Microsoft Corp. has announced the completion of its first renewable energy deal within the Karnataka state of India. The agreement will see Microsoft purchase 3 megawatts of solar-powered electricity from Atria Power to help power its new office building in Bengaluru. This will meet 80 percent of the projected electricity needs at the new facility.
This deal is part of a state government of Karnataka program to encourage investments in local solar energy operations, in line with the larger Indian government goal to ramp up solar power generation to 100 gigawatts by 2022, as part of India’s efforts to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Investing in local solar energy to help power our new Bangalore office building is good for Microsoft, good for India and good for the environment. We are proud to be deepening our long history of partnership and investment in India with this agreement. This deal will help us grow sustainably and supports the growth of the Indian solar energy industry, so that the entire country can more easily and reliably access clean electricity.
Rob Bernard, Chief Environmental Strategist, Microsoft, said
Microsoft, like India, has ambitious commitments to use more renewable energy. By purchasing local solar power to meet some of our local electricity needs, we’re not only meeting our goals but also supporting the growth of local clean energy industries. This growth leads to more clean electricity capacity, which will help India meet its targets for the Paris Agreement, reduce carbon emissions and provide clean electricity to its growing population. We’re proud to play a small role in this Indian energy transformation.
This is Microsoft’s first solar energy agreement in India, and one of the first in Asia — the company completed a new solar agreement in Singapore last week. Once completed, this project will bring Microsoft’s total global direct procurement in renewable energy projects to nearly 900 megawatts. The deals in Asia follow windprojects in Europe and a substantial portfolio in the United States, and mark continued momentum toward the corporate clean energy commitments set by the company in 2016. Microsoft’s goal is to rely on wind, solar and hydro-power electricity for at least 50 percent of its energy usage worldwide by the end of 2018.
Here are some simple yet useful tips that will help you complete the IT filing process in one go:
Keep Your PAN Card Handy
When you are ready to file your tax returns, ensure that you have your PAN card with you. Make sure to quote your PAN number accurately on your income tax return. Furthermore, your date of birth and fathers name mentioned on the income tax return should match with your PAN card details.
Make Sure Your Aadhaar Card Is Ready
Since July 2017, mentioning the Aadhaar card number on the income tax return forms have become mandatory. If you don’t have an Aadhaar card, you will not be able to file your tax returns. So if you don’t have an Aadhaar card, make sure to apply for one as soon as possible.
Get Form 16 from Your Employer
Form 16 is an important document that lists all the information required while filing income tax returns. Generally, the employer provides Form 16 to the all its employees by 31st May of every year. In case you were employed at more than one company within a single financial year, you will have to collect Form 16 from all the companies.
Know the Prevailing Income Tax Rates
Are you aware of the latest income tax slab for AY 2018-19? If not, you must acquaint yourself with it. Understanding the prevailing Income Tax Rates will help you plan your taxes and get a better understanding of the tax filing process.
Utilize Form 26AS
Form 26AS features the TDS details linked to your PAN. The TDS details will include the income deducted from sources such as fixed deposit, rent, commission income, and salary. You can adjust the TDS from your total tax liability, as TDS is already deducted from your income. However, make sure to include details of the corresponding income from which the TDS is deducted.
Furnish the Details of Your Assets If Your Income Is Above 50 Lakhs
If your total income after deductions exceeds Rs 50 Lakhs, you will have to provide additional details regarding your income. Furnish details such as Value of an immovable asset, movable asset, jewellery and liabilities and cash in hand.
Download Your Bank Statements
Including Bank Statements in your IT returns serves two purposes. Firstly, it is mandatory to mention them on your income tax returns. Secondly, it will tell you the amount of savings bank interest credited to your account. Savings bank interest is exempt from tax up to INR 10,000. If you have any dormant bank accounts, you need not mention it in your returns.
