Anoop Pabby Appointed New CEO Of DHFL Pramerica Life Insurance

DHFL Pramerica Life Insurance Co. Ltd. (DPLI) has announced the appointment of Anoop Pabby as the new Managing Director & CEO of the Company.

               

Pabby has over 25 years of experience in the retail financial services sector including as Managing Director & CEO of Deutsche Postbank Home Finance Ltd. and President - Strategic Initiatives at Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Ltd. He has also held several senior management positions at Cholamandalam MS General Insurance Company Ltd. and Royal Sundaram Alliance Insurance Co. Ltd. He has vast operational and strategic experience in leading turn around challenges as well as successfully closing complex M&A transactions and subsequent integration exercises.

Commenting on his appointment, Pabby said, “I am excited about leading DHFL Pramerica. DPLI has been built on a strong foundation over the last 5 years and my intent is to take it from where it currently is, to a position where it is acknowledged as a strong and trusted player in the industry. Our focus will be on designing innovative products that best meet our customers’ needs, along with offering them high quality of advice and efficient service delivery. This I believe will help us become the preferred life insurance partner for our customers and distributors.”

Pabby took charge as DPLI’s CEO Officiating in February this year and under his leadership, the Company has accelerated its performance over the last two months. It has reported a significant growth in premium collection and has also improved its industry ranking.

Global Semicon Capital Equipment Spending To Raise 12.2 Percent In 2014: Gartner

Worldwide semiconductor capital equipment spending is projected to total $37.5 billion in 2014, an increase of 12.2 percent from 2013 spending of $33.5 billion, according to Gartner, Inc. Capital spending will increase 5.5 percent in 2014 as the industry begins to recover from the recent economic downturn and total spending will follow a generally increasing pattern in all sectors through 2018.

"While capital spending outperformed wafer fab equipment (WFE) spending in 2013, the reverse will hold for 2014," said Bob Johnson, research vice president at Gartner. "Total capital spending will grow by 5.5 percent, while WFE will increase 13 percent as manufacturers pull back on new fab construction and concentrate in ramping new capacity instead. Momentum from exceptionally strong fourth-quarter 2013 sales is carried forward into the first quarter, then is expected to bounce around a flat trend line through the remainder of 2014. In the longer-term profile, growth continues through 2015, dips slightly in 2016 and increases through 2018."

Logic spending remains the key driver of capital spending throughout the forecast period, but due to the anticipated softening of mobile markets it will grow less than memory. Memory will provide most of the growth in capital spending through 2018, with NAND Flash being the primary impetus.

Capital spending is highly concentrated among a handful of companies. The top three companies (Intel, TSMC and Samsung) continue to account for more than half of total spending. Spending by the top five semiconductor manufacturers exceeds 64 percent of total projected 2014 spending, with the top 10 accounting for 78 percent of the total.

Gartner predicts that 2014 semiconductor capital spending will increase 5.5 percent, followed by 10 percent growth in 2015. The next cyclical decline will be a slight drop of 3.3 percent in 2016, followed by a return to growth in 2017 and 2018.

Semiconductor inventories combined with overall market weakness depressed utilization rates at the end of 2013. Although demand from smartphones and media tablets is producing leading-edge demand for logic production, it is not enough to bring total utilization up to desired levels. Gartner expects utilization rates to climb upward again in 2014, as demand for chip production returns, and overall utilization rates will return to normal levels through 2014, providing continued impetus for capital investment.

Overall wafer fab manufacturing capacity utilization responded to increasing inventories at the end of 2013 by staying in the low-80 percent range at the end of 2013. In 2014, a return to more normal inventory levels will propel overall utilization of almost 90 percent by year end. Leading-edge utilization will remain in the mid-90 percent range through 2014, providing for a positive capital investment environment.

The capital spending forecast estimates total capital spending from all forms of semiconductor manufacturers, including foundries and back-end assembly and test services companies. This is based on the industry's requirements for new and upgraded facilities to meet the forecast demand for semiconductor production. Capital spending represents the total amount spent by the industry for equipment and new facilities.

The WFE forecast estimates market revenue based on future global sales of the equipment needed to produce the wafers on which semiconductor devices are fabricated. WFE demand is a function of the number of fabs in operation, capacity utilization, their size and their technology profile.

This research is produced by Gartner's Semiconductor Manufacturing program. This research program, which is part of the overall semiconductor research group, provides a comprehensive view of the entire semiconductor industry, from manufacturing to device and application market trends. More information on Gartner's semiconductor research can be found in the Gartner Semiconductor Manufacturing Focus Area at http://www.gartner.com/technology/core/products/research/markets/semiconductorManufacturing.jsp

Techies To Create Apps Resilient To Natural Disasters

Code for India, the  non-profit organization that inspires techies to volunteer their time and talent to the developing world, today announced a  first-of-its-kind parallel India-United States hackathon to be held May 9-10 at the Google campuses in Bangalore and in Mountain View. The event will gather engineers interested in creating technology-based applications that empower poor populations to address specific public service delivery problems.

