News in brief..

NIIT, Telstra form alliance

CIOL Bureau

BANGALORE: NIIT and Telstra, have formed an alliance to offer a range of

value added application and communication services to markets in India and the

Asia-Pacific. Under this agreement, NIIT will provide application solutions for

enterprises using Telstra's managed networking infrastructure and hosting

capabilities. The relationship will enable corporate customers to get a full

range of services and solutions from a single source.

This strategic initiative will offer to customers a managed service covering

all aspects of software application development and systems integration as well

as complete facilities management. Announcing this partnership NIIT director

Arvind Thakur said, "Appplication Service Provisioning (ASP) and value

added corporate data solutions are a direct result of the proliferation of

Internet and packet switching technologies."

KoolMal brings selling to the Net

Cyber News Service

MUMBAI: This time it is more to do with the consumer selling than just using

the Net for buying. In the e-commerce jargon this site is more about CtoC

business than BtoB or BtoC. A seller can log in the KoolMal.com and put up his

or her product for sale along with the floor price. Buyers then can bid for the

product and at the end of a certain period–a time frame ascertained by the

seller, the seller gets the list of potential buyers and their bids to chose

from. All these transactions are free of cost. Only one needs to have an

Internet connection and PC to log on.

The site which is launched by the Delhi based Info-X Software Technology Pvt.

Ltd., an IT training and Web development services, has about 32 product

listing--from antiques to household, to chose from. A seller can select any one

of these categories to display one’s products to be sold. The site has also

tied up with celebrities to put up their product on sale. However, the money

earned will go to HelpAge India as charity.

Talking about the performance of the site Info-X MD, Rishi Parti said that

during last 12 days, from the day the site was actually launched, there are

about 25 successful bids registered. He also mentioned that he has invested Rs

10 lakh in developing the site and will invest another Rs 10 lakh before

breaking even in two years time. Banner ads on the site is the only revenue

being sought as there is absolutely no fee or commissions charged from either

the seller or the buyer. 

Shape your destiny with cyberastro.com

Cyber News Service

MUMBAI: All those Marjorie Orr fans, who would like to try the desi style of

astrological predictions need not look any further. Cyber Astro Pvt. Ltd. has

relaunched its Web site www.cyberastro.com

to cater to the increasing demand from millions of Net-savvy individuals

inclined towards astrology.

Piggy-backing on the e-commerce bandwagon, it has Web-enabled and provides

the customers with instant personalized predictions based on their birth

details. Speaking on the occasion, Cyber Astro Pvt. Ltd. CEO Satyajit Majumdar

said, "There has been a quantum leap in the number of people visiting our

site and we realized that we were not sufficiently geared to cater to the

growing volume." Cyber Astro has been existent since Setember 1997 and it

is has been professionally redesigned by the interactive division of TBWA

Anthem. It has gained a lot of attention for its free and paid products for

Vedic astrological services, establishing it as a favourite on search engines

like Direct Hit and Altavista.

GoldReed redefines the Green Revolution

Cyber News Service

NEW DELHI: The dot.com mania has caught up with India’s agricultural sector

too! KrishiUdyog.com, a full-fledged interactive portal on the Internet

exclusively devoted to agriculture, makes its debut, thanks to GoldReed

Innovations Pvt. Ltd. "We are clear about the purpose as the USP of the

site 'Redefining Green Revolution' indicates. We want to show the world a new

dimension of our age-old heritage and culture," says Ajay Gambhir, who

conceived and developed the Web site.

Nitish Kumar, Union Minister for Agriculture, while formally browsing the Web

site at the Krishi Expo 2000 in New Delhi, said, "Indian agriculture sector

is set for yet another Green Revolution with the invasion of IT. While the

earlier one brought most of the land under the plough, making India sufficiently

equipped to feed its teeming millions, the third revolution with the help of IT

would see it through the competitive globalization process." He also

assured that he would provide adequate support to make the venture a success.

KrishiUdyog.com provides information on the latest in the field of

agricultural research and development, tools and machinery, seeds, fertilizers,

insecticides and pesticides, farming, soil and climatic data and so on. It will

also provide a vehicle to minimize loss (depending on the type of food

commodity) to a large extent using appropriate post harvest technology and

equipment, resulting in increased productivity, employment and revenue in the

agricultural sector.

Currently, India produces about 395 million tonnes of food items of plant

(320 million tonnes) and animal (75 million tonnes) origins that are transformed

into edible products through post-harvest phase starting from production till

consumption. However, 5 to 50 per cent of food items get lost and the extent of

loss depends on whether they are durable, semi-perishable or perishable.

"We have also incepted two new terminologies--'e-kisan' and

'e-agriculture'--to mark this new beginning," said Gambir. "We are

also aiming to provide marketing inputs to assist a farmer market his produce

independent of middlemen."

Founded in 1998, GoldReed Innovations Pvt. Ltd, a networking and ISDN

solutions provider, diversified its operations into Internet technologies about

six months ago. The company has also designed a portal for the

Delhiites--www.delhiites.com. Another one coming up shortly,

www.indiansoldiers.com will focus on the Indian Defence and the defence

personnel.