Indian IT‘s temporary hiring to double by 2020

The percentage of flexi hires in the IT sector is expected to double to 20% by 2020 as IT companies increasingly outsource non-core activities and focus on high-margin businesses, said a report by the flexi staffing body Indian Staffing Federation (ISF).

"IT firms are swiftly adopting the practice of hiring flexi staff in order to beat margin pressures, maintain lean benches and also facilitate just-in-time hiring in a highly volatile market. Keeping the current situation in mind, we are expecting more and more IT companies to adopt staffing as the preferred means to man their projects," said K Pandia Rajan, president of the ISF. The flexi staffing industry in the IT sector touched $950 million last year, growing 15% in each of the last three years.

The Indian flexi staffing industry employs 1.3 million people; they form 3% of the organized sector employment. This number is expected to touch 9 million and comprise of 10% of the organized workforce by 2025. About 79% of workers in the flexi staffing industry fall in the 21-30 year age group, indicating that flexi workers are hired mostly at entry and junior level positions.

Traditionally, IT companies focused on application development and maintenance, but that's increasingly getting commoditized, pushing IT firms to explore other high margin businesses like consulting where billing is proportionate to deliverables. "The IT sector is moving towards the cloud and virtualization that will create new roles in the industry focused on outcomes," said Nagendra Venkaswamy, MD of India and South Asia at Arista Networks.

"Flexi workforce makes up for 10-15 % of our staff right from highly specialized R&D resources to tech support. With people plugging into their devices on the go, there is a huge shortage in areas like mobile device management," said Pallab Bandopadhyay, HR director in Citrix Systems.

Venkaswamy highlighted how the staffing companies should raise their bar by partnering with IT companies in their growth story. "The staffing industry is where the IT industry was in 2000, when 40% of what the IT companies did was to provide staffing solutions to their clients. So it's important for staffing firms to rise above transactions and add value by contributing to the business outcomes of the client's companies," he said.

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Hot sub-Rs 10,000 cameras

I want a digital camera for under 10,000 with at least 8X optical zoom and a 15MP image sensor. The shooter should be user friendly and lightweight; Wi-Fi is preferable though not mandatory. 

--Ramesh Srinivasan, Santosh Kadam, Mohit Khanna

There are several cameras that can be picked up for under 10,000, with very little difference in terms of image quality when you compare their output. All these shooters are capable of good snapshots in daylight, but tend to suffer from some noise in low-light photography. This is because all these devices are equipped with smaller image sensors when compared to what is found in DSLRs and more expensive bridge cameras. Still, all these gadgets are more than capable of good 'holiday' and 'birthday' pictures.

Of the lot, our first choice is the 16-megapixel Nikon Coolpix S6300. It sells for around Rs 9,000. It is a well built device that boasts of good image output, and it even performs decently in low light due to its backlit CMOS sensor (usually, most cameras in this price range use CCD sensors that are a little less sensitive to light when compared to CMOS). The S6300 comes with 10X optical zoom (focal length of 25mm-250 mm). This makes it a suitable travel companion. The camera uses a rechargeable battery pack - and the only noticeable issue, if it matters to you, is the lack of robust manual control. The Coolpix S6300 is best used on auto or its different preset modes. If you like to set your own exposure and shutter speed before clicking an image, this is not the right device for you.

The second camera worth considering is the 10-megapixel Canon IXUS 510 HS. This camera is available for Rs 8,500 (approx). In terms of image quality, this device is clearly the best in its price range, capable of vivid and sharp photographs. Other than image quality, the USP of this camera is its Wi-Fi capability and touchscreen control. Using the latter, for example, users can set their focus area by merely tapping on the screen. The camera is equipped with a CMOS censor and offers 12X zoom (28mm-336 mm focal length). Unlike most cameras, the IXUS 510 HS doesn't support SD cards; it uses microSD cards. And yes, this is another camera that is best used in auto mode, especially since accessing various settings through its touchscreen can be a bit cumbersome.

Our final recommendation is the 16-megapixel Canon PowerShot SX160 IS. It sells for around Rs 9,500. This shooter is not as pocketable as the Coolpix S6300, but it has certain unique advantages: The biggest reason to pick this over the Nikon is that it offers full manual controls, if a photographer wants it. It also has a much bigger reach with its 16X optical zoom (focal range 28mm-448 mm). The only issue with PowerShot SX160 is its battery. The camera uses standard AA batteries, which may turn out to be an expensive proposition when compared to the rechargeable batteries that IXUS 510 and Coolpix S6300 use.

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Apple has grand vision for TV market: CEO

After computers, Apple is now eyeing to take the TV market by storm following a hint by CEO Tim Cook who said that the company maintains 'a very grand vision' of improving the already experimented Apple TV. 

