Here's an article on Citi's current strategy for cost-cutting. The cuts would be mostly on cost-center of Citi - IT. This was bound to happen - the firms were just getting their feet wet (or maturing the relationship with the service providers) in the last 3 or 4 years. This is backed by evidence from a previous article pointing to a Deloitte survey in 2003.
While helping students think through their offers (at MISM), I had always asked them to assess profiles based on nature of job, what they want, etc other than just the pay. When it came to financial firms, one of the dimensions I asked them to consider was whether they were a part of the revenue drivers for the firm or the cost centers for the firm. If they were the cost-centers then there is a possibility that they will have to face one of these days (where they face the axe) !
I get some pleasure in seeing that my thought process was in the right direction. However, I feel sorry for those who will be under the axe because of this step by Citi.
The article highlights on them using offshore services providers ! Election year has come and we will see increasing backlash against outsourcing. However, for global firms such as Citi - it doesn't make sense to run operations from here if they can be done cheaper in some other location on the globe and is able to do so with reasonable SLA adherence.
However, outsourcing need not be the only option. Use of ITIL concepts and other best practices can help reduce costs and make IT more agile and competitive as well. Besides, mindset of converting these cost centers to revenue centers with the existing staff will help achieve the golden middle path - however, that would take more time than Wall St. can wait before next quarter or year ! Also, that would involve significant re-training of existing folks.
Outsourcing, if undertaken, must adhere to eSCM-CL principles developed at ITsqc by an inter-disciplinary set of researchers led by Bill Hefley ! It is a near-complete model w.r.t. dimensions to think about when it comes to Sourcing initiatives.
On an arbitrarily tangential note, a good choice to go long on would be Indian services stocks - which heavily serve these folks. Long live Indian service providers !
Saturday, April 14, 2007
What Board Needs to know about IT !
Board IT Engagement Maturity Model.
Yes, Yet another Maturity Model ! This one deals with how boards of directors are approaching information technology and how they must approach.
Ken Porrello, principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP, introduced this concept at CMU today for a set of ISM grad students. He has close to 20 years of experience in various industries and currently, oversees some of the India operations as well. He is one of the senior partners at the TI practice, where I would be joining in June this year.
Phase 1 of his research included Boards of 455 companies in the United States. Phase 2 is going to include a broad participation in form of 1000 global companies. The phase 1 outcomes can be seen here. The magazine Corporate Board Member also mentioned about this research initiative at Deloitte in their magazine.
At the end, he applauded CMU for having such an interdisciplinary program such as the MISM program.
Yes, Yet another Maturity Model ! This one deals with how boards of directors are approaching information technology and how they must approach.
Ken Porrello, principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP, introduced this concept at CMU today for a set of ISM grad students. He has close to 20 years of experience in various industries and currently, oversees some of the India operations as well. He is one of the senior partners at the TI practice, where I would be joining in June this year.
Phase 1 of his research included Boards of 455 companies in the United States. Phase 2 is going to include a broad participation in form of 1000 global companies. The phase 1 outcomes can be seen here. The magazine Corporate Board Member also mentioned about this research initiative at Deloitte in their magazine.
At the end, he applauded CMU for having such an interdisciplinary program such as the MISM program.
international finance
Pulchritudinous purveyor of intellectual zest - that's what I will term Prof. Chris Telmer as !
I wish I could've taken his 12-unit course than a 6-unit one - but most of the MBA courses at Tepper are designed to be 6-unit ones.
I wish so because I have rarely seen a professor as involved in his work as him. He starts his concepts with extremely basic premises. This is the hallmark of most of the experts - they are able to express their thoughts with simplicity - be it Prof. Chris Telmer or be it Rakesh Jhunjhunwala !
Today, we had this video on international economics in the form of the DVD Commanding Heights - an awesome set of DVDs - I am going to make sure that I go through them before I graduate.
A sample of the same is posted below.
Concepts of International Finance are absolutely essential for a manager in the future with both goods and services becoming tradeable throughtout the nations of this planet. Prof. Bob Dalton had introduced me to Prof. Telmer's class as one of Bob's International Business class was focussed on how to handle opportunities, risks, etc in International business scenario w.r.t. International Finance. I realised that in order to develop a deeper intuition, I need to ask Bob for guidance and he guided me to undertake Chris's class.
Finally, Prof. Chris Telmer doesn't go to agree with what all the big boys have to say. With correct rationale and strong supporting argument, he even criticized the hoopla being carried out by notable speakers (Buffett, Roubini, Roach et al) about the US trade-deficits. The paper can be found here on the NYU website.
Finally, on a resigning note, here's a video on how India saved its day by having meritorious ppl in place.
I hope the current Govt remains in place for some time to come !
I wish I could've taken his 12-unit course than a 6-unit one - but most of the MBA courses at Tepper are designed to be 6-unit ones.
I wish so because I have rarely seen a professor as involved in his work as him. He starts his concepts with extremely basic premises. This is the hallmark of most of the experts - they are able to express their thoughts with simplicity - be it Prof. Chris Telmer or be it Rakesh Jhunjhunwala !
Today, we had this video on international economics in the form of the DVD Commanding Heights - an awesome set of DVDs - I am going to make sure that I go through them before I graduate.
A sample of the same is posted below.
Concepts of International Finance are absolutely essential for a manager in the future with both goods and services becoming tradeable throughtout the nations of this planet. Prof. Bob Dalton had introduced me to Prof. Telmer's class as one of Bob's International Business class was focussed on how to handle opportunities, risks, etc in International business scenario w.r.t. International Finance. I realised that in order to develop a deeper intuition, I need to ask Bob for guidance and he guided me to undertake Chris's class.
Finally, Prof. Chris Telmer doesn't go to agree with what all the big boys have to say. With correct rationale and strong supporting argument, he even criticized the hoopla being carried out by notable speakers (Buffett, Roubini, Roach et al) about the US trade-deficits. The paper can be found here on the NYU website.
Finally, on a resigning note, here's a video on how India saved its day by having meritorious ppl in place.
I hope the current Govt remains in place for some time to come !
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
challenging times ahead...
Next week is going to be hectic ! Mid-terms, assignments, taxes, what not !
Time management will be critical and keeping good health would be essential.
I might sound masochistic while inflicting this pain on myself by taking up so many courses though only 3 units worth work was required for graduation. But hey, I wanted to see if I can do it- this one last time :) I started off school with 7 courses and ending with similar workload.
Letsee how it goes !
Time management will be critical and keeping good health would be essential.
I might sound masochistic while inflicting this pain on myself by taking up so many courses though only 3 units worth work was required for graduation. But hey, I wanted to see if I can do it- this one last time :) I started off school with 7 courses and ending with similar workload.
Letsee how it goes !
Monday, April 09, 2007
keywords on your resume
I knew about this all along: Check out this article for more information for the same.
No wonder, the amount of interview calls I received reflected a high hit-rate because I didn't laze out and submit the same resume to every position. Crafting the resume to fit the position advertised is important and well-reflected in this article. I had been searching for such an exhaustive article since long and finally, Marc's email showed me the same.
I had no idea that there exists services like these - using which one can get certified as a resume-writer. Services are getting highly specialized and hence, the need for qualifications. This highlights how important one's resume can be - at least to get the foot in the door - thereafter, its all you !
No wonder, the amount of interview calls I received reflected a high hit-rate because I didn't laze out and submit the same resume to every position. Crafting the resume to fit the position advertised is important and well-reflected in this article. I had been searching for such an exhaustive article since long and finally, Marc's email showed me the same.
I had no idea that there exists services like these - using which one can get certified as a resume-writer. Services are getting highly specialized and hence, the need for qualifications. This highlights how important one's resume can be - at least to get the foot in the door - thereafter, its all you !
Sunday, March 25, 2007
...last mini...
In order to avoid suffering from Senioritis, I took up quite a challenging workload for this mini. Besides the regular project work going on for Citi and the Macroeconomics class (yea, its a full-length gig), I have the following on my platter:
Macroeconomics:
Prof Sleet continues this mini (yea, it's a full-length) further with Macroeconomics. We dig Ben Bernanke's book further for some more models, theories, etc.
International Finance:
As Prof Bob Dalton suggested, I have taken this course to learn how to finance cash flows in international business, and of course, how to manage risks (using say, hedging) and take advantage of opportunities made available by market sometimes.
Prof Chris Telmer has a specific chutzpah ! He is Canadian and pronounces "out" in the typical Canadian way. Besides, the part which makes the class interesting is his variety of interests. I couldn't believe when he mentioned Jimi Hendrix in the history of International Finance :) Very interesting. I look forward to see how this class shapes up. I am already excited with the first assignment as it was a good excercise for me.
Marketing Applications of Data Mining:
Fairly demanding on time. Learning curve involved is slightly steeper (as we have to learn SAS). However, that's a good thing. Heinz course on Data mining didn't have SAS involved and I wanted this eclectic mix (as its offered by Tepper) and not a pure Data Mining class (as offered by Heinz). Of course, nothing beats Auton Lab's data mining stuff at CMU !
Corporate Finance:
Lynn Pastor continues this semester with Corp Finance. (I have taken atleast one course per semester with her:)). Curriculum for Corporate Finance is fairly similar to Valuation class I have done and I think I may drop it eventually. Let me figure out my schedule in the next 2 weeks. The course does not have much demands - similar to earlier classes such as Accounting, Principles of Finance, etc
Sourcing Management:
Bill Hefley, ITsqc Director, is delivering this super-awesome course !
Man, he knows more about India than most of the Indians do (lol!). Of course some may argue that he is doing business with India and hence, must know about it. CMM Level 5 is created in Pittsburgh and implemented in Bangalore (this is a statement by my fellow colleague!). He knows Indian IT services business folks by names and they know him personally.
In this course, we go in depth with eSCM and several other aspects of Sourcing. This will be one of those dreamed of courses for me and I am fortunate that Bill chose to deliver it this semester :)
IS ProjecT:
Yes - The Project ! This is shaping up well and getting exciting with me studying more of ITIL and application of the principles to solve client's problems. We are close to entering the design phase soon.
Business Process Modeling:
I sampled this course last week and figured out that it is a great course. Karyn Moore, my academic advisor as well, is delivering this new course. Text book seems good and so does the tools involved in the course learning (IBM Websphere Business Modeler).
ITIL certification:
Have to get this done in this mini.
TAship for Enterprise Architectures course:
Yes - this mini the class is offered as a distance lecture making the dynamics completely different as compared to the earlier one. We had to change the syllabus, readings, nature of assignments, interaction protocol, etc. in order to ensure students get the most for their money.
Nice exercise though !
I have taken courses which demand quite a bit. The committment will be for 8 weeks and hence, I dont want to enter something I am not comfortable with. As you can see, this mini is fairly challenging w.r.t. time management. Off I go for the next meeting.
Macroeconomics:
Prof Sleet continues this mini (yea, it's a full-length) further with Macroeconomics. We dig Ben Bernanke's book further for some more models, theories, etc.
International Finance:
As Prof Bob Dalton suggested, I have taken this course to learn how to finance cash flows in international business, and of course, how to manage risks (using say, hedging) and take advantage of opportunities made available by market sometimes.
Prof Chris Telmer has a specific chutzpah ! He is Canadian and pronounces "out" in the typical Canadian way. Besides, the part which makes the class interesting is his variety of interests. I couldn't believe when he mentioned Jimi Hendrix in the history of International Finance :) Very interesting. I look forward to see how this class shapes up. I am already excited with the first assignment as it was a good excercise for me.
Marketing Applications of Data Mining:
Fairly demanding on time. Learning curve involved is slightly steeper (as we have to learn SAS). However, that's a good thing. Heinz course on Data mining didn't have SAS involved and I wanted this eclectic mix (as its offered by Tepper) and not a pure Data Mining class (as offered by Heinz). Of course, nothing beats Auton Lab's data mining stuff at CMU !
Corporate Finance:
Lynn Pastor continues this semester with Corp Finance. (I have taken atleast one course per semester with her:)). Curriculum for Corporate Finance is fairly similar to Valuation class I have done and I think I may drop it eventually. Let me figure out my schedule in the next 2 weeks. The course does not have much demands - similar to earlier classes such as Accounting, Principles of Finance, etc
Sourcing Management:
Bill Hefley, ITsqc Director, is delivering this super-awesome course !
Man, he knows more about India than most of the Indians do (lol!). Of course some may argue that he is doing business with India and hence, must know about it. CMM Level 5 is created in Pittsburgh and implemented in Bangalore (this is a statement by my fellow colleague!). He knows Indian IT services business folks by names and they know him personally.
In this course, we go in depth with eSCM and several other aspects of Sourcing. This will be one of those dreamed of courses for me and I am fortunate that Bill chose to deliver it this semester :)
IS ProjecT:
Yes - The Project ! This is shaping up well and getting exciting with me studying more of ITIL and application of the principles to solve client's problems. We are close to entering the design phase soon.
