Microsoft to support Russia's IT

MOSCOW: Microsoft plans to provide Russian IT market newbies with $100 million (78 million euros) worth of software and technical support, Russia'
s communications ministry said.

"Together with Russian venture funds (Microsoft) will choose 1,000 software producers whom Microsoft is willing to offer software, support and consultations," the ministry said in a statement on its website, following talks between Communications Minister Igor Shchegolev and Microsoft International's president Jean-Philippe Courtois.

The packages are worth about 100,000 dollars apiece, it added. Microsoft also plans to set up a network of education centers in Russia to teach budding entrepreneurs business basics and provide small businesses with discounts on its software, it said.

Courtois also said Microsoft had abandoned the idea of bringing prices on Russian-language software up to European standards.

Courtesy: Times of India

Ten tips to cope with pink slips

Coutesy: Times of India

Are you part of a burgeoning crowd that has either been given a pink slip, or a warning signal by the employers, thanks to the economic crisis? Don't lose hope. There is sliver lining to every cloud. With most companies trying to cut costs by downsizing workforce, it is a difficult time for IT pros. The bad job market situation only makes the crisis worse. So how can one deal with the current turbulent economic phase? How not to get disheartened even after getting a pink slip, or depressed having to live under the constant fear of getting laid off anytime? Here are a few tips that can help you better cope with the current challenging economic environment. But before going over to the tips remember, one always learns more from the defeats than from the victories.

Brush up your CV

If your CV still wears that jaded look, please shred it and begin anew. High time you reinvent your resume and put in your best effort before contacting the prospective employers. Wondering how to do this? Just search online. There are numerous sites that guide you how to best frame the right covering letter and resume for that 'perfect' job. Also, you can take help from placement consultants. They can possibly guide you what an employer looks for in a resume, especially in the current times.

Acquire new qualifications

If you are among those who jumped onto the BPO bandwagon immediately after graduation, this is just the right time for you to add to your educational qualification. Another academic or professional qualification will further enrich your BPO experience and, of course, open doors to a better profile. If you are not among the BPO category, you can go for courses that will further strengthen your experience. Look for a specialised course related to your current field, or area of expertise. Remember, education is an investment which always pays.

Arm yourself with soft skills

With changing times, the requirements of workplaces are changing too. So why not leverage the current phase to augment those soft skills which you always thought you had, but needed a little brushing up. This way, you can well defy the commonly held view that techies only understand the language of computers. You can even hit a grooming class! Brush up skills like how to better your presentations, how to write that perfect mail and those other interpersonal nuances. Remember, recession will pass, but these skills will stay with you forever and boost your career as well as personality.

Try turning an entrepreneur

Recession is the best time for one to look beyond the obvious. How about cashing in on all the aggression that you showed at those customer interactions, sales meets, or in cracking the deals? Channelise the same energy to bring out the entrepreneur within you. Heard stories of how the foundation of many a big enterprises was laid during the toughest of times. Some of the biggest tech czars of today -- IBM, Microsoft and HP -- have risen from the rubble of the most difficult recessions that have ravaged global economy. History is full of tales of successful startups that were born out of deepest recessions. So start now: think out of the box, revise your ideas list, unleash your creative side, look for opportunities and tap all of them to see if you can embark on your own venture.

Time for networking

The economic crisis hitting the firms across the globe has further increased the usage of professional networking sites like Xing and LinkedIn as people try to discover job opportunities through networking. No prizes for guessing that being connected pays, especially in tough times. You never know which of your connection can help you land a job, or give a positive reference. Networking platforms primarily help people share their professional interests and build contacts. Unlike other social networking sites like Facebook, Orkut or MySpace, these sites have a focussed business approach. So this is perhaps the right time for you to market yourself online, and beyond.

Depressed? Go & party!

Those late working hours never gave you time to socialise. How about starting it now? Remember, you worked hard. Now is the time to let your hair down and party harder, instead of letting all that stress get to you. With recession hitting all major sectors across the globe, it is the time for you to market yourself rightly. Parties can be a good forum for that. Position yourself and build contacts among people from various spheres of life, and what better place than all those social dos that you otherwise skipped. You never know who, where may be your knight in the shining armour. So, it may not be such a bad idea to acquire that P3P (Page 3 parties for the uninitiated) persona after all!

Acquire secondary skills

Thought a tech job is all that you can do? If, for instance, coding is your core area of work, and you believe that is all you can ever do, you may be wrong. There may be other choices that you would otherwise have never explored. One option could be to look within the sector and identify other job profiles that are still in demand. Say project managers, operations managers and the like. Also, you may look at peripheral options like IT management, or IT training. For some, tech teaching may be a good future career option. So brush up skills for such profiles and streamline your approach. For all you know, the shift may turn out to be a blessing in disguise.

