Rupee falls to 1-week low; importer demand sustains

MUMBAI: Rupee fell to its lowest in a week on Tuesday, logging a second successive day of loss, as importers continued to buy dollars and a weak euro posed headwinds to the currency.


Dollar demand from importers, particularly oil and gold buyers, has been consistently strong in recent sessions with global commodity prices plummeting, dealers said.

The dollar demand has prevented the rupee from gaining, though recent macroeconomic indicators have signalled a positive turn.

India's economy is expected to grow at 6.4 per cent in the current fiscal year and the slowdown in economic growth has bottomed out, the Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council said in a report on Tuesday, a more optimistic projection than that of most private estimates.

The panel said it expects the full-year current account deficit, seen as the main worry for the economy, to narrow to 4.7 per cent in the current financial year from 5.1 percent last year, helped by higher exports and lower gold imports.

The partially convertible rupee closed at 54.38/39 per dollar, weaker than its close of 54.14/15 on Monday. It fell 0.4 percent, its biggest single day fall since April 4.

It had fallen to 54.42 in session, its lowest level since April 16.

Indian financial markets will be shut on Wednesday for a local holiday.

"The demand for dollars is much higher from importers and oil companies. If we see some foreign investor outflows in May, the rupee can move towards 55 to the dollar," said Param Sarma, chief executive at NSP Forex in Mumbai.

The euro hit a two-week low against the dollar on Tuesday after weak German data fanned concerns about the euro zone economy and speculation the European Central Bank could cut interest rates.

Dealers are also closely watching political developments, with key bills lined up for passage in the second half of the budget session of parliament.

In the offshore non-deliverable forwards, the one-month contract was at 54.56, while three-month was at 55.15.

In the currency futures market, the most-traded near-month dollar/rupee contracts on the National Stock Exchange, the MCX-SX and the United Stock Exchange all closed around 54.37, with a total traded volume of $5.6 billion.

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Yahoo To Shut Down Its Email Service In World's Most Populous Country

Bangalore: Yahoo is all set to close its email services in China by this summer as a part of the agreement with its partner Alibaba Group, one of China's biggest Internet companies. This service is scheduled to close on August 19, reports Huffington Post.

Yahoo has started recommending its users in China to opt for another service provider such as Aliyun, an email service provider suggested as an alternative by the Alibaba Group. The company, since 2005 wanted to phase out of China after it handed over its website, email and other services over to Alibaba. As a part of that deal, Yahoo had acquired Alibaba's 40 percent stake paying around $1 billion.

The investment decision made by Yahoo by acquiring the stake is proved to be a good deal, as the company made a huge profit of $7.6 billion by selling half of its stake back to Alibaba last year. Analysts believe the remaining half of the stakes is now worth even more, predicted to be about $14 billion.

Alibaba is considering going public in the coming two years which would give an opportunity for Yahoo to sell more of its holdings.

In the same line, Yahoo has announced shutting down few of its other products and services in U.S. too which is low profitable and are not used by many. This in turn, would help the company to reduce its cost and thereby allowing its engineers to work more on other profit making apps and mobile products.  

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Supreme Court issues notice to Centre, TRAI to fix cap on SMS charge

The Supreme Court Monday issued notices to the Centre and TRAI on a plea seeking its direction to the government to fix cost-based tariff as cap for SMSes in view of "arbitrary charges" being levied by telecom operators.A bench headed by Chief Justice Altamas Kabir agreed to hear a PIL which pleaded that the government and the sector regulator should put a cap on the tariff of telecom services and the companies should not be allowed to levy termination charges(TC) for SMSes.
It asked the government and TRAI to file their replies within four weeks.
The court passed the order on a PIL filed by a registered society Telecom Watchdrog which alleged that all operators have started raising the tariff arbitrarily, taking advantage of the situation of reduced competition after the cancellation of 122 licenses by the apex court on February 6, 2012.
"In case of SMS, the cost of terminating a communication is negligible and therefore, TRAI had left it to the operators. All the operators had been following BAK (Bill-And-Keep) method, that means zero TC. However, of late, certain operators are trying to put a base price of a minimum of 10 paisa per SMS by way of imposing a levy of 10 paisa per SMS under the guise of TC," advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for the petitioner, said.
Termination charges are paid by an operator from whose network calls or SMSes originate to the one on whose network these communications are made.
The petitioner submitted that levy of TC would increase the base tariff of SMS many-fold and TC for SMS, being insisted on by certain operators in their bilateral agreement, are arbitrary, illegal, non-transparent.

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Vodafone India launches new roaming packs for pre-paid customers

Vodafone India Tuesday launched a new national roaming plan for its pre-paid customers. With this plan, Vodafone pre-paid customers will be able to receive incoming calls while roaming on Vodafone network at 30 paise per minute, across the country. Outgoing call rates are 1.5 paise per sec for all local & STD calls, while roaming or at home.

The price point for the new national roaming plan varies from state to state and ranges between Rs 26 to Rs 47. For example, in Delhi, there are two price points - Rs 21 and Rs 42.

With the new plan, Vodafone aims to capitalise on the upcoming holiday season where most people will be planning their vacations, and this new roaming plan will let the vacationers enjoy better roaming rates. Vodafone notes that plans come with a roaming incoming benefit of 30 days and tariff validity of 180 days. Standard rates will be applicable for SMS, data roaming and ISD roaming.

Standard national roaming tariff for pre-paid customers in Delhi is 1 rupee per minute for all incoming and local outgoing calls, and 1.5 rupees per minute for outgoing STD calls. An existing special recharge of Rs. 24 gives customers free incoming calls while roaming in Bihar, with outgoing calls (both local and STD) at 1.5 paise per sec.

Commenting on the initiative, Vivek Mathur, Chief Commercial Officer, Vodafone India said, "Vodafone has always been a pioneer, when it comes to enabling customers to enjoy a superior connectivity experience at affordable rates. We are pleased to present this new scheme, empowering our pre-paid customers with better value in terms of tariff and location options. The new national roaming plan has been specially created for those who tend to travel a lot on a regular basis. They can now talk more without worrying about high roaming costs."

These new roaming plans for pre-paid customers are presently available in all Vodafone circles, except Himachal Pradesh, Odisha and J&K.

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Google Street View now in 50 different countries

The search giant has just added Hungary and Lesotho to its list of Street View-enabled countries.

A Google Street View image of the Hungarian Parliament building.

