Test Test Test

Apparently our beloved Prime Minister Dr.Manmohan Singh wants to know more about the twitter phenomenon and has asked the Minister of State for External affairs minister Dr. Sashi Tharoor,  who by the way is one of the celebrity power users of twitter in India.  Though its interesting how twitter is attracting celebrities to signup, what is more important is that by this means scores of people are getting to talk to these celebrities and like wise the celebrities get to connect to people more on a one-one setting. This is truly a powerful medium for communication and I hope more celebrities, especially politicians take a leaf out of the Dr.Singhs book and start thinking about adopting and using this powerful tool. I’ve complied a small list of some of our Indian celebrities on twitter, feel free to add to the list if I missed someone.

Indian celebrities on twitter:

Sashi Tharoor

Narendra Modi

Barkha Dutt

Meghna Gulzar

Gul Panag

SMX, one of the more popular and niche search marketing conferences in the world in coming to India. According to their website it is scheduled for November 2009. This is great news for the fledgling SEM industry in our country. This is a chance for folks in the SEM & SEO domain to talk, listen and network with some of the best brains in the industry. The SMX India site is not up yet but bookmark this space: http://www.searchmarketingexpo.co.in/

They also seem to have set up a twitter account here: http://twitter.com/smxindia

I’ll try to update this space regularly regarding this event.

Time to get excited?

A new start with a new website ! I did move all of the content from my old blog:

biztrivia.wordpress.com/

to this new place.
http://www.biztrivia.org/blog/

I will be more regular in updating this space and hopefully will meet and make many good friends

Ok. So my last post was about the changing fortunes of the Indian IT companies due to a decline in the conversion rate. My closing line was quoting a hint to the Indian government to rise to the occasion to look for means and ways to prevent the IT boom going bust. But that’s not an easy effort. There are more than 1 billion people in the country. Out of this there are about 500 million children who are currently under the age of 15 who will soon be joining the workforce. Neither the government nor any large business empire can create avenues for employment and growth for these people. It is only possible by budding entrepreneurs.

There are far too few cases to talk about when it comes to Entrepreneurship in India. But the few cases are worth talking about. V.G Siddharth setting up a chain of outlets called the Cafe coffee day is a classic example. In days when coffee was considered to be a beverage only for the elder generation, Siddharth brought in a whole new hip look for the younger generation and having a coffee mug in your hand a style statement. He wanted the youth to come in and have their own choice of coffee, munch on their favorite cake or sandwich and even check their emails. Today the Coffee day is a successful chain not only providing delight to its customers but also providing thousands of employment opportunities.

A graduate of NDA (National Defence Academy) and after serving for some years in Indian army in the aviation branch, Captain Gorur.R.Gopinath decided to take voluntary retirement and return to Bangalore. One day he heard about a story of a Vietnamese woman who returned from Paris to start a helicopter service in Vietnam to provide access to remote locations. That made sense to Gopinath. He felt that the same concept was applicable to India as well where infrastructure remains poor and many parts of the country inaccessible. Air Deccan as an idea was born then. Today it is known as company that started a revolution in the Indian Aviation industry and as a pioneer in budgeted airline service bringing in the skies closer to the common man. Needless to say this company has brought in hundreds of thousands of jobs along with it.

Entrepreneurs create jobs. Jobs provide livelihoods. Livelihoods provide a sense of confidence to provide emotional security to people who depend on us. So, encouraging entrepreneurship should be a top priority for any developing country. If India has to see herself as a world economic super power then there has to be focus on encouraging Entrepreneurs. Institutes like EDI (Entrepreneurship Development Institute) are being established with a mission to provide training and guidance to encourage and ignite young minds to take up this responsibility. It’s an ideal situation a Utopia of sorts but in the end it’s a call the Youth of this Nation has to take!

Gone are the days to be happy that the Indian Rupee (INR) is gaining space over the U.S Dollar (USD). The initial frenzy and buzz over this remarkable achievement dampened as quickly as it sparked. The Ravenous Rupee is not only feasting on the now feeble and frail looking USD but also is eating into the Indian IT industry that has so proudly boasted of its strength and might in the recent years. Reports say that the INR has been on the downside for more than a decade rising sharply from 25 Rupees for a Dollar to about 48 Rupees for a Dollar in 2002. That’s almost about a 100% rise over the decade. When we are talking about these figures in the context of currency appreciation of a country, that’s a huge deal. This phenomenon is hurting the SMEs (Small & Medium Scaled Industries) the more than anybody else. Lion’s Share of business for SMEs is from their US clients and so they are directly impacted by this dipping conversion.

