The gaming industry, worth $15 billion to $20 billion globally, is seen as one of the major markets for Indian firms looking to diversify their businesses. To try and exploit this opportunity, Bangalore-based Dhruva Interactive, a gaming solutions' vendor has entered into an exclusive global tie-up with Microsoft Games Studios to work on its latest releases. Dhruva has also forayed into the mobile gaming space with a tie-up with the world's largest handset maker Nokia. Dhruva is expected to work on a game that is due for release some time in August 2004. The company was selected ahead of ten other companies from around the world for this contract. Dhruva works with several other large studios including Atari (formerly Infogames) and Code masters. In the last three years, Dhruva has contributed to the development of several best-selling games. They include Mission: Impossible, Mission: Impossible 2, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Geoff Grammond's Grand Prix 4, and TOCA Pro Race Driver. Dhruva has, meanwhile, embarked on the development of a multi-player pool game for the domestic market. Mr Rao said this game would be available on a utility-like pay-per-use model, rather than off-the-shelf on a CD.

Courtesy: The Economic Times, November 28, 2003

Back to Index

The Indian Navy will induct its smallest but fastest combatant -- an indigenously built 60 ton extra fast attack craft - into its fleet on Thursday. The XFAC-T-83, built in collaboration with Israel's IAI Ramta, is designed for day night coastal surveillance and reconnaissance, beaching, troop pickups and landings and search and rescue operations. Articulated service drive propulsion and surface piercing propellers give the craft high maneouverability in shallow waters. It comes fitted with MK-20 naval stabilised gun systems with a 20 mm canon on the forward. The Goa Shipyard says it is purpose designed to carry state-of-the-art electro-optic detection system and armaments that would enable the XFAC to accurately destroy small high-speed crafts and engage in light shore combat.

Courtesy: The Asian Age, November 28, 2003

Back to Index

The Defence Materials Stores, Research and Development Establishment (DMSRDE), Kanpur, is on the verge of becoming the first organisation in the world to develop a device using the carbon nano-technology. The nature of the device is being kept secret for security reasons. But the scientists giving final touches to the device with a team of Pennsylvania State University, US, are likely to file a patent soon. Director Dr G.N. Mathur said, "It's a matter of two or three months and we will be the first to have developed a device using the carbon nano-technology worldwide." The DMSRDE recently claimed to have developed a coiled carbon nano-tube.

Courtesy: Hindustan Times, November 27, 2003

Back to Index

Technology is in the process of being harnessed for agriculture. Beginning next year, sugar co-operatives in the state are expected to know details about the availability of sugarcane, their raw material, well before the crushing season begins. The Maharashtra Remote Sensing Applications Centre, Nagpur, which takes satellite pictures for various departments, will take district-wise images of sugarcane from next year. Currently, it is in the process of standardising norms for this. This will help the factory plan production since it will know how much cane will be locally available and how much it will have to source from outside. Meanwhile, the MRSAC is working on standardising the co-efficients and co-relating the basis on which data will be gathered. Once standardised, the project will move out of the pilot project stage to a full-fledged roll out. The MRSAC is also mapping cotton and rabi sorghum which it does district wise in the regions the crops grow on a pilot basis.

Courtesy: The Economic Times, November 27, 2003

Back to Index

In a breakthrough, scientists at the M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation have created a new rice variety, which could be grown in saline conditions. The development assumes significance in the context of assessments by international agencies such as the United Nations Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change that because of global warming, sea water level could rise and inundate low lying areas along coastal areas. Speaking to reporters here today, the Chairman of the Foundation, M.S. Swaminathan, said the new variety had been found to be highly effective in preliminary studies at the greenhouse level. It was now ready for field trial. The Review Committee on Genetic Manipulation under the Department of Biotechnology recently gave its approval for a limited field trial and it would begin soon. The new rice variety had been created by incorporating genes isolated from some plant species obtained from a mangrove in Tamil Nadu into an existing rice strain. The Foundation was also working on creating saline tolerant varieties of pulses and mustard. Some progress had been made on these crops, but unlike in the case of rice, tests with regards to these crops were still at the greenhouse level, he said. The Foundation had launched a programme to develop crops tolerant to saline conditions so that India would be ready with alternatives when the predictions of climate change experts came true. This was essential particularly since India had a long coast and much of agricultural activity took place in the coastal areas.

