Online Digital Marketing Workshop by North Storm Academy will Host a Free 3-Day Digital Marketing Training

North Storm Academy is launching one of the Biggest Online Education events in the history of education where they are organizing a free 3-day Digital Marketing Training exclusively for students and till now there are 60,000+ registration received who wish to attend the event live. This event is happening on 8th, 9th and 10th of May from 5:00 pm to 6:30 pm. Students from over 450 colleges and 250+ cities are participating.

Prior to this event, North Storm Academy had organized a free online Faculty Development Program for teachers where over 7,000 teachers were educated on how to take their schools and colleges online. Teachers are silent COVID19 warrior forces who are trying their best to keep the country’s education system intact during this pandemic, but a lot of schools, colleges are not digitally ready for it. North Storm Academy, one of the finest institutes for Digital Marketing in India decided to change this. Before the onset of Largest Student Workshop

This event is happening on 8th, 9th and 10th of May and is a 3-day online event where the topics covered are

Day 1: Fundamentals of Digital Marketing & how to begin your online journey
Day 2: Path to become an Influencer and how to perform Affiliate Marketing
Day 3: How to build a perfect online resume & stand out among your peers

Time: 5:00 pm to 6:30 pm
Those who wish to join can register here: http://bit.ly/sdmay20

The event will be conducted on YouTube LIVE. This event aims to reach 1,00,000+ students and we wish to make a history in the field of education. In the past no other institute has handled and hosted such a big event online and at such a scale.

The communication with these students is powered by Zoho Campaigns—an email marketing software. North Storm Academy is thankful to Zoho Corporation—a made in India company with a suite of over 45 applications—for helping us connect and engage with all these students.

This event is for students across India and has received a tremendous response. This is one of the biggest events during the lockdown. The founders of North Storm Academy are Hitesh Motwani, Roshni Motwani and Neil Dodhia.

Hitesh Motwani, Director North Storm Academy said, “We aim to change the education system in India by empowering Youth, Teachers and everyone with Digital knowledge. Today Digital Marketing is no longer an option, but it is a necessity. Especially during Lockdown one of the most in demand skills is Digital Marketing skills. After empowering 7000+ teachers we thought why not empower students too. To our surprise one the first day itself we received 35000 registrations and we couldn't believe our eyes. We are excited and anxious as you can say this is equal to a Digital concert happening online. Help us reach 1,00,000 students by sharing this information with as many as people as possible.”

Matic Network, Harmony and æternity Join Telangana Blockchain District’s Accelerator Program

T-Block Accelerator, the inaugural accelerator program under the aegis of the Telangana Blockchain District today announced its partnership with three of the leading global blockchain protocol companies- Matic Network, Harmony and æternity as the platform partners.  A first of its kind public blockchain accelerator organised by Telangana government and Tech Mahindra and run by IBC Media, an innovation management company, T-Block Accelerator is aimed at startups that have a strong blockchain use-case; thereby accelerating the start-up growth and therefore contributing to the growth of the overall industry.

The platform integrators are fast, secure scalable, next-gen blockchain protocols that are equipped to help startups build scalable and decentralised solutions to everyday problems. The Matic Network - India’s homegrown public blockchain network, will provide a high scale platform for decentralised applications. The æternity Blockchain, engineered by Yanislav Malahov - the Godfather of Ethereum, provides scalable smart contracts for decentralised applications. The Harmony Protocol, a Silicon Valley-based sharded Proof-of-Stake blockchain, will give fintech startups the ability to create & transact digital assets on its global ledger with instant confirmation and near-zero transaction fees.

With the support and expertise of these protocols as innovation enablers in the blockchain realm, T-block will provide the Indian startups that make it into the boot camp phase with technical support to build their solutions on their platform, GTM (Go-To-Market) support in Europe, technology implementation support and grants on a case-on-case basis.

Jaynti Kanani - CEO & Co-founder, Matic Network, commented, “As a part of the partnership, we will extend the Matic Network and our in-house expertise to mentor and train the participating startups. The startups will be familiarised and trained to use the platform based on their projects’ requirements.” He also added that this is just a facet of Matic’s involvement. “In addition to mentoring the startups, our in-house experts will also join the judges’ panel to select the startups that will go on to the next level of acceleration and aid with financial grants to support the startups through their journey,” said Kanani.

Nikola Stojanow, CEO of AE Ventures and CBO of æternity added, “India has a booming blockchain ecosystem and we are happy to be a part of this growth story. Having concluded the first edition of Starfleet India Accelerator recently, we are excited to join this initiative by the Telangana government and Tech M for T-Block and look forward to supporting the startups with our GMT access in the European countries.”

