Highlights of IT Technology Major Infosys Offices in India

· In fiscal 2017, three of Infosys’ buildings in Pune, Mysuru and Thiruvananthapuram were awarded the LEED India Platinum rating

· The Pune and Hyderabad STPI campuses were awarded the LEED EB platinum certification. The Hinjewadi campus in Pune was awarded the Platinum Certification under LEED EB O&M v.3 of the 2009 rating system of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), making it the largest campus in the world to have achieved this distinction.

·  Infosys now has 17 LEED platinum-rated buildings, two LEED EB platinum-rated campuses and four buildings with GRIHA 5-star rating making it to the total of 11.1 million sq. ft. of buildings with the highest level of green certification

·  In fiscal 2017, the per capita electricity consumption reduced by 2.88% taking the total per capita electricity consumption down by 51% compared to fiscal 2008. The company achieved its goal of ‘reducing per capita electricity consumption by 50% in fiscal 2018’ by fiscal 2017, one year ahead of the committed year

· Currently, over 20 million sq. ft. covering 91 buildings is monitored through the Central Command Center in Bengaluru and Mysuru.

·  During fiscal 2017, 118.90 million units of electricity was from renewable sources, which is about 44.6% of overall electricity requirements of their campuses in India

· Infosys is at the forefront when it comes to exploring the possibilities of solar energy, 17,572 MWh of electricity was generated from solar PV systems at Infosys’ campuses.  The company has installed 15.2 MW rooftop solar plants and ground -mount installations across our campuses in India.

·  Efforts in energy efficiency and the use of RE has helped the company reduce their carbon footprint by about 70% across their scope 1 and 2 emissions. As a part of their carbon neutrality commitment, Infosys is implementing carbon offset projects with the goal of offsetting our scope 3 emissions

· During the year, the company started three new carbon offset projects – a rural electrification project and two projects which involved distribution of high efficiency biomass cook stoves for households in rural areas. Together, they will generate approximately 50% of our carbon offset requirement in 2017-18.

·Infosys is working to achieve zero waste to landfill and 100% food waste treatment within their campuses. Currently 63% of the waste generated is treated in biogas plants.

·  The company has installed 9.25 TPD installed capacity of Biogas plants across our Mysuru, Bengaluru, Thiruvananthapuram, Hyderabad, Pune, Mangaluru and Bhubaneshwar campuses. In addition to the biogas plants, Infosys also has 3.1 TPD installed capacity of composting plants in our Mysuru, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Jaipur, Thiruvananthapuram and Mangaluru campuses

·  Infosys’ water conservation strategy encompasses action to reduce recycle and reuse. In fiscal 2017, Infosys reduced per capita water consumption by 8.33% over the last year.  The company’s data-driven approach and water efficient fixtures have decreased the  per capita water consumption by 46% since 2008

·  Infosys’ harvest rainwater in all their campuses and have constructed 270 deep-injection wells and 25 lakes for recharging groundwater with the harvested rainwater. The company’s goal is to harvest 100% roof top rainwater from all their buildings and use it for consumption after treatment

· The innovative smart water metering program enables Infosys to monitor all water consumption online on a continuous basis and eliminate water wastage significantly.

PwC India Launches GST Compliance Solution to Assist Companies in India

PwC India has launched a customised software solution that will help companies in India in end-to-end automation of Goods and Services Tax (GST) compliance. This software will help automate month-end tax compliances and reporting for companies with options for interfacing with multiple enterprise resource planning (ERP) environments.

The software solution has been developed by PwC, a leader in Tax technology and has been used very successfully and extensively in Europe and other parts of the world.

Elaborating on the solution, Pratik Jain, Partner and Leader Indirect Tax, PwC India, said: “Under GST, most companies will move towards a managed tax compliance model, wherein all the filings would be done centrally. Today’s tax tools may be inadequate in catering to the needs of tomorrow’stechnology-driven GST compliance requirements and this would be a big challenge for corporates. There was a need for a solution to help our clients navigate these issues, especially in the Indian context.