Google Street View is now snapping panoramic pictures in 50 countries around the world.
The mapping service reached its 49th and 50th countries on Tuesday by launching in Hungary and Lesotho, according to the Google Maps blog. In addition, Street View has expanded its coverage in Poland, Romania, and other spots. In total, Google updated its Street View images for almost 350,000 miles of roads throughout 14 countries.
The images of Hungary include a view of the Hungarian Parliament building, a walk across the Chain bridge, and a peek at the Buda castle.
Lesotho, a country surrounded by South Africa, is the only independent state in the world situated entirely at 3,281 feet or more above sea level. As such, Street View images unveil some of the country's many mountainous regions, as well as such landmarks as the Lesotho Evangelical Church.
Launched in 2007, Google Street View kicked off with images of five cities in the U.S. It now covers 5 million miles of byways throughout the world.

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Forget online drives, sync directly with BitTorrent Sync

New BitTorrent Sync offers decentralized file syncing between your computers.

If you do not trust online storage drives for file syncing across your devices or are frustrated with storage limits, there is another player in town. BitTorrent has released a new alpha version of its Sync software, which supports syncing folders across the Internet without going through an intermediary like Dropbox, Cloud Drive, or iCloud.
The Sync software uses the standard BitTorrent decentralized file-sharing technology to establish a secure file-synchronizing routine between your various devices. It does so by use of local peer discovery, peer exchange, and static known hosts as well as DHT and classic BitTorrent trackers to establish links between your systems, and then uses standard P2P BitTorrent protocols to transfer and reassemble files in chunks.

Right-click a shared folder to copy the folder's shared secret encryption key for transfer to another system.

Files are sent directly between your computers if possible, but if not then relay servers are used. All traffic is encrypted with 256-bit AES encryption, and the use of an encryption "secret" prevents data from being read by anything but your authorized devices.
After installing the software, you select a folder or two to synchronize, and then generate a 21-byte encryption secret to link up your various devices. Copying this secret to the BitTorrent Sync client on another computer will establish the appropriate link and allow file sync to start immediately.
The benefits of this technology are that you do not rely on a third-party intermediary as a synchronization medium, and as such the only limit to storage size is the capacity of your systems' hard drives (and perhaps bandwidth limits imposed by your ISP).

With the shared secret copied, pasting it to another system's BitTorrent Sync settings will start the encrypted sync. Be sure to keep your 'secret' truly secret.

When initially announced in January, BitTorrent Sync was kept as a private test, but BitTorrent has made the latest release of Sync available to the public on Windows (XP SP3 or later), OS X (10.6 Snow Leopard or later), and Linux (kernel 2.6.16 or later) platforms. The latest version has added one-way synchronization options, and settings to exclude subdirectories and specific files.

Currently the sync does not offer versioning and backup management, but if your systems are coupled with Time Machine or another backup routine then files should be properly secured.
While it's available to the public, do keep in mind that BitTorrent Sync is still in alpha development, meaning that it will likely undergo significant changes in the upcoming months, and potentially have serious bugs in its code that could lead to data loss; however, it may be fun to try for those who regularly access multiple systems and wish to keep certain directories of files up to date.

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Apple profit slips 18%, but iPhone, iPad sales stay strong

Many of the numbers were good as Apple beat Wall Street's expectations for the most recent quarter -- but said it won't for the next one.

 

Apple surprised Wall Street today with stronger than expected earnings in its second quarter, though the company came up short in its estimates for the next one.
Apple reported earnings of $9.5 billion on $43.6 billion in sales. That was right on target with the $9.5 billion in profit and just barely above the $42.3 billion in sales that Wall Street expected. It was also above Apple's own expectations, which were between $9.23 and $10.23 per share on sales of $41 billion to $43 billion.
By comparison, Apple tallied up a higher $11.6 billion in profit on sales of $39.2 billion during the same quarter last year. That was fueled by iPhone and iPad sales that were 88 percent and 151 percent better than the year before, respectively.
"We are pleased to report record March quarter revenue thanks to continued strong performance of iPhone and iPad," Apple CEO Tim Cook said in a statement. "Our teams are hard at work on some amazing new hardware, software, and services, and we are very excited about the products in our pipeline."

Still, the results represent Apple's first year-over-year profit decline in a decade, an 18 percent drop from the year-ago quarter. The last time Apple posted a decline in profit from the previous year's quarter, it was the very beginning of 2003, and the company was hit by both the economic downturn and a restructuring charge, and then some.
"Fiscal 2012 results were incredibly strong," Cook told analysts during an earnings call after the news, adding that it was "making it difficult" to compare previous results. Other variables included a higher gross margins, higher strength of the dollar, and what Cook referred to as "historically low" component costs.
Apple said it sold 37.4 million iPhones during the quarter, well above the average of 34 million that Wall Street expected. Trailing that were sales of 19.5 million iPads, which also were above the consensus of 18 million to 19 million tablets. The two products are Apple's most popular, and they were revamped last fall. For other products, Apple sold 5.6 million iPods, and "just under" 4 million Macs, in line with estimates of around 3.9 million.
Cook played up the Mac sales, despite the 2 percent drop in sales from the previous year, pointing to the iPad as a potential gateway device. "We sold nearly 20 million iPads," Cook told analysts. "We believe if anything, the huge market in tablets may benefit the Mac, because it pushes people to expect and think about that product in a new manner." He added that the company was going to "continue making the best personal computers," and that "more great stuff" was planned.
For its next quarter, Apple said it expects sales between $33.5 billion and $35.5 billion and a margin between 36 percent and 37 percent, which even at the high end is less than the $38.6 billion in sales and 38.6 percent margin that analysts, on average, were expecting ahead of the call.
In after-hours trading following the news, shares of Apple jumped up $21.09, or 5.19 percent, though later settled down $1.15 to $404.98, or down 0.28 percent.
This is the first quarter since Apple changed the way it estimates its future financial results. The company was well known for comically low-balling its forecast, something that became more of an issue after a string of record-setting blowouts that drove many analysts to pump their estimates. During its last call with analysts, the company's CFO noted that Apple was moving from a set number to a "range of guidance that reflects our belief of what we are likely to achieve."
Alongside its quarterly performance, Apple announced an increase to its capital return program that adds another $55 billion on top of what it put into place last year. It also increased the amount of its quarterly dividend by 15 percent, which the company says will mean a pay out of a total of $11 billion to shareholders a year. That move coincides with Apple announcing it accrued $12.5 billion in cash during the quarter, bringing its grand total to $145 billion, up from the $137 billion the company reported at the end of January.
Apple is hosting a call with financial analysts at 2 p.m. PT, which should provide a number of insights into the company's numbers, including some that aren't initially reported. We'll add any important details from that call to this post.

