This cleanliness drive has enthused us iridiumiites and we, right now,  right here pledge to keep our city clean and also create awareness amongst people in our own big or small way and make our cities a heaven to live in. Spread the word and let more people join in!!!!

Manish is a Practice Director at iridium Interactive and spear heads the Web2.0 and Social media practice.

It is important to find ways to work differently, more efficiently and more productively. It is not enough to try to do the same thing in the same manner. The need is to change the paradigm. Question the status quo.

The old norms of pricing for IT solutions would soon be thrown out of the Windows – no pun intended here. Customers are unsure of their own business survival; and hence, are expecting their partners and associated companies to aid them in developing solutions to help make their decisions smarter and better.

Solutions to be provided quickly; global launch on the fly. Sounds ludicrous? Not any more. Cloud Computing is in. These kind of solutions will ensure that organizations can ramp up faster; scale up speedier. And not at the cost of the proverbial many arms and many legs.

For instance, one session talked about how a Banking Client rolled out an innovative Zero Branch Bank in Europe. Oracle is helping them put this together. All touchpoints are automated. Of course, not just that! The application is a Hosted Solution model. Rather than investing in infrastructure to be deployed over many months and years, this will ensure rollout in a fraction of that time.

The learnings from this Live example??  – Even if times are bleak, innovative solutions are always going to invite discretionary spending by organizations.

As pointed out by Peter Coffee (Salesforce) and Sharad Sharma (Yahoo R&D), the most glaringly outstanding examples of how an existing proposition has been successfully remodeled and presented to the world is of how CLOUD COMPUTING has enabled the runaway success of AMAZON and FACEBOOK. The former utilized Cloud Computing as a Development Platform while Facebook used it for a Distribution Platform. This enabled both these business ideas to ramp up into global entities pronto.  And ofcourse, the cost savings on doing it all in this manner instead of an on-premise-model  have been huge too.

Given the very nature of the beast called CLOUD COMPUTING, it would not be foolhardy to expect that the next big blockbuster business hits aka YAHOO or FACEBOOK can be from the garages or streetcorners of Hyderabad or Mumbai or Delhi.

The NILF also had a heady mix of celebrated and eloquent academicians. This lot expectedly stated their perspective take, without mincing many words. Professor Pankaj Ghemawat, who has already made his mark as a noted academician who redefines norms did the same during his session. He highlighted the need for focusing on the Key metric of Revenue per Employee. Seems obviously simple? Inspite of this, this key metric has remained flat for most Indian IT companies over the last 4-5 years.

Having said that, the intention should not be to cut costs needlessly or retrench benches but to work towards shoring up efficiencies.

Some to Dos (This is not intended an exhaustive Dhobi List):

• No Needless Buyouts
• No carte blanche reduction in headcount
• Reshape. Don’t just retrench
• LIFO approach in retrench to be avoided
• No moratorium on training and development

The message to all is that the Cloud looms large over the blue sky. The Dark Clouds shall soon pass – but the Clouds of the Computing kind are real and here to stay. The Cloud Computing concepts are going to be the new paradigm shift happening while we speak and let’s embrace it.

The ‘NASSCOM India Leadership Forum 2009’ will be held from February 11-13, 2009 at the Hotel Grand Hyatt, Mumbai. The theme for this years’ event is “Reshaping the global economy”.

It is a matter of joy and pride that Iridium interactive, has partnered with NASSCOM to create a SOCIAL Networking product, called NASSCOM Connect, to add value to the NASSCOM ILF delegate experience. NASSCOM Connect is a social networking platform which is a combination of Linked-in and Facebook, that will help attendees and delegates to maintain ties and continue their dialogue in the virtual space. A unique platform, the NASSCOM Connect enables the delegates to touchbase with each other before the event kicks off on February 11th at Mumbai. Within the last week we have seen 40,359 page impressions with about 1,000+ connections amongst the delegates, for this platform.

With ‘NASSCOM Connect’, delegates can benefit from the following:

• Connect with delegates before and after the event.
• Meet delegates who are attending the same sessions to discuss similar experiences and challenges around the topic.
• Meet other delegates to compare notes on exhibitors and products.
• Meet exhibitors to learn more about their products and services.
• Powerful Search Features will enable finding new delegates of specific skills, interests and geographic location.

