Archive for ‘Digital communications’

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23/01/2013

* Mahindra Sees IT Revival

WSJ: “It is good to do the first interview in Davos with someone who can feel the pulse of the global economy, and Anand Mahindra, chairman and managing director Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. 500520.BY -0.19%, can to an extent do that.

Sure, the giant Mahindra federation of companies—don’t call it a conglomerate, please—has many large businesses focused on its home market of India. But its information technology business relies on the investment decisions taken in the boardrooms of New York, London and Frankfurt—and the feeling of Mr. Mahindra is positive.

“The IT companies are going to see a revival,” says the Harvard-educated Mr. Mahindra. “I have been surprised at how strong the recovery has been.”

“What we are seeing is that customers in the west, by which I mean U.S., U.K. and Western Europe, these companies have not shied away in the last year from making the necessary investments in IT that they need to improve their businesses.”

That would be good news for the broader IT sector in India, which started the year with upbeat corporate results from some of the big players, but then some of the shine diminished when No. 3 player Wipro Ltd. 507685.BY +0.75% said it didn’t see any significant increase in demand.

It would also be good news for the broader global economy. Mr. Mahindra says, “I don’t think anyone in the world uses Indian IT companies as a barometer, but I think it’s a very interesting one.”

Mahindra & Mahindra has an incredibly diverse range of businesses, from tractors to parts for jet fighters to rural lending.

Mahindra Group has two software services companies—Tech Mahindra Ltd. and Satyam Computer Services Ltd. 500376.BY -0.30% The two companies have already announced a merger, which will create the fifth biggest Indian software services company by sales.

For the domestic business environment, he says he is more optimistic now than he has been for a couple of years.”

via Mahindra Sees IT Revival – India Real Time – WSJ.

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22/01/2013

* China Pushes Industry Consolidation

WSJ: “China’s industry ministry on Tuesday set an aggressive goal of forging global giants in the electronics sector within the next two years through mergers and alliances, and reiterated a longstanding push for Chinese companies to explore overseas acquisitions.

The target for the electronics sector is part of a wider plan to consolidate China’s fragmented major industries, including steel, shipping, automotives, cement and aluminum. Overcapacity in heavy industries has been blamed for amplifying a sharp slowdown in growth in the last two years.”

via China Pushes Industry Consolidation – WSJ.com.

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08/01/2013

* India Proposes Curbs on Tech Imports

WSJ: “India has proposed sweeping curbs on the import of technology products ranging from laptops to Wi-Fi devices to computer-network equipment.

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The proposed regulations, which were reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, would create an expansive “Buy India” mandate requiring a large percentage of the high-tech goods sold in the country to be manufactured locally.

If implemented, the rules could wreak havoc on the business plans of a wide range of U.S. and other foreign firms, including hardware-makers Cisco Systems Inc. CSCO -0.40% and Dell DELL -2.22% Inc.; services companies such as International Business Machines IBM -0.64% Corp.; and telecom-gear suppliers such as Nokia Siemens Networks B.V. and Telefon AB L.M. Ericsson ERIC-B.SK -3.89% .

To comply with the rules, foreign companies would have to set up factories in India quickly—possibly as soon as April—or significantly expand their existing manufacturing capacity in a country where the infrastructure is poor and building plants can take years because of red tape and other hassles.

Or they could face the loss of current business—collectively the industries affected generate billions of dollars in sales here annually—and the chance to tap into what is expected to be a booming technology market in years to come. Spending in India’s technology and electronics market is expected to reach about $400 billion by 2020, up from $45 billion in 2009.

Proposed regulations would require most high-tech goods sold in India to be made there. A Dell factory in India.

The rules are in draft form, and their sweep may reflect some brinkmanship on the part of the Indian government, which wants foreign firms to increase manufacturing in India. The government could still choose to delay or scale back its plan.

Still, U.S. lobbyists and industry are strenuously opposing the proposals, which have quickly become the most serious point of tension in commercial relations between the two countries. The proposals also aren’t the U.S. government’s only concern. It is also trying to head off Indian anti-tax-avoidance rules that would expose foreign investors to huge potential liability if they take effect in April as planned.