We are getting very encouraging feedback from clients on our tool. We are in the process of deploying it with many large companies”, he added.

Effective 1 July, GST will entail electronic filing of multiple monthly state-wise returns, transaction-level data upload, numerous reconciliations (revenue reconciliation, reconciliation with vendor details, upload on GST Network) and complex tax computation.

PwC’s GST Compliance Solution has several key benefits:

·  Comprehensive compliance coverage

·  Seamless interface with GSTN for information upload/download

·  100+ data validation checks to ensure factual as well as legal precision

·  Extensive reporting/business intelligence modules providing relevant insights to the

concerned stakeholders

·  Intuitive dashboards for different user profiles

·  Continuous monitoring of compliances for timely completion of related activities

·  Secured infrastructure

·  Access control mechanism to ensure users see only what is necessary

·  Audit trail for both internal as well as external stakeholders

·  Integration with PwC’s GST App (GST with PwC)

All this and more is backed by a strong team of PwC India’s indirect tax and technology professionals who will provide implementation and ongoing support for the compliance solution.

Sula Wines Appoints Sula Nick Pringle as Chief Operating Officer

Sula is pleased to announce the appointment of Nick Pringle as the company’s Chief Operating Officer (COO), effective immediately. In his capacity as the COO of India’s leading wine company and fastest growing alcobev company, Nick will work closely with Rajeev Samant, Founder and CEO, Sula Vineyards, while overlooking the company’s strategy and operations.

Rajeev Samant commented, “I am delighted that Nick Pringle is joining Sula as COO. Nick brings a wealth of experience from his previous roles at Accolade Wines and AB InBev and is the right person to help steer Sula Vineyards, one of Asia’s fastest growing wine and alcobev companies, to even greater heights!”

Nick has over 20 years of experience in the wine and spirits industry. He has worked extensively in international markets to create a significant category across emerging markets for wine and spirits consumption and he strongly believes that numerous opportunities lie in the Indian alcobev industry.

Nick Pringle stated, “India is a very young and dynamic market. It has immense potential to grow in the wine sector and the enthusiasm, with great people that Sula possesses is infectious! Despite barriers, Sula entered the wine industry here in India and carved a niche for itself as both, the best and leading wine company. Sula recognized the changing industry trends and launched Sula Selections and Artisan Spirits to diversify itself, becoming a genuine front runner in the industry. I am proud to be associated with a brand that has turned things around for the industry altogether and look forward to creating more milestones for us to achieve together.”

Prior to this, Nick worked at AB InBev for 12 years. He later joined Constellation to assume a variety of roles and eventually joined Accolade Wines to strengthen Hardys globally in 2011.

At Accolade Wines, Nick was in charge of emerging markets and responsible for travel retail relationships across regions spanning Africa, the Middle East, South and Central America, Asia Sub-Continent and Southern Europe. Key markets for growth from his regions were Central and South America, Africa and India, which became a passion for him, while in India an increasing number of consumers were experimenting and progressing from beer and spirits to the wine category, during this time he was working in partnership with Sula. In 2016, Nick was appointed as Head of Accolade Wines for China, a significantly growing market for the company, before being given this amazing opportunity with Sula.

Before working in the wine and spirits industry, Nick was a professional cricketer and played for his home county - Somerset, from 1986 to 1991. Now he loves to see his son, Mathew play cricket and enjoys playing with him too. A thorough sportsman, he also used to play rugby and he loves watching football. Nick is a fitness enthusiast and also takes keen interest in music and travelling.

2nd edition of the IoT India Congress 2017 Opens Entries for IoT Start-Up Awards and the IoT Thought Leadership Awards

Call for entries for the two prestigious awards at the second edition of the IoT India Congress, 2017 opens today. The two signature awards, IoT Start-up Award and Thought Leadership Award aims to recognize excellence in the IoT ecosystem.

