TiE's New Level Playing Field For Startups

 Delhi chapter of TiE; a global network of entrepreneurs and professionals, established to inspire start-ups to innovate and foster the essence of entrepreneurship, recently announced the 14^th edition of TiEcon Delhi. The two day mega event, TiEcon Delhi 2014, will be held in the Taj Palace, New Delhi on October 17-18, 2014. 

As the parade of new technologies and scientific breakthroughs is relentless and is unfolding on many fronts, TiEcon will serve as a platform focusing on disruptive technologies impacting businesses by bringing them new customers or force them to defend their existing bases or inspire them to invent new strategies. The event will bring about opportunities to connect, collaborate and succeed at one mega gathering of accomplished entrepreneurs, thought leaders and industry captains. The participants will get an opportunity to experience special networking zones at TiEcon Delhi, creating those synergies enabling an organization to stand out, rise above the noise and remain top of the mind.  

The two day conference will include several exciting sub-themes such as Internet of Things: Find where you and your products stand as everything gets connected and how to leverage the technologies of tomorrow. Design Thinking: How design-specific cognitive activities that designers apply have come to be the mainstream for any business and activity. SMAC: How Social Mobile Analytics and Cloud are changing the way we do business. Travel/Lifetstyle/Design: What are the trends in these mainstream businesses? Social Entrepreneurship: How BoP has to move with the mainstream and how it makes for the irrefutable foundation of our society.

The TiEcon Delhi 2014 will see participation from over more than 1500 delegates including India’s leading business leaders, innovators and investors. TiEcon Delhi 2014 takes pride in being a content and value driven conference, with each session having curated content and focused speakers. Some of the Ashish Dhawan - Central Square Foundation, Ravi Adusumalli - SAIF Partners, Ashish Goel - Urban Ladder, Suchi Mukherjee -  LimeRoad, Peyush Bansal – Lenskart, Mithun Sacheti – Caratlane, Patu Keswani - Lemon Tree Hotels, Isaac George –Wipro, Amit Manga - J.Perrot Enterprises, Siddharth Sharma - Foundations PRand A.Muruganantham - Inventor, Jayashree Industries.   

Avishkara Launched To Accelerate Science & Innovation in Karnataka

 Intel India in association with the Department of Public Instruction, Govt. of Karnataka^* and Agastya Foundation today launched “Avishkara - Karnataka Student Innovation Program” at the Visvesvaraya Industrial and Technological Museum^*, Bangalore. Aimed at fostering the next generation of innovators by accelerating science & innovation in Karnataka, the Program will promote ‘STEM’ (Science Technology Engineering and Math) initiatives in the State, and drive greater collaboration to promote research and innovation. 

Present at the event was S R Patil, Minister for IT, BT and ST, Government of Karnataka along with Mohammed Mohsin, IAS, Commissioner for Public Instruction, Department of Public Instruction, Govt. of Karnataka, and Jitendra Chaddah, Director, Strategic Relations and Operations, Intel India. Also present were KG Kumar, Director, Visvesvaraya Industrial and Technological Museum, Bangalore, and Ramji Raghavan, Founder, Agastya Foundation.

S R Patil inaugurated the ‘Intel  Galileo Corner’, a hub to provide hands-on experience and inculcate a Do It Yourself (DIY) culture amongst students while popularizing design and innovation at the Visvesvaraya Industrial and Technological Museum, Bangalore. He also flagged off of the iMobile Program, an initiative of Agastya Foundation supported by Intel to provide science, innovation and digital literacy skills to the rural community at their doorstep. Several students from Karnataka, who were IRIS National Fair Winners and have represented India at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, the world's largest international pre-college science competition, were also felicitated at the event. 

On the occasion, Jitendra Chaddah, Director, Strategic Relations and Operations, Intel India said, “Intel believes that young minds are the key to taking on big ideas, and a strong STEM foundation is crucial for their success. We are happy to work with the Government of Karnataka, Agastya Foundation and the Visvesvaraya Industrial and Technological Museum, Bangalore on a wide array of STEM-centred initiatives and   resources, designed to inspire innovative spirit among students and result in better learning and great discovery.”

S R Patil, Honorable Minister for IT, BT and ST, Govt. of Karnataka said, “Education is the key to the country’s economic future. We need to encourage students to pursue education that focuses on exploration, discovery & innovation.  We need talent to compete globally, and we will need even more in the future. It is not a matter of choice- For India to remain the global innovation leader; we must make the most of all of the potential talent this country has to offer. We are fortunate to have technology giant like Intel being pioneers to provide such opportunity to the educators and students in the state of Karnataka. The Innovation program launched in the state is laudable and will inspire the young generation in the right direction.” 

“This is a decade of innovation and today’s workforce involves acquisition of multiple skills.  Therefore education has become vital and what better way to encourage teachers & students participate in innovation related programs.  We are very fortunate to have Intel leading the way and launching its program focusing on Innovation in the state of Karnataka.  It gives me great pleasure to see students from our state stand up to the International Competition and winning laurels for our country.  I am sure such initiatives will go a long way and build a smart track of young talent in India,” said Mohammed Mohsin., I.A.S., Commissioner for Public Instruction, Department of Public Instruction, Govt. of Karnataka.

“If we allow our imaginations to fly and sour high, creativity develops. All of us are creative by nature; as man has always been an explorer. But children are more creative because most of the things they do or see is happening for the first time in their life. It is at this juncture that they should be caught and trained. Science museums are the best place to start with, where creativity and innovative thoughts can move without hindrance by way of exhibits and activities to develop such attitude in them. We are happy to be associated with Intel in this journey to nurture creativity and innovation among children,” said K G Kumar, Director, Visvesvaraya Industrial and Technological Museum, Bangalore.