Cook said that the television experience today is just the same as it was 10 to 20 years before and nothing has changed much to make people love the experience. 

The company's earlier experimental product, Apple TV, which is a fairly limited set-top device, selling more than 13 million since the device was launched has been but a learning experience for the company that Cook called a 'hobby', a report by Fox News said. 

Cook claimed that the Apple TV tried to address some of the problems of the TV viewing experience. 

The report said that although the CEO refused to announce a proper TV set but maintained that the product continues to be an area of great interest to the company.

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Motorola: First made-in-US Moto X phone coming

Cellphone pioneer Motorola announced Wednesday that it's opening a Texas manufacturing facility that will create 2,000 jobs and produce its new flagship device, Moto X, the first smartphone ever assembled in the US. 

The company has already begun hiring for the Fort Worth plant. The site was most recently unoccupied but was once used by fellow phone manufacturer Nokia, meaning it was designed to produce mobile devices, said Will Moss, a spokesman for Motorola Mobility, which is owned by Google. 

"It was a great facility in an ideal location," said Moss, who said it will be an easy trip for Motorola engineering teams based in Chicago and Silicon Valley, and is also close to the company's service and repair operations in Mexico. 

The formal announcement came at AllThingsD's D11 Conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, from Motorola CEO Dennis Woodside. 

Texas Governer Rick Perry's office administers a pair of special state incentive funds meant to help attract job-creating businesses to the state, but Moss said the Republican governor did not distribute any money to close this deal. 

"Motorola Mobility's decision to manufacture its new smartphone and create thousands of new jobs in Texas is great news for our growing state," Perry said through a spokeswoman. "Our strong, healthy economy, built on a foundation of low taxes, smart regulation, fair legal system and a skilled workforce is attracting companies from across the country and around the world that want to be a part of the rising Texas success story." 

The factory will be owned and run by Flextronics International Ltd., a Singapore-based contract electronics manufacturer that has had a long relationship with Motorola. 

Assembly accounts for relatively little of the cost of a smartphone. The cost largely lies in the chips, battery and display, most of which come from Asian factories. For instance, research firm iSuppli estimates that the components of Samsung's latest flagship phone, the Galaxy S4, cost $229, while the assembly costs $8. 

In December, Apple said it would move manufacturing of one of its existing lines of Mac computers to the US this year, reversing decades of increasing outsourcing. The company has come under some criticism for working conditions at the Chinese factories where its products are assembled. 

Some other manufacturers, such as Hewlett-Packard, have kept some PC assembly operations in the US. 

Moss said the Moto X will go on sale this summer. He said he could provide few details, citing priority secrets. He said the idea from the beginning was to bring manufacturing back to the US. 

"It's obviously our major market so, for us, having manufacturing here gets us much closer to our key customers and partners as well as our end users," he said. "It makes for much leaner, more efficient operations." 

But Motorola will still have global manufacturing operations, including at factories in China and Brazil. 

"Fact remains that more than 130 million people in the US are using smartphones," Mark Randall, Motorola's senior vice president of supply chain and Operations, said in a statement, "but until Moto X, none of those smartphones have been built in the USA."

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Facebook starts verifying high-profile accounts

Social networking giant Facebook today announced that it has started a new feature that allows users to identify official pages and profiles of celebrities, brands, journalists, businesses etc. Microblogging website Twitter already has this feature, called Verified Accounts. 

As part of this initiative, Facebook will add a Verification Badge to the profile/page in question, so that users are assured of authenticity. The company said, "There is no action required for Page admins to add a verification badge. In the coming days, we will automatically verify the largest Pages on Facebook that are at the greatest risk of duplication. At this time we cannot accept verification requests for all Pages." 

Official pages and profiles that do not get the Verification Badge (a small blue-coloured tick mark) can contact the company via its help centre to address the issue. They can also report fake profiles and pages to Facebook. 

The new Facebook Verification Badges will appear alongside the name of the page/person, when users hover over the name of a page, in search results as well as News Feed in desktop as well as mobile modes. Apart from that, the badges will also be shown in stories about users liking a page as well as in "Pages You May Like" suggestions.

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‘Deleted‘ Snapchat photos hit the internet

Photographs shared via popular photo-sharing app SnapChat have been reportedly leaked on other websites without users' knowledge. 

SnapChat, which claimed that all the photographs shared on the app remain visible for only ten seconds, overlooked its minimal technical prowess leading to users storing the photographs forever. 

In a report by New York Daily News, app users are finding their private photos on sites like SnapChat Leaked without their consent. 

The Facebook page of SnapChat Leaked, snapchatleaked.com, received 5,34,000 likes in just 20 hours before being suspended by Facebook for violating its policies as users started using the page to bully others. 

