Replace Google Meet With These Platforms For Team Communication

Are you stuck juggling between your non-Google mail client and Google Meet for chatting? Are you not comfortable using your personal Google account or WhatsApp to chat with your co-workers? Maybe you’re just looking for something new and integrated.

Hangouts or Meet isn’t your only option anymore—the remote work boom (thanks to the pandemic) has brought out a handful of chat tools that let you connect with your colleagues, with added features like video chats and audio messaging. Plus, Hangouts simply isn’t enough for your business—especially if you need file sharing.

Here are some of the top alternatives for Google Hangouts to help you pick the right tool for your business communication.

1. Flock

Flock is built for communicating with your colleagues, just like Google Hangouts. But it goes beyond just chat and video conferencing—Flock works with all your other productivity tools like Google Calendar, Asana, Zoom, and many more.

Like Hangouts/Meet, you can find all your company contacts right within Flock. Flock takes a step further with a company directory and the facility to search for and join group conversations (channels) for any project you’re working on. Alos, unlike Hangouts, Flock has built-in audio and video conferencing as well as the ability to leave an audio message in any channel.

Flock is free for small teams that are just getting started, with unlimited messages, 10 public channels, and unlimited 1:1 video calls. Midsize teams who need more features can use Flock PRO and larger enterprises can upgrade with additional features

2. Slack

Slack, a software for business, works as a central hub for all your business’s communication, setting up separate channels and bringing on “the death of email” as they call it. Slack makes it easy to navigate multiple conversations at all times, with easy-to-find channels and the ability to join multiple Slack teams with just one login.

While Slack’s video functionality works well for 1:1 chats, it isn’t built around video conferencing. For group calls on video, you’ll need a Zoom or Jitsi integration, just like platforms such as Flock.

3. Telegram

Telegram calls itself “the world’s fastest messaging app,” and allows quick sharing of videos, gifs, images, geolocation, and documents. Its “secret chats,” similar to Snapchat, are encrypted end-to-end with a self-destruct mechanism that deletes messages after a set period of time, from one second to one week. However, Telegram chats aren’t normally encrypted—so if you’re looking for a secure communication tool for your business, Telegram may not be your best bet.

Video calling on Telegram is new as of 2020 and only available for 1:1 videos. The jury's still out on whether it's an effective video conferencing tool—but its new profile video feature is a standout that this writer is hoping to see become the standard across messaging platforms. Telegram is best for small working groups or nonprofessional teams. Use it as a regular messaging app for more than two individuals. Telegram's runs on a "free forever" model.

4. Skype

Skype is a household name for those who communicate with loved ones or business partners who live a great distance away. However, Skype has traditionally been for one on one communications and only recently began to dive into supporting multiple profiles in one meeting.

Skype has proven to be reliable but is sketchy when it comes to business use. The reason for this is based upon the limited number of participants allowed at one time, which is currently capped at ten users.

A benefit to Skype is the ability to share files with participants, share screens, as well as an impressive chat feature.

5. Jitsi

Jitsi is an open-source platform that replaces Google Hangouts’ and Google Meets' chat and video functions. Jitsi allows for screen sharing and web conferencing and requires no software downloads; there’s a mobile app, too. Jitsi provides VoIP and Jabber texting for quick communication. The simple interface makes it a free and easy Google Hangouts alternative for small groups or 1:1 interactions. Jitsi is free and requires no signup to use.

Indus Health Plus Ties-Up with OYO Hotels & Homes, Provides COVID-19 Testing Assistance to Travelers

Indus Health Plus, a pioneer in preventive healthcare has today, announced its partnership with OYO Hotels & Homes, the world’s leading hospitality chain to extend its services to conduct COVID-19 detection tests. The collaboration aims to provide a convenient platform for COVID-19 detection tests for the people who are planning their travels. It is essential if a person is travelling to a state that is following pre-travel COVID test guidelines. In addition, through this service, travellers will be able to easily book an appointment call back for a COVID-19 test from OYO’s app and its website across all major metros, tier I and tier-II cities. This service will enable customers of OYO to plan a safe and healthy trip along with a peace of mind.

This development will also help in enhancing the company’s focus on preventing and controlling disease transmission through extensive testing of COVID-19. These COVID-19 detection tests will be priced at standard rates as followed by respective states.

Amol Naikawadi, Joint Managing Director, Indus Health Plus, commented on this development said, “Our organization is committed to prevention and we believe that as the lockdown state comes to an end, travelling will become more frequent. Hence, it will be critical to have a preventive healthcare system in place to test people travelling to states where pre-travel tests guidelines are mandatory. We have partnered with OYO Hotels to extend our support to fight this pandemic and provide ease to OYO Hotels customers in different parts of the country. We will continue to provide support and identify opportunities where Indus Health Plus can be a part to control this challenging situation in our country.”