Business Process Modeling:
I sampled this course last week and figured out that it is a great course. Karyn Moore, my academic advisor as well, is delivering this new course. Text book seems good and so does the tools involved in the course learning (IBM Websphere Business Modeler).
ITIL certification:
Have to get this done in this mini.
TAship for Enterprise Architectures course:
Yes - this mini the class is offered as a distance lecture making the dynamics completely different as compared to the earlier one. We had to change the syllabus, readings, nature of assignments, interaction protocol, etc. in order to ensure students get the most for their money.
Nice exercise though !
I have taken courses which demand quite a bit. The committment will be for 8 weeks and hence, I dont want to enter something I am not comfortable with. As you can see, this mini is fairly challenging w.r.t. time management. Off I go for the next meeting.
Thursday, March 15, 2007
cap exempted
Soooooooo relieved to know from our Office of International Education expert on immigration matters today - "You are cap exempted". Yay - I dont have to worry about the damn caps (65k or 20k ...whichever).
I just have to do my OPT procedure with USCIS - no hassle of non-travel during the change of status filing as OPT still remains F1 status and employment authorization for the same is truly not change of status. Change of status will happen later - at the end of OPT when I file for H and that time, I dont have to wait till Oct 08 - lol
...Infy zindabad !
I just have to do my OPT procedure with USCIS - no hassle of non-travel during the change of status filing as OPT still remains F1 status and employment authorization for the same is truly not change of status. Change of status will happen later - at the end of OPT when I file for H and that time, I dont have to wait till Oct 08 - lol
...Infy zindabad !
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
associate offers in indian b-schools !
Finally, Associate positions make a scene on the indian b-school campuses... Check out this article on the same ! Ppl wanting to invest in US B-schools now have some hard time to think - instead of investing 10s of thousands of $s, they can get a cheaper one in India- but the competition is intense.
So, someone might say - if one is capable of competing - it makes economic sense to get one in India. However, that's not the case. The # of associate positions is fairly low. In IIM-A, out of 235, only 12 associate positions were made. If you compare that vis-a-vis a US b-school campus, the ratios are different. Moreover, the experience and backgrounds of US bschool folks is richer (it is changing though - it is getting dominated by desi folks these days !).
However, I am glad to see this progress year after year. Schools such as ISB are placing huge pressure on IIMs to perform. Even if they have bureaucracy, they have to cater to demands. I still remember huge demand for managers was a topic of discussion in 2005. The demand is evident in the Indian labor markets. Many companies are promoting their engineers to management positions whenever they cant fill those up with MBAs. Alternatively, they hire managers from tier 2 and tier 3 schools which drives up demand for students from those schools resulting in huge boom.
Supply must be ramped up from qualitative and quantitative dimensions. Soft skills are extremely important for this workforce to be prove themselves to be globally competitive. Team spirits are extremely important and lonely wolves lose out in the long race. I see Indian schools still requiring the soft skills part to be developed !
Most of the foreign firms which hire on Indian firms are looking out for typeAs. Their hiring does not indicate that we have a globally competitive workforce which is capable of grooming leaders. Leaders are groomed in a different setup than the one provided by the Indian schools. I wish someday they progress to GROOM leaders !
So, someone might say - if one is capable of competing - it makes economic sense to get one in India. However, that's not the case. The # of associate positions is fairly low. In IIM-A, out of 235, only 12 associate positions were made. If you compare that vis-a-vis a US b-school campus, the ratios are different. Moreover, the experience and backgrounds of US bschool folks is richer (it is changing though - it is getting dominated by desi folks these days !).
However, I am glad to see this progress year after year. Schools such as ISB are placing huge pressure on IIMs to perform. Even if they have bureaucracy, they have to cater to demands. I still remember huge demand for managers was a topic of discussion in 2005. The demand is evident in the Indian labor markets. Many companies are promoting their engineers to management positions whenever they cant fill those up with MBAs. Alternatively, they hire managers from tier 2 and tier 3 schools which drives up demand for students from those schools resulting in huge boom.
Supply must be ramped up from qualitative and quantitative dimensions. Soft skills are extremely important for this workforce to be prove themselves to be globally competitive. Team spirits are extremely important and lonely wolves lose out in the long race. I see Indian schools still requiring the soft skills part to be developed !
Most of the foreign firms which hire on Indian firms are looking out for typeAs. Their hiring does not indicate that we have a globally competitive workforce which is capable of grooming leaders. Leaders are groomed in a different setup than the one provided by the Indian schools. I wish someday they progress to GROOM leaders !
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
neo biz harp
It is fairly apparent that my exams are over. :P
The Verizon article in WSJ today morning made me log this post. Verizon wants to get into gaming and other stuff in order to capture value of the market they are creating. Stupid ! - they didn't play it safe like AT&T. Their top managers shouted from the top of their lungs that ATT will find it difficult to expand capacities later on. Expand for who? AT&T spent only 4.3 b whereas Verizon spent 20b. A huge committment doesn't always result in a huge return. Verizon has several plans but the original visionaries of the FiOS deal are still around - ask them and they seem to be scared. Scared that their plans may not pan out what they originally planned it for.
For instance, in the gaming space, there is already this company in place: Digital Chocolate. Name of the company aptly suits it as it is going to indulge public in mass-consumption of the cellphone gaming.
Podshow is another firm which will take major piece of the content provision pie in this convergence game. It will be mostly the non Verizon firms which will come in and derive value from the high bandwidth networks made available. How can Verizon stop them from free-riding? Differential QoS is already in doubts due to the whole net-neutrality saga.
There is no point for Verizon to spend so much on the backbone in order to create such large networks which will eventually be used by others. One conspiracy theorist mentions to me that the person who politically forwarded this decision for laying out the fiber had personal interests in the entire affair. Neither the shareholders nor the BoD were convinced about this. So, what does a shareholder do? Sell !
btw, other neo-biz which excited me recently were: Tell Me, Akimbo, Good Technology
Tell Me: has created this seemingly huge platform already. Slowly, steadily, they plan to takeover. Before we even knew, they have 35 m folks working on their systems daily ! They arent the state of the art but they have been able to capture the market relatively fast. Personally, I love the Tmobile IVS - its awesome !!! However, in this world where network externalities come into play - Tell Me may start to rule !
Akimbo: Your wish is on demand ! This continues in my line of harp - IPTV and the digital convergence. Akimbo is well-positioned to take advantage ...they might be little too late to create a lock-in with set top boxes similar to those of 2Wire's or Scientific Atlanta's. However, they are making sure that they have the content !
Good Technology: got acquired by Motorola - dayyuuummm ! Motorola's fatherhood may either provide a huge impetus or suffocate this new startup's spirit. Let us see what happens. Good Technology take advantage of the fact that there are more cell phones than personal computers !
Now, I need to get going to prepare for an engagement tomorrow !
The Verizon article in WSJ today morning made me log this post. Verizon wants to get into gaming and other stuff in order to capture value of the market they are creating. Stupid ! - they didn't play it safe like AT&T. Their top managers shouted from the top of their lungs that ATT will find it difficult to expand capacities later on. Expand for who? AT&T spent only 4.3 b whereas Verizon spent 20b. A huge committment doesn't always result in a huge return. Verizon has several plans but the original visionaries of the FiOS deal are still around - ask them and they seem to be scared. Scared that their plans may not pan out what they originally planned it for.
For instance, in the gaming space, there is already this company in place: Digital Chocolate. Name of the company aptly suits it as it is going to indulge public in mass-consumption of the cellphone gaming.
Podshow is another firm which will take major piece of the content provision pie in this convergence game. It will be mostly the non Verizon firms which will come in and derive value from the high bandwidth networks made available. How can Verizon stop them from free-riding? Differential QoS is already in doubts due to the whole net-neutrality saga.
There is no point for Verizon to spend so much on the backbone in order to create such large networks which will eventually be used by others. One conspiracy theorist mentions to me that the person who politically forwarded this decision for laying out the fiber had personal interests in the entire affair. Neither the shareholders nor the BoD were convinced about this. So, what does a shareholder do? Sell !
btw, other neo-biz which excited me recently were: Tell Me, Akimbo, Good Technology
Tell Me: has created this seemingly huge platform already. Slowly, steadily, they plan to takeover. Before we even knew, they have 35 m folks working on their systems daily ! They arent the state of the art but they have been able to capture the market relatively fast. Personally, I love the Tmobile IVS - its awesome !!! However, in this world where network externalities come into play - Tell Me may start to rule !
Akimbo: Your wish is on demand ! This continues in my line of harp - IPTV and the digital convergence. Akimbo is well-positioned to take advantage ...they might be little too late to create a lock-in with set top boxes similar to those of 2Wire's or Scientific Atlanta's. However, they are making sure that they have the content !
Good Technology: got acquired by Motorola - dayyuuummm ! Motorola's fatherhood may either provide a huge impetus or suffocate this new startup's spirit. Let us see what happens. Good Technology take advantage of the fact that there are more cell phones than personal computers !
Now, I need to get going to prepare for an engagement tomorrow !
usability and free products: google, yahoo, microsoft
Can you imagine having a service provider (having no monopolistic advantages) trying to give you, a user, a hard time with their interface for your interaction. What do you do if you have other options? Switch !
Ease of use, and relevance are of prime importance. There is a reason that there exists a graduate program named "Human Computer Interaction" in some of the leading universities. There is a reason why these students get hired by most of the leading companies quickly. Ease of use does matter.
Check out why Google made it's way much ahead of its competitors such as Yahoo and Microsoft. Google has about 55%+ market of the search market. Yahoo is about 25% and Microsoft, a pithy 5-8%. There are many reasons and HCI is one of the prime ones. Larry Page, one of the Google founders, was a HCI grad student ! Their products beat Yahoo hands down. Microsoft was busy with anti-trust trial and totally lost track.
Microsoft has now started having good HCI products in their portfolio. Also, Yahoo has a similar ideology. They still don't have as much user-inclusion in their product developments. An acquaintance from Microsoft program management team for their search product explained me their process and I believe that they still need to allocate more time for the usability piece. However, to be fair - they are getting better!
Ray Ozzie has discovered that Google is way ahead and MSFT was left behind. However, he also respects them. At the same time, he is pushing his product dev team to get their act right with Live search product. He wants Microsoft back in this game. This market is going to double from USD 40b to USD 80b in 3 years. Microsoft cannot afford to stay back with a mere 5-8% market share.
One way to get back in the game is consolidating the smaller players. I foresee this consolidation happening. How - I dont know....! Let us say, what if the software giant makes a kill and buys out Yahoo? Picture this -
At today's price of 30-32 and outstanding shares of 1.34b, we get about 40b market-cap. If MSFT makes a bid of 20% higher, it will be about USD 48-50 b. MSFT can afford this purchase without any leverage - given their warchest of cash they've built up on their books. Besides, they needn't buy the whole pie; they can just buy a 51% stake at about USD 24 to 25 b. If they wait a bit, they can get it for cheaper as the stock market capitulates due to economic outlook - lol !
MSFT-Facebook romance is going on anyways. (Is this due to the Harvard connection???) So, MSFT will have a good usability team at hand and will be back in the game to take head on with GOOG. This wont be a serious threat to Google because the merger will be disruptive for both the companies from a talent perspective. However, this move will still strengthen Microsoft's position vis-a-vis Google and this move is the only way for Microsoft to get into this search arena, if they are serious about it.
Going back to the usability game, it is interesting to note that Govt of America has considered this seriously and has guidelines at usability.gov.
Ease of use, and relevance are of prime importance. There is a reason that there exists a graduate program named "Human Computer Interaction" in some of the leading universities. There is a reason why these students get hired by most of the leading companies quickly. Ease of use does matter.
Check out why Google made it's way much ahead of its competitors such as Yahoo and Microsoft. Google has about 55%+ market of the search market. Yahoo is about 25% and Microsoft, a pithy 5-8%. There are many reasons and HCI is one of the prime ones. Larry Page, one of the Google founders, was a HCI grad student ! Their products beat Yahoo hands down. Microsoft was busy with anti-trust trial and totally lost track.
Microsoft has now started having good HCI products in their portfolio. Also, Yahoo has a similar ideology. They still don't have as much user-inclusion in their product developments. An acquaintance from Microsoft program management team for their search product explained me their process and I believe that they still need to allocate more time for the usability piece. However, to be fair - they are getting better!
Ray Ozzie has discovered that Google is way ahead and MSFT was left behind. However, he also respects them. At the same time, he is pushing his product dev team to get their act right with Live search product. He wants Microsoft back in this game. This market is going to double from USD 40b to USD 80b in 3 years. Microsoft cannot afford to stay back with a mere 5-8% market share.