SnapChat Leaked said that it is working with Facebook on this issue. It further added that the images are user submitted and most see it as fun and getting 'Facebook Famous'. 

This has given a rise to vindictive revenge porn where the exes and scorned lovers are lashing out on their partners by submitting their intimate photos to erotic websites, the report added.

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Apple CEO calls Google Glass difficult

Google's wearable technology Google Glass, which has been gaining a lot of uncertainty about its usage and subsequent abuse related to privacy concerns, did not find a clear admirer in Apple's CEO Tim Cook.

Cook, while addressing a conference, said that the product by Google is not only difficult in terms of wearing the technology on the face but also acquiring it for $1,500, reports CNN.

Cook questioned whether people would actually want to wear the technology on their faces.

Speculations about the company unveiling an iWatch have been rampant and Cook also hinted towards entering the 'wearables' market someday but did not give out specifications saying that there is a lot of scope for exploration in this space.

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Obama‘s cybersecurity plan ‘apes‘ India‘s

India's top security brass has claimed that the Obama administration came up with an executive order that resembles India's cybersecurity initiatives after it had failed to get the Cyber Security Bill approved in the US Senate.

A confidential document circulated by National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS) — the apex agency looking into the country's political, economic, energy and strategic security concerns — to the chiefs of the Indian Army, Navy and Air Force said that the Executive Order issued by the US President on February 12, this year 'in many respects mirrors the initiatives taken by India in it's document on framework of cybersecurity.'

A document issued by security brass of the country, which was reviewed by ET, cites at least 12 instances where the US order mirrors India's cybersecurity framework that was drafted in 2011. These include setting out a cybersecurity policy, defining critical infrastructure , information sharing between departments and protection of civil liberties. It's imperative to note that US President Barack Obama was unable to get the draft cybersecurity bill passed in the US Senate last year.

Under fire from civil and internet liberal associations, the bill had failed by eight votes. The bill needed 60 votes in a 100-member senate. However, Obama's order is silent on identifying enemy infrastructure. ET reported in December of 2011 about India's cybersecurity framework, which includes mapping of cybersystems of other countries, including their internet gateways, routers, IT system layouts, and web routing patterns.

At the same time, the National Security Council Secretariat has also pointed out that the US has made substantive progress in protection of critical infrastructure against cyberthreats. "The executive order stipulates time frames for auction that are still absent in the Indian perspective. There appears to be greater recognition of and sensitivity to threats in cyberspace and, hence, a greater sense of urgency than what is apparent in India. There are also closer linkages with the private sector and a more defined consultative process. Lastly, the order specifically stresses the need to ensure due protection of privacy and civil liberties as an integral part of any efforts towards cybersecurity," the National Security Council Secretariat communication added.

Both India and US have been victims of cyberattacks originating from China. US-China ties have also come under pressure due to cyber spying from China. In a report released this month, Pentagon, which houses the US Department of Defense, has alleged that China is cyberspying against the US government, which includes attacks to gain information about its weapons programs.

India's external affairs, home affairs and defence ministries have come under cyberattacks originating from China.

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Sistema: It’s tough to do business in India

Vladimir Evtoushenkov is co-founder and chairman of Sistema, the $34 billion Russian conglomerate, which is the majority shareholder in mobile telecom firm Sistema Shyam. The Indian venture has managed to win back nine of the 21 licences that it had lost due to the Supreme Court ruling last year. Although it is looking to invest in new sectors such as retail and power, Evtoushenkov says future investments will depend on how quickly the government deals with some of Sistema concerns in telecom. Excerpts: 

Telecom is your largest investment and it's been through ups and downs. Has it gone the way you wanted it to go?

We have substantial investment of around $3.6 billion and we will make further investments . But it is very difficult to recover this investment because the telecom market is not very stable. It is very difficult to say how much investment is needed because the rules are not stable and the regulatory system is changing. According to preliminary business we should have achieved break-even in 2013. Now, the cash break-even is beyond 2017, or may be even longer . That's why the Indian market is very peculiar. But, the market is getting more sophisticated and the situation will improve. 

Is India one of the toughest places to do business in?

I don't know if it's the toughest but it is certainly tough. Regulatory climate is not very good. You can put together a business plan but you can't implement it because the rules keep changing. 

You had a setback because you had planned for pan-India presence but you are now in nine circles...

As the government prepared new rules, we decided to decrease the number of circles to nine. Once we see an EBIDTA break-even by 2014-end, we will then look at going to further circles. 

You had sought arbitration with the Indian government, are you going to pursue that further?

It's in abeyance at this moment . We want to wait and see if we will get what we were promised. We are awaiting clarity on merger and acquisition rules and actual allocation of spectrum. A lot of things need to be put in place and delivered before we can withdraw the notice. 

