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Innaugural Session-(From Left to Right) Ashim Basu, Sr. Sales Manager- Western Digital, Hitesh Sharma, National manager-Education consulting- HP India, Prof. A.K. Panda, Center for IT Education-Bhubaneswar, A.K. Mohanty, M.D- Tatwa Tecnologies, Dayanand Rath, Secretary- ITAO, Shri. Surya Narayan Patro, Minister of Revenue & Disaster Management, Govt. of Odisha, Deepak Ku. Sahu,Publisher, VARINDIA, Bhaskar Joshi, Head Marketing-OIS- CANON India and Venkat Ramanujam N., Manager-Sales & Marketing-FOXCONN (MEIA)
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| Hon'ble Chief Guest Shri. Surya Narayan Patro, Minister of Revenue & Disaster management, Govt. of Odisha addressing the IT Fair |
VARINDIA has organized its 5th edition of Odisha Information Technology Fair -OITF 2013 on 11th January in the hotel- The HHI, Bhubaneswar. OITF 2013 was yet another attempt towards congregating the IT industry of Odisha in a common platform for the benefit of the state and the society at large . The event was attended by around 200 CXO’s from various corporates (Large and small companies in Odisha) where the IT industry showcased various products and technologies. The invitees of the event include various IT honchos, VARs and senior officials from the Educational fraternity.
As per the custom, the evening started with lighting of the lamp. The moment was graced by Shri. Surya Narayan Patro, Minister of Revenue & Disaster management, Govt. of Odisha.
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| Award winners of 5th OITF 2013 |
Other guests who graced the event were Shri, C.J.Venugopal, IAS, Commissioner-cum –secretary, Dept. Of Public Enterprises, Govt. of Odisha; Dr. Gopal Krishna Nayak, Director- IIIT- Bhubaneswar; Shri Manash Ranjan Panda, Addl. Director –STPI, Government of India; Aditya Mohapatra, OSD- OCAC; Prof. A.K. Panda, - MBA Department, Centre for IT Education, Bhubaneswar; Deepak Ku. Sahu, Publisher, VARIndia; A.K. Mohanty, M.D- Tatwa Tecnologies; Dayanand Rath, Secretary- ITAO; Hitesh Sharma, National manager-Education consulting-HP INDIA; Bhaskar Joshi, Head marketing-OIS-CANON India; Ashim Basu, Sr. Sales manager-Western Digital and Venkat Ramanujam N., Manager-Sales & Marketing- Foxconn MEIA.
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| HP India received award for BEST SERVICE SUPPORT, ODISHA, the award was received by Mr. Sujoy Basu | First Nano PC from the house of FOXCONN being unveiled by Shri Surya Narayan Patro, Minister of Revenue & Disaster management Government of Odisha | CANON India receved award for the OFFICE AUTOMATION PRODUCTS, ODISHA, the award was received by Mr.Bhaskar Joshi | REDINGTON India was awarded the BEST DISTRIBUTOR, ODISHA, the award was received by Mr. Anshuman Mohapatra |
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| MR. ANIL CHOUDHURY, BEST VAR, ODISHA - MAPLE COMPUTER & COMMUNICATION | MR. DHIRU KHANDELWAL, BEST SOFTWARE SERVICES, ODISHA- E-SQUARE TECHNOLOGIES | MR. MANOJ LALANI, BEST RESELLER,ODISHA – LALANI INFOTECH | MR. RAESH DORA, BEST SYSTEM INTEGRATOR, ODISHA -PRINTLINK COMPUTER& COMMUNICATIONS |
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| Presentation by Mr. Bhaskar Joshi, Head marketing-OIS- CANON India | Presentation by Mr. Ashim Basu Sr. Sales Manager- Western Digital | Presentation by Mr. Hitesh Sharma, National Manager-Education consulting- HP India | Presentation by Mr. Venkat Ramanu jam N., Manager-Sales & Marketing, Foxconn MEIA |
On welcoming the guests, Deepak Kumar Sahu, Publisher, VARIndia threw light on the significance of the event being held in Orissa. He said, “We go to different States in the country to strengthen the industry. It is a really great that Indian villages are becoming digital, Orissa being one of the hotspots. Villages will now see the coming of high speed broadband with 100 mbps connectivity.” He also announced that the third VARINDIA Cup will be held in Infosys ground in Bhubaneswar, with the support of STPI. He further emphasized that from this year VARINDIA is trying to recognize the regional VARS and this starts from the techno city of Bhubaneswar.
The Chief Guest of the evening, Shri Surya Narayan Patro, Minister of Revenue & Disaster management, Govt. of Odisha, said, “I have been associated with VARINDIA since 2004.” He further elaborated, “When I was the IT minister of the State, IT just started penetrating in Odisha. At that time, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Delhi were the place where IT was flourishing. Infosys made its way Odisha and then Satyam but beyond that no other big corporates came here. It was like Lakshmi(deity of wealth and prosperity) coming to home. I set up to promote IT in the state and met the CM to take this forward. I went from company to company in different places like a medical representative to bring them to Odisha but most of them did not pay much heed. Only some of them turned up, but in the year 2009, 114 companies came in and 1100 people were directly employed. Today Orissa is one of the top most states in non metro cities for trade and export. We gradually found that funds do not only pour from other sectors but a good amount of it can be garnered from the IT sector.”
