by Editor | May 25, 2021 | Interviews
Shanmugh Natarajan
By Nishant Arora,
Noida : Industries globally, including in India, are going through a seismic change today when it comes to embracing disruptive technologies like Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI).
Sensing the future requirements, software giant Adobe India is already reskilling employees who have the right pace to catch up with the next wave of technology, a top company executive has stressed.
According to Shanmugh Natarajan, Managing Director-Adobe India and Vice President-Products, newer jumps are happening in the field of technology across verticals in the country — be it banking and finance, aviation, hospitality or manufacturing — and reskilling its engineers to help get on top of new technologies is core to the company.
“We have the expertise and talent with core algorithmic mathematical background, with right set of engineering degrees. A new skill-set, however, is to be learnt on top of those and Adobe is already doing that with its engineers in the field of research and development,” Natarajan told IANS in a free-wheeling interview at the company’s sprawling campus here.
The global software giant has a massive set-up in India, with nearly 5,500 employees spread across four campuses in Noida and Bengaluru, with one-third of the workforce employed in the R&D work.
“The younger generation today is interested in ML, AI and other technologies and I am confident that such talent is already emerging from Indian universities. The new generation has tremendous opportunities in the core learning areas,” emphasised Natarajan, who continues to lead R&D operations for Adobe India.
Natarajan joined Adobe in 2008 and has been instrumental in leading development of products like Adobe Illustrator, InDesign, Dreamweaver, Flash and Lightroom. He has also contributed to the development of several mobile and web products for Adobe Creative Cloud.
According to him, the last five years witnessed a jump in Big Data and AI is the natural next step.
“The big data is coming from mobiles, wearable devices and what not, with every click, with every action being recorded. Now is the time to process that humongous amount of data and ML with neural and learning networks and AI will help make sense of that data,” Natarajan said.
“ML and AI are going to give industries a seismic jump, not on the scale Internet gave us, but just like Big Data — even bigger. India, in the meanwhile, is set to ride on a faster, deeper and wider AI wave,” he added.
The infusion of new technologies aboard Cloud is happening at a great level across Adobe products: Creative, Document and Experience Cloud.
“India is steadily evolving into an ‘Experience Economy’. The competency of delivering compelling digital experiences is now a key barometer of success for progressive businesses. As the creators of revolutionary innovations like Photoshop and PDF, Adobe has set the standard for modern day ‘Experience Business’,” Natarajan noted.
Several Adobe products are today being developed in India. “Illustrator is being completely done here, The popular Lightroom is being done here and nearly 80 percent of Acrobat is done out of the country,” Natarajan noted.
Riding on the success of its Creative, Document and Experience Cloud portfolios, Adobe achieved a record $2.01 billion revenue in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2017 that ended on December 1.
The company’s ‘Digital Media’ segment’s revenue was $1.39 billion, with Creative and Document Cloud achieving accounting for the bulk of this at $1.16 billion and $235 million, respectively.
Adobe Experience Cloud achieved a revenue of $550 million, which represents a 18 per cent year-over-year growth.
The company’s unified AI and ML platform Adobe Sensei now powers more than 100 capabilities in its products across Clouds.
“Innovations like Sensei are a result of our R&D talent in India and across the globe, joining forces to tackle the most complex experience challenges. Adobe India R&D centre stands strong as an integral pillar of the company’s global innovation agenda,” he added.
For Natarajan, Experience Cloud is a huge business opportunity that is built on solid technology pieces.
“In India, we have made tremendous progress on Creative Cloud across industries. Now with Experience Cloud, any sector that got a large-scale customer data — from the government to aviation, banking and hospitality — will be able to seamlessly deliver experiences to the end users,” Natarajan told IANS.
(Nishant Arora can be contacted at nishant.a@ians.in)
—IANS
by Editor | May 25, 2021 | Business, Economy, Large Enterprise, Markets, News, Technology
New Delhi : For an overwhelming 97 per cent of Indian businesses, adopting Next-Gen software solutions is the key to driving growth and expansion while 92 per cent of them stated that software is important for them to create new products or services to enter new markets, a survey said on Monday.
According to the leading software company CA Technologies’ “Modern Software Factory” survey, 91 per cent of the respondents highlighted software as key to their digital transformation journey.
