HCL technologies' Chief Executive Vineet Nayar recently said that American tech graduates are basically 'unemployable', according to an InformationWeek report. He says that he views American tech grads as inferior to those from India, China and Brazil. American tech students only enter the field to get rich or to dream up the next big thing while students from India and China are willing to handle even the boring part of the industry, ITIL and Six Sigma.
Several months ago few western CEO had claimed that even though India produces second largest number of engineers in the world, more than half of them are unemployable. They also say that Indian graduates are smart, driven and they work for a pittance compared to their Western counterparts but lack critical thinking and creativity and function like robots.
Nayar has responded back to such claims as he feels that Americans are too costly to train as compared to Indian graduates who are highly trained in real life applications because they attend vocational courses and have hands on experience. HCL, however, has recently announced that it plans to open a delivery centre in North Carolina with an investment of $3.2 million and will hire over 500 employees over the next five years under a U.S. Job Development Investment Grant.
These remarks from Nayar have already created quite a few controversies. InformationWeek's Robert Preston wrote: "Imagine if the CEO of a U.S.-based tech company marched into Mumbai seeking a bigger share of the country's multibillion dollar market and declared the locals to be unemployable and un-trainable. A culture of innovation isn't inconsistent with one that values attention to detail." Few websites have taken this to extreme. A protectionist web site JobDestruction.com has sent email newsletter which says, "HCL hires Indians almost exclusively, so it's safe to assume that Nayar's disparaging comments don't just apply to our young college graduates. He thinks ALL Americans are unemployable."
Thursday, June 25, 2009
IT market
Indian IT boom to provide job opportunities abroad
Source: siliconindia
So far American firms have been picking up talent from India by offering good salary packages. But things might soon change as Indian companies are now scouting global market to hire employee. One such company is Infosys which is spending $100 million over the next year to train 25,000 overseas workers and college graduates, targeting in particular those from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University.
Many Indian companies are opening offshore offices and recruiting the local staff. Also, labor shortage in India is forcing companies to look elsewhere. Indian companies have come a long way from just being back office outsourcing firms. Now they process into areas such as design, research and development, and sophisticated business applications that require highly skilled workers.
For many years, U.S. companies have hired people from India but now caps on number of visas for foreign professionals have caused delays in processing applications and has forced Indian companies to develop another strategy for its offshore branches. "They said, 'Let us train people in the U.S. or India and make them an extension of our offshore team, in the U.S.' So, Americans are now becoming the offshore component for foreign firms," says Gary David, an associate professor of sociology at Bentley College, Boston.
Right now, more than 10,000 American expatriates work in India for Indian information technology consulting and other outsourcing firms, a number that is expected to grow, says John McCarthy, vice-president of Asia Pacific research at Forrester Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He estimates that U.S. employers will move 3.4 million jobs and $136 billion in wages overseas by 2017.
U.S. firms seek to cut costs while Indian firms Infosys and TCS are scouting for highly skilled talent outside India, and they say they will pay the local going rate. "We're hoping to bring a different kind of diversity to our workplace. For us, diversity is a way to encourage innovation," said Bikramjit Maitra, Head of Human Resources at Infosys. Since India has become a centre for computer science, firms can teach new employees in India, where there is state-of-the-art training, says Surya Kant, President of TCS America.
Analysts from Gartner, based in Connecticut, say that outsourcing of IT jobs from the U.S. and Europe to developing countries will increase to 30 percent by 2015, up from less than 5 percent currently.
So far American firms have been picking up talent from India by offering good salary packages. But things might soon change as Indian companies are now scouting global market to hire employee. One such company is Infosys which is spending $100 million over the next year to train 25,000 overseas workers and college graduates, targeting in particular those from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University.
Many Indian companies are opening offshore offices and recruiting the local staff. Also, labor shortage in India is forcing companies to look elsewhere. Indian companies have come a long way from just being back office outsourcing firms. Now they process into areas such as design, research and development, and sophisticated business applications that require highly skilled workers.
