Indian Govt Makes 4401 User Account Requests To Google, 66% Complied: Transparency Report

Google has released their six monthly Transparency Report and according to it, Indian Government made 2513 data requests that requested information on 4401 Users/Accounts in the period between July 2013 to Dec 2013. This is second highest among all the nations after the USA.

For all the requests that were made, Google complied to 66 percent of them furnishing some kind of data. 4401 Users or Account requests was the highest number since Google started publishing Transparency report since July 2009.

During first half of last year, Indian Government had made 2691 data requests that requested information on 4161 Users or Accounts.

Top 10 Countries on Transparency Report

USA remains the top country when it comes to number of data requests made by the Government agencies. They made 10,574 user data requests requesting information on 18254 accounts and Google complied with over 83% of those requests, again highest among all the nations.

France (3378) and Germany (3255) were behind US and India in terms Users/Accounts information requests.

Between July-Dec 2013, various government agencies across the world made a total of 27477 user data were made for over 42648 user account information.

Google Compliance Rate

At a global level Google complied with 64% of all the requests made with some kind of data. India has  slightly higher compliance rate of 66%.

Among the Top 10 countries with user requests, Google provided back 83% of data to agencies for the USA, followed by Australia (70%), United Kingdom (69%), Singapore (68%) and India (66%).

Google was the first online company to start offering transparency report back in 2009. Over last 3-4 years nearly every major online company including Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft and Yahoo have come out with their transparency reports.

Transparency reports are obviously great way in which normal users can know how much data is being shared with Government without their knowledge.

[Google Transparency Report]

Indian Companies Invested $17B In USA, Generated 81000 Jobs!

As per a recent a recent survey by CII (Confederation of Indian Industry), it has been revealed that Indian companies collectively invested whooping $17 billion in the USA and generated close to 81,000 jobs in diversified sectors.

In 2013, CII surveyed 68 companies spread across 40 American states and found that the largest concentration of Indian companies are in New Jersey, California, New York, Texas and Illinois.

The report titled ‘Indian Roots, American Soil: Story of Indian Companies, growing impact on the US economy’said that, “According to the survey, the collective investments amount to a whopping $ 17 billion as of today and together they generate employment for more than 81,000 people in the United States.”

Presence of Indian Companies Across United States

The TATA Group remains one of the biggest Indian employers in US as they have provided jobs to more than 20,000 Americans, spread across 30 states.

Mahindra, another big Indian company has generated 3000 jobs for Americans in California, Georgia, Kansas, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Texas and have some major expansion plans soon.

ESSAR America said that they are planning to invest $3 billion for mining exploration in Minnesota if the state laws allow them to invest.

Presence of Indian Companies in USA, across Industries

As per US Department of Commerce, India has been ranked among the top 10 countries which have made maximum Foreign Direct Investment or FDI inside USA. And as a compliment, Reserve Bank of India has confirmed that US is among top 5 importers of Indian talent and skills along with capital.

The report further adds, “All of these factors point to the growing prowess of Indian industry in the United States, in terms of investments, job creation and thus, overall economic impact. The US-India economic relationship is certainly poised for further growth, though awaits more impetus.”

USA is right now in the midst of a very peculiar phenomenon called “Reverse Outsourcing” as more and more Indian companies are opening their offices in USA to bring down the costs involved in operations and to hire the best American talent. Often India has been held responsible for snatching away American jobs as the term “Bangalored” became quite popular, negatively.

In 2012, NBC news had researched the reasons behind this reverse outsourcing trend in US and found out some reasons which make it completely feasible and profit-oriented. As per the research, more than 3 million jobs would be created by this phenomenon in US in the next decade.

And India has just started the trend!

MS Office Now Completely Free On iPhone & Android Phones

In the short duration since Satya Nadella has taken over as the boss, Microsoft seems to be shedding the image of a laid-back software giant. With slew of decisions being taken in last month or so, it is clear that they want to aggressive and nimble to market needs.

Yesterday, Microsoft released an update to their Microsoft Office mobile app for iPhone and Android, and a big surprise came as part of that update. The application  has now become completely free on both the OSes for home and personal use.

Interestingly, Microsoft has not officially announced this, but if you see the app change log, it clearly mentions 2 things in “What’s New” section:

• Office Mobile for Android phones is now free for home use.
• Bug fixes and stability improvements.

Prior to this update, all users needed to have a office 365 subscription to use Office mobile on their iPhones and Android. It was only available for free on Windows OS phones. So, going forward users can start to view, edit, update and share documents on Office mobile for free.

Also, this facility is made available for home personal use, so businesses will still need to pay the subscription charges if they need to use Office mobile.

While Office is the defacto document creation and editing suite on desktops and Notebooks, they were not able to simulate the same success in mobile world. Firstly, they came in quite late, and secondly it was available only for Office 365 subscribers. iWork on iOS and Google docs on Android/iOS have taken bulk of mobile market share.

However, now with Office mobile becoming free, it would be interesting to see if mobile users shift to it.

Whatever said and done, it is heartening to see Microsoft moving into “free app” territory, especially in Office space, which has been their bread and butter over last couple of decades.

Apart from coming on phones, Office mobile yesterday launched on iPads and will also be soon coming to Android Tablets as well!

Narendra Modi Tweets To Famous Personalities To Push Voter Registration

Narendra Modi is king of Social Media, atleast as far as Politicians go. He is probably one of the top 10 politicians to have such a large online following. He has over 5.5 million followers on Twitter and Facebook alone! Check out some of the statistics that we collated couple of weeks back on Narendra Modi’s social clout.

And there is a reason for his social media success – unlike many others he has never “bought” followers or used sponsored stories or tweets to spread the message. All of his followers have come organically because of the efforts put by him and his team. They post every update, every announcement online and at the same time engage with the audience.