Mumbai based Wellthy Therapeutics, a digital therapeutics company for chronic disease management announced that it has raised USD 2.1 million in seed funding. Dr. Ranjan Pai through his family office, along with Beenext Ventures, GrowX Ventures, Currae Healthcare and other strategic HNIs like Ashutosh Taparia & Karan Bhagat participated in the round.
Self-funded until this seed round, Wellthy Therapeutics has spent the last 2 years in clinical pilots and gathering real world evidence of its solution capability, and in the process has graduated from the Merck Global Digital Health accelerator, Swiss Re’ Global and ICICI Lombard’s Nova InsurTech accelerators.
The company plans to use this funding to enhance the efficacy of its type II diabetes digital therapeutic while developing solutions for other disease areas, build deeper integrations with healthcare stakeholders in South Asia and Asia, and expand its team.
Commenting on the development, Abhishek Shah, Co-founder & CEO, Wellthy Therapeutics said
Digital health interventions are a necessity to enhance the effectiveness of current chronic disease care. Our product suite directly boosts outcome efficacy in incredibly significant ways, well beyond what current healthcare is able to do. This fund raise will help us continue to pioneer a new category of medicine that will revolutionize chronic disease care across Asia.
Dr. Ranjan Pai, CEO & Managing Director, Manipal Education and Medical Group added
Globally and in India, chronic diseases have become the largest burden on healthcare. Wellthy Therapeutics’ product suite has the potential to be the glue that binds healthcare providers, insurers, pharma and diagnostics one step closer to better patient outcomes. We were impressed with the early data of Wellthy’s type II diabetes digital therapeutic, and can see the opportunity for their solution suite to elevate the standard of care for multiple therapy areas.
As a part of this round, Siddharth Dhondhiyal will join the board as the investor representative.
About Wellthy Therapeutics
Wellthy Therapeutics is a digital therapeutics company that uses a hybrid of artificial intelligence and human paramedical coaches to improve health literacy and facilitate behavior change for better outcomes in patients. It’s first digital therapeutic for type II diabetes has been endorsed by Asia’s largest diabetes association [RSSDI]. For more information, please visit Wellthy Therapeutics
Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in cyber-security solutions had their global executive Steve Quane, Executive VP, Network Defense and Hybrid Cloud Security in India recently, stressing on the unprecedented pace of infrastructure changes engulfing enterprises. He stressed on cloud adoption, particularly moving to ‘container’ and ‘server-less’ architecture having huge benefits for organizations. The benefits which translate not only to cost, but include stability, scalability and ultimately the security aspect.
With respect to trends around the threat landscape in Asia, which includes India, he opined that he could draw parallels to what is happening globally, in that they are very similar. While there is still a significant amount of Ransomware activity currently, Crypto Mining will rise to equal Ransomware if not exceed it.
While delving on the ‘mentality shift’ of organizations sharing responsibilities, Steve said
There is a new model that needs to be in place for cloud security that is different than on- premise. The word ‘hybrid’ is very specific here, the ability to live in both places at the same time. That is, to live in an older legacy network-based environment that you have complete control over, while moving to a cloud environment where you share responsibility with your service provider. For organizations that do make the shift, they find that the cloud security model is as-good-as if not better than their on- premise security model.
On the role of next-gen technologies in security, Steve opined that the role of Machine Learning and Artificial intelligence [AI] would be to essentially sieve through data and find anomalies and trends that either humans can’t see or don’t have time to see. When it comes to blockchain, its application would be to help secure a very insecure environment.
People, Process and Procedures need to be addressed particularly in this age of impending data regulations and privacy regulations. Also, organizations are increasingly seen grappling with newer issues – How do we deal with AI driven security fighting AI driven threats ? At some point the infrastructure fights itself. Interestingly, we have started to see attacks on AI done by AI.
