Home > News & Analysis Print Friendly Page || Email this story Patni Computer Systems expands U.S. operations

Patni Computer Systems has announced the expansion of its onshore operation in the U.S. with the opening of its third Regional Development Center (RDC). Inaugurated by Bloomington’s Mayor, Stephen F. Stockton and Patni senior management, the new RDC Bloomington, Illinois facility is nearly 10,000 square feet and can accommodate 100 professionals. The center will initially focus on executing software development projects for Patni’s Insurance Business Unit with the objective of ramping up swiftly in support of the company’s overall development operations in North America.

With the new Bloomington RDC, Patni will be better able to support the high growth Midwest market and offer services directly from Patni facilities to the client base in the region and throughout North America.

“The expansion to Bloomington is part of our corporate strategy to build strong, onsite operations to achieve leadership in important markets as well as satisfy customer demand. We will continue to invest in our global delivery model throughout the U.S. and the world.” said Mrinal Sattawala, Patni’s Chief Operating Officer.

Bloomington’s Mayor Stockton added, “Patni’s RDC brings new employment opportunities to the area, taking advantage of our regional talent pool. We are delighted that Patni chose Bloomington for its facility and appreciate the investment it represents in our local economy.”

Tech Mahindra to set up Software Development Centre at Hyderabad

Tech Mahindra, has announced the setting up of its state-of-the-art software development center in Hyderabad at Kokapet near Golkonda within the SEZ area.

The new state-of-the-art campus when complete will be capable of housing 3,000 software engineers and will have all modern facilities like video conferencing, training centres, food courts, a gymnasium and a sports complex, which is spreading over 8.43 acres of area. The green complex to be built in the form of campus will have rain water harvesting mechanisms, an in-house sewage treatment plant to recycle water and minimise the impact on environment. The structures will be built encompassing intelligent building management system with intelligent lighting systems.

CP Gurnani, President International Operations of Tech Mahindra and Ms Ratna Prabha Principal Secretary IT &C Department, Government of Andhra Pradesh recently signed a MOU (Memorandum Of Understanding) for the acquisition of land which will be handed over to the company within next few days.

On the announcement of Tech Mahindra’s Hyderabad campus plans, Gurnani said, “We are overwhelmed by the support that we received both from the investor-friendly government and professionals here. We are keen to tap the Andhra Pradesh talent pool and make this centre a major hub in the region and thus participate in the techno-economic development of the State.”

“Tech Mahindra has been on a continuous journey of transformation, addressing new players in the telecom ecosystem and expanding service lines. We have chosen Hyderabad because of its rapidly developing infrastructure, IT-friendly policies and access to a high quality pool of software professionals. Hyderabad is integral to the expansion of the company’s service offerings and delivery capabilities. The huge presence of many of Tech Mahindra’s ecosystem Partners in the city makes it further more attractive” he further added.

HCL and Hewlett-Packard form a strategic partnership

HCL Technologies Ltd (HCL) and Hewlett-Packard (HP) inaugurated EnsureIT—an IT management program resulting in assured IT performance for HCL Technologies’ BPO division (HCL BPO). With EnsureIT, HCL BPO will be the first BPO in the country to successfully deploy the ITIL based management solution—uniquely positioning it to expand its service offerings to its global customers. Spread across eight geographically dispersed centers and with a workforce of more than 11,000 employees, HCL BPO will now leverage EnsureIT as the single point of contact for end-user management. The newly deployed infrastructure management services will harness 400 plus server and network infrastructure at HCL BPO. Speaking on the occasion, Mr. Ranjit Narasimhan, President and CEO of HCL BPO said, “HCL BPO is constantly looking for ways to optimise end-user satisfaction. The partnership with HP has made it possible for us to leverage our infrastructure better so as to maximise utilisation, performance and improve response time.”

Subex Azure to unveil world’s first revenue operations center

Subex Azure Limited a vendor of revenue maximisation solutions for telecom operators unveiled a model Revenue Operations Center (ROC) at the recently concluded 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona.

The mobile sector is currently losing an estimated $77 billion through avoidable revenue leakage a figure which could well rise with the emergence of new content-based services. To combat this leakage, Subex Azure pioneered the strategic concept of a ROC, which is a centralised and integrated platform for operators to assess, address and correct all aspects of their revenue maximisation processes.

The ROC affords operators centralised revenue monitoring and control via a set of dashboards and process workflows by integrating individual revenue assurance, fraud management and risk management solutions. This will allow operators to keep an eye on the financial performance (e.g. total revenue, ARPU, subscriber growth), revenue performance (e.g. revenue/ cost by category, revenue/ fraud loss) and operational performance (e.g. revenue/ fraud/ bad debt loss by root cause) across their networks.

