Active.AI Joins Infosys Finacle’s Growing FinTech Ecosystem Globally

Infosys Finacle, part of EdgeVerve Systems, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Infosys has announced a partnership with Active.AI, a Singapore based FinTech that offers an Enterprise AI platform for banks globally. The Active AI platform, integrated with Finacle, will help financial institutions offer conversational banking services through chat and voice based interfaces across their digital channels. Banks can leverage the joint solution to harness artificial intelligence to automate and enhance customer experience.

Active.AI is one of the companies that was recognized in the recently concluded chapter of Finacle FinTech Connect, an initiative that builds on ongoing alliances and the Infosys Innovation Fund program to identify promising new FinTechs.

Highlights

·         The Active.AI platform, integrated with Finacle, will be delivered with pre-integrated banking services and pre-trained data models for banking services

·         With this joint solution, end customers will be able to interact with software bots in natural language through voice and chat interface to access account information, pay bills, make transfers and access several other banking services

·         The joint solution will use artificial intelligence to better understand customer interactions across channels. It will also be able to personalize conversations to make tailored offers to customers

·          The solution will be available in multiple languages and will be offered through Finacle digital channels solutions such as Finacle Online Banking and Finacle Mobile Banking

Sanat Rao, Chief Business Officer, Infosys Finacle says, “Elevating customer experience and reducing servicing costs are two of the strategic goals banks across the world are pursuing. The advancement in artificial intelligence technologies offer a significant opportunity to achieve these twin goals. Active.AI conversational banking offering focused on financial services will complement our suite of digital banking offerings and will help our clients make banking simpler for their customers.” 

Parikshit Paspulati, Chief Technology Officer, Active.AI says, “We are building the next generation of secure and scalable technology for financial services with an AI first approach. Our enterprise AI platform will enable banks to be ready for the conversational era. Partnering with Finacle helps us greatly increase delivery velocity for our mutual clients. Axis Bank is one of the first banks, where we have integrated our AI platform with Finacle ecosystem.”

Honeywell and HackerEarth National Hackathon Challenge Attracts Over 2,000 Tech Students

Honeywell hosted its first Honeywell Hackathon Challenge on June 9 in Bengaluru, India in association with HackerEarth, which is a provider of enterprise software solutions that help organizations in their innovation management and talent assessment endeavors. The first in a series of similar events scheduled for this year, The Honeywell Hackathon Challenge was held at Honeywell Technology Solutions’ office with more than 2,000 participants.

The Honeywell Hackathon Challenge is designed to stimulate creativity and innovation on technologies that are defining our increasingly connected world. The first Hackathon ideated on Chatbots, Augmented Reality/Virtual Reality, Predictive Analytics, Image Recognition, Machine Learning, Natural Language Processing, and Real-Time Location Sensing / GPS. The 169 entries were evaluated based on the innovativeness of the idea, its relevance as a solution to the problem, and the maturity of technology employed. Twenty-two shortlisted teams comprising 41 contestants then participated in the day-long offline Hackathon held at the Honeywell Bengaluru campus.

The winners were Lezwon Castellino, Jaison Chacko and Rahul Acharya, students at Christ University, Bangalore, whose application was a Self-Driving Artificial Intelligence. Says Lezwon: “We have participated in other Hackathons before but were truly inspired by the caliber of solutions designed by other teams at this event. It was great to meet and talk with the engineering and development teams at Honeywell. We deeply appreciate the steer and mentoring we got from Honeywell to optimize our solution.”

The Honeywell Hackathon Challenge saw 1,200 students from the prestigious Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), Regional Engineering Colleges, and school children from across the country submit their ideas. Gaurang Bharti, a student of Oakridge International School, whose idea made it to the final shortlist, was among the youngest participants. “Our idea was appraised by professionals. We received feedback on improving the idea for mass use. This is a very rare opportunity and a great learning exercise”, said Bharti.

