With the start of general elections as a source of revenue Bharti Airtel’s direct-to-home arm is ready to launch its mobile DTH units for cars.

The company that launched its DTH operations in October last year is in talks with various automobile companies to install their mobile DTH units.

DTH in cars works with the help of a special auto-tracking antenna that is mounted on the roof of the car. The antenna tracks the company’s satellite placed in orbit at 36,000 km, from where signals will be fed to the set top box placed near the television set inside the car. This will enable seamless transmission of satellite channels in the vehicle.

N Arjun, executive director of DTH Services of Bharti Airtel Ltd says, “We have a product for SUVs, trains and buses. The cost of installations is high. That is why we are talking about higher-end side of the market, like SUVs and trains.”

Not revealing the cost of Bharti Airtel’s mobile DTH unit, N Arjun said, “We are in talks with a host of companies for these products, but haven’t commercially launched it right now.”

This service was launched by Essel Group’s Dish TV in 2007, which has found a few hundred takers for this service. A company spokesperson said, “Election is a major puller for this service. Politicians and other interested parties need information round the clock so this keeps them connected to the news all the time. This service is substantially present in the metros.” The installation of a DTH unit in a vehicle costs upwards of Rs 150,000.

MORE…

It’s official now: Even Google can’t escape the recession. With its first-quarter results on Apr. 16, the leader in Web search revealed its first quarter-on-quarter decline in sales, reflecting cutbacks in online ad spending. Thanks to cost cutting, Google handily beat profit expectations, but it offered no assurance that overall business conditions would turn around anytime soon.

Google’s revenue, almost all of which comes from advertisements placed next to related search results, rose 6% from a year earlier but slipped 3% from the fourth quarter. Sales, after subtracting commissions to Web site partners, were $4.07 billion. That’s about what analysts, who have been reducing their estimates in recent weeks, had expected.

Investors initially liked what they saw, boosting the stock almost 6% in extended trading after the figures were released. After all, Google’s slowdown looks good compared with the larger advertising market, which is expected to fall at least 5% this year. But as it became apparent that Google’s underlying business was feeling the effects of the recession, shares reversed course and gained only a fraction of 1%. “The quarter confirms that Google is suffering from the economic slowdown,” says Sandeep Aggarwal, analyst at financial-services firm Collins Stewart.

MORE…

Infosys Technologies has fired 2,100 people across the country, after an annual performance appraisal exercise concluded mid-March. TV Mohandas Pai, head of the company’s HR, told TOI that based on the performance, 2,100 employees had left Infosys. “The tolerance for non-performance has come down to zero,” said Pai.

“The appraisal was conducted for 60,000 of our employees. At the bottom, some 3.5% of the people were either outplaced or left the company. It’s an annual scenario after every performance assessment. In fact, normally the bottom size is 5%,” he said. Trainees were not part of this exercise.

Outplacement is a new jargon used by enterprises, which means off-loading excess/unwanted staff to another employer. However, outplacing is not a viable option in the current scenario where few jobs are available in the market.

Infosys currently has an employee base of 1,05,000 which includes 45,000 trainees who were not part of this appraisal exercise. During quarter ending December 31, the company had a total headcount of 1,03,078.

A quarter ago Infosys had said it would hire 26,000 people during fiscal 2008-09, more than what it had projected in the beginning of the year. During the third quarter, the company made a gross addition of 5,997 with the net intake being 2,772.

Infosys has made offers to around 20,000 engineering graduates for the current year. The company has been vocal about honouring all the offers it made to freshers. Infosys’ earnings for 2008-09 will be out on April 15.

[SOURCE]

Computer giant Microsoft has signed a $170-million, five-year contract with India’s HCL  for outsourcing work for its online business productivity suite.

HCL will provide 600 employees to support the contract and nearly 250 workers have already begun work on the project.

Microsoft has not said whether this contract is to replace any existing agreement it has in India, or if this deal is an expansion of its current outsourcing scope.

Despite the recent job cuts, Microsoft has been expanding its online services business and has recently announced plans to make its business productivity online suite, a software-as-a-service offering, available for trial and purchase in 19 countries.

Three Indian entities — Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries, diversified conglomerate Tata Group and IT bellwether Infosys have
entered BusinessWeek magazine’s list of world’s 50 most innovative companies, topped by iPhone maker Apple.

The league of innovative firms also features NRI Lakshmi Mittal-led world’s largest steel producer ArcelorMittal.

Among the 50 companies, Tata Group ranks 13th, Reliance Industries 15th and Infosys 26th.

Tata Group and Reliance Industries have been ranked ahead of American industrial conglomerate General Electric (17), German car manufacturer BMW (20), Japanese auto firm Honda Motor (22) and telecom major AT&T (23), among others.

However, while the Tata Group slipped in ranking from the sixth place in 2008, Reliance Industries has improved its previous year’s rank 19. Infosys was not in the list in 2008.

BusinessWeek has placed ArcelorMittal at the 35th spot. Among the top five, Apple is followed by Internet search giant Google at the second position. Both companies have retained their respective ranks from last year.

Japanese auto maker Toyota Motor, software major Microsoft and Jap

[SOURCE]

A voluminous 65,000 page chargesheet in the Satyam case was produced in the CBI court in Hyderabad on Tuesday and it was filed in a record 45 days since the CBI took over the case from the CID.

The chargesheet also consists of 1532 documents as evidence with 433 witness statements.

Sources say that CBI could meet the deadline due to the presence of the multidisciplinary team which examined the various parts of the case.

So while SEBI focussed on the capital markets and the issue of insider trading amounting to Rs 700 crore, SFIO focussed on inflation of accounts and the fraudulent methods used by the management.

More than 7000 fake invoices were recovered and evidence of loans arranged for the Raju’s family through 327 companies were also gathered.

So what did it take to come out with such a voluminous chargesheet within 90 days?

The core investigating team comprised of 11 officers from CBI, 14 officers who formed the multidisciplinary team, 10 junior officers worked on gathering the evidence and and 4 public prosecutors to help with the legal issues.

And ever since the scam broke out, these officers have worked for 16 hours a day sacrificing their weekly offs and public holidays.

But there were a few surprises too in the chargesheet. Contrary to common belief, there was no mention of siphoning of funds to the Maytas companies owned by the promoter family something that the Raju family has been maintaining since the fraud came to light on January 7.

“We have filed the chargesheet and the investigations are going on. But as and when facts come out we would file supplementary chargesheets,” said VV Laxminarayana, DIG, CBI.

With the chargesheet done, the next task before the agency would be to ensure strict sentences against the accused.

While there is no evidence of siphoning of funds which could have invited a more harsh sentence for Satyam’s former chairman Raju, CBI maintains that the charge under section 467 of the IPC dealing with forgery of valuable securities alone could give Raju life in prison while the other charges could give him a measly 2-7 years in jail once the charges are proved in court.

[SOURCE]