has today, many levels of digitization could solve it. “if you understand the problem, then it becomes quite easy to map the required technology or technology framework to adopt to it.”

Manish Gaur, Head, IT- Patanjali remarked that it is good to digitize but it should be to certain limits. “We understand digitization can lead to disruptions and there are also risks associated with it. So I believe that post digitization analysis is a must, like is it taking away our jobs.”

Chetan Hingu, Country Category Head Workstations, Virtualisation, RPOS - HP India said that whenever there is any digitization happening, there is a fear for disruption. “For instance when Uber first came, there was a fear for lots of drivers to lose jobs but they soon found out an alternative and it is no longer seen as a challenge.”

Damodar Sahu, Partner & Industry advisorWIPRO looks at digitization from a different perspective. “Being from a digital consultancy background, I feel that if digitization does not impact millions of lives I don’t call it disruption or digital transformation. The Digital revolution in food safety that is taking place in many countries today through IoT and blockchain can be a good example of disruption.”

TOP 25 ICT BRANDS IN INDIA (Most Trusted Companies)

Group photograph of the corporates while receiving the awards for the Top 25 Brands in the Indian ICT Industry

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EVENTS

Panel Discussion Session II - Challenging Times Ahead With Multi-Dimensional Threats (From L-to-R) Bharat B Anand, CIO- NATGRID; Dr. Herald D’costa, Director- Intelligent Quotient Security; Col. Ajay Purohit, Cyber Intelligent Expert; Alok Gupta, Managing Director- Unistal; Subroto K Panda, CIO- Anand & Anand; Meetali Sharma, Corporate Risk & Information security leader- SDG Software and Ravinder Arora, Head, Information Security - IRIS Software The 2nd panel was moderated again by Dr. Deepak Kumar Sahu, Chief Editor, VARINDIA and it tried to emphasize on the fact that the time has come to change the game when it comes to dealing with cyber-threats and data protection.

“It is very important for governing bodies to ensure that their people’s data and privacy are safeguarded and in this regard we feel that GDPR is a good step,” he said.

Bharat B Anand, CIO- NATGRID said that technologists around the world have to face the same problems day in and day out, though the scale or the line of business might be different.

“Because technology is developed by us, the human angle will always be there and this will result in more errors and threats to occur.

Probably we should come to a point where we start allowing people to take actions at a strategic level and this will be a real aspect of technology enablement.”

Dr. Herald D’costa, Director- Intelligent Quotient Security perceived that security threats from the digital perspective will be more on the financial domain. “Digital space has got its own

cup of threats, but I personally believe that the financial industry is more prone to such security threats. Also these threats are going to increase as we expand into a cashless economy.”

Col. Ajay Purohit, Cyber Intelligent Expert said that if software, networking, and computing devices are connected through communication technologies, there are many loopholes and failure points that can be found. “We are living in very exciting times. Today we have different communication technologies deployed and software created, the codes of which are an invention of human minds. So you cannot overrule any errors and breaches to take place.”

Alok Gupta, Managing Director- Unistal said that there are two kinds of environment we are living in the digital age. “One is the personal data that everyone is consuming and the second is the corporate environment. Both of them are intertwined and irrespective of whether you incorporate a law or not, consumer data will be used for doing business in India.”

Subroto K Panda, CIO- Anand & Anand said that threats would increase as we continue

to adopt digital technologies. “Threats can come from any place – be it a city or a village. It is not that only professional hacker or a cracker would give you a threat. There should be a framework created of how to detect or measure the threat which is coming.”

Meetali Sharma, Corporate Risk & Information security leader- SDG Software said that a threat gives the opportunity to develop a new product. “Threats will always be there, but we should keep in mind that whenever we as a CIO/CISO deploy any new product we should not do it just because we have the budgets but there needs to be a thorough risk assessment done before deploying anything.”

Ravinder Arora, Head, Information Security - IRIS Software said, “As a CISO of my organization, one thing I think we really need to work on is employee awareness. Since my data is available everywhere today, I feel that a phishing test essentially needs to be done on a regular basis, because a click on a malicious link or mail can drag us into trouble.”

SOLUTION DISPLAY AT THE EVENT

SPONSORS Gold Partners

Media Partner by

Datacenter & Cloud Innovation Partner

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2018

Security Partners

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Cybersecurity Partner

VAR SME

5 challenges Small and Medium Enterprises face in today’s competitive environment and can deliver customized and tailor-made goods and services. “In order to differentiate themselves from the pack or competition, SMEs have to continually focus on creating value for the customer to buy or deliver an experience that an established player cannot create. This is the challenging task, as this is continuously evolving.”Vivek Kumar, CEO, Platinum One Business Services Pvt. Ltd.

Vivek Kumar CEO, Platinum One Business Services Pvt. Ltd. Entrepreneurship is one of the key factors in the developmental process of a nation. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are touted to be the main engine of economic growth. The dynamism of SMEs, their adaptability, flexibility and innovative capacity have made them a cornerstone of ongoing economic reforms.

SMEs contribute significantly to the economy in terms of output, employment, new job creation and innovation. In India, SMEs’ contribution towards GDP is nearly 50%.

There is a gaping need to assist SMEs to realize their trade and investment opportunities and become competitive both in domestic and global market. Tally Solutions has introduced the Tally Xcelerator (TX) Program, which is an integrated entrepreneurial capacity-building program that promotes entrepreneurship and the overall SME development in the nation. Under this program, Tally has appointed carefully selected partners called ‘Tally Xcelerators’, who extend business advisory services and play the role of a coach, mentor and trainer to all of Tally’s partners and small and medium businesses across the country.

“Today you will find a number of organizations willing and eager to provide mentorship and advisory services to large corporates, but there are very few in this role for MSMEs. Tally Xcelerators are the one stop solution for the MSMEs – they play the role of virtual CXOs, System Integrators (SI), Strategy Planners and assists in Goal Setting & Monitoring, Policy Making, Process Reengineering, MIS & Analytics etc.”CA BhibhutiBhusan Mishra, Chief Mentor, Fincrony Consulting Pvt. Ltd. Since the inception of the program, Tally Xcelerator Partners have been working with businesses to understand their pain points and finding effective solutions to mitigate the problems and help them grow. Some common challenges SMEs face are: I. Lack of continuous innovation Innovation plays a significant role in a nation’s ability to make a mark on the global map. It also reflects on the company’s competitiveness within its own playing field. Unlike larger MNCs, SMEs understand the pulse of their target audience

II. Inconsistency in customer experience Lack of an organizational culture or a welldefined structure might not seem to be an important area to focus on when a business is in the early years; however, as the number of customer and employee count increases, absence of these two can have adverse effects on the customer experience and product quality.

When aspects like marketing, operations and finance rank high in the priority list and leads to compromising on the quality of the service it will eventually lead to a decrease in customers.

Therefore, it becomes very critical to lay down

CA Bhibhuti Bhusan Mishra Chief Mentor, Fincrony Consulting Pvt. Ltd. thefoundation and adopt best industry practices, which not only improves retention of customers and maintains high customer service level but also lets SMEs be more competitive, develop newer markets, reduce costs and become more efficient, and improve the skills of their workforce.

III. Lack of finance Most SMEs are a result of their founders’ personal savings and loans taken-up against property and assets. While this kind of capital is a good starting point for any business, the challenge arises when one wants to scale up and diversify.

Most SMEs find it difficult to raise adequate funds from banks especially for high risk projects.

“SMEs don’t have deep pockets unlike bigger players. TX therefore will provide smarter ways to capture market and build brands without burning hole in their pockets.Some of these may include use of social media, website, blog, communityconnect and various unconventional tools and methods. TX will ensure that such critical elements of business do not remain an afterthought, but get the differentiated focus within the smaller

budgets that SMEs can afford.” Says Ajay Kumar, Owner, Cognegix Learning LLP. IV. Scaling-up The challenge of expanding and growing is dependent on a number of features like access to the right technology, substantial funds, structuredplanning, divided focus and training and mentoring the employees.“Some of these products have the potential to compete against the big brands. The challenge they face is in expansion and branding of these products. Many such potential market-fit products are doomed to fail if SMEs do not pay due attention and deserved focus. TX provides services to SMEs in creating branding and marketing strategies to expand to larger geographies, taking the competition headon and creating a market for themselves; whilst serving a niche customer base.” Ajay Kumar.

“The role of Tally Xcelerators can come in handy for such organizations. It is important to build the team beyond the owner’s capability to ensure scope for expansion and diversification in the future. By delegating and up-skilling employees, it allows the entrepreneur to move away from the daily operational tasks to being a visionary” said Vivek Kumar V. Adopting changing regulations Businesses today have various regulations to comply with which include regulations, taxes, environmental and certain sector specific regulatory laws and licenses. SMEs can set up units anywhere in the country but are subject to local restrictions. With so many to dos’ and exemptions and in the absence of proper centralized information centers, it becomes difficult for the MSMEs to comprehend the complexity.“Through Process Reengineering, we also help organizations to build the automated statutory compliance processes for PF, ESI, TDS, IT, GST and ROC matters, which was earlier subject to individual professional decision” CA BhibhutiBhusan Mishra. Fincrony Consulting Pvt Ltd is a change agent enabling organizations to adapt compliance requirements and accelerate in diversified business and statutory regulations environment.

Ajay Kumar Owner Cognegix Learning LLP.

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COVER STORY

General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has brought about an unprecedented change in the European data protection laws after more than 20 years. It strengthens the data rights of EU residents and harmonizes data protection laws across all member states, thus designating individual choice as a priority over everything else.

GDPR was enacted two years ago while its enforcement across all 28 EU countries came into effect at midnight on 25 May 2018.The new act is going to strengthen the data rights of EU residents and harmonize data protection laws across all member states, making it identical.

“The GDPR will replace the 1995 Data Protection Directive and is aimed at protecting EU citizens’ personal data in the new digital world. It is a significant, wide-ranging piece of legislation which will, no doubt, have a major effect on the world of cyber security and data protection. GDPR in spirit applies to nearly every organization based in India dealing with the personal data of subjects residing in the EU, regardless of the company’s location,” explainsVijay Mhaskar, Chief Operating Officer, Quick Heal Technologies.

More than anything else, GDPR will make it easier and cheaper for companies to comply with data protection rules. It will also increase

the potential fines organisations face for misusing data, and make it easier for people to discover what information organisations have in them. The EU believes this will collectively save companies €2.3 billion a year. GDPR will govern how organizations within and outside the EU will collect, manage, process, and protect personal data while respecting individual choice.