On Trend Micro’s cloud offering, Steve highlighted on their Connected Threat Defense approach. Their cloud offering – ‘Deep Security’ is tied to network-based IPS, which is in-turn tied to their sand-boxing technologies. The ability to detect suspicious behavior anywhere in the enterprise environment and submit that malicious activity to a centralized investigation service is unique to anyone in the industry.
The second aspect, is the ability to follow the workload, building the security profile around a computing workload and following it anywhere in the world from virtual infrastructure to multi-cloud. Trend Micro is one of the most critical partner for AWS, Azure and VMware in India and they work hand-in-hand with them to offer customers a seamless hassle free experience.
He emphasized the two big areas which are unique to Trend Micro. First being the Security Universities, where they plan to graduate about 300 to 400 security professionals a year, once they reach a particular scale. With presence in Egypt and Brazil they now plan to expand to Eastern Europe and Asia as well. The second one being around identifying talent through Ethical hacking,and the tremendous growth witnessed around The Zero Day initiative bug bounty program which has roughly 3500 researchers. He opined that Asia has lost the sheen of being the land of the ethical hackers, and the most prolific at that, with the decrease in ethical hacking in Asia. Also, they plan to organize probably the biggest hacking event in the world, called Pwn2Own scheduled next month, with an estimated prize money of USD 2 million for the grabs.
Close to home, Nilesh Jain, Vice President – South East Asia and India, Trend Micro, said
In India, we are seeing two trends, very specifically to large enterprises. One, is the adoption of new technologies of AI, Big Data & Blockchain. Secondly, it’s the cloud adoption related migration happening across sectors. Also, customers are increasingly evaluating vendors who can deliver EDR [Endpoint Detection and Response] as well as who can deliver security on Cloud, and move on those latest technologies faster.
Our major investment is in engaging and developing the different categories of channel partners in India. We are building a big team for channels, which includes, channel sales, channel technical and channel services. There are channel partners who are doing large sized infrastructure projects, there are pure-play MSSP [Managed Security Service Providers] partners, and there are largely cloud services partners.
About Trend Micro
Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in cyber-security solutions, helps to make the world safe for exchanging digital information. Their innovative solutions for consumers, businesses, and governments provide layered security for data centers, cloud environments, networks and endpoints. With more than 5,000 employees in over 50 countries and the world’s most advanced global threat intelligence, Trend Micro enables organizations to secure their journey to the cloud. For more information, please visit Trend Micro
The The GLOMO Awards are considered the Oscars of mobile industry to recognize and celebrate the best of the best, highlighting the technologies, products, companies and individuals that are pushing the boundaries of ingenuity and innovation thereby creating a better future for all of us.
Speaking about the award to JioTV, the judges said
In a country where less than half the population has access to television, this is delivering a wide range of channels with a unified & personalized experience for everyone.
We are excited & humbled to win the prestigious GLOMO awards. It shows that all our initiatives at Jio are driven by customer obsession & innovation. The intent to empower every Indian has been our guiding philosophy throughout.
JioTV’s prime motto has been to bring the best in class content, be it entertainment or news or movies or sports, to all its users on the go. It houses 575+ Live TV channels showing content across 15+ Indian languages & 7 days of catch up for most of the shows thereby enabling Jio Digital Life.
JioTV has been a leader in the infotainment space with its100 million+ downloads coming in a real short time. Ever since its launch, it has consistently been ranked amongst the ‘Top Entertainment’ apps on Google Play with a 4.4 star rating. JioTV also won the award for the ‘Innovative Mobile TV App’ in the recently concluded Aegis Graham Bell Award on February 23rd 2018 in New Delhi.
JioTV not only brings forth the Indian gamut of entertainment to its users but also opens up the world of international events to Indians. JioTV was the official broadcast partner for recently concluded PyeongChang 2018 Olympic Winter Games. It is also the exclusive digital broadcaster for the upcoming T20I tri-series ‘Nidahas Trophy’ being played between India, Sri Lanka & Bangladesh stated to begin on March 6th 2018.