“India is the largest free-market democracy in the world. To mandate local manufacturing is antithetical to the very concept of a free marketplace,” said Ron Somers, president of the U.S.-India Business Council, a lobby group for U.S. firms in India.”

via India Proposes Curbs on Tech Imports – WSJ.com.

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31/12/2012

* Report confirms blog’s power in fighting graft

This research report confirms what has been obvious for several years: the power of the Internet over formal communications channels.

China Daily: “Micro blogs, like the social networking site Sina Weibo, have improved authority’s efficiency in handling anti-corruption cases, but also pose challenges in distinguishing true from false, according to a recently released report by Shanghai Jiao Tong University’s Public Opinion Research Lab.

Of the 24 widespread micro blog reports this year, nine have been confirmed as frauds, the report said.

“The micro blog plays a major role in fighting corruption nowadays, but posts online need to be carefully sifted to find what is reliable information,” the report said.

As more netizens become familiar with and participate in fighting corruption, more messages spread each day that await authorities’ attention, said Xie Yungeng, an expert in public opinion and new media at Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

“A regulation should be established on what kind of reports discipline authorities should respond to and set time limits for their response,” he said.

“The new way of fighting corruption is testing the wisdom and ability of disciplinary bodies,” said Zhu Lijia, a senior researcher at the Chinese Academy of Governance.”

via Report confirms blog’s power in fighting graft[1]|chinadaily.com.cn.

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29/09/2012

* India’s heaviest satellite GSAT-10 launched

The Hindu: “GSAT-10, the country’s newest and heaviest satellite, was launched in the wee hours of Saturday from the Kourou launchpad in French Guiana in South America. It will directly boost telecommunications and direct-to-home broadcasting among others.

The satellite, 9th in ISRO’s present fleet, will be operational in November and add 30 transponders to the domestic INSAT system, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said soon after the launch.

The ISRO launched the 3.4-tonne spacecraft on the European Ariane 5 rocket as the agency cannot currently launch satellites of such mass on its own vehicles. The satellite and the launch fee cost the agency Rs. 750 crore.

The ISRO called its 101st mission “a grand success,” adding that the satellite was in good health.

ISRO’s Chairman and Secretary, Department of Space, Dr. K. Radhakrishnan, and senior scientists have been at the Master Control Facility, Hassan (some 80 km from Bangalore) since Friday evening. It is also the first time that the Chairman was not present at the launch site.”

via The Hindu : News / National : India’s heaviest satellite GSAT-10 launched.

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Posted in Aerospace, Digital communications, Economics, India alert, Space flight, Technology | 1 Comment »

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20/07/2012

* Rural Chinese get online as mobile overtakes desktop

BBC News: “Mobile phones are now the most common way for people to connect to the internet in China, a report has said.

For the first time, desktop computers are no longer the leading method for the country’s 538 million connected citizens to get online.

The report from the China Internet Network Information Center (CINIC) said over 50% of the year’s new internet users were from rural areas.

A fall in smartphone costs has been the key cause of growth, experts said. “Mobile phones are a cheaper and more convenient way to access the internet for [residents in] China’s vast rural areas and for the enormous migrant population,” said the report from the state-linked CINIC.

Mobile internet users now number 388 million, up almost 10% since the start of the year. “Mobile phone prices continued to drop,” the report said.

“The emergence of smartphones under 1,000 yuan [$157, £100] sharply lowered the threshold for using the devices and encouraged average mobile phone users to become mobile web surfers.”

The total number of those online has risen 5% since the end of last year, many of whom are very active in cyberspace.”

via BBC News – Rural Chinese get online as mobile overtakes desktop.

See also: https://chindia-alert.org/economic-factors/information-technology/

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15/07/2012

* Google Tries Something Retro – Made in the U.S.A.

NYTimes: “Etched into the base of Google’s new wireless home media player that was introduced on Wednesday is its most intriguing feature. On the underside of the Nexus Q is a simple inscription: “Designed and Manufactured in the U.S.A.”

The Google executives and engineers who decided to build the player here are engaged in an experiment in American manufacturing. “We’ve been absent for so long, we decided, ‘Why don’t we try it and see what happens?’ ” said Andy Rubin, the Google executive who leads the company’s Android mobile business.

Google is not saying a lot about its domestic manufacturing, declining even to disclose publicly where the factory is in Silicon Valley. It also is not saying much about the source of many of its parts in the United States. And Mr. Rubin said the company was not engaged in a crusade.

