NASSCOM marked the second anniversary of its 10,000 Start-up Program to create 10,000 domain specific start-ups in the country by 2020. As the 10,000 start-up program keeps rolling to its fourth phase of shortlisting, Phase 3 had 500 startup shortlists who went through pitch & mentoring Konnect sessions.

Applications are currently being processed on FIFO basis till 22nd April for the next session of Startup Konnect which is a mini boot-camp program for shortlisted startups who will be eligible for connect-2-pitch with all ecosystem partners including leading Accelerators, Angel investor networks & venture capital firms.

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Speaking at the occasion, Rajat Tandon, Senior Director, NASSCOM 10,000 Startups stated

Startups are the lifeblood of our economy. We today have the support of 150 volunteer mentors, industry specialists, angel investors & VCs, as well as a startup alumni network like no other.

We can proudly say that through its phases the 10,000 start-ups program has been able to carve out many success stories across domains. Now with the roll out of the fourth phase, we are looking to accelerate more startups who will re-define the technology landscape of the country.

Speaking at the occasion Mary Grove, Director, Google for Entrepreneurs said

We are impressed by 10,000 Startups’ work to foster a vibrant ecosystem of innovation and entrepreneurship in India. We are very excited for the fourth phase of 10,000 Startups Program that enables entrepreneurs to connect with investors and mentors to grow and expand.

Ravi Narayan, Managing Director, Microsoft Ventures India said

Microsoft Ventures has been working with NASSCOM 10,000 startups to accelerate high potential startups and we are delighted to see the impact of our partnership. Many of the startups we have helped gain traction through our accelerator programs were previously incubated in the 10K Warehouse and the startups have benefited from both programs immensely. We are positive that this partnership will continue to build a stronger ecosystem for startups in India and provide them promising future.

Application Process for startups

  • Startups need to apply for the program here
  • Startups should provide a detailed overview of their business idea and the market opportunity.
  • Approximately 200 startups will be shortlisted for the 4th batch, handpicked by the ecosystem partners.

Benefits of the Program

  • Shortlisted startups will participate in the intensive accelerator pitch & mentoring connect sessions starting June 1st week across Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Kolkata, Chennai and Hyderabad
  • They also get a Start-up Kit – a package worth $25,000 of value added services and credits from Google, Microsoft, AWS, Knowlarity, HackerRank and Kotak

About 10,000 Startups

Started in April 2013, 10,000 Startups is an ambitious attempt by NASSCOM to scale up the startup ecosystem in India by 10x. 10,000 Startups aims to enable incubation, funding and support for 10,000 technology startups in India over the next ten years. The initiative brings together key stakeholders of the ecosystem including startup incubators, accelerators, angel investors, venture capitalists, startup support groups, mentors, and technology corporations.

Since its launch in April 2013, they have done about 450+ events in 22 cities of the country which were attended by a whopping 25,000 attendees and received 9000 Applicants, 800 Startups Shortlists, and 150 Impacts.

Nasscom-Partners

The program is supported by founding partner Google for Entrepreneurs, Microsoft Ventures, Intel and Kotak Mahindra Bank.

Selling cars was a challenge during the olden days [1900 period] until an extra-ordinary salesman & entrepreneur William Billy Durant, founder of General Motors introduced the concept of “Auto-mobile Financing”. Auto-mobile loans were not very common during that period in India & were only restricted to certain standard of society. All that has changed post the liberalization era.

Change in Indian mindset

Consumer mindset of 1980’s was that of ‘caution’. People were only interested in government paying jobs since they were secure even though many of them were low paying!!! Also, in terms of saving; buying a house was only a priority. Owing a vehicle was definitely a distant dream.

Banking sector was also impacted because of this mindset. During the 1980’s, percentage of vehicle loans were minuscule compared to the asset size of the bank.

Emergence of automobile finance

With the increase of foreign investment in India, it impacted many sectors including automobile. This not only impacted the buying capacity of the consumers but also impacted the automobile job sector. Special focus was on the passengers cars & multi-utility vehicle since it impacted the overall economic conditions of India.

Changing consumer mindset

With the changes in the overall landscape in economy & with the Privatization wave during the 1990’s; many things changed for the country. There was an increase in the “overall disposable income” of the Indians & now the consumers were less risk-averse. Now the consumers had the additional help of “loans” whether they wanted to purchase their dream home or buy a car!!!