Infosys Founder and Chairman N.R. Narayan Murthy and Google Senior Vice President Amit Singhal will provide keynote remarks.

The hackathon is co-sponsored by the World Bank Institute, the World Bank Group’s Open Finances team and Code For Resilience, a project of the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery and ICT Unit of the World Bank in partnership with Code for Japan. Other partners and supporters include Amazon, Cisco, Google, TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs), NASSCOM Foundation and AFI (Action for India).

Code For India is one of the fastest growing tech-driven non-profits with thousands of volunteering engineers from Google, Facebook, Linkedin, VMware, Oracle, Cisco, Visa, Infosys, and many more engaging to promote transparency, participation and efficiency in the way local people can voice their concern and find solutions,” said Karl Mehta, founder of Code for India and venture partner at Menlo Ventures. “The transformative power of technology will aid India -- and other developing countries facing similar problems --fight the failing public service infrastructure.”

A key theme of the event is making India more resilient to natural disasters like earthquakes, drought or cyclones. Teams of hackers that register their disaster resilience apps at www.CodeForResilience.org by May 11, 2014 will be eligible for a grand prize trip to London, England to pitch their idea to an audience of over 800 disaster risk management experts gathering for the Understanding Risk conference.

The hackathon also will seek to catalyze developers to consider the commercial value of open data in India, including social enterprise opportunities.  With the launch of India’s Open Government Data Platform, opportunities for developers to identify market gaps, create new data-driven products and services, and improve operational efficiency in existing organizations are steadily growing.   

The World Bank Institute and the World Bank Group’s Open Finances team have provided open data sets to Code for India for the event. These data sets include development and financial data as well as existing public sector and IFC projects, and will be a critical resource for participants in the hackathon.   

More details about how to register for the Code for India hackathon can be found at http://codeforindia.org/cfi-hackathon/

27’’ Screen For Professional & Commercial Markets

ViewSonic, a leading global provider of visual solution products, has successfully expanded its display series with the innovative 27-inches monitor size. This series includes products such as professional Quad HD display for graphic design, edge-to-edge frameless monitors, intuitive touch screens and audio-visual entertainment models. With this complete product range, ViewSonic provides customers with a broader choice of applications, whether it is in the professional graphics, business sector, interactive education, digital signage, or entertainment.

“The shipment for LCD monitor 27-inches is gradually growing and becomes a trend on the market as the users are getting used to big screens.” said Max Liu, Sales Director, ViewSonic Asia Pacific. “The demand from business sector and professional graphics for large-sized display is increased in recent years.  With the popularity of wireless networks and multimedia devices, more and more enterprises integrate communications into video conferencing equipment.  Large-screen video conferencing enable all the images clearer and break the limitation of screen size. Besides, as the global design industry is flourishing, the demand for professional graphic design platform is also growing dramatically. And color performance is of the utmost importance to professional users.”

For all the years, ViewSonic has been investing in R&D for large-sized displays.  Tailored made for graphic design, media creation, publishing and other color-critical applications, ViewSonic 27-inches VP2772 and VP2770 comes with 2560x1440 QHD resolution and wide viewing angles to deliver ultimate color and image quality. The VP2772 delivers outstanding levels of detail and clarity with 2560x1440 QHD resolutions. Accurately displaying 99 percent of the wider Adobe RGB color space, the VP2772 features an advanced 12-bit color engine that delivers 1.07 billion colors and creates stunning images for professional graphic design, media editing, or even gaming entertainment for true-to-life colors. 

Getting in front of the trend for large-screen displays for audio-video enjoyment, ViewSonic introduces the sexy slim VX2770Sml-LED/VX2770Smh-LED/VX2703mh-LED for convenient connectivity to smartphones, tablets, and other mobile devices. The VX2770Smh-LED/VX2703mh-LED comes with full HD1080p high resolutions and HDMI interface to connect to high-definition multimedia devices and brings perfect visual for playing games, watching movie clips and more. The speakers powered by SRS Premium Sound delivers a rich multimedia experience. 

As to the sleek frameless VX2770Sml-LED, it comes with the industry-leading SuperClear Image Enhancement Technology with wide viewing angles, brilliant pixel quality of the 1920x1080 Full HD panel, 30,000,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, and MHL 2.0 connection. The MHL and HDMI connections share the same ports, providing the VX2770Sml-LED flawless streaming from a variety of MHL and HDMI-equipped media devices, such as smartphones and tablets without turning on a PC/Laptop. ViewSonic provide the best choice for all featured monitors to deliver the functionality and services that define the new era of digital entertainment.

Intuit QuickBooks Partners Daredevils for IPL 2014

Intuit Inc. has announced its partnership with the Delhi Daredevils cricket team for the IPL season 2014. This is Intuit’s first major sports endorsement in the country and the company will soon be rolling out a nation wide campaign for small business and accountant cricket fans.