“At Harmony, we are confident of India’s technology prowess and are excited to enable the creation and innovation of highly-scalable & secure FinTech solutions from India through our partnership with T-Block Accelerator. We are happy to support them with the technical expertise to build products & applications on our platform and aid them with grants that will provide the necessary impetus for their growth in this journey.  ” Sahil Dewan, Co-Founder, Harmony commented.

These collaborations with prominent players like the Matic Network, æternity, and Harmony for initiatives like T-block will truly make an impact on Indian startups and innovators who are making their way through this realm and strengthen Telangana Government’s endeavor to make Telangana as the ‘Blockchain Capital of the World’.

Rama Devi Lanka (Director, Emerging Technologies & Officer on Special Duty, ITE&C Department, Government of Telangana) said “Building synergies between all the stakeholders in this ecosystem will propel India’s blockchain revolution and we are happy that our T-Block Accelerator is partnering with these platform protocols to strengthen this ecosystem. As the first government-led blockchain accelerator, this partnership is a true testimony to how a synergy between the government body and private players can support innovators in their entrepreneurial journey and will help build, scale, and create amazing opportunities for startups. We’re excited to see how the startups will benefit from these partnerships.”

With go-to-market support from Tech Mahindra, infrastructure support from the State Government of Telangana, innovation deal-flow support from IBC Media, and platform support from the Matic Network, æternity, and Harmony, the startups to be shortlisted are stepping into a growth-fueled environment. Launched in February 2020, the T-Block Accelerator has completed its deal flow and selected start-ups will undergo a one-week boot camp, followed by a four-month-long intensive training program.

Kids’ Food and Nutrition Startup ‘Lil’ Goodness’ Announces the Completion of Seed Funding

Funding

* Funding led by prominent institutional investor  Beyond Next Ventures (BNV), VC fund based out of Japan
* Funds to be used for expanding packaged foods product range, new digital interface with features such as real-time quality checks and 100% COVID-19 safe facilities.

‘Lil'Goodness’, a Bengaluru based kids’ food and nutrition start-up, has announced the successful completion of their seed funding round of RS. 5 Crores.

The new investors in the round included Beyond Next Ventures (BNV), a Japanese VC Fund, led by Tsuyoshi Ito, President and Mayu Morishima, Executive Officer.  Top business leaders such as Sajan Pillai, former CEO-UST Global, and General Partner-Season two Ventures, the family of Lalit Pai, ex-CEO, Nightingales Healthcare and Dr. Muthu Krishnan, ex-CEO Tata Health have also earlier invested in the seed round.

‘Lil’Goodness’ is empowering millennial moms with a unique combination of ‘goodness’ filled choices for their Lil’ ones. The company, led by IIM Calcutta alumnus, Harshavardhan & nutrition expert Pariksha Rao, is set to revolutionize the eating habits among children through a comprehensive ecosystem of fresh and packaged meal options integrated with technology to create awareness of eating right amongst kids at an early age. The start-up is focused on providing a range of kids foods based on good health to strengthen immunity, extreme focus on quality, hygiene and food safety, while providing the convenience of anytime, anywhere accessibility to moms. In the times of COVID-19, these core pillars are even more relevant.

Expressing his optimism on the fresh funding support, Harshavardhan, Co-Founder & CEO, Lil’ Goodness said, “We are excited to receive the additional investment support from ‘Beyond Next Ventures’. Given the current circumstances, this is indeed a good boost for the entire team. We, at ‘Lil’ Goodness’ have the vision to positively influence the eating habits of our future generations through tasty, nutritious food options. With this fund infusion, we are looking to further expand our product range & distribution of packaged foods, develop a digital interface that will enable mothers to order products directly to their homes through a contactless delivery option for the fresh meals business, SCoolMeal. We are already preparing ourselves for the new normal once this pandemic ends and are confident that our extreme focus on immunity based nutrition, highest standards of food safety, hygiene will be rewarded by our consumers.”

Tsuyoshi Ito, President and Mayu Morishima, Executive Officer, Beyond Next Ventures said, "We are quite excited by the vision of the founders -Harshavardhan & Pariksha, in building a scientific food and nutrition brand focused on the kids. There is a huge opportunity for growth in this space especially as mothers look for healthy and hygienic solutions in the current context of COVID-19. We are impressed with the differentiated business model of the enterprise that combines the range between fresh meals and packaged foods, enabled by technology, and with a deep focus on principles of good nutrition”.