In order to lure the growing demand of cars among consumers, banks also came up with various types of loans. This definitely helped them to manage their finances in much better way.

Some of the various categories of affordable home-loans are below:

  1. Margin Money Scheme
  2. Advanced Equated Monthly Instalment Scheme
  3. Security Deposit Scheme
  4. Hire Purchase Scheme
  5. Lease Financing Scheme

[Source – SurfIndia]

Game Changer – The internet Era

With the rise of mobile phones in India & the data-rates becoming lesser day by day, consumers made Internet the primary medium for only buying via e-commerce websites but also for securing affordable car-loans. Internet not only provided a medium for the young-trendy consumers to compare prices of cars but also helped them to get car loans at lesser interest rate.

When we talk of internet, we cannot leave behind Bangalore. If you are looking for automobile loan in Bangalore, there are plethora of options that are available with them. Also, considering the traffic situation in Bangalore, there are many people interested in buying cars since it provides them more convenience. Interest rates become very important since many terms & conditions of banks & financial institutions are cryptic, so better to have a look at the car loan interest rate in Bangalore

When it comes to car financing, we have already looked at couple of useful options that might help our readers take an intelligent step in buying their “dream car” but insurance of the car also becomes an integral part of car.

Car Insurance

Car Insurance or motor insurance covers for losses that you might incur if your car gets damaged or stolen. The premium amount of your car insurance is decided on the basis of Insured Declared Value or IDV of the vehicle.

The insurance helps to get coverage against loss/damage, theft, accident, fire & coverage against financial liability [injury/death]. Since, Bangalore is our city of focus, hence you need to properly choose car insurance in Bangalore

Conclusion

The automobile market in India is growing at a very rapid pace & with the recent “Make In India” movement, many companies are keen to setup their “manufacturing plants” in India. This is already happening & it would not only affect the country’s GDP but also prove to be a boon to the consumers & young Indians aspiring to enter the automobile industry…

Pitney Bowes Inc., a global technology company that provides innovative products and solutions to power commerce, called for entries for the second phase of the Pitney Bowes Accelerator Program in India. The program focuses on startups that leverage software for customer information management, mobile, data analytics, location-based services, E-commerce management & Machine learning.

Selected startups will be informed by April, 2015 and invited to present before a jury panel. After the selection process, the names of the selected startups for the six-month long acceleration program will be announced in May, 2015.

Last year, Pitney Bowes named eight startups to the program.  Participants last year included Audianz, Tagalys, Teritree, RetailNav, Heuristics, Ideata, Yo-app and Brown Tape.

More details about the program

  • As part of the program, Pitney Bowes will shortlist entrepreneurs/startups that will have a choice to be located in the PB offices either in Pune or in Noida for incubation and mentorship.
  • Startups in the program will have access to Pitney Bowes’ software, application programming interfaces [APIs] and data for the duration of the program.
  • Training, technical and business guidance and mentoring will be provided to the start-ups from Pitney Bowes engineering and innovation leaders, and from software industry experts.
  • In addition to these strategic connections, start-ups in the Pitney Bowes Accelerator program will also be networking with prospective investors.

Speaking on the of launch of the second batch, Manish Choudhary, Vice President, Global Engineering and Managing Director, Pitney Bowes Software India said

Pitney Bowes guides its clients through the complex worlds of digital and physical technologies to drive growth and create meaningful impact. Startups are vital to technology innovation and India is a hotbed of startups. The talent fostered through the Accelerator Program has the ability to develop disruptive technologies that can be scaled globally.

Pitney Bowes continues to build its presence as a strong organization in India centered on innovation by becoming an incubator partner to NASSCOM’s 10,000 Start-ups initiative. 

About Pitney Bowes

Pitney Bowes is a global technology company offering innovative products and solutions that enable commerce in the areas of customer information management, location intelligence, customer engagement, shipping and mailing, and global e-commerce.  More than 1.5 million clients in approximately 100 countries around the world rely on products, solutions and services from Pitney Bowes.  For additional information, visit Pitney Bowes at www.pb.com

Businessmen and commuters can now check their emails and deal with work issues on the go, thanks to portable computer devices like the Samsung Galaxy Tab and the Apple iPad. Those who love gadgets are also never far from playing their favorite games or accessing the internet, because the tab comes equipped with WiFi and an array of downloadable apps. Unlike mobile phones – where BlackBerry’s are intended for business, while iPhone’s are perfect for social networking and gaming uses – the tablet computers seem to incorporate both. What are the main benefits of owning a portable computer tab?