Courtesy: The Hindu, November 27, 2003

Back to Index

The United States will engage India as an outsourcing base for research in hydrogen through a newly-created multilateral platform. The forum, International Partnership on Hydrogen Economy, was launched last week in Washington, with the US leading a group of 14 nations to a joint protocol, intended to make hydrogen a commercially-viable future fuel. India's cost-effective research initiatives, as compared to the US or European Union and their intellectual capital standards, is being made central to New Delhi's role in the partnership. The escalating cost of research and the gestation period, spanning over years for its commercial viability to transpire, the developed nations think outsourcing could reap better benefits for them. "Why should India shy away from the fact that its science and technology infrastructure is good?" Mr Pant said.

Courtesy: The Pioneer, November 26, 2003

Back to Index

New Delhi: Nageswara SV Rao, a graduate from the Regional Engineering College, Warangal, is heading a US government-funded project to design a high-speed computer network capable of carrying massive amounts of science data.He is with the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), which has been awarded $4.5 million to design the high-speed network. The prototype system, funded by the Department of Energy's Office of Science, will be called Science Ultra Net. The network is expected to operate at 10 gigabits to 40 gigabits, which is about 200,000 to 800,000 times faster than the fastest dial-up connection of 56,000 bits per second. "

Courtesy: www.economictimes.com, November 26, 2003

Back to Index

New Delhi, November 25: India will be an active partner in the European Union Galileo Project. The Italian ambassador Benedetto Amari told reporters that three agreements, including one on a 300 million euro commitment by New Delhi for its participation in EU's Galileo civilian satellite project, would be signed during the two day Indo EU summit. Galileo is the first satellite positioning and navigation system specifically designed for civil purposes. It was jointly developed by European Union and European Space Agency, and will become operational in 2008.

Courtesy: The Asian Age, November 26, 2003

Back to Index

Bangalore: What do you do when you receive digital pictures from friends or family? Either you delete them after viewing or save them in a folder. Time passes by, more and more images add up, and then to find a particular one from the clutter becomes one heck of a laborious task.

With Adobe's new photoshop Album Starter version, which can be downloaded free from the site, managing and sending these soft pictures is a breeze. If that's something you knew already, then what you may not know is that this whole new downloadable product has been entirely developed by an eight-member team from Abobe India. (Would you say that Indians are the world's best software pros?)

Says Naresh Gupta, MD, Adobe India, "We worked on this for about a year and the key challenge was to reduce the size of the Photo Album version 2.0 from 140 Mb to 5 Mb. Reducing size is always a challenge and we are very proud this was done completely here. In the first 15 days, we have had about 15,000 downloads.

Adobe India's 250-member team had earlier developed entire products like Acrobat Reader for handhelds, Pagemaker, FrameMaker and Acrobat Reader for the Unix platform. Over twenty patent applications have been filed in the past three years from this development center.

Courtesy: The Economic Times, November 24, 2003

Back to Index

The Defence Research and Development Establishment (DRDE), Gwalior, which has developed a new Leptospirosis antigen detection kit billed as first of its kind in the world, has signed an MoU with the Kerala-based Cochin Diagnostics for technology transfer.

The technology, cheaper and faster than other detection methods, had been developed a year ago, and has undergone clinical trials in the past few months, Dr H.V. Batra, scientist and head of the DRDE's microbiology department said.

It will be commercially available in a few months time, he added.

Some evaluations were undertaken in Kerala at the Kozhikode Medical College and the Cochin Diagnostics, a sister concern of Endocrinology and Immunology Lab, he said.

The test kit is very specific to leptospiral antigen. The patient's blood or urine has to be applied on the stick and within few minutes the results can be had. The test is for specific pathogenic strains which are known to produce disease in human beings.

Courtesy: Hindustan Times, November 24, 2003

Back to Index

An Indian American soil specialist has given dirt its due -- turning his knowledge of geology into a multimillion-dollar business!

Allahabad-born Dhirendra Swarup "Sax" Saxena is president and CEO of ASC Geosciences, headquartered in Lakeland, Florida.

Saxena is a geotechnical engineer, a soil specialist who helps developers determine the makeup of the ground they intend to build on and how to engineer a solid foundation.