Cut costs, increase savings

This can also be a good time to introspect. Think hard, and dwell upon your mistakes and the lessons learnt, if any. In future, be ready with a contingency plan as misfortune can come knocking at the door anytime. For now, you too can chalk out belt-tightening steps that cut any avoidable expenses. Keep liquidity. It will help you tide over any crunch situation. If investing in stocks or mutual funds doesn't jell with your idea of investment, consult a portfolio manager as he may give you a clearer investment picture. Investing in gold or real estate may be wise options, but again go by the market trends in a planned manner.

Destress yourself

Being laid off is often seen as a stigma many are not able to cope up with. Do not see this as a reflection upon your capabilities. Instead, see it as a silver lining that life has provided. Sit back, reflect, and think about alternatives in life that you may have wanted to pursue for a long time. Look at it from another perspective: work pressures never permitted you to gather enough courage to ask your boss to ask for that sabbatical. Yes, you got it. This is the time! Remember, sitting and brooding will take you nowhere, definitely not out of your self-formed well of unhappiness! It is time to recognise that you are stressed and take steps that distress you adequately. Take up things like Yoga, Reiki, Pranayam, wellness or meditation courses, or indulge in hobby pursuits such as dancing, reading, sports... Why, you can even start your own blog and express yourself in a manner like no other as blogging is a great stress buster in itself.

Nothing helps like help

What better time to do some social work! Why not join or assist organisations working for social causes like poverty, social upliftment or may be healthcare. Identify the causes you feel about the most and extend your time and support to those. You will utilise your time well and feel very worthy at the same time. You can also help your neighbourhood welfare association, or may be indulge in some long overdue community work. Old age homes, which also require a lot of volunteers, is another option. Volunteering for Polio or AIDS campaigns can also be quite morally fulfilling and uplifting. A heightened self-esteem can work wonders for you in many respects.

US employers announce a combined 20,000 job cuts

ST LOUIS: A round of more than 15,000 layoffs announced by AT&T Inc, DuPont and Viacom Inc suggests a yearlong wave of US job cuts is
accelerating, just as the government is expected to report a higher unemployment rate for November on Friday.

Swiss bank Credit Suisse Group has announced 5,300 job cuts, although it's unclear how many will be in the United States.

The latest layoffs coincided with a government report showing the proportion of workers continuing to receive jobless benefits has matched a level last reached in September 1992. The deepening recession is pressuring companies to slash costs, and payroll is typically the quickest and most efficient way to do it.

Yesterday's announced job cuts spanned an array of economic sectors, hitting telecom workers, bankers, salespeople and chemical manufacturers. The breadth of the layoffs suggests the pain of the recession will be felt broadly and well into 2009.

Dallas-based AT&T plans to cut 12,000 jobs, about 4 percent of its work force. The nation's biggest telecommunications company said the job cuts will begin this month and continue throughout 2009.

Wilmington, Delaware-based chemical company Dupont will cut 2,500 jobs and cut back hours for remaining workers. It also plans to eliminate 4,000 contractors this month, with more contractor cuts in 2009.

New York-based media conglomerate Viacom will cut about 850 jobs, or 7 percent of its work force.

Credit Suisse's 5,300 planned job cuts worldwide represents about 11 percent of its work force.

Courtesy: Times of India

HP freezes salaries to cut costs

SAN FRANCISCO: Hewlett-Packard Co, the world’s largest personal-computer maker, is freezing salaries as part of Chief Executive Officer Mark Hurd’s efforts to contain costs, people familiar with the plan said.

Employees have been notified by e-mail that they won’t receive a salary increase in fiscal 2009, which began in November, according to two people who asked not to be identified because the message was confidential. The only exceptions will be in countries where pay freezes are illegal, the two people said.

Hurd has cut jobs, closed offices and merged data centers to lift profit, even as he expands through acquisitions. Hewlett- Packard also is limiting travel, curtailing hiring and eliminating “favorite science projects” to save on research costs in 2009, Chief Financial Officer Cathie Lesjak said last month on a conference call.

Hewlett-Packard, which has 320,000 employees, declined to confirm the salary freeze. “In this difficult macroeconomic environment, we believe it is prudent and responsible to reduce costs where possible,” said spokeswoman Emma McCulloch. “H-P has a longstanding and disciplined approach to managing costs in order to invest in the company’s growth.”

Hewlett-Packard, based in Palo Alto, California, fell $1.43 to $33.39 at 4 pm in New York Stock Exchange trading. The shares have dropped 34 per cent this year.

Hurd, who became CEO in 2005, received $25.3 million in total compensation in fiscal 2007.

Tighter budgets
Worldwide technology spending growth will slow to 2.6 per cent next year, less than half the rate initially predicted, research firm IDC said last month. Growth in the US will decelerate to 0.9 per cent, the Framingham, Massachusetts-based company estimated.

