Fifth-Gen Array ADCs Deliver Upto 300% Greater Performance for Entry-Level & Mid-Range Customers

Array Networks Inc., a global leader in application delivery networking, announced today the immediate availability of three new fifth-generation application delivery controller (ADC) appliances. Running Array's recently released Version 8.6 software, the entry-level APV1600 and APV2600 and the mid-range APV3600 achieve industry-leading Layer-4, Layer-7 and SSL benchmarks for throughput and connections per second - delivering up to 300% better performance without increasing prices for Array customers.

·  APV1600 Layer-4 and Layer-7 throughput increased by 50% to 3.7Gbps and 3Gbps respectively. Layer-4 connections per second increased by 300% to 280K, while Layer-7 requests per second increase by 100% to 200K. Full-featured list price beginning at $8,495.

·  APV2600 Layer-4 and Layer-7 throughput increased by 100% to 18Gbps and 13Gbps respectively. Layer-4 connections per second increased by 50% to 360K, while Layer-7 requests per second increased by 100% to 200K. Full-featured list price starting at $13,995.

·  APV3600 Layer-4 throughput increased by 100% to 37Gbps. Layer-4 connections per second increased by 33% to 1M, while Layer-7 requests per second increased by 20% to 635K. 2048-bit SSL TPS increased by 40% to 35K. Full-featured list price from $28,995.

Industry-Leading Software SSL

With the introduction of elliptic curve cryptography (ECC) support in Array's recently released Version 8.6 software, the APV1600, 2600 and 3600 appliances now support industry-leading performance for software-based SSL offload. The APV1600, 2600 and 3600 support up to 2100, 5500 and 35,000 SSL TPS respectively  without the need for additional-cost hardware acceleration modules - performance that is between 4-to-6 times better than similarly priced alternative ADC solutions. 

"As a pioneer in integrated traffic management and application delivery, we are pleased to launch the fifth generation of our APV Series products," said Paul Andersen, Senior Director of Marketing at Array Networks. "While recent efforts have seen Array expand its portfolio of cloud and security-focused solutions, we remain committed to leading the way for both physical and virtual load balancing and application delivery solutions. With the new APV1600, 2600 and 3600 appliances, Array continues to raise the bar for entry-level and mid-range solutions, providing our customers with a superior combination of features, reliability and price-performance."

BroadGrain Opts for Eka CTRM Software & Advanced Analytics

Eka Software Solutions, the leading global provider of Smart Commodity Management software solutions, announced today that BroadGrain has selected Eka’s agricultural CTRM software platform with advanced analytics to manage global commodity trading and risk for its operations both domestically and internationally.

BroadGrain is a leading global marketer and handler of grains, oilseeds, by-products, and specialty crops for both feed and food markets. Operating on nearly every continent, BroadGrain is committed to connecting producers, processors, and consumers of food and agricultural commodities around the world.

“We needed the most functionally advanced end-to-end agriculture trading, risk, and supply chain solution to support our growing business both domestically and internationally,” said Zaid Qadoumi, CEO, BroadGrain. “Through our evaluations, Eka’s platform proved to be the most modern and complete multi-commodity software solution on the market today, making our decision easy.”

BroadGrain licensed InSight CM, a next-generation CTRM software solution for managing commodity transactions end-to-end throughout the value chain, and Commodity Analytics Cloud, an advanced analytics solution that brings commodity specific analytics to all business users. These two solutions provide the operational and analytical solutions that commodities companies need to manage in today’s complex and volatile markets. InSight CM is an advanced transaction management platform, suitable for a wide range of commodities in the agriculture, manufacturing, metals, and energy industries. Commodity Analytics Cloud harnesses data from both internal and external sources to answer the most important questions for commodities companies in the areas of PandL, procurement, risk, and supply chain.

“Eka’s agricultural solution captures, analyzes, and manages physical trading, procurement, logistics, bulk handling, processing, risk, and compliance across all agri-commodities including dairy, grains, oilseeds, livestock, feed ingredients, biofuels, and fertilizers,” said Sanjay Singla, GM of CTRM, Eka. “The fully integrated platform provides straight-through processing of agri-commodities for the front, middle, and back office and is the most functional end-to-end solution on the market. In addition, our advanced analytics solution addresses the high value business issues agriculture companies face today. By leveraging analytics, commodities companies can make faster, better informed decisions when managing trading, positions, risk, PandL, inventory, costs, and logistics.”

Top Honours at Barclays Supplier Awards 2015-16 for Intelenet Global Services

Intelenet Global Services, a leading Indian exporter of BPM services is recognized as the ‘Supplier of the Year’ for year 2015-16 by Barclays, a transatlantic consumer, corporate and investment bank offering products and services across personal, corporate and investment banking, credit cards and wealth management. Intelenet has been acknowledged for its outstanding contribution in delivering service excellence and coming up with innovative solutions that provide sustainable benefits to Barclays.