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Young professionals choose MNCs for better pay and work-life balance

According to a recent survey conducted by Jobbuzz, young Indian professionals prefer to work for multinational corporations. Out of a total number of 8,000 respondents, approximately 22% were of the opinion that MNCs offer a better pay package; around 1000 respondents say it is because of a better work-life balance; and another 1300 said they prefer multi-nationals because of the well defined career path. Other reasons why young professionals prefer working for MNCs are opportunities to work abroad, organised processes, lesser politics, and the scope to work with smarter people.
While Indian companies are going global, there are still some aspects that they need to address to become ‘employers of choice’, according to the survey. For young professionals today, a good place to work is more than taking just a six digit salary; it is about a better learning experience, peer-to-peer interaction, and most importantly a steady growth path. MNCs, according to the survey, focus on all these aspects to provide a wholesome work environment.
According to employee perception, as reflected by the Jobbuzz survey, in Indian companies growth and industry exposure is often limited, MNCs however prove to be worthy in terms of providing adequate training and development programmes; encourage employees to gain international work experience; and last but not the least offer handsome pay package and perks.
Better Salaries & Perks
Explains Deepak Kaistha, managing director, Planman Consulting, “The lucrative schemes and policies of international MNCs surely fascinate the Indian employees. It is also believed that one’s lifestyle statement undergoes a sea change when he is associated with an international organisation.”
Better work-life balance
It is evident from the JobBuzz survey that a large percentage of Indian employees also believe that MNCs provide a better work-life balance. Suman Rudra, HR Head, NCR India is also of the opinion that the MNCs not only support flexi work, but often allow employees to work from home.
In our fast moving life where everything revolves around deadlines, many professionals face problems in balancing their personal and professional needs. Kaistha says, “MNCs have always been particular regarding their employee satisfaction. This is the reason why their offices are not only a place to work, but also a recreational hub after tiring office hours.”

Focused career path
A company might be giving its employees all the perks that are required, but are they also offering a positive growth path for them? Jaideep Shergill, CEO MSL Group, says, “In an MNC, employees get to move between functions, roles, and departments within a short span of time. This scope is missing if the company is based out of only one location. MNCs allow their employees to not only move within the organisation, but also externally, resulting in a better career growth path.”
Rudra points out some of the other aspects multi-national corporations provide:
-A professional work environment based on ethics and value system
-International career opportunities
-International learning opportunities like training cross geographic projects and multi country experience
Also,
-The workplace has strong multicultural work ethos and supports equal opportunity
-They are diversity focused and are sensitive to their needs, gender and other types
-Focus on performance and result orientation than people preference
-Attracts women employees as they encourage grooming women managers and leaders
As Indian professionals get more global exposure, in terms of best practices that are brought into the country by MNCs of Indian and non-Indian origin, it is a matter of time before other employers take note and start adopting these practices to become ‘great places to work’.

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Brilliant ways to get a flatter belly

Get a flatter belly

Worried why all your ab exercises aren't showing the results you want? Maybe you are missing something. These simple tips will make your workout work better for you...

Begin with small moves
Begin easy — you cannot go on a cyclothon before you know how to cycle and similarly you cannot do 50 crunches the first time you learn how to do it. Work a small range — hold a plank for 20 seconds or do only 10 crunches in the beginning.

Warm enough?
Some people do not realise the importance of a proper warm up before a workout session, and believe that it is a waste of time. But, warming up your muscles prevents injury. A little walking, marching on the spot, rotating your mid-section gently, bending forwards to touch your toe, etc can warm up your core for an ab workout.

Breathe
Oxygen is important for your core muscles, if you want them to work their full capacity. So, don't hold your breath. Inhale when you are doing the easy part of the move, and exhale when you have to exert force.

For example — exhale when you are on the way up while doing crunches.

Don't get distracted
If you thought only your muscles play an important role when it comes to doing those push ups, you were wrong — our mind too plays an important part in workout schedules. So, avoid watching TV while exercising, instead concentrate on the muscles, and feel them move, stretch and contract. It will improve your results.

Be an all rounder
When you want a flat belly fast, the trick is to do movements in all dimensions. Don't just concentrate on crunches — include other exercises and asanas like Vakrasana that help you twist and turn your body.

Balance
For strong abs you should try to incorporate some balance into your routine. Even something as simple as — standing on one leg while the other feet rests on your thigh, arms raised above your head and palms touching — the Vriksasana or the Tree pose.

Rest it out
Your workout will only work for you if you give yourself adequate rest. Overworking your abs won't help. The rest will help the muscles recover and will make them stronger.

Slow and steady
Speeding up your workout will not help. Slow down and you will burn fat better.

Try yoga
Sick of gymming? Try yoga. Most yoga poses are excellent for strengthening the core. Yoga not only exercises your mind along with your body, but it makes you flexible and reduces your stress-levels.

Weight matters
Your abdominal muscles could do better if they are challenged with some weights. With a kilo or so thrown in, your regular workout can give you even better results.

Pay attention to what you eat
If you want washboard abs, you need to eat right — just going through gruelling gym routines day after day, will not work. A city-based nutritionist says, "Make sure your diet consists of plenty of protein, low fat milk and milk products, fruits and fresh vegetables.

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Samsung Galaxy S4 to launch in India on April 26

Samsung will launch its flagship smartphone – Galaxy S4 – In India on April 26.

NEW DELHI: Samsung will launch its flagship smartphone - Galaxy S4 - In India on April 26. The launch is part of the global rollout of the device. It will go on sale in other markets like the US and some European countries on the same day.

For now, Samsung hasn't revealed any India price but the phone is expected to cost a little more than Rs 40,000.

Samsung has two versions of Galaxy S4 - one powered by a Qualcomm S600 processor and another powered by Samsung's 8-core Exynos processor. In India, the Korean company is expected to launch the Exynos model.

Galaxy S4, which is powered by Android operating system, is the successor to Galaxy S III. Samsung hopes to sell around 10 million units of its top smartphone within one month of launch.

In India, the company is the top smartphone vendor. According to CyberMedia Research, Samsung had a share of 43% in Indian smartphone market at the end of 2012.