Saxena, 63, has invested a lifetime in the science of soils. ASC Geosciences employs 80 people and has branch offices in six states.

A graduate of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kanpur, he migrated to the United States via Canada. He went on to study at Technical University of Nova Scotia, Canada, when he got a scholarship.

Saxena, who uses the nickname Sax, has left much of the operation to his two sons, Anu and Jay, leaving him time to concentrate on especially challenging projects that require his expertise in soil mechanics. The firm also specialises in the broader field of environmental engineering, which incorporates other elements such as water and air.

Saxena's reputation has grown so far and wide that architects working for the University of South Florida employed him in the university's search for a new Lakeland campus.

His firm is currently working on a project at Lakeland Regional Medical Centre, which is adding a 300-bed wing.

The weight of the nine-storey tower rests on Saxena's reputation, which merits praise from some of his peers.

Other Saxena projects in recent years include the Turkey Point Nuclear Power Plant near Homestead, the World Marriott Resort at Lake Buena Vista and more than a dozen airport improvement jobs throughout the state, including Lakeland, Bartow and Winter Haven.

Courtesy: www.hindustantimes.com, November 23, 2003

Back to Index

New York, November 21: The recipients of the inaugural Global Indus Technovators Awards announced by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), include some of the smartest men and women of Indian origin in the world.

The 21 recipients of this year's awards represent 20 institutions and businesses in the US and India. They are a group of innovators - graduate students and young professors share honours with grass-roots development workers and successful entrepreneurs.

The winners for innovations in Biotechnology, Healthcare, and Medicine are Ram Sasisekharan, Chaitan Khosla, Ramesh Hariharan, Amar Sawhney, Tejal Desai, Samir Mitragotri and Pawan Sinha. Desai was among the 10 innovative scientists named by Popular Science magazine.

Sinha, a B. Tech. from IIT, New Delhi and PhD from MIT, has contributed towards understanding how the brain interprets and encodes visual information to perform complex tasks. Sinha's ''Project Prakash'' has been developed with a focus on the large population of blind children in India. The Information Technology awards went to: Vanu Bose, son of the creator of Bose Speakers, Rajiv Ramaswami, Dev Mukherjee, who maintained the website of this year's US Open, Ramesh Raskar and Zeeshan Syed.

The award winners in the area of Nanotechnology, Materials and Devices are Surya Mallapragda, Vivek Subramanian, Rashid Bashir, Rahul Sarpeshkar, Sundar Manoharan and Islamshah Amlani.

For work in energy related innovation and grassroots development, the winners are Anil Kumar, Madhusoodanan CG and Viswanadham Nagabhatla. Manindra Agrawal, Nitin Saxena and Neeraj Kayal of IIT Kanpur, got an honourable mention for their work in cracking a mathematical problem with relevance to computers and internet security. The recipients will be honoured at MIT next week.

Courtesy: The Indian Express, November 22, 2003

Back to Index

High technology cooperation in an era of changed equations. Both India and the United States now agree that the stage is set for resolving contentious issues like trade in "dual use" goods and technologies and strategic trade, both realising the need to view the present relationship sans barriers of the past.

The second Indo-US High Technology Cooperation Group (HTCG) met in the Capital on Thursday to discuss ways of promoting expansion of trade in strategic goods and technologies. Foreign Secretary Kanwal Sibal headed the Indian side while US Under Secretary of State for Commerce Kenneth Juster led the American delegation.

"We are now well into the process of resolving these issues, consistent with our respective laws, national security and international obligations, but entirely in the spirit of the new relationship between our two countries," the Foreign Secretary said.

Courtesy: The Pioneer, November 21, 2003

Back to Index

As software gets more complex, it needs to be tested even more vigorously. More so because a bug could mean the loss of huge amounts of money in lost time to market. Is fully automatic testing possible? Unfortunately, that's still a dream, says Dr Alexander Petrenko, an expert on model-based testing, who was in India recently. Still, systematic testing is possible and at the moment it's as close to the dream as it can get. This requires that computers should already be equipped with some data, they should be able to execute it and give the report.

According to Petrenko, the two problems so far have been: the complexity of information, and the lack of standards of correctness. "Even verification can have errors. To automatically correct errors, the tools need more information, which is possible only by manual testing today. Human beings can spot errors based on experience, advice, knowledge etc."