Dr. Akshay Bellare, vice president and general manager of Honeywell Technology Solutions, India, Honeywell’s technology development and engineering arm, said: “I’m delighted to see the thirst for learning among such a young group of technology enthusiasts. As Honeywell transforms into a software industrial company, with about half of our 23,000 global engineers working on software, we recognize that digital and physical solutions will become more and more connected to change the way we live and work. We are committed to nurturing Indian engineering talent and supporting the tech community in making it more robust and in-step with the latest technology trends.”

Honeywell will hold two more Hackathon Challenge events in the coming months to enable the developer community to innovate and ideate on focus areas consuming the technology world today.    

Hero Motors Sales Growth Up 13% in Motorcycles and 22% in Scooters for June 2017

Hero MotoCorp Ltd (HMCL), the world’s largest two-wheeler manufacturer today announced record sales performance for the first quarter of the Financial Year (FY’18).

Registering strong sales, the Company sold 18,49,375 units in first three months (April 2017 – June 2017) of this fiscal - the highest-ever sales by Hero MotoCorp in any quarter. The Company’s previous highest quarterly sales was in the second quarter (July-September) of FY16-17, when it sold 18.23 lakhs units.

With sales of 624,185 two-wheelers in June 2017, the Company registered a growth of 14% over the corresponding month of the previous fiscal when it sold 549,533 units.

Hero MotoCorp has clocked such robust volumes in the month of June on account of strong growth in both motorcycles and scooters. The Company sold 547,185 units of motorcycles during the month of June,  thereby growing by 13% over the corresponding month last year. Hero MotoCorp sold 77,000scooters in June, registering a 22% growth over the corresponding month in 2016.

Motorcycle segment volume growth was supported by the wedding season and the very successful in-market activations for Hero's portfolio of trusted brands including Glamour, Splendor, Passion, HF Deluxe and Achiever. Scooters have gained volumes driven by the very effective ‘360 degree’ Go-To-Market programmes along-with the introduction of new upgrades and refreshes earlier in the quarter.

Hero MotoCorp has welcomed GST as a game-changing tax reform in the country.

The Company has passed on the benefit of GST to its customers with a reduction in the prices of models across its product portfolio in most of the states w.e.f. July 1, 2017. The quantum of reduction ranges from Rs 400 to Rs 1800 on mass-selling models. The actual benefit varies from state to state, depending on the pre and post-GST rates. Some of the premium segment models see a reduction of up to Rs 4000 in certain markets. In one or two states, such as Haryana, where the pre-GST rates were lower than the post-GST rate, the prices of a few models have gone up marginally.

Zippo Shines Bright at the 6th Edition of Bangalore Open Air

More than 1500 music lovers from across India came together to celebrate and enjoy pulsating rock and metal music, at the 6th season of the Bangalore Open Air music festival. Hosted at the lush Royal Orchid Resort and Convention Center, the festival witnessed some of the best talents from both Indian and International bands.

The definitive highlight of the festival was the Zippo Flame Art which was setup at the venue. Symbolizing the passion and love for rock music, the jaw-dropping flame art entranced the audiences, creating a magical moment that the crowd won’t forget for years to come!

An exciting highlight of the festival was the Zippo Flame Art which was setup at the venue. Symbolizing the passion and love for rock music, the flame art created fun and magical moments for the artists and the crowd, which they won’t forget for years to come!

The festival goers also got to witness the Zippo Encore area in all its glory! From unleashing their creative spirits at the ‘Zippo Custom Contest’, to trying their luck at the ‘Zippo Wheel of Fortune’ and celebrating their inner-passion through face-painting, the Zippo Encore Area had an activity for everyone. The attendees also had a chance to find their perfect Zippo windproof lighter from the host of exclusive collectibles available.

How Data Centers Helped India Deal with Demonetization?

By Praveen Nair, General Manager for DCD, Mumbai, India

In November 2016, the Government of India announced it would demonetize the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 banknotes of the Mahatma Gandhi Series. The bold move of swiftly taking the notes out of circulation set off a chain reaction of events that led to a period of uncertainty and chaos throughout the nation. Now that the dust has settled and life has returned to normal in most cities, we examine how data centers were central in ensuring that across the country, the average person could still go about their lives with minimal disruption.