Portable computer tablets, such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab or the iPad, are beneficial for both business people and gadget fans alike because they offer both easy access to emails and word processing programmes, plus they are equipped for gaming and listening to music on. Busy work people can reply to emails, edit word documents or even host online calls, which makes dealing with work issues convenient and accessible at any time. Many commuters can now do some work on the train, meaning they can relax when they get home.

Alternatively, portable tablets are perfect for those who love socializing and gaming. The Wifi allows users to go online, chat to friends using instant messaging and browse their favorite websites. Users can view sites like Facebook, YouTube or even do some online shopping. Plus, the large screen makes reading online magazines, newspapers and E-books easy and clear.

With the growing penetration of internet in India, many consumers are using the tablet not only for consuming internet content but also using the Calling Tablets which is definitely an add-on while using the tablet. Users always have the option to “Auto-Sync” their content when they are connected to the internet. “Auto-Sync” not only saves the pain of manually updating the data in the central servers i.e. Gmail Server etc. but also ensures huge time-saving when there is more data to be synced.

Battery life plays a very important role since Modem would be active constantly paging to the network & when there is “Background Sync” enabled, consumption might be much more.

In addition, these tablets can keep any film fanatic or music lover occupied for hours. Recent models provide a large memory capacity, allowing films to be stored and watched at any time. Plus, the tablet can be used as an MP3 player. Music fans can either upload their music onto the device, download new tunes from the web or stream free, live music off software such as Spotify, Saavn

Do share your experience with the tablet & how you use it for your day to day use, be it personal or official 🙂

When it comes to clothing, electronics & many other segments, there are many options namely e-commerce websites, price comparison engines etc that are available. However, when it comes to buying motor-bikes, brand value plays a very important role. In a city like Bangalore, where traffic is growing at a breath-taking pace; motor bikes & bi-cycles come in very handy to beat the traffic !!!

As per one of the recent research paper on consumer behavior, consumers usually buy a bike with the intention of keeping for a long period of time; further, you can buy a new bike, since it is an industry with a well-developed secondary market. But bikes are also experience goods: you cannot ascertain every characteristic of the bike before buying the bike as far as your utility function is concerned. You can learn a lot about bikes before buying them, but you still learn a lot after driving them; in particular, you learn whether they are a good match or a bad match for you.

With fuel prices climbing higher and higher, more consumers are interested in motorcycles for their fuel economy. The size and shape of your bike will have a huge impact on its gas mileage though.

There are different kinds of consumers, here we look at the buying motivations of buying a bike

Bike_Buying_Motivations

Source : Study on Motivation factor for purchasing bikes study

Well, but there are many different kinds of consumers namely:

  1. Convenience seekerBuyers from this segment feel that bike should have good resale value, it should be very convenient to drive on rough roads and bike should be comfortable to drive even for long journey. Hence researcher names these buyers as convenience conscious buyers..
  2. Brand seekerBrand seeker buyers are those who feel that they always first look at the brand name before buying and they prefer to buy a bike whose original spares parts are easily available. These buyers named as brand conscious buyers.
  3. Liberty seekerLiberty seeker buyers feels that bike gives them sense of independence, enjoy when they drive the bike and feel proud when they drive the bike .These buyers are known as liberty conscious buyers.
  4. Quality seeker – These buyers thinks that foreign collaboration bikes are always quality products and they want to buy a good quality product even at higher price. These buyers reflected quality conscious i.e. they named quality conscious buyers.
  5. Economy seekerIn this segment, buyers want to buy cheap bike and prefer to buy bike on installment basis. Researcher named these buyers as economy conscious buyers.

Now that we know that each one of us as a consumer fall in any of the above categories, we look into couple of options for people who are searching for bikes in Bangalore

While we were searching for Honda bikes, Yamaha Bikes in Bangalore which are not only reliable but one of the biggest brands in bikes; it becomes necessary to buy it from the right partner J And yes, not to forget that it should provide mileage & the after sales-support should be good. We collate some of the options for consumers planning to buy Yamaha Bikes

Now, that you being a brand conscious customer have picked up your favorite bike, but what if there is a starter problem or any other issue in the warranty period !!! It becomes important that the “Authorized Dealer” provides best service. This is where choosing the right dealer would help.