“Revenue management is becoming increasingly important for operators offering next-generation wireless and wire-line services. With many services being delivered by third-party providers, an end-to-end approach to monitoring and protecting revenues will be required to deliver a greater customer experience,” said Norbert Scholz, Research Director at Gartner.

At 3GSM, Subex Azure will demonstrate how the ROC would work for a mobile operator with around 100,000 subscribers. The demonstration will illustrate a series of real-life scenarios that mobile operators typically face and how the ROC would help address them. These scenarios is expected to include include managing increases in interconnect costs, revenue leakage on content provision, relaxed credit scoring leading to bad debt, Internal fraud, rising customer complaints and rebates and handset theft.

Subash Menon, Founder Chairman, Managing Director & CEO, Subex Azure Limited, said: “With the emergence of complex next-generation content services it is imperative that mobile operators maximise these potential revenues. The ROC is an innovative solution and will play a central role by providing an end-to-end view of revenue flows throughout the whole business.”

JPMorgan report on chip manufacturing

Chip design is also an opportunity: India clearly has an opportunity to build an eco-system that can lead it to the same path as Taiwan, a powerhouse in chip design. India already has a very large and growing pool of experienced IC design engineers, and hundreds of expat engineers are returning to India every year (like Taiwan in the 80s). The investment in eco-system can start at the grassroots level with a modification of education to make it targeted more at problem solving and creativity, and continue with infrastructure and financial support for R&D centers that focus on enabling technologies of tomorrow. India’s semiconductor manufacturing: Too late—just don’t bother The Indian government is drafting a semiconductor policy, which is likely to be manufacturer-friendly, following the trend of many Asian countries. The chip manufacturing unit requires all sorts of infrastructure including basic things such as uninterrupted water and power supply in addition to the land provided at attractive rates by the government. The policy has seen delays due to a standoff between the finance and IT ministries on the issue of the fiscal incentive package for investors setting up fabrication units. The finance ministry had suggested that investors could choose a mix of incentives (equity participation, interest subsidy, tax exemption, duty reduction) for setting up their project, with the overall cost of incentives restricted to 20-25 percent of the total capital expenditure on the project. This policy and incentives are still under review by the ministries. In order to attract foreign and domestic investors, the Indian government is also encouraging Electronic Hardware Technology Parks (EHTP) to foster electronics manufacturing in the country. Some of the benefits of the EHTPs are: Foreign equity is permissible up to 100 percent. No duties are levied on the import of capital goods, raw materials and components. Access to the Indian domestic market is allowed up to 50 percent of the free-on-board value exports. An EHTP unit can be set up for both software and hardware operations in an integrated manner. Anyone starting an IC fabrication facility in India will first face the dilemma of choosing a technology level. If the fabrication is of mature technology—it will be in direct competition with the large capacities built-up by China and other countries that are themselves struggling for profitability. Profitability in such a scenario is almost unachievable. On the other hand, building a state of the art fab requires, other than financial and physical resources; access to technology, skilled manpower with experience on foundry process, and customers willingness to devote resources to switch over to a new entrant. In either scenario, the possibility of success is minimal. According to a recent news story, the government is planning to revise the draft Fab policy to extend fiscal incentives to other technology products such as LCDs, OLED, plasma panel displays, storage devices and solar cells. This is a favourable approach compared to just focusing on semiconductors as it provides incentives to a larger array of manufacturing and assembly options within the technology industry rather than restricting it to the capital intensive semiconductor manufacturing. IC assembly, packaging and test, challenging, but a viable option than front-end manufacturing: IC assembly involves a different and lower order of complexity than what is required in front end wafer processing. IC assembly is functionally separate from the other stages of production even when performed in close proximity to fabrication. With final testing the finished chips can be shipped directly to customers—a large part of which are in Asia itself. IC assembly business dominated by a few players: The four dominant players in IC assembly space are ASE, SPIL, Amkor and STATS ChipPac. These companies have built up significant technological leadership in the advanced packaging/testing capacities and the high initial investment required is a natural barrier to new entrants. Advanced packaging already forms close to 70 percent of the packaging market from revenue stand point. Turnaround after disastrous 2001-02: Following disastrous performance in 2001-02 time-frame, the industry has seen some consolidation. Unlike the foundry sector, with cautious capital expenditure, the industry has restricted capacity addition in recent years, which has turned out to be good for the industry as a whole. Location and technology: Indian backend companies would need to develop strong packaging and test capabilities along with capabilities of direct shipment to end customers. Local IC assembly operations could come up adjacent to hubs of electronics contract manufacturing industry. Initially, in the absence of foundries, Indian houses could partner with packaging houses from Taiwan, Singapore or Malaysia for technological knowledge, especially on advanced packaging techniques. Raw material supply security: Another important factor in the packaging industry is securing supply of substrate and raw material that will help reduce manufacturing costs and maintain profitability. Big