Fast growth in digital

Since demonetization, government statistics say digital transactions have increased between 400 to 1000 percent with a huge growth in business from 52 Crores to 191 Crores. The surge in data traffic has in turn increased investment in data centers, with data center players increasing their data capabilities and capacities. The Internet & Mobile Association of India has estimated India’s data center business will touch US$4.5 Billion by 2018, which makes it the 2nd largest in the Asia Pacific region.

At the recent DCD > Focus On Hyderabad conference, Srinivas Muppaneni, CIO of Andhra Pradesh State Cooperative Bank and Telangana State Cooperative Bank spoke about the importance of data centers especially post demonetization. He asserted: “Demonetization has forced many banks including ours to provide digital service in villages. For instance, post demonetization many villages in Telangana state have gone digital.”

The increase in digitization of the processes led to huge demand of storage especially from the BFSI (banking, financial services and insurance), telecom, and IT/ITES sectors. These sectors were unable to fulfill the sudden and huge demand of storage from their existing infrastructure and hence they were looking at data center providers. Muppaneni shared his bank’s experience. He said, “Being from the BFSI sector, post demonetization, we were worried whether our existing infrastructure would be able to handle the huge digital transactions or would our systems crash?”

Storage demands

Today, industries are looking at a place where massive amounts of data can be stored and utilized with security and efficiency. Hence it is crucial for today’s data centers to have the right storage, processing and security capabilities. But according to Muppaneni, data centers in India are not yet ready to handle the huge data traffic and there are very few data centers located in India. He asserted: “Data centers in India are not yet ready to take up the increased data volumes and being from a BFSI sector, due to security norms, we cannot host our data in the data centers that do not have a physical presence in India. Hence localization of huge data centers with all the required storage, processing and security capabilities is vital.”

Demonetization had an adverse effect on many businesses, but for data center players, business has been good as there has been an increase in data traffic, usage of network infrastructure and storage space. The data center players are realizing the importance of the Indian market and they are trying to fulfill the demand of Indian companies. However, demand is still outstripping supply.

Some experts in the industry have told us we are currently at a stage whereby the need for more data centers in India is a cause for concern. So what could be done? For starters, State Governments would do well to emulate the Telangana State Government by coming out with a data center policy which encourages more data centers to be set up by ensuring the entire process is free from bureaucratic red tape, and also ensuring the availability of power and connectivity. Existing data centers should be refurbished and upgraded, data center practitioners educated and trained with a comprehensive framework in mind and finally, data centers should be audited and certified as to meeting key standards.

DCD>Webscale Bangalore 2017

To know more about the impact of demonetization and how data centers are an integral part of the digital economy, join us on the July 19-20 at DCD>Webscale Bangalore at the Sheraton The Grand, Bangalore.

This year we have a conference packed with international and local experts discussing the latest trends and technologies, networking opportunities and break-away sessions. To register for the conference or for more information, please visit www.dcd-india.com

Tally to Conduct 7000 GST Adoption Camps to Help Businesses Transition

Tally Solutions, India's premier software product company today announced that it will conduct 7000 “Upgrade your Tally” camps across the country to help its customers to move to its GST ready software. The company will work with its network of 28000+ partner network in the country to cover all cities and towns. The schedule of camps is available at tallysolutions.com/events.

Businesses can walk into any of these camps as per their convenience between 8 am to 8 pm, get their Tally upgraded to GST ready Tally.ERP 9 Release 6 and also get their GST queries answered by GST experts. In addition, businesses who are interested to experience GST ready Tally will also be able to get a free demo of the product on-site. The company is also hosting DIY tools on its site help.tallysolutions.com to simplify the migration process.

Speaking on the occasion, Tejas Goenka, Executive Director - Tally Solutions said, "Our focus is to help our 11 lakh plus customers to move to the new tax era smoothly. We have already had 4 lakh+ downloads of our GST ready software in 4 days and we are expecting this rush to continue over the next few weeks. To provide on-ground support to our customers, we are conducting these camps so that businesses find it easy and convenient to move. Our partners are working round the clock to not just make these camps happen but supporting from their office premises as well. For post implementation support, we have doubled our customer service wing and increasingly promoting self-service so that people can move faster", he signed off.

