Garmin India Brings Out Tacx Range of Indoor Cycling Trainers

Bringing more thrill for the cycling enthusiasts in India, Garmin India today launched Tacx’s smart range of indoor cycling trainers and rollers including Flux 2 Smart, Flux S Smart, Antares and Galaxia roller trainers. The newly launched trainers will create ‘a one-of-a-kind’ indoor cycling experience and be an ideal indoor training companion for cyclists.

The tacx range of indoor cycling trainers provide very realistic ride feel and accurate track of your performance. These smart bike trainers are everything you need for an enjoyable and efficient indoor training session equipped with advanced features making it an ideal training companion. The new range of trainers surely climb the leaderboard in the cycling world.

Ecstatic with the launch of revolutionary smart indoor cycling trainers, Mr. Ali Rizvi, Director of Garmin India said, “Garmin has always aligned itself with fitness fanatics and made sure we support them with the best of products and cutting edge technology to enhance and promote healthy and active lifestyles. Wth the launch of Tacx’s new smart range of indoor cycling trainers, we are sure that these products will definitely be a bench mark for cycling enthusiasts across India. These trainers are equipped with advanced and more powerful features which will make them an ideal training companion and help improve the performance of cyclists in all aspects.”

Flux 2 Smart- a powerful and realistic smart direct drive trainer

The Flux 2 Smart is equipped with a bigger and stronger resistance unit and a heavier flywheel resulting in a wider simulation range, better ride feel and a more accurate power measurement. With a bigger resistance unit, allowing for a wider simulation range, it is able to realistically simulate inclines up to 16% gradient. Providing a reliable, accurate and consistent power measurement FLUX 2 Smart measures your power accurately within 2.5%. The FLUX 2 Smart is designed to bring vibrations and noise levels to the absolute minimum resulting in a very silent flywheel equipped bike trainer. The well-balanced design and large footprint of the FLUX 2 Smart trainer ensures maximum stability, even during the most explosive sprints, up to 2,000 watts.

Flux S Smart – A Smart Trainer that checks all the boxes

The FLUX S Smart is a reliable, accurate and quiet direct drive trainer that features a heavy flywheel for a realistic ride feel. Measuring data accurately within 3%, the FLUX S Smart is designed to provide power, speed and cadence measurements to help riders track their performance and progress. To train for those big climbs, the FLUX S Smart realistically simulates inclines up to a 10% gradient and powers sprints up to 1,500 watts.

Get more from your ride with the Tacx Training App

Designed to make a ride feel as realistic as possible, cyclists can use the Tacx software or take on the virtual worlds of Zwift to experience the road feel feature, which lets the trainer simulate the feeling of riding on different surfaces, like cobblestone and gravel.

The Tacx Training app allows riders to stream a large collection of high-quality films1 and virtually experience their favorite courses, from famous classics to the steep hills of the Alps, live opponents, 3D map rides, structured workouts and more. By downloading films ahead of time using the desktop version, riders can avoid interruptions due to buffering for the best virtual cycling experience possible. Users can also create or upload GPS data from an Edge® cycling computer, or by linking a Strava account and the app will create a 3D map ride, meaning there are no boundaries on where cyclists can train.

While riding, cyclists can view their speed, power, cadence and heart rate2 right on the screen. This data can then be accessed afterwards to help users analyze performance and help them train better. Additionally, cyclists can race against friends who are currently riding the same course, or even select previous rides and use them as a virtual training partner3.

While using the desktop or tablet version of the Tacx Training app, riders can structure workouts based on target slope, power or FTP and sync these plans between all devices and even share them with friends. The Tacx Training app also syncs seamlessly with Strava, making it easy for cyclists to export and share training data.

Pricing and Availability

The Tacx Flux 2 Smart and Flux S Smart are available at the price of Rs. 79,990 and Rs. 69,990 respectively.  The Antares and Galaxia roller trainers are available at the price of  Rs. 17,990 and Rs. 23,990 respectively. 

Vedantu Assists the Government of Karnataka to Train Doctors Online on COVID-19

Train Doctors

* Karnataka Ministry of Health reinvents its training and communication channel

* Goes online using Vedantu’s W.A.V.E platform to train the doctors to battle COVID 19

Vedantu, a pioneer in LIVE online learning platform in India, is assisting the Ministry of Health (Govt of Karnataka) to impart COVID  training and communication to doctors across  the State. 

To assist the Karnataka State Government & Doctors in the ongoing battle against Covid-19, Vedantu has volunteered to offer its WAVE platform. This initiative is helping the ministry to reach out to 250+ doctors across Karnataka and train them LIVE using Vedantu’s platform to improve their understanding on the following - 

* How to diagnose a Covid-19 patient

* What precautions are to be taken while treating a Covid-19 patient

* Which are the nearest hospitals that are available for testing

* How to attend to numerous queries of individuals about Covid-19 

* Daily preventive measures to be taken to prevent the Covid-19 

* This training is led by senior officials - Dr. Ravi Kumar, Senior Regional Director at Ministry of Health & FW, Govt of India and Dr Mahamood Shariff, Research officer, NVBDCP, Directorate of H&FW, Govt of Karnataka.