Currently, Samsung and Apple are fighting a bitter war in Indian market. Last year Apple bolstered its operations in India. This year it has launched several aggressive schemes, including price cuts on older models of iPhones, to increase sale of its smartphones. Samsung has responded by introducing its own schemes, including cash back and zero interest EMIs for several models of Galaxy phones.

The Korean company hopes Galaxy S4 will help it stay ahead of Apple as a new iPhone is not expected to launch anytime soon.

When it hits the market, Galaxy S4 will also compete against HTC One, a phone that has garnered much praise among technology reviewers for its design, camera performance and a few unique features like Zoe. HTC One has been priced at Rs 42,990. It will be available in Indian market by the end of this month.

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Despite loss, Dravid feels Royals were exceptional

Rahul Dravid said another big positive from the match was all-rounder Shane Watson's fiery 61-ball 101.

CHENNAI: They might have ended up on the losing side but Rajasthan Royals captain Rahul Dravid feels his team was "exceptional" against the Chennai Super Kings given that the conditions were not too ideal for the bowlers in their IPL match.

"Throughout the innings, we executed our plans with the ball well. I thought it was a pretty good score to defend...it was not easy in terms of bowling conditions as the ball was getting wet and sweating," Dravid said after CSK chased down an imposing 186-run target to hand RR a five-wicket defeat.

"I thought the performance was exceptional today and particularly Jimmy Faulkner with the ball was superb show," he added referring to the bowler's effort of 3 for 20.

Dravid said another big positive from the match was all-rounder Shane Watson's fiery 61-ball 101, which was laced with half a dozen sixes and an equal number of fours.

"When someone plays an innings like that, you actually try being on the winning side. Binny was also very good to us giving the impetus in the last overs. I thought 185 was a really good score," he said.

The affable veteran was also lavish in praise of the opposition.

"I think the credit should go to Super Kings as well. They batted well in the middle phase and they had some dangerous players towards the end," he said.

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Psy's 'Gentleman' tops YouTube charts with 38M views in one day

The question is now: will "Gentleman" beat out "Gangnam Style" for overall views?

Views of Psy's "Gentleman" vs. "Gangnam Style" videos over their first 50 days on YouTube.

With the same searing beat, ridiculous lyrics, and tongue-in-cheek antics, South Korea's Internet phenomenon Psy is breaking charts again with his new single "Gentleman."
YouTube announced Monday that "Gentleman" is giving "Gangnam Style" a run for its money by setting the record for getting the most views in one day ever. On April 14, "Gentleman" hit more than 38 million views. And, after only being up for about a week, the video has a total of nearly 204 million views.
"From a stats perspective, it's one of the biggest music video launches the web has ever seen," YouTube Trends manager Kevin Allocca wrote in a blog post Monday. "For some added perspective, 'Gentleman' was seen 100 million times in less than 4 days in regions all over the world, a milestone that it took 'Gangnam Style' nearly two months to achieve."

"Gangnam Style" broke YouTube records by becoming the most viewed video of all-time, it now has a staggering 1.5 billion views. It was also the first video to ever even hit 1 billion views. But, now, it's looking like "Gentleman" is making gains on "Gangnam Style." According to YouTube, Psy's new hit debuted at No. 1 on YouTube's music chart last week -- bumping "Gangnam Style" down to No. 2.
The previous single-day record was set by KONY 2012 last March with 31 million views in one day, according to YouTube. This video has a far different subject matter than Psy's dance beats; KONY 2012 tells the controversial tale of filmmaker Jason Russell's personal mission to take down Joseph Kony, the Ugandan leader of the guerrilla group Lord's Resistance Army.

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Google Now could be Google's new home page

iGoogle isn't long for this world, but that doesn't mean that Google won't have a personalized home page for you.

A Google-made extension appears to port Google Now beyond Android via Chrome.

A Chrome browser extension and some code hidden on a Web site indicate that Google might replace iGoogle with a desktop version of Google Now.
The unconfirmed report on Google Operating System, a blog that's not affiliated with Google, highlights code on a Web page that it says Google uses to test new features. In this case, the code calls out "Google Now" in instructions on what the new features do.

The code also contains an introduction to Google Now: "Get started with Google Now. Just the right information at just the right time." Google Now debuted last year as a personal assistant that also offered predictive search in Android 4.2 Jelly Bean.
Google revealed last summer that its previous customizable home page, iGoogle, would be shut down on November 1, 2013. iGoogle launched its Google-flavored combination of search and widgets in 2005 to compete with My Yahoo.
Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment. CNET will update this story when we hear back.
There are other indications that big plans are afoot for Google Now. Along with the call-outs hidden in the test page's HTML, Google has built a Chrome desktop extension that opens Google Now as your "new tab" page. Its default language is set to Russian, but it is verified in the Chrome Web Store as coming from Google.
Co-founder and CEO Larry Page also gave a shout-out to Google Now in last week's quarterly earnings call, as sure a sign as any that Now won't face the dreaded Google service death-by-neglect anytime soon.

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Windows 8.1 Start button may not offer actual Start menu

The much-rumored Start button may simply lead users back to the Start screen, sources tell The Verge.

The Windows 8 desktop.

Windows 8 users hoping for a return of the traditional Start button and Start menu in Windows 8.1 may be disappointed.
Rumors have floated recently that Microsoft may revive the familiar Start button in the Windows 8.1 update scheduled for release later this year. A new report today from The Verge claims that "sources familiar with Microsoft's plans" have confirmed the return of the Start button.
But -- and there always seems to be a "but" -- the new Start button apparently will not trigger a traditional Start menu but instead simply bounce users back to the Start screen, according to The Verge's sources. If true, that means the button would serve the same role as the Start screen thumbnail that appears when you move your mouse to the lower left "hot" corner.
Excuse me? Assuming The Verge's sources are correct, I guess such a Start button would benefit people who don't know they can access the Start screen thumbnail by hovering over the left corner. Otherwise, I don't see the advantage in a Start button that just brings you back to the Start screen.

Microsoft reportedly killed the Start button and Start menu from Windows 8 based on "telemetry" obtained from its Customer Experience Improvement Program. The company is now eyeing a return of the button for Windows 8.1 as a result of user feedback, according to The Verge.
But what about the user feedback clamoring for a true Start menu? There's a reason why Start menu replacements such as Classic Shell, Pokki for Windows 8, and Start8 have proven so popular. People clearly at least want the option to be able to access their applications, folders, and settings via an old-school but reliable menu.
Offering a Start button that just leads you back to the Start screen seems like a half-hearted effort at best. Or course, it's not fair yet to criticize Microsoft based simply on rumors of such a feature. But if the report is true, I think Microsoft needs to listen a bit more closely to its user feedback.