Commenting on the partnership, Rohit Kapoor, Chief Executive Officer, OYO India & South Asia, said “We’re seeing really positive signs of travel coming back. After spending months under lockdown and now, restrictions easing across the country, consumers are looking forward to stepping out and exploring new destinations, closer to home, and of course with utmost precautions. While intentions to travel are strengthening, our teams are working round the clock to also strengthen our offerings, and our value to the consumer.”

He added, “For instance, to ensure we come up with the most useful solutions for travellers, our senior leaders have personally spoken with nearly 2000+ consumers to understand their aspirations and worries, their concerns, and requirements. Through these conversations, we understood that leisure travel is on the rise but consumers are still cautious about sanitisation and regulations, and therefore, we launched Sanitised Stays to increase our standard of hygiene at OYO properties. To make the planning process easier for consumers, we also introduced Travel Assistance on our app to help with COVID-19 testing and state-wise guidelines, therefore, becoming a part of our guests’ journey right from the very beginning.”

The service will allow the customers to book a sample collection from home or make an appointment at a screening center as per convenience.

E-commerce Start-Up The Indus Valley Wins Prestigious TiE50 Award at TiEcon 2020

 

The Indus Valley a D2C natural cookware brand is excited to announce that it has been selected as a 2020 TiE50 Winner in the prestigious TiE50 Awards Program. This ten-year-old awards competition is a program of TiEcon, the world's largest conference for tech entrepreneurs.

The Indus Valley was founded in 2016 by the husband and wife duo Jagadeesh Kumar and Madhumitha Udaykumar. After receiving funding from The Chennai Angels, they have managed to grow rapidly and are currently at the 25 Crore ARR.

They are on a mission to make all Indian kitchens natural and safe. They design and sell natural cookware products like iron tawa (griddle), cast iron Kadai (frying pan) and wooden spatulas.

“Customer is in the centre of everything we do. Being a D2C brand we are close to the customer and continuously make improvements.” said Jagadeesh, to which Madhumitha added “The products that we develop are designed for Indian food. We have a strong iterative product development method that helps us continuously launch new products and improve our products and process.”

The TiE50 Awards was presented virtually to the winners during a ceremony on September 3rd. The Indus Valley was recognized for its work as a trusted consumer brand using the D2C e-commerce model.

"TiE50 again attracted high potential startups bringing innovation from different parts of the world. Besides the recognition associated with the TiE50 award, this year TiE50 also partnered with Meet the Draper's, a ground-breaking reality show to give an opportunity to some companies to pitch to the show," said Kamal Anand, TiE50 Program Chair, while speaking about the Award Program.

"For over 28 years as a not-for-profit organization dedicated to fostering entrepreneurship and with a global footprint of half a million entrepreneurs, enterprise executives, and investment professionals, at TiE Silicon Valley we take pride in the fact that we have created TiE50, a strong 10-year-old brand for recognizing high potential startups," said BJ Arun, President, TiE Silicon Valley.

With this added dose of enthusiasm and recognition, The Indus Valley will continue building a strong presence in the cookware space. The company sells on their own website (https://www.theindusvalley.in/), as well as marketplace presence on Amazon, Tata Cliq and Flipkart among others. 

Currently the company is processing 15000 + monthly shipments. They are a strong 100+ member team. They have reached 1,00,000+ customers in 6000+ pin codes. Going forward, The Indus Valley plans to focus more on product development and research. “Our financial goal is to reach an INR 100 Cr ARR by 2022,” said Jagadeesh, adding that the company also has plans to extend its reach beyond the current category and is working on raising fresh capital to fuel the growth.

Hindware Promotes Safe Public Hygiene Practices In Bengaluru Through a Distinct Campaign - ‘Safety in Your Hands’!

Reiterating its commitment towards promoting good health and hygiene in the society, Brilloca Ltd, makers of India’s iconic bathware brand, Hindware, launched the second phase of their ongoing campaign– ‘Safety in your Hands’.

Having catered to over 1 lakh people in the first phase by installing 8 contactless handwash booths in the Delhi NCR region, the company has now launched the campaign in Bengaluru.

Hindware contactless handwash booths are installed at four high footfall locations across Bengaluru including Corporation Circle, Majestic, Sattelite and Guttahali. Through this unique initiative, the company aims to continue propagating the message and importance of maintaining proper sanitation and personal hygiene.