What comes closest to automatic testing is model based testing (MBT), where this knowledge and criteria is used to provide formal information to the computer. As input, it should have understandable digital documentation and well-defined behaviour. "While designers invent algorithms, testers define the criteria. For each project, specifications have to be laid down - and these are reusable," says Petrenka.

Arithnet Technical Services (ATS India) a subsidiary ATS Denmark, has entered into a technical collaboration with the Institute For Systems Programming of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, for development of several software testing related products. According to Bala Swamy, general manager, business development, ATS India, "We have been conducting seminars and training programmes to create awareness about this methodology. The response from Indian companies has been very good."

MBT is poised become the preferred approach of testing because it's quicker and more accurate with results. As of now, it is used in telecommunication hardware and software areas. A consortium called The Formal Techniques Industry Association (ForTIA) has been formed to promote and create industry awareness of the value of MBT. For mission critical applications, MBT has become imperative. NASA and the Europe Space Agency have already implemented model based testing.

MBT will take the drudgery out of the job for testers employed at testing labs, and promises not to take away jobs. For instance, if software specifications and the ultimate design don't match, the MBT product will point it out even before the code is written. That may sound like magic, but Petrenka says "there's no magic. No amount of automation can take away the need for human presence," says Petrenka.

Courtesy: The Economic Times, November 20, 2003

Back to Index

New Delhi, November 18: Two of the world's largest IT companies specialising in storage solutions today separately announced their strategies for the growing Indian market.

Hitachi Data Systems said it had allocated $500 million worldwide for increasing its presence. A substantial part will go to India, China and Brazil described as "super focus countries.'' EMC, another world leader in information storage, said it had earmarked $100 million for India specific operations over the next five years. Both companies also declared their plans to gain market leadership in the country.

Speaking to newspersons, the Hitachi India Country Manager, P. P. Subramanian, expected the Government to be the biggest buyer of storage systems some of which cost Rs. 4 crores. "Some tenders are so huge that it is amazing,'' he observed, adding that banking, finance, securities and insurance, IT and telecom would be the other key areas. Hitachi has appointed Ingram Micro as the main distributor and has identified 60 resellers for tier II and tier III cities and towns all over the country.

The turnover is expected to increase by 40 per cent to $20 million next year.

Besides gaining market leadership, EMC will be investing in its Bangalore-based software development centre set up in January this year. "We are looking at an aggressive recruitment drive, improve facilities and bring demonstration equipment, said senior official, Gary Jackson. EMC has extended its global partnership with Dell and Datacraft to India and has also tied up with Indian integrators such as Wipro, HCL and Tata Elxsi. Both companies will be addressing other specialised areas besides the traditional storage market.

Courtesy: The Hindu, November 19, 2003

Back to Index

Chennai, November 18: Rane Brake Linings has been awarded the prestigious Deming Prize by the Japanese Union of Scientists and Engineers for its excellent Total Quality Management (TQM) practices. Rane Brake Linings is among the few like TVS Motor Company and Sundaram Clayton, which have won this award.

Addressing a press conference here today, L. Lakshman, Chairman, Rane Group of companies, said the award called for extreme rigour and discipline on the part of the TQM practitioner. Rane, he said, felt the need to launch an initiative with clear milestones, so that the whole organisation could work towards world-class standards.

With the receipt of the Deming award, Mr. Lakshman expected "the overseas customers to take Rane Brake Linings much more seriously". Even before landing the Deming award, the Rane group company had set itself an export target of 15 per cent of its turnover, to be hit by 2007. "We are working towards it diligently," the Chairman said. He hoped the turnover of the company would have increased to Rs.180 crores by then.

Courtesy: The Hindu, November 19, 2003

Back to Index

Mumbai: Outsourcing isn't just making waves in India, it seems the flavour in US universities too. For Patrick T Harker, dean of Wharton School, outsourcing appears to be the biggest fad. But he adds in the same breath that India is so "hot" because of this fad on US campuses, that almost every faculty member wants to come to India. "We carried out a research on outsourcing and India, and the demand among business, students and academia was so great that we are doing a programme on it," he says.

"I try to dissuade the faculty from following fads as it does not lead to long-term credibility. I remember when I was starting out, Japanese manufacturing was a rage and everyone was making a pilgrimage to Japan to learn about it. The same seems to be happening in outsourcing these days," he says.