In Mumbai, NASSCOM CONNECT will have all that is needed to give an opportunity to delegates, exhibitors, speakers, editors and analysts to introduce, network, ideate and  Engage with each other prior to arriving at the event.

Do check this out….

1. The NASSCOM EVENT online destination: http://indialeadershipforum.nasscom.in
2. NASSCOM EVENT BLOG : http://indialeadershipforum.nasscom.in/blog
3. NASSCOM EVENT NETWORKING PORTAL : http://www.nasscom.in/connect

February of every year, the city of Mumbai sees a different profile of visitors – not just the filmstars, sportstars and political leaders but the stalwarts of the global IT world. The NASSCOM INDIA Leadership Forum (NILF) has become an event that has become a ‘Must-Attend Event’ for the entire IT diaspora & related audiences from across the world.

It is a great sense of joy and pride that iridium Interactive has been selected to partner with NASSCOM for this event. iridium Interactive has been working closely for this prestigious event – our efforts and painstaking night outs have gone on to ensure the success of NILF in 2008. In keeping with the adage – ‘Good work begets more work’, we are pleased that iridium Interactive has continued its association for 2009 as well. iridium Interactive has now embarked on a grand objective to take the NILF event to a next level of virtual connectedness.

New tools and avenues have been designed, developed and implemented on the web portal – that enables delegates to virtually meet, interact and work closely together.

Check out the new look NILF site that is drawing huge crowds from across the globe already. The new additions are being raved about – the trendier looking NILF Blog and an all new NASSCOM Connect Section.

iridium Interactive has worked on the mission of developing solutions that would facilitate the event – by leveraging the power of IT and the web medium to simplify business interactions and streamline interconnected effectiveness.

The NILF, to be held from Feb 11-13th in Mumbai, will see the arrival of IT doyens from across the world.  In their midst will also be the iridium Interactive team – working at the backend – to ensure that the event is captured in all this regal pomp and splendour for now and for posterity.

Cross functional teams across our Development Centres have worked on this NILF portal for the last many months – including the excited Chaaywallahs at the office. After Jamaal Mallik’s astounding success in SlumDog Millionaire, the Chaaywallah has become a sought after position in most IT offices across India  :). JAI HO – ii

February of every year, the city of Mumbai sees a different profile of visitors – not just the filmstars, sportstars and political leaders but the stalwarts of the global IT world. The NASSCOM INDIA Leadership Forum (NILF) has become an event that has become a ‘Must-Attend Event’ for the entire IT diaspora & related audiences from across the world.

It is a great sense of joy and pride that iridium Interactive has been selected to partner with NASSCOM for this event. iridium Interactive has been working closely for this prestigious event – our efforts and painstaking night outs have gone on to ensure the success of NILF in 2008. In keeping with the adage – ‘Good work begets more work’, we are pleased that iridium Interactive has continued its association for 2009 as well. iridium Interactive has now embarked on a grand objective to take the NILF event to a next level of virtual connectedness.

New tools and avenues have been designed, developed and implemented on the web portal – that enables delegates to virtually meet, interact and work closely together.

Check out the new look NILF site that is drawing huge crowds from across the globe already. The new additions are being raved about – the trendier looking NILF Blog and an all new NASSCOM Connect Section.

iridium Interactive has worked on the mission of developing solutions that would facilitate the event – by leveraging the power of IT and the web medium to simplify business interactions and streamline interconnected effectiveness.

The NILF, to be held from Feb 11-13th in Mumbai, will see the arrival of IT doyens from across the world.  In their midst will also be the iridium Interactive team – working at the backend – to ensure that the event is captured in all this regal pomp and splendour for now and for posterity.

Cross functional teams across our Development Centres have worked on this NILF portal for the last many months – including the excited Chaaywallahs at the office. After Jamaal Mallik’s astounding success in SlumDog Millionaire, the Chaaywallah has become a sought after position in most IT offices across India  :). JAI HO – ii

The work shop offered a platform create awareness of the power of IT/web technologies and how it can be leveraged to revitalize agricultural Industry. Sriram and Nishant attended the session, representing iridium Interactive.