companies such as ASE and SPIL have managed to secure substrate supplies. The absence of any sort of ecosystem is likely to be a problem area for Indian backend companies, as they will have to import most of the raw materials. Niche plays may be viable, new technology and R&D costs could be prohibitive:There are many small backend companies in Asia that are just about profitable. The key for these companies has been focus on specific, growing market opportunities, such as memory and display drivers and establishing long-term contractual relationships with key potential clients. This is exactly what any start-up in this sector will have to do to generate profits and have some sort of buffer against the cyclical nature of the industry. A start-up would need to spend significant amount of resources to enter the advanced packaging market, which forms over 70 percent of the total packaging market. Moreover, the top four dominant players enjoy a considerable lead in advanced packaging, so even intensive R&D cannot guarantee commercial competitiveness and profitability. Hence we believe that smaller players would have to target the niche market to be profitable. IC design is a better option than IC manufacturing in India India should focus on opportunities that require less monetary investment but more human capital. The semiconductor design process is skill intensive, and requires only Electronic Design Automation (EDA) software. Fabrication, on the other hand, needs a huge fixed investment (of the order of $3 billion) to build and operate a fabrication plant that holds a wide variety of expensive equipment and that meets extreme requirements of cleanliness. Assembly and test also requires expensive equipment, but the overall costs of plant and equipment are much lower than for the fab, as are the average skill requirements. Overall, worker skill requirements go down along the value chain and upfront investment costs are highest for manufacturing. Reason why India can be a favoured destination India has certain advantages over China, including superior technical education, high number of English-speakers and IP protection laws and belief boosted by the successful Indian software sector. The fact that India has no chip foundries should not matter as much since most big companies are used to designing in the US for foundries in Taiwan. Some of the design companies value the opportunity to design on a 24-hour cycle because of the pressure to reach the market ahead of competitors. IC Design is already picking up in India According to iSuppli, India’s design services industry grew from revenue of $511 million in 2004 to $623 million in 2005. India has about 125 companies doing design, including multinationals, domestic companies such as Wipro and Sasken, and a handful of Silicon Valley startups with Indian R&D centers. In 2005, giant multinationals like TI, Intel, Cypress, Infineon, and STMicroelectronics comprise about 70 percent of the total semiconductor design industry in India and about 30 percent was produced by homegrown companies. In 1985, Texas Istruments became the first multinationals to open a design center in India, to work on its design automation software for internal use. TI’s India center designs at 90nm and has begun doing 65nm and also designs for DSP devices, the company’s flagship product line. TI India has been awarded the highest number of patents (225) for any R & D center in India. Wipro’s VLSI team has evolved from job shop to full design services, with 1,400 engineers, including more than 840 IC designers. It began to win business in ASICs and SOCs five years ago and in the last two years has taped out 125 designs in automotive, consumer, industrial and other segments. About 25 percent were 130nm and 10 percent were 90nm. It recently taped out its first 65-nm design. STMicroelectronics’ India design center was established in 1992. Among the multinationals, it has one of the largest staffs: 1,650, mostly in Greater Noida, with 50 in Bangalore. About two-thirds work on hardware design. Intel India’s Bangalore operations include the Intel India Design Center and sales and marketing operations. Intel India employs over 2,500 people and more than half are design engineers. Investment should also be targeted at the grassroots level, Quality education is key to employment generation From the point of view of employment generation and environment friendliness, the IC Design industry is a much better choice than IC manufacturing. There is high demand for experienced engineers in the VLSI sector, and the demand will only grow as multinationals source more designs from India. One challenge is the supply/demand gap for qualified professionals, despite a strong education network in India. The quality of engineering education plays a key role in creating interest for large multinational companies and developing a local IC design industry. Japan, Korea, and Taiwan score well in this area due to the existence of large number of good quality colleges. Taiwan and Japan have most likely moved closer to Western style education (focus on problem solving and creativity rather than information reproduction). While India has some great institutions, average quality is not good enough. Instead of wasting money on subsidies for $30mn a piece of lithography equipment, India can spend the same money on higher education and that includes incentives for attracting the world’s top universities to open campuses in India. TI, STMicroelectronics and most other large multinationals are already engaged in university programs to help build design expertise in India. TI India, for example, has a University Relations program under which it works with several Indian universities and has helped to establish many DSP labs which train more than 1,500 students in graduation and post-graduation studies every year. Parameters IC Design IC Manufacturing IC Assembly and test Labour Very high skill level required. Mix of very specialised and difficult to find process skills and relatively moderate skill level to operate the equipment. Mix of relatively specialised packaging technology skills and quite moderate skill level to operate the equipment. Investment Low. Requires expensive EDA tools. License may be per design engineer. Very high. Plant, equipment and land all push the fixed cost to order of $3bn for a fab. High. Plant and equipment costs are not as high as that of a fab.