Barclays organized the third edition of its annual ‘Go-To’ Supplier Awards to celebrate the contributions of those suppliers that have exceeded expectations. Intelenet was chosen and felicitated the award by Ashok Vaswani, Chief Executive Officer – Barclays UK.

From a global supply base of many thousands, Intelenet was announced as the winner of the Supplier of the Year award in recognition for implementing colleague development programmes, tools and processes, reducing takeover fraud, increasing customer advocacy and also providing incredible support during the Chennai flood disaster.

Intelenet has been investing in newer technologies as well as tapping in-house tools with an agenda to enhance customer experiences in an era that is seeing disruption and design thinking across sectors. Always keeping its clients first, Intelenet presents its clients with solutions that meet basic goals from cost savings to business transformation. Clients also derive tremendous value from Intelenet’s ability to consistently provide operational excellence, significant cost reduction and energized partnerships. The entire Intelenet team, from executives to front-line agents, puts the customer first.

Microsoft & 100 NGOs Partner Globally to Close Computer Science Education Skills Gap

Today, Microsoft Philanthropies announced grants for over 100 nonprofit organizations in 55 countries, including NASSCOM Foundation and QUEST Alliance in India. The grants are a component of the $75M commitment Microsoft made to increase access to computer science education around the world through Microsoft YouthSpark, as announced by Satya Nadella last year. 

Microsoft is partnering with these nonprofits by providing cash grants, content and other resources they need to bring computational thinking and problem-solving skills to young people in local communities, important building blocks to help them succeed in today’s tech-fueled economy.

“Computational thinking and problem-solving skills will be relevant to every job in the future,” said Satya Nadella, CEO, Microsoft. “Through our partnerships with nonprofit organizations around the world, we aim to empower all youth to prepare for this future with the foundational knowledge of computer science to dream and create the innovations of tomorrow.”

Here in India, the grant that Microsoft Philanthropies made to NASSCOM Foundation and QUEST Alliance will enable under-served youth to embrace computer science through developingcomputer programming curriculum and integrating IT and computer science training into current employability & entrepreneurship curriculum respectively.

NASSCOM Foundation:  Through the Code A Future project, NASSCOM Foundation will introduce and promote Computer Science to under-served youth and encourage them to pursue higher courses in advanced computing and leverage these skills for future employment. Nasscom will develop basic and advanced computer programming curriculum and partner with local organizations to deliver the training to 12,000 youth.

QUEST Alliance: With support from Microsoft YouthSpark, Quest Alliance will develop a toolkit focused on integrating IT and computer science training into current employability and entrepreneurship curriculum. The computer science modules will be customized for the Indian context and will include easy to understand classroom activities, work sheets, interactive peer engagements and video case studies. Instructor training and orientation materials will be included to ensure trainers are able to easily adopt methodologies and content, with continuous virtual support provided by QUEST through its online trainer support platform. The program aims to reach 20,000 youth with a special focus on reaching young women. All materials, approach and tools developed under this initiative will be scaled across QUEST and Microsoft India partners in order to build capacity of youth serving organizations to integrate computer science in existing employability & entrepreneurship programs for under-served youth.

Manju Dhasmana, Lead – Community Affairs at Microsoft India, said, “Microsoft is deeply invested in the success of India’s youth by empowering them in three core areas - education, employment, and entrepreneurship. We see our work with nonprofits as a partnership where we can bring to the table our resources and tech expertise to some of the organizations that are already making impact with young people in our community.”

Closing the computer science skills gap and reaching young people on a global scale is a multi-faceted challenge that cannot be solved by one organization or solution alone. Microsoft’s partnerships with nonprofit organizations mean that more young people around the world—particularly underserved communities, girls and ethnic and racially diverse populations-will have access to computer science education, helping build skills critical for future success.

Design Conclave 2016 Aspiring Designers in Bengaluru on April 23

Aiming at inspiring creative minds, ‘Design Conclave 2016’ is here to create a breakthrough in the Indian Education System by playing an important catalyst in the field of design. To be held on April 23 in Bengaluru, the Design Conclave aims at comforting aspiring designers with vast opportunities that design has to offer and how students can make the best out of a career in Design.

The premier design conclave to witness design stalwarts, students, creative evangelists, design and engineering professionals and educators from the field of architecture, engineering and construction and media. The conclave aims at disseminating actionable knowledge that people can use and apply immediately in their creations for conceiving new products and improving the existing ones. This conclave is all about experiencing how design can create a competitive advantage for aspiring designers and help them to discover new opportunities for further growth.

To be held at The Lalit Ashok, Bengaluru, this conclave is one such unique initiative that brings together industry experts to share their views and experiences related to design. This year, the conclave will provide an opportunity to come face to face with illustrious speakers from design industry, such as Biren Ghoshe, leader in animation and visual effects and country head of Technicolor, India, Manoviraj Khosla, leading fashion designer of international repute, Sanju Mathew, Manager Digital Sculpting at General Motors, India, and Ninad Panse, CEO of DSK International Campus in Pune.