Sriram was also one of the speakers and spoke on Web Standards, Technologies and Standardization. The talk started off well with the audience clued on to the jazz of the presentation but it hit the note when Sriram started talking about the Rural initiatives through CauseanEffect, e Learning bringing insurance closer to rural people, Case Studies of using Web 2.0 to solve business problems for Maruti, NASSCOM, Escorts and ITC e-Choupal and delivery mechanisms through examples of films made to educate people on alternative livelihoods post tsunami.

Agriculture and its audience need to be understood to use technology to bring value close to the rural people. There are so many initiatives that can change lives… eLearning for Agricultural practices, banking and insurance facilities for rural people, latest trends and machinery in farming etc. Hoping this workshop will help generate ideas for rural betterment.

About a year back iridium Interactive launched NASSCOM EMERGE blog for NASSCOM, a platform for SMEs to interact and share their thougts and ideas with each other and the organization. Nasscom Emerge recently celebrated its first birthday, completing a very successful and fruitful year overcoming a lot of opposition, resistance and hiccups. Read on to know more about the journey and what they have to say about Iridium.

August 3, 2007 is the day that the NASSCOM EMERGE blog first made an appearance in the Internet space, opening up a new platform for NASSCOM’s SME members to interact with each other and the organization.

It was a year ago, when overcoming significant internal opposition and initial hiccups, that the blog went live and received its very first hit. Not everyone was convinced about the relevance of the platform and even more circumspect about the kind of feedback it would generate about NASSCOM. However, the concerns were set aside as we were keen to share with our members the kind of exciting work we were doing within the “Emerging Companies” space. We wanted to keep them regularly updated about our activities and encourage them to share in their outcomes.
The idea was to reach out to our membership and gain vital feedback about the initiatives we had launched and how we can improve upon. While a step in this direction had already been made with our website, www.nasscom.in was inadequate and did not facilitate a two-way communication between NASSCOM and our members.
The blog was also an effort to create a platform for industry leaders to share their insights and experiences, to talk about what had worked for them and what had not and advise startups and entrepreneurs about how to leverage Best Practices to build success stories.
Having completed a year, we are delighted to share with you that the blog is an unmitigated hit. It has generated considerable excitement among our members and is being actively used by them to stay in touch with other companies and voice their opinions on a host of issues impacting SMEs. Leading industry practitioners have been interacting with other bloggers through this medium and guiding them about how they can achieve their goals. In less than a year, almost 153 opinions and articles have been posted on the site, with more than 223 comments in 21 categories, with atleast two to three updates going live every week. Over 30 people have been regularly contributing very valuable content to the blog and kick starting debate and discussion on contentious issues. The blog has been generating considerable traffic, with 65,000 page views every month.
The good news is that we are extending the frontiers of the blog even further. Besides providing a detailed view of events that are organized for Emerging Companies by NASSCOM, we have even begun posting video recordings of activities on the blog, so that viewers can get a first hand look and feel of the event. A major pat on NASSCOM’s back is the visibility that the blog is gaining within the market. Recently, India’s leading national business daily, The Economic Times carried an article on the blog and highlighted its unique features.
It’s been a great year and we can now look forward to even more exciting initiatives on the EMERGE community and the Web2.0 initiatives. Once again, we’d like to thank to all the contributors and our web partner –
iridium Interactive who have supported us in pursuing our objective to reach out to the membership community. We look forward to your continuous support and your best wishes for the future!
Warm regards,
Avinash Raghava
NASSCOM EMERGE Blog admin

NASSCOM is a global trade body with over 1200 members, of which over 250 are global companies from the US, UK, EU, Japan and China. The departments of NASSCOM are spread across various locations and have over 100 members.

NASSCOM maintains hundreds of documents – HR, Research, Consulting, White Papers, Case Studies and more – in various formats and file sizes.For NASSCOM all this repository is a wealth of information. They required an IT solution that could take advantage of internet based technologies so that employees of various teams work efficiently and serves their responsibilities/services in a better way. They needed a more efficient way of managing, updating & distributing important documents.
They also needed to impove interactions among the employees and administration, create a sense of community among the team and have a common platform to share team views and get updated on the events/happenings in NASSCOM
Working with iridium Interactive Ltd, NASSCOM deployed the Intranet solution using Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server 2007 as development platform that provides relevant information to users engaged in various research, events, forums, initiatives, HR and GTD activities.