Indian businesses recognise software as the defining competitive advantage that will enable them to create new, disruptive businesses or to re-shape their existing business landscape, the findings showed.
“Digital disruption and changing customer expectations are driving organisations to become more agile, and to introduce new products and services to meet evolving demands. Software is not only a catalyst in transforming ideas into outcomes but is also a competitive differentiator,” Sunil Manglore, Managing Director, CA Technologies, India, said in a statement.
“By adopting the modern software factory framework, organisations are better able to speed-up time to market, consistently improve the quality of output, reduce risk and increase productivity,” he added.
Nearly 93 per cent of respondents said software is essential for them to deliver a better customer experience.
“About 92 per cent said it is essential to improving insights into customers’ needs and wants while 90 per cent said it is essential for repositioning the company and its brand,” the survey noted.
As firms in India become cognizant of the decisive role that software plays in facilitating key business priorities, the survey also found that there is a corresponding emphasis in software-related priorities.
Almost 99 per cent of respondents highlighted that it is essential or important to have better prioritisation of software development in line with business goals.
Although this is seen as the most important priority in India, less than half of them (47 per cent) said their IT teams are very effective in realising it.
When it comes to security, the respondents asked to make security a more embedded part of the software development process.
The global online survey of 1,279 senior IT and business executives (575 in the Asia-Pacific region) was sponsored by CA Technologies and conducted by industry analyst firm Freeform Dynamics Intelligence Unit in July 2017.
The Asia-Pacific countries surveyed were India, Australia, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and South Korea.
Although software is indisputably pivotal for the growth of companies, the survey found that most organisations are lacking the right IT capabilities.
“Organisations in India need to understand that every company today is a software company. Without a modern approach to software, they will be left behind in today’s application economy,” stressed Manglore.
—IANS
by Editor | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Buzz, Corporate finance, Markets, Technology
New Delhi : Cloud computing and using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to process vast amounts of disparate data were most picked up in 2017 that brought success for the Banking, Financial Services and Insurance (BFSI) sector in India, Microsoft said on Tuesday.
“The year 2017 witnessed a revolution in the BFSI sector as far as technology integration is concerned. A digital culture shift, designing a modern workplace that harnesses digital intelligence and enabling mobility are key aspects of it,” Microsoft said in a statement.
The rise of self-service technology for partners and consumers drastically reduced the servicing cost for enterprises and improved customer satisfaction.
On these lines, Microsoft launched Kaizala, a mobile app and service for Android, iOS and Windows phones, designed for large group communication and work management.
The app coordinates work with the entire value chain, including field employees, vendors, partners and customers on-the-go.
In 2017, Cloud offered enterprises its unique advantages on three levels — making banks agile by rapidly upgrading to Cloud-based technology, focusing on user adoption by identifying use cases based on work profiles and transforming business by process alignment with the new tools — all of which together ultimately enhanced, both branch and customer experience.
AI transformed both front and back office operations with its self-improving programmes.
Managing data has a lot to do with security and banking and finance institutions are sitting on a dearth of confidential information that requires technology intervention.
Stable and high performing ‘BankingEasy’ applications, enabled small to mid-size banks to offer services and digital experiences such as centralised clearing, multi-channel banking, relationship banking, real time dynamic reporting, among others.
Mobility and automation innovation in technology enabled banks in their turnaround time and to minimise errors. This will be a big boon for the banking and financial institutions in the coming year, Microsoft said.
—IANS
by Editor | May 25, 2021 | Markets, Technology
San Francisco : Announcing its plan to broaden the AI for Earth programme, Microsoft has pledged $50 million over the next five years to put artificial intelligence technology in the hands of those who are working to mitigate climate change.
Microsoft rolled out the AI for Earth programme six months ago with an aim to put the power of artificial intelligence towards tackling environmental challenges.
“At Microsoft, we believe artificial intelligence is a game changer. Our approach as a company is focused on democratising AI so its features and capabilities can be put to use by individuals and organisations around the world to improve real-world outcomes,” Microsoft President and Chief Legal Officer Brad Smith wrote in a blog post on Monday.
The announcement came on the eve of the second anniversary of the Paris Agreement.