“As we stand amidst the fourth industrial revolution, maintaining the integrity of personal data has become as imperative to national security as protecting a country’s cyber borders.

Organizations are under increased scrutiny, with everybody from lawmakers and investors to employees and consumers examining the relationship between what’s good for business and what’s good for individuals. Regulations like GDPR will begin a dialogue about what nations and multilateral stakeholders can do to streamline a system of checks and balances on a digital planet,” citesAnant Maheshwari,

President, Microsoft India.

“25th May – a day where Data will no longer be the same,” reiterates Ramesh Mamgain, Area Vice President, Commvault India & SAARC Region. “If you think it only affects your production data, it's much more complex than that. Managing your secondary data is probably the more difficult challenge for many companies.

Organizations need to acknowledge that GDPR compliance is no longer simply an IT or technology issue. This is a chance to improve the efficiency of data governance. A holistic ‘People, Process and Technology’ mantra is still the way to achieve amidst the chaos of complying with increasing Data privacy laws around the globe.”

Comments Aniketh Jain, CEO & CoFounder, Solutions Infini, "GDPR, General Data Protection Regulation is a great step taken by the European Union. With the massive amount of data sharing taking place around us, it’s important now more than ever that a

Anant Maheshwari

Ramesh Mamgain

Vijay Mhaskar

President Microsoft India

Area Vice President Commvault India & SAARC Region

Chief Operating Officer Quick Heal Technologies

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Erik Andreson

Aniketh Jain

Supratim Chakraborty

Practice leader of Cyber Security services F-Secure

CEO & Co-Founder, Solutions Infini

Associate Partner, Khaitan & Co.

consumer’s data is protected and used only with their permit. The law is well defined and it’s a major change for most of the organizations and it’s good to see that it has been accepted well.

The law also has strict penalties which makes sure that companies comply."

Says George Chang, VP, APAC, Forcepoint, “As the capacity to collect, store and analyze data for commercial purposes continue to grow exponentially, GDPR seeks to strengthen and unify personal data privacy and protection - putting people in control of their data and ensuring that businesses treat this data in a fair, transparent and secure manner. It’s no surprise that this seismic shift in the way we approach data security has caused a ripple effect across the globe, with many countries following suit and modernizing their own privacy and data protection laws.”

Supratim Chakraborty, Associate Partner, Khaitan & Co. observes that in the GDPR era, most business houses are frantically trying to put their house in order to be compliant with the data privacy and data protection related requirements of GDPR. “What is most interesting to note is that GDPR has forced business entities to sit up and take a serious look at the data that they have been amassing. Even the smallest of start-ups struggled to decipher how much data they have collected, where they have been stored and how

they were processed. Therefore, I would say it is a good wake-up call which should be emulated by all businesses. The principles of GDPR are beneficial and could be adopted by all business houses whether there is an EU interface or not.

Also, this may be helpful because our domestic law on this subject, which is in the making, may largely adopt the principles of GDPR. Therefore, organizations which are equipped with the principles of GDPR would be futureready for the new Indian legislation.”

As regulations catch up, Data Privacy has fast evolved to become a matter of survival for companies. According to Rana Gupta, Vice President – APAC Sales, Identity and Data Protection, Gemalto,companies (Boards) that continue to ignore this risk will become non-existent almost overnight in the wake of any data breaches. “The fast-approaching GDPR enforcement date has already resulted in the undertaking of massive changes to consumer data collection and processing practices, especially in consumer-led markets.

As a result, we will continue to see tightening of the regulatory environment with respect to data privacy and enforcement of penalties on firms as well as fiduciary officers in the wake of data breaches resulting out of inadequately protection measures.”

The proactive approach for data privacy

and cyber security can result in new business opportunities, along with the trust of a company’s stakeholders. Instead of searching for quick fixes to comply with GDPR, companies should focus upon long term sustainable improvements.

SaysErik Andreson, practice leader of Cyber Security services - F-Secure,“Markets must work closely with the legal and IT departments over handling the personal data of customers they need for their strategic business objectives.The regulation simply makes it the organization’s duty to assess and decide what types of measures shall be implemented to comply with the GDPR, and to ensure that all precautions are undertaken to minimize the risk of data breaches by detecting breach attempts.”

However a recent survey of IT professionals (ESG research) has revealed that only 11% of organizations are completely prepared for the GDPR, a third of organizations say they are mostly prepared, and 44% are enroute to implementing the processes they would like to have in place to meet GDPR requirements.

Sanjay Gupta, Managing Director, South Asia, Middle East, NICE puts forward his observation. “For many organizations, the initial transition to GDPR compliance is likely to be a lengthy and challenging process. As the digital revolution marches on, it brings about numerous technological advances that is the thrill of the

Arun Balasubramanian

Srinivas Rao

Sanjay Gupta

Managing Director, Qlik India

Co-Founder & CEO, Aujas

Managing Director, South Asia Middle East NICE

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37

COVER STORY

Rana Gupta

George Chang

Shree Parthasarathy

Vice President – APAC Sales, Identity and Data Protection, Gemalto

VP, APAC, Forcepoint

Partner, Deloitte India

fourth Industrial revolution. However, there is one dimension called compliance and regulation that needs to be addressed and requires reevaluation based on the continued reassessment of the risks.A broad, powerful, and automated approach to security is required to achieve this.”

Surendra Singh, senior country director, India, Forcepoint also observes that the GDPR does not provide a prescriptive path to compliance. He says, “It is not just a CISO or a CIO issue. It is recommended that a leadership team is formed that involves CIO, CISO, legal and HR to have a shared understanding of the regulation’s requirements and alignment on how it would affect their company.”

He further continues, “In the end, every company will have their own version of GDPR compliance; it is important to have common understanding across the company, better communication between leadership team, quick anticipation and implementation of right technologies to protect against data incidents.”

Microsoft began work on GDPR as soon as it was adopted by the European Union, and was compliant before the deadline. “We have had over 300 of our full time engineers dedicated towards GDPR compliance and adopted over 30 controls based on GDPR,” says Keshav Dhakad, Director and Assistant General Counsel – Corporate, External and Legal Affairs (CELA), Microsoft India. “Through significant investments in our products and services, we have helped customers comply with GDPR within Azure, Office 365, Windows, EMS, SQL Database and Dynamics 365. Our cloud products are designed with industry-leading privacy policies and security measures to safeguard customer data in the cloud, including the categories of personal data identified by the GDPR. Additionally, we have provided the best data governance, security, and privacy tools in the market to our customers to help simplify the compliance process and have also supported many large global companies in GDPR compliance.”

To provide intelligent response to new GDPR requirement, Guardtime has developed its solution for GDPR compliance, named as Volta which utilizes KSI blockchain technology.

It provides mechanism for companies to demonstrate Privacy by design, Privacy by default

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and lawful processing, required for GDPR with the added benefits of trust, transparency, integrity and provenance that are inherent to a blockchain solution.

Inspira along-with Guardtime works with the client to ensure that all GDPR events associated with PII across the organization (i.e. consent, access, modification, copy etc.) are tracked in VOLTA and anchored in the KSI blockchain. By leveraging industrial scale and low-latency transaction registration process of KSI, VOLTA runs in near real time, offering an automated immutable GDPR compliance service. Guardtime’s KSI blockchain provides the proof, provenance and trust required to satisfy compliance and audit requirements of GDPR and third parties such as regulators, auditors and the PII affected individuals.

GDPR Governance Service from Crayon is a comprehensive GDPR management and risk mitigation solution. Aligning to the required policies & process frameworks for GDPR can save organisations from potential risks. Says Rajesh Thadhani, Director Crayon Software Experts P. Ltd, “Failure to prepare for the regulation could have serious consequences, not only to your bottom line, but also to your customer relationships and brand image.”

GDPR & India

GDPR presents a good opportunity for India to drive thought leadership in the global market. Organizations can build expertise and capabilities, create new lines of advisory and consulting businesses, develop a market differentiator and be a source of competitiveness.

With millions of people going online for the first time, protecting their vulnerabilities cannot be compromised. The Supreme Court of India has already demonstrated its commitment to its citizens when it declared privacy a fundamental right last year, and now with the passage of GDPR, the onus is now upon corporatesto play its part.

GDPR is sure to have a major impact on business operations. Organizations in India need to place compliance and data security as a priority, considering the cost for violating privacy laws is about to get very expensive. GDPR can cost businesses up to 20 million Euros or 4%

of annual turnover, whichever is higher, for intentional or negligent violations. With these kind of stakes, investing in compliance now is the only right move for a sustainable business model.

While many may be worried about the implications of a new regulatory era, in reality it will create trust and provide good practices that will benefit both the individuals and the business. These laws collectively present a positive business opportunity, when approached in the right way. Compliance can drive operational efficiencies, cost-savings and even fuel innovation. With strong data protection strategies in place, customers will place greater confidence in businesses, and businesses will minimize the all too common reputational and financial fall-out of a breach.

Hence, Indian Businesses need to implement more robust data protection measures to prevent and manage data breaches. Businesses should adopt a robust data protection policy which outlines the procedure and designates responsibilities for ensuring complete privacy of consumer information. This should include strong password policy, investment in the right IT security solutions, Data Loss Prevention (DLP) and Encryption, regular data backups, employee awareness programs, and a comprehensive action plan to counteract data breach incidents.

This focus on data protection will help them in nurturing greater trust with their European clients and expanding their market footprint within the region.

“Indian businesses are battling severe issues of data protection and cyber security that have larger business implications on productivity and customer confidence,” says Shree Parthasarathy, Partner, Deloitte India. “GDPR is a welcome step towards addressing privacy issues, as it now brings data protection at the forefront.

Embracing GDPR with a strategic roadmap should be the immediate priority for Indian CXOs that would include creating awareness, training as well as constitution of a dedicated data protection framework. GDPR can be a competitive advantage for India, if enterprises understand its relevance and further bring in a risk-based iterative mechanism to their business strategy that is trustworthy secure, and agile in

Basawaraj Vastrad

Surendra Singh

Rajesh Thadhani

Technical Director - BD Soft Country Partner, Bitdefender

Senior Country Director Forcepoint - India

Director Crayon Software Experts P. Ltd,

the digital world.”