The company along with its 28000+ strong partner network pan India has already conducted more than 5000 GST events across the country. It has tied up with associations like CAIT, FAIDA, ASSOCHAM, CII and principal companies for the same and reached out to more than 2 lakh businesses already. Tally also launched an exclusive blog (blogs.tallysolutions.com) and mobile app (Tally for GST) to demystify and simplify GST. 

In order to help businesses who are currently maintaining books manually to automate in the GST era, the company recently launched Biz Guru in association with Acer India and CAIT. Biz Guru is a one stop plug and play accounting and GST compliance solution. They intend to continue these initiatives and drive several more activities to help the business community with GST.

Hilton Named One of India’s Best Companies to Work For in 2017: Great Place to Work Institute & Economic Times

For the second year in a row, Hilton has been recognised as one of India’s Best Companies to Work For, an accolade dedicated to companies with exceptional workplace cultures. Ranked 25^th on the Top 100 list, Hilton has been distinguished for creating a high trust and high performance organizational culture by offering Team Members (employees) great environments, careers and rewards.

"We are absolutely thrilled to be recognized as one of India’s Best Companies to Work For consistently for the second year running. As a business of people serving people, our Team Members truly are at the heart of our success,” said Brendan Toomey, vice president of human resources, Asia Pacific, Hilton. “I am extremely proud of our team in India and the incredible culture that we have built together which aligns with our commitment to be the most hospitable company in the world."

This recognition follows a series of other recent accolades for being a great place to work. Hilton was ranked third in the Asia's Best Multinational Workplaces 2017 and Best Companies to Work For in Greater China 2017 by Great Place to Work. Last month, Universum also named Hilton as a top hospitality employer and one of Top 100 Most Attractive Employers for business students in China.

The awards and recognitions bear testament to the leading practices and programmes that build a winning team culture at Hilton. In India, these include:

· Five-day workweek policy, which is currently in place across the majority of hotels and corporate office in India. Plans are underway to implement this policy across India.

·  Travel with Purpose, Hilton’s corporate responsibility commitment enables Team Members to positively impact local environments and communities around the world through initiatives including Global Month of Service, Earth Week and Travel with Purpose Action Grants. To date, US$42,000 worth of Action Grants have supported 10 projects in India.

·  Celebrating diversity in the workplace through initiatives such as Women in Leadership events that have empowered more than 30 female Team Members in India since 2016, helping them in their career journeys. The ongoing effort underpins Hilton’s pledge to drive diversity across Asia Pacific as a Singapore IMPACT Champion in support of HeForShe, an UN-led gender equality movement.

·  Opportunities for development through programmes such as Hilton South East Asia & India Management Trainee Programme, which was introduced to India in 2015. So far, 20 graduates and trainees from India have had the opportunity to gain overseas work experiences in hotels across Asia Pacific. Other initiatives include Hilton University, a substantial online learning resource, as well as E3 (Elevate, Engage, Excel), a leadership development framework.

·  Go Hilton, a programme that provides exclusive travel discounts and benefits for Team Members, as well as their family and friends.

·  Opportunities for recognition through programmes such as Catch Me at My Best, and the CEO Light & Warmth Awards that acknowledge Team Members at all levels from guests, peers and managers, as well as Team Member Appreciation Week which saw over 100 events organized to celebrate Team Members in India.

Every year, Great Place to Work collaborates with The Economic Times to identify India’s Best Companies to Work For. Over 600 organizations, spanning 20 industry sectors were assessed in 2017. The selection process includes an employee survey and an in-depth questionnaire about company practices and programmes.

Hilton employs more than 2,500 people in India across its 15 trading hotels and corporate office. The company is creating thousands of new jobs in India through its pipeline of 18 new hotels, including the forthcoming Conrad Bangalore, which opens later this year.