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Today`s Quotes

“Sometimes people are beautiful.

Not in looks.

Not in what they say.

Just in what they are.”

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Demand for engineering talent declining in IT industry: Report

NEW DELHI: Demand for engineering graduates in the IT industry is reducing due to slowdown in revenue growth, change in business mix and preference for science graduates to lower costs, says a new report. “We attribute slowdown in absorption of engineering talent to slowdown in revenue growth rates of Indian IT, change in nature of demand (BPO and infrastructure management services) and effort by companies to lower cost of delivery by recruiting science graduates for delivery of services,” a Kotak Institutional Equitiesreport said.
The report said business mix of Indian IT is changing with incremental growth accruing from analytics, consulting, BPO etc., which requires employees with different skill profiles.
“Protectionism and expansion of delivery network to other low-cost locations such as Mexico, China and Eastern Europe are leading to accelerated hiring by companies outside India,” it said.
The report said TCSBSE -0.58 % recruited over 5,000 non-Indians in the past four quarters while Infosys has significantly stepped up hiring in local geographies.
“In addition, many new deals involve re-badging of client employees. This reduces demand for Indian engineering talent,” it added.
The report said supply of engineers has also increased aggressively over the past few years.
“India now trains more engineers annually (1.5 mn) than China (1.1 mn) and the US (0.1 mn) combined. This may lead to meaningful underemployment or stagnating wages,” the report said.
Excess supply will give companies flexibility to recruit in line with requirements, it added.

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Foods that don't let you slim down

Foods that stop you from slimming down

Your diet staples could be sabotaging your efforts to slim down and denying you vitamins and minerals

Those low-fat, low-taste alternatives passed off as 'health foods' could, in fact, be costing you your health. It's easy to be misled with labels such as 'high fiber', and 'natural'. In reality, many so called 'healthy' foods contain high levels of fat, sugar and salt. Reading the ingredient list and nutrition facts column could help you choose the right items. Here's a round up of the things you consider good that may actually be bad:

Honey
You think honey is healthier and more natural than sugar? You are wrong. Both contain similarly high levels of glucose. Because honey is denser, one tablespoon actually contains more calories than the same sized spoonful of granulated sugar. Eat too much honey and you'll gain just as much weight as you will gorging on other sweet stuff.

Low-fat salad dressing
Scientists at Iowa State University, US, have found that low-fat dressing cancels out the goodness in salad. Conversely, using olive oil, or a little butter, boosted vitamin intake because fat helps your body absorb nutrients from vegetables more efficiently.

Breakfast cereals
Studies show that people who eat cereal for breakfast tend to be slimmer than those who don't — but only if they're opting for a healthy brand. Choose the wrong box and you may as well start your day with a slice of cake, as some cereals are high in sugar and fat. The main ones to watch out for are your flavoured, chocolate and sugar-coated or frosted kids' ones. So always read the label. Not that you need to skip the cereal aisle altogether — experts agree that tucking into a bowl of porridge or any other wholegrain cereal is actually healthy. Naturally low in calories and high in fibre, these will help keep you fuller for longer and ward off midmorning snacking.

Skimmed milk
Although guzzling whole milk has been demonised as a health no-no in recent years, research shows that it could be a better choice than its skimmed counterpart.

Whole milk only contains around 4 per cent fat per 100ml as opposed to the 20 per cent plus deemed to be in the 'high fat' category. Skimmed milk contains 0.1 per cent fat. So switching from whole to skimmed milk won't make a huge difference.

Skimmed milk is less nutritious because cream contains fatsoluble vitamins A, D, E and K. Research reveals that full-fat milk boosts metabolism and help you burn more calories, while also lowering the risk of heart disease.

Raw vegetables
Cooking is believed to kill the vitamins and minerals, but studies have found the opposite. While cooking may destroy some (but not all) vitamin C, the process boosts the uptake of disease-fighting nutrients — antioxidants. A 2008 study found that vegetables such as carrots, spinach, mushrooms, asparagus, cabbage and peppers supply more antioxidants when cooked than when eaten raw. This is because cooking breaks down vegetables' thick cell walls, making it easier for the body to absorb the nutrients they contain. Steaming is best, then gentle boiling. Frying preserves the least vitamins and minerals.

Diet drinks
They seem like a straightforward way for soft drink lovers to cut calories but experts think diet drinks could actually scupper weight loss. While the artificial sweeteners in such drinks can convince the taste buds they're consuming sugar, the brain can't be tricked so easily. When it's denied the calories it's expecting, your body goes on a calorie hunt, making you feel hungry and eat more. Which is why consuming diet drinks can make people more likely to pile on weight, than reduce it.

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Tata Teleservices to surrender spectrum in 15 circles

Tata Teleservices Ltd, India's sixth-biggest cellular carrier by customers, said it will surrender part of its CDMA mobile airwaves in all but two of its zones, after the government asked carriers to pay surcharges on airwaves.Tata Tele, 26 percent owned by Japan's NTT DoCoMo, said it has informed the telecommunications ministry that it will give up CDMA airwaves beyond 2.5 megahertz in 15 service areas, but retain 3.75 megahertz in the Delhi and Mumbai cities.
"The company stands committed to ensuring that this will not adversely affect network or service quality and is looking to deploy additional capex to offset the reduced spectrum availability," the company said in a statement.
It was not immediately known how much Tata Tele, which was required to pay more than $200 million in surcharges, would save by returning part of the airwaves. Tata Tele operates two separate networks based on the GSM and CDMA technology.
India has imposed surcharges totalling more than $4 billion on long-established carriers, after an overhaul in the country's airwave sale process, a move which carriers have challenged in courts and its execution has been halted.
Carriers operating on the popular GSM technology are required to pay surcharges on their airwave holding exceeding 4.4 megahertz, while for CDMA-based carriers the surcharges are imposed on holding beyond 2.5 megahertz.
Those companies who do not want to pay the surcharges have the option to give back the airwaves to the government.