“The GDPR applies to companies in Europe (specifically those in the EU / EEA), so it will affect an Indian company which has a European office, or is marketing to European customers,” says Arun Balasubramanian, Managing Director, Qlik India. “In terms of readiness, companies have had a long time to prepare for GDPR,

only flourish when you connect people, process, data and things in an ethical, meaningful and secure way,” says Srinivas Rao, Co-Founder & CEO, Aujas.“We feel that GDPR is a step towards that. The toughest aspect of the GDPR is its guidelines to adhere to the security policies by organization handling EU data in and outside of the state. In order to be compliant, businesses

Key Take-aways

01

GDPR seeks to strengthen and unify personal data privacy and protection - putting people in control of their data and ensuring that businesses treat this data in a fair, transparent and secure manner.

Indian Businesses should adopt a robust data protection policy which outlines the procedure and designates responsibilities for ensuring complete privacy of consumer information.

03

02

The implementation of the GDPR law in Europe will also stimulate Indian companies to fortify their databases, leading to an upswing in the search for cyber security and privacy professionals.

but as the GDPR bar is quite high, many may be struggling to be ready. The biggest challenge in meeting the requirements is understanding not only what personal data companies have in their multiple systems, but also understanding the relationships of that data as well as who has access to it. This includes monitoring the consent and tracking of who opted in or out in for campaigns, newsletters, or petitions. GDPR is considered by many to be the highest global standard, and many countries have and will continue to strengthen their privacy laws in the near future.”

“As the world is getting more and more digital with proliferation of mobile phones and usage of the internet, it is very important for governing bodies to ensure that their people’s data and privacy are safeguarded. Digital economy can

must begin by introducing the correct security protocols in their journey to reaching GDPR compliance, including encryption, two-factor authentication and key management strategies to avoid severe legal, financial and reputational consequences. India has evolved to become a technology hub equipped with deep expertise and GDPR could be an opportunity for Indian companies to stand out as leaders in providing privacy compliant services and solutions.”

The implementation of the GDPR law in Europe has thus stimulated Indian companies to fortify their databases, leading to an upswing in the search for cyber security and privacy professionals. This has also resulted in an upsurge of job postings for cyber security roles. According to data from the job site, Indeed,cyber security job postings have risen

up by 150% between January 2017 and March 2018, along with a corresponding increase of 129% in job searches for the same in the same period. Between January 2017 and March 2018, there has also been a spike in the number of job postings for Data Protection roles, which have seen an increase of 143%, while the number of job searches for the same have risen by 188%.

Agrees Basawaraj Vastrad (Technical Director of BD Soft, Country Partner of Bitdefender), "Indian companies are likely to face increased compliance costs or risk huge penalties if they fail. They should review their policies, procedures and existing privacy programmes.

Developing a solid understanding of what the GDPR entails means to fully review your data, understand where it’s located and how it’s structured, how it flows and, most importantly, what it contains."

However, despite cyber security jobs having zero percent unemployment, there is a huge dearth of skilled professionals, who can understand the complexities of today’s interconnected world.

Also, with cyber security breaches and intricacies having touched all industries and sectors, it is vital for all organisations to increase their security systems and processes.

And so…

As GDPR comes into effect it will significantly strengthen a number of rights - Individuals will find themselves with more power to demand companies reveal or delete the personal data they hold; regulators will be able to work in concert across the EU for the first time, rather than having to launch separate actions in each jurisdiction; and their enforcement actions will have real teeth, with the maximum fine now reaching the higher of €20 million or 4 percent of the company’s global turnover.

Certainly businesses can take a few lessons from GDPR. GDPR is teaching businesses to collect less information from its customers, unless they really need it. Even if some businesses don't need to comply with GDPR, this is simply a good practice. Business saves money by having less data to protect and customers gain the privacy that many desire in the process. n Samrita Baruah samrita@varindia.com

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IN FOCUS

Marg ERP brings accounting and banking solutions for MSMEs

Anup Bagchi Executive Director, ICICI Bank

Thakur Anup Singh CMD, Marg ERP.

With the accounting and banking solutions made available from Marg ERP, MSMEs no longer required to toggle between a banking platform and an ERP software to undertake their business transactions. The integrated platform also enables automated reconciliation service The recent tie-up with ICICI Bank, Marg ERP software brings accounting and banking solutions for MSMEs. The partnership will give access to ICICI Bank internet based cheque writing facility.

It is offering an integrated payments platform to MSME customers, using MARG's accounting software. This integration will enable connected banking and also empower ICICI Bank's current account holders to securely connect to their bank accounts with the MARG ERP software and undertake an array of digital transactions from within the ERP platform itself, said Thakur Anup Singh, CMD, Marg ERP. The partnership will provide an array of benefits that will also initiate financial transactions for businesses.

It will enable businesses to initiate vendor and salary payments via RTGS, NEFT or IMPS directly from this platform, automate reconciliation of banking and accounting entries, apply for working capital loans as well as schedule future dated payments, thereby offering them an exemplary command over day-to-day financial transactions.

This pioneering initiative significantly

enhances convenience for MSMEs as they are no longer required to toggle between a banking platform and an ERP software to undertake their business transactions. It also allows them to seamlessly connect their banking and accounting, which was once available only for large companies with large IT and infrastructure budgets.

Talking about the partnership, Anup Bagchi, Executive Director, ICICI Bank said," ICICI Bank has always pioneered in bringing digital innovations and providing world-class banking experience to its customers. We are delighted to partner with Marg ERP to bring forth an integrated payments solution that will offer MSMEs with an unparalleled ease of doing business. The collaboration aims to promote the concept of ‘Connected Banking’ wherein we aim to get various banking functions such as initiating transactions, payments and reconciliation on a common platform. Additionally, it will enable businesses to initiate vendor & salary payments digitally, apply for working capital loans as well as schedule future dated payments without having to shift between a banking and an ERP software platform. We will continue the model of co-creating to deliver innovative products and services to our customers."

"This is a maiden tie-up between Marg ERP and ICICI Bank, where we will provide integrated software solutions to small and medium enterprises and will address many of

Sudhir Singh MD, Marg ERP Ltd the complexities related to their payables and accounting. This tie up will enable them to initiate RTGS, NEFT, and IMPS transactions directly from Marg ERP’s platform. The customers just need to register their ICICI Bank’s current account on Marg ERP software through a simple two-click one-time process.

SMEs and MSMEs in the country can now leverage the power of Integrated Banking, save time and increase productivity. We are happy and proud to be associating with ICICI Bank," said Sudhir Singh, MD, Marg ERP Ltd. He further said, “We expects to garner revenue of around Rs 110 crore in 2018-19 financial year. We are also planning to raise Rs 100 crore to fund its future growth. In 2017-18, we posted revenue of around Rs 73 crore. This year we expect Rs 100 crore from domestic market and additional Rs 10 crore from overseas markets, Sudhir added.

“The company has over 600 people on direct roles and has roped in around 8,000 people through partners. Our focus has been on SMEs. We started AI in our software since the beginning.

We have a team of 200 people for research and development to focus on new technology," Singh said.

With ICICI Bank current account and Marg ERP software, small and medium businesses can now experience secured, connected banking which was only available to large corporates having expensive IT infrastructure. n

Benefits of the ICICI Bank-Marg ERP partnership – • Control over fund flow without any additional efforts: With this integration, business owners can keep track of transactions flowing in and out of their bank accounts on Marg ERP. Businesses can eliminate data entry and manual errors of accounting, as transactions are directly fetched from the bank. Real-time bank balance and transaction status visibility on accounting platform will help business owners to take important decisions instantly.

• Automates Bank reconciliation: All bank transactions can be fetched automatically into Marg ERP, after which Marg ERP will automatically reconcile the bank statement with entries in the accounting ledger saving its user a lot of time. This is again a unique feature of this alliance that auto bank reconciliation will now be available to SMEs in India.

• Secure and Safe: Marg and ICICI Bank have implemented multiple layer’s security mechanism on the integrated platform, so users can do banking with complete peace.

• Pay directly from Marg ERP: Users do not have to toggle between their accounting and banking applications to make business payments anymore. ICICI Bank’s current account holders can simply log in to Marg ERP, select the appropriate bills, and make payments through their connected ICICI Bank account in just a few clicks.

• One dashboard for payments made: Businesses can continue to approve their payments in ICICI Bank's Corporate Internet Banking (CIB) portal and see every payment status updated automatically on the Marg ERP platform • Access to ICICI Bank internet based cheque writing facility from MARG ERP: It is a completely secured and fraud-proof cheque system June 40 and will2018 help in www.varindia.com elimination of cheque fraud and keeping accurate books of accounts. The authorized signatory can approve cheque request remotely ensuring that the customer is always in control of their business.

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FACE TO FACE

ESET eyeing the Enterprise segment in India Parvinder Walia

Sales & Marketing Director, Asia Pacific & Japan at ESET

With a double digit growth for the last four years, ESET considers India as an important market. After becoming a well known brand among SMBs, the company is targeting the Enterprise segment with new offerings. In a chat with VARINDIA, Parvinder Walia, Sales & Marketing Director, Asia Pacific & Japan - ESET talks about the brand positioning in the APAC market, India market and cyber security landscape in the country Talking about the market positioning, Parvinder Walia, Sales & Marketing Director, Asia Pacific & Japan - ESET says that in Asia Pacific the endpoint security market would be $2 billion with Japan coming in the top position whereas India market is between $6080 million. The Endpoint security provider, ESET holds 4th position in Asia Pacific market and India contributes around 2-4% to the whole APAC revenue of the company.

“In terms of market size, according to IDC, Asia Pacific in 2018-19 would be $2 billion for Endpoint security. In this $2 billion market, 50% belongs to Japan.

According to IDC, India market is somewhere between $60-80 million but we believe that it is much more than that, basically around $100 million. This is our estimate based on the Partner feedback and what we see in the market as well.

IDC has ranked ESET as No. 4 in terms of our market share in Asia Pacific and that is about 5.5-5.8% market share in APAC. Majority of the revenue comes from Japan.

We have about 7% market share in Japan and approximately we gather about $ 65-70 million on yearly basis from Japan. The second biggest market for us is Australia followed by New Zealand, China region (China, Hong Kong and Taiwan), Thailand, India and Indonesia. So

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revenue contribution from India is somewhere between 2-4% to the entire APAC revenue for ESET,” asserts Parvinder.

and management capabilities, there is a market for us to gain for our future growth.”

