The "Sing-song Theory"

Going through the paysclaes of some of the companies that visit top notch institutes every year , an interesting thought hit me .

Do we join a bigger mnc and then join a smaller company as a team lead ... or
Do we slog at a smaller company and then join a bigger comapany ,in all probability as another programmer ,and if lucky a project lead.

And hence I came up with the "sing-song career thoery" as I 'd like to call it that could add some scope of direction to an illustrious career in the IT field.

My "sing-song career thoery" states : While doing a job shift ,toggle between a big company and a small company.

This could help you in a number of ways I feel :
- join a big company to add the brand image to ur CV thru the biggie's ,learn how to scale up .
- join the small company for innovation and applying what youve learnt at the big companies
-go back to a big comapny and show them the results of what you applied in the smaller company

Continue this cycle and im guessing you should have one amazing CV and a satisfying and challenging job profile that would'nt allow stagnation at any point in your career.

Here are the stats by the way,courtesy of few threads at Pagalguy.

Triology : 6+ L p.a.
Microsoft : 6+ L p.a.
Flextronics : 36K p.m.
Oracle : 35K p.m.
Motorola : 4+ L p.a.
CTS : 18K p.m.
Wipro : 18K p.m.
Infosys : 15K p.m.(might increase after may 2005 ) yes ,to 18k
TCS : 15K p.m.
techspan/headstrong : 5 lpa
samsung : 4.6 lpa
softgin : 35kpm
intel : 4.9lpa
computer associates : 4.5 lpa(approx)
sun microsystems : 5 lpa
infy setlabs : 4.2 lpa
HLS Asia - 8.25
Indus Logic - 4
Interra Systems(H\W) - 4.6
Fiorano - 5
Attrenta - 4.5
TI/STM- 4.5
Tavant-3.6
Mindtree/Nagarro/MBT/HCLTech/Perot Systems - 2.5
Tata Elxsi-1.9
CISCO - 3.65 lacs pa+PF+Gratuity= 4.1 lac (appx)
SAP Labs - 3.98 lacs pa
google 12lpa for development, 8lpa for testing
Hexaware - 2.1 pa
Kanbay - 2.28 pa
Syntel - 2.05 pa

These were the best packages offered at IITM for B.Techs/Dual degree in '05 -

1. Capital One - $59,000 p.a (US posting) , selected -2
2. Mckinsey and Co - Rs. 7 L ,selected -2
3. Trilogy - 8.1 , selected 4-6
4. Amazon - 7-8
5. Microsoft - 7.5
6. Schlumberger - >8L if placed in India, but 50% of selected students to be placed abroad
6. Lee specialities - $ 29,000 + benefits (training in Canada, then in middle east or Canada) ,selected -4
7. NVidia - 6+
8. ITC - 8+
9. HLL - 7.2
10. Cash systems, Switzerland - USD 6,000 p.m ,selected 3-4
11. ZS Associates - ~6L ,selected 6-7
12. Oracle - 5L for people without CS background, 5.5L for CS students and 6L for CS PG's,seleected 16-17
13. Chartered Semiconductors - 2,800 Singapore Dollars p.m ,selected 3-4
14. Computer associates - 5 +

A full circle for IIT'ians

Today i was on a journey to find out just what IIT'ians are upto.Have they finally decided to contemplate a "return2india",or can we expect more board members of the top corporates in the US to be occupied by more IIT graduates.

As i was reading through teh article "Technical Sutra",by Alexander Salkever .He goes on to say -

How have IIT graduates come to represent such an economic and entrepreneurial
juggernaut? Educated in English and ready to travel at the drop of a hat,
IIT grads embody all the ideals of the new economy: They are flexible
and brilliant technological knowledge workers who easily cross borders
and cultures to pursue their entrepreneurial and employment dreams.

Later i was going through the remarks by Bill Gates on India Institute of Technology 50th Anniversary Celebration "at Cupertino, CaliforniaJanuary 17, 2003 where he quotes -

I was careful to do research for this speech so I went up to the Web site -- the
IIT Web site -- and sort of browsed around, and after I did that I thought,
well, I'll go to the MIT Web site and browse around just to see, you know, these
things seem very similar. And on the MIT Web site the hot news was that the
coffee house was closing down because people weren't spending enough money
there. (Laughter.) On the IIT Bombay site, though, things were far more
interesting. They said that they had caught a leopard on the campus recently.
(Laughter, applause.) And that's something these U.S. universities just can't
offer in terms of an experience. (Laughter.)

In this rather old ,but still significant must read ,he later talks about technology in a truly splendid speech.

And then going through the very informative iit bombay' s news archive page withe loads of news related info reagarding happening s as well as this snippet.