One way to get back in the game is consolidating the smaller players. I foresee this consolidation happening. How - I dont know....! Let us say, what if the software giant makes a kill and buys out Yahoo? Picture this -
At today's price of 30-32 and outstanding shares of 1.34b, we get about 40b market-cap. If MSFT makes a bid of 20% higher, it will be about USD 48-50 b. MSFT can afford this purchase without any leverage - given their warchest of cash they've built up on their books. Besides, they needn't buy the whole pie; they can just buy a 51% stake at about USD 24 to 25 b. If they wait a bit, they can get it for cheaper as the stock market capitulates due to economic outlook - lol !
MSFT-Facebook romance is going on anyways. (Is this due to the Harvard connection???) So, MSFT will have a good usability team at hand and will be back in the game to take head on with GOOG. This wont be a serious threat to Google because the merger will be disruptive for both the companies from a talent perspective. However, this move will still strengthen Microsoft's position vis-a-vis Google and this move is the only way for Microsoft to get into this search arena, if they are serious about it.
Going back to the usability game, it is interesting to note that Govt of America has considered this seriously and has guidelines at usability.gov.
global sourcing
Mellon bank's senior officials visited CMU for a presentation on Global Sourcing. They wanted insights into what incremental innovations they can make in order to add productivity, security, performance, and nurture further relationships with their vendors, namely, CTS and INFY. The representatives from both CTS and Infy were present there. I had a talk with Ajay Bhandari, Sr. Engagement Manager from Infy thereafter on some other dimensions.
I could think of application of ATAM from SEI for architectural evaluation by Mellon and Octave from Cylab. Besides, all my productivity tips will go straight to their wiki and cannot be discussed any further. Its interesting to know that this was part of curriculum for a grad education program. Besides, the crowd also provide some other strategic insights for certain cultural aspects. I must appreciate the step forward from Mellon to place a Mellon personnel at offshore DC to be their eyes and ears for the sourcing initiative to be successful.
eSCM certifications are now happening both for service providers as well as clients. These are conducted by ITSqc or IT Services Qualifications Center. Global Sourcing is maturing to the next level. More on the topic later...
I could think of application of ATAM from SEI for architectural evaluation by Mellon and Octave from Cylab. Besides, all my productivity tips will go straight to their wiki and cannot be discussed any further. Its interesting to know that this was part of curriculum for a grad education program. Besides, the crowd also provide some other strategic insights for certain cultural aspects. I must appreciate the step forward from Mellon to place a Mellon personnel at offshore DC to be their eyes and ears for the sourcing initiative to be successful.
eSCM certifications are now happening both for service providers as well as clients. These are conducted by ITSqc or IT Services Qualifications Center. Global Sourcing is maturing to the next level. More on the topic later...
Sunday, February 25, 2007
stalkerish..
This is stalking to the extreme !
Earlier, they wanted to know what everyone is searching for - now they wanna know the locations(lat/long coordinates).
Man, this is compromise of privacy - big time :) Ppl give up privacy for services they receive - not knowing what price they might pay for it later.
The recent one in stack is Google's Dodgeball
Is this Google's answer to 2 challenges:
1. orkut not being as popular/usable as facebook.
2. need to locate folks and provide advertisement possibilities to local businesses.
well, letsee wait-n-watch what happens !
Earlier, they wanted to know what everyone is searching for - now they wanna know the locations(lat/long coordinates).
Man, this is compromise of privacy - big time :) Ppl give up privacy for services they receive - not knowing what price they might pay for it later.
The recent one in stack is Google's Dodgeball
Is this Google's answer to 2 challenges:
1. orkut not being as popular/usable as facebook.
2. need to locate folks and provide advertisement possibilities to local businesses.
well, letsee wait-n-watch what happens !
Sunday, February 18, 2007
which company is your favorite company?
Usually, many of my colleagues ask me this question: Which is your dream company?
My reply: my own company :D
They ask: Besides that?
My reply: From what perspective?
They ask: to work for...duh!
My reply: None
My reply: my own company :D
They ask: Besides that?
My reply: From what perspective?
They ask: to work for...duh!
My reply: None
india business conference
Date: 2/16
Theme: Investing in India: An Entrepreneur's Canvas
Organized by: South Asian Business Association
Experience:
The event started off with a panel's meeting. Panel included CMU's Ashish Arora, Madan Mohan from Infosys, Rick Russow from USIBC, and some others.
Citi India portfolio owner for CitiCards managed his session over Webex as his flight from NYC got cancelled. CEO of iGate, Mr. Sunil Wadhwani had come down for one of the speeches. Besides, Rick had one speech as well. Rick is remarkably aware about India's political, economic, and cultural panorama(Of course, he had coffees with most of the bureaucrats including Montek Singh Ahluwalia and deals with bureaucrats in Tamil Nadu quite often!) Last speech was by Vish Mishra, from Clearstone Venture Capital. Clearstone invests in India-centric ventures (for instance, BillDesk)
In between, there were breaks with Indian foodstuff lined up (samosas, dhoklas, etc). I was unimpressed by CMU's Indian populace who didn't participate at this event ~ doesn't talk well about the entrepreneurial spirit of the community at the school.
Theme: Investing in India: An Entrepreneur's Canvas
Organized by: South Asian Business Association
Experience:
The event started off with a panel's meeting. Panel included CMU's Ashish Arora, Madan Mohan from Infosys, Rick Russow from USIBC, and some others.
Citi India portfolio owner for CitiCards managed his session over Webex as his flight from NYC got cancelled. CEO of iGate, Mr. Sunil Wadhwani had come down for one of the speeches. Besides, Rick had one speech as well. Rick is remarkably aware about India's political, economic, and cultural panorama(Of course, he had coffees with most of the bureaucrats including Montek Singh Ahluwalia and deals with bureaucrats in Tamil Nadu quite often!) Last speech was by Vish Mishra, from Clearstone Venture Capital. Clearstone invests in India-centric ventures (for instance, BillDesk)
In between, there were breaks with Indian foodstuff lined up (samosas, dhoklas, etc). I was unimpressed by CMU's Indian populace who didn't participate at this event ~ doesn't talk well about the entrepreneurial spirit of the community at the school.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
spring courses
Technically, the school authorities call it the spring semester - I have no idea why - this cold is getting annoying - the temperature is 8F and feels like -2F. Man, that's -18C....! that's coooooooooollllllllddddddddddddd !
I wanted to write this post since a long time but either didn't have time or didn't have an inclination towards it. However, right now, I think I am over my writer's block period and can write ...and yo, I am back !
Macroeconomics
Prof Christopher Sleet has recommended the textbook of the most influential economist in the world - Mr. Ben Bernanke !I have the fifth edition but the professor insists on the sixth one which came out midway between the mini. However, this is a semester long course.
I am grasping some important macroeconomic concepts which help give an added dimension and credibility to any of my analysis.
Some of the CMU students are so impudent - they keep their feet on the bag! Check out the adjacent picture !
Business Law and Ethics
Course on Contracts by Ashish Arora was cancelled. That made me take this course and I am so glad I took it. Prof Dale Hershey has close to 40 years of experience practicing civil lawsuits. The book by Beatty Samuelson on Business Law is exhaustive and interesting at the same time.
This gives me a perspective on strategy analysis and also good amount of information required for a manager while making decisions and taking actions.
Contracts, Corporate structuring, intellectual property, cyber law, class actions, jurisdictions, shareholder rights, insider trading, antitrust, environmental law, consumer law, uniform commercial code (UCC), CISG, etc are the topics which are broadly well-covered in this mini-course.
On a sidebar, I met a bunch of first years (MBA) students in this class for our group presentation - all of them were caught up in a crazy chase for the internships .... 2 of the 4 I worked with got offers from Amazon which are freaking amazing offers :) One got from AT Kearney and one is still looking as she wants more !
Digital Transformation
Prof Ramayya Krishnan brings in some good models to think while making decisions w.r.t. IT and deployment of IT for strategic purposes. We mostly deal with IT user category of companies and not the creators.
However, I have a complaint: As participation has such a high grade component, in order
to be fair to everyone, he gives way too much time to some of the folks in the class who crave attention. For instance, someone gives a long pregnant pause (just to get the footage) once s/he is given an opportunity to talk. Moreover, there are folks who bring in previous points while the discussion is in a specific flow (no matter how irrelevant they are to the current discussion). Then there's someone that takes at least 3 mins to describe the point s/he is trying to make.
I feel stuck in this class.... I didn't have a choice while taking this course as it has been made a capstone course which is compulsory. It must be dropped from the list of required courses - or must be allowed to be exempted if something similar is done. My strong opinions come from the fact that I had to miss the Capability Improvement for Service Organizations class due to time conflict with Digital Transformation. If DT wasn't a core course, I would've taken the Capability one !
Information Security and Risk Analysis
Interesting course with a great deal of insight in valuing risk. This is close to Options Pricing which I studied last semester. When I put up the point regarding security firms coming up with insurance for the clients w.r.t. managed security services, professor mentioned that there is lack of data. I could quickly correlate it to the fact that in case of stocks, there is second to second ticker data.
Prof Ashish Arora puts out the ideas really neat - these are useful for a consultant in general and a security department personnel in specific.
One of his TA Sasha Ramanov has a nice site which you can check out here. Another TA suggested me the WEIS 2007 event. I will try to make sure I am in Pgh around that time in order to attend it.
Lectures are conducted in Collaborative Innovation Center (CyLab hosts Google, Intel, etc offices here) for the infrastructure setup as the classes are being relayed to Kobe(Japan) as well.
Capstone project: Citigroup Corporate and Investment Banking
I can't write much about this as we have to protect the interests of our client.
In order to maximize the learning experience, our advisor Dave Burke has given roles to the
folks who did not have experience in those areas. For instance, I have acquired knowledge on being an architect but never worked as an architect before - so, I was made the architect. Someone else hasn't done project management, so s/he took up prj mgr role and myself and someone else who has done it will guide him/her. This method has its own pros and cons.
All in all, a busy semester going on. I can manage to hit the gym several times a week and I am happy about that. Moreover, I am able to undertake other activities such as ice-skating, skiing, clubbing, latino dancing, etc in some free pockets of time.
I wanted to write this post since a long time but either didn't have time or didn't have an inclination towards it. However, right now, I think I am over my writer's block period and can write ...and yo, I am back !
Macroeconomics
Prof Christopher Sleet has recommended the textbook of the most influential economist in the world - Mr. Ben Bernanke !I have the fifth edition but the professor insists on the sixth one which came out midway between the mini. However, this is a semester long course.
I am grasping some important macroeconomic concepts which help give an added dimension and credibility to any of my analysis.
Some of the CMU students are so impudent - they keep their feet on the bag! Check out the adjacent picture !
Business Law and Ethics
Course on Contracts by Ashish Arora was cancelled. That made me take this course and I am so glad I took it. Prof Dale Hershey has close to 40 years of experience practicing civil lawsuits. The book by Beatty Samuelson on Business Law is exhaustive and interesting at the same time.This gives me a perspective on strategy analysis and also good amount of information required for a manager while making decisions and taking actions.
Contracts, Corporate structuring, intellectual property, cyber law, class actions, jurisdictions, shareholder rights, insider trading, antitrust, environmental law, consumer law, uniform commercial code (UCC), CISG, etc are the topics which are broadly well-covered in this mini-course.
On a sidebar, I met a bunch of first years (MBA) students in this class for our group presentation - all of them were caught up in a crazy chase for the internships .... 2 of the 4 I worked with got offers from Amazon which are freaking amazing offers :) One got from AT Kearney and one is still looking as she wants more !
Digital Transformation
Prof Ramayya Krishnan brings in some good models to think while making decisions w.r.t. IT and deployment of IT for strategic purposes. We mostly deal with IT user category of companies and not the creators.
However, I have a complaint: As participation has such a high grade component, in order
to be fair to everyone, he gives way too much time to some of the folks in the class who crave attention. For instance, someone gives a long pregnant pause (just to get the footage) once s/he is given an opportunity to talk. Moreover, there are folks who bring in previous points while the discussion is in a specific flow (no matter how irrelevant they are to the current discussion). Then there's someone that takes at least 3 mins to describe the point s/he is trying to make.I feel stuck in this class.... I didn't have a choice while taking this course as it has been made a capstone course which is compulsory. It must be dropped from the list of required courses - or must be allowed to be exempted if something similar is done. My strong opinions come from the fact that I had to miss the Capability Improvement for Service Organizations class due to time conflict with Digital Transformation. If DT wasn't a core course, I would've taken the Capability one !
Information Security and Risk Analysis
Interesting course with a great deal of insight in valuing risk. This is close to Options Pricing which I studied last semester. When I put up the point regarding security firms coming up with insurance for the clients w.r.t. managed security services, professor mentioned that there is lack of data. I could quickly correlate it to the fact that in case of stocks, there is second to second ticker data.
Prof Ashish Arora puts out the ideas really neat - these are useful for a consultant in general and a security department personnel in specific.