In keeping with the brand’s legacy of driving innovation as per the evolving needs of the community, the sensor-based handwashing system addresses one of the key priorities of the nation, i.e., creating awareness and building access to safe and hygienic hand-washing facilities at public places.

To create awareness among the masses and drive behavior change, the Company has introduced a series of thoughtful initiatives, both on-ground and through its social media platforms (@Hindware_Homes on YouTube, twitter, Facebook and Instagram). These include safety-oriented videos and posts, instructions on using the contactless handwashing booths and interaction with users near the stations. 

Commenting on the occasion, Mr Sanjay Kalra, CEO, Bath Products & Tiles, Brilloca Limited, said, “Having received an overwhelming response with over 1 lakh hand washes in phase one, we have commenced phase two of the ‘Hindware, Safety in your Hands’ campaign in our effort to continue promoting health and hygiene. As the country unlocks, it necessitates the cultivation of a conscious practice of washing hands, especially when accessing public places. Aimed at driving a behavioral change through this campaign, we are encouraging safe and hygienic practices by placing these booths at high footfall locations and expect to bring about the change which has become an imperative for the new normal”

Crafted after a thorough study at Hindware Design Studio, the contactless hand wash system is fitted with sensor operated faucet, basin and foot operated soap dispenser with a digital sensor, keeping a count of hand-washes of a particular station.

Ms Charu Malhotra Bhatia, Vice President - Marketing., Brilloca Limited, added, “It is imperative that the brands, with their expertise and knowledge, bring solutions that contribute towards the larger priority of the nation. Through this initiative, we want to do our bit where there is a seamless connect with our products and offerings with the societal cause. Coming from a brand of Indian lineage and our legacy, we take it as our responsibility to drive behavioral change in the changed normal.”

Hindware has been a pioneer and trend setter in the sanitaryware segment for more than six decades. As India’s leading sanitaryware and faucets brand, it has a strong brand recall and loyal customer base of millions across the country. Driven by innovation at the Hindware Design Studio, it brings together a perfect amalgamation of technology and aesthetics, creating bathroom products that are aligned with the evolving consumer requirements offering quality, design and trust of brand Hindware.

Nutrify India Partners with NRDC to Promote Reliable and Competitive Technologies from R&D Institutes

Nutrify India, a leading nutra-consulting firm and Ideas-To-Commercialization platform in Nutraceuticals, has announced its partnership with National Research Development Corporation (NRDC). NRDC was established in 1953 by the Government of India, with the primary objective to promote, develop and commercialise technologies from various national R&D institutions and universities and is presently working under the administrative control of the Department of Scientific & Industrial Research, Ministry of Science & Technology.

The partnership has been created with an aim to promote, develop, nurture and commercialize innovative, reliable and competitive technologies from R&D institutes through value addition. The association has already resulted in one big success story of EspererOnco Nutrition and now there are Nutra startups in India who will be jointly screened by Nutrify India and NRDC to support them till commercialization. Nutrify India will continue hand holding till larger market access in India and abroad. As per this agreement, Nutrify India will have an office representation in NRDC headquarters too.

Commenting on the partnership, Amit Srivastava, Chief Catalyst, Nutrify India, "Post -Covid 19, the Nutraceuticals space has witnessed unprecedented growth as preventive health has sharply come into focus. Nutrify India is focused on helping expanding business horizons for companies in the Nutraceutical space by helping them with business collaborations and creating synergies.With this collaboration, we plan to create an innovative ecosystem for all startups. It is an honour to have NRDC as our partner in this mission of providing aid to all the startups to expand their horizons.

“India is a fast-growing Nutraceutical hub and if it has to evolve into a global epicenter of nutraceuticals then it has to be concerted effort by industry bodies like Nutrify India and government bodies like NRDC. We are privileged to join hands with Nutrify India along with many universities and institutions. With this collaboration, the objective is to protect the indigenous process and product so that it could be make it market table export potential. Today, intellectual property is very important for all the sector of the technology without that we are not going to mitigate the challenge what we have been facing”, said the Regional Head of NRDC- Dr BK Sahu.

Growth Of Sports In India : Fantasy Gaming The Country's New Booming Sport

The Indian fantasy sports market has shown phenomenal growth. Gross revenues of online fantasy sports operators stood at ₹2,400 crore in FY20 compared to ₹920 crore in FY19, up almost three times year-on-year, according to the FIFS-KPMG 2020 report. Cricket continues to dominate the sports arena, but the emerging generation is fast developing interest in the rapidly growing sport, football, which also happens to be the second most popular fantasy game of choice.

