Human Resources

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 08 mar 2016

TechGig Geek Goddess - Celebrating the Code Divas/Women in Technology of the Indian IT Industry (TG3), a 14-day engagement program where women coders got a chance to show their skills, concluded today on International Women's Day. The following were the top 3 winners and their brief comments - (1) Janani Anbarasan from CISCO: 'Considering the limited exposure women have towards programming, this level of competition targets women who aspire to become good programmers...' (2) Rijutha N. from CISCO: 'TG3 is a wonderful opportunity for working women to compete...' (3) Rashmi Kejariwal from Sapient: 'I would like to recommend people to take time off from their expected deliverables and pursue their interest and enhance their expertise in coding as TG3 provides a great platform...' While speaking on TG3, Puja Mehra (VP of Sapient Global Markets) said, '...TG3's tech webinars, AMA (Ask Me Anything) and empower sessions, for promoting our women in tech, helped us push our charter of making women's voices count. I personally liked the coding contest a lot. It was encouraging to see our leaders, encourage our women employees to participate...' TechGig.com website also mentions winners that got 4th and 5th place as, Priyanka Naik (CDK-Global) and Tarvinder Kaur respectively. Read on...

GIZMODO: Top women coders shine at TechGig Geek Goddess
Author: NA

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 27 feb 2016

Government policies and budgetary allocations play an important role in building a business-friendly environment. Since startups are essential for growth of economic activity, they need to be nurtured during their early stages of development. Government has to provide facilitating ecosystem for entrepreneurial ventures and give special consideration in annual budgets. Indian government's campaigns like 'Make in India', 'Startup India', 'Digital India' and 'Skill India', are driven to stimulate economic activity and support local business development along with attracting global investments. To fulfil these ideas and particularly 'Startup India', Indian government's Budget'2016 should have specific allocations for startups. Following is the list of 19 entrepreneurs and their expectations from the budget - (1) K. Balakrishnan, MD & CEO, Servion Global Solutions: Provide necessary incentives, legal/tax framework and infrastructure support to IT and Electronics industry; Increase investments in broadband connectivity; Improved IT infrastructure and e-governance. (2) Saurabh Arora, Founder & CEO, Lybrate: Increase the tax holiday period from 3 years to at least 5 years; Profitable startups be charged less corporate tax; Benefit of tax rebate on healthcare expense should be for entire tax payer class and not just for salaried class. (3) Aloke Bajpai, CEO & Co-founder, ixigo: Tourism-friendly policies; Focus more on infrastructure and develop airports and provide better connectivity to smaller towns; Better definition for online aggregators and their taxation norms; Clearly define online marketplace. (4) Sobhan Babu, Professor at IIT Hyderabad and founder of Plianto Technologies: Support for startups in the tender bidding process with easy norms. (5) Ankur Bhatia, Executive Director of Bird Group and Member of CII National Committee on Civil Aviation: Draft aviation policy and development of airports in tier-I and tier-II cities is a positive step; Address challenges related to complex policies, aggressive price cuts, multi-tiered tax system and infrastructure deterring the true potential of the Indian aviation industry; Treat aviations sector as national priority. (6) Rohan Bhargava, Co-founder, CashKaro.com: Fund-of-funds and tax benefits for startups need to be implemented effectively; Set out clear and measurable timelines with minimal bureaucratic intervention; Provide clear tax policy that will address the complications of the current tax structure faced by ecommerce sites; Present GST roadmap. (7) Manish Kumar, CEO & Co-founder, GREX Alternative Investments Pvt Ltd: Fund-of-funds should invest directly in startups; Proposed US$ 1.5 billion in FoF is not enough to make impact; Remove 'angel tax'; Relaxation on capital gain tax; Explore alternative ways for raising funds like venture debt; Promote risk investing through proper framework for investor exit. (8) Geetha Kannan, Managing Director, The Anita Borg Institute (ABI) India: Expecting 'gender mainstreaming'; Integrate gender perspective to all relevant policies and initiatives; Special allocation for women entrepreneurs; Provide women-friendly facilities and infrastructure in '100 Smart City' initiative; Focus on women-safety; Get more aggressive on women-specific policies. (9) Ankita Tandon, Chief Operating