The company also said it will only hire workers for “revenue-generating positions,” reduce spending on contractors and limit travel to customer-related activities, according to the e-mail, a copy of which was obtained by Bloomberg News.

“These are difficult actions, but necessary in the current environment,” said the message, which was distributed by Hewlett-Packard’s division chiefs.

Hewlett-Packard’s PC sales, which account for about a third of revenue, rose 10 percent to $11.2 billion last quarter, beating some estimates. Demand for notebooks offset declining printer sales in a shrinking economy. The company is the world’s top printer maker and also sells software, server computers, storage devices and services.

Profit forecast
Last month, Hurd forecast a rise in profit to as much as $4.03 a share this fiscal year, more than the $3.89 anticipated by analysts in a Bloomberg survey. Investors took that as a sign the company is prepared to squeeze more profit out of sales as customers reduce spending.

“It will be a challenging environment and we’re planning on such,” Hurd, 51, said on a Nov 23 conference call with reporters. “We can only control the things we can control, which is our cost structure and the competitiveness of our products.”

This week, Hewlett-Packard raised $2 billion in debt to help fund its $13.2 billion purchase of Electronic Data Systems Corp. It acquired that company in August to expand its services business.

Courtesy: Times of India

Sr IT execs fired for faking degree

NEW DELHI: Broadcom Corp, the maker of chips for phones and consumer electronics, fired Senior Vice President Vahid Manian after questions surfaced about the validity of academic degrees listed in his company biography.

A search has begun for his replacement, the company said today in a regulatory filing. Manian didn’t earn degrees from the University of California at Irvine that are cited on the company’s web site, according to the school’s registrar.

Manian also serves on the board of STEC Inc with Microsemi Corp Chief Executive Officer James Peterson, who faces separate questions about his credentials. Peterson, who lists degrees from Brigham Young University in government filings, never received them from that school, said Carri Jenkins, a university spokeswoman in Provo, Utah. Peterson did take classes there from 1978 to 1980, Jenkins said.

Manian’s firing is the first action taken by one of the three businesses tied to the executives, which are all technology companies in California’s Orange County. His departure follows the retirement of MGM Mirage Chairman and CEO Terry Lanni, who stepped down last month after similar questions surfaced about his MBA from the University of Southern California. MGM said the claims didn’t influence his decision.

Broadcom’s site said Manian had bachelor’s and master’s of business administration degrees from the University of California at Irvine. The executive, who oversaw global manufacturing at Broadcom, attended the school between September 1979 and August 1983 but wasn’t awarded any degrees, said Mark Fonseca, who is responsible for privacy issues in the registrar’s office.

No MBA record
Fonseca said Manian attended classes for four years but didn’t graduate. He said he isn’t allowed by law to disclose why Manian didn’t receive a degree. The school had no record of Manian studying for an MBA, Fonseca said.

Manian joined Irvine-based Broadcom in 1996 as director of operations after a stint at Silicon Systems Inc. Microsemi’s Peterson said he had vetted and hired Manian when the two worked at that company.

Peterson said today that he “categorically denies” misrepresenting degrees from Brigham Young University.

“I am working directly with the university to clarify this situation,” Peterson said in a statement. “I have every reason to expect that Brigham Young will investigate this allegation shortly and officially confirm my degrees.”

Peterson said a background check on him may have mistakenly used the name James J. Patterson.

‘Very careful’
Brigham Young’s Jenkins said in an interview after the statement that she checked degree records again and couldn’t find any record of a degree for Peterson. She said she had been checking the right name.

“We are always very careful when we release this kind of information,” she said.

Microsemi fell $2.88, or 16 percent, to $15.47 at 4 p.m. New York time in Nasdaq Stock Market trading. Broadcom rose $1.27 to $15.51, while STEC gained 2 cents to $4.91.

Microsemi’s Peterson serves with Manian on STEC’s audit, compensation, and nominating and corporate-governance committees.

A US government security clearance application form provided by Peterson lists his position at Microsemi and states that he has bachelor’s and MBA degrees from Brigham Young. A regulatory filing for STEC also lists the degrees.

Associate’s degree
Peterson was awarded an associate’s degree in arts, sciences and general education from Ricks College in Rexburg, Idaho, in December 1978, said Kyle Martin, registrar of Brigham Young University Idaho. In 2001, Ricks College became Brigham Young University Idaho, which is separate from the school in Utah, he said. As a former junior college, it couldn’t have conferred a higher degree, he said.

The discrepancies were uncovered by Barry Minkow, co-founder of the Fraud Discovery Institute, which looks into the backgrounds of executives.
Minkow served more than seven years in prison, from 1988 to 1995, after being convicted of fraud while running a company called ZZZZ Best Co.

Minkow almost always holds a position in securities his organization reports on, according to a disclaimer on his Web site. He said he has put options on STEC and Microsemi shares, and doesn’t own a position in Broadcom.