Avishkara is a joint initiative by Intel Education and the Department of Education, Karnataka to accelerate STEM-based governmental and non-governmental programs like Inspire and Initiative for Research and Innovation in Science (IRIS) which encourage student interest and participation in STEM related subjects. Earlier this year, Intel India and National Council of Science Museums^* collaborated to set-up an ‘Intel  Galileo Corner’ at select NCSM^* centres starting with New Delhi. This ‘Intel  Galileo Corner’ will give students’ access to the Intel Galileo Development Board  to help them build prototypes for their ideas of smart devices.This learning and discovery process would be helped by relevant technologists who will be on-hand to guide on potential usage capabilities of the platform. 

New Commerce Platform With Retail Analytics At Forum

Openbravo, a complete commerce solution for agile retailers and a solid horizontal ERP solution for any industry, will showcase its latest Commerce platform at the India Retail Forum, Renaissance Hotel, Mumbai on September 17-18, 2014. At booth C8, Openbravo will exhibit its Commerce Platform embedded with Retail Analytics for the first time.

India Retail Forum (IRF) is the premier knowledge and networking platform for India’s burgeoning retail and shopping center industries. In its 11th year, the annual congregation with the participation of the most esteemed visionaries, retail experts and influential decision makers charts a brand new course every year for the retail and shopping center fraternities. The Forum acts as a bridge between Indian and International players providing a holistic picture of the latest scenarios and opportunities.

 The technologies on display at IRF 2014 will allow the visitors to experience the true game-changing potential that retail technology can offer in the coming future.  The Openbravo team at India Retail Forum will provide a demo of their latest solutions and discuss with visitors on their various business needs, challenges faced by retailers and how a commerce solution can help tackle this. 

“We view India as an important market with unlimited opportunities for growth, especially in the retail segment which was projected to grow to $792.84 billion by the end of 2017. India is the fifth largest retail destination globally. We are excited to offer our complete commerce solution, which enables our customers to maintain their competitiveness in this retail wave.  Our breakthrough solutions will enable their business to be truly agile. It will help our customers effectively adapt to rapidly changing business challenges”, said Sunando Banerjee, Channel Business Manager for Asia Pacific & Middle East, Openbravo.

The Openbravo Commerce Platform with its embedded Retail Analytics provides retailers with the best solution to stay agile in today’s new consumer age. Web and mobile point of sale, integration with e-commerce, flexible merchandise management capabilities and a comprehensive supply chain management help retailers to allow physical stores to play their new role, to progress in cross-channel and be more engaging with customers, employees and partners. And now with a strong set of specific retail reports build on top of the Openbravo Analytics solution retailers can be more responsive to customer behavior or market changes thanks to actionable insights about business performance across all channels. 

World Vision India Launches Blog-a-thon Hunger Contest

In an effort to raise awareness on the extent of malnutrition among children below the age of 5, World Vision India, in association with Youth Ki Awaaz, announced the launch of a blog-a-thon contest on hunger today.

Hunger is an endemic issue across the nation, with India being home to a quarter of the world’s underweight children under the age of 5. To this day, 40% of the population is malnourished – a decrease of only 10% in the last three decades. Every year, around 6.6 million children die of preventable diseases in the world, 60% of which is due to hunger and malnutrition. From stunted children to undernourished farmers who go hungry every night, hunger remains a menace for which a solution is urgently called for.

The one-of-a-kind blog-a-thon launched today aims at stirring up a conversation around hunger by harnessing the power of blogs. Participants can stage a post, a video, an article, a poem, a doodle or even a photo story on the theme of “Hunger is…”  They can also use personal narratives of how they have seen hunger around them or build an entirely new story. 

“Hunger is a structural issue that needs active attention and we need to refocus the nation on this very intrinsic problem,” said Dr Jayakumar Christian, CEO, World Vision India. “With the blog-a-thon, we hope to use social media, and blogs specifically, to spread awareness among the large number of socially conscious youth in the country. These are highly active, very creative people who are starting to drive the call for change in our country and their participation, be it through fictional accounts or fact-based articles, can help bring hunger back into the spotlight and move our society closer to a better understanding of its causes and possible solutions.”

The blog-a-thon is the latest step taken by World Vision India as part of its 24 Hour Famine, a campaign targeted at addressing issues of hunger and malnutrition that severely impact the lives of children, especially those under the age of 5. 

“Untimely deaths, chronic diseases and a massive loss in the nation’s productivity should not be reduced to mere statistics worthy only for repetition in political narratives, but needs to become an integral topic of thought” said Dr Jayakumar. “It is high time we discuss hunger as not just an economic but a social problem, which spreads due to the callous attitude meted out to it. The way to end hunger lies with spreading awareness and campaigns such as the 24 Hour Famine is designed to kick start such conversations and drive home to the nation the fact that for a wide majority of Indians, sleeping after a filling meal is but a dream.”

The World Vision India blog-a-thon on Youth Ki Awaaz is now officially open and will run till 20^th September. Participants can submit their entries at http://www.youthkiawaaz.com/hungeris/ . The best blog entry will receive a MOTO E mobile phone as a token of appreciation.

Conducted in 7 cities across the nation – Chennai, Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Guwahati – the 24 Hour Famine consists of events from art exhibitions to literary and cultural competitions driven by local communities, school children as well as civil and public officials to drive home the message. It hopes to engage the public and youth from ages of 13–30 on the problems faced by children due to malnourishment. 

More information on the 24 Hour Famine campaign can be found at http://www.24hourfamine.in/.