Intuit is the No.1 cloud business and financial management software for small businesses and accountants, with more than 1.5 million users worldwide as of February 2014. Intuit QuickBooks, the company’s flagship product was launched in India in 2012, providing users with easy access to their finances through an internet-connected computer or data plan-enabled smartphone.

Speaking on the partnership Nikhil Arora, Vice President and Managing Director, Intuit India said, “ Intuit is thrilled to be partnering with Delhi Daredevils one of the leading teams in IPL. At Intuit the culture of entrepreneurship is core to what we do, small teams are tasked to solve for key customer pain points while delighting them every step of the way. Through this association we celebrate awesome teams at Intuit and Delhi Daredevils.”

 This partnership also comes at a special time for us we have just crossed 100,000 signups for Intuit QuickBooks India. As a token of our gratitude we’ll be hosting a fully paid trip for the first paid small business and the first paid accountant user of Intuit QuickBooks to watch a live Delhi Daredevils match. We’ll also be soon announcing the launch of a nationwide campaign which will give small businesses and accountants in India an opportunity to interact with the Delhi Daredevils players and watch some exciting matches live.” added Nikhil Arora.

Intuit is happy to announce that Exotel a Bangalore based startup that offers virtual business phone system services to small businesses is the first paid small business user and Balakrishna & Co a chartered accountant firm based in Bangalore is the first paid accountant user of Intuit QuickBooks. These two users will get a unique opportunity to watch a live match in Delhi along with the Intuit team. Also noteworthy is Exotel was one of the winning start-ups that received the highest funding of INR 2.5 crores  through the Intuit Super Angles initiative in 2012 and Pawan Sharma of Balakrishnan & Co was the winner of the Intuit QuickBooks Excellence Awards 2013 under the Cloud Savvy Accountant of the Year  category.

 We at Delhi Daredevils are proud to associate with Intuit India. Intuit is a financial solutions company for small businesses and accountants. Intuit has innovation and collaboration as its core values and we at Daredevils believe those two components are key for our team’s success also. We at Delhi Daredevils believe this innovation and partnership will provide the opportunity to share new skills with the Intuit employees as well as with our players. said Hemant Dua, CEO, Delhi Daredevils.

GMR Sports, the Delhi Daredevils franchise owners are backed by the GMR Group. The Delhi daredevils have a strong squad line-up for the season captained by the globally recognized Kevin Pietersen, who is credited with the ‘switch hit’ and has a blistering strike rate of 141 in T20 matches.

Intuit QuickBooks lets small businesses easily create localised invoices, pay bills and track expenses. The easy-to-use, cloud-based service needs no professional accounting training and allows the small business owners to take data-driven business decisions on the move.

SHV Energy Simplifies Distribution Using SAP

SAP AG has announced that SHV Energy Pvt. Ltd,( SEPL), one of the leading distributor and marketer of LPG (liquid petroleum gas) in India, has chosen Transport Management (TM) and Supply Network Planning (SNP) solutions from SAP. The comprehensive software from SAP will help SEPL – adapt processes that optimize revenue and control operational costs associated with its transportation management by making the process more flexible and dynamic.

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SEPL is engaged in the business of importing and distribution of LPG to domestic, commercial and industrial customers. In India, SEPL markets its products and services under the brand name ‘SUPER Gas’. 

As the global marketplace grows, transportation management becomes more complex and expensive. In their efforts to grow revenues and cut transportation costs —SEPL aimed to gain better control over their supply chains and minimize coordination inefficiencies. Implemented in partnership with Hexaware, the deployment of SAP’s portfolio of customized solutions can assist SEPL to lower inventory and logistics costs, improve processes and increase visibility across its national operations.

APAC PC Market Down 11% Y-o-Y In Q1 2014: IDC

IDC's preliminary results show that the Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan) PC market declined 8% sequentially and 11% year-on-year in 2014 Q1 to reach 23.8 million units, coming in marginally lower than IDC's initial forecasts. Elections in some of the bigger markets contributed to the region’s overall decline.

In India, an ongoing large education project was postponed due to the upcoming elections, shaving off about half a million units from the commercial PC segment. In Thailand, political unrest continued to have an adverse impact on the economy, while in Indonesia, government funds were diverted in the run-up to the elections, resulting in lower commercial spending in PCs there this quarter.

“However, as these markets stabilize after the elections, IDC expects commercial activity to resume in the second half as a result of pent-up demand," says Handoko Andi, Research Manager for Client Devices at IDC Asia/Pacific.

“On the consumer side, ongoing distractions from smartphones and tablets as well as cautious channel intake impacted most markets in the region, especially in South East Asia.”

Lenovo retained the top spot despite a sequential decline in many markets in the region including China, where the vendor, due to Chinese New Year festivities, did fewer commercial shipments than usual.

Dell retained the second spot and continued to be ahead of HP for a second consecutive quarter, as the latter was impacted in key markets like China and India.

ASUS replaced Acer at the fourth spot. China contributed the most to ASUS’ share gain in the region as the vendor had a healthy channel inventory and did well in the consumer space with attractive entry-level product lines.