The government has recently announced the implementation date of the e-Way Bill as 1st April 2018. e-Way Bill as a mechanism helps reduce tax evasion and ensures seamless inter-state transportation of goods, with minimal loss of time at check-points. With the introduction of e-Way Bill, invoicing will become a more frequent activity than before. Businesses will be required to record sales invoices, and then generate the e-Way Bill. Invoice generation and dispatching of goods will have to take place simultaneously. Tally Solutions, the country’s premier business software, has launched its latest software Tally.ERP 9 Release 6.4 which caters to effective e-Way Bill compliance.
With e-Way Bill being introduced in a month’s time, it will be critical for businesses to adopt a solution which assists in generating and managing e-Way Bills, and at the same time facilitates recording and maintenance of accurate invoices. Tally has been the invoicing and accounting solution of choice for more than 1.3 million businesses and with the new release the company is extending a simplified e-Way Bill compliance solution.
How Tally. ERP 9 Release 6.4 offers an effective solution
Generate e-Way Bill and print invoices with EBNs [e-Way Bill nos.] – Tally. ERP 9 allows businesses to capture all the mandatory details required for generating e-Way Bill in the e-Way Bill portal. These details are not required to be entered in the portal again, reducing time consuming repetitive tasks. At the time of saving the invoice, the user can choose to generate a JSON/Excel of the invoice which has to be uploaded on the e-way portal for generating e-Way Bill with EBN.
JSON of single or multiple invoices for generating e-Way Bills – In order to generate e-Way Bills, businesses will need to upload invoice data in JSON. The software gives flexibility to businesses to generate JSON for a single invoice, or a single JSON for multiple invoices, to reduce operational effort. This will help generate multiple e-Way Bills from a single JSON.
Manage varied business scenarios – With Tally.ERP 9, businesses can generate JSON in situations when they wish to get e-Way Bills generated for their purchases, or for purchases made from unregistered dealers.
e-Way Bills for consolidated invoices – Once e-Way Bills are generated for individual invoices, the user can group invoices with their e-Way Bills as per mode of transport, vehicle nos., place of supply or State, and generate a consolidated e-Way Bill on the portal, to make transporter’s life simple.
Commenting on the launch, Tejas Goenka, Executive Director, Tally Solutions, said
Over the last few weeks we have been focusing on getting businesses ready to operate the e-Way Bill system to ensure that they remain compliant with the law. Our latest release Tally.ERP 9 Release 6.4 is designed to make it very simple for businesses to generate and manage e-Way Bills.
We have made a conscious attempt to make the solution flexible to accommodate various exceptional circumstances that different businesses might find themselves in, while complying with the new reform. We have also extended a solution to businesses who have registered under the composition scheme, who can now generate bill of supply and file GSTR-4 with ease. With these additions to our latest release, we are confident that businesses will find it easier to transition to the new reform.
Tally.ERP 9 Release 6.4 will also enable businesses registered under the composition scheme to become GST compliant. With Tally, businesses can generate Bills of Supply for their sales. Businesses can also export GSTR4 in JSON at the click of a button and upload it to the GST portal. The product is priced at INR 18,000+GST for a single user edition and INR 54,000+GST for a multi-user edition, the same as earlier.
The latest version of GST-ready Tally continues to be available for purchase at an affordable EMI. The single user edition can be purchased with a down payment of INR 5,287, and the remaining amount can be paid in equal monthly installments over a period of 7 months.
India Electronics and Semiconductor Association [IESA], the premier trade body, representing the Indian electronic system design and manufacturing space in collaboration with MarketsAndMarkets launched an industry report on – Indian semiconductor fabless startup ecosystemat the this year’s Vision Summit.