Sajan Pillai, General Partner, Season Two Ventures said, “I personally believe that in today's context good health, hygiene and the convenience of contactless digital ordering for convenience will be the key drivers in a COVID-safe world. Lil’Goodness founders have the right vision, attitude and hard work to make this happen. I am particularly impressed with the manner they have approached the go-to-market, from the perspective of an end to end solution to the mother’s daily problems. Given their experience in healthcare and nutrition, I believe the founders know what it takes to really understand and come up with innovative solutions in these challenging times”.

‘LiL'Goodness’, the packaged food brand, is currently offering 7 products across 67 stores in Bengaluru and through online delivery app Amazon India. The products are designed to build immunity in kids using vegetables, cereals, and milk in crackers, porridges, and shelf-stable yogurts. These products are manufactured in hygienic, sterile facilities to ensure the highest quality of food safety and hygiene. The products contain zero preservatives and no artificial colors. Lil’Goodness also owns and operates sCoolMeal, a fresh meal brand, has partnered with 55 educational institutions in Bengaluru serving around 1800 orders per day, in the next session it is expanding to across 90+ institutions in Bengaluru sCoolMeal is available at educational institutions, kids’ activity centers, and at home through online delivery app Swiggy.

The company is also introducing a new application that will enable mothers to order meals directly to their homes through a contactless delivery option. The kitchen facilities have been recently re-certified for ISO-22000 (2018), a testament to the high standards of hygiene being maintained.

Additionally, despite being an early-stage start-up, as a socially responsible corporate, the company like many other big corporate giants stepped up its relief efforts towards COVID-19 pandemic and provided 30,000 meals to less privileged and less fortunate kids in Bengaluru as part of the ‘Hope, Not Hunger’ program with Swiggy.

The startup also recently was recognised as one of the top 5 most disruptive startups for customer value creation by FICCI-FLO.

Deliver Hot Meals to Hungry Customers with ‘Food Delivery Run’ by Platanista Games

When it comes to food, everyone likes their meals to be hot, tasty, and served on time! With a growing number of food delivery apps in the market, there are fewer hungry customers worrying about the delivery of their meals. Inspired by the thrilling journey of food delivery riders, Platanista Games, a gaming studio by IN10 Media Network, announces the launch of ‘Food Delivery Run’ a 3D casual game for mobile devices.

Link to the trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVT2auwPgPI&feature=youtu.be

Food Delivery Run is a 3D casual game where the player gets to be a delivery boy. The mission is to fight through the city traffic, overcome various obstacles and challenges, and successfully deliver food to hungry customers. Features like ‘Speed Boost’, allows players to run at supersonic speed; ‘Multiplier’, doubles the player’s score and cash on delivery; and ‘Super Delivery’, let’s the player deliver the food in every lane of the city. The game also allows players to customize characters for the gameplay as well as collect and redeem in-game cash to unlock super vehicles from the shop for an enhanced experience.

Commenting about the launch, Mansi Darbar, Vice President - Corporate Strategy and Development, IN10 Media Network, says, “The rapid digitization of the food delivery industry is undoubtedly one of the most fascinating innovations and its market is booming at lightning speed, especially in current times. It’s the amalgamation of technology and a universal concept of delivery that inspired us to create Food Delivery Run, giving a fun peek into the world of riders. With Food Delivery Run, Platanista Games reaffirms its commitment to provide captivating gaming experience for a broad range of players.”

With an aim to create universal-appealing and immersive gaming experiences across all demographics, Platanista Games has launched several interactive, casual games in a short span. The first game by the studio was ‘Surgical Strike – Border Escape’, a multilingual (English, Hindi & Marathi) 3D endless shooting game, followed by ‘Super Keeper’, another multilingual (English, Hindi, Marathi & Tamil) 3D casual sports game wherein the player gets to play the role of their favourite wicket-keeper and recently launched ‘Space Finder’, an endless casual game offering space travel to players for iOS and Android users.

Along with Apple Store on iOS and Google Play Store on Android, players can download ‘Food Delivery Run’ from Catappult, Apptoide, Indus IOS, Amazon Apps, Samsung Apps, Cherry Mobile, Multilaser, 9 Apps, Bemobi, GetJar, Appxplore.

Download Food Delivery Run now, and zip, zap & zoom through city traffic to become a star delivery rider!