India Market for ESET

Cyber security landscape in India

Though ESET is present in India maket since 2007-08 but to strengthen its channel network the company is working with Sakri IT Solutions. In 2016, the company grew about 45% and is growing in double digits in last four years. Though SOHO is an important segment for the vendor but it has also started catering to Enterprises.

“In India we have been present in the market since 2007-08 and via resellers initially.

In last couple of years we are working with Sakri IT Solutions to strengthen our channel network. In last two years we have doubled our market share. In 2016 our growth was about 45%. In APAC, ESET is growing in double digits in last four years. India is a key market for the company. It is very popular amongst consumer, SOHO and SMB segment. But SMB has been our sweet spot over a period of time. As a global company we have started to produce products catering to the Enterprise segment. We are upgrading our endpoint solution to version 7 and at the same time we will be releasing EDR solution which is basically endpoint detection and response solutions,” says Parvinder.

Adding to it he says, “The global idea is to move to the enterprise segment. We have researched for a very long time and received a lot of feedback from many organizations, asking us to provide a solution which cater to their needs. There are so many opportunities in which a big enterprise can utilize ESET’s technology, because we believe that the core technology to protect against the cyber crime is the same but the management capability differs and that is why we redesigned our management console to cater to enterprises.

There is a lot of revenue potential in enterprise and we believe if we can use our technology

Digitalization is the new wave in India and the country is on the right path. Technology is to make lives easy but often it is misused by cyber criminals, so the government and its organizations are also working towards protecting the interests of common man.

“India is on a right track in terms of Digitalization of many facilities. Technology always comes with the problem of being misused by cyber criminals or people misusing it for financial gains. If India has a technology to create unique Ids like AADHAR then definitely the government organizations are also working towards safeguarding the interest of the common man by securing their information and prevent any malicious activity,” explains Parvinder.

A collaborative approach between government and private organization is necessary for the nation to protect from cyber crimes. This collaboration approach has been followed in many countries and it is also gradually taking up in India.

“The collaboration with government and private organization is necessary; you must join hands for the sake of cyber security of the nation. Not only the government but the security agencies must collaborate. I have seen collaboration in various countries where security vendors are also collaborating on various projects, not for financial gains but to safeguard that particular country by knowledge transfer and information sharing.

So that is paramount from my point of view. I see that too happening in India and we need to be more pro-active than reactive.

It is moving towards the right direction,” concludes Parvinder. n Aparna Mullick aparna@varindia.com

FACE TO FACE

R&D: The core of Rocket Software Built with the core values like trust, love, empathy and humanity, Rocket Software started its journey in 1990 with solutions based on IBM ecosystem. It treats itself as an individual and has a very unconventional outlook towards business. The company primarily considers itself as an R&D organization and is currently aiming to expand in India for the talent pool.

“The foremost thing is our culture and we are an engineering company. Our core values are Trust, Love, Empathy and Humanity. These are the core values of every Rocketeer. Rocket is like an individual and we expect Rocket to behave like a person and each of us to behave like a person and be a human being,” describes Anjali Arora, Senior Vice President, Chief Product Officer, Rocket Software.

Journey Founded with an objective of turning ideas into products, Rocket Software considers that R&D is the main essence of the company.

Majority of its employees are into R&D. It is the heart of the company.

“Rocket started with two people in 1990 but today there are 1500 employees called as Rocketeers across the world. Rocket Software has been founded and led by engineers, so it is a R&D company. It is the DNA of the company.

Rocket was founded to solve problems and to be able to turn ideas into products. Out of 1500 Rocketeers, 1000 are in R&D. Engineering is the core and heart of Rocket Software,” feels Anjali.

Adding further she says, “Rocket grew into the IBM ecosystem, it started with a product that Andy Youniss, President and CEO had an idea related to DB2 (database) and then IBM asked if they could licence the product and start selling it. This is how the IBM partnership started and it is for over 20 years. Now we focus on three platforms – IBM Z which is the big mainframe, IBM Power which is mid-range mainframe and multi-value which is our platform and that is a database and application server platform. Based on these three platforms we focus on data, application, storage and security. We provide solutions in these four spaces and there are also a lot of things like we invest in open source, all the modern technologies but over the last 28 years the company has just grown.

In the company we have products that run on IBM platform and we also have products which are offered on cloud and the product line is Trubiquity which is for automotive industry.

We also have products in distributed side, cloud and products that help in storage from mainframe to cloud or secure the cloud. We have products in all the spaces but predominant

Anjali Arora Senior Vice President, Chief Product Officer, Rocket Software portfolio in our company strategy revolves the IBM ecosystem. It is such from where most of our revenue comes from.”

India Market Rocket has a very different take regarding entering into different markets across the globe.

The company venturing into India for its latent and not for the market. It first sets up its R&D center in any new country, observes the market and then decides about entering the market.

“We are entering India not because of its market but for its talent. When we enter a country, we enter with R&D. We setup R&D Centers, build the teams and once we are established with it then we start learning the local market and customers, SIs, Partners and then we decide whether we want to enter the market.

Rocket does everything very thoughtfully. Two third of the company is into R&D. We provide horizontal products and most of our customers are in financial space which includes Banks, insurance companies, healthcare providers, transportation, automotive, retails etc.

If you look at India, all the top companies in the world who are in this space have a center in India. They run their R&D, IT out of here. Most of our customers have center here in India. The only difference is they are still our customers in North America or Europe so the decisions are still made there for a lot companies, although

they have big presence in India. We want is to understand working with them in both the countries, how they work, what decision they make here and what decisions can they make here. After that we want to figure out what exactly we want to do,” explains Anjali.

Focus The prime focus of the company at present is to establish Rocket Center of Excellence and expand it by increasing workforce. It is targeting to hire 300 people in India by 2019.

“Since our focus is R&D, we want to first establish our R&D center, hire talent and our model is Rocket Center of Excellence where we are creating centers with full product development so all the decisions are owned here. As we establish it in next 18 months, we want to learn more about what our European and American customers are doing in India and what are their requirements. Then we will figure out our go to market strategy.

By end of 2019, we are targeting to be at strength of 300 people in India. In Pune we will creating our hub apart from Bangalore.

We will hire 200 people in Pune. We have officially launched a center in Bangalore where there are 35 people. The Pune center will be launched later this year,” reveals Anjali. n Aparna Mullick aparna@varindia.com

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CIO SPECIAL

New age CIOs streamlining business transformation with new technologies

The digital transformation journey has started. The business and IT landscape has significantly shifted over the years and the use of digital technologies to transform business is dramatically impacting every single sector and industry. However the success for CIOs and IT executives leading digitally transformative projects for their respective organizations rests on the technologies they are adopting and their ability in aligning it with their business goals and strategies According to Gartner’s 2018 CIO Agenda Report, growth tops the list of business priorities reported by CIOs for 2018. The results mirror the 2017 CEO Survey, in which 58 percent of respondents identified growth as their top priority. Other key priorities include digital business/digital transformation (cited by 17 percent), profit improvements, and innovation/ new products (each cited by 10 percent).

Technology priorities of today’s CIO

computing, IoT, Ai/cognitive computing and Mobile technologies and applications.

As leaders prioritize their technology adoption and digital transformation, these five enterprise technologies represent their most urgent areas of need – Security, Cloud

“This is going to be the year when Artificial Intelligence and Cloud are going to define the industry,” says Meetali Sharma, Corporate Risk & Information security leader- SDG Software.

“With the emerging threats, security is also going to one of the focuses for the companies.

Keeping that in mind, we have our GRC platform and our core focus would be to enhance that platform for AI and then moving into cloud while embedding big data and analytics into it.

Since we are into information security, our focus will also be to sustain the security posture of the organization, build cyber resilience and for doing that we will be focusing on standards like ISO, CMMI and PCI.”

Another study conducted by Telstra last year claims that 97% of organizations already have a formal strategy in place to manage disruption, led by a CIO and actively supported by the CEO. The pressure is then on the CIO to enable their organization to disrupt itself using technology – an approach commonly referred to as “digital transformation.” As a matter of fact, companies across Asia are set to spend US$16.5 billion on digital transformation projects from now till 2020.

It is true that businesses can't stop innovating.

As disruption takes place and in order to catch up with the transformations happening in the industry’s landscape, it is upon organizations to either embrace the change or risk falling behind their competition.

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Ravinder Arora Head, Information Security IRIS Software

She further adds, “It is an agile world and technologies keep on changing; emerging threats and technologies are there. So if you are planning everything in a phased manner then it will be easier to move from one technology to the other. It has to be based on certain risk assessment and the result would be able to help you determine which technologies you need to adopt and when you need to plan those

Meetali Sharma Corporate Risk & Information security leader- SDG Software transitions.”

“Like any other organization, my organization is currently focused on 3 things – Artificial Intelligence, Big Data and Internet of Things. If you are in the information security field, you have to be on your toes and have to learn something new every day. Like if IoT is our focus, then we have to understand the security control for big data,” Ravinder Arora, Head, Information Security - IRIS Software.

Today, digital has become the quintessential platform for any customer to interact with businesses, before taking any other point of engagement. With global digital commerce revenue over $1 trillion annually, organizations view digital business as their fuel for growth.

In the years to come, this might change again.

Riding with this wave of change, a CIO has to see how best he can fit himself/herself in these situations that require adapting to new technological developments, business models and rising customer demands. It is also up to a CIO of how he/she can lead this innovation and capture the opportunity with their business colleagues and determine which side they play on in the great digital game of disruption.

Says Manish Gaur, Head, IT- Patanjali, “The

Sunil Tripathy Dy. Manager - Corp IT, Jindal Saw Ltd.

Vivek Ahuja Head - IT – India, IDEMIA priority for us is digitization, SCADA, adopting IoT in the company and information security.

We also look at datacenter consolidation as another of our focus area. Whenever we adopt any new technology, we need to first check the gaps that are there in the infrastructure and so this becomes a continuous process. When we do continual checks and measurement of the process, we find the existing gaps. To meet those gaps, we require new technology. We keep on evaluating those technologies and see where they can fit into.”

“We have gone through a merger recently and the integration between the two organizations is a big priority for us,” says Vivek Ahuja, Head IT – India, IDEMIA. “I do agree that quite a lot of good technologies are coming out in the market, and there are definitely advancements in that. We are using a lot of new technologies for our customer applications. So for that we prefer to use the cloud technologies. If we go to our public facing applications, we are using public cloud. Otherwise internally we are using lot of virtualization and hyper-converged infrastructure based on All-flash. Hyperconverged allows us to have a higher density of servers with low costs. We can expand out to multiple clusters of VMs.”