One of his TA Sasha Ramanov has a nice site which you can check out here. Another TA suggested me the WEIS 2007 event. I will try to make sure I am in Pgh around that time in order to attend it.
Lectures are conducted in Collaborative Innovation Center (CyLab hosts Google, Intel, etc offices here) for the infrastructure setup as the classes are being relayed to Kobe(Japan) as well.
Capstone project: Citigroup Corporate and Investment Banking
I can't write much about this as we have to protect the interests of our client.
In order to maximize the learning experience, our advisor Dave Burke has given roles to the
folks who did not have experience in those areas. For instance, I have acquired knowledge on being an architect but never worked as an architect before - so, I was made the architect. Someone else hasn't done project management, so s/he took up prj mgr role and myself and someone else who has done it will guide him/her. This method has its own pros and cons.All in all, a busy semester going on. I can manage to hit the gym several times a week and I am happy about that. Moreover, I am able to undertake other activities such as ice-skating, skiing, clubbing, latino dancing, etc in some free pockets of time.
Saturday, February 03, 2007
Rendezvous with a Mayor!
Last night, at the PNC Park, I had an opportunity to meet the youngest 
Mayor in the United States Mr. Ravenstahl. He is young, dynamic, understands business terms and concepts well, and a visionary. He is fairly matured for his age and has the burning desire for turning around the City of Pittsburgh. Accordingly, he has taken steps at the micro-levels to work on converting the "Iron City" to a "Techno City". I wished him all the best in his endeavors when I met him and briefly introduced myself to him and where my origins are from (Mumbai).
After the Mayor's event followed the Network Pittsburgh event for Alumni networking. I met a few Deloitte folks out there and met some other interesting folks from the Heinz school who I had never met before. Nice event !
Post-networking meet, we went for the happy hour to Atria's to have some more meetings with the folks. Ron, our career services director, gave me compliment for being the "best dressed MISM" - so flattering ! Thank you Ron !
The travel back home was horrendous. My lips hurt due to the extreme cold weather in Pittsburgh. I didn't drive down to the event because I was planning on having some drinks. Hence, I had to use several connections of the bus routes to reach back home. One such link made me wait for half an hour and I think the temperature was -5 F. This coupled with the thin suit trousers sent shivers through my spine...literally ! It taught me a good lesson that I must never be out in the cold - no matter what my cold tolerance is.
Mayor in the United States Mr. Ravenstahl. He is young, dynamic, understands business terms and concepts well, and a visionary. He is fairly matured for his age and has the burning desire for turning around the City of Pittsburgh. Accordingly, he has taken steps at the micro-levels to work on converting the "Iron City" to a "Techno City". I wished him all the best in his endeavors when I met him and briefly introduced myself to him and where my origins are from (Mumbai).
After the Mayor's event followed the Network Pittsburgh event for Alumni networking. I met a few Deloitte folks out there and met some other interesting folks from the Heinz school who I had never met before. Nice event !Post-networking meet, we went for the happy hour to Atria's to have some more meetings with the folks. Ron, our career services director, gave me compliment for being the "best dressed MISM" - so flattering ! Thank you Ron !
The travel back home was horrendous. My lips hurt due to the extreme cold weather in Pittsburgh. I didn't drive down to the event because I was planning on having some drinks. Hence, I had to use several connections of the bus routes to reach back home. One such link made me wait for half an hour and I think the temperature was -5 F. This coupled with the thin suit trousers sent shivers through my spine...literally ! It taught me a good lesson that I must never be out in the cold - no matter what my cold tolerance is.
Sunday, January 28, 2007
social entrepreneurship
Jerr Boschee, the grand-daddy of social entrepreneurship had recently visited CMU. Received a lot of gyan from him on why SE ventures must make themselves self-sustaining and how to acheive that.
Moreover, he also mentioned that someone in this field, if in a dilemma (does it matter? types) can approach him for a discussion.
He had visited and taught students in India in the past ...after which he got this enlightment about devoting himself for a social cause - fairly noble person it appears.
Moreover, he also mentioned that someone in this field, if in a dilemma (does it matter? types) can approach him for a discussion.
He had visited and taught students in India in the past ...after which he got this enlightment about devoting himself for a social cause - fairly noble person it appears.
Saturday, January 20, 2007
ice skating
screeeeetch, whoooosh, whooop, THUD ...... are the sounds you easily get to listen at the ice rink if there is no music in the background. Yes, my first experience with ice-skating was yesterday evening. It reminded me of roller-blading days of 1995 !
Despite of few hurdles, a few MISM colleagues finally managed to reach the Schenley Park ice rink (on a lighter note, how many MISMs does it take to locate the rink ...LOL). While I was waiting at the rink, I saw quite a few kids doing nice maneuvers. As folks arrived and we tied our skates, we entered the rink with some apprehension. Some crashed at the beginning and some others as the time progressed.
Fortunately, I didn't fall in the first session. In the second session, in the last five minutes, I was stretching too far and my muscles had given up. I was unable to lift up my legs for the gliding action and hence, lost balance and fell. I crashed softly though and it was fun - no pains, no tears. The muscles of the lower back and the tendons of vastus medialis were screaming at me -
Manik Manik
Go away
Come again another day....
Little tendons want to lay !
When I learnt rollerblades, I had someone to teach me baby-steps with the skates on and then hold my hand for making a few rounds of the skating ring. I learnt faster that way. Yesterday was different as none of us were good at this though UD did well at the learning curve part - he was way ahead. However, I did have a bunch of folks who were constantly motivating me. Nah, not my colleagues, but a bunch of folks from UPitt who I met while tying up the shoes. Drea was one of them and she was half American and half Puerto Rican - very warm personality ! She was fascinated by Indian culture as well. I could never believe that she was skating for the first time because she was doing it so well!
All of us (MISMers) had decided that we shall have a look at the city from the point above the ice rink - however, that never happened ! A few other aspects ruined my mood towards the end of the event but that was fine - a part n parcel of this journey called life. After the skating event, I met some friends at Silkys and enjoyed some drinks with them for about a hour or more!
All in all, it was a good part of the weekend activity. Letsee whats lined up for today!
Despite of few hurdles, a few MISM colleagues finally managed to reach the Schenley Park ice rink (on a lighter note, how many MISMs does it take to locate the rink ...LOL). While I was waiting at the rink, I saw quite a few kids doing nice maneuvers. As folks arrived and we tied our skates, we entered the rink with some apprehension. Some crashed at the beginning and some others as the time progressed.
Fortunately, I didn't fall in the first session. In the second session, in the last five minutes, I was stretching too far and my muscles had given up. I was unable to lift up my legs for the gliding action and hence, lost balance and fell. I crashed softly though and it was fun - no pains, no tears. The muscles of the lower back and the tendons of vastus medialis were screaming at me -
Manik Manik
Go away
Come again another day....
Little tendons want to lay !
When I learnt rollerblades, I had someone to teach me baby-steps with the skates on and then hold my hand for making a few rounds of the skating ring. I learnt faster that way. Yesterday was different as none of us were good at this though UD did well at the learning curve part - he was way ahead. However, I did have a bunch of folks who were constantly motivating me. Nah, not my colleagues, but a bunch of folks from UPitt who I met while tying up the shoes. Drea was one of them and she was half American and half Puerto Rican - very warm personality ! She was fascinated by Indian culture as well. I could never believe that she was skating for the first time because she was doing it so well!
All of us (MISMers) had decided that we shall have a look at the city from the point above the ice rink - however, that never happened ! A few other aspects ruined my mood towards the end of the event but that was fine - a part n parcel of this journey called life. After the skating event, I met some friends at Silkys and enjoyed some drinks with them for about a hour or more!
All in all, it was a good part of the weekend activity. Letsee whats lined up for today!
Saturday, January 13, 2007
GramIT - phenomenal !
At the turn of the millennium, I asked KB Chandrashekhar aka Chandra, about when does he think that IT will become a part of India's GDP contribution and help at the grass-root levels. His reply was that when the jobs from all this IT boom in India reach the country-side, it will mark the significant contribution.
Seven years later, I read this news piece on GramIT. If offshoring is to remain India's growth engine, this must happen. Wage inflation and attrition at major centers such as Hyderabad, Bangalore, and Mumbai are causing huge problems on the supply side for the companies who are setting up shops in India. For GramIT employees, lack of other paying jobs make sure that currently, these are not the issues. With Indian service providers moving up the value chain, the lower end work can go to places such as GramIT.
I feel that this cartoon of outsourced CEO is exaggerated. However, moving up the value chain is so evident - few years ago, we could not imagine an Infy employee doing Application Management and yet, I was both, a Project Manager and Application Manager at AT&T. These are functions traditionally offered to US-based consolidated labor suppliers such as IBM, EDS, Accenture, Deloitte, etc 
Traditional model put virtual team mgrs with other vendors such as IBM. However, cos like Infy are invading this chain from right to left - right uptil client coordinator :)
Will this journey stop?
India has a significant challenge in maintaining its supremacy in being the preferred offshore destination. The offshoring industry is going to be 1.45 to 1.55million in strength and will contribute to about 7% of GDP by 2008 end. Challenges arise from the fact that clustering has happened during evolving stages at locations such as Hyd, Blore, Bbay, etc pushing the prices higher. This has caused huge internal competition within clusters and coupled with lack of supply (talented pool) has accentuated the problem. Let us look at the real numbers.
There are about 14m young grads in India with about 2.5m new ones getting added each year. However, only 10% are suited for the MNCs setting up shops. English skills remain a major issue. Bigger problem lies in the fact that Indian univs have varying quality of education. IITs and IIMs are world-class. However, the quality steeply declines as one goes into the second and the third tier institutions. The higher suitability figures lie in the engineering crowds - roughly 25% are suitable for MNCs. However, given the supply side constraints of engineering schools and huge demand in no. of IT workers and middle managers required, the wages are being pushed northwards. This is similar to demand for a stock in absence of floating stock and institutions placing huge orders.
Some doomsdayers say that Indian wages will get equated to US wages. This belief is misplaced. When the threshold of 30% of US wages will be crossed, Indian IT labor suppliers ( Infosys, TCS, Satyam, etc) will start looking in other low-wage labor supplying countries such as China. Infosys Shanghai already has already been set up and TCS has made several acquisitions in China. PRC provides cheap programmers but costly managers (with dual language skills) and hence, cost of team is the same at both the places in India and PRC. Suppliers are looking at Philipines as another destination for call centers as they have lesser Indian accents and can understand US accent with relative ease.
So what must GoI do?
---------------------------
Disperse the clustering
This is risk-diversification. GramIT is on right track - more such things must happen in India which will help both, Indian populace coupled with capitalists. More regions will get developed. Currently, due to origins of most of IT entrepreneurs being from Southern part of India, they are mostly concentrating in the South with Pune, Chennai, etc being the alternative destinations to avoid clustering issues. However, MNCs such as Accenture, IBM, et al have set up their shops there as well. So, cos such as Infy run to Kolkatta, Jaipur - nice solution :)
In order to enable this dispersion, government needs to focus on infrastructure such as airports, utilities, telecom network, etc. The effects of neglect by GoI in this matter have been benign so far but they will rapidly become a hindrance for the growth in next 3-5 years.
Airports
When interrogated about the bias for Chennai and other south Indian destinations, entrepreneurs mention that the infrastructure in other places is not as developed. For instance, Infy setup a shop at Chandigarh but there's no easy international airport access. Hence, government must focus on developing international airports fast. Jaipur is a good destination because of the international airport decision made in 2002 budget.
Telecom network
If telecom network is well developed then telecommuting can be started in India leading to easing pressures on wages. This will help dispersion of work in low-wage areas within the country. GramIT is the best example. Labor is available at $800 per head at less than 5% churnover rate- wow !
Utilities
Individual companies have been making sure that electric power, water, etc do not become an issue at their offshore development centers. For them, it makes business sense as economies of scale ensure lower marginal cost which they can pass on to the customer under component of reliability. However, GoI can provide this to the smaller startups who can compete far better. This takes us to the next aspect why should GoI support smaller ventures.
Showcase the depth and the breadth of Indian pool
India's talent pool can be showcased in other fields such as industrial R&D, Finance & Accounting (culture which invented zero man !), etc. Small ventures are starting in these arena and must be helped by GoI in various forms and they will reap the benefits of the same in next 5-10 years in form of higher $ revenues, money sent back by expats, etc. In order to scale up on manufacturing supply, we need roads, roads, and roads ! Bharat Forge is an innovative auto-component solutions provider helping companies from the developed nations become more competitive. I agree beating PRC is very difficult given the lead they have over India...however, its not impossible. PRC supplier rates are going up. India can become an alternate supplier
location for competitive supply chains.