The IoT Start-up Awards will identify start-ups with breakthrough innovations in IoT and a winning strategy to monetize their product/services and propagate the evolving movement of IoT in India. The Thought Leadership Award is uniquely designed to honour individuals with over 1-5 years of experience of leading an IoT project that is transformational in nature or worked towards building and sustaining awareness on IoT. Members of the jury for the awards include Dr Richard Soley, Executive Director, Industrial Internet Consortium, Arun Jain, Director, Sales & Marketing Texas Instruments India Pvt Ltd, Sanjeev Malhotra, CEO – IOT Centre of Excellence Nasscom, Shradha Sharma, Founder & CEO YourStory Media and Vivek Sharma, Managing Director STMicroelectronics Pvt. Ltd.

The IoT India Congress 2017, a platform-of-platforms for empowering business outcomes using the Internet of Things in India, will be a two-day mega event to be held on 14-15 September 2017 at Park Plaza, Bangalore. The IoT India Congress is conceptualized and designed by the members of the Institution of Engineering and Technology’s (The IET) IoT Panel – an independent and neutral visionary think-tank led by select industry leaders. The panel envisions laying a solid foundation in the next step of adoption of IoT by supporting policy makers, and bringing together the practitioners and IoT enablers to work together and create a platform that is industry efficient as well as robust.

HH Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, Founder, Art of Living will be the Chief Guest for the IoT Thought Leadership Awards on September 14, 2017. Submissions for nominations for both the awards close on July 30, 2017.

Nomination for the eligible IoT enthusiasts / company can be made by submitting the details in the form provided on the website – http://www.iotindiacongress.com/awards/

In this context, Dr. Rishi Bhatnagar, Chairman of the IET India IoT Panel said, “The IoT India Congress is a neutral platform that extends beyond the borders of organisations for people to come together and create the roadmap for IoT adoption. We wish to replicate the success seen at the Congress last year by identifying and recognizing exciting work done in the field of IoT by start-ups and individuals through these awards. These are exciting times and we look forward to seeing some great nominations.”

NI Showcases Smart Platforms and Tools for the Indian Aerospace & Defence Industry

NI, the provider of systems that enable engineers and scientists to solve the world’s greatest engineering challenges, hosted the India Defence and Aerospace Symposium 2017 in association with Society of Indian Aerospace Technologies and Industries (SIATI). The symposium which witnessed a footfall of 500, was attended by engineers, scientists, managers and professionals in the aviation, space and defence industries and focused on navigation, RADAR, Electronics Warfare, Military Communications, Satellites as well as test rig construction and HIL.

At the event, NI showcased how the design, development and test challenges of the Indian Aerospace & Defence (A&D) Industry can be integrated by smart platforms & tools powered by ready-made technology.The diverse set of industry experts present, shared their ideas on revolution in simulation and test solutions, challenges of RADAR design & test, advanced techniques for phase aligned RF signal generation & acquisition and data acquisition systems for A&D applications.

Commenting on the importance of system design for the Aerospace and Defence industry, Tarun Gupta, Business Development Manager, National Instruments India, said, “India is an established technology hub for engineering services and product development for the global defence market. At National Instruments, it is our endeavor to provide the best-in-class testing solutions for enabling this industry rapidly develop and deploy systems. The India Defence and Aerospace Symposium 2017 gives us a platform to showcase the advanced technologies that can help build modern & reliable automated test systems for the aerospace & defence segments.”

At the event, NI showcased:

·         Smarter approach to system design in Aerospace & Defence

·         Prototyping & Testing modern Electronic Warfare (EW) Systems and RADARs

·         Gigahertz Record & Playback Systems & Using Software Defined Radios (SDRs) for prototyping communications systems for A&D industry

·         Validating and Testing of Avionic Systems & Advanced Techniques for Phase Aligned signal generation and acquisition

·         Architecting Flexible HIL Test Systems for Embedded Controllers & Data Acquisition Systems for A&D Industry

The annual National Instruments Defence & Aerospace event aims to bring together and share domain knowledge and best practices from partners in the Indian Aerospace and Defence industry.