Intranet solution gives users at the NASSCOM centralized access to their documents & reports. The instranet solution leverages the power of MOSS 2007 in creating collaborative workspaces,efficient maintenance of document library and reliable enterprise wide search and connecting the users through portals .

For the HR, the solution facilitates smooth functioning by making available the organization chart ,induction related information, policies, various HR forms etc in a single location.Additional innovative features such as Employee face book, Employee of the Month, Editor of the month, Editor of the month have been received very well by the employees and the admin .

The “GYAANX’ “ document library section facilitates employees to view the documents categorized under subscriptions, articles, white papers, presentations and pictures .

“My Workspace” is a personalized section for every employee of the NASSCOM and provides the following facilities for publishing his/her personal profile and activity chart.Other facilities for employees include board room/dial-in bridge booking, quizes and polls, leave applications, public forums to name a few .

The project has been a great experience for iridium Interactive !!!!

NASSCOM is a global trade body with over 1200 members, of which over 250 are global companies from the US, UK, EU, Japan and China. The departments of NASSCOM are spread across various locations and have over 100 members. NASSCOM maintains hundreds of documents – HR, Research, Consulting, White Papers, Case Studies and more – in various formats and file sizes.
For NASSCOM all this repository is a wealth of information. They required an IT solution that could take advantage of internet based technologies so that employees of various teams work efficiently and serves their responsibilities/services in a better way. They needed a more efficient way of managing, updating & distributing important documents.
They also needed to improve interactions among the employees and administration, create a sense of community among the team and have a common platform to share team views and get updated on the events/happenings in NASSCOM.

Working with iridium Interactive, NASSCOM deployed the Intranet solution using Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server 2007 as development platform that provides relevant information to users engaged in various research, events, forums, initiatives, HR and GTD activities.
Intranet solution gives users at the NASSCOM centralized access to their documents & reports. The intranet solution leverages the power of MOSS 2007 in creating collaborative workspaces, efficient maintenance of document library and reliable enterprise wide search and connecting the users through portals.
For the HR, the solution facilitates smooth functioning by making available the organization chart, induction related information, policies, various HR forms etc in a single location. Additional innovative features such as Employee face book, Employee of the Month, Editor of the month have been received very well by the employees and the administration.
The GYAANX document library section facilitates employees to view the documents categorized under subscriptions, articles, white papers, presentations and pictures.
My Workspace is a personalized section for every employee of the NASSCOM and provides the following facilities for publishing his/her personal profile and activity chart. Other facilities for employees include board room/dial-in bridge booking, quizzes and polls, leave applications, public forums to name a few .
The project has been a great experience for iridium Interactive !!!!

Emerging businesses are getting their voices heard in cyberspace. If Nasscom’s Emerge blog fulfills the need for knowledge of emerging companies in IT, Milagrow looks at a more holistic approach with a thrust on manufacturing. While desistartups.in has a ‘one-stop-shop’ approach, Alibaba.com’s Aliblogs has tied up with Infomedia to design a blog for small and medium businesses (SMBs). Suddenly, SMBs are all over the blogosphere.Nasscom experts say blogs in India are at a nascent stage but herald huge potential, especially the ones on SMBs. The association has recently launched its own SMB blog, Nasscom Emerge, where IT start-ups can tank up. It aims to target more than two million software professional in India. Today, India has three million SMBs, which comprise roughly 80% of the industrial sector.

NASSCOM vice-president Sangeeta Gupta says the Emerge blog gets more than 6,000 page views per month. She adds,

There is a huge potential in this sector as people are actively looking out for such blogs that act as a guide and provide information on relevant topics

Emerge discusses subjects like innovation, talent management, building a product company and others.Milagrow is another blog that is specially dedicated to SMBs and discusses issues related to retail, manufacturing, services and IT, besides others. Rajiv Karwal, Milagrow’s founder director, also agrees there is potential for corporate blogging in India. Karwal is also penning a book on the same.

for more login to :http://blog.nasscom.in/emerge/