He said that India is hot and everyone wants to understand the country, its companies and economy. In conversation with ET, Harker also spoke about ethics in management and the challenges of globalising a B-school. (Can there be a reverse brain drain from the US to India?)

Courtesy: The Economic Times, November 19, 2003

Back to Index

Washington: A supercomputer rigged up from off-the-shelf components by an Indian researcher at VirginiaTech has been ranked third in the TOP500 list of the world's fastest machines released this weekend.

Srinidhi Varadarajan 's' 1100-Apple Mac contraption cranked out more than 10 Teraflops (or trillion calculations per second) to place third behind the top-ranked Japanese Earth Simulator (35.86 TFlops) and the second-placed U.S. Department of Energy's Los Alamos National Laboratory ASCI Q (13.88 TFlops), the gurus in the business announced at the annual supercomputing mela in Phoenix, Arizona.

The VirginiaTech achievement, reported in these columns last month, has been attracting wide attention at the jamboree. What was remarkable, the conference noted, was that Srinidhi and his team was able to build the system in less than four months for only $5.2 million -- less than one tenth the average cost of comparable systems. Such a breakthrough could change the economics of supercomputing.

Courtesy: The Times of India, November 18, 2003

Back to Index

India's electronic hardware and computer software services registered a growth of 35 per cent in dollar terms at $6.5 billion during the first half (Aril - September) period of the current fiscal. However, in rupee terms, the increase is 31.06 per cent during the six-month period at Rs 30,623 crore, D.K. Sareen, executive director, Electronics and Computer Software Export Promotion Council (ESC) said after realising the half-yearly estimates of software and electronics hardware.

The growth in export of computer software and services was 38 per cent in dollar terms during H1, while that of electronics hardware was 13.29 per cent, he said. "Going by the trend, we are confident that export target set for 2003-04 at $13.77 billion is in the achievable realm", he said.

Courtesy: The Indian Express, November 18, 2003

Back to Index

Swedish white goods AB Electrolux has identified India as a sourcing base for components used in its outdoor division which makes garden and forestry equipment like lawn mowers and lawn tractors. The company currently sources $9 billion worth of parts, of which 30 per cent will be sourced from the Asia Pacific, including India, a statement said. A 20-member team from the company's operations in Sweden, North America and Asia-Pacific will be in India for the national vendor selection and sourcing meet being organised here later this month. This July the company had set up a national purchasing office in Gurgaon to source raw materials, components and finished goods for its global manufacturing operations.

Courtesy: The Indian Express, November 18, 2003

Back to Index

India and the European Union will lay the foundation of a new strategic partnership with an agreement to join hands for a new global navigation satellite system, Galileo. The partnership will bring India, the EU and China under one umbrella at the India-EU summit on November 29.

A joint declaration that will chart the future of Indo-EU relations will be the highlight of the summit. Galileo will be the first global positioning service under civilian control, aiming to break the monopoly of the American Global Positioning System.

"We have a convergence of views with India and China and this system will lead to multi-polarism in the world," remarked a senior European Diplomat.

While India is expected to contribute $350 million, China has already pledged $230 million for the project, expected to cost about $3.2 billion. "We see Galileo as an important ingredient for a multi-polar world," said a senior official. Although there is a huge cost involved, New Delhi is viewing the larger picture. "We were keen to be on board because global positioning technology can have many advantages for India, especially in transport and disaster management," said a senior official. Experts say the EU was keen to engage India because of its expertise in space and IT.

Courtesy: Hindustan Times, November 17, 2003

Back to Index

Kolkata, November 15: The problem with West Bengal, according to Mr Manab Mukherjee, state information & technology minister, is its perception among potential investors. To improve that perception and subsequently increase investment particularly in IT, the state government launched "Advantage Bengal", its dedicated IT promotional cell today.

The cell will focus on investment promotion and strengthening the IT infrastructure in the state. Officers from Webel, the state government's agency promoting software and electronics industry, will be personally responsible for ensuring ease of setting up operations for IT investors. Dedicated escorts will also be provided to companies investing more than one crore. The cell is housed in the government's new office buildings on Camac Street, being fully operational from 17 November.

Mr Somnath Chatterjee, MP said, "People should know the correct information regarding facilities available in the state. The efforts being put in by the state government must also be highlighted."

