Tech News Stop - Sharing by Wasim Akhtar

::::IBM, Infy top workplaces for graduates::::

<img src="http://www.techgig.com/files/photo_1335320266_temp.png" border="0" alt="Image" align="left" />IBM and Infosys have been chosen as the most preferred employers by both engineering (BE/BTech) as well as non-engineering graduate (B.Sc /BBA, BA, BCA) students, according to a survey. Both these companies have topped the employer preference charts for a second year in a row as per a survey conducted by First Naukri.com. The survey is based on interview of some 2000+ engineering and non-engineering graduate students.  Among non-engineering graduates, Infosys andWipro topped the chart of preferred companies with over 41% and 39% students opting for the same as their favoured employer. IBM takes the third slot while TCS is ranked at the fifth position.  In case of engineering students, over 43% of them ranked IBM as their most preferred employer. Infosys and TCS share the second and third position respectively followed by Wipro andAccenture.  The survey also asked students on what basis do they decide to appear for a company during placements. 33% respondents ranked 'job profile' in the company as their first choice. 27% said 'growth prospect' within the company and another 27% said 'brand image' of the company is the key deciding factor.  When asked about the biggest influencer during campus interviews, 31% respondents said seniors (alumni). Approximately 23% of them said parents and 19% opted for batch mates.  Commenting on the findings of the survey Deepali Singh, Business Head, Firstnaukri.com said "Defence has emerged as a preferred sector among engineers from non-IT stream with most of them looking at DRDO as the first option.  This shows a tilt towards working in government and PSU's sectors have started getting traction. Also, it is interesting to note that seniors and parents play a key role in influencing decision during campus interviews." 

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::::How Google Searches the Entire Web in Half a Second::::

<div class="custm_img_blk"><img src="http://www.techgig.com/files/photo_1335231597_temp.jpg" border="0" width="350" height="200" align="left" /></div>It only takes half a second for Google to return a search based on keywords you type in, but there’s a whole lot more happening behind the scenes to give you the results you need. Google on Monday launched a video that explains the science behind how the massive search engine actually works. Matt Cutts, software engineer head of Google’s webspam team, details in a YouTube video how the search engine giant thoroughly scours the web on a daily basis to provide the most up-to-date results to users. “There are three things you need to do to be the best search engine in the world. First, you need to crawl the web comprehensively and deeply, then you want to rank or serve those pages and return the most relevant ones first,” Cutts said. Although Google crawls the web on a daily basis, that wasn’t always the case. “We used to crawl for 30 days… and then index for about a week and push that data out — and that would take about a week,” Cutts said. “Sometimes you would hit a data center with new data and sometimes you would hit a data center with old data.” But this method wasn’t optimized since a lot of the information would be out of date. In 2003, Google switched to crawling a significant amount of the Internet each day. By scouring the web each day for new content, it incrementally updated its index. “We have gotten even better over time, and at this point, we can keep it very fresh,” Cutts said. To do so, page rank is the key deciding factor as to how likely you are to see a link: “We basically take page rank as the primary determinant and the more page rank you have — that is, the more people that link to you and the more reputable those people are — the more likely it is that we will discover your page relatively early in the crawl,” Cutts said. Google also places a lot of emphasis on word order. For example, a search for pop singer “Katy Perry” will look for results with those two words next to each other, rather than having “Katy” and the word “Perry” show up in different parts of the content. Finding the right balance between word proximity, page reputation and links pointing to it is the key. “That’s kind of the secret sauce,” Cutt added. Google then sends that query out to hundreds of different machines all at once, which look through their fraction of the web that has been indexed to find the best match. “We say, ‘what’s the best page that matches this query across our entire index?” Cutts said. “We take that page and we try to show it with a useful snippet, so we show the keywords in the context of the document and get it all back in under half a second.” How do you think companies can use this information to better show up in Google search results? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.