Officer, CouponDunia: Minimal government or bureaucratic intervention in channeling startup funds; Further increase existing tax exemptions for startups; Better internet connectivity in tier-I and tier-II cities; Introduce tax incentives for startup employees to encourage youths to join startups. (10) Srikanth Reddy, Founder/Chairman, Palred Technologies & LatestOne.com: Encourage participation of Indian institutional investors in startups; ESOP/Sweat Equity shares should be taxed when they are actually sold. (11) Deepit Purkayastha, Co-founder & Chief Strategy Officer, Inshorts: 'Skill India' program should work with 'Startup India'; Maket investments to impart contemporary skills and entrepenerial education; Overhaul of university incubators; Exempt tax on angel investments and ESOPs and relaxed regime for startups to go public and launch IPOs. (12) Pushpinder Singh, CEO & Co-founder, Travelkhana: Announce separate railways startup policy; Include only the transportation cost on rail ticket with additional facilities like food, blankets etc kept as optional charges; Develop a system to utilize data generated by railways everyday. (13) Sanjay Sethi, CEO & Co-founder, Shopclues: GST should become a reality; Tax incentives for startup employees; Policy support for startups going for IPO. (14) Mohit Dubey, Co-founder & CEO, Carwale: Steps toward concrete vehicular pollution policy; Incentives and rebates for hybrids and less polluting vehicular technologies; Fuel policy towards global quality standards and encourage less polluting fuels. (15) Vipin Pathak, Co-founder & CEO, Care24: Easy FDI investment norms, licensing and startup support (tax, documentation, licensing, legal). (16) Manu Agarwal, Founder & CEO, Naaptol: Provide clarity to taxation laws relatd to online marketplaces; Better infrastructure and logistic systems like larger ports and transit systems are need to facilitate imports. (17) Hitesh Doshi, CMD, Waaree Energies: Push for solar manufacturing industry through fulfilling material's requirement locally; Encourage local production through incentives and implementation of anti-dumping policies; Investments in solar energy R&D and technology innovation; Policy reforms like that of depreciation benefits. (18) Amit Mishra, Co-founder & CEO, Quifers: Streamline tax on capital deducted at source like giving first year start-ups the benefit of tax exemption at source; Decreasing service tax by a certain percentage in the first year of operation; Giving out tax benefits and incentives to early stage investors. (19) Chirag Haria, CEO of Aarogyam Energy Jewellery: Utilization of India Post Rural Network with incentives on Cash on Delivery (COD) orders in Rural India, to help increase rural spending; Income tax benefits for individuals/trust investing in Gold Monetization Scheme to bring down gold imports; Increase Excise Duty exemptions from 1.5 crore to 5 crore to encourage small scale manufacturing and prevent black marketing. Read on...

TechStory: What Startups Want From Budget 2016?
Author: Dipti Gore

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 20 feb 2016

Experts at the international health conference, 'Delivering On the Promise of Universal Health Coverage in India: Policy Options and Challenges', suggested that India has to sincerely and immediately resolve the issues related to the healthcare sector. Over the years the sector has been neglected, policy decisions are influenced too much with politics and the sector was unable to provide quality services. According to Prof. T. Sundararaman, dean of School of Health Systems Studies at TISS (Tata Institute of Social Sciences), 'The 12th Five Year Plan said it will be the health plan but soon after funds dried up.' Prof. Sundararaman mentioned some of the important issues adversely affecting the growth of the health sector - re-positioning the role of states, contradictory assessment of NRHM (National Rural Health Mission), contradictions in HR policy and a gap between expectations and reality in private sector engagement. Anjali Chikersal of Center for Policy Research said, 'The first thing we need is availability of data. India has critical shortage of manpower in the sector but we also have imbalances.' According to Ravinder Singh Duggal of Internatinal Budget Partnership, 'We are producing adequate number of doctors but we do not capitalise on that. India needs consolidated National Health Rights Bill as our approach to health is very fragmented.' Prof. Richard Cash of Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health commented, 'India needs to learn from others, especially from those who share like experiences.' Ajith M. Sharan, Secretary at Ministry of AYUSH, added, 'We need to look at different kind of paradigm with more focus on paramedics.' Read on...