Mr Mukherjee said, "In the last six months we have directly communicated with 70 companies which are interested in investing for IT and ITES and within two months the figure will reach 400." Some of the potential investors are Reliance, Tata AIG, Satyam, GE Capital, WNS and Sitel, he said. "We are asking investors not to rely on perception and come and evaluate the city in reality." He also announced the building of two towers to cope with the demand for work area from IT companies.

Courtesy: The Statesman, November 16, 2003

Back to Index

Reuters, the global information company, on Wednesday announced the launch of Reuters Dealing 3000 Forwards Matching service, the premier fully electronic forward broking system, in India. This follows the earlier launch of Reuters Spot Matching service and introduction of the Indian Rupee to its electronic trading services. These moves support Reuter's aims to be the leading emerging markets' electronic broker. Mr Mitya New, managing director, Reuters South Asia, said, "Twenty-eight major banks in India are now using Reuters Dealing Forwards Matching System.

Courtesy: The Asian Age, November 13, 2003

Back to Index

India's first osteoporosis management programme, Wishbone, launched in Mumbai by Aventis Pharma on Tuesday, might be an answer to managing the calcium deficiency disease, which affects one out of every two women over the age of 45. The osteoporosis-related pains and aches, accepted as a part of ageing by most women, are a serious threat and can have a permanent affect. Aventis' commercial operations director Dr Sandeep Bhattacharya informed that Wishbone would go beyond medical administration and take a holistic approach towards the disease's management. "Wishbone is the only such programme to have been taken up in India, offering fast and sustained protection against the disease. It has been taken up because most women resort to pain killers for temporary relief of the osteoporotic pain. "Besides drug therapy, Wishbone will also suggest alternates for calcium, and provide regular tests to mark the improvement. Programme affiliates will also be provided with educational material, help of support groups, on-call dieticians, on-call physiotherapists and even counsellors, to suggest modifications to residences of patients, so that they don't get hurt by ill-placed furniture," he said. He added that Wishbone will also provide insurance cover for fractures and related-accidents.

Courtesy: The Asian Age, November 12, 2003

Back to Index

Virginia Tech's scientists led by 30-year-old Indian American Assistant Professor Dr Srinidhi Varadarajan have amazed the computing industry by putting together the world's third-fastest supercomputer in a record time of three months, and at record low cost of $5.2 million, using off-the-shelf components. Most other machines of its class cost upward of $40 million and take years to assemble. Japan's Earth Simulator, the number one supercomputer, is said to have cost at least $350 million. ''This is arguably the cheapest supercomputer and is definitely the most powerful home-built supercomputer,'' adds its architect. The supercomputer made from 1,100 dual-processor power Mac G5s, nicknamed by some as 'Big Mac', ranks third among the world's 500 fastest supercomputers, many of which handle with ease one trillion calculations per second. Theoretically, Big Mac could handle a potential 17 teraflops, or 17 trillion operations per second. That still falls short of the No. 1 machine, Japan's Earth Simulator, whose 5,000-plus processors allow it do 35.8 teraflops, with the potential of another five teraflops. This is followed by two other supercomputers, at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, both dedicated to weapons design and running at between 7 and 9 teraflops, according to a widely-accepted ratings list maintained by Big Mac. ''The newly completed supercomputer operates at 9.55 trillion operations a second, or 9.55 teraflops,'' says Varadarajan, but he says it can go higher.

Courtesy: The Indian Express, November 10, 2003

Back to Index

Researchers at the HP Labs India here have developed a prototype of "script form", a low-cost device which enables people to write by hand and send mails in Indian languages at an affordable cost. The note-book sized machine, designed to be rugged for use in the country, adopts visual compression technique and intelligent character recognition to send handwritten mails. The Bangalore-based one-and-half year old HP Labs India, one of the seven of global IT major HP in the world, works on developing affordable solutions for countries like India for the business units of HP. "This (device) is extremely useful for a non-computer savvy user," Borgaonkar said.