Various corporates like HP, CANON, Western Digital and FOXCONN expressed that they are eyeing Odisha as the key market for growth as there lies a great demand. FOXCONN especially stressed on odisha’s immense opportunity in the education sector and chose OITF as a platform to launch the first nano PC weighing only 400 gram.
Venkat Ramanujam N., Manager Marketing-Middle east, India & Africa, Foxconn informed, “Foxconn is a $ 100 billion company and has a employee base of 1.3 million.” He further spoke on Foxconn’s focus in Odisha and the state’s vast potential and that Foxconn has appointed Infonet for taking care of the sales and services of Foxconn products in Odisha.
Hitesh Sharma, National manager-Education consulting-HP INDIA, spoke on how HP has worked on developing solutions that will utilize IT to handle education better. He further said, “Today the world is very different from how we perceived it 5 years back. Now people belong to a generation which is familiar with Facebook, Wikipedia and so on. They want things which are interactive, personalized, intuitive and multimedia enabled. While people are used to all these, but education has not taken much pace. It is still very textbook oriented, where people are expected to learn the same way as they were learning 10, 20 or 30 years ago. Thus this gap needs to be bridged.
Bhaskar Joshi, Head marketing-OAS, Canon India, opined, “Canon is presenting managed document services which would enable outsourcing of printing. Canon is a printing company and it talks about paper.There is a basic fact about paper and printing, the usage of paper is increasing by the day. According to research agencies, the cost of printing will go up to 3%. But managed services will ensure convenience and reduce cost.
Ashim Basu, Sr. Sales Manager, Western Digital India, said, “WD hard drives are much powerful then the traditional hard drives.” He further explained the powerful features of the Western Digital products.
The event was supported and showcased by IT majors like, Canon, HP, WD, Foxconn, Railtel, PGCIL, OCAC, STPI and Team Odisha. Various gifts were won by lucky winners in the lucky draw session.
The event also comprised of an interesting panel discussion, the theme of which was “Best Practices for Channel Empowerment in Odisha”. The session was moderated by Deepak Kumar Sahu. The Panel discussion included participation from the VAR community, Government, IT Association and CXO’s of various companies from India and abroad.
The consecutive success of the event for half a decade is proof enough of the State's immense potential and keenness of development in the ICT sector. And for years it has been VARINDIA’s undaunted effort to be the voice of VARS and the ICT industry at large. No wonder OITF 2013 was yet another path breaking success of VARINDIA in carrying out the modus operandi.
for more contact :
moumita@varindia.com
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 | Panel Discussion Best Practices for Channel Empowerment in Odisha |  |
| Moderated by Mr. Deepak Kumar Sahu, Publisher & Editor - in - Chief, VARINDIA | Audience listening to the Panel discussion |
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| Panel Discussion ( From Left to right) Mr. Ashok Ku. Nayak, Director- Mars Technology Mart, Mr. Dayanand Rath - Secretary-ITAO, Mr Ravi Sethi,Marketing head , Solutions business, OIS Division, Canon India, Mr. Ashim Basu, Sr. sales Manager, W.D. India, Mr. Hitesh Sharma, National manager-Education consulting-HP India, Prof.A.K.Panda,Center of IT Education-Bhubaneswar |
The Panel discussion was a powerful discourse on the empowerment of the very arterial, Channel fraternity. The discussion not only set an example of a successful role model of active voice of VAR and Corporate bodies in the ICT business but also best practices and ways to overcome challenges including delivery of latest Technology. The Panel discussion was moderated by Deepak Kumar Sahu.
On putting forward a thought by Deepak Kumar Sahu on the best practices of delivery model, Prof. AK. Panda, Center of IT Education-Bhu baneswar, said, “The delivery of products and services to the customers have to be very effective. It is very important to satisfy customer’s requirement. IT can improve the quality of delivery method. Odisha is extensively using IT applications to bring up better quality in the delivery of products and services.” Hitesh Sharma, National manager-Education consulting-HP India opined that the people in Odisha are open to new ideas and technologies and that Odisha, gives HP inspiration to launch new products.
Emphasizing on this, Ashim Basu, Sr. Sales Manager, W.D. India, “I have seen a typical thing about Odisha. People here are interested and educated. Today Odisha houses almost everything, be it schools, hospitals, universities etc. What is required for the channel partner now is to cater to their need with technical knowledge.” Ravi Sethi, Marketing head , Solutions business, OIS Division, Canon India, pointed out, “In odisha, the government is not only promoting the large enterprises but is also taking care of the small business. The government is emphasising that may be 2-3 lakhs IT jobs come in the state by 2014. That is when infrastructure needs to be proper. When talking about channel empowerment, it means building relationship with customers. And canon helps its partners do that.” Dayanand Rath - Secretary-ITAO said that empowerment would come from the knowledge of the products. Value addition is important for channel empowerment. Marketing people should have the technical knowledge. Training programmes are very significant. And last but not the least, Ashok Kumar Nayak, Director- Mars Technology Mart informed that the key growth sectors as far as the hardware is concerned lies in the retail segment. He further emphasized, “We have to work towards the feel good factor of the customer.”
Technology Showcase
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| By Foxconn | By Western Digital | By HP |
