Computers Today, November 1-15, 1999, Country Buzz, pg3

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November 1-15, 1999 COUNTRY BUZZE

IT.Com Aims to Generate Rs 500 cr Business

The government of Karnataka is organising "Bangalore IT.Com" the second edition of its annual IT extravaganza from November 1-5. Billed as the largest IT event in the country, the focus of the current year's event is expected to be the six pavilions which will focus on different sections of the industry. The pavilions would cover nearly 20,000 sq. ft and the event is being hosted at 'Electronics City' situated on the outskirts of Bangalore. The special focus pavilions include ones on areas such as Linux, ERP, E-commerce, infrastructure, home PC market and IT education.

The Linux pavilion is expected to provide an opportunity for the participants to display their services and products which are available on this OS platform. This pavilion has expectedly drawn very high interest specially in the light of the recent decision of the Karnataka government to make Linux a part of the compulsory curricula of the state's university syllabus to ensure availability of trained manpower on this fast growing platform.

The E-commerce pavilion will focus on supply chain management, procurement and seller service opportunities for the participants.

Godrej & Boyce Exits from GPTL, Sells Stake

Godrej: End of the game Godrej & Boyce Manufacturing Ltd have announced divestment of its 50 percent equity shareholding in the infotech distribution company, Godrej Pacific Technology Ltd to its joint venture partner Tech Pacific. All nominees of Godrej & Boyce have stepped down as directors, and Shailendra Gupta has been appointed as the managing director. The operating management structure remains the same. Says managing director Janshyd Godrej, "This transaction was inevitable and is the outcome of the group's restructuring efforts."

NEW RELEASES
TCS Launches MasterCraft For Development Projects

After years of beta testing, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has finally launched MasterCraft, an integrated suite of software products, in India. The company describes the package as the world's first comprehensive software tool-based model for the systematic execution and management of large software development projects.

MasterCraft has been positioned as an ideal development environment for medium to large scale multi-tier generic and customer applications. It has been designed to address major technology issues such as fast change in technology leading to swift upgradation. TCS expects software companies, insurance and financial sector companies and other core sector agencies to buy the concept. On the timing of the launch, TCS chief executive S. Ramadorai said that the concept had achieved maturity and the company was feeling confident for the global launch. "MasterCraft will find use in complex application development and will free companies from being locked into obsolescent platforms," he said. MasterCraft has been developed by Tata Research Design and Development Centre at Pune, which has been doing major research projects for the Tata Group. The suite has at its heart a new modelling tool called Adex, which supports industry standard notations such as UML and ER modeling. It is suitable for different distributed architectures and uses object-oriented technology. The product is component-based and has repository-driven environment.

Seagate Intros Sea Shell for Data Protection

A systems failure for merely two-three days can lead to a loss of $7 billion for a company. Sounds amazing but this is how the state of IT is. With information becoming the key asset of an organisation, it's become almost imperative for companies to protect whatever they have in their PCs. In a bid to address this key area, Seagate Technology Inc. has introduced a new packaging technology, Sea Shell, as a part of their 3D Defense System. It can protect disk drives from over 1000 Gs of shock, shield drives from electrostatic discharge and reduce failure caused by handling damages by up to 70 percent. This is expected to result in a lot of cost savings to the customers. Sea Shell is a thermo-formed, shock-ribbed, translucent package allowing the customer to read labels, scan bar-codes, load software and move drives in warehouse keeping the drives more or less immune to the hazards.

ISPS & TELECOM
Korean Giant Picks up Equity Stake in Convergent

Venkat Kedlaya: More funds in the kitty Convergent Communications India Pvt. Ltd (CCIPL), formed last year by Motorola Internet and Networking Group's (ING) core team of network professionals, has got a major boost to its business plans following South Korea-based Comtec Systems deciding to pick up a 49 percent stake in the former. According to Venkat Kedlaya, managing director, CCIPL, the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) has already cleared the proposal of the Korean firm for the investment. Convergent Communications, with an authorised capital of Rs 1 crore, is expecting Comtec to bring in its investments shortly. These will be utilised to further Convergent's expansion plans. It will also enable Convergent to introduce in the Indian market, the entire range of networking products on Comtec, which include hubs, switches and routers. Convergent Communications is a leading provider of LAN/WAN solutions in the Indian market place. It recently introduced Motorola's Electronic Technical Assistance Centre (eTAC) services to all its customers in India.

E-mailing NRIs in US Becomes Easier

E-mails have turned out to be the best mode of communicating with people in other parts of the world. Though this is being rated as the most cost-effective means of communication, the receiver has to run to his PC to check the mails. But a group of NRIs based in the US have come out with a new solution to send and receive mails in America. This new service allows you to post messages from India to your relatives or business associates in America over their phone, fax or even pagers using a simple E-mail service. NotifyUS.com is a new company that has come out with a Web site-www.notifyus.com-wherein you can just type out your message to the person in the US, which will be delivered on to his phone, fax, cellular or pager. The type message gets converted into a voice mail and is immediately sent to the receiver. In turn, the receiver has the option to send a reply back as a voice response. Says Shyam Aiyar, CEO, "During my small research on the usage of Internet E-mails in US, I found that about 80 percent of regular Internet users have their PCs connected to the Net for less than three hours a day and they check mails about twice a day. To address this need we conceived this new Web site."

Kale Rolls out a Range of Intranet Software

Jain: Casting a web on banks Mumbai-based Kale Consultants has introduced four Intranet software packages aimed at improving overall performance efficiency of large, multi-locational organisations. The products, tailored to suit the needs of the banking industry, are: Web Friday Reporting, Web CIS, Sahayak and Web PMS. Says Vipul Jain, managing director, Kale Consultants, "These packages are ideal for the banking sectors."

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