Courtesy: The Pioneer, November 10, 2003

Back to Index

Information Technology, Bollywood and now biotech - it seems like Frankfurt is eyeing India in a big way. If it succeeds in its plans, firms like Shantha Biotech could soon be setting up office in Germany. Frankfurter Innovationszentrum Biotechnologie (FIB), the organisation spear-heading this drive, is already talking to Shantha Biotech, whose MD Varaprasad Reddy, may be in Frankfurt by end-November. "Many Indian companies have been selling their products to European companies, but we see a potential for more long-term co-operation between Indian biotech companies and Germany," Mr Garbe said. FIB hopes to be a facilitator in this process. Apart from providing contacts with huge German pharmaceutical companies, FIB is setting up a huge office and laboratory facilities in Frankfurt (expected to be completed by April next year), which could be rented out by Indian biotech companies. It also plans to set up a 30m euros venture capital fund which will co-invest in research and development projects that Indian biotech firms undertake in collaboration with a German body.

Courtesy: The Economic Times, November 10, 2003

Back to Index

BrahMos, the supersonic cruise missile jointly developed by India and Russia, was launched for the fifth time from the Interim-Test-Range at Chandipur-on-Sea, 13 km from Balasore, Orissa, today. The flight was successful and met all the mission objectives. The missile took off shortly after noon - at 12.02 p.m. and landed 290 km away in the Bay of Bengal. It flew at a speed of 2.8 times that of sound. "The importance of today's mission was that the BrahMos was launched from a mobile complex, which has the indigenously-built TATRA truck as the base." All the parameters were captured by tracking stations on the ground and ships located at various points on the sea. Today's launch was to prove that the BrahMos was suitable for launching attacks on targets located both on land and at sea. The missile enjoys a maneuverable trajectory. It took off vertically from the mobile launch complex today, took off in no time to an altitude of 14 km, changed its course and plunged to a very low altitude when it was closer to the target on the sea. Then it homed in on the target, which was 290 km from the mobile launch complex on the beachfront. The complex consists of an indigenously built multi-axle truck called TATRA, which has a cross-country capability. In other words, TATRA is the base around which the mobile complex has been built and TATRA can carry the BrahMos to different types of terrain. It has its own fire-control system for the missile. The BrahMos is capable of carrying warheads weighing between 200 kg and 300 kg. It could cruise at a speed of 3 Mach at an altitude of 15 km. It can be launched from a variety of platforms - fixed and mobile platforms on land, surface ships, submarines and aircraft. It has multi-target capability.

Courtesy: The Hindu, November 10, 2003

Back to Index

It might seem unlikely to find a connection between an Army jawan serving at high altitudes in the Himalayas and a Mumbai yuppie partying at sea level. What's even unlikelier is the form the connection takes.: Leh Berry , is a bright yellow-orange drink that has a faintly spicy taste. And not just any drink, but one which claims, extravagantly, to contain incredible amounts of vitamins, nutrients and anti-oxidants, and to have the properties of reducing cholesterol and blood pressure, increasing resistance against cancer and coronary diseases, and even helping HIV positive patients delay the onset of the disease. The Chinese are well aware of its value, and according to Varun Kumar managing director of Ladakh Foods Limited, the organisation that manufactures the Leh Berry drink, there are more than 1,700 companies in China devoted to selling its products. Ladakh Foods became the only Indian counterpart thanks to its owner, B.K. Mittal, who was in the business of supplying pre-fabricated shelters to the army in Ladakh. He met one of the officers in charge of the DRDO laboratory in Leh, who told him about the berry and of a process the DRDO had developed for processing it into useable pulp. Mittal became the only official licensee for the technology in India.

Courtesy: The Economic Times, November 10, 2003

Back to Index

Engineers at the Indian Development Centre of the U.S.-based digital and analogue chip-maker, Texas Instruments (TI), are perfecting a key ingredient for a radical, single-chip solution for mobile phones. When it is unveiled, within a year, the chip is expected to be the first ever product where the analogue, digital and radio frequency building blocks are integrated on the same matchbox-sized slab of silicon. As a result, new-generation cellular mobile phones based on the chip were expected to be smaller, cheaper and less power-hungry, said Gilles Delfassy, senior vice-president for world-wide wireless terminals business at the Dallas headquarters of TI. However, TI's Bangalore-based development team has succeeded in realising the "digital radio processing" functions on the same type of silicon as the other circuit and memory functions - in effect removing the last technical hurdle to creating a one-chip mobile phone. Indian engineers at TI as well as its development partners like Wipro and Sasken have also contributed to another key mobile phone building block, OMAP, an in-house buzzword for technology that creates `smart phones' to carry both voice and multimedia data. Further down the road, TI is working to launch a cell-phone that incorporates navigation and Position-sensing information, based on the satellite-backed Global Positioning System (GPS).