The report was launched by Ashwini K Aggarwal, Chairman, IESA; Anilkumar Muniswamy, Director, SLN Technologies Ltd. and Jitendra Chaddah, Chair, Fabless CIG and Senior Director, Strategic Relations and Operations, Intel India on Day 1 of IESA’s annual flagship event – Vision Summit. It has revealed that the Indian semiconductor component market is expected to be worth USD 32.35 billion by 2025, growing at a CAGR of 10.1% between 2018 and 2025.
The inaugural session was presided over by Shri Priyank M Kharge, Honorable Minister for IT, BT and S&T, GoK. Sharing the stage was H.E Ms. Dana Kursh, Consul General of Israel to South India, Sh. Shailendra Tyagi, Director, STPI Bangalore, who addressed the audience on the necessity to refocus on the unbridged talent pool, need for accelerating investment promotions, international alliances, start-up ecosystem and policy implementation to strengthen India’s contributions in Design-led Electronics Manufacturing.
The Vision Summit is a global leadership conclave for the Electronics System Design & Manufacturing [ESDM] industry. This year, the theme is Resurgent India: Electronics, Entrepreneurship and Economy attracted a powerful line-up of industry experts, thought leaders, policy makers, government officials, business and technology experts, venture capitalists, entrepreneurs who shared their views and vision on the future of the ESDM industry as well as the trends, challenges, and opportunities shaping the Indian industry.
Ashwini K Aggarwal, Chairman – IESA and Chaddah, Chair – Fabless-CIG-IESA
We are witnessing the rise of a new India with a stable government clearing policy logjams, taking bold decisions and ambitious targets. With digital as the growth hack and aggressive engagement from the government’s ‘Make in India’ campaign, the ESDM industry will benefit and is projected to see investment proposals over $1.5 Bln over next 2 years. We believe that now is the time to build the future of design led manufacturing.
The fabless report clearly highlights the opportunities for the Indian fabless ecosystem. This year’s theme at IESA Vision Summit 2018 is dedicated towards building the industry success by highlighting opportunity areas and addresses the challenges being faced.
Further, during the launch of SFAL and fabless report, Jitendra Chaddah, Chair, Fabless CIG, IESA, and Senior Director, Strategic Relations and Operations, Intel India said
Given the availability of abundant talent and chip design expertise in India, I am very excited about the tremendous opportunity we have to accelerate the semiconductor fabless ecosystem in the country. The SFAL [Semiconductor Fabless Accelerator Lab] announcement by the Govt. of Karnataka in collaboration with IESA and the release of fabless report are going to be key ingredients to enable India in becoming a Design-led Electronics Manufacturing hub in the coming years.
This initiative also reinforces this year’s Vision Summit that is focusing on ‘Resurgent India: Electronics, Entrepreneurship and Economy’, with a vision to tap the opportunities in the ESDM sector.
Highlights from the Indian Semiconductor Fabless Startup report highlights
The key trends identified in the report include; Smart Industrial Automation, Defense and Rural Broadband
It elaborates on the Indian semiconductor design ecosystem; and highlights the various opportunities for major global semiconductor players to consider India as their global R&D destination
It revealed that India is a highly attractive destination for global R&D centers owing to the availability of talent, as well as lower cost [compared with the US and Western Europe]
About India Electronics & Semiconductor Association [IESA]
IESA is the premier trade body representing the Indian Electronics System Design and Manufacturing ESDM industry and has represented it since 2005. It has over 280 members – both domestic and multinational enterprises. IESA is committed towards building global awareness for the Indian ESDM industry and supporting its growth through focused initiatives in developing the ecosystem. This is through publishing credible data, networking events and alliances with other international associations. IESA works closely with the Government as a knowledge partner on the sector, both at the centre and at the state level. For more information, please visit IESA
myGate, a mobile-based security management solution for gated premises, today announced its foray into Hyderabad. In the first 50 days, myGate has already secured 28 gated communities in the city and is rapidly adding many more each week. Hyderabad is the fastest growing market for myGate and the security solution is now present in more than 15,000 flats/villas within various popular gated communities.