So, if you are planning to buy Bike than compare prices online & choose the “Trusted Delaer” in your locality which would be a win-win situation.

We hope that these tips help you in buying your favorite Yamaha or Honda bikes in Bangalore. If you are any other tips, please leave them in the comments section !!!

Tata Elxsi launched ACTIV@TE, a first of it’s kind Academic Collaboration & Talent Incubation Program in association with Sree Chitra Thirunal [SCT] College of Engineering.

ACTIV@TE is an academic collaboration and talent incubation to develop engineering students with the objective of preparing them to be job ready and productive from the very first day of their professional careers. The training will be imparted at state-of-the-art lab facilities provided by Tata Elxsi & SCT, where the chosen talent will be exposed to various industry projects giving them an added advantage in the technology space.

TataElxisi

The services industry has often found that freshers joining at technical positions lack the job ready skill set to contribute to the organization from day one and need to be trained for extended periods before they can be effective.

Speaking about the collaboration, Dr. Shaji Senadhipan, Principal, SCTCE said

Our college has many distinctions on many aspects, one of which is the track record in Campus Placements. We are happy to associate with Tata-Elxsi, for this ACTIV@TE-program.

Speaking at the occasion, Mr. Anil Sondur, Vice President, Tata Elxsi said

We are proud to announce the very first chapter of ACTIV@TE program at SCT College. ACTIV@TE is expected to build to the talent ecosystem at the fresher level and prepare engineering students to have job relevant technical skills across technology domains.

About SCT College of Engineering

SCT College of Engineering Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India started in the year 1995 and functioning under the Dept. of Transport, Govt. of Kerala, is one of the premier engineering colleges in the state. In 2006, Outlook magazine gave SCT College a rank of 98 in its list of top 100 engineering colleges of India, and it is one of the top 3 engineering colleges in Kerala. SCTCE is one of the seven colleges in the state of Kerala aided under the World Bank funded Technical Education Quality Improvement Programme [TEQIP] in 2003. More details at http://www.sctce.ac.in

edX, the non-profit online learning initiative joins hands with Microsoft Corporation as its first corporate member to offer MOOCs on edX.org. Through this program, Microsoft will offer the edX global learning community courses to acquire the core development skills needed to be successful in the cloud-first, mobile-first world.

MicrosoftLogo

Taught by Microsoft experts, these first courses would focus on in-demand skills, feature interactive coding, assessments & exercises and are now open for enrolment. Anders Hejlsberg, technical fellow at Microsoft, will co-teach “Introduction to TypeScript” with “Introduction to Bootstrap”, students will learn a popular front-end web development framework. Students can enroll in Microsoft courses for free or obtain a verified certificate for a fee. Enrollment opens today, with courses beginning at the end of March.

Speaking about the collaboration, Anant Agarwal, CEO, edX said:

Microsoft has already made significant contributions to the edX platform by developing an XBlock that enables course creators to embed Office Mix lectures into their edX courses. With these new MOOCs, millions of edX learners around the world will gain important technical skills to excel in their careers.

Speaking at the occasion, Steve Guggenheimer, Corporate Vice President & Chief Evangelist, Developer Experience [DX] at Microsoft said:

Microsoft has a long history of working within the community to make coding and app development more accessible and rewarding to the growing number of people who want to help shape the technology industry. Together with edX, we can provide new opportunities for students and developers from around the world to create innovative applications, services & experiences that have a meaningful impact on today’s mobile and cloud centric world. This new initiative expands upon edX’s recent collaboration with Microsoft’s Office Mix. With Office Mix, educators produce videos and online lectures that deliver an engaging experience to students, with support for audio and video recordings, screen captures, hyper-links and digital ink.

Microsoft courses include

Programming with C#

C# is a widely-used .NET programming language that is designed to provide a simple yet powerful language for general purpose programming needs. Students will learn the fundamentals of C# supporting cross-platform application development.

Introduction to TypeScript

TypeScript is a new highly-productive superset of JavaScript that is rapidly gaining currency amongst developers who build and maintain large JavaScript applications. In this course co-authored by Anders Hejlsberg, students will learn language syntax and how to use TypeScript to generate JavaScript for any platform.

Introduction to Bootstrap

Bootstrap is a mobile-first web UI framework originally developed at Twitter that has become a foundational technology for front-end web development. This course will investigate the power of Bootstrap and how to implement it in applications.