For many years, U.S. companies have hired people from India but now caps on number of visas for foreign professionals have caused delays in processing applications and has forced Indian companies to develop another strategy for its offshore branches. "They said, 'Let us train people in the U.S. or India and make them an extension of our offshore team, in the U.S.' So, Americans are now becoming the offshore component for foreign firms," says Gary David, an associate professor of sociology at Bentley College, Boston.
Right now, more than 10,000 American expatriates work in India for Indian information technology consulting and other outsourcing firms, a number that is expected to grow, says John McCarthy, vice-president of Asia Pacific research at Forrester Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He estimates that U.S. employers will move 3.4 million jobs and $136 billion in wages overseas by 2017.
U.S. firms seek to cut costs while Indian firms Infosys and TCS are scouting for highly skilled talent outside India, and they say they will pay the local going rate. "We're hoping to bring a different kind of diversity to our workplace. For us, diversity is a way to encourage innovation," said Bikramjit Maitra, Head of Human Resources at Infosys. Since India has become a centre for computer science, firms can teach new employees in India, where there is state-of-the-art training, says Surya Kant, President of TCS America.
Analysts from Gartner, based in Connecticut, say that outsourcing of IT jobs from the U.S. and Europe to developing countries will increase to 30 percent by 2015, up from less than 5 percent currently.
IT market, new openings
Genpact eyes expansion in India
Business process outsourcing company Genpact Ltd expects its healthcare services business to grow at "a good pace," and is looking to expand the segment in the United States, India and the Europe, its chief executive said.
"This is one (segment) that can grow at very large double digits mainly because it is a relatively untapped market," Genpact Chief Executive Pramod Bhasin said in an interview. Genpact, which provides services in asset management, hospital administration, supply chain logistics and finance, gets about 7 per cent to 8 per cent of its revenue from healthcare outsourcing. The company, which draws majority of its revenue from banking, financial services and insurance, and manufacturing sectors, reported revenue of $1 billion in 2008.
"This is one (segment) that can grow at very large double digits mainly because it is a relatively untapped market," Genpact Chief Executive Pramod Bhasin said in an interview. Genpact, which provides services in asset management, hospital administration, supply chain logistics and finance, gets about 7 per cent to 8 per cent of its revenue from healthcare outsourcing. The company, which draws majority of its revenue from banking, financial services and insurance, and manufacturing sectors, reported revenue of $1 billion in 2008.
TCS
TCS passport project gets delayed
Promising a passport within three days, it peddled a dream to Indians crowding understaffed and overburdened regional passport centres. But the Passport Seva Project -- one of the government's flagship e-governance programmes -- is running behind schedule.
In October 2008, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) signed the agreement with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) to implement the project, estimated to be worth Rs.1 billion. Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon had then said the pilot project -- with centres in Chandigarh and Bangalore -- will become functional in June 2009, with the rest of the country to be serviced by 77 stations in 2010.
But it seems increasingly unlikely that the schedule will be adhered to. A major reason for the delay is the inordinate time required to draft the software requirement specification (SRS) document, which was completed only recently.
"We didn't realise how much time it would take to draw up this document," a senior official closely involved in the process said.
The SRS, which details how the software programme will behave in diverse circumstances, had taken a lot of brainstorming sessions between MEA and TCS engineers. The final document comes to about 400 pages.
Also, the state-run National Informatics Centre (NIC), which had so far managed the back-end of the passport system, handed over the data for 80 million records to MEA earlier this month.
The data will be kept in a specially constructed data centre as it awaits 'migration' to the new software programme developed by TCS. But there's more to be done before the pilot project gets off the ground.
The ministry still has to sign a non-disclosure agreement with TCS, as the latter will have access to information of millions of applicants. Incidentally, MEA has insisted that all "sensitive activities" will be carried out only by government agencies.
While the main data centre is ready, the recovery centre is taking a lot of time to be set up. "It was assessed that it will be too risky to start the project without a back-up data centre," he said.