SNIA’S SMI-S standard adopted by ISO and IEC

The Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) today announced that its Storage Management Initiative Specification (SMI-S) has been designated an International Standard by the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) and International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC). This designation is expected to further accelerate the already widespread adoption of the standard by storage vendors and IT users worldwide.

“The recognition of SMI-S by ISO and IEC is clear evidence that the specification has become visible among the worldwide storage community as a key to helping increase storage interoperability and decrease management complexity. It is also evidence of SNIA’s growing reputation for producing high quality standards,” said Vincent Franceschini, chair of the SNIA. “SMI-S was created to develop interoperable storage management technologies, and its ratification as an international standard signifies the impact it can have on a global level to achieve these goals,” he added.

According to PK Gupta, Chair of SNIA India, “”ISO is a well respected standards body in the India region. Having SMI-S standardised by ISO lends extra authority to the standard and helps in wider acceptance of interoperability standards for storage area networking and systems, which are growing in India at the rate of 70 percent per year. This is a big step for the storage industry in terms of standardisation and solving end users’ pain points of managing heterogeneous storage.”

The SNIA has worked to drive the global adoption of SMI-S through a wide array of activities hosted by SNIA Regional Affiliates in Australia-New Zealand, North America – Canada, China, Europe (EMEA), India, Japan and South-Asia. The SNIA is also a co-owner of Storage Networking World conferences that take place in China, Germany, Australia and the US where educational activities such as tutorials, Hands-on-Labs, Solution Center demonstrations and plugfests have built an international coalition of vendors and users that are implementing SMI-S.

“Continued progress toward the establishment of standards benefits end users by decreasing their interoperability pain points, and the processing of SMI-S as an ISO/IEC International Standard marks a significant step forward for the future development of storage standards,” said Wendy Betts, Distributed Storage Manager for Hewitt Associates and chair of the SNIA End User Council (EUC). “Global enterprises are deploying storage networks in increasingly large numbers to support their worldwide infrastructure, and SMI-S is allowing users to centrally manage their multi-vendor, multi-geography networks through a standard interface.”

The SNIA was supported in the ISO/IEC standardisation effort by partnering with the International Committee for Information Technology Standards (INCITS), whose T11 Technical Committee assisted with the submission of the specification to the ISO/IEC Joint Technical Committee, JTC 1, Information Technology. After processing by the JTC 1 subcommittee SC 25, Interconnection of Information Technology Equipment, SMI-S was successfully voted as an International Standard on 28 November 2006. It is expected to be published before the end of the first quarter of 2007 as ISO/IEC 24775, Information Technology – Storage Management.

“Adoption of SMI-S as an ISO/IEC International Standard is a key milestone that is likely to increase market confidence. It also demonstrates the flexibility of IEC and ISO in recognizing consortia commitment and contributions to standards.” said Gabriel Barta, Technical Officer for SC 25 in IEC.”

The SNIA recently announced it is continuing to expand SMI-S with new capabilities in an effort to meet global IT users’ needs and vendor requirements for rapidly evolving storage technology. Support for such storage capabilities as host-based controllers, storage enclosures, support for file system quotas, volume protection and consistency management for snapshot and replication management support are expected to be included in future releases of the SMI-S standard. So far, SMI-S has been implemented in more than 450 products tested for conformance with the standard.

Indian IT sector revenues to grow ten fold in a decade

NASSCOM Strategic Review 2007’s key findings have been released. The Indian IT Industry is on course to achieve an exports target of $60 billion by 2010.

• Software and Services (IT-BPO) exports to exceed $31 billion in FY 2006-07, a 32.6 percent growth
• Employment in sector to exceed 1.6 million up from 1.28 million last year
• Domestic IT market broke out of the hardware linked growth pattern for the first time ever in FY ’06 and the trend of software and services gaining share is expected to continue; total sise expected to cross $15.9 billion in FY 2006-07, a 21 percent growth
• MNC investments reach an unprecedented scale; over $10 billion announced in FY 2006-07, to be invested over the next few years.
• Indian Service Providers have grown their share of contracts of values in excess of $50 million dollars from 1 percent in 2002 to 7 percent in 2006
• Offshore product development and engineering services to drive increased IP creation

Key findings of Strategic Review 2007

The highlights of the findings indicate that the Indian IT industry has grown its revenues ten fold in the past decade, from $4.8 billion in FY 1997-98 to $47.8 billion in FY 2006-07. Its contribution to GDP is estimated to have grown from 1.2 percent to 5.4 percent in the same period.

Commenting on the key findings of the Strategic Review 2007, Mr. B Ramalinga Raju, Founder and Chairman of Satyam Computer Services and Chairman, NASSCOM, said “The last decade is testament to the growing impact that the Indian IT industry is having on the global and local economies. The industry is perfectly poised to tap new opportunities in the offshoring and domestic segments for greater wealth and IP creation for the country.”