Querying with Transact SQL

Transact-SQL is the structured query language for SQL Server. This course will show how to use Transact-SQL to code a range of solutions, ranging from retrieving data from a SQL Server database to implementing transactional programming logic.

Building Cloud Apps with Microsoft Azure

This course takes a patterns-based approach to building real-world cloud solutions on Microsoft Azure.  Students will learn the latest tools and technologies in cloud development and study the techniques for cloud-based application design.

Introduction to Office 365 API’s

Office 365 offers the tools users need to get work done anywhere and on any device. In this course, developers will learn how to create robust cross-platform applications using Office 365.

Windows PowerShell Fundamentals

This course provides fundamental knowledge and skills needed to use Windows PowerShell to automate common administrative functions in Windows-based clients and servers. Students will get hands-on practice to replace manual, repetitive & time-consuming operations with effective, automated solutions in both local and remote scenarios. This course is offered as part of the edX Professional Education series and has a fee associated with it.

About edX

EdX is a nonprofit, open-source enterprise offering online courses from more than 60 member institutions, composed of both leading global universities and colleges and a diverse group of prominent organizations from around the world. Founded by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, edX is focused on transforming online and on-campus learning through ground-breaking methodologies, game-like experiences and cutting-edge research on an open-source platform.

Tally Solutions Pvt. Limited [TSPL] announced the launch of its new channel partner program Vriddhi, to enable its channel partner ecosystem to deliver higher quality experience to customers, while maximizing profitability in business. The program offers opportunities to both new and existing partners to develop greater specialization in their respective domains and lines of business.

TallySolutions

The Vriddhi framework will classify partners into Certified Partners, Associate Partners, Partner Developers and Distributors. The program will institutionalize Tally Solutions’ partner enablement process through certification, ensuring partners are in specialized roles to deliver better and more streamlined services to Tally customers.

Speaking about Vriddhi, Tejas Goenka, Executive Director, Tally Solutions Pvt. Ltd. mentioned

With Vriddhi, we intend to create the country’s largest, and most profitable software ecosystem that can deliver great experiences on our world-class products to the diverse customer base that we serve. The new model recognises that growth for the existing ecosystem requires serious focus, dedication, and support from the principal company – especially given the uncertain times that this market is going through right now. With Vriddhi, we will have customers getting access to better sales and support facilities. We will also see more profitable partners pursuing growth like never before.

Partners have been classified based on their organisational strengths and their aspirations with Tally business.

The Certified Partners [CPs] specialize in the sales, implementation and solutions of Tally products. They are characterized by their ability to deliver a great customer experience which enables them to grow faster. They are process-driven organizations and based on the kind of customers they reach out to, they will be classified as 3 star partners and 5 star partners. While the former group will meet regular and generic business solution needs, the latter will cater to more complex business requirements.

Tally also has a clear path to ready its aspiring partners for certification.  These partners would use the expertise that they have developed in Tally products to advise businesses on their Tally related requirements. As they grow in this capacity they will graduate to becoming Certified Partners.

The next category is the Associate Partners [APs], who will play a pivotal role in Tally solutions’ expansion plans. These partners will essentially be IT hardware vendors who are looking to add Tally to their portfolio and thereby addressing more customers, along with serving their existing customers better.

Partner Developers [PDs], will be the niche set of partners who will appoint, train and mentor the Certified Partner category and assist them with certification. Tally desires to do both, grow its existing partners, as well as expand its network to get more and more partners certified. Partner developers will play a key role with this objective and drive their business growth with this model of growing partners.

Distributors will be the bridge for the product between Tally Solutions and all customer-facing partners. They will ensure maximum coverage and access for these partners which will lead to the ease of commerce overall.

Led by the firm belief that Tally will grow only if its partners grow, Vriddhi is defining new beginnings with a greater experience for all its customers, continuous knowledge update for partner resources and sustainable, consistent and fast-paced growth for all Tally partners.

About Tally Solutions Private Limited

Tally Solutions Pvt. Ltd. is a pioneer in the business software products arena. Since its inception in 1986, Tally’s simple yet powerful products have been revolutionizing the way businesses run. Having delivered path breaking technology consistently for more than 27 years, Tally symbolizes unmatched innovation and leadership. Today, it caters to millions of users across industries in over 100 countries and continues unchallenged as the industry leader in the enterprise resource planning software domain. For more details, please visit their website