Taking cue from the same,  India's first football dedicated fantasy gaming app Twelfth Man, the flagship product of NxGn Sports Interactive launched in April 2020 with the Indian football legend Sunil Chhetri as its brand ambassador has successfully grown from a piece of document to a strong community of 500k users. The app currently follows the freemium model & gives the users an option to play for free as well. In a short span of time, the app has gained about 10k + followers on Instagram; about 82K + page likes on Facebook; about 2K subscribers on YouTube; about 5k followers on Twitter.

The long-term plan of Twelfth Man is to become the go-to Football app in India, and one of the biggest football communities in India with special focus on supporting the growth of fan culture in India and creating a positive impact on Indian football.   The Indian Fantasy Sports industry grew at a CAGR of approximately 215% from 2016 to 2020 and is expected to cross the $3.7 billion mark by 2024. In the same time frame between 2016 and 2020, the Indian Fantasy Sports' user base grew from a meagre 4 million to over 90 million users.  

Female Workforce Participation Increased from 30% in April to Reach 37% at the End of July: LinkedIn

LinkedIn, the world’s largest online professional network, today announced findings of the second edition of the ‘Labour Market Update’, a monthly update on hiring trends and insights based on LinkedIn's Economic Graph, a digital representation of the Indian economy built by conducting a close analysis of actions of 69+ million members in India. The ‘Labour Market Update’ highlights the hiring rate in India, female representation across the workforce and in key sectors, and the impact on hiring rates for talent with digital skills. Insights from this edition show that hiring continues to recover, gender parity has improved, and disruptive digital skills can help to increase the resilience of professionals to challenges in the current job market.

Hiring picked up by 25 percentage points by end of July as compared to June

The Labour Market Update analysis for July looks at the year-on-year changes in hiring rate, which is a measure of hires divided by LinkedIn membership. Earlier in the year, hiring declines reached a low of below -50% year-on-year in April, before starting to slowly recover. The hiring rate was at -15% year-on-year as of the end of June. In late July, it crossed the 0% mark and reached positive territory of around +10% year-on-year as of the end of July, registering a 25 percentage point improvement compared to the end of June. However, risks of second-wave of infections still remain, and further recovery may also be tempered by weak economic outlook.

India increased gender parity during lockdown

Globally, lockdown measures put in place to contain the spread of Covid-19 had a more severe impact on the share of women being hired. Our global analysis showed that the hiring of women in many developed countries followed a U-shaped trajectory in 2020, dipping in April before recovering in June and July. However, India bucked the trend in maintaining and even increasing gender parity - the share of female hires increased from around 30% in April to reach 37% at the end of July.

One possible reason for this could be the strong support from live-in help and grandparents, as well as more flexible working hours with remote working schemes, which has allowed more women have been able to enter the workforce despite schools and childcare facilities being closed during the lock-down.

“In India, work from home has certainly boosted gender parity and emerged as a great equalizer in terms of gender diversity with increase in female representation across key sectors. The lockdown, which promoted acceptance of the work from home concept supported by flexible work hours, has emerged as an opportunity for women to rebuild their careers and start afresh,” said Pei Ying Chua, APAC Lead Economist, Economic Graph team at LinkedIn.

Gender parity has improved across many industries: Female representation grew by 8 percentage points across Corporate Services, Education, Health Care and Media & Communications

With the exception of the Manufacturing sector, female representation across most industries increased during the lockdown period and continued to rise in subsequent months. The increase in female representation was also more pronounced in industries which already had higher gender parity to begin with (such as Corporate Services, Education, Health Care and Media & Communications) - female representation grew by 8 percentage points on average, in contrast with the 4 percentage points increase seen for industries that started out with lower gender parity (such as Consumer Goods, Finance, Manufacturing and Software & IT). It is possible that these industries are inherently more family-friendly in terms of flexible hours and work arrangements, hence the challenges of having to juggle work and household responsibilities has led more females to join those industries.  

Talent with disruptive digital skills have weathered the COVID storm better

This analysis looks at the hiring rates of talent with basic digital skills (defined as digital literacy skills to access email and basic applications such as Microsoft Office), versus advanced disruptive digital skills (defined as skills required for designing and developing new technologies, such as artificial intelligence and robotics). From the data, we see that talent with more advanced digital skills have weathered the COVID storm better than those with basic digital skills - the hiring dip for talent with advanced digital skills was 1.8x less than talent with basic digital skills.

Examples of disruptive digital skills: Aerospace Engineering, Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, Development Tools, Genetic Engineering, Human Computer Interaction, Materials Science, Nanotechnology, Robotics.