From the article on "demigods and the dark side of the moon(tragedy if IIT's),brains into Indian society.

A quick glance at the placement scenario at most IIT's reveals a very interesting picture. A majority of B.Tech.'s and M.Tech.'s irrespective of their branch of study take up jobs at some software company or the other. Informal discussions with students reveal that the only options available to a passing out B.Tech. can be summed up as follows:

Join an Indian software company
Join a foreign software company
Go to USA for further studies
Join one of the IIM's for management studies
Plan a career in academics and join for M.Tech. and later Ph.D. at IIT (A negligible miniscule minority takes this option)

The option of working for an Indian company in the field of one's specialization is almost non-existent.

Return to india's msn group also had some nice thoughts from veterans coming back,on how and what to expect when returning .

As for me,Im on the lookout to join an IIT startup !

Another looming point for discussion

Do those who settle for less often often underachieve?

I am a person who tried to make the most of what I have.But often I see people who are content with what they have ,hesitate to take on an aggressive personna and go on to achieve what they want.Sort of the side effects you would find with the overdose of self confidence ,mostly found in qualified professional i presume,that tends to instill the ideology ,that 'Im prepared to take on anything'.Blame it on corporate pressure or the deadline theories,It does have its pro's and con's though.

Second review done

March 23 and 24th were the dates for the "Meet the experts" and "Experts review".Microsoft Evangelist Kevin DSouza ,presented technological updates in the .net arena urging students to adopt them in their future projects like Mobile platform based application and embedded systems.The venue was the .Net centre for Excellence at Anna University,Chennai.

This was followed by the review,where my particular project "Radio Taxi",which deals with building the business model and information system for a call taxi management firm; was reviewed.Although the project was appreciated,suggeestions to incorporate newer paradigms like mobile technologies and windows based internet connectivity in the application rather than a purely web based methodology.

I plan to finish the coding and deployment after my semester exams, as that I think is the deadline.Moreover my 6th sem exams are on from april 27th to mid may which gives just about enough time to wrap up our first full fledged project on .net .

How the cookie crumbled in Indian Tech Forums

When i joined my first indian forum in May of 2004,i never realised that i would get as involved as i did later on,conssciously or unconsiously.It was definitley something that did a whole lot of people a lot of good.TA went on to become at that time,India's most coveted tech forums with more than 4000 members.
I ended up winning the first and till date only contest to be held,became a moderator and staff member and really lived TA.But there was a lot i didnt know about its history early on ,and heres to remind me it ,whenever i feel im want to go back.

The history and evolution of the TA and TechEnclave forums..

For the fun,time and hardwork spent there,and the lessons learnt,the sweat and the tears,the satisfaction and the emotions,.... I will be grateful forever.

Cheers to TA,Long Live TechEnclave.

big fish or small fish.

I've always had this looming doubt.

"Should i join a BIG(as in top 5 )IT company or a small MNC or local
but small company with good potential for growth. "

coz i feel(this is ony my view) bigger the company ,smaller the part
you play,and like wise..smaller the company - bigger the part you can
play and consequently gather more experience and scope for job growth.

A lot of ppl go furthe on to say that its nice to get the rough side
of life in a top company and then shift to other ones ,while otehrs
say that you can work in a small company,get the reqd skills and then
move on to higer posts in bigger companies.

If any1 could pls enlighten me on this,i'd be ever so grateful.

Microsoft Academic Project

The Good news, coming in this weekend. My Microsoft student project (assigned to us via the Microsoft Academic Alliance) in college has been selected or the final round of reviews wher we get to mae a presenatation to pther experts.Our score was a9.12 on 10 and considered pretty good when you take into consideration that the highest was only 9.45 .On a all india basis,that accounts to the top 300 who progress into the next level,and the last rankwas on a 83% which means that our rank must be in the 100-200 level .Anyway,cheers to that and hope that we can impress the judges there .

IN case ur wondering what all this is...its jus the basics of delivering a company in "india inc "

The first entrepeneaurship cell in any college has been setup in Sri Venkateswara College of Engineering,chennai recetly. check www.svce.ac.in for more information

IT Act 2000 in India

The Information Technology Act, 2000 (No. 21 of 2000)



An Act to provide legal recognition for transactions carried out by means of electronic data interchange and other means of electronic communication, commonly referred to as "electronic commerce", which involve the use of alternatives to paper-based methods of communication and storage of information, to facilitate electronic filing of documents with the Government agencies and further to amend the Indian Penal Code, the Indian Evidence Act, 1872, the Bankers' Books Evidence Act, 1891 and the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934 and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.