You have other business interests, including retail. Will you enter this sector since FDI is now allowed?

As soon as he telecom issue is solved we will look at it. For us, priority is the safe city project for which we had done a pilot in Delhi. The pilot project was very successful. We are the leader in Russia in the safety and security system. There are issues on financing and a national policy is missing. There are federal guidelines in Russia and municipal financing. We are talking to the home ministry on a policy on this. It is an integrated model where the entire city, including buses, have cameras and is connected to an emergency response system. In a city like Delhi it can be very helpful. We did the pilot in Delhi three years ago and if it was implemented, rapes and other crimes would have been checked. We also have a navigation system and we have an agreement with BSNL but that is not working. We are looking for pilot projects. We also want to look at power station, construction and real estate development but all this depends on what happens in telecom.

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Google: Students should take up jobs based on interests

Students should pursue jobs as per their interests and set a goal for their lives, a senior official at search engine giant Google said.

Speaking to students of Rajasthan University, Google Slovakia Country Manager Rasto Kulich motivated and guided them to set and achieve their goals and gave tips on better learning. 

Kulich emphasised on identifying one's interests, values and skills and asked them to pursue a career in the field of own interest. 

"Interest is the most important thing when you choose you job. Besides, setting a goal and writing it on paper helps one becoming more committed towards the goal," he said. 

He also asked students to not read very much in order to be able to implement what has been learnt from the books. 

"Read enough, not very much. It is important to implement what you have learnt," he said, while laying emphasis on finding a mentor for learning much faster. 

After giving a presentation, he also interacted with the students and gave them tips for success while guiding them for staying away from overnight success theory. 

University's Vice Chancellor Madhukar Gupta, Ajmer Divisional Commissioner Kiran Soni Gupta and faculty members were present on the occasion.

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5 ways social media strengthens employee communication

What started as a phenomenon on a more personal level is now extending its reach to work and offices. Organisations started by using social media as a recruiting tool. But now companies are realising the importance of social media for internal communication as well. After all, the concept of 'Employee Branding' is catching up like fire in the age where people don't hesitate to express themselves. 

"Many organisations are known to use social media strategies to reach out to customers and peers quite successfully. Now, communication professionals are realising that this tool can be used effectively to reach out to internal audience as well," says Sunil Goel, managing director, GlobalHunt. 

According to an international survey, about 42% of employees would be happy to talk with their line manager or team leader on Facebook, and would even be comfortable tweeting the head of department or chief executive. Likewise, nearly 40% of managers would be happy to respond. 

"In India sectors like Telecom, media, FMCG, Retail and IT are largely considering social media for internal communication," points out Goel. 

Developing on this interest could result in enhancing internal communication, creating opportunities for innovation and knowledge sharing. However, for it to be successful, HR will have to take it up as an opportunity to persuade management to engage with employees in this "new age" way. 

One of the ways this can be done is through employee blogging, encouraging employees to share ideas and giving opinions on new policies. "This tool will also ensure that every piece of communication reaches employees, which otherwise is lost through mass mails or newsletters," points out Goel. 

Going forward, the line between internal and external communication will blur as social media starts to play a key part. 

Here are top 5 reasons how social media will help strengthen employee communication: 

* Open new feedback channels: People from across departments can share ideas and thoughts. This will bring in fresh ideas and boost creativity. 

* Blur the distance: Social media will help in communicating across geographies and bring employees from different regions on the same platform. This will ensure that the message is reached to everyone in just one click. 

* Breaking down hierarchies: This will encourage cross-platform communication and open office environment. 

* Interactive: Without doubt the communication will be two-way, unlike through emails and newsletters. This will make employees feel like they are being heard. 

* Approachability: Employees can pick and choose who and what to engage, hear what others have to say, understand a different perspective and so on. 

These attributes are certainly desirable in an organisation. But, don't get carried away advises Goel. "It's important to draw a line while communicating on social media platform. Let the employees know the dos and don'ts. This will ensure that no trade secret is discussed on an open platform." 

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Google adds tabs to Gmail, aims to declutter inbox

Google on Wednesday announced a new inbox for Gmail, the company's email service used by over 400 million people worldwide. In a post on its official blog the company said that the new inbox would help users sort their emails better and focus on the communication that mattered to them.


The new inbox, which will be rolled out to users in the coming weeks, will sort mails under five different tabs by default. The primary tab, which will be visible to the user when he logs into Gmail, will be for the genuine and important communication. Email notifications sent by social media sites will automatically go under the Social tab and emails sent by e-commerce sites like eBayor Amazon will go under the Promotions tab. The two others tabs deal with confirmation emails and messages from mailing lists. 

Each tab will also show the number of new or unread messages. 