Still, the project will be closely watched by other electronics companies. It has become accepted wisdom that consumer electronics products can no longer be made in the United States. During the last decade, abundant low-cost Chinese labor and looser environmental regulations have virtually erased what was once a vibrant American industry.

Since the 1990s, one American company after another, including Hewlett-Packard, Dell and Apple, has become a design and marketing shell, with production shifted to contract manufacturers in Shenzhen and elsewhere in China.

Now that trend may be showing early signs of reversing.

It’s a trickle, but some American companies are again making products in the United States. While many of those companies have been small, like ET Water Systems, there have also been some highly visible moves by America’s largest consumer and industrial manufacturers. General Electric and Caterpillar, for example, have moved assembly operations back to the United States in the last year. (Airbus, a European company, is said to be near a deal to build jets in Alabama.)

There is no single reason for the change. Rising labor and energy costs have made manufacturing in China significantly more expensive; transportation costs have risen; companies have become increasingly aware of the risks of the theft of intellectual property when products are made in China; and in a business where time-to-market is a competitive advantage, it is easier for engineers to drive 10 minutes on the freeway to the factory than to fly for 16 hours.

That was true for ET Water Systems, a California company. “You need a collaboration that is real time,” said Pat McIntyre, chief executive of the maker of irrigation management systems, which recently moved its manufacturing operation from Dalian, China, to Silicon Valley. “We prefer local, frankly, because sending one of our people to China for two weeks at a time is challenging.”

Harold L. Sirkin, a managing director at Boston Consulting Group, said, “At 58 cents an hour, bringing manufacturing back was impossible, but at $3 to $6 an hour, where wages are today in coastal China, all of a sudden the equation changes.”

The firm reported in April that one-third of American companies with revenue greater than $1 billion were either planning or considering to move manufacturing back to the United States. Boston Consulting predicted that the reversal could bring two million to three million jobs back to this country.”

via Google Tries Something Retro – Made in the U.S.A. – NYTimes.com.

This cost difference is continuing to erode away as China has been increasing its basic wages by between 10-15% per annum for the last 10 years and intends to continue doing so in order to improve the standard of living of the working person thereby passing on the benefits of the improving GDP.

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Posted in China alert, Digital communications, Economics, Labour, Manufacturing, Reverse off-shoring, Salaries, Technology | 2 Comments »

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19/05/2012

* How China’s 300m microbloggers are shaking the system

The Times: “There was a time when a hardline editorial in the Beijing Daily could strike fear into Chinese hearts. These days, such clumsy propaganda draws a stream of sarcasm from the country’s 300 million or so microbloggers. …

Welcome to the world of the Twitter-like Sina Weibo — weibo means microblog — which has become one of the greatest threats to Communist Party supremacy. With 20 million followers, the most popular microblogger is the actress Yao Chen, whose musings, like “the traffic is good today” or “I recommend that documentary” are hardly incendiary. But many more want to weigh in on touchier topics … It is clashes like these that are reframing the battle for control of information.

Concerns have intensified as China approaches its once-a-decade change of leadership in a state of political turmoil not seen for 20 years. What Beijing wants is stability, a smooth transfer of power and a public convinced that everything is improving. The microbloggers ensure that it will have to achieve that against a backdrop of scrutiny, mockery and even defiance.

For a regime that has long prided itself on its control of information, the huge numbers who follow the most popular microblogs are a potent reminder of diminishing influence. In common with the most followed people on Twitter, which is banned by Chinese censors, the most popular weibos have readerships that dwarf the circulation of the largest newspapers.

“It has given a voice to 300 million Chinese and that has never happened before,” said Zhan Jiang, a professor of journalism at the Beijing Foreign Studies University. “It has taken on the role of spreading information when news is breaking and that is a big challenge to the Government and media.” As the Government is quickly recognising, sheer size of readership is not the real problem. The war being lost by the authorities, said Hu Xingdou, of the Beijing University of Technology, involves the sophistication of the information in the public domain, the speed of its flow and the vibrant debate. “Weibo has started the enlightenment in China and promoted social progress,” he said. “It is pushing the Government to disclose more, exposing more truths and allowing people to play a role in politics. We should thank God for giving weibo to China: without it, our prospects would not be good.”