Kiran Karnik, President, NASSCOM said, “The Indian IT industry’s consistent growth in both exports and domestic segments and its ongoing expansion into new potentially high growth opportunities reaffirms the continued confidence and global competitiveness of the Indian IT sector. We are confident that the industry will achieve its ambitious target of $60 bn in exports in 2010. The challenges faced by industry are being addressed jointly by the industry, government and other stakeholders through both short and long term solutions.

Optimistic market signs indicate there is more headroom for growth, through large unaddressed areas and the possible unbundling of IT-BPO mega-deals with increasing shares of global delivery. The other positive sign is the maturing of the domestic IT industry. For the first time ever, the domestic industry has broken out of the hardware linked growth pattern and Indian firms are playing an increasing role within this segment.”

The Strategic Review 2007 reviews the industry’s performance in 2007, estimates the growth expected in the current fiscal (FY07), details the service line trends observed across the various industry segments over the past year, presents an assessment of India’s competitiveness as a sourcing destination, analyses the sustainability of each individual factor contributing to India’s leadership position and provides a view of the outlook projected for the global and Indian IT-ITES industries. It outlines the opportunities, challenges and agenda for key stakeholders to further extend India’s leadership in this space.

Employment Trends & NASSCOM Initiatives: Total IT Software and services employment to reach 1.6 million in FY07. The industry in collaboration with the government and other stakeholders has initiated several initiatives to further enhance the availability and access to suitable talent for IT-ITES in India

• The NAC (NASSCOM Assessment of Competence) has been nationally rolled our in November 2006, after a successful pilot. This is being taken to a number of states in 2007
• A comprehensive skill assessment and certification programs for entry-level talent and executives (low-middle level management) is underway
• An image enhancement program to build greater awareness about the career opportunities in this segment is underway
• NASSCOM has been working with the academia across the country under its IT Workforce development initiative to encourage and facilitate greater industry interaction; NASSCOM has signed MoUs with UGC and AICTE to take forward these initiatives
• NASSCOM has suggested the concept of experimenting with adapting the Special Economic Zone concept (deregulation and removal of restrictions) for education, and create Special Education Zones. The long term steps that are needed include much higher government investment in education, major education reform and better compensation and research grants for teachers/researchers
• NASSCOM has proposed the setting up of a chain of finishing schools for IT professionals to make them more employable with a simple 3-4 months of honing of technical skills and imparting soft skill training, helping bridge the manpower supply-demand gap by at least 30-40 percent. It has been proposed that such finishing schools be set up by the IITs and National Institutes of Technology.

Emerging Locations - As global delivery matures, newer locations are emerging; however India is expected to remain the undisputed leader

• Going forward: For India to fully capitalise on the opportunity and sustain a disproportionate lead in the global IT-ITES space, stakeholders need to continue working towards timely and coherent execution of initiatives to address supply-side concerns across the following areas
• Augmenting Talent Supply
• Creating world-class infrastructure
• Strengthening information security
• Enhancing operational excellence
• Providing regulatory support
• Catalyzing domestic market development
• Fostering an ecosystem for innovation

There’s more to IPv6 than just more IP addresses

With IPv4 unable to scale up in proportion to the rapid growth in Internet and wireless enabled devices, the decks have been cleared for the adoption of IPv6, the latest kid on the block. Chandan Mendiratta analyses the technology and finds there is more to it than just more IP addresses. He points out that the technology has the potential to fuel the growth of India’s Internet economy

Picture this: you are not able to log on because your computer says ‘Sorry, all IP addresses are now being used!!!’ So what does one do in circumstances like these? Right now, nothing. With the rapid growth of the Internet and proliferation of wireless devices that require unique IP addresses, IPv4 is beginning to show its age.

The distant rumbling of the next-generation IP protocol ’version 6’ is growing louder. IPv6 (Internet Protocol Version 6), is the ‘next generation’ protocol designed by the IETF to replace the current version Internet Protocol, IP Version 4 (IPv4) and is now being positioned as the antidote to the problem of shortage of IP addresses.

The catalyst in action!

The escalating demand for IP addresses has served as the main catalyst in the development of IPv6. It’s estimated that in the wireless arena alone, more than 1 billion mobile phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and other wireless devices will require Internet access and each will need its own unique IP address. IPv6, as specified by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), most notably offers:

• Expanded IP addresses to accommodate widespread proliferation of Internet devices such as personal computers, personal digital assistants, wireless devices, and new Internet appliances.
• Expansion of the Internet throughout the world.
• Increasing use of ‘always on’ Internet access.
• Requirements for emerging Internet applications.

IPv6 also provides integrated auto-configuration for plug-and play capabilities, enhanced mobility, and end-to-end security.

Is it a killer app?

The question isn’t ‘if’ but rather ‘when’ will the world migrate to IP protocol version 6 (IPv6). With an exponentially increasing demand for IP addresses, the world is outgrowing IPv4. Billions of new, always-on Internet appliances for the home from the TV to the refrigerator and utility meter will be connected through various technologies, and each of these devices will require its own IP address.