"We get a lot of different types of email: messages from friends, social notifications, deals and offers, confirmations and receipts, and more. All of these emails can compete for our attention and make it harder to focus on the things we need to get done," wrote Itamar Gilad, a product manager for Gmail, on the Google blog. "Sometimes it feels like our inboxes are controlling us, rather than the other way around." 

Gilad noted that the new inbox would allow users customization options. "Your inbox is organized in a way that lets you see what's new at a glance and decide which emails you want to read when," he wrote. 

In many ways, the new feature is similar to Labels and Filters that users can create withinGmail to sort emails. Through a new Filter, users can set emails from websites like Twitter and Facebook to skip their main inbox. Instead, these mails can be sorted into a virtual folder with the help of a new Label. 

However, the tabbed inbox automates the whole process and makes it easier, especially for less-technology savvy users, to sort and prioritize emails in a better way. By putting tabs on top of the inbox it also makes easier for users to access the emails that have skipped the main inbox. 

"You can easily customize the new inbox - select the tabs you want from all five to none, drag-and-drop to move messages between tabs, set certain senders to always appear in a particular tab and star messages so that they also appear in the Primary tab," wrote Gilad. 

Google said that users who don't like the new inbox would have the option to go back to classic inbox. 

"The (new) desktop, Android and iOS versions will become available within the next few weeks. If you'd like to try out the new inbox on desktop sooner, keep an eye on the gear menu and select Configure inbox when it appears in the settings options," wrote Gilad.

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Samsung Galaxy S4 gets official price cut in India

Planning to buy a Samsung Galaxy S4? Here's good news for you, the device has recently received an official price cut in the Indian market, barely a month after its launch.

The phone, which launched in India on the day of its global launch at a price tag of Rs 41,500, is now selling at Rs 40,300 on Samsung India e-store. This translates to a discount of Rs 1,200. The company is also offering a 12-month EMI option for the device.

However, while the official price cut is recent, some of the major e-commerce websites in the country like Flipkart and Snapdeal have been selling Galaxy S4 at this price since many weeks now. In fact, some of the smaller online retailers are selling the device for under Rs 40,000.

Another smartphone to receive a price cut is Samsung's week-old phone Galaxy Grand Quattro. The company's cheapest phone with quad-core processor was listed at Rs 18,260 on the India website at the time of launch. The device is now priced at Rs 16,900, a reduction of Rs 1,360. This phone, a rival of Micromax Canvas HD, can be purchased for approximately Rs 16,570 on e-commerce websites.

Samsung Galaxy S4 features a 5-inch SuperAMOLEDtouchscreen with 1920x1080p resolution and 441ppi pixel density. The Indian variant of the phone has a 1.6GHz eight-core processor and comes in 16, 32 and 64GB versions, with microSD card support up to 64GB, and 2GB RAM. Connectivity features of this phone include 2G, 3G, 4G, Wi-Fi, NFC, Bluetooth 4.0 and microUSB 2.0. Powered by a 2,600mAh battery, this phone also had a 1.9MP front-facing camera and a 13MP rear unit with LED flash.

The all-new Galaxy Grand Quattro features a 4.7-inch TFT touchscreen with 800x480p resolution and 200ppi pixel density. The device is powered by Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean) and comes with 1GB RAM and supports 32GBmicroSD card. Connectivity features

in Samsung Galaxy Grand Quattro include 2G, 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 3.0 and microUSB 2.0. A 5MP camera with LED flash is strapped to the back of this smartphone, while a VGA unit is placed in the front. It is powered by a 2,000mAh battery, supports dual-sim functionality and is available in black and white colours.

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Can video games treat dementia?

Ryuta Kawashima is used to children pointing at him on the street. They often shout "Kawashima Devil!" It's the price the neuroscientist pays for being the famous face of a lucrative series of brain puzzles that he developed for Nintendo. 

Kawashima appears in the videos as a disembodied, floating head with horns and a bright red face, asking "devilishly" hard maths and memory questions. Millions of games have been sold, earning him royalties of over $30m. But, he says, his games are more than just a fun way to learn: they could, in fact, provide a revolutionary new way to treat dementia. 

The 54-year-old refused to keep the money he made from the brain puzzle series, ploughing much of it into a research centre in Japan's Tohoku University, attached to the Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer. Kawashima's 40-strong team of young scientists spends their days working on ways to train our working memory and stimulate the prefrontal cortex, the area of the brain that deals with problem-solving and personality. Brain exercises have been shown to expand the cortex of healthy young people, he says, "So why not the old?" 

That question animates a remarkable new documentary on Kawashima's work. In 'Do You Know What My Name Is?' pensioners with severe dementia at a care home in the US state of Cleveland, Ohio, are seen recovering the use of their memories after using a six-month programme of learning therapy he designed. Some are almost literally brought back to life, transformed from depressed, hollow shells slipping inexorably toward death back into sociable, happy people. 