Speaking on the partnership, Dr. PC Jaffer (IAS), Secretary to Govt (Expenditure), Finance Department, Karnataka Govt Secretariat, said, “In the current times, taking the risk of face to face training was out of question for us. It was imperative to find a solution that mirrors, but also has the same impact as the face to face training. Hence, we decided to choose Vedantu’s platform, given its rich and interactive platform capabilities, to train and converse online with our COVID warriors across the state. We are glad as our training sessions are happening smoothly now and we continue our fight against COVID.

“It is Vedantu’s great honour to support doctors who are in the front line of the fight against the pandemic. We are happy to extend our support to the Government of Karnataka through our W.A.V.E platform to deliver their training sessions to doctors LIVE and Online " said Shivani Suri, Chief Marketing Officer, Vedantu.

Will TCS reduce the salary of campus recruits?

IT services company TCS (Tata Consultancy Services) has announced that it would revise the compensation package of campus recruits. Under the changed structure, TCS trainees will no longer be paid the variable component of the compensation - which works out at Rs. 5,000 per month or 19-20 percent of the total annual pay packet of Rs. 3.1 lakh - offered to them during their in-campus recruitment.

Ajoy Mukherjee, Global Head, Human Resources, TCS said, "As part of a compensation restructuring exercise, freshers joining the company this quarter onwards will not be eligible for variable pay during the training period. Restructuring trainees' salaries is being done from the point of view of productivity so that they get accustomed to the fact that variable pay depends on performance."

Last year, the company had made campus offers to 24,885 students. Of this, the company is expecting around 19,000-20,000 students to join. Going by this number, the company is expected to save around Rs. 10 crore per month by altering the variable part of salary for trainees. For six months, the savings would be Rs. 60 crore. Mukherjee said, "The company would be able to take on board all campus recruits in the current fiscal itself."

However, other IT giants like Infosys and Wipro are not fiddling with the compensation package of trainees. Infosys decides on the variables based on a test conducted after 18 weeks of initial training. Mohandas Pai, HR head, Infosys said, "Those who score four out of five are entitled to variables." Wipro claims to pay the variable part to its employees from the beginning of the training period.

Now, it would be interesting to see, what steps these companies take for campus recruitment in next fiscal. TCS is yet to decide on how these campus offers would be made in the next fiscal.

Agencies

Have IT cos skipped campus recruitment for 2009-10?

With Nasscom, the software industry's apex body advising its members not to go to campuses for recruitment, the placements at engineering colleges has dried up. However, although 2008-09 was a difficult year for training and placement officers (TPO) at engineering colleges, 2009-10 could be the most critical year for campus placements, reports Economic Times.

JN Pitambare, Dean of Sinhagad Institute says, "Normally, 75-80 percent of the placements used to take place by mid-August. However, this year I will be happy if I am able to place even 10-15 percent of our students by December."

SV Dravid, TPO, DY Patil College of Engineering at Akurdi, near Pune said, "Last year, we had placed 150 students by this time. This year, not a single student has been placed. I hope the situation improves by December." Normally the big software companies finish recruitment by mid-August, placing around 75 percent of the college students.The core sector companies used to come from August, but this year they are non-committal.

Companies have been telling TPOs that their placement requirements are yet to be firmed up since things are not planned yet or they do not know how many projects they will get. "Most of the core companies are in a dilemma. They have promised to come for placements by December," said TPO Federation President Professor Shital Rawandale. Not only are there fewer jobs on offer for 2009-10 but the companies are adopting various techniques to defer the joining dates of candidates recruited last year or even to reject them.

Top colleges like the College of Engineering Pune (COEP) are also facing problems. "Of the 576 students placed last year, only 150 have joined till now. For the rest of them, joining has been deferred from July to December," said Assistant TPO, COEP, SA Meshram.

Some of the selected candidates are being asked to take more tests. With the recession, singing of bonds has also returned. "Some small and medium-sized software companies now want the candidates whom they had already selected to enter into two-year bonds," said a TPO.

Economic Times

Avail IT education tourism in India from IBM

IBM today announced the launch of an education programme that it said would enable IT professionals and students to come to India and receive IBM certified training here.

To avail of this offer, an individual needs to register for a course from the IBM Power and IBM System Storage Curriculum, the company said in a statement.

All visa formalities, tickets and accommodation requirements are arranged and facilitated by an IBM training partner, it said.

The IT education tourism programme, slated to start next month, is a unique initiative where IBM has partnered with Stratom IT Solutions Pvt. Ltd., India to introduce IT education tourism as a package for global students and IT professionals.

IBM plans to target around 300 participants in India for a minimum of 30 days this year.

As part of the programme,IBM would offer a comprehensive portfolio of technical training and education services for systems designed for individuals, companies and public organisations to acquire, maintain, and optimise their IT skills, the statement added.

Agencies