The need for more addresses is compounded by the fact that addresses have not been distributed evenly worldwide. Although IPv4 theoretically can support as many as 4 billion unique addresses, the actual allocation of space has locked up nearly 75 percent of these addresses. In contrast to IPv4, which has 32 bits of address space, IPv6 has 128 bits of address space, pushing the theoretical limit of unique IPv6 nodes to roughly 3.4 x 1038 or about 340 billion billion billion billion unique addresses.

Deploying IPv6 and its benefits

A wide range of techniques have been identified and implemented, basically falling into three categories:

• Dual Stack Techniques, to allow IPv4 and IPv6 to co-exist in the same devices and networks
• Tunnelling Techniques, to avoid order dependencies when upgrading hosts, routers and regions
• Translation Techniques, to allow IPv6-only devices to communicate with IPv4 only devices.

Expanded addressing is not the only benefit of IPv6. Other benefits include:

• IPv6’s auto configuration feature or autodiscovery will eliminate the labour-intensive and costly approach to administration of Dynamic Host Control Protocol (DHCP) servers that most large organisations use to manage their IPv4 addresses.
• IPv6 uses a ‘stateless autoconfiguration’ that combines an interface ID number, such as the machine’s existing MAC address, and a network prefix from the local router to assign its IP address instead of one allocated by the DHCP server.
• IPv6 will also provide a peer-to-peer applications architecture that will allow for a global, end-to-end addressing scheme. This setup will eliminate the need for Network Address Translation (NAT) devices at the edge of some large enterprise networks, which can slow down the encryption process and are inefficient for applications such as Voice over IP, mobile IP, and distributed gaming.

What would it mean to India?

IPv6 will emerge as one of the most extremely critical success factors for growth of IT in India. Currently, on IPv4, India has only three ranges of Class B network address families. Each Class B network can have 255 X 255 (= 65025) IP addresses, which means that India today has a total of only about 2 lakh IP addresses. This is one of the biggest constraints to the adoption of intelligent IP based network applications and devices within the country. Currently, the existing network users share these IP addresses.

Further, IPv4 based addresses have proven difficult to get allotted, as there is a severe shortage internationally. Therefore, it is critical for India and other developing countries to move to the IPv6 platform, simply because IPv4 chokes the possibilities and potential for the growth of the Internet in India.

Secondly, India has software and engineering capabilities that are recognised across the world. IPv6 is the ideal standard for Indians to start developing applications and services for, since even if the standard is adopted internationally, its growth will be restrained by the ability of companies to provide applications based on this standard.

After years of early testing and limited deployment, movement toward IPv6 is gaining momentum. The ultimate beauty of IPv6 is that it will bring us back to an end-to-end, global addressing architecture, but the transition to IPv6 will be slow and measured. Therefore, it is critical for India to consider IPv6 since both as a market as well as a development centre, the standard holds tremendous potential to fuel the growth of India’s Internet economy.

New technologies advance the field of Image Processing

We are in the midst of a revolution sparked by rapid progress in digital image processing technology. Hareish Gur explains the nuances of Image Processing and looks at the range of applications in which the technology is being deployed

Image Processing is considered to be one of the most rapidly evolving areas of information technology today, with growing applications in all areas of business. This technology holds the possibility of developing the ultimate machine in the future that would be able to perform the visual functions of human beings. It also forms a core area of research within the computer science and engineering disciplines at most of the top universities and institutes in the US and other developed countries. As such, it forms the basis for all kinds of future visual automation.

Image Processing deals with images which are two-dimensional entities (such as scanned office documents, x-ray films, satellite pictures, etc) captured electronically through a scanner or camera system that digitises the spatially continuous coordinates to a sequence of 0’s and 1’s. A digital image is a mapping from the real three-dimensional world to a set of two-dimensional discrete points. Each of these spatially distinct points, holds a number that denotes grey level or colour for it, and can be conveniently fed to a digital computer for processing. Here, processing essentially means algorithmic enhancement, manipulation, or analysis (also understanding or recognition) of the digital image data. Every image processing technique or algorithm takes an input, an image or a sequence of images and produces an output, which may be a modified image and/or a description of the input image contents.

For example, if we give as input, a person’s photograph, an image processing system could return his or her name and whether or not that person is wearing glasses or a necktie. Since a digital computer is used in the process rather than an analogue one, this branch of studies is also popularly known as Digital Image Processing.

Importance of image data

According to one estimate, more than 75 percent of all the information received by man is visual. Some researchers arguably consider this figure to be as high as 99 percent! Even if we consider the conservative estimate, the remaining four senses contribute to only 25 percent of the total share. And man has known this since ancient times. Probably that’s the reason why the ancient Chinese coined the now popular proverb, “A picture speaks a thousand words.” It is very evident that vision is a major source of information for human beings, and thus if we could possibly provide similar visual faculties to machines, we shall be able to achieve visual automation for a very broad range of applications.