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::::7 Tips for Women in the Tech Industry::::

<img src="http://9.mshcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Business-Woman-600.jpg" border="0" alt="Businesswoman at her desk using a digital tablet" width="275" align="left" />Being a female entrepreneur in the male-dominated tech industry is challenging, and comes with a distinct set of barriers. Thankfully, there are several female-led organizations that are working to bring more women into the tech fold.  I asked a panel of successful young female entrepreneurs from the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC), an invite-only nonprofit organization comprised of the world’s most promising young entrepreneurs, what challenges women in tech face, and what could help eliminate some of those barriers? Here’s what they shared. <h2>1. Women’s Organizations Help</h2> <img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-1063101" src="http://4.mshcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/lisa.jpg" border="0" title="lisa" width="140" height="140" /> While women tend to be more relationship-oriented in general, I’ve found that networking our way into the inner circle of the tech world is not as easy for us. There are probably a number of reasons for this, but I believe organizations like Women 2.0 and Women in Technology will be instrumental in bridging that gap in the coming years.  - Lisa Nicole Bell, Inspired Life Media Group <h2>2. Sharing is Key</h2> <img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-1063095" src="http://6.mshcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Amanda.jpg" border="0" title="Amanda" width="140" height="140" />Whether a woman is contemplating launching her first startup or simply considering registering for a course that will teach her to code, it’s so important that she share this with friends and colleagues. When these conversations between women don’t take place, the circle of women in tech grows at a much slower rate. Outside the tech world, there’s this perception that “only men are doing it.” But if we all talked about it more, I think that would give more women permission to dive in.  - Amanda Aitken, The Girl’s Guide to Web Design <h2>3. See the Glass as Half Full</h2> <img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-1063107" src="http://7.mshcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Thursday.jpg" border="0" title="Thursday" width="140" height="140" /> Despite the fact that we tell girls and women that any path is possible, there are still strong gender roles that reinforce the idea that women aren’t as good at STEM skills. The most important step we can take is to integrate these skills in the classroom as early as possible by showcasing successful female tech entrepreneurs. We also need to quit treating women in tech as a rarity, when numbers have grown dramatically. We’re creating something of a self-fulfilling prophecy, and we need to step back from that.   - Thursday Bram, Hyper Modern Consulting <h2>4. Develop Access to Capital</h2> <img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-1063097" src="http://4.mshcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/doreen.jpg" border="0" title="doreen" width="140" height="140" /> Women founders can find it more difficult to raise funding for their businesses. The statistics show that less than 20 percent of female-led ventures get funding, which is much lower than the statistics for men. That said, there are several great organizations trying to help women reach their funding goals, including Women 2.0, Astia, and others. We need to support such groups.  - Doreen Bloch, Poshly Inc. <h2>5. Be Yourself</h2> <img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-1063099" src="http://7.mshcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Lauren.jpg" border="0" title="Lauren" width="140" height="140" /> When I was starting TalentEgg, not only was I a woman in the tech industry, but I was also very young — a 24-year-old who looked like I was only 15. Thankfully, I learned early on that my biggest strength was my ability to be myself. I didn’t pretend to be older than I was, or have more experience than I had. I also didn’t try to emulate men in my industry. I was just me, and I never listened to any commentary regarding the barriers that I was supposedly facing by being a young woman in technology. 

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::::State Bank of India launches virtual debit card to curb fraud in ecommerce transactions::::

<img src="http://www.techgig.com/files/photo_1335231482_temp.gif" border="0" width="200" height="105" align="left" /><div class="custm_img_blk">The State Bank of India (SBI) has introduced a virtual debit card called State Bank Virtual to address the users’ concern about debit card fraud while doing ecommerce transactions. The electronic card can be created by the account holder or customer using SBI's Net banking facility for ecommerce transactions. State Bank Virtual has a limited shelf life and can be used for only one transaction to limit the exposure of the account.</div>It allows the user to create a virtual card for any online transaction and the person is not required to share details of the principal account on the merchant Website thus insulating the account from any possible fraud.There is no charge on creation of the card and the customer can create any number of cards at the same time. The card is created for each online transaction and is valid for maximum of 48 hours. There is no transfer of balance from the principal account in as much as only a lien is marked on the account. Actual transfer of balance takes place only when the customer does the actual transaction online, SBI said."All forms of transactions, be it Internet banking, credit and debit cards, are fully secured but there are some people who are scared and hold back from online transactions on fears of compromise of data. The main objective behind this new product is to provide relief to these customers and give a push to e-commerce," Richhpal Singh, DGM, Payment Systems, SBI has said in a statement.