Naveen Gulati Corporate VP & Group CIO Fourth Dimension Solutions Ltd

Manish Gaur Head, IT- Patanjali

“As a company we are at present a growing organization and so like any other growing organization the top priority always remains in building a brand but other than that we believe in creating life-time relationships using our technologies. So that is a top priority for us.

Adopting a new technology at least for us has not been a challenge because we have more than 200 people who have been supporting various kinds of technologies in UK and US markets.

The processes that we have built around and the learnings that we have got has helped us to embrace technologies very quickly,” observes Dr. Rajeev Papneja, COO & EVP, ESDS Software Solution.

“Some of the priorities that we plan for this year are primarily solar IoT security – this is again a challenging field wherein the security of the IoT devices is a big challenge. IoT, big data, analytics, and blockchain are going to be disrupting technologies and are also going to sustain this year,” says Bohitesh Misra, Vice President - IT & BI, Simpa Networks.

Naveen Gulati, Corporate VP & Group CIO, Fourth Dimension Solutions Ltd says that for them their key priorities have been towards

Jyoti Chopra Director - IT, Glaze

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CIO SPECIAL

Dr. Rajeev Papneja COO & EVP, ESDS Software Solution machine learning and artificial intelligence. “We are into large scale projects which are globally diversified and geographically into various territories which are not easily reachable. Some of the initiatives which we are working on are around optimizing our supply chain, getting real-time information through various sources when using embedded and IoT technologies and how predictive algorithms using AI can predict where things are about to go wrong so that our project teams take proactive decisions. This has really been helping us in bringing in efficiencies towards our work processes, more value to our clients and also optimizing our operations,” he says.

Some of the technologies that his company is eyeing and see them as new emerging digital disruptors are in the field of IoT, and how these embedded technologies can be integrated using cloud and mobility devices. “We also see how these technologies are actually enabling our people who are our ‘feet on street’ by bringing out real time information for them through our core CRM and HRMS systems and how they can integrate the plethora of IT out there and bring in real-time analytics to our management.

These analytics have been helping our people in taking various proactive decisions and bring in insights that were never really there. So these are very exciting times to be leading IT from the forefront,” says Naveen.

“As a CIO, my first priority is to make business easy for my distributors and customers, so that we have a seamless reach of our business to them. The topmost priority for us is the mobile application, which makes them feel connected with the business; second is having the artificial intelligence to it so that they can proactively analyze where their individual strength is and how they can reach to the next level in a better way,” says Jyoti Chopra, Director - IT, Glaze.

“Initially it was very challenging as the distributors are in the tier 2 & 3 cities and touching through digital end is like touching their nerves and they were not ready to accept these technologies. They were like – you do not want us to be in your business and so you are

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Shailendra Choudhary Vice President & Head-I.T., Interarch Building Products bringing in these technologies. But now we have reached a level where they are a part of our business that is driven through technology. They are the ones who are suggesting to us now what technologies they want and giving us examples of where they need those technologies,” she says.

“We are already in the digitalized format and all our 22 plants are connected on the MPLS (Multiprotocol Label Switching). We are on Office 365 and are able to access our emails even remotely. We have also implemented UTM so that no one can target our systems and invade into our environment. We also have the Advanced threat protection (ATP) features with sandboxing, and so we are totally equipped with security. Though we cannot say that we are 100% secured, because no one can assure that, but we are able to track the problem for using sandboxing. So anything that comes into the environment gets reported to the concerned OEM and we receive the message telling us whether we are infected or not,” says Sunil Tripathy, Dy. Manager - Corp IT, Jindal Saw Ltd. “I try to evaluate the things of what is good for me and what is not,” he further says. “But as time goes on, there comes new challenges which you have to face it. But yes we know we are ahead on our journey.”

It will also be wise to note here that no department in any organization has undergone such profound change as IT. The shift in the nature of the CIO’s role is most influenced by the changing technologies of social, mobile, cloud computing and big data and analytics.

With these profound changes, the CIO has the opportunity to move from traditional IT roles to become more involved in business strategy.

“A CIO faces many challenges. Security challenge is a major challenge CIOs face in any of the organizations. There are many technology buzzwords coming in and the most prominent is the cloud solutions. Customers can be seen moving from on-premises to the cloud. And this is the priority of our company as well,” points out Shailendra Choudhary, Vice President & Head-I.T., Interarch Building Products.

Bohitesh Misra Vice President - IT & BI, Simpa Networks

He adds further, “Adoption of emerging & new technologies have to be done by the CIOs. The demand of the current market is such that unless you go for digitization of the company, it will not be on the growth path. So digitization of my company is also another focus area for us.”

Also, with IT operations largely automated, CIOs today no longer need to monitor and manage organizational infrastructure at a granular level, which also means that the technology leaders have now more time to focus on the concepts that really matter - agility, innovation and business value.

And so...

Going forward, CIOs expect their jobs to change due to digitalization. While world-class IT delivery role is a worldwide phenomenon, it will increasingly take up less of the CIO's time. Respondents believe that the two biggest transformations in the CIO role will be to become a change leader, followed by assuming increased and broader responsibilities.

Inevitably, the job of CIO will extend beyond the traditional delivery roles to other areas of the business, such as innovation management and talent development.

2018 will see a fundamental shift in the role of the CIO in businesses that recognize the value of instant, limitless scalability and immediate access to innovation. Postmodern CIOs will •

Move from operating IT to innovating business operations • Swap owning software for leveraging interlocking cloud ERP solutions across an ecosystem • Shift from managing teams to growing an inclusive, confident workforce • Change the focus from keeping the lights on to delivering differentiation.

TECH TRENDS

Collaborative Bots- COBOT Cobots, is a collaborative robot that work along-side humans better than traditional robots. This interacts with humans, save time and money. Industrial robots have been around for decades, but real cobots developed on Denmark universal robotic system. Globally, they are used in neurosurgery, bartending, physiotherapy, filmmaking and many industries. Today, there are about 400UR cobots in India, across sectors, especially automobile and auto-components, FMCG and Electronics industries. Many large companies are going to buy robots because they have no choice. Small and medium based enterprises targeting for cobots.

A cobot or co-robot (from collaborative robot) is a robot intended to physically interact with humans in a shared workspace.

This is in contrast with other robots, designed to operate autonomously or with limited guidance, which is what most industrial robots were up until the decades.

Robot Vs Cobot are:1. Partnering in human-machine teams Classic industry robots are powerhouses that carry out their work following a fixed program, without regard for the people working around them. Accidents are prevented using fences and cages. Cobots, however, are specifically designed to work together with people, not just for them.

Instead of being caged, they work in a cooperative environment and assist with complex tasks that cannot be fully automated.

For example, they can hand components to human co-workers, who execute the more precise assembly or quality control tasks.

2. Relief from risky activities Cobots fulfil tasks that could be risky for people, such as safely transporting sharp, pointed or hot work pieces, or dangerous bolting work. This results in fewer accidents, and leaves technicians to focus on less arduous aspects of production.

3. "Smart" and safe behaviour Cobots are designed to work seamlessly together with their human colleagues. They immobilize at the slightest touch thanks to sophisticated sensors, to prevent any danger to nearby people. Closed areas and safety fencing are no longer needed.

4. Flexible and teachable Cobots are very easy to program. Unlike traditional industrial robots, which require specialized programming skills, some cobot

models even learn independently. For example, from a technician performing a movement with the robot arm, which the cobot can then automatically reproduce.

Other systems can be given work instructions without coding, using a graphic user interface. Employees can thus flexibly reprogram cobots and use them for a variety of tasks.

also been able to deploy their expensive manpower’s to work towards strategical than operational function. Robots having market presence of around 40$billions, whereas cobots having only 1$ billion by coming next year. Although, the market for cobots is increasing with a fast pace of 65% CAGRthere is still a long way to go and become a mainstream for enterprise performances.

5. Usable anywhere Not only are cobots easy to reprogram, they are also relatively easy to move and utilize at other points on the production chain. Most cobots can be mounted on any surface – horizontal, vertical, on the ceiling.

And they are often light enough to be carried by just one person.

Cobot adoptions will fully depends on the range of problems it can resolve for multi-variety of users and industries.

Cobots will be a helping hands to humans.

Cobots are once again one of the most exciting trends at HANNOVER MESSE. Such as at the flagship trade fair Industrial Automation where opportunities from the latest automation solutions are on display.

Robots and Cobots are having different technologies. Any industries with 100 percent automation required robots with sophisticated sensors, cameras and security systems; which would be an expensive proposition options. While, on the other hand Cobots emphasise on limited or partial automation features where no need of sensors to perform the job; also less costly too.

Robots and Cobots are having different technologies. Any industries with 100 percent automation required robots with sophisticated sensors, cameras and security systems; which would be an expensive proposition options. While, on the other hand Cobots emphasize on limited or partial automation features where no need of sensors to perform the job; also less costly too.

The cost difference between robots and cobots is huge, and that’s why this is targeting more towards SME enterprises. The need for product customisation, cost and flexibility are driving the growth of cobots. Cobots cannot execute any task by his own, it has to be embed and engineered with specific multi-platform applications. Cobots are currently used by few bank institutions.

Cobots not pose a threat to employment or human jobs, but many companies should rationalise low-level jobs. Companies have

The cost difference between robots and cobots is huge, and that’s why this is targeting more towards SME enterprises.

The need for product customization, cost and flexibility are driving the growth of cobots. Cobots cannot execute any task by his own, it has to be embed and engineered with specific multi-platform applications.

By Sourabh Tiwari CIO/IT - Head, Overseas Infrastructure Alliance (India)

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INDIAN MARKET SCAPE

After Market Service:

Miles To Go

Though 70% of India’s after sales market is served through unorganised aftermarket service players, few organized players are still holding the fort, and trying to better the dynamics It is said ‘after sales’ is more important than the ‘sale’ itself as the former helps a brand retain its customer while the later just creates new customer. As more and more electronics, communications and IT products are being purchased in the market in sync with the growing demands, providing right sort of after market service has become imperative. In India, the after sales market has never been adequately organised, and with more and more products being purchased online, the market has become too fragmented now.

Why After Market Is Important For Brands

A global survey of 13,000 marketing, creative and technology professionals has found that customer experience management has emerged as the top strategic priority for businesses in the coming year.