Last week the ministry signed a deal with the state-run Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) to build the recovery data centre in Chennai. The STPI has apparently said while the physical infrastructure would be in place by mid-July, the networking to different stations may take longer.
Confusion also persists on whether the NIC's current PISON (passport information service system on the net) will continue in parallel to the proposed TCS software - and, if so, their mode of compatibility.
The dilemma has arisen as Indian missions abroad -- which also issue passports and are linked through the NIC programme -- are not part of the Passport Seva Project.
This is not the first time the schedule has been changed. Earlier, before the formal signing in October, there had been assurances that the pilot project would start by March. But the formal announcement listed June as the deadline for the pilot project.
The agreement has a strict provision for levying penalty on TCS, but the ministry has decided to not yet invoke that clause. When TCS was contacted about the status of the project, its officials directed all queries to the ministry.
"It is a very complicated process. The project is ongoing and will be started very soon," A. Manickam, joint secretary, consular, passport and visa, MEA, told IANS.
In October 2008, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) signed the agreement with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) to implement the project, estimated to be worth Rs.1 billion. Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon had then said the pilot project -- with centres in Chandigarh and Bangalore -- will become functional in June 2009, with the rest of the country to be serviced by 77 stations in 2010.
But it seems increasingly unlikely that the schedule will be adhered to. A major reason for the delay is the inordinate time required to draft the software requirement specification (SRS) document, which was completed only recently.
"We didn't realise how much time it would take to draw up this document," a senior official closely involved in the process said.
The SRS, which details how the software programme will behave in diverse circumstances, had taken a lot of brainstorming sessions between MEA and TCS engineers. The final document comes to about 400 pages.
Also, the state-run National Informatics Centre (NIC), which had so far managed the back-end of the passport system, handed over the data for 80 million records to MEA earlier this month.
The data will be kept in a specially constructed data centre as it awaits 'migration' to the new software programme developed by TCS. But there's more to be done before the pilot project gets off the ground.
The ministry still has to sign a non-disclosure agreement with TCS, as the latter will have access to information of millions of applicants. Incidentally, MEA has insisted that all "sensitive activities" will be carried out only by government agencies.
While the main data centre is ready, the recovery centre is taking a lot of time to be set up. "It was assessed that it will be too risky to start the project without a back-up data centre," he said.
Last week the ministry signed a deal with the state-run Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) to build the recovery data centre in Chennai. The STPI has apparently said while the physical infrastructure would be in place by mid-July, the networking to different stations may take longer.
Confusion also persists on whether the NIC's current PISON (passport information service system on the net) will continue in parallel to the proposed TCS software - and, if so, their mode of compatibility.
The dilemma has arisen as Indian missions abroad -- which also issue passports and are linked through the NIC programme -- are not part of the Passport Seva Project.
This is not the first time the schedule has been changed. Earlier, before the formal signing in October, there had been assurances that the pilot project would start by March. But the formal announcement listed June as the deadline for the pilot project.
The agreement has a strict provision for levying penalty on TCS, but the ministry has decided to not yet invoke that clause. When TCS was contacted about the status of the project, its officials directed all queries to the ministry.
"It is a very complicated process. The project is ongoing and will be started very soon," A. Manickam, joint secretary, consular, passport and visa, MEA, told IANS.
Layoffs in India, Satyam
70-80 senior leaders at Satyam under lens
Ram Mynampati resigns.
Mahindra Satyam is understood to have asked its middle-level leadership to shape up. The roles of these officials, according to a new plan, which will be effective from July 1, will be “trimmed” to reduce duplication, rendering the work profile of around 70-80 senior leaders redundant. Each of these employees have about six to seven years’ experience at Satyam, a company official, confirmed on condition of anonymity.
“The new owner has lost no time in communicating that it’s performance which will matter,” the official said. Those employees who are not pliable enough to meld in these new roles may be asked to leave the company, he said, adding that integration was on the cards in verticals like telecom, which is the core strength of Tech Mahindra.