Business Standard: India needs to urgently resolve healthcare issues - Experts
Author: NA

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 14 feb 2016

Make in India Week has now started in Mumbai and along with it India Design Forum (IDF) 2016 is developing strategies and advocating how a facilitating design environment and culture can be nurtured to enable growth of manufacturing. IDF is integrated into Make in India campaign's plan to demonstrate the potential of design, innovation and sustainability across India's manufacturing sector. Rajshree Pathy, founder of IDF, explains, 'Design is not merely about clothes, shoes, handbags and jewellery, as is commonly believed. Those are incidental. Design is, in fact, at the heart of the manufacturing process. It is not a 'thing', it is a way of thinking.' Satyendra Pakhale, an Amsterdam-based designer, citing Tata Nano's example says, 'It is a good example of Indian design, which combined engineering innovations with a careful consideration for the demands of the domestic market. In fact, one of India's most famous qualities - jugaad - is indicative of an innovative mindset.' According to Simran Lal, CEO of Good Earth, 'It's important that we bring rural design and India's rural design communities along on this journey.' Time is now ripe for India to upgrade to a design-driven manufacturing ecosystem, attract global investments, partner with global corporations and manufacture for the world, but without losing the focus on serving the needs of the large local market. Read on...

The Indian Express: Make in India Week - Putting design at the heart of manufacturing
Author: Pooja Pillai

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 09 feb 2016

Dynamics of interactions, engagement and relationships between entrepreneurs and investors is an essential component of new business development process. During the initial phase of startup creation and at different stages of development and growth of their enterprise, entrepreneurs need investors that can fulfil their financial or fundraising requirements. Prof. Thillai Rajan A. of Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras and Prof. Swati Panda of Institute of Management Technology at Hyderabad, provide insights on how entrepreneurs can improve their chances of getting funded if they understand the differences between various types of investors and pitch to them accordingly. They conducted a detailed survey of 45 investors, whom they classified into three categories - angel investors, independent venture capitalists (VCs) and institutional VCs. All types of investors consider valuation as having a mix of both subjectivity and objectivity, but the quantity of each vary with the type of investor. Higher number of angel investors indicated valuation as a subjective process, while higher proportion of institutional VCs consider valuation as an objective process. When asked about the priorities for the different factors that influence valuation, all investors indicated that founder and management team are the biggest influencer of valuation. Moreover all types of investors gave least emphasis to past financial performance, and focused more on the future prospects. In case of relative importance of valuation, deal structure and return covenants, although all investors gave valuation of deal first preference, but the relative priorities differ. For angel investors valuation is relatively lowest while return covenants the highest. Deal structuring has almost same emphasis for all. Prof. Rajan explains, 'This indicates that entry valuation can be an important determinant of returns. While deal structure and return covenants can help contain losses, valuation probably determines the magnitude of upside gains from the investment.' Knowing the differences between investors can assist entrepreneurs to customize their propositions and deliver effective and targeted communication. Read on...

The Hindu: Right pitching key to fund-raising
Authors: Thillai Rajan A., Swati Panda

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 08 jan 2016

Technology-driven healthcare startups are finding new opportunities in India's mostly traditional healthcare system. But it is not an easy ride, with lack of digital orientation, policy and regulational scenario, slow pace of change in the healthcare industry etc. Simply put, these healthcare pioneers in India face more challenges than what the normal startups actually do. Mudit Vijayvergiya, Co-founder of Curofy, provides five most relevant challenges that all healthcare startups are broadly facing in India - (1) Slow Growth: Sluggish pace of growth of the industry is hard for survival. (2) Complex Industry: Complex rules and regulations can be obstacles for entrepreneurship and innovative thinking. Various policies are unclear and cause confusion at workplace. (3) Doctors are Tough: Miserable doctor patient ratio of 1:1700 and horrible 1:60000 in rural areas, make availability of doctors rare. Moreover digital healthcare is last on their mind. (4) Monetization: Slow growth of sector makes startups hard to monetize and to have a sustainable revenue model. Moreover social nature of the market and lack of financial ability of patients make it hard for private startups to make money. (5) Lack of Healthcare Mentors in India: Although India has large pool of trained medical professionals, but it has very few seasoned mentors and investors in the health-tech space to share their experience with entrepreneurs. Moreover track record of startups in healthcare is not very good either. Thus India currently lacks a win-win scenario for mentors, investors and entrepreneurs. Read on...