The findings were published by Adobe and Econsultancy as part of the former’s Digital Trends report for 2018. 45% of respondents ranked customer experience as one of their three most important tasks in the next 12 months, with 20% listing it as their primary strategic focus.

Many think that they are on their way to achieving that goal, with 62% claiming that they have a “cohesive plan”, as well as long-term vision and executive support for making it happen. The report suggests that one of the keys to building effective customer experiences is creating cross collaboration between creative, content, marketing and web teams.

Those businesses that employ tools to facilitate streamlined workflows between different business functions are 62% more likely to show better business performance. 43% of respondents, however, reported that their current tech set-up is fragmented and inconsistent.

Market Size

There has hardly any study been conducted on Indian aftermarket services to estimate its size. However, looking at the humongous size of the Indian IT, telecom, and mobile phones business, the Indian after sales market can easily be guessed to be quite big.

India sold close to 300 million mobile phones in 2017 including smartphones and feature phones with a ratio of 43% to 57% respectively.

Similarly, close to 10 million PCs and laptops, and around 4 million printers

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were sold in 2017.

In value terms the Indian mobile phones market is close to Rs 1,60,000 crore, and the PC, tablet, printer, server, storage and the telecom equipment, put together, adds another two lakh crore. In total the whole electronics and communications market size was hovering around Rs 3,50,000 crore in 2017.

Industry experts VARIndia spoke to estimate a 10% of this market towards the after sales services market which put the size to Rs 35,000 to 40,000 crore. While the aftermarket service cost of server, storage, telecom equipments range between 5 to 7%, the same for smartphones and IT products range from 10-15% in India.

While this is a huge market, the industry is primarily served by highvolume-low-margin unorganised service providers and some domestic as well as global organised aftermarket players.

B2X

B2X is a Munich, Germany based aftermarket player and primarily serves the tier-1 IT and communications brands. Some of the prominent names in its customer list include Apple, Samsung, OnePlus, Lenovo, Google, Microsoft, Motorola, Xiaomi and Sony.

The company’s India business supports three neighbouring countries – Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal. The company has 237 frontend service locations and 12 backend repair centers. The firm employs around 900 employees to support these four markets. In these markets B2X serves customers of Apple, Samsung, Google, Microsoft and Xiaomi.

B2X operates 27 Apple authorized service centers across India where people using Apple products receive immediate help – from software support and device diagnosis to hardware repair services for in-warranty and out-of-warranty issues.

The entire after-sales service process of B2X is automated through the B2X SMARTCARE Technology platform. B2X’s SMARTANALYTICS provides real-time visibility on all service interactions.

HCL

HCL Care, the Support and Service division has one of the largest and most extensive service networks across the country and provides end to end support services across product categories – Laptop, Desktop, Tablet, Mobile Phones, Home Appliances and other Consumer Electronics & Durables. With proven track record of more than a decade of providing integrated end to end service support to leading brands, such as HCL, Philips, Lenovo, BlackBerry, Samsung, Bajaj, Emerson, Nokia, Dell etc, HCL Care has firmly established itself as the leader in after sales service & support of consumer electronics products. HCL Care specializes in providing tailored solution to its clients across the service value chain – Call Center Support, Walk-In Service Centers, Supply Chain Management and Repair Factory. With an aim to achieve 100% district coverage across India, we continue to grow our service network extensively across India and provide the best in class services to all our esteemed customers.

HCL has a remarkable tradition of service excellence span over decades.

HCL has been a preferred choice of partner for marquee brands like HCL, Philips, Lenovo, BlackBerry, Samsung, Nokia, OBI, Oneplus, Xiaomi etc.

We have served our customers with an immense sense of commitment and we would like to find a similar commitment in our partners.

HCL has tied up with leading OEM players in digital products to offer after sales warranty service support across India. We provide support on wide array of products – Mobile Phones, Smart Phones, Tablets, Laptop, Desktop, Printers, TV and other consumer electronics & lifestyle products.

• • • •

HCL Highpoints 24x7 Multi Channel, multi-lingual support Analytics driven service Integrated quality management system Platform based service delivery with vertical wrappers

IQor

iQor is one of the world’s biggest after market service providers. The company entered Indian space in 2015 and had announced to invest Rs 1300 crore over a period of 3 years time and create employment for more than 20,000 people. At present the firm has more than 5000 people in India and a majority of them are located in the company contact center in Noida. iQor perhaps is the only company in India to offer end to end aftermarket services to its customers. The company boasts of clientele including Oracle, Cisco, Ericsson and Apple besides almost all the handset brands including Indian smartphone players like Micromax, Karbonn and Lava.

iQor Highpoints

• Multi-channel expertise in products, programs, contracts, and support • Outsourcing partner to some of the world’s largest telecommunications firms • iQor intelligence and analytics-based customer retention • Field return receiving and sorting • Reverse logistics and inventory management • ECO upgrade • Repair, including SW / cosmetic upgrades and motherboard level • Asset recovery: HDD swap and cosmetic refurbishment • Failure analysis and environmental stress screening

Redington

Redington is one more big name in Indian after sales services market.

It has set up hardware support service centres across the country with 77 owned service centres, supported by a certified franchisee network of 266 service partners, Redington provides the full spectrum of warranty and post-warranty services including solution design and consulting, technical helpdesk, field engineering support, parts warehousing, Forward and Reverse logistics, Imports and -re-exports, and asset recovery . All these centres run on a robust CRM that enable us to tightly manage the end-toend service life cycle and create a great customer experience.

The company serves some premium customers including Hewlett Packard, Toshiba, Lenovo, Fujitsu, Apple, Motorola, Huawei, Microsoft, Ricoh, Logitech, Konica among others – several of them for a decade or more – ample testimony to the consistent value delivered by our Service team, enabling these brands live up to their commitment of providing world class service to their customers across the Indian sub-continent.

Aforeserve

Aforeserve is one more company offering after sales services to multiple products across verticals. This Noida based firm perhaps has the widest range of products to serve – from PCs, tablets, smartphones, scanners, printers, servers, networking switches, routers, STBs, ATMs and VSAT. Some of its major customers include HPE, IBM, Dimension Data, HP, Wipro, Lenovo, RIL, Tyco, Emerson, Micromax and Tata Sky. Headquartered at Noida, the Company works closely with customers to implement tailored service solutions through an extensive, pan India support network of service centers in 45 major cities and resident engineers across 182 regional towns.

Supported by a team of over 2600 engineers, technicians and service executives, Aforeserve handles more than 55000 service calls every month, combining industry experience with superior repair capabilities and standardized support practices to assist individual and small-scale establishments as well as complex IT environments in large organizations to install, maintain, refurbish and dispose their ICT assets in a cost-effective, efficient and viable manner.

TVS Electronics

TVS Electronics, from the TVS Group, is one more player in the after sales market. However, unlike others, TVS Electronics does not limit itself to just services of the products, rather it repairs as well as sells the refurbished products as well. Some of its refurbished products offer warranty of equal duration as the new product.

Some of the key services that TVS Electronics offers include repair services, refurbishment services, managed services, e-auction services and extended warranty plans.

From a product perspective, the company offers services for all sort of IT products including PCs and laptops, printers etc, telecom products including smartphones and feature phones, CCTVs, ATMs and PoS machines.

Some of its major clients include HTC, Lava, Micromax, Samsung, Xiaomi, Dell, Hitachi and NCR.

inTarvo

InTarvo, based in Noida, also offers after sales service for many brands and multiple products including IT, telecom, VSAT and banking. Besides after sales service, the firm also offers repair and refurbishment services, e-waste management and disposal services. The company is 18 year old and has a huge facility in Noida – 1,22,000 square feet. Besides it has 200 more collection and fulfilment centers across the country.

Going Forward

While brands do acknowledge that providing after sales service is key to their long-term businesses in any market, few put it into action.

A recent survey has found that 43% of the respondents say mobile and computer manufacturers have the worst after sales offering whereas 53% says companies never replace the product despite offering that in their sales pitch. A big chunk of the respondents of the study – 93% - want their complaints should be acknowledged in 24 hours. While there is varying degree of opinion around various parameters of the after sales support industry in India, on one aspect, the respondents were unanimous – standardisation. Almost all the respondents wished there should be an industry standard to address the after sales issues of the customers – irrespective of brands.

This survey tells volumes about the industry and the underlying opportunity. Brands, across consumer product segments, need to strengthen their core service and repair network. And more than that, they need to improve the quality of service, and they need to offer equal, rather, more importance to after sales than the actual ‘sale’. n

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Quantum Hi-Tech focusing on penetrating into Tier two and three cities In a chat with VARINDIA, Ashish Mutneja – Director, Quantum Hi-Tech elaborates about the India market, the company’s strategy, importance of channels and future of the surveillance industry Surveillance these days has become an integral part of modern day life. It has been well accepted by every industry. Buoyed with growth of public infrastructure and increasing IT security spending, Quantum Hi-Tech is bullish about the growth of this segment in India which is further boosted by government initiatives.

“In India, the ambiguity seems to have been resolved squarely in favour of surveillance. Under the existing regulatory rule, surveillance is either expressly mandated or unregulated, and requires surveillance to be built into the architecture and design of public spaces like internet and telephone networks, or even public roads and parks. In this context, security expos and exhibitions provide critical insight into this industry. In terms of adoption, with the growth of public infrastructure on a constant rise, accompanied by increasing IT and security spending, the surveillance sector is expected to witness a robust growth in India. Also, Government initiatives like Make in India, Digital India and Smart Cities will drive greater adoption of video security surveillance,” views Ashish Mutneja – Director, Quantum Hi-Tech.

IP solutions and VSaaS will further dominate the industry as it would be economical for the consumers. Service providers need to offer an array of options to the customers to stay relevant among the competition.

“IP solutions are likely to gain prominence. Video Surveillance as a Service (VSaaS) will gain prominence because of the associated benefits of less cost and higher comfort to the consumer. It will be crucial for the service providers to offer a range of options to the user - Live only (real-time viewing), Camera storage, On-premise storage, Cloud-based storage, etc.

The move from analogue to digital is both budgetary and also technological. The IP Cameras not only bring superior image resolution, Scalability, ease of installation but also able to apply video analytics. Though currently, analogue cameras are more cost-effective, combined with the abovementioned IP but there would be a switch off too,” explains Ashish.

Strategy to stay competitive

To face strong competition in the industry, Quantum has already chalked out its strategy. To remain at the forefront of the competition, the company has an array of products to offer to its consumers and at the same time it will focus on penetrating into Tier two and three cities with increased sales touch points.