Game links below

Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.platanista.fooddeliveryrun&hl=en_IN

iOS: https://apps.apple.com/in/app/food-delivery-run/id1507998016

Indian Startup Dhiway Joins the ToIP Global Foundation as Founding Member

Governments, nonprofits and private sectors across finance, health care, enterprise software and more team up with Linux Foundation to enhance universal security and privacy protocols for consumers and businesses in the digital era

Dhiway, India’s first Verifiable Data Exchange Platform joined the Trust over IP (ToIP) Foundation as a Founding Steering Committee member, to help enable trustworthy exchange and verification of data between any two parties on the Internet. The ToIP Foundation is hosted at the Linux Foundation with the goal of creating a robust common standard that gives people and businesses the confidence that data is coming from a trusted source, allowing them to connect, interact and innovate at a speed and scale not possible today. 

Dhiway is a startup out of Bengaluru, India. Founded by technologists with extensive experience in building open source projects which scale, Dhiway is committed to working with open standards in order to drive innovation.  Dhiway builds data interchange systems and enables organizations to deploy governance frameworks to sustain these as sustainable digital assets.

“Our strategic initiatives are designed to bring a higher degree of assurance to the exchange of data between peers, over the Internet and other digital networks. Our participation is aligned with our vision to make the world more transparent and trusted, using digital frameworks that can be universally referenced, understood, and consumed,” said Satish Mohan, Founder & CTO, Dhiway. “We intend to contribute our knowledge and expertise towards the mission of establishing a complete architecture for Internet-scale digital trust that combines cryptographic trust at the machine layer with human trust at the business, legal, and social layers.”

The ToIP Foundation is being developed with global, pan-industry support from leading organizations with sector-specific expertise. The other Founding Steering Committee members include Accenture, BrightHive, Cloudocracy, Continuum Loop, CULedger, esatus, Evernym, Finicity, Futurewei Technologies, IBM Security, IdRamp, Lumedic, Mastercard, MITRE, the Province of British Columbia and SICPA. Contributing members include DIDx, GLEIF, The Human Colossus Foundation, iRespond, kiva.org, Marist College, Northern Block, R3, Secours.io, TNO and University of Arkansas. Dhiway is proud to belong to this foundation, the only Indian company to do so.

The authenticity and verification of data sources is a key challenge for businesses worldwide. The deficit in confidence has an impact on the adoption of key business drivers such as digital identity, verifiable credentials, and smart contracts. The operational efficiency of businesses; ease of access to markets and convenience of transactions are focus areas to build through innovation and introduction of new products and technologies.

“The time has never been more important to advance an integrated stack for digital trust, which is clear from the strong representation of companies across industries that are supporting this work,” said Drummond Reed, interim executive director, ToIP Foundation. “We’re pleased to have Dhiway contributing this work and look forward to the collaboration.”

The Linux Foundation’s open governance model enables the ToIP Foundation to advance a combination of technology and governance standards for digital trust in a neutral forum that supports pan-industry collaboration. An open governance model that can be integrated into the development of the standards for digital trust is essential where the business, legal, and social guidelines for technology adoption impacts human trust and behaviour.

The ToIP Foundation will initially host four Working Groups. The Technical Stack Working Group and the Governance Stack Working Group will focus on building out and hardening the Technical and Governance halves of the ToIP stack, respectively. The Utility Foundry Working Group and the Ecosystem Foundry Working Group will serve as communities of practice for projects that wish to collaborate on the development of ToIP utility networks or entire ToIP digital trust ecosystems.

The ToIP Foundation will host an all-digital launch event on May 7, 2020, at 9:30 PM IST (9AM PDT) that will feature a panel discussion, interoperability demonstration and live Q&A. Register now for the live event. A second event will be hosted for the APAC region on May 8, 2020, at 6:30 AM IST (6:00 PM PDT).

Manipal Hospitals Bangalore Collaborates with Government of Karnataka to Conduct E-Rounds Initiative

Manipal Hospitals Bangalore in a bid to support Government of Karnataka (GOK) to combat pandemic cases is providing support via conducting E-rounds for high risk Covid Patients across 7 districts of the State. The war room set up in Bangalore, comprising of Principal Secretary for health and family welfare, health commissioner and government appointed doctors facilitate virtual health rounds between the districts and the specialists. The team facilitates consultations via video conference with all the Hospitals twice daily. Over the last 2 weeks, a specialist team comprising of a Geriatrician, Intensivist, Pulmonologist, Anesthetist and Nephrologist have been monitoring critically ill COVID – 19 centres across the state.

The expert team of doctors are getting together virtually everyday at 11:00am and 18:00pm to evaluate cases of SARI (Severe Acute Respiratory Illness) and ILI (Influenza Like Illnesses), across 7 districts of the State i.e Belagavi, Bidar, Kalburgi, Vijayapura, Gadag and Dakshina Kannada and Davangere. Identifying critically ill patients, going through the case records, lab investigations, XRays and coming up with a treatment protocol in conjunction with the treating doctors at these district hospitals has now become a routine. The doctors go through all the case details and come up with individual management plans.