AI can be very useful in monitoring, modelling and managingthe Earth’s natural systems.
Data can speak volumes about the health of our home planet, including the conditions of air, water, land and the well-being of our wildlife.
“But we need technology’s help to capture this vast amount of data and convert it into actionable intelligence. AI can be trained to classify raw data from sensors on the ground, in the sky or in space into categories that both humans and computers understand,” Smith said.
“Fundamentally, AI can accelerate our ability to observe environmental systems and how they are changing at a global scale, convert the data into useful information and apply that information to take concrete steps to better manage our natural resources,” he added.
Over the past six months, Microsoft has awarded over 35 grants in more than 10 countries for access to Microsoft Azure and AI technology.
Microsoft said its AI for Earth could be a force multiplier for groups and individuals who are creating sustainable solutions.
“That’s why we’re not just putting more resources into this effort, but also coupling this with a long-term commitment to applying AI to grow and scale in four key areas – climate, water, agriculture and biodiversity,” Smith said.
Microsoft wants to do it in three ways. First, it plans to expand seed grants around the world to create and test new AI applications.
“We will also provide universities, nongovernmental organisations and others with advanced training to put AI to its best use,” Smith said.
Next, Microsoft will identify the projects that show the most promise and make larger investments to help bring them to scale.
“Finally, as these projects advance, we’ll identify and pursue opportunities to incorporate new AI advances into platform-level services so that others can use them for their own sustainability initiatives,” Smith said.
—IANS
by Editor | May 25, 2021 | Branding, Business, Large Enterprise, Marketing Basics, Markets, Technology
By Krishna SinhaChaudhury,
New Delhi : With dual-camera phones fast gaining popularity in the cut-throat Indian smartphone market, ASUS recently introduced three smartphones in its Zenfone 4 selfie series in the country.
The Taiwanese company introduced a total of six smartphones — Zenfone 4, Zenfone 4 Pro, Zenfone 4 Max, Zenfone 4 Max Pro and Zenfone 4 Selfie (two variants) — in Taipei but brought only three selfie-centric devices to India.
We received Rs 14,999 Zenfone 4 Selfie (Dual-Camera) and here is what we think of it.
At 144 grams, the smartphone is impressively light and easy to operate with one hand.
It sports a unibody design with metallic finish with stripes at the top and bottom ends that give it an attractive look.
We especially liked the design language used around the camera lens that reminded us of ASUS’ trademark concentric circle design.
The 5.5-inch HD LCD display topped with 2.5D curved glass blends well with the chassis. The display is bright with decent viewing angles.
Above the display lies the LED flash, dual-camera set-up, earpiece and the proximity sensor.
The fingerprint sensor sits below the display which was pretty quick to unlock the device.
The selfie shooter of the device has a 20MP sensor (aperture of f/2.0) and an 8MP secondary sensor (aperture of f/2.4) that lets the user click decent selfies — a high point of Zenfone 4 Selfie (Dual Camera) smartphone.
The user can also select the portrait mode that adds “Bokeh” effect to the selfies.
In our opinion, the selfies taken in standard mode fared better than the wide-angle selfies.
The front shooter also features “Live Beautification” mode that lets the user add artificial beautification to their image from level 1 to 10.
The 16MP rear camera takes good images and close-up shots in proper lighting had enough detail.
The phone is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 chipset coupled with 4GB RAM and 64GB internal storage that ensures smooth everyday performance.
The device runs its custom Zen UI based atop Android 7.1.1 Nougat operating system (OS).
ASUS has not bundled unnecessary pre-installed apps in the smartphone, which is a welcome change.
The 3,000mAh battery lasted a little more than 12 hours on moderate usage with 4G running on one SIM slot, on a single charge.
What does not work?
The Snapdragon 430 processor does its job well in keeping the smartphone cool and gets daily tasks done, but considering the price, we would have loved to see a Snapdragon 625 chipset in this one.
Photos taken in low-light conditions had much noise.
The sunlight legibility of the display could have been better.
Conclusion: With decent overall performance, Zenfone 4 Selfie (Dual Camera) smartphone is a competent attempt by ASUS to make a mark in the selfie smartphone race in this price range.
(Krishna SinhaChaudhury can be contacted at krishna.s@ians.in )
—IANS