Brand India as a destination for alternative services. This includes wide range from medical tourism in Hinduja hospital in Mumbai to exotic Himalayas in the north and the healing Ayurveda destinations in Kerala. Our slogan must become:
What can Mr. Bharat do for you?
Besides, investment in educational infrastructure is required.
Private sector
Companies such as Infy, Wipro, TCS, etc must invest in educational centers. Profits seen today on a quarter to quarter basis will vanish soon if they remain myopic and do not address this 3-5 years pending issue. Their margins will be squeezed out if they dont invest in educational institutions which ensure a steady stream of good quality graduates. For this, both Indian as well as MNCs will have to form a consortium of sorts in order to invest together.
GoI
It can help setup an IIT in every state. Even if quality of existing grads is improved then the existing numbers will yield huge supply metrics which will satisfy demand of foreseeable future. India still remains a low-cost labor supply nation with cost of a grad being 12% of that of US grad and working hours being atleast 5% higher (2058 hours p.a. vis-a-vis 1900 p.a in US).
Bottomline: Collaborative execution committee between corporate world and govt is required which will yield results that can help country reach the BRICs dream drafted out by Goldman Sachs in y2k.
Seven years later, I read this news piece on GramIT. If offshoring is to remain India's growth engine, this must happen. Wage inflation and attrition at major centers such as Hyderabad, Bangalore, and Mumbai are causing huge problems on the supply side for the companies who are setting up shops in India. For GramIT employees, lack of other paying jobs make sure that currently, these are not the issues. With Indian service providers moving up the value chain, the lower end work can go to places such as GramIT.
I feel that this cartoon of outsourced CEO is exaggerated. However, moving up the value chain is so evident - few years ago, we could not imagine an Infy employee doing Application Management and yet, I was both, a Project Manager and Application Manager at AT&T. These are functions traditionally offered to US-based consolidated labor suppliers such as IBM, EDS, Accenture, Deloitte, etc 
Traditional model put virtual team mgrs with other vendors such as IBM. However, cos like Infy are invading this chain from right to left - right uptil client coordinator :)Will this journey stop?
India has a significant challenge in maintaining its supremacy in being the preferred offshore destination. The offshoring industry is going to be 1.45 to 1.55million in strength and will contribute to about 7% of GDP by 2008 end. Challenges arise from the fact that clustering has happened during evolving stages at locations such as Hyd, Blore, Bbay, etc pushing the prices higher. This has caused huge internal competition within clusters and coupled with lack of supply (talented pool) has accentuated the problem. Let us look at the real numbers.
There are about 14m young grads in India with about 2.5m new ones getting added each year. However, only 10% are suited for the MNCs setting up shops. English skills remain a major issue. Bigger problem lies in the fact that Indian univs have varying quality of education. IITs and IIMs are world-class. However, the quality steeply declines as one goes into the second and the third tier institutions. The higher suitability figures lie in the engineering crowds - roughly 25% are suitable for MNCs. However, given the supply side constraints of engineering schools and huge demand in no. of IT workers and middle managers required, the wages are being pushed northwards. This is similar to demand for a stock in absence of floating stock and institutions placing huge orders.
Some doomsdayers say that Indian wages will get equated to US wages. This belief is misplaced. When the threshold of 30% of US wages will be crossed, Indian IT labor suppliers ( Infosys, TCS, Satyam, etc) will start looking in other low-wage labor supplying countries such as China. Infosys Shanghai already has already been set up and TCS has made several acquisitions in China. PRC provides cheap programmers but costly managers (with dual language skills) and hence, cost of team is the same at both the places in India and PRC. Suppliers are looking at Philipines as another destination for call centers as they have lesser Indian accents and can understand US accent with relative ease.
So what must GoI do?
---------------------------
Disperse the clustering
This is risk-diversification. GramIT is on right track - more such things must happen in India which will help both, Indian populace coupled with capitalists. More regions will get developed. Currently, due to origins of most of IT entrepreneurs being from Southern part of India, they are mostly concentrating in the South with Pune, Chennai, etc being the alternative destinations to avoid clustering issues. However, MNCs such as Accenture, IBM, et al have set up their shops there as well. So, cos such as Infy run to Kolkatta, Jaipur - nice solution :)
In order to enable this dispersion, government needs to focus on infrastructure such as airports, utilities, telecom network, etc. The effects of neglect by GoI in this matter have been benign so far but they will rapidly become a hindrance for the growth in next 3-5 years.
Airports
When interrogated about the bias for Chennai and other south Indian destinations, entrepreneurs mention that the infrastructure in other places is not as developed. For instance, Infy setup a shop at Chandigarh but there's no easy international airport access. Hence, government must focus on developing international airports fast. Jaipur is a good destination because of the international airport decision made in 2002 budget.
Telecom network
If telecom network is well developed then telecommuting can be started in India leading to easing pressures on wages. This will help dispersion of work in low-wage areas within the country. GramIT is the best example. Labor is available at $800 per head at less than 5% churnover rate- wow !
Utilities
Individual companies have been making sure that electric power, water, etc do not become an issue at their offshore development centers. For them, it makes business sense as economies of scale ensure lower marginal cost which they can pass on to the customer under component of reliability. However, GoI can provide this to the smaller startups who can compete far better. This takes us to the next aspect why should GoI support smaller ventures.
Showcase the depth and the breadth of Indian pool
India's talent pool can be showcased in other fields such as industrial R&D, Finance & Accounting (culture which invented zero man !), etc. Small ventures are starting in these arena and must be helped by GoI in various forms and they will reap the benefits of the same in next 5-10 years in form of higher $ revenues, money sent back by expats, etc. In order to scale up on manufacturing supply, we need roads, roads, and roads ! Bharat Forge is an innovative auto-component solutions provider helping companies from the developed nations become more competitive. I agree beating PRC is very difficult given the lead they have over India...however, its not impossible. PRC supplier rates are going up. India can become an alternate supplier
location for competitive supply chains.Brand India as a destination for alternative services. This includes wide range from medical tourism in Hinduja hospital in Mumbai to exotic Himalayas in the north and the healing Ayurveda destinations in Kerala. Our slogan must become:
What can Mr. Bharat do for you?
Besides, investment in educational infrastructure is required.
Private sector
Companies such as Infy, Wipro, TCS, etc must invest in educational centers. Profits seen today on a quarter to quarter basis will vanish soon if they remain myopic and do not address this 3-5 years pending issue. Their margins will be squeezed out if they dont invest in educational institutions which ensure a steady stream of good quality graduates. For this, both Indian as well as MNCs will have to form a consortium of sorts in order to invest together.
GoI
It can help setup an IIT in every state. Even if quality of existing grads is improved then the existing numbers will yield huge supply metrics which will satisfy demand of foreseeable future. India still remains a low-cost labor supply nation with cost of a grad being 12% of that of US grad and working hours being atleast 5% higher (2058 hours p.a. vis-a-vis 1900 p.a in US).
Bottomline: Collaborative execution committee between corporate world and govt is required which will yield results that can help country reach the BRICs dream drafted out by Goldman Sachs in y2k.
Monday, January 08, 2007
winter break ends..
With the last week in the winter break, I want to blog the winter break experience. After the initial hedonism, I wanted to focus on family-time and health.
Bal, Val, and myself headed for a trip to Virginia beach in the week before Christmas to celebrate Christmas at Val's mom's place. On the trip, we once took an exit towards Williamsburg which has one of the oldest schools of US - College of William and Mary. On that night, we went for holiday lights at the beach front. The waiting line was quite long for the car-drive-thru but we were enjoying with christmas carols in the background. The best lightings were the ones towards the end - depicting the 12 days of Christmas.
On the day of Christmas, we all awaited the princess to come - Angelina - Val's niece. After she arrived later in the day, the gift exchange ritual started and undoubtedly the princess was the center of attention. I was in complete festive mood because the family provided me with such warmth, care, and hospitality. The gifts which Bal, Val, Val's mom and Val's sister gave me will go long way in helping a student like me :) Thank you for everything...it was so thoughtful of you guys!
Bal, Val, and myself headed for a trip to Virginia beach in the week before Christmas to celebrate Christmas at Val's mom's place. On the trip, we once took an exit towards Williamsburg which has one of the oldest schools of US - College of William and Mary. On that night, we went for holiday lights at the beach front. The waiting line was quite long for the car-drive-thru but we were enjoying with christmas carols in the background. The best lightings were the ones towards the end - depicting the 12 days of Christmas.Next day, myself and Val headed for the Virginia beach museum and I checked out some marine species out there. Touching a ray-fish with bare hands was the high point for that visit ! Later in the day, we forgot that the shops will get closed after 3:30 pm for Christm
as eve and we were having difficulty finding a good place to eat. Finally, we got to eat at Val's favorite Mexican place. ....yummy salsa they had. The family spent the evening watching "walk the line." I watched it for the third time - but everytime I keep on finding something new in it. 
Well-made movie, I must say. I extended in the night to watch "Christmas with the Kranks."
as eve and we were having difficulty finding a good place to eat. Finally, we got to eat at Val's favorite Mexican place. ....yummy salsa they had. The family spent the evening watching "walk the line." I watched it for the third time - but everytime I keep on finding something new in it. 
Well-made movie, I must say. I extended in the night to watch "Christmas with the Kranks."On the day of Christmas, we all awaited the princess to come - Angelina - Val's niece. After she arrived later in the day, the gift exchange ritual started and undoubtedly the princess was the center of attention. I was in complete festive mood because the family provided me with such warmth, care, and hospitality. The gifts which Bal, Val, Val's mom and Val's sister gave me will go long way in helping a student like me :) Thank you for everything...it was so thoughtful of you guys!
Sunday, January 07, 2007
UK users gagging for IPTV
Check this out - this is just the beginning of the end for the cable folks .....as mentioned by the proponents of IPTV gang.
However, I feel that cable folks have some long way to go before giving up the battle. Comcast had taken up AT&T Broadband last year - and their results haven't been as impressive yet. Company has megalo-debt with it and it will take some time before they make themselves fit in order to compete. This keeps them on their toes at all the times in order to strive for the best. The consumers are the obvious ones to benefit due to this competition.
Stay hungry - stay foolish !
However, I feel that cable folks have some long way to go before giving up the battle. Comcast had taken up AT&T Broadband last year - and their results haven't been as impressive yet. Company has megalo-debt with it and it will take some time before they make themselves fit in order to compete. This keeps them on their toes at all the times in order to strive for the best. The consumers are the obvious ones to benefit due to this competition.
Stay hungry - stay foolish !
Apple Keynote Bloopers
| Some funny clips of Steve Jobs and his gang over at Apple mssing up on their very important keynotes. ....so much for the ones who try to poke holes into Microsoft's imperfections .... | |
Friday, January 05, 2007
Thursday, January 04, 2007
reading spree
I've been on a reading spree in the last few days and would like to share some of the highlights.
After I finished The Tao of Warren Buffett, I got onto the online video search for Warren Buffett - I didn't find very many videos but some interesting ones are posted on my bazaar blog.
The next one in line was My life as a quant. The book is a recommended reading for the Financial Engineers. Bernstein, Rubenstein, Taleeb, et al have all given good reviews for and the same. Mr. Derman is program director for MSFE program in Columbia these days and will shape the future of this field as he has in the last decade or so while at Goldman Sachs. His model was fairly popular. What drove me to read this book was the excellent class by Prof. Duane Seppi for Options.
Next one was 7 indicators that move the markets by Paul Kasriel and Keith Schap. That's a fine book and recommended for anyone trying to get the correlation of macros with the markets.
Besides, the reading on Strategy Power plays from Businessweek is enlightening. They havent been as good as HBR case studies, however, help me get updated on some of the fields that I wasn't as update.
While searching for tax-saving books, I had a glance at the book Financial guidebook - 9 steps to work by Suze Orman - which I will recommend to anyone seeking practical to-dos in order to lead a financially independent life. Most of us know most of the concepts she presents and yet ppl act contrary to the conventional wisdom. What I liked in particular about the book was her down-to-the-dirty-details approach and charts etc created for layman. For instance, she has mentioned a checklist of aspects to figure out what all to check while considering a credit card offer. Also, she has beautifully pounded on the idea that if you dont respect your money (by spending it too much) then you disrespect yourself. I like this lady as she gives practical advice and her show must be watched by everyone who feels they know very little about financial matters because she elicits it so well. I knew most of it but it is a sort of book which I will recommend folks who are trying to get in grips with that kind of information/knowledge.
A bunch of other books too - however, I left them mid-way either because the topics were not of my priority or because the content was not good enough.