iamwire: 5 Biggest Challenges All Healthcare Tech Startups are Facing in India
Author: Mudit Vijayvergiya

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 06 jan 2016

Entrepreneurship is an essential component of the market economy. Entrepreneurs seek new opportunities through their extraordinary drive and skills, create enterprises that provide employment and generate revenues, to help economy grow. To successfully take leverage of demographic dividend and build a thriving economy, India needs to focus on entrepreneurship and continue to build an ecosystem that facilitates new venture development. As Kunal Bahl, Co-founder of Snapdeal, rightly said recently, 'India needs more entrepreneurs and less policy.' Given below is the partial list of Indian entrepreneurs that have created startups and hold a great promise in 2016 - (1) Abhinav Asthana, Postman (2) Jaydeep Barman, Faasos (3) Sahil Barua, Delhivery (4) Abhiraj Bhal, Urbanclap (5) Hitendra Chaturvedi, Greendust (6) Sunil Coushik, Prijector (7) Abhishek Goyal, Tracxn (8) Nalin Gupta, Auro Robotics (9) Virendra Gupta, Dailyhunt (10) Amit Jain, Cardekho (11) Nithin Kamath, Zerodha (12) Mohit Kumar, Roadrunnr (13) Byju Raveendran, Byju's (14) Abhinav Shashank, Innovaccer (15) MN Srinivasu, Billdesk (16) Rajesh Yabaji, Blackbuck. Read on...

The Economic Times: 16 startup founders to watch out for in 2016
Author: NA

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 30 dec 2015

The technology-enabled interactions of consumers and businesses have provided opportunities to capture data and utilize analytics to improve business processes and enhance products and services for customers in variety of industries. The analytics industry ecosystem is mushrooming with numerous vendors, from niche providers to one-stop solutions that include capture, storage, access and study of data for valuable insights. Suhale Kapoor, Co-founder of Absolutdata Analytics, captures various aspects of the analytics industry and its evolution in 2015 and explains what are the expected trends in the year ahead. Trends in 2015 - Growth of new startups and digital marketing tools; Increased use of analytics and Business Intelligence (BI); Rise in use of social media and social advertising on mobile; Rapid expansion of Internet of Things (IoT); Video content; Content marketing and predictive analytics; End-user experience and integration of online and offline content to improve service standards. Trends for 2016 - Shift towards cloud; Streaming architectures will hasten data computations; Visuals will come to rule; Data integration tools will assume more importance; Centre of Excellence (COE) will equip a business in understanding the peculiar needs and challenges for a data scientist; The Internet of Things (IoT) is all poised to bring about a data revolution; Non-analysts will start to dabble in data. Read on...

DATAQUEST: The Analytics Sector - Emerging trends and forecast for 2016
Author: Suhale Kapoor