“Due to the fickle, unpredictable nature of the Indian market, we do face rigid competition. But Quantum remains an undeterred brand. To satisfy the expectations, we do have an entire range of products lined up for the next year. This year, we will also focus on strong expansion in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities with our products and establish our sales touch points in every targeted region. We shall continue to focus on affordable devices that can empower the masses of India. At Quantum HiTech, ‘quality’ is the cornerstone of every offering. The company continuously strives to add quality products and solutions to the lives of consumers to assure them a ‘Higher-Technology’ experience in every facet of life. True to its ‘Reliable IT Solutions’ philosophy, Quantum Hi-tech touches lives of its consumers with its razor-sharp commitment to service excellence and ensures every product represents the ‘wow’ factor to not only meet but exceed the expectations of today’s evolving digital consumers,” reveals Ashish.

Channel

Channel is the backbone of any brand as it represents the company to the customers and vendors also get market feedback to better their products and services.

“The Channel Market is huge in India and also plays a crucial role for the growth of the Brand.

The Channel partners bring the first-hand experience to the customers, with detailed market research that help the Brands to adapt changes. Apart from targeting region wise approach, the Channel also

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Ashish Mutneja Director Quantum Hi-Tech enables the outreach to unique offerings,” feels Ashish.

Future of the Surveillance Industry

Face recognition, integration of AI with CCTV cameras are few of the trends that will be highly accepted across the globe. Few other trends like person detection and scanners and full body scanner systems are also coming up.

“The video surveillance market is experiencing a steady growth rate over the years in the current scenario and is anticipated to rise in the coming years. The modern IP cameras are now replacing the conventional or analogue cameras and establishing a new trend of network-based video surveillance cameras.

Facial recognition, Incorporation of artificial intelligence (AI) integrated with CCTV cameras, is one of the rapidly growing aspects which shall see the wide acceptance till the corners of the world. On the similar way, Person detection and scanners and full body scanner systems for the airport management, is also been seen in the coming years. The new technologies facilitate the end users by allowing connecting the cameras from a remote location and can fetch data over the internet. Hence, the demand for IP cameras is increasing in developed countries as well as developing countries owing to the benefits of the systems, thus, impacting positively on the growth of the market for video surveillance systems in the coming years,” concludes Ashish. n Aparna Mullick aparna@varindia.com

VAR SECURITY

CP PLUS rolls out H.265 powered IP Surveillance solutions and monitors CP PLUS launched a range of monitors and H.265 powered IP cameras and NVRs. While the former has been designed specifically for surveillance, the latter offers a range of IP cameras and NVRs that offer the latest CODEC H.265 compression for unmatched bandwidth and storage savings.

“The CP PLUS monitors have been designed in response to the long time need for monitors that are user friendly in the context of surveillance infrastructure.

While the larger monitors (22” and above) offer speakers, the smaller screens do not have this facility.

Since smaller screens are have a greater demand, our monitors will save on the added cost of additional speakers. Also, our latest range of H.265 powered IP cameras and NVRs will now offer in-device compression thereby saving significant bandwidth and storage costs.

This range will be a highly advantageous in 4K video streaming”, said Yogesh B. Dutta, COO, CP PLUS. CP PLUS LED monitors have been designed to cater to the

needs of a CCTV surveillance infrastructure, complete with inbuilt speakers, high luminosity and backlight. Available in 19” and 22”, these monitors are compact and rugged in design and offer both audio and video streaming. With the launch of these monitors, the CP PLUS product portfolio will now offer a complete end-to-end solution for all surveillance needs.

The H.265 powered IP cameras and NVRs, on the other hand, are equipped with the latest CODEC, H.265, also known as High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC). Aimed at the next generation 4K recording and displays, the H.265 CODEC technology will double the data compression ratio as compared to the earlier H.264 at the same level of video quality, thereby doubling the bandwidth and storage savings. This range includes 2MP, 3MP, and 4MP IP cameras and 4, 8, 16, and 32 channel NVRs in 1 SATA and 2 SATA storage capacities.

The CP PLUS LED monitors and H.265 powered IP surveillance range will be out in the market early next month.

PRODUCT OF THE MONTH

Vivo V9 – the latest phone with the notch display design Vivo V9 smartphone features a notch at the front. This phone comes with an almost bezel-less display and is equipped with a rear-mounted fingerprint sensor. It has a screen size of 6.3-inch FHD+ Full View Display. The display comes with 19:9 screen ratio with crisp colours and a clarity of the stunning Full View display.

On the back the phone has a glossy finish. The Vivo V9 has an aluminium back and the device is 7.9mm thick. It’s a surprisingly easy to use device considering its size. The other usual set of specifications include the 3.5mm audio jack, speaker grille and microUSB port which are located at the bottom. The left side is home to the hybrid SIM slot whereas the usual suspects like the power button and volume rockers find a space on the right hand side.

The Vivo V9 runs Android 8.1 Oreo out of the box and comes with dual 16+5-megapixel rear shooters which can capture detailed and quality images and videos. Also, there is an LED flash that helps you shoot in the dark. On the front, to assist selfies and video calling, the smartphone is bundled with a 24-megapixel front camera along with an AI-assisted beautify mode, which can automatically enhance your selfies. The overall quality of selfies is quite good, as the camera manages to capture plenty of details. The camera also gets modes like group selfies, videos, and AR Stickers.

Vivo V9 is powered with a 2.2GHz octa-core Snapdragon 626 SoC and 4GB of RAM that ensures smooth running even while you are working on multiple apps at the same time or playing graphics-intensive games. It has non-removable Li-Ion 3,260mAh battery.

For connectivity, you get options like 4G with VoLTE support, Bluetooth 4.2, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/ g/n, GPS, NFC, and a microUSB 2.0 port.

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Ziox Mobiles aims to achieve Rs 600 cr by Q4 of FY 2018-19 With a focus to increase the revenue to Rs. 600 cr, Ziox Mobiles believes in offering latest technology at a cost-effective price. In a chat with VARINDIA, Deepak Kabu, CEO, Ziox Mobiles talks about the brands, channel strategy, focus of the company and future plans A customer loyal brand, Ziox has always prioritized technology, quality of the product and affordability and these factors are the differentiators for the company. The company believes that these factors help to create a strong bond with the customers.

“Ziox is a customer loyal brand, packaged with the right price and latest technology that enables a strong connect with consumers.

We are also steadfast in introducing our brand’s products that will redefine the quality of cost-effective offerings, against the competition brands. Technology + Quality + Affordable prices keep Ziox at the top of its Game in the very dynamic Mobile Industry,” believes Deepak Kabu, CEO, Ziox Mobiles.

Strategy With a vision to connect the gap between consumer demands and latest technology, Ziox has itself as an economical smartphone brand.

In a competitive smartphone market like India, the company has always focused on offering premium products at premium price which is a game changing factor for the brand.

“Ziox Mobiles is known for its quality with latest innovation at best affordable prices. Being a pocket- friendly brand, Ziox is one of the fastest growing Brands in India. The market is glutted with brands that offer premium product offerings at most premium prices and that’s where Ziox marks a change. Our vision is to bridge the gap between consumer demands and the high-end technology. In smartphones, our product range starts from Rs. 3000 with latest specs and technology. Our products are a redefinition of the level of quality and cost-effective offerings in India.

We prioritize providing uncompromised quality, integrated with high-end technology,” explains Deepak.

Talking about the channel strategy, Deepak says that the company has chosen offline channel over online and 90% of the business comes from offline channel. It is a channel friendly company and believes in growing with the channel. The company believes in strengthening and supporting its partners.

“Ziox infact is a very channel friendly company and we believe in growing with our channel partners. We are one of the few brands who have opted the offline over the online route to establish our strong presence. Our distribution channel constitutes 90% share in our sale and rest 10% comes from E- commerce media. Currently the brand has over 850+ channel partners, and further expanding stronger. We have made a stronger communication model to reach our channel more effectively.

Channel partners will play a key role in sustaining and expanding the brand’s presence in the country. We believe in strengthening and supporting our partners by introducing exciting creative marketing promotion for the channel partners and end users.”

Focus of the company Ziox is currently focusing on retail visibility and connecting with the consumers. To reach the customers across the country, the company aims

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Deepak Kabu CEO, Ziox Mobiles for a 360 degree marketing campaign.

“To achieve a firm foothold in today’s challenging and competitive market of India, one may not need to be different but think/act differently.

And keeping that in mind, we differentiate ourselves as delivering superior quality technology at potent prices. With a total investment of Rs 100 cr, our go to market strategy is chiefly to focus on retail visibility and connecting with the consumer through BTL activities and social media. So as to make our brand reach the consumers across Pan India, a 360-degree marketing campaign is what our element of go to market strategy is,” says Deepak.

Plans for 2018 & Revenue Target To keep a pace with the dynamic smartphone industry, Ziox is planning to launch a good number of handsets by Q4 of 2018-19, of which 60% will be feature phones and 40% smartphones. In the previous financial year (FY), the company did a business of Rs 450 cr and is now aiming to take the numbers to Rs. 600 cr.

“With the pace of smartphone evolution moving so fast, there’s always something waiting in the wings. With every new launch, there is an anticipation for the next big thing, especially in the Mobile industry. In sync with the same, we will launch around 15- 20 new Mobile phones by Q4 of this FY 2018-2019, out of which we have recently launched 4 in in Lucknow, which includes 3 feature phones and 1 smart phone.

In last FY, Ziox has done a revenue business of Rs. 450 cr, and we are aiming to cross Rs. 600 cr by Q4 of FY 2018-19. We are coming up with some new innovative smartphones and feature phones , like 4G feature phone which is in high demand and the infinity screen smart phones.

Our aggressive marketing strategy paired with innovative solutions, shall expand the Target audience along with key focus on Branding and being able to be seen at the right locations,” reveals Deepak. n Aparna Mullick aparna@varindia.com

VAR MOBILITY

Motorola debuts moto g6 and moto g6 play

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otorola has rolled out moto g6 and g6 play smartphones which offer the perfect combinations of features for consumers

who don’t want to compromise on quality, style or experience. They are smarter than ever and focus on immersive display, stunning glass design and have the speed and power of Qualcomm Snapdragon

processors.