whereas the General Assembly of the United Nations by resolution A/RES/51/162, dated the 30th January, 1997 has adopted the Model Law on Electronic Commerce adopted by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law;

and whereas the said resolution recommends inter alia that all States give favourable consideration to the said Model Law when they enact or revise their laws, in view of the need for uniformity of the law applicable to alternatives to paper-cased methods of communication and storage of information; and whereas it is considered necessary to give effect to the said resolution and to promote efficient delivery of Government services by means of reliable electronic records. be it enacted by Parliament in the Fifty-first Year of the Republic of India as follows:-
Posted by Bhasker vk on 09:00 AM




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Nasscom 2003 will be held at Hotel Oberoi, in Mumbai from 11 - 14 February 2003. The theme for this year's conference is "Leveraging Knowledge Capital for Enabling Growth". In keeping with this objective, eminent Industry leaders from the IT vendor and user community will share insights, strategies, opportunities and imperatives for companies to make most of their IT investments.

Nasscom 2003 is being organized with an objective to make it into India's biggest and Asia's leading B2B conference. Positioning the annual IT event - NASSCOM 2003 as a pure B2B focused customer conference.

NASSCOM has invited global CIO's to participate in NASSCOM 2003 to share their strategies and list out opportunities and imperatives for Indian companies and also provide a perspective of what customers are looking for. To have maximum participation of the CIOs from the Fortune 500 who are the probable customers for the Indian players, NASSCOM has entered into a direct mailing campaign to more that 3000 companies in US and Europe which includes invite to a large number of CIO's from Fortune 500 companies to participate. The exercise was initiated a month back. Among them include CIO of Johnsons Controls, a global market leader in automotive systems and facility management and control.

NASSCOM is inviting international delegations from across the globe including companies from USA, Europe, Asia Pacific, Canada, and West Asia etc

Special features
Attended by more than 900 Delegates
More than 100 National and International speakers
3 parallel tracks with a total of19 sessions
Country Forum
Special BPO Track
Focus on telecom, manufacturing, semiconductor technology, and embedded software and emerging verticals including transportations, healthcare, retail.


For more details contact a Nasscom Representative at events@nasscom.org

Doing Business in India

Setting up IT Software and services operations in India

General Indian Citizen / Company
Overseas Company
Liaison Office/Representative Office
Project Office
Branch Office
As an Indian Company
Joint Venture with an Indian partner
Wholly Owned subsidiary


General Indian Citizen / Company

An individual and citizen of India can set up I.T. software and services operations in India through the following:
as an Individual / Proprietor
as a Partnership / Firm / Trust
as a Company registered under the Companies Act, 1956
No prior permission of Government of India is required to set up I.T. / Software units in India. Moreover, to encourage units in this sector, Government of India has announced

Domestic Tariff Area: When the primary focus is to sell in the domestic market in India. This unit can be set anywhere in India. All normal laws apply. No concession is available on import duties. Exports are permitted. A special Export Promotion Capital Goods (EPCG) scheme of Ministry of Commerce can be availed. This scheme allows zero duty import of capital goods against export obligations.

Special Economic Zones (SEZs). SEZ is a new scheme announced by the Government of India. SEZs are areas where export production can take place free from plethora of rules, regulations governing imports and exports. Units operating in these zones have full flexibility of operations and can import capital goods and raw material duty free. The movement of goods from and to ports and from SEZ are unrestricted. The units in SEZ have to export the entire production. The first two SEZs are being set up at Positra, Gujarat and Nangunery, Tamilnadu. Immediately, Santacruz Electronic Export Promotion Zone, Kandla Export Promotion Zone, Vizag Export Promotion Zone and Cochin Export Promotion Zones are proposed to be converted in SEZs.

Export Processing Zones (EPZ). These zones are located at various places including Cochin, Falta (Near Calcutta), Kandla, Chennai, Noida, Santacruz (Mumbai), Vishakhapatnam and Surat. A unit can be set up in these zones subject to availability of space. No import duty, special 10 years income tax holiday are some of the incentives provided. There is no restriction on quantity of domestic sales.

100% Export Oriented Unit (EOU). This is similar to EPZ scheme. But in this scheme, there is no need to be physically located at EPZ. All other incentives are same as provided to EPZ units.

Software Technology Park (STP). A very special scheme under Ministry of Information Technology. STPs are located at Noida, Navi Mumbai, Pune, Gandhinagar, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Bhubaneshwar, Jaipur, Mohali and Thiruvanathapuram. This scheme offers zero import duty on import of all capital goods, special 10 years income tax holiday, availability of infrastructural facilities like high speed data- communication links etc. are some of the incentives available under this scheme.

and then there was ...

Bhasker V K ,aka bosky is a student at SVCE (2002-2006),chennai