Also, I read a bunch of other mags - Readers' digest, Scientific American, Scientific American Mind, some other health related reads. Apparently, USDA has changed the food pyramid this year from what it was in 2005- shifted focus from having lotssa carbs to having lotssa other nutrition. So, less pasta, bread, etc. Carbs were included in the pyramid at the base in 2005 when a major revision was done after the earlier revision in 1992. I read about some of the secrets to live longer:
1. Large number of anti-oxidants from veggies and/or fruits.
2. Croatian olives and oil used for cooking must be plant oils such as olive oil, soy oil, etc.
3. Eating a few 100 cals less per meal. This is inspired from Okinawans from Japan.
4. Red wine (frequency: 1 to 3 per week in less to moderate amounts).
Shall keep my blogreaders updated about the other reads which I may find interesting. I have CKPrahalad's residual reading next in my mind.
After I finished The Tao of Warren Buffett, I got onto the online video search for Warren Buffett - I didn't find very many videos but some interesting ones are posted on my bazaar blog.
The next one in line was My life as a quant. The book is a recommended reading for the Financial Engineers. Bernstein, Rubenstein, Taleeb, et al have all given good reviews for and the same. Mr. Derman is program director for MSFE program in Columbia these days and will shape the future of this field as he has in the last decade or so while at Goldman Sachs. His model was fairly popular. What drove me to read this book was the excellent class by Prof. Duane Seppi for Options.
Next one was 7 indicators that move the markets by Paul Kasriel and Keith Schap. That's a fine book and recommended for anyone trying to get the correlation of macros with the markets.
Besides, the reading on Strategy Power plays from Businessweek is enlightening. They havent been as good as HBR case studies, however, help me get updated on some of the fields that I wasn't as update.
While searching for tax-saving books, I had a glance at the book Financial guidebook - 9 steps to work by Suze Orman - which I will recommend to anyone seeking practical to-dos in order to lead a financially independent life. Most of us know most of the concepts she presents and yet ppl act contrary to the conventional wisdom. What I liked in particular about the book was her down-to-the-dirty-details approach and charts etc created for layman. For instance, she has mentioned a checklist of aspects to figure out what all to check while considering a credit card offer. Also, she has beautifully pounded on the idea that if you dont respect your money (by spending it too much) then you disrespect yourself. I like this lady as she gives practical advice and her show must be watched by everyone who feels they know very little about financial matters because she elicits it so well. I knew most of it but it is a sort of book which I will recommend folks who are trying to get in grips with that kind of information/knowledge.
A bunch of other books too - however, I left them mid-way either because the topics were not of my priority or because the content was not good enough.
Also, I read a bunch of other mags - Readers' digest, Scientific American, Scientific American Mind, some other health related reads. Apparently, USDA has changed the food pyramid this year from what it was in 2005- shifted focus from having lotssa carbs to having lotssa other nutrition. So, less pasta, bread, etc. Carbs were included in the pyramid at the base in 2005 when a major revision was done after the earlier revision in 1992. I read about some of the secrets to live longer:
1. Large number of anti-oxidants from veggies and/or fruits.
2. Croatian olives and oil used for cooking must be plant oils such as olive oil, soy oil, etc.
3. Eating a few 100 cals less per meal. This is inspired from Okinawans from Japan.
4. Red wine (frequency: 1 to 3 per week in less to moderate amounts).
Shall keep my blogreaders updated about the other reads which I may find interesting. I have CKPrahalad's residual reading next in my mind.
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Sunday, December 24, 2006
Sunday, December 17, 2006
winter break begins !
Fall semester exams got over on Thursday and that evening we had a final farewell hangout at PHI on Forbes with the graduating batch from 8 pm thru midnight. I got out at around 11:30 pm as I was not feeling comfortable in the smoke anymore.
Next day, I hit the gym for a few hours and enjoyed the steam room and the spa (Carnegie Mellon is a luxury brand - no second thoughts about that). Later, I had a talk with a recruiter about my offer and discussed the conversation with my career services folks to take a feedback if my conversation was in the correct direction.
On Friday evening, I decide to get freed of all the thoughts of the placements, etc. Consequently, we went for farewell of Shashank, an exchange student from Singapore. Playing charades was a nice light-hearted event with sumptuous meal (yummy !) to follow along with audio/video in the one of the Porter Hall rooms.
Later, we made a sudden decision to hit the Prive Ultralounge and have a good time - dancing !
Ambience: Good
Bar: Average to good (they messed up on my tab)
Crowd: Average to good again.
Dance floor: Can be well arranged.
DJ: Average to good (giving him good for being sensitive that there's Indian population and playing a Bhangra #)
Overall, I will give it a rating of 5.5 on a scale of 10. This is because I have experienced better ones earlier!
Next day, at 11 am, the phone rings - the dreaded call...from the landlady - is she going to visit? is the kitchen clean for her inspection? is she going to impose a fine on us? Apprehensions in my mind dont let me think but I HAVE to pick up the phone. What if it's a call to inform us of something else (say, cancellation of her inspection trip?). When I talk with her, she says, the maintenence guy is going to come in a while. Phew - a relief - because I was expecting something else. Meanwhile, I get ready before he comes because I have a lunch to attend with one of the earlier MISM reps as they are going.
Lunch was ok with a greek wrap (I've never had lunch at Shadygrove and so, I didn't know what to expect...shadysticks were nice though). Surprisingly, the Shadyside area was slightly crowded on a Saturday morning. It may be primarily due to holiday season and people doing holiday shopping.
Post-lunch, I came back and went to Waterfront for a small piece of work and later, got hung up on phone with a close friend and talked for long hours - it was as if we were catching up after a long time. Finally, I got hold of this great book by Mary Buffett "The Tao of Warren Buffet". I recommend it to everyone who wants to be successful in general.
In the evening, I came back to pickup my friends and went back to Waterfront for the movie Apocalypto. Nice movie ! It was nominated for a golden globe award in the best foreign film category - no wonder, it had English subtitles. More about the movie on one of my other blogs!
The weekend has been hedonistic so far and I want to catchup with my temple proceedings alongwith some other meetings. I wish I could've travelled to India or PRC this vacation but there are some things which are out of your control and you need to accept that !
Next day, I hit the gym for a few hours and enjoyed the steam room and the spa (Carnegie Mellon is a luxury brand - no second thoughts about that). Later, I had a talk with a recruiter about my offer and discussed the conversation with my career services folks to take a feedback if my conversation was in the correct direction.
On Friday evening, I decide to get freed of all the thoughts of the placements, etc. Consequently, we went for farewell of Shashank, an exchange student from Singapore. Playing charades was a nice light-hearted event with sumptuous meal (yummy !) to follow along with audio/video in the one of the Porter Hall rooms.
Later, we made a sudden decision to hit the Prive Ultralounge and have a good time - dancing !
Ambience: Good
Bar: Average to good (they messed up on my tab)
Crowd: Average to good again.
Dance floor: Can be well arranged.
DJ: Average to good (giving him good for being sensitive that there's Indian population and playing a Bhangra #)
Overall, I will give it a rating of 5.5 on a scale of 10. This is because I have experienced better ones earlier!
Next day, at 11 am, the phone rings - the dreaded call...from the landlady - is she going to visit? is the kitchen clean for her inspection? is she going to impose a fine on us? Apprehensions in my mind dont let me think but I HAVE to pick up the phone. What if it's a call to inform us of something else (say, cancellation of her inspection trip?). When I talk with her, she says, the maintenence guy is going to come in a while. Phew - a relief - because I was expecting something else. Meanwhile, I get ready before he comes because I have a lunch to attend with one of the earlier MISM reps as they are going.
Lunch was ok with a greek wrap (I've never had lunch at Shadygrove and so, I didn't know what to expect...shadysticks were nice though). Surprisingly, the Shadyside area was slightly crowded on a Saturday morning. It may be primarily due to holiday season and people doing holiday shopping.
Post-lunch, I came back and went to Waterfront for a small piece of work and later, got hung up on phone with a close friend and talked for long hours - it was as if we were catching up after a long time. Finally, I got hold of this great book by Mary Buffett "The Tao of Warren Buffet". I recommend it to everyone who wants to be successful in general.
In the evening, I came back to pickup my friends and went back to Waterfront for the movie Apocalypto. Nice movie ! It was nominated for a golden globe award in the best foreign film category - no wonder, it had English subtitles. More about the movie on one of my other blogs!
The weekend has been hedonistic so far and I want to catchup with my temple proceedings alongwith some other meetings. I wish I could've travelled to India or PRC this vacation but there are some things which are out of your control and you need to accept that !
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
IIT
Indian Institute of Technology are becoming more and more popular in Dilbert - check out today's strip ! Young Asok has long way to go.....lol !
Monday, December 11, 2006
iptv harp
http://www.fool.com/news/commentary/2006/commentary06121110.htm?source=mppromo
its all coming together....iptv , zune, ipod, all the pieces complete the zigsaw puzzle - entertainment is the future !
its all coming together....iptv , zune, ipod, all the pieces complete the zigsaw puzzle - entertainment is the future !
Sunday, December 10, 2006
ie7
Most of the features are picked up from Mozilla and hence, they are nice. However, some problems prevail:
1. IE crashes a whole lot more when compared with Mozilla - that's annoying especially while you are composing that web-based email or making that entry into the blog.
2. IE still has ActiveX - something which I consider as a big threat.
3. The tab-closing X is at the window tab itself - this is not good as per usability as the tab can be closed without it being highlighted and lead to potential loss of information on that window by accident.
Seems like the folks in Redmond have some more miles to walk before their products come close to those created by the open-source folks.
1. IE crashes a whole lot more when compared with Mozilla - that's annoying especially while you are composing that web-based email or making that entry into the blog.
2. IE still has ActiveX - something which I consider as a big threat.
3. The tab-closing X is at the window tab itself - this is not good as per usability as the tab can be closed without it being highlighted and lead to potential loss of information on that window by accident.
Seems like the folks in Redmond have some more miles to walk before their products come close to those created by the open-source folks.
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
valuation
This course has been awesome so far !
Carolyn Levine, expert in Accounting, today taught us how to value a financially distressed firm. We had an assignment on Rite-Aid of the time when they were distressed.
Her earlier lectures on various topics have been good as well. I hope my project group on valuing a firm goes well. We opted for Spherion amongst the list of companies which professor chose as being mispriced. Letsee what we come up with --well, I will get back to work now.
Carolyn Levine, expert in Accounting, today taught us how to value a financially distressed firm. We had an assignment on Rite-Aid of the time when they were distressed.
Her earlier lectures on various topics have been good as well. I hope my project group on valuing a firm goes well. We opted for Spherion amongst the list of companies which professor chose as being mispriced. Letsee what we come up with --well, I will get back to work now.
Monday, December 04, 2006
roomie's offer
It was such a pleasant news today morning ! Arun got an offer from Cisco ! Offer is completely gangsta-style...Cali location and one of the best networking firms in the industry.
As soon as all the roomies are done with their job offers - we plan to host parties (party every weekend) at our townhouse .....it will be a Spring party season !!!
As soon as all the roomies are done with their job offers - we plan to host parties (party every weekend) at our townhouse .....it will be a Spring party season !!!
Sunday, December 03, 2006
future
check out Dean Khosla's clip on future role of American engineers. He walks the talk - check out the number of inter-disciplinary programs offered on his campus.
Cross-cultural sensitivity, management techniques, and ability to be a good engineering manager are the keys to be able to deploy assets globally.
....thus begins my journey in search of a global career.....
Cross-cultural sensitivity, management techniques, and ability to be a good engineering manager are the keys to be able to deploy assets globally.
....thus begins my journey in search of a global career.....
Friday, December 01, 2006
Course: Principles of Finance
The course on principles of Finance introduces the basics of financial principles to the students. The course's objectives is to enable future IT managers to understand how project selection is done by the Finance office when IT proposes a project.
CAPM, NPV, FV, etc are imbibed well with the assignments provided for the course.
Lynn Pastor is the instructor for this course and her grading scheme is highly objective. I have not seen other programs offering such a mix of courses which are so relevant to the industry needs.
This calls for the recruiters to look once more into the valuation of the MISM students who have grasped these concepts well before they make an offer.
CAPM, NPV, FV, etc are imbibed well with the assignments provided for the course.
Lynn Pastor is the instructor for this course and her grading scheme is highly objective. I have not seen other programs offering such a mix of courses which are so relevant to the industry needs.
This calls for the recruiters to look once more into the valuation of the MISM students who have grasped these concepts well before they make an offer.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
laptops n injuries
Laptops, which are becoming increasingly popular (their sales growing at faster pace than desktops), are endangering injuries.
Injuries for shoulders, wrists , spine, and even fertility !
For spine - read here
For fertility - read here
For wrists - read here
For avoiding injuries, check this out - click here and here
I hated when my previous employer gave me laptop. I hated it when I had to put in 2100 $ in order to buy a laptop. It does not have facility for another keyboard which is ergonomically better. Dayyuuuum...I could not buy the $10 deal on wireless ergonomic keyboards because it will help me stay healthy. Laptops are similar to fastfoods - instant gratification - however, unhealthy !