"We neuroscientists knew that brain plasticity exists in young subjects. The new point is that we now know it exists even in the brains of dementia sufferers," Kawashima explains. 

He says stimulating the frontal cortex clearly improves memory and brainpower: "We found that the best candidate for training working memory in people with dementia is reading aloud and performing simple arithmetic." Kawashima claims his own tests show an improvement in up to six out of 10 dementia sufferers, and he thinks that this can be bettered. 

Dementia, a catch-all term for symptoms that include loss of memory and cognitive function, afflicts about 800,0000 people in the UK, according to the Alzheimer's Society. The symptoms are progressive , robbing victims of memory , confidence, personality and, eventually, life as they slowly fade away. The condition costs the UK economy an estimated £23bn a year, says the Society. With the number of sufferers expected to treble worldwide from 36 million to 115 million by 2050, according to the World Health Organization, scientists are now turning to non-drug treatment. 

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‘Google movie’ nears release, company jittery

When The Internship, a comedy starring Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson, hits movie theaters on June 7, Google will be taking more than a little interest in how the film is received. 

In an unusual collaboration, the internet giant was closely involved with the film, a $58 million Fox production which features two middle-aged watch salesmen who are determined to get a job at Google. 

Amidst the comedic hijinks, the film indeed delivers a picture of a kind and gentle Google, a company that offers free food and exercise classes and is in every respect the place you'd like to work. Various Google products get plugs in the film, and co-founder Sergey Brin gets a cameo role. 

The favourable PR comes at an opportune moment for Google, whose unofficial motto is "Don't Be Evil" but which is often portrayed in far darker tones by privacy advocates, antitrust regulators and competitors such as Microsoft. The US Federal Trade Commission recently began exploring a new set of antitrust allegations against the company, sources told Reuters last week. 

"It's a good move. It's going to enhance and warm up Google's image perception," said former Coca Cola chief marketing officer Peter Sealey, who is an adjunct professor at Claremont Graduate University and worked as a consultant for Google seven years ago. 

The movie is a far cry from the Hollywood experience of rival Facebook. The social networking kingpin did not collaborate with The Social Network, which focused heavily on the conflicts between founder Mark Zuckerberg and his early partners and didn't make any of them look very good. 

"Movies like this are always a risk," said Howard Bragman, a Hollywood publicist and vice-chairman of the internet image-management firm Reputation.com. "They can be great for employee morale or they can drag it down." 

Early signs suggest Google's gamble may pay off. The website Marketingland.com said the film was "A fun movie, but also a beautiful Google commercial."

Inspiration from '60 Minutes'

Shawn Levy, director of The Internship, said Vaughn came up with the premise for the film after seeing a '60 Minutes' special that portrayed Google as one of the best places in the world to work. 

Vaughn arranged a lunch with Wilson and a group of Googlers at the company's Mountain View campus, and sought the company's participation. Google eventually agreed, and vice president of marketing Lorraine Twohill oversaw the project. 

The company did not make Brin or Twohill available for comment. CEO Larry Page said at a recent conference that Google agreed to collaborate partly because executives felt they didn't have much choice, but also to promote science and technology. 

"The reason why we got involved in that is that computer science has a marketing problem. We're the nerdy curmudgeons," Page said at the Google IO conference. 

Google insisted on creative control over how the film portrayed its products, Levy said. Such agreements are fairly common when auto makers and other companies strike deals for their products to appear in movies. 

The company was closely involved in assuring authenticity when production shifted to Georgia Tech, where the film crew built a reproduction of Google's campus, right down to the slides that employees use in the lobby of its buildings and the "nap pods" where they can rest during the day. 

Levy said the company's input was limited to technical issues rather than plot. 

Accurately or not, the film cheerfully plays into geek stereotypes. Overweight, slovenly nerds appear in many scenes. Interns are shown wearing hats with propeller blades that are painted in Google's signature red, blue and gold colors, modeled on the ones that Google employees and interns wear on their first day at work. 

Teams of interns compete against one another in a game based on Quidditch, an invention of the Harry Potter books that's a favourite with computer programmers. Predictably, many of the interns are less than adept at running or catching a ball. 

Google executives may have cringed at some scenes, such as one in which interns get drunk at a strip club. 

Google complained about the portrayal of the intern group's training officer, who the company thought was mean-spirited and decidedly not Googley, said Levy. By the film's conclusion, the trainer abruptly becomes warm and cuddly - an evolution that Levy says wasn't in the original script, but which he denies was done to appease Google. 

The producers let Google executives see an early cut of the film, three months ahead of time, and were prepared for "notes" - Hollywoodspeak for corrections - that Levy said never came. 