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Goodbye QWERTY, hello faster typing with KALQ

Texting just got a lot easier! Researchers claim to have developed a new keyboard for touchscreens that allows superfast thumb-typing, enabling you to type 34 percent faster than on a QWERTY layout. The research team used computational optimisation techniques in conjunction with a model of thumb movement to search among millions of potential layouts before identifying one that yields superior performance.
Typing on today's mobile phones and tablets is needlessly slow. One limitation is that the QWERTY layout is ill-suited for tablets and other touchscreen devices when typing with the thumbs, researchers said.
Thumb typing is also ergonomically very different from typing on a physical keyboard.
Researchers said it has been established that normal users using a QWERTY on a touchscreen device are limited to typing at a rate of around 20 words per minute, which is slow compared to the rates achieved on physical keyboards.
The researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Informatics and colleagues from the University of St Andrews and Montana Tech initiated the process to develop a layout for two-thumb text entry with the goal of improving typing performance and minimising the strain for the thumbs.
"The key to optimising a keyboard for two thumbs is to minimise long sequences with a single thumb," lead researcher Antti Oulasvirta said.
"We also want to place frequently used letters centrally close to each other. Experienced typists move their thumbs simultaneously: While one is typing, the other is approaching its next target. We derived a predictive model of this behaviour for the optimisation method," said Oulasvirta.
The computational optimisation process had two goals: To minimise the moving time of the thumbs and to approximate alternating sides as well as possible.
In the new keyboard KALQ, all vowels, with the exception of the letter "y" are placed in the area for the right thumb, whereas the left thumb gets assigned more keys.
To fully benefit from this layout, the users were trained to move their thumbs simultaneously. While one thumb is typing, the other one can move to its next target.
Finally, researchers developed probabilistic error correction methods that took into account how thumbs move and also statistical knowledge about the texts users type.
With these improvements, users were able to reach 37 words per minute, which is the best ever reported for two-thumb typing on touchscreen devices, significantly more than the approximate 20 words on a split QWERTY for regular users.
Researchers said KALQ will be made available as a free app for Android-based smartphones at the beginning of May.

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Google's new Motorola smartphones "very, very impressive": Schmidt

In the past few months, there have been no dearth of rumours regarding Google's Motorola building the 'X Phone'. Now Google Executive Chairman has added a dash of excitement to these rumours by stating that he has seen the smartphones coming up at Motorola and they are "very, very impressive."Schmidt made this remark while talking at the AllThingsD Dive Into Mobile conference. He further went to add,"They have a new set of products, which are phenomenal." He also mentioned that these smartphones should not be termed as just phones but "Think of it as phones-plus." We're not sure if that's a reference to the size of the phones, or their quality, but Schmidt has definitely added a new sense of anticipation towards the devices.
One reason to believe it is not a reference to the size of the phones are the comments made by Jim Wicks, Design Chief at Motorola. While talking to PC Magazine, Wicks said that the company will be launching stock Android devices. He further exclaimed, "if you like smaller form-factor devices or stock Android, you're going to be excited."
The current trend for smartphones is to have a larger screen size but looks like Motorola will not be looking at having "mega" screen and be more focussed on the Android experience for its forthcoming smartphones.
It is noteworthy, that Google completed its acquisition of Motorola in May 2012. Under the new management, Motorola had launched a line of RAZR smartphones, but Google executives maintain that these smartphones were built under the supervision of old management and they had negligible influence on what was churned out. Google even went out to state that Motorola smartphones lacked the "wow factor".
However, the company now plans to change the same. The company had earlier in the year roped in former Apple evangelist Guy Kawasaki. Kawasaki is reportedly focussing on product design, user interface, marketing and social media at Google and is expected to fuse in some enthusiasm in the Motorola brand.
Commenting about Android, Schmidt predicted at the Dive Into Mobile conference that in the coming six to nine months, there will be more than a billion devices running Android.
Schmidt also remarked that the search engine giant was "phenomenally happy" with the Facebook's Home app, which replaces the home screen on Android phones and said Google has no plans to block it.

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Social media as breaking-news feed: Worse information, faster

commentary The unfolding of breaking news on social media can create a dangerous well of misinformation, witch-hunting, and egomaniacal info-spewing. Time for some ground rules for the Internet.

One of the many non-news sites that accidentally libeled a high-schooler in the rush to be a real-time news source.

Early this morning, the public Facebook page called Binders Full of Women apologized for posting Boston police scanner chatter that erroneously identified a missing Brown undergrad as a suspect in this week's Boston Marathon bombings. The Binders Full of Women feed author subsequently deleted the post. Earlier, in the midst of multiple other posts about the unfolding Watertown, Mass., manhunt and shootout that started last night, the author defensively noted that any misinformation must be excused because, "I am NOT a journalist, and I am only relaying information from the [Boston Police Department] scanner and news sources."
But in point of fact, why, exactly, is a public page dedicated to women's rights issues in America essentially live-blogging a suspect manhunt, warts and all, on Facebook? Not that the Facebook page (whose 319,000 followers all got the same misinformation) was the only offender.
Michael Skolnik, of hip-hop culture and news blog Global Grind also apologized on Twitter for publishing the name overheard from scanner chatter, which was also tweeted by many, many others who either heard it on police scanners or retweeted what they saw online.
And Reddit moderators were apologizing for kicking off the whole domino chain after their commenter community initially targeted the student, Sunil Tripathi, as a possible suspect, and then repeated the news that his name had been used on police scanners.
Meanwhile, a high-school track runner is afraid to leave his house because he was wrongly identified as a possible suspect in crowdsourced photos and by the New York Post. And this poor guy was briefly held, questioned, and released in Watertown last night, but not before he was identified all over Twitter as a "suspect on the ground."
If speed is the currency of the modern information era, misinformation is the increasingly high cost. Some, like Matthew Ingram at Paid Content, argue that journalism is made better by multiple sources. And certainly, high profile mistakes (and occasionally laughable coverage) by the likes of CNN, and downright irresponsible journalism by the New York Post, might seem to suggest that's true.
It's not. We have more information, but it's a morass of truths, half-truths, and what we used to call libel. It's fast, but it's bad. And bad information is a cancer that just keeps growing. I'd argue the opposite of Ingram: that the hyperintense pressure of real-time reporting from Twitter, crowdsourcing from Reddit, and constant mockery from an online community that is empirically skewed toward negativity and criticism is actually hurting journalism. It's making all the news worse.