Image Processing vs. Computer Graphics

There generally is a bit of confusion in recognising the difference between the fields of Image Processing and Computer Graphics, often even in the minds of tech-savvy computer professionals. Actually, Image Processing and Computer Graphics are entirely different, almost the opposite of each other. A computer graphics system is involved with image synthesis, and not recognition or analysis, as in the case of Image Processing. The input of a computer graphics system consists of an item list that describes a scene and its purpose is to transform this list into a digital image, which could have been formed, if this scene would really exist. Morphing used in advertisements could be said to be the most commonly witnessed computer graphics technique. In contrast, input to an Image Processing system is always a real image formed via some physical phenomenon such as scanning, filming, etc. The main role of Image Processing is not to create information but to extract it, integrate it, make it explicit and usable.

Applications market

Broadly one can classify the applications areas into four categories: document and medical imaging, computer vision & industrial applications, remote sensing & space applications, and military applications.

From the IT industry viewpoint, Document and Medical imaging applications are the ones that have proliferated. According to an estimate, the international market for the first category alone is growing at about 25 percent CAGR (compounded annual growth rate), and is projected to be worth more than US$ 30 billion this year. The computer vision and industrial applications market is still in its nascent stage since common solutions cannot be applied across a varying range of industrial problems. The third category of remote sensing and space applications is mainly in the clutches of government departments or research organisations the world over, but it is definitely very heavily funded. NASA, ISRO and NRSA are a few of the organisations involved in this segment.

The last category of military and classified defence projects is the one for which the less said the better. Research work and finances of such projects are kept confidential and are anybody’s guess.

Coming back to the software perspective, for many years the computer industry has been promising that document imaging would solve a stack of paper-related ills. But little came of those promises, until the Internet began to change the dynamics of information. In today’s scenario, the benefits of electronically managing documents are not only surfacing but are also being widely accepted. Most business information resides on paper making documents one of the most highly valued assets of any business. Image processing technology leads to business applications such as Electronic Document Management System (EDMS), Workflow, etc, that manage data files and paper documents alike, to make the “paperless office” dream a reality. So, document and medical imaging are the most important applications of image processing technology as of now.

Office applications

EDMS in its most basic form, is just an archival-retrieval system. Archive and retrieval document image processing is concerned with simply replacing paper storage and filing by electronic movement of records. One could make freehand annotations or highlight a portion of a document electronically (just as could be done on paper), along with many other powerful tools for full-text searching, security and controlled sharing, etc. Users can achieve huge RoI on this through benefits such as reduced storage space cost, instant access to documents, reduced risks of lost or missing documents, and manpower reduction, thereby providing a cost-effective solution, as also increasing organisational efficiency.

Workflow solutions automate a business process, in whole or part, during which documents, information or tasks are passed from one participant (human or machine) to another for action, according to a set of procedural rules. Workflow automation adds the capability to interpret information contained within the documents rather than just storing them. The solution is best applied in situations where information is derived from a variety of sources and there exists a well-established, multi-stage processing environment.

Forms Processing deals with volumes of paper-based forms for automatic extraction of data, using technologies such as Optical Mark Recognition, Optical Character Recognition, Intelligent Character Recognition, Barcode Recognition, etc.

These solutions find application in several business areas like banking, financial institutions, telecom, educational institutions, hospitals, manufacturing, insurance, customer care, and government.

The Future

Today, we are in the middle of a revolution sparked by rapid progress in imaging and computer technology. But contrary to common belief, computers are not as fast as humans in computations related to the analysis or processing of images. Biological or human vision is still by far the most powerful and versatile perceptual mechanism. Scientist Mead notes that “the visual system of a single human being does more image processing than the entire world’s supply of supercomputers.” However, some tasks such as image compression, enhancement and data extraction from paper via technologies such as OMR, OCR and ICR, etc, can now be performed on desktop computers available today.

With increasing power and sophistication of modern computing, the concept of computation can go beyond the traditional, sequential Von Neumann architecture and one could even contemplate optical implementations. A major challenge for automatic image analysis is that the sheer complexity of the visual task has been mostly ignored by the current approaches. We (humans) compute, but not necessarily the way most of the present day computer systems do. After all, nature did not know anything about bits and Boolean algebra when vision was created!

It should be noted that the present computer methods, by contrast, could provide answers only to precisely stated questions that are not ill-defined. But a ray of hope surely comes from the distributed and parallel computing paradigms that are expected to boost real-time response for many image processing solutions. Image processing technology is waiting to address many unanswered questions. There is every reason to believe that once this technology achieves a level of competence that even modestly approaches that of human vision, and at a competitive cost, the imaging applications will virtually explode.