Well for that matter it’s not just the SMEs but even the bigger players like Infosys, Wipro, and Satyam all have reported dips in their profit margins. There is no question about the fact that the impact is paramount. For every 1% appreciation there will be a 40-45 basis points impact on the net margins. This is because the INR’s stellar show against the USD also had ramifications into the European market. Since the start of Fiscal year 07 the rupee has moved from 87 INR to 82 INR against the GBP and from 59 INR to 55 INR against the Euro.

If this trend continues we may soon have to loose a lot of business to countries like China, Philippines who are considered as potential outsource geographies in the West. The onus is completely in the Indian Government to tackle this issue to come up with plans to keep encouraging the IT market that has been a splendid performer contributing to its economy.

Almost three months of no blogging for various reasons has turned out to be a blessing in disguise for me and this blog. I finally have a Page Rank. Thats right folks my blog actually has a PR of 2. Thats more than what some of the ‘better’ sites would die for. This also turned out to be a source of inspiration for me to start blogging again, so much so that , Iam writing this post as soon as I discovered the miracle. I know all the hoopla about ‘Google Dance’ and all the elements of uncertainty that surrounds the consistency of sustaining an actual Page Rank for a significant time. But then, Iam going to relish this momentary state of bliss. Bless my Soul !

Indian Customers can now buy DELL machines for hopefully cheaper rates from July, 2007 thanks to Dell’s manufacturing plant that has been set up on the outskirts of Sriperumbudur. Michael Dell, the company’s founder and CEO made a statement on tuesday that the company is planning to invest as much as 30 million $ in the next five years in order to meet the rising demand of a growing economy. The manufacturing plant would initially start off with 4 lakh personal computers per annum and would rise gradually. Mr. Dell stated that the Dell’s Indian presence was really important for the company as the domestic sales grew about 70% year on year to $ 500 million since last year. Even the Server and Workstation sales have risen to about 19% when compared to last year’s 9%. The company is looking forward to touch the magic figure of $ 1 billion in annual sales soon. Mr. Dell said that the company is going to focus on alternative models and focus on the consumer segment primarily to increase market share. In a country of more than a billion there are only about 50million people who are online which is about 5%, one of the important strategies is to improve this percentage by providing technology at much cheaper rates. He said that the India research centre that has been working to produce world class designs will now start concentrating on domestic products too. The founder also said that the company was looking at introducing some local display shops in an effort to increase awareness of the brand in local markets. It really would be interesting to look at the range of products that DELL would release as its first line of products in India. Can’t wait!

The booming Indian Economy has definitely changed the lifestyle of many. Let it be funky electronic gadgets, trendy clothes , lavish cars, the Indian customer has never been left behind when it comes to owing them. Now, he can buy and own a helipcopter as well. Yes thats true, companies like Eurocopter and Bell are planning to launch their helicopters for sale in India and reports say that there are quite a few enquiries about this project already. Costing around 10 crore rupees these companies are lending their services to provide finance schemes if the customer wants to buy in montly installments as well. Well I wonder how long it will be before I write a post on planes for sale !!! Lageraho India.

With cross broder acquisitions becoming a norm and with domestic mergers on the foray the race is on to reach the magic figure of $ 100 billion for most of the Indian companies. But India’s biggest and most trusted company Reliance Industries stands at No.1 position with a total market value of $ 43 billion sharing the position with India’s public sector energy gaint ONGC. Bharti Airtel which is India’s No.1 telecom company takes the third spot with a market capitalisation of $ 32 billion. All these companies have still a long way to go to reach the magic figure.

So are we giving way too much attention to this topic than it requires? Maybe or maynot. But what is true is that India’s Economy has never been better and the good news is that the party has just begun. The Indian stock market has been performing extremely well and has shown signs of standing pretty tall in difficult times which is always good in the long term. What is more encouraging are the projections that some of the top financial analysts have furnished. Even the most cautious ones are quite confident that the sensex can easily soar over 40,000 mark in comfortable time. Morgan Stanley said that the sensex will cross the 50000 barrier in about 10 years from now, which sounds unbeliavable , atleast this point in time. Earning a global footprint through foreign acquisitions and domestic mergers which would eventually unlock greater value through its operations are other strong reasons for us to be optimistic. Finally other businesses that are huge and have not been listed ,like the Retail sector, when listed will only help in realising the $ 100 billlion dream faster. What is defnitely true and maybe more important than anything else for the members of India Inc., to focus on is the fact that there will be tough competition and the the only way to reach the top spot is to sustain this competition. After all its the Survival of the Fittest !