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::::Tata Sons enters ecommerce by launching CromaRetail.com::::

<img src="http://www.techgig.com/files/photo_1335232215_temp.JPG" border="0" alt="Image" width="400" height="280" align="left" />This has been doing the rounds for quite a while now. Infiniti Retail Ltd, a 100% subsidiary of Tata Sons, today made their foray into the ecommerce arena with the launch of CromaRetail.com. CromaRetail.com will house home entertainment systems, small appliances, white goods, computers and peripherals, mobile phones, imaging and gaming software.“Since the launch of Croma five years ago, we have seen the retail industry evolve into being an integral part of our consumers’ lives and the launch of our ecommerce venture is a natural progression towards delivering growth and trusted service to our users across India. We are excited with the potential and the opportunity online retailing currently offers in India. With the increasing growth in internet penetration and more and more users going online to shop, we feel the time is right for Croma to take the digital leap,” said  RK Krishna Kumar, Chairman, Infiniti Retail Ltd. and Director, Tata Sons.Ajit Joshi, CEO and MD, Infiniti Retail, said “As the No.1 electronic retail brand in the country that has built a strong network of stores, trust with consumers and added value to shopping experiences, the online opportunity for Infiniti Retail has enormous potential. Consumers are increasingly researching their purchases online and our presence in the ecommerce environment brings with it the credibility and superior service of any Croma store.” 

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::::LinkedIn: India becomes second largest market::::

<div class="custm_img_blk"><img src="http://www.techgig.com/files/photo_1335231870_temp.jpg" border="0" width="300" height="180" align="left" /></div>Social networking site LinkedIn's Indian user base has grown 300% in the three years it has had a marketing presence in India. The firm, today, has about 14 million users from India, which has quickly become its second-largest market globally, bigger than China and only behind the United States, according to Jeff Weiner, LinkedIn's chief executive.  Those 14 million Indian users join another 135 million-odd who are tapping into some 2 million companies and many more individuals to seek out jobs (or be sought out for one), organise conferences and network with a broad spectrum of people. On a recent trip to India to keynote his firm's B2B conference in Mumbai, Weiner-the 42-year-old former executive-in-residence, with two venture capital firms in Silicon Valley-said the firm's mobile business accounts for a fifth of its user base today, compared to 8% in January 2011.  "Mobile is our fastest-growing business," says Weiner. "LinkedIn connects talent with opportunity at a massive scale. Ultimately, our vision is to create an economic opportunity for every professional," he adds. The stage may now be set for monetisation. In February, on an earnings call after announcing the company's fourth-quarter results of 2011, Weiner had said that now that LinkedIn had got the product and user experience right, the time was ripe to test ads in the mobile environment. 

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::::Investors Who Gave Groupon, Like, A Billion Dollars Slip Closer To, Like, Breaking Even::::

<div class="custm_img_blk"><img src="http://www.techgig.com/files/photo_1335231918_temp.jpg" border="0" align="left" /></div>Remember when Groupon raised, like, a billion dollars? We certainly do.Well, it looks like Groupon’s slide over the past month is bringing its last round of venture investors ever closer to breaking even. The stock has rebounded slightly this morning to $11.49, but the number to watch is $7.90.That’s effectively what several top-tier Silicon Valley venture firms including Kleiner Perkins, Greylock and Andreessen Horowitz paid per share when they invested $946 million in Groupon between December 2010 and January 2011. At that point, they bought Series G Preferred Shares for $31.59 each. These later converted into four shares of Class A common stock on October 31 of last year, just a few days before Groupon’s initial public offering on November 4.All eyes are on May 14, when Groupon will report quarterly earnings for the second time as a publicly traded company. More notably, the end of the lock-up period is coming up soon. That’s the point at which investors will actually be able to sell their stakes in the company. It’s coming up on June 1, after being pushed back from the original date of May 2 because that was too close to their earnings date.

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