Peterson said in an interview that he earned credits during his military service that counted toward the degree from Brigham Young. He didn’t provide a university transcript after earlier saying he would.

Cliff Silver, a spokesman for Microsemi, referred inquiries to the CEO. The Irvine-based company makes chips for military and aerospace customers.

Manouch Moshayedi, STEC’S chief executive officer, defended Manian and Peterson yesterday in a telephone interview, saying they were “extremely competent.” STEC, based in Santa Ana, California, makes memory chips.

Minkow also raised the questions about MGM’s Lanni, who listed an MBA in his company biography. Lanni responded that he did receive an honorary MBA from the University of Southern California.

Courtesy: Times of India

Infy to freeze hiring, no job cuts

NEW DELHI: Infosys Technologies Ltd will freeze recruitment after meeting this fiscal year's target of hiring 25,000 staff, a telling sign the glo
bal downturn is hitting India's $52 billion outsourcing sector.

India's second largest software services firm however has no plans to cut jobs and is sticking with its third quarter outlook, CEO Kris Gopalakrishnan told reporters.

He said the outsourcing sector's growth rate would halve next year as some customers delay orders.

"Last year the IT industry grew more than 30 per cent, this year it is looking at somewhere in the region of 15 per cent," Gopalakrishnan said.

India's export-driven IT sector, used to a scorching pace of growth, has been hit by the financial crisis and recession in the United States, which contributes more than half their revenue.

In the last few years, the outsourcing industry has created tens of thousands of jobs, mainly attracting young workers, as global companies look to trim labour costs.

Infosys hired 16,000-17,000 employees in the first half of the fiscal year that began in April and would honour commitments to 6,000 under training, Gopalakrishnan said.

Infosys, which counts Goldman Sachs and Philips Electronics among its clients, cut its full-year dollar revenue outlook in October due to the worsening global downturn.
Gopalakrishnan said that the company would freeze fresh recruitment, apart from meeting specific skill needs.

"We will have to look at controlling our cost, controlling our expenses making sure that we run an optimised business. We will have to look at what are things we need to do in order to prepare ourselves for the recovery."

"Growth is coming more and more from emerging markets so these are the things we need to prepare ourselves. We should not lose momentum in this s
lowdown," he said.

But Infosys still expects its strong client base and a weakening rupee to help it meet a forecast for December quarter earnings of $0.57 a share. The Indian rupee has fallen nearly six per cent so far this quarter against the dollar.

"Infosys is seeing further degradation of the demand environment, with headwinds from leadership changes at customers, a shrinking large deal pipeline .... Pricing pressure has emerged," CLSA Asia-Pacific said in a report this week.

By 0845 GMT, Infosys shares were up 2 per cent in a Mumbai market, but outperforming a 4 per cent gain in the broader Mumbai market. Infosys shares have fallen 33 per cent so far this year.

Courtesy: Times of India

Adobe cuts jobs, lowers outlook

SAN FRANCISCO: Adobe Systems Inc lowered is revenue outlook and said it will eliminate 600 jobs, or around 8 per cent of its workforce, due to the
weak economy, sending its stock down 7 per cent in extended trading.

"The global economic crisis significantly impacted our revenue during the fourth quarter," said Shantanu Narayen, the company's chief executive, in a statement. "We have taken action to reduce our operating costs and fine-tune the focus of our resources on key strategic priorities."

Adobe spokeswoman Jodi Sorensen said it would be an across-the-board headcount reduction, impacting all geographic regions and company divisions.

The maker of Acrobat Reader, Flash and Photoshop software took its revenue outlook for the fiscal fourth-quarter ended November 28 to a range of $912 million to $915 million from its earlier view of $925 million to $955 million.

The company also said it expects fourth-quarter adjusted earnings in a range of 59 cents to 60 cents a share, higher than its previous forecast, as it benefited from two favorable tax items.

For the February quarter, Adobe forecast revenue of $800 million to $850 million, well below analysts' forecast range of $846 million to $1.02 billion, according to Reuters Estimates.

Adobe cited weaker-than-expected demand for its new Creative Suite 4 family of products, which began shipping in the quarter, as the main cause of the revenue shortfall.

CS4 is a package of tools for graphical designers that includes Photoshop photo-editing software, 3D computer drawing programme Illustrator, Dreamweaver for designing websites and Soundbooth for audio-editing.

In a conference call in September, Narayen told investors that CS4 would be Adobe's biggest product introduction ever.

The company will record $44 million to $50 million in charges related to the headcount reduction, with $28 million to $30 million of the total coming in the fourth-quarter.

Shares of the San Jose, California-based company closed the regular session up 54 cents, or 2.5 per cent, at $22.54 and fell to $20.55 in extended trading.

Courtesy: Times of India