Near New Trimble Nomad GPS field computer:$1400.00

his is a Like New Trimble TDS ruggedized Nomad 800L. $1400.00. It has 806 MHz DDR memory, It performs flawlessly and never even once locked up. Even with the enormous maps we used, it was unstoppable. The screen quality and clarity is unbelievable and in my opinion, it is the best all in one unit on the market and the best value for the money. The onboard GPS performed flawlessly and acquired satellites quickly. It has never been dropped or mishandled. List price is $1899 (per SDG systems). It comes with the following features/accessories:

System

-Windows Mobile version 6 OS

-806MHz XScale processor

-128MB DDR SDRAM

-1GB non-volatile built-in Flash storage

-1 SD Memory card slot

-1 CompactFlash (CF) (Type II) slot

-Integrated Bluetooth 2.0

-USB Boot with USB-client, USB-host, and audio jack

-3.5 inch VGA display, sunlight readable color touchscreen

-Integrated spaker and microphone

-15 Hour battery life with active use (default settings)

Standard Software

-GPS Controller software for controlling NMEA output and in-field mission planning

-Microsoft Office Mobile

-Transcriber (handwriting recognition)

Standard Accessories

-Rechargeable Li-Ion battery module

-Screen protector

-AC power supply/recharger

-USB data cable

-User guide

-Hand strap

Configuration options (For this model: 800L)

-Integrated 802.11 b/g wireless

-Integrated GPS (2-5 m post processed accuracy)

Email : sales@avalanchemapping.org

Attached Thumbnails

Computer Science - A Growing Field That Needs a Few (More) Good Women

Barbara Liskov of MIT recently won the prestigious Turing Award.

Credit : Donna Coveney, MIT (contact MIT before using this image)

Permission Granted

State: Massachusetts,New Hampshire

Agency: NSF

Date: March 30, 2009

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When the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) awarded Barbara Liskov the prestigious Turing Award earlier this month, their decision and timing were perfect--Liskov is a true pioneer in her field and March is National Women's History Month. In addition to making the types of "foundational innovations" that the ACM cited in awarding the MIT professor the honor often described as the 'Nobel Prize in computing,' Liskov was also the first woman to receive a doctorate from a computer science department in the United States.

In the years since Liskov began her career, the field of computer science has seen astonishing changes and advances that have touched every field of science and modern life. Yet for all of this progress, one stubborn fact remains the same-relatively few women are studying computer science as their academic major.

According to Jan Cuny, program office for the National Science Foundation's Broadening Participation in Computing (BPC) program, fewer than one in five degrees in computer science are being awarded to women. Cuny says that research shows many girls are interested in the field when they are younger, but as they approach their middle school years, that interest begins to drop off dramatically. There are a lot of reasons for this, Cuny says, including dull middle school and high school classes that portray computer science as more of a non-challenging vocational field.

Cuny says that perhaps the biggest barrier, however, is the perception that field itself just isn't very fun. "Girls have an image of computer scientists as being nerds who spend all day in isolation," Cuny said in a recent interview. "This is a misconception, but it's very difficult to convince a fourth- or fifth-grade girl otherwise."

Many prominent women working in the field as researchers paint a very different picture of computer science. To them, computer science offers them the chance to solve complex problems that challenge the world and contribute to discoveries and breakthroughs happening in other fields of science. They speak of the unique perspective that computer scientists bring to the pursuit of knowledge. "I think computer science is a great field," Liskov said last week. "It requires a certain kind of thinking. It's an engineering field, so you really have to enjoy building things."

Tanzeem Choudhury, a researcher at Dartmouth College, agrees. To her, computer science is a highly collaborative field where computer scientists work in teams to create new ideas and technologies. Choudhury, who was recently named one of the top 35 innovators in science and technology under the age of 35 by MIT's Technology Review, works on developing machine learning techniques can analyze how humans interact with each other.

Choudhury agrees that there are many barriers that prevent women from getting involved in computer science. "There are lots of stereotypes," Choudhury said earlier this month, "and stereotypes take awhile to go away. Just take the notion that women aren't good at math and computer science, which is just not true."

Choudhury advises young women to ignore the stereotypes and talk to women working in computer science to get a better idea of what the field is really like and what it has to offer.

All the women interviewed agreed that more women are needed in the field. "Technology is so pervasive and is going to become more and more so," Cuny said. "Women should have a voice in how those changes are going to be made."

Related Institutions/Organizations
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Dartmouth College

Locations
Massachusetts
New Hampshire

Related Websites
Barbara Liskov's homepage at MIT: http://www.pmg.csail.mit.edu/~liskov/
Tanzeem Choudhury's homepage at Dartmouth College: http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~tanzeem/
NSF's Broadening Participation in Computing program: http://www.nsf.gov/funding/pgm_summ.jsp?pims_id=13510&org=CNS&from=home