This is sheerly driven by mindsets of some capitalists who want to extract your money away from you ! Sounds cynical but analyze this - Employers give you laptops so they can extract more from you. Manufacturers make it because they make more margins on these ! Lenovo makes decent margins on the laptops !
Do you want to fall for it?
Injuries for shoulders, wrists , spine, and even fertility !
For spine - read here
For fertility - read here
For wrists - read here
For avoiding injuries, check this out - click here and here
I hated when my previous employer gave me laptop. I hated it when I had to put in 2100 $ in order to buy a laptop. It does not have facility for another keyboard which is ergonomically better. Dayyuuuum...I could not buy the $10 deal on wireless ergonomic keyboards because it will help me stay healthy. Laptops are similar to fastfoods - instant gratification - however, unhealthy !
This is sheerly driven by mindsets of some capitalists who want to extract your money away from you ! Sounds cynical but analyze this - Employers give you laptops so they can extract more from you. Manufacturers make it because they make more margins on these ! Lenovo makes decent margins on the laptops !
Do you want to fall for it?
Saturday, November 25, 2006
thanksgiving
This year, I was fortunate to get to attend Thanksgiving with an American family - well, I will correct myself, Indo-American family. Bal-n-Val (from Carnegie Mellon) have been great friends and they invited me for the Thanksgiving dinner.
The decoration and the efforts put in by the couple was admirable!
Darn-it-car-battery failed in the afternoon while I was in ShadySide on Thanksgivings. I was scheduled to go to the temple before the dinner event. Thanks to Bal who came to my rescue and picked me up from Squirrel Hill.
In contrast with last year's dishes, and thanks to Val that the meals were a vegetarian's delight !!! Tofurky - yummmmmmmmmy....... deliiiiciiiiiious ...I asked for the seasoning and I have to pick that one from Williams Sonoma. Bal tasted it and mentioned that there was barely any difference between the Turkey and the Tofurky - (I think I got a perfect substitute then). I have all the leftovers which will continue with me till Sunday.
To share with my readers, I took a picture of the sight at the table (above). The family sat around the table and we had a small prayer before we could start.
Post-dinner, we sat reading the ads in the handouts and I made a quick shopping list. The hosts were kind enough to offer me a shelter for the night and also, Bal was awesomely hospitable to take me back to my home for a quick pick up of my stuff for the stayover. I cannot thank the hosts enough !
Next day, early morning I woke up for the shopping - yay ! By the time we reached BestBuy, I had anticipated that the lines must've disappeared but Best Buy's line was fairly long and hence, I moved on to Circuit City. I got some stuff at Circuit City and was standing in the 90 minute atrocious queue for checking out the items. I should've made an intelligent choice to opt out of the queue without checking out. It wasn't worth it....anyways, my items are missing when I came back - I am unable to recall if I didn't get them inside the door and left them on my porch.
Later, I met Myers & Co (Val n her family) at Target and I bought some stuff there as per my list. We moved to Kohl's and I felt - daayuuumm, I should've come here before :) Kohl's had quite a bit of trendy variety - no wonder it was so crowded. I got quite a bit of stuff there. Following Kohls', we drove to downtown to get a shot at Saks and Macy's. I got a Nautica topcoat which Val had pointed out last night - great deal ! Thus, the theme this year undoubtedly was building up my winter collection unlike last year which was building up my shirts' section. Val's sister got her Louis Vuitton bag at Saks/Macy's. Right after, I got my John Ashford gift tie :) - Thanks !!!
Finally, we went to an Italian place for lunch - Girasole in Shadyside. They had delicious dishes and entremets out there. Salad was great - pretty different from the Olive Garden regular I've got used to ! We went around in some shops for checking out the stuff in ShadySide shops.
The day ended when I was dropped out at my place ( I was shopped out !) - this reminded me of my Dusherra days in Mumbai till 2002 .....they were just like this - having lunches and dinners with family and running around the town with family for shopping - this one will be a memorable Thanksgiving day for me !
The decoration and the efforts put in by the couple was admirable!Darn-it-car-battery failed in the afternoon while I was in ShadySide on Thanksgivings. I was scheduled to go to the temple before the dinner event. Thanks to Bal who came to my rescue and picked me up from Squirrel Hill.
In contrast with last year's dishes, and thanks to Val that the meals were a vegetarian's delight !!! Tofurky - yummmmmmmmmy....... deliiiiciiiiiious ...I asked for the seasoning and I have to pick that one from Williams Sonoma. Bal tasted it and mentioned that there was barely any difference between the Turkey and the Tofurky - (I think I got a perfect substitute then). I have all the leftovers which will continue with me till Sunday.
To share with my readers, I took a picture of the sight at the table (above). The family sat around the table and we had a small prayer before we could start.
Post-dinner, we sat reading the ads in the handouts and I made a quick shopping list. The hosts were kind enough to offer me a shelter for the night and also, Bal was awesomely hospitable to take me back to my home for a quick pick up of my stuff for the stayover. I cannot thank the hosts enough !
Next day, early morning I woke up for the shopping - yay ! By the time we reached BestBuy, I had anticipated that the lines must've disappeared but Best Buy's line was fairly long and hence, I moved on to Circuit City. I got some stuff at Circuit City and was standing in the 90 minute atrocious queue for checking out the items. I should've made an intelligent choice to opt out of the queue without checking out. It wasn't worth it....anyways, my items are missing when I came back - I am unable to recall if I didn't get them inside the door and left them on my porch.
Later, I met Myers & Co (Val n her family) at Target and I bought some stuff there as per my list. We moved to Kohl's and I felt - daayuuumm, I should've come here before :) Kohl's had quite a bit of trendy variety - no wonder it was so crowded. I got quite a bit of stuff there. Following Kohls', we drove to downtown to get a shot at Saks and Macy's. I got a Nautica topcoat which Val had pointed out last night - great deal ! Thus, the theme this year undoubtedly was building up my winter collection unlike last year which was building up my shirts' section. Val's sister got her Louis Vuitton bag at Saks/Macy's. Right after, I got my John Ashford gift tie :) - Thanks !!!
Finally, we went to an Italian place for lunch - Girasole in Shadyside. They had delicious dishes and entremets out there. Salad was great - pretty different from the Olive Garden regular I've got used to ! We went around in some shops for checking out the stuff in ShadySide shops.
The day ended when I was dropped out at my place ( I was shopped out !) - this reminded me of my Dusherra days in Mumbai till 2002 .....they were just like this - having lunches and dinners with family and running around the town with family for shopping - this one will be a memorable Thanksgiving day for me !
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
salary value cities
This concept makes sense - "Salary value" cities !
A friend of mine chose to live in a small town in southern IL cos it saved money for her - a lots of it. moreover, it was convenient 35 min train ride from work to home and precision timing from home to train stn and work to train stn of 2.5 mins. She earns a package similar to what a Big 4 is offering me but can save more because cost of living at her place is so low. Smart lady !
More savings imply - higher disposable income later. Convenient travel to airport also implies better conditions to live. Moreover, money is well-spent. Time is well spent on weekends for productive causes.
Trade-off is that there is barely any socialisation ! Also, possibility for seeking opportunities is less. However, if one has decided to stick out with the firm for several years, then this kind of salary is a huge plus.
...considering whether i should take up this offer and change my location or go ahead with this and think of jumping ?
A friend of mine chose to live in a small town in southern IL cos it saved money for her - a lots of it. moreover, it was convenient 35 min train ride from work to home and precision timing from home to train stn and work to train stn of 2.5 mins. She earns a package similar to what a Big 4 is offering me but can save more because cost of living at her place is so low. Smart lady !
More savings imply - higher disposable income later. Convenient travel to airport also implies better conditions to live. Moreover, money is well-spent. Time is well spent on weekends for productive causes.
Trade-off is that there is barely any socialisation ! Also, possibility for seeking opportunities is less. However, if one has decided to stick out with the firm for several years, then this kind of salary is a huge plus.
...considering whether i should take up this offer and change my location or go ahead with this and think of jumping ?
Saturday, November 18, 2006
opera
Last night, I went through a rollercoaster of emotions.
Romeo n Juliet was the one I watched at Pittsburgh Opera.
Balcony seats were subsidized for CMU students.
I wasn't a great fan of this production - however, they did well. Juliet role was played by a good actress - however, Romeo's character could've been played better. Juliet's father wasn't as effective as well. Other Montagues were just fine.
We (myself and 4 other CMU colleagues) arrived at the opera by 8:10 pm - Delay can be attributed to parking spots being unavailable in downtown due to the lightshow. huhh- talk about parking issues in Pgh downtown.
After Doc's Place party for Heinz school, we drove down to downtown. I had wrong directions but fortunately, someone knew about it. I parked the car at a spot which I didn't note down and then we were running (all dressed up) around downtown to find the Opera - finally, when we reached there - the show had just started - so, didn't miss much.
While the show was on, I reminsced the song by Mary Chapin Carpenter - I'll never fall in love again. At the same time, the recently read book's thoughts flashed in front of my eyes; those of the book- The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck.
As Romeo starts falling for Juliet and she says to him - if this is a lighthearted love, then let me remain in my grief and tears and he need not meet her again. Juliet questions his motivations in a style that reminds me of the OST by Bryan Ferry - Will you love me tomorrow?
When cruel sorrow of separation hits them, both are in despair. Again, the Hindi song of Wo Lamhe started running in my head - I should get it out of my CD tracks in my car. Bee, are you reading this?
The book mentioned above mentions falling in love as dissolution of ego-boundaries. After a while, when love subsides (what I call as - when honeymoon period is over....after say 5-10 years) ego boundaries emerge again. She may not like his friends and/or vice-versa. He may want to make love but she may not and/or vice-versa at different points in time.
While searching for partner, it has to be based more than that of perishable attributes. It has to be based on whether the partners are leading to each other's spiritual growth. My Dronacharya-type guru also recently left his long-lived marriage and married another lady - yea, I am talking about Warren Buffet - the sage from Omaha.
Bossa Nova - a nice lounge recommended by a fellow CMU person was a nice place to explore after the opera. While heading back home, I had to search my car- as I had forgotten where I parked it. On the way back home, a colleague had to check out India Garden; unfortunately, it was just closed by 1:15 am, when we reached there.
Life's a bittersweet symphony !
I should not watch tragedies after all.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
It is not worth $17 :-P
Romeo n Juliet was the one I watched at Pittsburgh Opera.
Balcony seats were subsidized for CMU students.I wasn't a great fan of this production - however, they did well. Juliet role was played by a good actress - however, Romeo's character could've been played better. Juliet's father wasn't as effective as well. Other Montagues were just fine.
We (myself and 4 other CMU colleagues) arrived at the opera by 8:10 pm - Delay can be attributed to parking spots being unavailable in downtown due to the lightshow. huhh- talk about parking issues in Pgh downtown.
After Doc's Place party for Heinz school, we drove down to downtown. I had wrong directions but fortunately, someone knew about it. I parked the car at a spot which I didn't note down and then we were running (all dressed up) around downtown to find the Opera - finally, when we reached there - the show had just started - so, didn't miss much.
While the show was on, I reminsced the song by Mary Chapin Carpenter - I'll never fall in love again. At the same time, the recently read book's thoughts flashed in front of my eyes; those of the book- The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck.
As Romeo starts falling for Juliet and she says to him - if this is a lighthearted love, then let me remain in my grief and tears and he need not meet her again. Juliet questions his motivations in a style that reminds me of the OST by Bryan Ferry - Will you love me tomorrow?
When cruel sorrow of separation hits them, both are in despair. Again, the Hindi song of Wo Lamhe started running in my head - I should get it out of my CD tracks in my car. Bee, are you reading this?
The book mentioned above mentions falling in love as dissolution of ego-boundaries. After a while, when love subsides (what I call as - when honeymoon period is over....after say 5-10 years) ego boundaries emerge again. She may not like his friends and/or vice-versa. He may want to make love but she may not and/or vice-versa at different points in time.
While searching for partner, it has to be based more than that of perishable attributes. It has to be based on whether the partners are leading to each other's spiritual growth. My Dronacharya-type guru also recently left his long-lived marriage and married another lady - yea, I am talking about Warren Buffet - the sage from Omaha.
Bossa Nova - a nice lounge recommended by a fellow CMU person was a nice place to explore after the opera. While heading back home, I had to search my car- as I had forgotten where I parked it. On the way back home, a colleague had to check out India Garden; unfortunately, it was just closed by 1:15 am, when we reached there.
Life's a bittersweet symphony !
I should not watch tragedies after all.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
It is not worth $17 :-P
offer
I haven't blogged this since a while... I have an offer ....Its for the position of Consultant at one of the Big 4 - not an Analyst, not a Sr Analyst - but a Consultant.
The recruiter at the Firm's Pgh office called me 2 weeks back to give me the good news. Later, she referred me to the NYC office recruiter because NYC office was my first preference.