The startup has also opened a 15-member strong office in T-HUB, Gachibowli and is looking to secure more than 400 communities in Hyderabad by the end of 2018. Some of the popular communities of Hyderabad where myGate is present are My Home Jewel, Aparna Sarovar, Lodha Bellezea, Rainbow Vistas and many more.
myGate is a mobile-app-based system that offers a simple yet comprehensive solution for gated communities to manage all operations at the entry and exit gates. It does so by digitizing and often automating manual tasks done by the guards. The solution comprises of an Android app for the security guards and an Android or iOS app for residents, with a fallback to a regular voice call for non-smartphone users.
With this system, all visitor entries and exits are approved and logged digitally, with complete visibility and control to the residents. myGate also offers several advanced capabilities such as e-intercom [automatic visitor authentication], child safety alerts, staff attendance, infrastructure-free vehicle management, touchless resident identification, clubhouse access management, management reporting, visitor overstay alerts. The app is easy to use and is hassle free for residents including senior citizens and children.
Hyderabad has been witnessing the rapid development of many apartment/villa complexes with gated communities coming up all over the city. According to the Telangana Social Development report 2017, around 30 per cent of the total urban population in Telangana state resides in the capital city of Hyderabad and most of them prefer living in a gated community. Security at gated communities has long followed conventional ‘man-guarding’, paper and pen system. The process is inefficient and error prone, making the life of security guards difficult.
In addition, authentication of residents, visitors, and support staff is a huge challenge. Despite significant investments in physical infrastructure like access cards, boom barriers, biometrics, landline intercom, and others, residential premises are unable to keep track of domestic helps, visitors, delivery trucks, taxicabs & other vehicle movements.
Apartment complexes in Hyderabad can now deploy the myGate security solution in less than a week without any investment in hardware or any capital expenditure. The security device is provided in a pay as you go pricing model. The startup also provides and manages the training of facility staff, security guards and building association members. The solution can be deployed in a multi-tiered system where there are multiple security checkpoints, viz. at the main gate and at the building gate. myGate also helps manage visitor car parking easily without compromising on the space reserved for other residents.
myGate started its operations in 2016 from Bengaluru and is focussed on securing two million homes across the top 7 cities within the next two years. The startup is backed by a strong founder team comprising of Vijay Arisetty, an ex- IAF pilot [Shaurya Chakra winner], Abhishek Kumar, former VP at Goldman Sachs, Shreyans Daga, an IIT-ISB alumni and Vivaik Bhardwaj, also an ex-IAF Pilot. myGate recently raised a total of INR 16 crore in its first round of funding, led by Prime Venture Partners.
Vijay Arisetty, CEO & Co-founder, myGate, said
The first 50 days in Hyderabad have been extremely exciting for us at myGate. We started operations in Hyderabad in response to a huge inbound demand and it is now growing faster than Bengaluru! Residents here are keen to adopt new technologies and are focused on improving security of their communities.
As per our estimate, there are over 10,000 gated communities in Hyderabad who will immediately benefit from myGate. We pride ourselves in understanding the complexities around gate management and have designed the entire solution for easy adoption by both the security guards and also the residents.
Srinidhi Babu, Association member for Security at Lodha Bellezea, said
We are delighted to have collaborated with myGate for such a seamless security experience. In today’s world security is of utmost importance. The growing urban population prefers to live in an apartment complex for the safety of their loved ones and having a software-based solution at the gates is not only imperative but also logical.
myGate provides an outstanding experience to the residents of gated communities, allowing them to keep a track of visitors and all the relevant developments happening in their community with the help of an app.
About myGate
Founded in 2016, myGate solves security and visitor problems with an intelligent app-based solution in gated premises. The company ensures safety and security of gated premises by deploying BIAA [Behavioral Intelligence Augmented Authentication] that is designed for hassle free experience of residents and their service staff. For more information, please visit myGate