TCS iON Partners in the Digital Transformation of Andhra University

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), a leading global IT services, consulting and business solutions organization today announced a definitive agreement with Andhra University to help transform the Andhra University School of Distance Education (AUSDE) into a digital university enabling easy access to a larger number of students wanting to avail courses offered by the prestigious institute.

As part of the agreement, AUSDE will deploy the TCS iON Platform to help bring online all key services offered by the University School including student admissions, academic course content, examination management as well as regular administrative services. With the services of AUSDE going online, students will be able to enroll onto and access courses of their choice, pay fees, get their examination hall tickets and also see their examination results, all of these, at a click of a button.

The TCS iON Platform provides a comprehensive end-to-end solution that enables a university to digitize all functions and services offered by it. The TCS iON Platform supports in building smarter university campuses with solutions that simplify learning, teaching and support processes to drive educational excellence. The iON Platform manages the Admission to Alumni life cycle of the student processes by providing a digital interface to the student.  Digitization of services offered by the university helps it reach out to a larger section of students at a lower cost without compromising on the quality of education imparted.  The AUSDE is offering Certificate, Diploma, Under Graduation, Post-Graduation and professional courses to over 60,000 students currently and the digitization of the university will help provide a superior experience to all the stakeholders.

Commenting on the agreement, V. Ramaswamy, Global Head, TCS iON said, “In today’s context, digitalization of any university is imperative to sustain excellence. We are extremely proud to be the partner of choice for Andhra University in their transformation journey.  With AUSDE going digital using the TCS iON Platform, every stakeholder of the university will be able to engage with ease and be confident of getting the highest level of services on-time without any deficiency.  Streamlining of the university’s services will also ensure that the university can focus more on driving academic excellence amongst students without being distracted by regular administrative functions.”

Speaking about the agreement, Vice Chancellor Prof G Nageswara Rao said, “Considering the need of upgrading technology, online and web-based operations, we had set up a panel in November last year to decide and advise the university on the necessary steps to be taken. The proposal received from TCS to help the university go digital for assisting in general enquiries, admissions, pre-examination and post-examination activities was seen to be the right one in helping AUSDE transform. We are delighted to enter into an agreement with TCS and be a part of the Digital India movement. Our plan ahead is to expand this initiative to the regular stream of education in addition to the distance education program.”

Samsung Galaxy Tab S3 Specs has Snapdragon 820, 4G LTE Support Unveiled at Rs 47,990 in India

Samsung is all set to launch its flagship Android-based tablet, aka the Galaxy Tab S3, in India on Tuesday. The company is hosting a press conference in Bengaluru where it will launch the Galaxy Tab S2 successor.

The Galaxy Tab S3 was first unveiled at MWC2017 in Barcelona. It costs $599.99 in the US which is approximately Rs 39,000. It is successor to the Galaxy Tab S2 which was launched in India back in 2015 at Rs 39,400.

The Galaxy Tab S3 sports a 9.7-inch AMOLED QXGA screen with a resolution of 1536x2048 pixels. The back of the device is built of glass with metal framing. There is also a fingerprint sensor placed within the home button at the front.  The tablet comes with a 6,000mAh battery with fast charging.

The Galaxy Tab S3 is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor clocked at 2.15 GHz coupled with Adreno 530 GPU and 4GB RAM. The tablet comes with 32GB internal storage which is expandable up to 256GB via microSD.

The Galaxy Tab S3 supports Stylus Pen input. In fact, this is the first time that a Samsung tablet will ship with an S Pen in the box. The tablet also supports a keyboard cover accessory on the lines of Apple's iPad Pro.

On the photography front, the Tab S3 packs in a 5MP front camera and a 13 MP rear camera with flash. The Tab S3 also boasts of quad core speakers placed at the top and bottom of the device. These speakers have been tuned by AKG.