Microsoft’s academic dev. program launched in India

BANGALORE: Microsoft has formally launched its academic developer program in India, focussing at the student community. To commemorate the program, the world’s largest software company has signed a MoU with Visveswaraiah Technological University (VTU). The program has been kicked off just a day before Microsoft’s annual developer event, Tech Ed 2002.

Under the academic developer program, Microsoft, has launched eight key initiatives spread over the next one year. These include, MSDN academic alliance, Microsoft .Net campus challenge, Alumni Mentor Program, seminars, faculty training program, faculty internship program, students projects program and student champs program.

"This initiative is aimed at producing software engineers with a radically different skill set and is our contribution to strengthen the intellectual capital that we as a country have taken for granted so far," said Microsoft Director .Net and developer Evangelism, Dilip Mistry. Microsoft developer tools will be made available for the faculty and the students.

VTU Vice Chacellor K Balaveera Reddy, said, "Today, a skills gap exists between the demand and supply of IT professionals. This poses a significant challenge that the academic community and the industry at large need to work together to address. We need to understand what the current and future needs and ensure that we are ready to keep pace with that change. This partnership with Microsoft and its effort to do the same with others, is a gesture that is welcomed by the entire academic community."

There are 114 engineering colleges in Karnataka, out of which 110 are affiliated with VTU. About 40,000 students are taken it every year. VTU also has similar programs in association with Intel and IBM.