While consulting firms and investment bankers preferred not to participate in the lateral placements as usual, sources say that companies such as KPMG, Aditya Birla Group, Barclays Bank, Microsoft, Infosys and Capgemini have issued the maximum number of offers.
Sources say Carnegie Mellon's president Jared L Cohon, who was in Bangalore recently, held discussions with senior state officials in this regard. The university is planning to establish a skeleton presence in Bangalore to study the market condition before starting a full-fledged campus here. They want to help the IT sector in the country secure quality manpower.
Ordyn bagged the contract after qualifying in a competitive bidding process in which global giants such as Huawei Technologies, ZTE, HFCL, IComm and Arasor took part.
During the third quarter ended December 31, 2007, the company got its first $100 million (Rs 400 crore) account, which it had bagged almost four years ago as a $200,000 (Rs 80 lakh) per annum account.
Access to market is going to be the major problem faced by start-up IT firms looking to hit the market with innovative products or solutions. Access to venture or angel funding, which was considered the prime issue a couple of years ago, has now been relegated to second or third position.
India's second-largest IT services exporter targets Australia, Japan, South Africa.
Retail investors stand to gain from the booming realty sector, through the Real Estate Investment Trusts.
Kingfisher Airlines, promoted by the UB Group, expects to get into the black in December. According to Ravi Nedungadi, president and CFO, UB Group, the airline has been driving in volumes and efficiencies which is likely to be reflected in the revenues this month.
The UB Group, which is an established leader in the Indian beer and spirits market, is aiming to replicate its success by addressing the wine market with its two companies - United Spirits and United Breweries.
The currency appreciation has increased the capital (in dollars) required for starting a business in India. The rising cost (in rupees) of employees, building space and infrastructure has only made matters worse.
A clutch of global financial institutions led by T Rowe Price, HSBC and an investment arm of the Government of Singapore are the lead investors in the Rs 600 crore (Rs 6 billion) qualified institutional placement (QIP) issue of UB Holdings.
In what may well be the first step towards establishing the first "human colony" on the moon, the Indian Space Research Organisation is examining the possibility of establishing a robotic set-up or unmanned mission on the moon.
Indian software product companies, which are planning to raise venture capital funding, will have to ensure that their domestic and emerging market focus is sharp. Indian IT start-ups, which are introducing software products, have better prospects of availing VC funding, according to many VCs. It has always been difficult for start-ups in the software product space to compete with the global software giants, even in the domestic market, they note.
Indian IT companies such as Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Wipro, Infosys and Satyam, besides MNCs such as IBM, are working towards becoming carbon neutral while simultaneously converting their expertise in this area to help global companies become environment-friendly.
Global and Indian private equity biggies as well as strategic players are in the race to acquire a minority stake in Excel Soft Technologies, the Mysore headquartered e-learning firm. This six-year-old firm provides a range of customised learner-centric Learning systems, Test & Assessment systems and Desktop tools.
According to analysts, the first two quarters are usually dull for the company historically, hence growth will be higher in the subsequent two quarters. If Wipro Infotech achieves the $1 billion mark, it would make Wipro the first Indian company to touch the figure through its largely domestic market-focussed arm. It derives about 90 per cent of its revenue from India.
Domestic IT company Wipro Technologies and global networking company Cisco are eyeing $1 billion revenue from their strategic alliance for developing and delivering IT services solutions in the global market. The partnership aims at $1 billion revenue over the next three years, said John Chambers, chairman and CEO of the $35 billion California-based company
This will be the company's first major expansion in the switching business after the acquisition of the North West Switches brand for Rs 102 crore (Rs 1.02 billion) in May last year. The plant will be located at Haridwar, Uttaranchal, where the company has acquired about six acres for the purpose. A significant part of the Rs 60 crore (Rs 600 million) capital expenditure earmarked for this fiscal will be spent on setting up the plant, Vineet Agrawal, president, said.
The size of the banking software application market globally is estimated to be at about $75 billion in 2007. The market is growing at about 5 per cent a year.