He said these managers would be measured by the profits or losses their units made. "Several organisational layers would be removed. In some departments, there are double and sometimes even three layers of accountability, which is a waste of time and resources," the official added.
Tech Mahindra is also exploring the possibility of taking some senior staff from Mahindra Satyam into their company.
Meanwhile, Ram Mynampati — former Satyam executive director — is understood to have quit the company. A senior executive of Mahindra Satyam, however, said that Mynampati has “indicated his intention to resign” but he was not aware whether he had put in his papers.
Mynampati was the interim chief executive officer of Satyam for a brief period after Ramalinga Raju had confessed to the massive financial fraud in the Hyderabad-based IT company. A day after the shocking disclosure of Raju on January 8, the then 10 top leaders of Satyam, including Mynampati, issued a joint statement pledging to remain in the company and work jointly to steer the organisation. Shortly thereafter, Mynampati left for the US where he has remained till now.
Mahindra Satyam is understood to have asked its middle-level leadership to shape up. The roles of these officials, according to a new plan, which will be effective from July 1, will be “trimmed” to reduce duplication, rendering the work profile of around 70-80 senior leaders redundant. Each of these employees have about six to seven years’ experience at Satyam, a company official, confirmed on condition of anonymity.
“The new owner has lost no time in communicating that it’s performance which will matter,” the official said. Those employees who are not pliable enough to meld in these new roles may be asked to leave the company, he said, adding that integration was on the cards in verticals like telecom, which is the core strength of Tech Mahindra.
He said these managers would be measured by the profits or losses their units made. "Several organisational layers would be removed. In some departments, there are double and sometimes even three layers of accountability, which is a waste of time and resources," the official added.
Tech Mahindra is also exploring the possibility of taking some senior staff from Mahindra Satyam into their company.
Meanwhile, Ram Mynampati — former Satyam executive director — is understood to have quit the company. A senior executive of Mahindra Satyam, however, said that Mynampati has “indicated his intention to resign” but he was not aware whether he had put in his papers.
Mynampati was the interim chief executive officer of Satyam for a brief period after Ramalinga Raju had confessed to the massive financial fraud in the Hyderabad-based IT company. A day after the shocking disclosure of Raju on January 8, the then 10 top leaders of Satyam, including Mynampati, issued a joint statement pledging to remain in the company and work jointly to steer the organisation. Shortly thereafter, Mynampati left for the US where he has remained till now.
'Depressed' over losing job, techie from Maharashtra ends life
Allegedly depressed over losing his job, a software engineer "ended his life" by hanging himself at Kachiguda here, police said today. Sachin B Khandewar (29), a native of Solapur in Maharashtra hanged himself, by using a nylon rope, to the ceiling fan in his room between 11.15 pm and 12.00 pm last night, Kachiguda police said.
Sachin's relatives came to know about the incident at about 6.30 am today after one of his aunts noticed his body hanging in the room, an investigation officer said.
Sachin was residing with his aunt for the past three years at Rajendranagar Colony at Kachiguda area and was working as a software engineer at a local software firm in Somajiguda here, but lost his job about six-months ago, he said.
A suicide note, purportedly written by Sachin, was found near his body. Quoting the note, the police officer stated, "He was under depression for the past 5-6 months after losing his job."
"No one is responsible for my death. I am fed up with this useless life and world," the note said.
An autopsy was being conducted on Sachin's body and further investigations were on.
Sachin's relatives came to know about the incident at about 6.30 am today after one of his aunts noticed his body hanging in the room, an investigation officer said.
Sachin was residing with his aunt for the past three years at Rajendranagar Colony at Kachiguda area and was working as a software engineer at a local software firm in Somajiguda here, but lost his job about six-months ago, he said.
A suicide note, purportedly written by Sachin, was found near his body. Quoting the note, the police officer stated, "He was under depression for the past 5-6 months after losing his job."
"No one is responsible for my death. I am fed up with this useless life and world," the note said.
An autopsy was being conducted on Sachin's body and further investigations were on.
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