Courtesy: The Hindu, November 09, 2003

Back to Index

By 2007, $42 billion of pharmaceutical drugs are to go off patent in the U.S. alone. Globally, including Japan and the EU, the estimates touch $50 billion. Led by Ranbaxy and Dr. Reddy's Laboratories, a handful of Indian companies are sinking money into hardcore medicinal chemistry research. It includes Sun Pharma, Torrent, Wockhardt, Orchid, Ajanta, Hickal and Biocon, say industry sources. Can they do it? One head of a research facility here, said, "Indian pharmaceutical industry always ignored medicinal chemistry. On that, we can't match the MNCs in the West. What we have is superior-to-world-class process knowledge, in synthesis". Over 50 per cent of Ranbaxy's revenues come from the U.S., on the back of cheaper generics. Last year it released a generic version of ceftin, an anti-infective made by GSK. DRL did it in 2001 with Prozac, Eli Lilly's anti-depressant. This year, Ranbaxy's challenge on lipitor, Pfizer's anti-cholesterol molecule made ripples. In August, after an analysts' report that the challenge wasn't to be taken lightly, Pfizer's valuation plunged 3 per cent. Contract manufacturing is another way to earn sure revenues. Biocon for example, makes statins, anti-cholesterol drugs, in bulk for export. If Indian scientists make the transition from synthesis to thinking originally about medicine and biology and back it up with research successes, the MNCs might themselves think of doing research here, said one scientist.

Courtesy: The Hindu, November 09, 2003

Back to Index

Worlds' biggest environment problem is set to produce the world's most-sought commodity. Results of 11 experiments conducted between July 1-10 at Indian Oil Corporation's R&D centre at Faridabad show that the plastic-to-petrol process invented by Umesh and Alka Zadgaonkar yields 40-60 per cent liquid petroleum from a kilo of waste plastic. The plastic can include polyvinyl chlorides, carrybags, broken buckets or PET bottles. The outcome is significant for India, which produces 7,000 tonnes of waste plastic every day. The Zadgaonkar invention was first reported in The Sunday Express in June 2003. Alka is the head of the department of applied chemistry at Nagpur's Raisoni College of Engineering and holds two Indian patents. The Zadgaonkars had refused to sell the idea to the foreign companies and had said they trusted the IOC. Their secret formula: Shredded plastic waste-free of oxygen-is heated with coal and a secret chemical. The products include 80 per cent fuel range liquids, 5 per cent coke and 15 per cent LPG range gases. However, it may take some time before the process yields petrol and diesel for commercial use. The state-run Oil Industry Development Board will be asked to fund a Rs 7.86-crore demonstration plant at Nagpur, where the Zadgaonkars live. ''In the current scenario, plastic waste disposal is a cost centre. The development of a useful technology can lead to setting up of a commercial plant that can convert waste plastic management into a profit centre,'' justifies IOC.

Courtesy: The Indian Express, November 06, 2003

Back to Index

Pfizer, the multi-national pharmaceutical giant, has identified its Indian clinical research set-up as one of the prime global hubs for its new drug development activity. The US giant which boasts of the largest R&D facility globally, has already pumped in around $12m in its Indian subsidiary, Pfizer India, and more dollars are likely to come in from its global headquarters in Connecticut, US. Consequently, the Indian subsidiary is gearing up its clinical research team. Currently the team has more than 100 scientists and the company has plans to expand its human resource base in phases. Pfizer India has started to figure high on the priorities of Pfizer, simply because of the three phases of clinical research. Pfizer has found that its Indian operations have a competitive advantage against the other global hubs in the study execution phase. Moreover, therapeutic diversity of the country, large patient pool, excellent computing infrastructure and low cost of medical care are also some of the stimulating reasons that have gone in favour of India by the Viagra makers. Much in line with the global headquarter's R&D policy, Pfizer India has also initiated the setting up of a one-stop training academy in clinical research (Academy for Clinical Excellence) in partnership with an academic pharmacy college and industry.

Courtesy: The Economic Times, November 06, 2003