Why is CNN reporting wrong information as soon as possible? Because if CNN reports that info 20 minutes after it showed up on Twitter, the network will be skewered as pathetically behind the times. But should CNN or Fox report erroneous information in the rush to keep up, the networks will be skewered with identical glee and ruthlessness, while Reddit's slanderous and speculative threads will be congratulated as collaborative crowdsourcing that, while it may lead to devastating mistakes early on, eventually lands on the truth.
What kind of ridiculous double standard is that?
We're still in the early stages of figuring out how to experience news on social media. I do agree that firsthand reports from witnesses, reporters on Twitter, and those to whom an event is actually happening are invaluable new sources of information. I agree that circulating official "have you seen this person" images on Reddit or anywhere else online is orders of magnitude more effective than the old days of nailing said posters to trees and outhouses. Social media and the Internet have a huge role to play in the future of news -- they may very well be the future of news. But right now, they're making news worse before they make it better.
So as we go forward, I'd like to suggest some social-media Ground Rules for Breaking News.
Rule #1: If you have a lot of followers and you want to help, direct people to reliable sources of information, like a police department feed, a news feed, or someone who's on the ground, as in the case of Danny Sullivan last night with Seth Mnookin and other local resources.
Rule #2: Do not, under any circumstances, broadcast the names or photos of alleged suspects before verification. Panicked police officers in the midst of a firefight, chase, manhunt, and explosions who are desperately shouting things over scanners do not count as verification.

Scanner apps rise to the Top 10 on iTunes. Put the scanner apps down, I beg you.

Rule #3: If you want to be involved, broadcast helpful information, not Any Information At All. If you're the Binders Full of Women Facebook page, tell your 319,000 followers how to donate blood in the aftermath of a bombing. Tell them to stay inside while the bombing suspect manhunt continues. Broadcast the number of the FBI tip line in case they see any suspicious information. You can be useful without trying to be a news wire.
Rule #4: Sometimes you are powerless and you do not have information. That's OK. It's not your job. The Internet doesn't make us a great, seething Collective Omniscient just because there are more eyeballs on what's happening. Information, unlike sending a tweet full of wrong information, still takes time. Just put down the computer and go to bed.

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Nokia's wireless chargers perk up local coffee shops

What will it take for wireless charging to catch on? Nokia and Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf shops hope that making stations public will do the trick.

Nokia's sponsored wireless charging station in a downtown San Francisco Coffee Bean shop.

Last September, Nokia kicked off the launch of its Nokia Lumia 920 with promises of exposing more people to wireless charging -- an available, but underused capability -- by bringing it to spots where people go.

Specifically, Nokia said it would sponsor wireless charging stations using the Qi protocol at Virgin America airport lounges and Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf stores.
Earlier this week, I finally saw Nokia's power-promotion installed at my favorite Coffee Bean location on San Francisco's busy Market Street. What a sorry sight it was.
Market Street is a bustling downtown location, so I'm not entirely surprised that Nokia's promotional sign is crammed in tight. Unfortunately, its image of the yellow Lumia 920 is only visible from a side angle, and almost completely obscured by customers and a table.
In front of the sign, the wooden, six-seater table in question houses two towers of power outlets and sports disintegrating printed paper urging you to lay your Qi-compatible phone down right there to give it a power top-up. (By the way, Qi is pronounced "chee.")

Is that smudged, disintegrating paper advertising Nokia's under-table charging stations? Ew.

Yet, there's no charging coil within the printed sheet of paper. Peek your head under the table (which I did, much to the horror of the people seated 'round the table) to see the deep grooves and troughs where the wireless charging pads are firmly inserted and bolted down.
Hiding the source of the charge is a great idea that boosts the chargers' aesthetics and makes the pricy units harder to steal. (Embedded stations also happen to be one future implementation of a second-generation wireless charging standard.)
However, why go to the effort of carving out perfect indentations if you're only going to use decomposing and coffee-stained notices to attract users, many of whom might not know if they have a Qi-enabled phone, let alone what Qi even is.

The Qi-enabled wireless chargers have been embedded beneath this work table.

So with that, let me offer some advice for future in-store demonstrations. Use paint, a large vinyl sticker, or some other laminate to denote the tabletop charging area. Put some effort into its graphics and font to make wireless charging as hip and modern as it really is.
And for heaven's sake, Nokia, or Coffee Bean, or whomever is in charge of this promotion, please do yourself a favor and have store clerks set up posters where they can do the most good promoting your actual product, the wireless charging phones you're trying to sell.

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Great battery life and a slim body for only $799

Average User Rating

The good: The Toshiba Satellite U845T is thin, with a decent brushed-aluminum body, a 128GB SSD, and better performance and battery life than the competition.

The bad: The keyboard has squeezed-down keys, a small spacebar, and some flex under heavy typing. The low screen resolution feels dated in a midsize laptop.

The bottom line: While it's not going to dazzle anyone, the Toshiba Satellite U845T is a great example of exactly how much laptop $799 should buy in 2013.

There's a reasonable chance you'll end up hearing about the Toshiba Satellite U845T on a semiregular basis from us. That's because, at $799 for a 14-inch laptop that's ultrabook-thin, with a touch screen, Intel Core i5 processor, and 128GB solid-state drive, it's about as middle-of-the-road as laptops get.
For the moment, that makes the U845T the perfect example of a midsize, midprice laptop, and thanks to a sharp aluminum design and lack of any overly annoying or deal-killing flaws, it may end up being our default laptop recommendation for a lot of readers.
This is an especially important comparison when we look at Atom-powered touch-screen laptop-tablet hybrids. Those systems usually have small screens, slow performance, and compromised designs, but can cost just as much when you include the optional keyboard docks and other accessories. A handful of Core i5 touch-screen laptops are available for about $100 less, usually with bulkier, plastic bodies, and adding $100-$200 gets you into premium territory, such as the Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga.

 

The U845T isn't perfect -- the keyboards on most Toshiba Satellite laptops are oddly squeezed, with especially small spacebars, and only one of the three USB ports is of the current 3.0 variety. But it's right in that midprice sweet spot, so if you're looking for a decent all-around laptop for under $800, this is a great place to start.

Price as reviewed	$799
Processor	1.8GHz Intel Core i5-3337U
Memory	6GB, 1,600MHz DDR3
Hard drive	128GB SSD
Graphics	Intel HD4000
Operating system	Windows 8
Dimensions (WD)	9.1x13.5 inches
Height	0.8 inch
Screen size (diagonal)	14 inches
System weight / Weight with AC adapter	3.6 pounds / 4.2 pounds
Category	Midsize

Design and features
If you think of a typical laptop design on the "nicer" side of the fence -- as opposed to the plastic, budget side -- you'll probably picture something that looks and feels a lot like the Toshiba Satellite U845T. Despite the midsize 14-inch screen, it's thin (0.8 inch), light (3.6 pounds), and solidly built. Spend more, and you can shave off some size and weight, but these 14- and 15-inch ultrabooks no matter what are sort of skirting the definition of everyday portability with their larger screens, as least compared with 13-inch models.
The brushed aluminum on the lid and keyboard tray is upscale without standing out. If you took the mirror-finish Toshiba logo off of the back of the lid, this could be a laptop from any number of PC makers. Open the lid, and the interior is minimalist, with only a couple of indicator lights and a backlit power button to accompany the touch pad and keyboard (OK, and a bunch of Intel, Energy Star, and EPEAT stickers).