Through panel discussions, these industry experts will share their experiences about the trends, technology developments, case studies, design processes and the role of design and other forms of media in building and sustaining a brand’s value. “Design has played a crucial role in bringing a change in the industry. The future is completely based on innovation as India is becoming a trendsetter with respect to the contribution made in the field of industrial designing that has been well accepted globally. The get inspired sessions at the conclave will definitely leverage one’s experience and expertise to create unique learning opportunities,” said Ninad Panse, CEO of DSK International Campus. 

Fourth Batch of the Target Accelerator Program Will Work Wellness, IoT & Retail Technologies

Target India has announced the launch of its accelerator program’s fourth batch. Five startups, Preksh, MintM, Uncanny Vision, Lechal and Lawbot were selected to develop disruptive ideas relevant to Target’s business. Broadening the scope of Target’s accelerator program, the latest batch will work in the areas of wellness, Internet of Things (IoT) and retail technologies.

“Our sustained effort to tap into India’s innovation potential has led to the success of our accelerator program,” said Navneet Kapoor, President and Managing Director, Target India. “We’re excited to have this latest batch focus on potentially game-changing technologies as well as areas of opportunities for Target like wellness and IoT.”

The five startups selected for the Target Accelerator Program include:

·         Preksh leverages visual merchandising in the store to create rich online experiences

·         MintM is an in-store customer engagement platform

·         Uncanny Vision is a computer vision processing library

·         Lechal is an interactive, haptic footwear

·         Lawbot is an automated platform that analyzes legal contracts

As a part of our commitment to foster Target’s entrepreneurial spirit, the fourth batch also includes two internal teams in addition to the startups. These are as follows:

·  A versus C will provide tools to better understand online shopping cart abandonment

·  Hashtag Shopping will enable shopping on social media through conversational commerce    

First India’s Private Sector Bank to Open Dedicated Branch for Startups

RBL Bank, one of India's fastest growing private sector banks today announced the launch of an exclusive branch for start-ups. RBL Bank will be the first private sector Bank to open a specialized branch for start-ups offering a bouquet of banking products to service the end-to-end needs of the emerging entrepreneurial eco-system.

The branch was inaugurated at Koramangala, Bengaluru, has by Nandan Nilekani, noted entrepreneur and former chairman of Unique Identification Authority of India. RBL Bank’s Chairman, Narayan Ramachandran and Rajeev Ahuja, Head – Strategy were present on the occasion.

The dedicated branch will assist entrepreneurs in setting up new companies or enterprises and offers a host of banking products including, foreign exchange services, remittances and cash management. The Branch will also provide a range of value added services including registration, legal and tax formalities etc. through its affiliates and partners.

RBL Bank Chairman Narayan Ramachandran said, “At RBL, we stand at the intersection of entrepreneurs, ideas, technology and banking services.  We provide a full range of banking services to fast-growing start-ups, in the language they speak — seamless technology, ease and speed. Our rapidly growing set of innovative start-ups has demanded that we rise to the challenge and deliver services that are responsive to their fast-evolving needs.  As an established bank in a renewed startup avatar, we can empathise with the journey of our startup clients, and have organised the Bank's technical capabilities and speed of response to match this requirement.”

Rajeev Ahuja, Head - Strategy, RBL Bank, noted, “Our latest offering in this comprehensive bouquet of services for innovative companies and start-ups is an exclusive branch for start-ups, located in Koramangala, at the epicentre of India's start-up revolution.  This is not merely a branch where a startup entrepreneur will walk up and ask for a current account or a remittance.  There will be all that and much more.  We expect to have conversations about Application Program Interface (API) banking, large volume electronic payments (IMPS/NEFT/RTGS) and receivables, prepaid cards-based solutions, escrow services, Universal Payment Interface (UPI), Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (AEPS), Direct Money Transfer (DMT) and so on.”

As another arrow in the quiver of offerings, the Bank is also at the forefront of supporting the emerging venture debt market in India. The Bank was an anchor investor in Trifecta Capital’s Venture Debt Fund, the first Alternative Investment Fund (AIF) of its kind in India. As part of its strategy, the Bank is also focusing on industry-wise specialists in wholesale lending, e-commerce and new-tech business. It has also made significant strides in e-lending through tie-ups and partnerships.

Earlier this year, RBL Bank launched India StartUp Club (ISC), a fast track program to support early stage companies with a basket of banking services to jumpstart their operations. This includes a Green Channel for Account Setup, Payroll Services, Cash Management, trade and foreign exchange service, escrow accounts, transaction banking solutions (API banking for managing various payment/receivable needs), Customised Debit Cards and a dedicated hotline to address the 24x7 needs of these high growth companies.

India StartUp Club also partners with various referral service providers and forums to provide a host of value added services for the startup community. The non-banking solutions offered through referral partners include, enterprise registration services (online CA), office space/meeting room services, human resource management system, social media marketing and branding, and customer relationship management. This empowers the start-ups to build and grow their businesses by offering multiple options under one roof at a special price.