"It was a nerve-racking moment," he recalled. "The final movie was definitely different than the screenplay Google had read. I was pleased that their desire for a satisfying movie trumped any kind of preciousness about their company and culture." 

Google had little choice but to cooperate, said Ruben Igielko-Herrlich, whose Propaganda GEM product placement firm finds roles in movies for clients that include BMW, Nokia and Lacoste. 

"The movie would get made with or without a company's input," said Igielko-Herrlich. "You have to embrace the production if you hope to soften whatever bad things they might have in there."

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Wipro may set up network gear testing lab

The telecom department (DoT) is likely to ask Wipro to set up a state-of-the-art lab in India to test network gear used by mobile phone companies as it has failed to reach an agreement on the proposed funding model withTech Mahindra, which had earlier evinced an interest to set up such a lab, executives aware of the matter told ET. 

Senior executives of Wipro's telecom business unit recently made a presentation to Ram Narain, who heads DoT's security wing, regarding the company's telecom devices testing facility in Bangalore. Wipro officials are learnt to have informed the telecom department that the company tests network equipment and devices for global telecom clients and also explored ways to make the test lab venture "a viable business case". 

Wipro is learnt to have also communicated to DoT that the minimum cost of setting up such a test lab would be $50-$100 million ( 275- 550 crore). 

DoT wants to hasten the test lab venture, which has been delayed for three years. In fact, it was recently compelled to extend the deadline from April 1 to October 31, 2013, for mobile phone companies who have been mandated to only use telecom gear tested by an authorised lab in India. 

The project is a critical piece of DoT's mission to ensure India's telecom networks are free from potential bugs and malicious software that may be used remotely for spying. 

Wipro declined to reply to ET's email queries about the meeting with the telecom department or on whether it was looking to invest in a greenfield test lab or planned to refurbish its existing Bangalore facility. 

The discussions with Wipro come at a time when the telecom department has proposed a 100-crore allocation during the 12th Plan for establishing a Centre for Telecom Equipment Testing and Security Certification, according to documents reviewed by ET. 

Tech Mahindra, which had earlier been approached by DoT, for setting up the testing lab, is understood to have drawn a blank during its discussions with the governnment on a workable funding model.

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McAfee Transforms Endpoint Security Market with Industry’s First Chip-to-Application Coverage

McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection Suites Uniquely Deliver Hardware-Enhanced Security and Real-Time Security Management 

McAfee introduced two new suites: McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection – Enterprise, and McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection – Business. These suites are the first to link security from chip to OS to applications, protecting against new threat vectors and bringing critical visibility to risk management. The suites are the first to include McAfee Deep Defender, a rootkit protection based on hardware-enhanced security jointly developed by Intel and McAfee, dynamic whitelisting, risk intelligence, and real-time security management. By including mobile device management and support for Macs and Linux, McAfee suites help businesses of all sizes protect devices, data and applications. 

“McAfee is the only security vendor that can provide protection for the endpoint from before the operating system starts, all the way to the cloud,' said Michael Sentonas, Vice President & Chief Technology Officer, McAfee Asia Pacific. 'Unlike competitive endpoint solutions on the market, the Complete Endpoint Protection suites include hardware-enhanced protection uniquely delivered by McAfee and Intel in addition to next-generation security technologies, such as a risk advisor and advanced dynamic whitelisting that help organisations defend against the newest and stealthiest threats.' 

Security staff will benefit by the extended span of coverage managed within a single console. IT administrators can see efficient installation in minutes, not hours, to ease deployment. End users benefit from higher performance scanning that minimizes the potential overhead of effective protection. Competitive pricing meets the needs of budget-minded buyers while delivering significant value for customers with mission-critical security needs. Finally, new incentives and affordable pricing engage the channel to help businesses with different budgets to adopt these unique products for protection and performance. 

New Threats Demand a New Standard of Protection 

Modern threats start with an ever-increasing stream of phishing, malicious web pages, rootkits, and compromised devices. These initial contacts can turn into persistent, multi-stage, targeted attacks. The explosion of devices multiplies the chance of an attack affecting the mobile workforce, who can unknowingly endanger the business and systems when reconnecting to the corporate network. McAfee tackles these obstacles with its Complete Endpoint Protection suites that target every phase of stealthy malware and persistent attacks. 

Tested and Proven 

Dynamic and distributed organizations, especially those with stringent requirements to safeguard data as well as verify and report on regulatory compliance, can rest assured since the new McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection suites include some of the most highly-ranked security technology in the industry. In comparative testing done by AV-Test, McAfee software scored 100% in rootkit protection with McAfee Deep Defender. In the 2013 Corporate Endpoint Protection Group Test by NSS Labs, McAfee software received the highest score in defending against exploit and evasion attacks. Also, in a study conducted by West Coast Labs, McAfee software scored 100% in malware protection with the combination of McAfee Application Control, McAfee VirusScan® Enterprise, and McAfee Host Intrusion Prevention, three of the central products in the McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection—Enterprise suites. 