The moto g6 14.5cm (5.7″) Full HD+ Max Vision display delivers vivid colors and fine details, while its attentiongrabbing 3D glass back creates a gorgeous shape and look that stands out among other premium smartphones. Advanced imaging software means studio quality portraits, artistic black and white shots, and hilarious face filters come to life through the dual rear 12MP + 5MP cameras. moto g6 is completely wrapped in scratch-resistant Corning Gorilla Glass with a 3D contoured back for a comfortable grip. It comes with dual rear cameras and photo enhancement software.

iVOOMi unveils V5 with shatterproof display and 4G VoLTE iVOOMi ‘V5’, an entrylevel smartphone with Shatterproof Display and 4G VoLTE is designed for high performance and efficiency. The company has partnered with Reliance Jio to provide an instant

cashback of Rs.2, 200 on the V5. The feature-rich smartphone which is priced at just Rs. 3,499 is available for purchase on Snapdeal.

After the success of its flagship devices Me3 and

Me3S with shatterproof displays, which received tremendous admiration from its customers, iVOOMi brings V5 with the much-coveted shatterproof display to the entry-level segment in India.

The smartphone is packed with 1GB RAM + 8GB ROM. The storage can be expanded up to 128 GB via a micro SD card on the device. The V5 is equipped with a 2,800mAh battery and runs on Android 7.0 Nougat.

The dual SIM smartphone features a 5-inch display; well-targeted to those who enjoy movies and games on a bigger screen and simultaneously look for a handy device. As for its optics, iVOOMi V5 sports a 5MP Rear Camera with LED flash and a 5MP Selfie Camera. At the heart, the device runs on Quad Core 1.2GHz Processor and is available in two colour variants namely Jade Black and Champagne Gold..

OnePlus 6 launched in India

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nePlus has announced its latest premium flagship device – the OnePlus 6. With a 6.28-inch Full Optic AMOLED 19:9 display – OnePlus' largestever screen, it offers an immersive viewing experience, while keeping a similar form factor to that of the OnePlus 5T. Combining new technology from Qualcomm with OnePlus' engineering, the OnePlus 6 is the fastest handset the company has ever produced.

"With the OnePlus 6, we challenged ourselves to deliver an external design as smooth and elegant as the work we've done inside the device," said OnePlus Founder & CEO Pete Lau. "We're proud of what we've accomplished, and we hope our users are too."

Commenting on the launch, Manish Tiwary, Vice-President – Category Management, Amazon India, said, “We are thrilled to announce the exclusive launch of OnePlus 6 on Amazon.in, unarguably one of the most-awaited smartphones this season.

OnePlus 6 is a dream smartphone for all gadget enthusiasts with industryleading features and design. With this launch, we continue to build a strong portfolio in the smartphones category providing customers with the widest exclusive selection, best value and unmatched shopping experience.”

With up to 8 GB of LPDDR4X RAM, the OnePlus 6 effortlessly switches between multiple apps running at the same time without a single second of lag, allowing users to multitask with ease. The OnePlus 6's dual-lane storage, based on UFS 2.1, ensures faster app loading and read/write speeds.

HTC introduces HTC Desire 12 and HTC Desire 12+

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TC has unveiled two new phones that deliver the goods – the HTC Desire 12 and HTC Desire 12+.

The HTC Desire 12 and HTC Desire 12+ will be available in Cool Black and Warm Silver color variant. Preorder of HTC Desire 12 and HTC Desire 12+ starts on 7th June, 2018 at a price of Rs.15,800/and Rs.19,790/, respectively.

Pre-order will be done exclusively on HTC India E-Store. Both the products will be available in retail from June 11, 2018 onwards.

Offering similar experiences in two different packages, the 5.5” HTC Desire 12 and 6” HTC Desire 12+ are both surprisingly slim and comfortable to hold despite

their big, 18:9 edge-to-edge screens.

A bigger and better viewing experience lets you enjoy the things you love while the swipe anywhere feature keeps everything you need just a thumb tap

away.Capture vivid photos, day or night, with the 13MP main camera, including Phase Detection Autofocus for extra clarity on the go.

The HTC Desire 12+ even offers dual cameras, letting you refocus photos after the shot to add a gorgeous, artistic bokeh effect.

Honor rolls out 7A and 7C with Dual-Lens Camera and Face Unlock

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onor – Huawei’s smartphone e-brand for digital natives, in the presence of Bollywood actress Neha Dhupia launched its most affordable dual lens camera devices Honor 7A & 7C. Packed with a dual-lens rear camera setup, a sleek design, FullView display and face unlock, the new phones from the house of Honor set new benchmarks in every way. The Honor 7A will be available on Flipkart starting May 29, 2018 and Honor 7C will be available on Amazon from 31st May, 2018.

P. Sanjeev, VicePresident – Sales, Huawei India-Consumer Business Group, said, “Honor is committed to scale new heights of product innovation and customer centricity through its products. At Honor we have always focused on simplifying the lives and needs of our consumers by

bringing together seamless smartphone experiences at affordable price points. The recent Counterpoint report placed Honor amongst top 5 smartphones brands in India which is a testimony of the trust consumers have shown in the brand.” He further added, “With the launch of Honor 7A and 7C, we are offering marketleading specifications by pushing boundaries of smartphone design with advanced technology and focusing on the needs of larger set of consumers.

Honor can do this like no other brand owing to our unique e-commerce business model and worldclass R&D capabilities.”

7A and 7C are designed with superior design and powerful dual cameras. The Honor 7A & 7C are built to capture more and unlocking more possibilities, given the great features like 13+2MP dual lens camera, face unlock, EMUI 8.0.

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Movers & Shakers

Bhaskar Choudhuri to head the Asia-Pacific marketing team at Lenovo

Lux Rao to lead Dimension Data India as the Solutions Director

Lenovo has appointed Bhaskar Choudhuri as the new head of its marketing team in AsiaPacific. Bhaskar, who was previously Lenovo India’s Head of Marketing, has succeeded former regional CMO Nick Reynolds, who has been appointed the company’s global Head of Marketing for Digital, Web & Social Media.

In his new role as CMO of Lenovo Asia-Pacific, Bhaskar, who is based in Bangalore, India, is tasked with expanding Lenovo's brand footprint in the Asia-Pacific region, and driving sales for PCs, Tablets and Smart Devices across diverse markets covering Japan, India, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand and Southeast Asia. He reports to Ken Wong, President of Lenovo Asia-Pacific.

Lux Rao has joined Dimension Data India as the Solutions Director. His new role will see him working towards empowering the company’s customers with outcome based solutions and helping them in their digital journeys.

His last stint was with Cisco where he served as the Director & Leader of Digital Transformation. While at Cisco, Lux drove the digital transformation agenda, covering and providing impetus to the opportunities across multiple verticals covering Smart Cities, IoT, Digital Banking, Smart Healthcare, Smart Education et al.

Citrix India bolsters its channel leadership

Capgemini names Carole Ferrand as Group CFO

Strengthening the channel leadership for its India business, Citrix has announced the appointment of Raghuram Krishnan as Director – Partner, Citrix India. In his new role, Raghuram will lead the company’s channel strategy and partner ecosystem growth across the India Subcontinent. He will work closely with the partners, distributors and system integrators to accelerate the adoption of Citrix innovations and drive relevance for channel ecosystem.

Raghuram brings over 20 years of IT industry experience and has spearheaded productive business engagements with all facets of partners, including, service providers and leading system integrators.

Carole Ferrand has joined Capgemini as Group Chief Financial Officer (CFO). In her capacity as Group CFO, Carole becomes a member of the Group Executive Board and reports to Paul Hermelin, Chairman & CEO. She replaces AimanEzzat who is Chief Operating Officer alongside Thierry Delaporte since January 1, 2018.

Prior to joining Capgemini, from 2013, Carole held the position of Financial Director at Artémis Group, the holding company of the Pinault family (Kering, FNAC, vineyards), where she was also in charge of strategic and financial support for certain investments. Carole is a director of FNAC and sat on Capgemini’s board of directors from May 2016 to May 28, 2018.

Andy Elder - new chief sales officer at Riverbed

HarshvendraSoin is Tech Mahindra's new Chief People Officer

Riverbed Technology has announced the appointment of Andy Elder to Chief Sales Officer, succeeding Paul Mountford, who was recently named Riverbed’s new CEO. Elder joined Riverbed in March 2017 as SVP EMEA Sales and during the last year he transformed the EMEA organization providing strong leadership and achieving significant growth in the region.

Elder joined Riverbed from Intel Security, where he spent two years as the President of EMEA, responsible for go-to-market and operations for 100 countries, and led Intel Security to growth in EMEA. Elder has also lead global sales teams in several other technology companies including Intellectual Ventures, Rovi, and Cisco.

Airtel Payments Bank announces Anubrata Biswas as MD & CEO

Airtel Payments Bank said that it has appointed Anubrata Biswas as its Managing Director & CEO. In his new role, Anubrata will be responsible for driving Airtel Payments Bank’s mission of taking convenient and innovative digital banking services to the doorstep of every Indian.

Anubrata brings with him rich experience of over 17 years in the banking sector. Prior to joining Airtel Payments Bank, he was the Joint General Manager and Retail Business Head – South India for ICICI Bank and was responsible for managing the retail banking business across over 550 branches of the bank.

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Tech Mahindra Ltd has announced the appointment of HarshvendraSoin as Chief People Officer effective July 1, 2018.

HarshvendraSoin has been associated with Tech Mahindra since 2012. He brings with him a rich experience of more than 24 years in the industry. Prior to his current role, he was heading the Canada Enterprise Business as Senior VP and Country Head at Tech Mahindra (Canada). He was also the Global Leadership Acquisition & Development, and Head – Business HR for APAC & IMEA (Telecom & Enterprise) for Tech Mahindra.

Quick Heal Technologies ropes in Manu Parpia to Board of Directors

Quick Heal Technologies Limited (“Quick Heal”) has announced the appointment of Manu Parpia as Additional Director (Independent Director). Parpia’s appointment is subject to shareholders’ approval at the ensuing Annual General Meeting.

With the addition of Manu Parpia, the Board strength of the company has increased to nine which includes five independent directors, including Parpia.Parpia was the founder of Geometric Ltd, and as its Managing Director & CEO till recently, oversaw its growth as it became a $200-million enterprise serving leading global companies as well as the leading ISVs in the CAD/PLM area.

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RNI - NO 72399/1999 Printing Date 18 & 19

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Reg. No: DL-SW-01/4030/18-20

56 pages including cover

Date of Posting 20 & 21 every month