Some bloggers talk about 2012 as the year in which Beijing might finally lose control of information. But they also fear that some of the most influential weibos are being quietly shut down — an attempt, said one, to test the “arrogant and stupid idea” that information can still be controlled. The 140-character weibo offers far more scope for provocative content than a 140-letter Tweet. Official data is ridiculed, corruption is outed and the contradictions of the system laid bare. When officials tried to bury news of a fatal train crash in southern Wenzhou last year, it was the exposure via weibo that forced the authorities to change tactics immediately.

“The more powerful weibo has become, the more use it could be to the central government if they thought about it,” said Francis Cheung, a China economist at CLSA Securities. “They are still thinking of weibo as something that can be controlled. In reality it is a new media that is telling Beijing more about what is going on around the country than it ever knew before.”For now, the Government appears to be resorting to tried and tested strategies: it is insisting that users register with their real names and has made it a crime to spread false rumours. Some believe these measures could kill the weibo phenomenon, others are convinced the genie is out of the bottle.

A large part of the power of weibo, which is hosted by Sina, the state-owned ISP, is its resilience. When words are blocked by the censors, codes and puns evolve within minutes to get around the ban. Premier Wen Jiabao becomes known as “teletubbies” while the deposed Chongqing party secretary, Bo Xilai, becomes “tomato”.

This week, weibo users were on form when the National Bureau of Corruption Prevention said that 72.7 per cent of Chinese were satisfied with government progress on fighting corruption. The derision went viral. “Public opinion poll? Did they conduct it inside the Politburo? Poor old public opinion — raped once again,” wrote one user.

“Weibo is doing something in China that is very different from what microblogs are doing in the West,” said Mr Hu. “It has become a means of making sure that people’s constitutionally guaranteed rights are actually upheld.”

via How China’s 300m microbloggers are shaking the system | The Times.

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26/04/2012

* Understanding social media in China

McKinsey Quarterly: “The world’s largest social-media market is vastly different from its counterpart in the West. Yet the ingredients of a winning strategy are familiar.

No Facebook. No Twitter. No YouTube. Listing the companies that don’t have access to China’s exploding social-media space underscores just how different it is from those of many Western markets. Understanding that space is vitally important for anyone trying to engage Chinese consumers: social media is a larger phenomenon in the world’s second-biggest economy than it is in other countries, including the United States. And it’s not indecipherable. Chinese consumers follow the same decision-making journey as their peers in other countries, and the basic rules for engaging with them effectively are reassuringly familiar.

In addition to having the world’s biggest Internet user base—513 million people, more than double the 245 million users in the United States. China also has the world’s most active environment for social media. More than 300 million people use it, from blogs to social-networking sites to microblogs and other online communities. That’s roughly equivalent to the combined population of France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the United Kingdom. In addition, China’s online users spend more than 40 percent of their time online on social media, a figure that continues to rise rapidly.

This appetite for all things social has spawned a dizzying array of companies, many with tools more advanced than those in the West: for example, Chinese users were able to embed multimedia content in social media more than 18 months before Twitter users could do so in the United States. Social media began in China in 1994 with online forums and communities and migrated to instant messaging in 1999. User review sites such as Dianping emerged around 2003.  Blogging took off in 2004, followed a year later by social-networking sites with chatting capabilities such as Renren. Sina Weibo launched in 2009, offering microblogging with multimedia. Location-based player Jiepang appeared in 2010, offering services similar to foursquare’s. This explosive growth shows few signs of abating, a trend that’s at least partially attributable to the fact that it’s harder for the government to censor social media than other information channels. That’s one critical way the Chinese market is unique.

As you shape your own social-media strategy, it’s important to fully understand some other nuances of the country’s consumers, content, and platforms.”

via Understanding social media in China – McKinsey Quarterly – Marketing & Sales – Digital Marketing.

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19/01/2012

* RedPad launched

This week, China introduced its RedPad based on Andriod. It is much more expensive than Apple’s iPad but it has feeds from all sorts of official Chinese government agencies and organs and is intended for the busy Communist cadre who has little time to sit at a desk and browse the web. The government perhaps hopes that this will help counter the largely critical comments spread through a twitter-like site Weibo.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/19/redpad-number-one-china_n_1215393.html

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