 

The backlit keyboard has black keys set against a gray keyboard tray. Like other Toshiba Satellite laptops, the actual island-style keys are more rectangular than round, but the end effect is that each key is slightly squashed, giving the keyboard a cramped feel. Many Toshiba laptops have unusually short spacebars, as is the case here, which can interfere with some typing styles. Add a small but noticeable amount of flex in the center of the keyboard, and you get a keyboard that's usable, but not my favorite part of this laptop.
The large clickpad-style touch pad fares better. With no separate left and right mouse buttons, there's more room for multitouch gestures, and two-finger scrolling is reasonably smooth.
The 14-inch display is one of the few lower-end components here. The 1,366x768-pixel native resolution is on the low side for a midsize laptop, and henceforth we'll likely see this resolution in fewer and fewer laptops, outside of the least expensive budget systems. Interestingly, while the U845T has a touch screen (and a perfectly responsive one at that), this is one of the only touch-screen laptops without an edge-to-edge glass overlay over the entire inside surface of the lid.

	Toshiba Satellite U845T	Average for category [midsize]
Video	HDMI	VGA plus HDMI or DisplayPort
Audio	Stereo speakers, headphone/microphone jacks	Stereo speakers, headphone/microphone jacks
Data	1 USB 3.0, 2 USB 2.0, SD card reader	2 USB 3.0, 2 USB 2.0, SD card reader
Networking	Ethernet, 802.11n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth	Ethernet, 802.11n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth
Optical drive	None	DVD burner

Connections, performance, and battery
The U845T continues its streak as a perfectly average laptop, with a perfectly average collection of ports and connections. There's only one video output, HDMI in this case, and also only one USB 3.0 port (it has two USB 2.0 ports), but I always like getting a built-in Ethernet jack and separate audio-in and -out jacks. Note that the single USB 3.0 port is of the sleep-and-charge variety, which means it can use the laptop's battery to charge devices such as a phone, even when the laptop is asleep or powered off.
While this Satellite U845T is a fixed-configuration $799 laptop, Toshiba does offer another model, also for $799, that swaps out the 128GB SSD for a standard 500GB, 5,400rpm hard drive. If you need a lot of storage space, that might be a good idea, but I'd stick with the SSD for its advantages in speed, power consumption, weight, and heat.
With a 1.8GHz Intel Core i5-3337U CPU, the Satellite U845T performed a tiny bit better than some other recent slim midsize laptops in our benchmark tests, most of which have a slightly slower Core i5-3317U processor. But the performance difference is slight, and for everyday use -- Web surfing, social media, HD video playback, basic productivity -- you'd be hard-pressed to tell the difference.

 

One area where the U845T does stand out, however, is battery life. In our video playback battery drain test, the system ran for 6 hours and 4 minutes. Any laptop that tops 6 hours is impressive, and for a $799 14-incher, that's even more impressive. HP's similar Pavilion 15 Sleekbook ran for only a little more than 3 hours on the same test.
Conclusion
Every once in a while, a laptop comes along that's just a great example of what a shopper should be able to get for a specific price. While it doesn't massively overshadow what other PC makers offer in the same category, the Toshiba Satellite U845T is exactly what I'd hope for in a midsize $799 laptop right now. It's thin, with a decent brushed-aluminum body, a 128GB SSD, and even slightly better performance and battery life than the competition gives.

Multimedia multitasking test (in seconds)(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Toshiba Satellite U845T-S4165

446 

Asus VivoBook S500C

486 

Dell Inspiron 15z

568 

HP Pavilion TouchSmart 15 Sleekbook

800 

Adobe Photoshop CS5 image-processing test (in seconds)(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Dell Inspiron 15z

187 

Toshiba Satellite U845T-S4165

241 

Asus VivoBook S500C

289 

HP Pavilion TouchSmart 15 Sleekbook

446 

Apple iTunes encoding test (in seconds)(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Toshiba Satellite U845T-S4165

121 

Asus VivoBook S500C

129 

Dell Inspiron 15z

131 

HP Pavilion TouchSmart 15 Sleekbook

288 

Video playback battery drain test (in minutes)(Longer bars indicate better performance)

Toshiba Satellite U845T-S4165

364 

Dell Inspiron 15z

304 

Asus VivoBook S500C

271 

HP Pavilion TouchSmart 15 Sleekbook

200 

Load test (average watts)(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Asus VivoBook S500C

26.1 

Dell Inspiron 15z

29.8 

Toshiba Satellite U845T-S4165

39.4 

HP Pavilion TouchSmart 15 Sleekbook

44.9 

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Today`s quotes

“The reason I talk to myself is because I’m the only one whose answers I accept.”

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Tech companies may hire 50,000 less this fiscal

India’s information technology industry is expected to generate between 1.3-1.5 lakh new jobs this financial year, as it slowly deploys the excess number of engineers hired last year when business growth turned out to be less than expected. The hiring estimates by industry body Nasscom pales in comparison to the just completed year when the industry created 1.88 lakh new jobs.

India’s IT and BPO sector provides direct employment to 30 lakh people. “Business is not growing in a linear fashion as we move up the value chain,” said Nasscom president Som Mittal. “Even with 1.30 lakh new jobs, still we are the largest employer.”
The $108-billion export-driven sector, however, is expected to see better growth in the current financial year, according to industry body Nasscom, which has pegged the growth at about 12-14 per cent compared to just about 10 per cent last year. Some of the larger companies like InfosysBSE 1.30 % and Wipro grew slower at half the industry pace, and are burdened with large ‘benches’ – engineers who are not working on any revenue generating projects.
While Infosys delayed the absorption of graduates hired from campuses by up to nine months, others like HCL have faced protests by engineering graduates who were selected from campuses in late 2011 but are awaiting joining dates.
The nature of services delivered by Indian IT firms are evolving, requiring less number of engineers as automation of work becomes common place.

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