The doctors have relentlessly supported and carried out 550 clinical interventions so far and more than 570 case discussions have happened until date. Around 47 lifesaving interventions like ventilation, dialysis, inotropes and thrombolysis have been performed. 40 of the 160 critically ill cases have recovered.

Dr. Trilok Chandra, IAS officer said, “The war room at Bengaluru maintains a parallel case sheet of every critical patient in the state. The expert team interacts with the local doctors four times a day and takes stock of the treatment being given to each of them. If required, the experts the experts also suggest the next line of treatment that can improve the condition of the patients. The main intention of the e-rounds is to ensure that not a single ICU patient is lost to Covid-19.

He further added “The team has taken telemedicine facility to a new level, where doctors from private hospitals have also joined the hands to fight this pandemic. As and when required, they take inputs from medical experts from other private hospitals also including paediatricians”

Along with medical interventions, the e-round team has also begun interacting with district administration and district health officers to ensure the doctors and medical staff receive all the required equipment and medicines to treat the patients.

Dr. Anoop Amarnath, Chief of Clinical Services at Manipal Hospitals, who is handling the e-rounds said, “This a very good example of how public-private partnership can work to improve accessibility to healthcare. Digital health enables remote care delivery. The e-rounds help in providing peer reviewed, best practice guidelines virtually. This is a thoughtful and wonderful initiative by Government of Karnataka which is helping critical patients through collaborative efforts.”

Sharing his thoughts Dr. Satyanarayana Mysore, HOD Interventional Pulmonology & Sleep Medicine, Manipal Hospitals Bangalore, “We have been able to streamline care, process of healthcare and this has reduced mortality in 6 districts of north Karnataka. It takes nearly 6 hours a day to get this private government partnership going to achieve low mortality amongst covid19 patients. This is in addition to our regular patient care.

Dr Sunil Karanth, Chairman, Critical Care Services, Manipal Hospitals said, “The COVID 19 pandemic has created tremendous distortion in all walks of life. During this health care professionals from different spheres have united to fight this common enemy. In a unique PPP, the state's health authority has teamed up with many private hospitals for conducting E-Rounds of critically ill COVID suspect patients in the second tier cities and interior parts of the state. This gives access to take expertise from the tertiary level hospitals to the grass roots and help saving lives.

Piramal Swasthya Attends Over 2.5 Lakh Calls on COVID-19 Via 104 Health Information Helpline

Piramal Swasthya Management and Research Institute, an initiative of Piramal Foundation, in partnership with various State Governments has managed to address over 2.5 lakh calls related to COVID-19 queries through 104 Health Information Helpline services. The Health Helpline in partnership State Governments of Assam, Jharkhand, Bihar and Chhattisgarh attended to these calls during the lockdown period from March 25, 2020 until date. On an average, the 104-Health Helpline received around 20,000 calls in a day.

During this COVID-19 pandemic, the 104 Health Information Helpline has been acting as a channel between the governments and the communities by offering validated medical advice to the callers 24x7 every day of the week. It has undertaken several unique and customised initiatives in collaboration with State Governments to create awareness around Covid-19 cases. State Governments of Assam, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Bihar have announced 104 helpline as one stop solution for all COVID -19 queries and grievances.

In order to deal with increased number of calls, the frontline staff team has been significantly expanded as per state requirement. Currently, over 1200 staff across various centres that includes paramedics, counsellors and doctors, are relentlessly attending to calls related to health advice, counselling, information sharing and reporting of COVID-19.

Paresh Parasnis, CEO, Piramal Foundation said, “At Piramal Swasthya we stay resolute in our efforts to support Central and State Governments to address the COVID-19 pandemic, even in the remotest part of the country. The 104 health helpline proved to be a simple and yet effective tool to share validated information as per the guidelines of WHO and Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, especially for people who are not technology savvy or live in areas where access to media is challenging.  This initiative has helped in creating awareness thus bringing down the anxiety and fear in the society caused due to the coronavirus.”

In the year 2006, Piramal Swasthya started 104 Health Information Helpline in India as a one stop solution for all health-related information and advice. The service is supported by innovative software application and Clinical Decision Support System of validated algorithms and disease summaries and helps in tackling shortage of human resource enabling access to quality Healthcare services.

Piramal Swasthya in partnership with the state governments has been supporting beneficiaries through 104 Health Helpline across 7 states – Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka and Bihar.