Unless they have a reasonable creative solution for the same....
As Le Chiffre says in the bond movie......
Freedom Fighter: "Do you believe in God, Mr. Le Chiffre."
Le Chiffre: "No. I believe in Reasonable Rate of Return."
The recruiter at the Firm's Pgh office called me 2 weeks back to give me the good news. Later, she referred me to the NYC office recruiter because NYC office was my first preference.
Unless they have a reasonable creative solution for the same....
As Le Chiffre says in the bond movie......
Freedom Fighter: "Do you believe in God, Mr. Le Chiffre."
Le Chiffre: "No. I believe in Reasonable Rate of Return."
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
...SFO...
Here's a small post on my memorable trip to SFO !
I flew on Thursday evening from Pittsburgh at 16:30 ET and with a 2-hour stop at Denver, flew to SFO. At Denver, I met a fantastic lady, Ms. Brooke Peterson. She was sitting down on the floor because there was just one switch and I was seated in the chair near it (charging up my laptop). I offered her the seat because my charger was extensible. With a gradual small talk, I got to know that SFO was home to her (man, she stays near the Golden Gate bridge - if I get a lottery house there - I will never leave it) and that she travelled for job. Distinct part of her job was that she could negotiate only a 4-day work week because she has 2 kids. Most interesting part of the lady's persona was that she had travelled Asia, Europe, etc. Multi-cultural exposure gave her a fairly open mind and a warm personality. Her hubby was Persian (Iran) and studied in UCal Berkeley for architecture. WoW ! She reminded me of Bee - pretty much.
The hotel room was simply awesome.
Check out my room's 3-D view at: http://www.hotelvitale.com/hotel/tours.php and click on "Superior Water View room."
Pictures of the room are on the link above and hence, I will not post them here.
I was impressed !
At 6:30 am next morning, the dawn breaks and I see this exotic view of sunrise with the Bay Bridge in between. It was so surreal. I woke up despite of the splitting headache and went out of my room. In the elevator, I met this lady and we talked about how beautiful the morning was and then we started walking and jogging together along Embarcadero ! Some of the pictures
are:Once the whole college-day affair was over, we (SalesForce team and candidates) had a dinner at Amici's near AT&T Park. Myself and Danielle (the smarty pants Berk candidate) walked down from near my hotel to this place. Nice evening! Later, I called up my high school buddy and he was kindda tired. As soon as I hit the room, I hit the bed and slept. TV was on and I woke up at 1:30 am to realise that I was knocked down by the whole exhausting journey and the busy day.
On Saturday, I wake up and call up my friend, who eventually lands up at 11:30 am. Meanwhile, I walk down some of the places on
Embarcadero and explored our terrace and the view from the terrace was awesome !So, here's what I captured. We went to Piers, took a one hour boat ride around Alcatraz and the Golden Gate bridge. Some more pictures.....
Yogesh's place was kindda cool - it was in San Jose. His roommate was warm and friendly - a recent MBA grad working for E&Y. Its Boston less all its things I dont like ! A few complaints though would be that there is no metro.
Main issue is with the expensive housing ! If only housing was cheaper here....reminds me of bbay ! but then Bbay was bigger than this.
Trip to China ....
I am contemplating about this trip.....
click here
It will be a good tour for sure. If I go to India - I will probably spend as much and barely any benefit. Instead, if I go here, I will get to learn something worth a course load. Most of the courses are valued at about this price - about 2-3k.
I will have to make up my mind by tomorrow.
click here
It will be a good tour for sure. If I go to India - I will probably spend as much and barely any benefit. Instead, if I go here, I will get to learn something worth a course load. Most of the courses are valued at about this price - about 2-3k.
I will have to make up my mind by tomorrow.
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Rendezvous with a Silicon Valley scientist !
An interesting rendezvous occured while I was flying back from SFO. An extremely eclectic company - an IBM IT Specialist who was earlier an researcher in one of the Silicon valley firms. He was my co-seat passenger!
It started off with him cautioning me about my coffee and helping me with something. Random small talk started...from why I was in SFO and then it moved on to his background and an arbitrary mention of Knowledge Management (KM) from me sparked the talk. He found the idea really interesting and wanted it to be implemented for his group.
Initially, when I got to know that he is from IBM and asking me more details, I thought he was testing me or something and I became cynical. Here's person in his late 50s, early 60s - travelling as an IT specialist for the Big Blue - and asking me help with implementation concepts on KM. Extremely eloquent, and articulate scientist - he exposed me to what he used to do 25 years ago in IT !
He suddenly asked me to elaborate on the KM idea and asked for an estimate. I said - it is difficult to estimate without details. I used my probing skills to gather high level requirements. While getting requirements from him he elaborated on how the Big Blue was organized and structured. He also mentioned how his group was structured. I clarified that his scope must be limited to making business plan and needs emergence rather than implementation details. He must mention requirements to management and design, engineering, etc will be done by other specialists. I gave him the usual house-building analogy !
Apparently, from the scope, cost, and schedule, I came up with a figure and he was taken aback - so much !? I said - this is if you get it done from a team at US costs and including license costs. If he did it using IBM systems and manhours, I was not sure what will be his estimates. However, he mentioned an instance regarding how cost-charging is done internally and blue-dollars move at a very costly rate.
Clearly, in my recommendations, I had also included the org-feasibility aspect because this had a slightly heavy political interaction in various groups.
Finally, we came to a point where we discussed about how he got to the Bay Area because he had done his PhD from SUNY Buffalo. He was working in SFO since 25 years. In the first 5 years, he rented apartments and later, got his own house. Man, he was lucky !(I wondered if I would ever be able to buy a house in that area. My SFO tour had some interesting insights which I will blog in a separate post !)
He gave me his visiting card and I gave him mine. My attire was misleading(too casual) and may have initially made him think that I was another young punk. Soon to realise that he needed me for helping him with his business case to his executives. I tried getting it in form of a final semester project - however, somehow, he was reluctant because it wasn't in his hands ! Well, I was ready to help him anyways - I just tried negotiating something which will help both of us.
Finally, I suggested him to consult one of his teams internally before we could even discuss further. We departed on a great note to contact each other and that was it for my rendezvous with a Silicon Valley scientist - a whole 4 hours of stimulating discussion!
It started off with him cautioning me about my coffee and helping me with something. Random small talk started...from why I was in SFO and then it moved on to his background and an arbitrary mention of Knowledge Management (KM) from me sparked the talk. He found the idea really interesting and wanted it to be implemented for his group.
Initially, when I got to know that he is from IBM and asking me more details, I thought he was testing me or something and I became cynical. Here's person in his late 50s, early 60s - travelling as an IT specialist for the Big Blue - and asking me help with implementation concepts on KM. Extremely eloquent, and articulate scientist - he exposed me to what he used to do 25 years ago in IT !
He suddenly asked me to elaborate on the KM idea and asked for an estimate. I said - it is difficult to estimate without details. I used my probing skills to gather high level requirements. While getting requirements from him he elaborated on how the Big Blue was organized and structured. He also mentioned how his group was structured. I clarified that his scope must be limited to making business plan and needs emergence rather than implementation details. He must mention requirements to management and design, engineering, etc will be done by other specialists. I gave him the usual house-building analogy !
Apparently, from the scope, cost, and schedule, I came up with a figure and he was taken aback - so much !? I said - this is if you get it done from a team at US costs and including license costs. If he did it using IBM systems and manhours, I was not sure what will be his estimates. However, he mentioned an instance regarding how cost-charging is done internally and blue-dollars move at a very costly rate.
Clearly, in my recommendations, I had also included the org-feasibility aspect because this had a slightly heavy political interaction in various groups.
Finally, we came to a point where we discussed about how he got to the Bay Area because he had done his PhD from SUNY Buffalo. He was working in SFO since 25 years. In the first 5 years, he rented apartments and later, got his own house. Man, he was lucky !(I wondered if I would ever be able to buy a house in that area. My SFO tour had some interesting insights which I will blog in a separate post !)
He gave me his visiting card and I gave him mine. My attire was misleading(too casual) and may have initially made him think that I was another young punk. Soon to realise that he needed me for helping him with his business case to his executives. I tried getting it in form of a final semester project - however, somehow, he was reluctant because it wasn't in his hands ! Well, I was ready to help him anyways - I just tried negotiating something which will help both of us.
Finally, I suggested him to consult one of his teams internally before we could even discuss further. We departed on a great note to contact each other and that was it for my rendezvous with a Silicon Valley scientist - a whole 4 hours of stimulating discussion!
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
Google =WalMart?
There was an interesting discussion of me with my friends. It was partially driven by something I had seen 2 years ago - EPIC
I teased the thought whether Google was becoming the WalMart of the cyberspace. The parallels are being drawn from the fact that Google is shattering the traditional myths, consolidating businesses to create economies of scale, and entering in various businesses with disruptive models.
There will come a time when there will be mass-protests against Google too....just like there are right now against WalMart, in general, and while Wal-Mart was trying to enter banking and financial services industry.
The whole thought process was triggered by the fact that Google is making headlines everyday and the recent proposal to dip their toes in the waters of radio industry was simply awesome !
Click here to read the story. It also decided to get into print media.
Under such conditions, will a career @ Google make sense? One, they dont have a career path defined (that's not required), and second they will try to exert pressure on their suppliers - for instance, the universities for the labor. Google has significant presence on Carnegie Mellon campus and is doing whatever it takes to woo the students, even if it involves their reps cursing the rivals Microsoft (I was taken aback when two of their reps ripped off Microsoft...and these were kids - just 6-8 months experience...clearly indicating their immaturity and arrogance). However, I think that the crowd at CMU is discerning enough to understand the whole deal....especially the management students.
Disclaimer: I have no grudges with Google...but the whole disruptive mindset is worth a critic - I may post something in details later (which will focus towards the fact that disruptive mindset is good in some arenas and not all.)
I teased the thought whether Google was becoming the WalMart of the cyberspace. The parallels are being drawn from the fact that Google is shattering the traditional myths, consolidating businesses to create economies of scale, and entering in various businesses with disruptive models.
There will come a time when there will be mass-protests against Google too....just like there are right now against WalMart, in general, and while Wal-Mart was trying to enter banking and financial services industry.
The whole thought process was triggered by the fact that Google is making headlines everyday and the recent proposal to dip their toes in the waters of radio industry was simply awesome !
Click here to read the story. It also decided to get into print media.
Under such conditions, will a career @ Google make sense? One, they dont have a career path defined (that's not required), and second they will try to exert pressure on their suppliers - for instance, the universities for the labor. Google has significant presence on Carnegie Mellon campus and is doing whatever it takes to woo the students, even if it involves their reps cursing the rivals Microsoft (I was taken aback when two of their reps ripped off Microsoft...and these were kids - just 6-8 months experience...clearly indicating their immaturity and arrogance). However, I think that the crowd at CMU is discerning enough to understand the whole deal....especially the management students.
Disclaimer: I have no grudges with Google...but the whole disruptive mindset is worth a critic - I may post something in details later (which will focus towards the fact that disruptive mindset is good in some arenas and not all.)
Verizon near content deal with YouTube
click here
The article just manifests one of the aspects mentioned in the IPTV paper made for Telecom Management course.
This is one of the business models emerging: sourcing content for the IPTV paradigm.
Other business models will include partnerships, JVs, and buyouts.
Just recently, YouTube signed up with Universal, BMG, Sony, and CBS.
Its coming and its BiG !!!
The article just manifests one of the aspects mentioned in the IPTV paper made for Telecom Management course.
This is one of the business models emerging: sourcing content for the IPTV paradigm.
Other business models will include partnerships, JVs, and buyouts.
Just recently, YouTube signed up with Universal, BMG, Sony, and CBS.
Its coming and its BiG !!!
Friday, November 03, 2006
HBO on IP... !
IPTV surges ahead !
Read this story to know HBO and the likes are moving towards the web ....and rankle the cable industry !
At times, I get a feeling that I have to drop out of school and execute my plans. This is THE TIME. Till 2010, battle will be sorted out. Not that I will wrestle with the biggies..but huge money to be made in the next couple of years in this space !
Read this story to know HBO and the likes are moving towards the web ....and rankle the cable industry !
At times, I get a feeling that I have to drop out of school and execute my plans. This is THE TIME. Till 2010, battle will be sorted out. Not that I will wrestle with the biggies..but huge money to be made in the next couple of years in this space !
SalesForce onsite interview
Yes....finally, made it to final rounds of SalesForce onsite interview !
Onsite interview with a whole day event on Friday, Nov 10th at SFO. So, next weekend is pretty much travelling.
Their growth figures are tremendous and that's what attracts me in this company ! CA is another reason.
Onsite interview with a whole day event on Friday, Nov 10th at SFO. So, next weekend is pretty much travelling.
Their growth figures are tremendous and that's what attracts me in this company ! CA is another reason.
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
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