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 19 dec 2015

The PPP Knowledge Lab of the World Bank defines a PPP (Public-Private Partnerships) as, 'A long-term contract between a private party and a government entity, for providing a public asset or service, in which the private party bears significant risk and management responsibility, and remuneration is linked to performance.' Different countries are incorporating modified version of the definition in their laws depending upon their own legal and institutional framework. Siraj Chaudhry, Chairman and CEO of Cargill India, suggests a PPP framework for India's agriculture for sustainability and better rural development, in which the government provides and co-finance the back-end of the value chain, while the rest is done by the private sector and the farmers. Although India has made continued progress in food security, quadrupling its food grain production. But a lot more is desired as its crop yield still hovers between 30% to 60% of the best sustainable crop yields achievable in developed and some other developing countries. There is substantial room for increase in productivity and total output gains. Moreover India has some of the highest postharvest food losses due to poor infrastructure and unorganized retail. To overcome infrastructural and supply-chain inefficiencies, degrading of land and water, effects of climate change etc, India requires a collaborative multipronged strategy in the form of PPP to utilize technologically advance farming practices, efficient supply chain and organized marketing and retailing. Mr. Chaudhry details the role of various PPP models that bring together all the stakeholders of the agricultural ecosystem for making India's agriculture as the engine of rural growth and development, to eradicate poverty, hunger and malnutrition, and in addition be a major source of food for the world - (1) Investing in smarter value chains: Develop food processing industry. Provide farm extension services. Enhance price realization. Cut out intermediaries. Improve supply chain through forward and backward linkages. (2) Improving access to credit, technology and markets: Utilize advance information technology and biotechnology. Provide farmers agricultural knowledge and guidance. Develop high-yield, pest resistant crops. Enable better management of natural resources. (3) Building farmer resilience to environmental shocks: Provide financial security to farmers. Enable them to de-risk through insurance etc. Develop integrated value chains. He cites the example of Maharashtra government's PPP for Integrated Agricultural Development (MPPIAD), that was catalyzed by World Economic Forum's New Vision for Agriculture (NVA), to develop integrated value chains. Read on...

Livemint: Making India's agriculture sustainable through PPPs
Author: Siraj Chaudhry

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 05 dec 2015

US-based Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) while describing the goals of architectural education explains, 'As a professional discipline, architecture spans both the arts and the sciences. Students must have an understanding of the arts and humanities, as well as a basic technical understanding of structures and construction. Skills in communication, both visual and verbal, are essential. While knowledge and skills must be developed, design is ultimately a process of critical thinking, analysis, and creative activity.' Prof. Akhtar Chauhan, Director of Rizvi College of Architecture (Mumbai, India) and founder president of International Association for Humane Habitat (IAHH), provides architectural students his views, discusses various aspects of architectural education and suggests what the education system should look for to create professionals who can work cohesively and sustainably for the future. ON CURRICULUM AND CLASSROOM LEARNING: 'Each student is encouraged to find his or her own expression through creative exploration...several electives are included which provides colleges with opportunities to experiment, explore and evolve their distinctive philosophy. Here at Rizvi, we are concerned with issues of sustainable architecture, affordable housing, appropriate and innovative technology and humane habitat.' ON ACADEMICS AND STUDENTS: 'You are likely to find the dreamers and the rebels. The dreamers create new kinds of environments. The rebels are the ones who want to change the world and look at every aspect of academics accordingly...since students in architecture are generally stressed with creativity, they are more involved in the process of self discovery over marks.' ON SOFT SKILLS: 'These are integrated within the curriculum...It is imperative for students of architecture to learn to express themselves through different mediums, including model making, photography, design, films, and so on.' ON CHALLENGES FACED BY STUDENTS: 'For those getting into first year, the environment change is huge...They need to unlearn those old methods at every step and adopt a new approach which is much more creative and open-ended...Due to emphasis on creativity, almost every student struggles initially to find his or her own expression. And students soon realise that this becomes a lifelong struggle.' ON BALANCE BETWEEN INDIVIDUAL CREATIVITY AND CLIENT'S NEEDS: 'Creating something for a client is a two-way process and every student should try and develop solutions for spaces...Students should think about the environment, sustainability, and aesthetic expression so that their architecture contributes a pride-level in society.' ON FINDING INSPIRATION: 'Nature itself is a great source of inspiration. Students can also look upon the great role models, architects like Charles Correa, Achyut Kanvinde, Christopher Benninger and Laurie Baker...At institutional level, they can approach architecture societies, associations and networks for advice, consultation and guidance.' Read on...

The Free Press Journal: "To create and innovate, you can't rely on copy and paste!" - Prof. Akhtar Chauhan
Author: Shraddha Kamdar

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