Below are just a few of the many capabilities offered by products included in the McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection suites: 

-- Real Time for McAfee ePO —uses a specialized design and best practice questions and actions within the workflow to help every administrator understand their security posture up to 1,000 times faster than any other means, and take action easily and immediately to manage potential risks. 

-- McAfee® Enterprise Mobility Management (McAfee EMM)—mobile device management and mobile data security are fully integrated with the McAfee® ePolicy Orchestrator® (McAfee ePO) platform environment. With ePO, customers can use a single pane of glass and policy environment to manage all endpoints, including the suites’ multi-platform package of smartphones, tablets, Macs, Windows, and Linux. To read the full EMM press release, also announced today, click here. 

-- McAfee Deep Defender—endpoints are protected from stealthy attacks through jointly developed Intel and McAfee hardware-enhanced security that goes beyond the operating system, protecting where traditional security tools can’t reach. 

-- McAfee Application Control for PCs—dynamic whitelisting for laptops and desktops reduces the chance of infection or disruption by containing the applications a user can run, including preventing malware from executing. The technology has been shown by West Coast Labs to offer 100% protection rates with very low system overhead. 

-- McAfee Risk Advisor—helps administrators instantly see which assets are at highest risk so they can protect the most essential assets first and accurately. 

“A few years ago, McAfee created the first security suites. We remain a market leader in what is estimated by IDC to be a $2B market in 20131. That’s more than half of all endpoint security sales,” said Candace Worley, senior vice president and general manager of endpoint security at McAfee. “Now, through performance and automation enhancements to our existing market-leading defenses and integration of distinctive and compelling new protections, McAfee suites again define a new level of endpoint protection—one that is firing on all cylinders: speed, security, simplicity, and value.” 

McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection suites incorporate ePolicy Orchestrator software, the world’s leading security management system, a central part of McAfee’s Security Connected management platform. This management system has been enhanced with Real Time for McAfee ePO software, which allows administrators to directly and instantly understand and manage endpoint health across all devices to keep critical assets and data secured and available. 

“With the McAfee ePO platform we receive heartbeat status in real time, while gaining visibility into important background information so that we can conduct comprehensive statistical analysis and reporting,” said Rick Snyder, Endpoint Security Supervisor at Boston Scientific. “As a medical device company dedicated to less-invasive medicine, we see the McAfee ePO platform as the most effective solution for managing our entire environment from a single point.” 

McAfee’s endpoint security provides complete protection technology for all devices, the data that runs through them, and the applications that run on them. Our comprehensive, tailored solutions reduce complexity to achieve multi-layer endpoint defense that won’t impact productivity and blends traditional smart malware scanning, dynamic whitelisting, behavioral day-zero intrusion prevention, unified management and integrated threat intelligence. McAfee uniquely provides a comprehensive approach to devices, protection technology and management. 

-- For the full list of integrated enhancements included in the new McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection suites please visit: http://www.mcafee.com/endpoint 

-- Video: Overview of Complete Endpoint Protection Suites: http://bcove.me/gz342igd 

-- Infographic: The Black and White of Endpoint Security:http://www.mcafee.com/img/infographics/mcafee-endpoint-security-infographic.jpg 

-- For specific partner incentives related to the new McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection suites please visit: http://securityalliance.mcafee.com 


Availability 

For more information on the McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection - Enterprise Suite and the McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection - Business Suite visit: http://www.mcafee.com/endpoint. 

1IDC, 'Worldwide Endpoint Security 2012–2016 Forecast and 2011 Vendor Shares,' doc #235930, July 2012 

About McAfee 

McAfee, a wholly owned subsidiary of Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC), empowers businesses, the public sector, and home users to safely experience the benefits of the Internet. The company delivers proactive and proven security solutions and services for systems, networks, and mobile devices around the world. With its Security Connected strategy, innovative approach to hardware-enhanced security, and unique Global Threat Intelligence network, McAfee is relentlessly focused on keeping its customers safe. http://www.mcafee.com 


Note: McAfee, VirusScan, ePolicy Orchestrator, and McAfee ePO are trademarks or registered trademarks of McAfee, Inc. in the United States and other countries. Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others. 

The information contained in this document is for informational purposes only and should not be deemed an offer by McAfee or create an obligation on McAfee. McAfee reserves the right to discontinue products at any time, add or subtract features or functionality, or modify its products, at its sole discretion, without notice and without incurring further obligations.

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