TCS BULLISH ON GOVERNMENT DEALS WORTH RS 3000 CRORE
Shelley Singh, New Delhi
The Economic Times
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is looking at Rs 3,000-crore government projects to help it double its revenues from the domestic market in three years.
The country’s largest IT services company is chasing 24 projects related to technology implementation in railways, defence, power and several state governments. The company hopes to bag a large number of these projects in the coming 12-18 months and double the share of its domestic business to 10 percent in three years. “We expect to increase domestic revenues to double digits by 2012,” said Tanmoy Chakrabarty, vice-president and head of global government industry group at TCS.
The increased activity in the domestic market - particularly from under-penetrated government departments and ministries - will help the portfolio of the export-focused domestic IT services firms as the global slowdown has seen their growth tapering off.
“Prior to elections, decisions were on hold. But now with the new government settling down, we expect quite a few large projects to be announced in the domestic market in 12-18 months,” said George Paul, executive vice-president for marketing at HCL Infosystems. HCL is also pursuing technology projects related to power, telecom and computerisation of municipal corporations in several states.
Infosys Technologies, the country’s second largest IT services company, is similarly pursuing opportunities in the domestic market. The Bangalore-based company’s nascent India business unit has bid for defence, telecom, railways and some power projects. The company was unavailable for comments as it is observing a mandatory silent period before announcing its financial results for the second quarter.
Small to mid-sized companies such as Mumbai-based Spanco that has bagged projects in Maharashtra and Orissa see opportunity in the domestic market. “We are chasing businesses like modernising public distribution system, border check posts and developing e-districts,” said Kaustubh Dhavse, head of business strategy at Spanco.
As government departments increasingly take the hi-tech path, there will be plenty of business for locally-focused IT players.
TCS BAGS RS 140 CR AP NETWORK PROJECT
Mumbai/Hyderabad
The Economic Times Financial Chronicle Mint The Hindu Business Line Business Standard
Tata Consultancy Services on Wednesday said it has been awarded a state-wide area network (SWAN) project from the Andhra Pradesh government, which targets to connect the state’s headquarters with all 23 district offices in the state to increase efficiency in government functioning.
Andhra Pradesh IT secretary Sameer Sharma said the size of the deal would be about Rs 140 crore. This is the largest such contract in the country and will be based on the build-own-operate-transfer (BOOT) model that is typically used in infrastructure projects for five years, TCS said in a statement.
TCS had previously won three similar projects to manage infrastructure in Chattisgarh, Tamil Nadu and Bihar. The SWAN project will allow the Andhra Pradesh government to start and run various e-governance projects and citizen services and is scheduled to be rolled out within 12 months. TCS, as per BOOT model, will maintain the contract for the next five years. “This SWAN project is yet another initiative of the government to bring a wider array of government services to the common man,” Sharma said.
The network will enable the state government to have video conferencing facility across government offices and also enable government offices to communicate and conference with each other over VoIP (voice over internet protocol). This will reduce communication expenses. Various e-governance applications, such as RTO, healthcare, education, municipality, will be on this network backbone.
“We will lay a state-wide network of IT infrastructure and set up common service centres for people to take advantage of e-government services,” said TCS VP Tanmoy Chakrabarty. The company will also set up a network operations centre and helpdesk to monitor the facility and services.
NREGS GETS E-TRANSPARENT
Suresh Dharur, Hyderabad
The Tribune
A unique software solution adopted by Andhra Pradesh has brought transparency and accountability in implementation of National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS), the flagship programme of the UPA government.
Developed by Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), the web-based software package has helped check corruption, fix loopholes in identification of beneficiaries and the works and resulted in effective implementation of the scheme, covering nearly 11 million people in the state.
From the time a job seeker enrolls with a local panchayat office to monitoring of assigned work and final wage payment, the entire process is registered and tracked online, using the software solution.
The system allows the officials to sift through entire data, including the number of job cards issued across 22 districts and identify the loopholes.
The progress of the NREGS works could be monitored through an automated system and the workers have been paid based on the amount of work they complete, independent of the number of hours they put in.
E-SAMARTH LAUNCHED IN 244 MIDDLE SCHOOLS
Patna
The Times of India
Chief minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday inaugurated 11 Soochna Bhavans in districts and also kicked off computer-aided learning E-Samarth through video conferencing.
He said that so far 14 Soochna Bhavans have been opened, three during his Vikas Yatra, and 20 more were under construction of which 10 will be inaugurated by March next and another 10 by August 2010. He asked information and public relation department (I&PRD) officials to establish relations of faith and confidence with the people and not remain only an advertising agency.