Here is an example: Currently voter registration drive is going on to ensure that every eligible voter can have their name of the list, especially the first time voters. Not having voter name of the list is one of the main reasons many cannot vote.

To push this, Narendra Modi has not simply tweeted about it, but has encouraged many famous personalities to spread the message. He has personally appealed to personalities like Amitabh Bachchan, Shahrukh Khan, Akshay Kumar, Sachin Tendulkar, Hrithik Roshan, Salman Khan, Priyanka Chopra, Deepika Padukone, Shashi Tharoor, Preity Zinta, Kiran Bedi,, Shri Shri Ravishankar and even Dalai Lama. Interestingly, he has tweeted this message even to Prime Minister’s office!

Dear @BeingSalmanKhan lets encourage voter registration among 18-24 yr olds. Large number of them unregistered. EC drive presently underway.
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 20, 2013

Dear @sachin_rt lets encourage voter registration among 18-24 yr olds. Large number of them are unregistered. EC drive presently underway.
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 20, 2013

Respected @DalaiLama lets encourage voter registration among 18-24 yr olds. Large number of them unregistered. EC drive presently underway.
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 20, 2013

With tweets to these personalities who themselves have huge number of following, Narendra Modi has ensure that not only his own, but millions of others who follow these personalities will get the message.

His 10 – 15 tweets can probably be the most effective channel of spreading this important message to millions, because most of the first time voters throng social media sites like Twitter and Facebook and follow atleast one of these celebrities!

It just goes to show how well Narendra Modi (and his SM team) understand the power of Social Media. Kudos to them!

What do you think?

Will Samsung Galaxy S5 Sell In India?

Samsung is the king of smartphones and there is no argument about this fact. The have sold the most smartphones and I do not see any reason why this should change in the near future. The trust in the brand of Samsung has increased a lot as well. While in the era of Nokia, few people ever looked at a Samsung phone, now a Galaxy phone is present in almost every segment for you to close your eyes and buy if you are not very tech-savvy. You won’t be disappointed as well for most part.

In this galaxy series, the primary is their S series which has evolved from the first Galaxy S (which did not have a flash) to the newest baby in the market, Galaxy S5. It was launched in the Mobile World Congress (MWC) so there is nothing new that could happen in the India event on 27^th March except the price and the launch date.

As per the announcement, Galaxy S5 comes on 11^th April and the pre-bookings start from March 29^th. It will bepriced at around Rs. 51000, which has made me fall in love with my Nexus 4 all over again.

Now, here are the specs for people interested:

• Display: 5.1” Super AMOLED Full HD
• Processor: Octa Core (Not the Quad core in India)
• OS: Android 4.4
• Camera: 16 MP (rear), 2 MP (front)
• IP67 Dust and Water Resistant
• RAM: 2GB
• Internal Memory: 16,32 GB (plus memory card upto 64 GB)
• Battery: 2800 mAh (21 Hours Talktime)

Breaking down this into what I think is good and what not so much:

Good:

The camera features are good and would encourage people to use their phone for the same. The phone is Water and Dust Resistant (first for Samsung flagship) which brings it closer to Sony Xperia Z series. In my opinion, this is a must feature for any high end phone. (Apple listening??)

Also, there are battery optimizations for longer battery life which is a plus.

The not so good:

While it might be a personal opinion, I think the screen of the phone is a little too big. It is now more of a phablet than a phone which is not good if you are interested in a powerful but smaller Android phone.

Second, the phone that is launched in India will not have 4G. While, 4G is not a feature that is needed in the immediate future it surely will come into fore this year with Airtel and Reliance Jio starting to setup the infrastructure for it. Of course, Samsung can simply bring the other variety (Quad core) once 4G becomes prominent later but it would be a loss for those who buy this phone now.

Lastly, the price of the phone is over Rs. 50000. That is reserved for Apple phones and as much as Samsung is the most successful smartphone brand, it still doesn’t warrant a place in India where people buy it instead of iPhone for the same price.

Another reason that I think people will long and hard is because at 51k, one would expect to use it for atleast couple of years, and with no 4G support (which is expected to launch everywhere by end of year), few have any real reason to go for such an expensive phone.

What is your views on this? Will Samsung reduce the prices soon or will the phone succeed despite its premium charge?

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Amazon Introduces EMI Schemes To Push Kindle Sales in India

Amazon has only recently started their business in India but the pace at which they are strolling is immense. Initially entering as Junglee.com (a price search engine), they finally entered as Amazon.in and have added almost all the categories that their competitors like Flipkart offer.

Adding to that of course is their Kindle store and devices which provides books to the people at great prices and e-book readers and the Kindle Fire series. However, as with any tablet device these days, the price point is very important for its sale in India. Also, ebook readers are not something that people instantly connect with.

Even a person who is an avid reader might feel that it is paying too much money for a device that does only one thing. To encourage such users, Amazon has introduced the age old method of EMI schemes in India.

You can purchase the Kindle devices directly from Amazon on EMI as low as Rs. 900 for Kindle Paperwhite and Rs. 500 for Kindle. These numbers are obviously for a twelve month plan but looking at the rates, it will surely intrigue avid book readers who were avoiding it for some time. Especially perhaps students who do not have that much money to spend on a product directly.

In a recent survey about ebook readers showed that the biggest deterrent for people in buying the e-book readers is in fact their price. Even serious readers do not feel the need to spend that much money on a device like that. As Kindle apps and books is one of Amazon’s primary ways to earn money, it is very important that these products sell great.

Apple has already shown that the EMI schemes are great in India. Even product like iPhone which is mostly a high end gadget benefits from setting EMI giving a clear indication that Amazon is on a right path with this idea.

Interestingly, the survey shows that most people would buy a Kindle if they do buy an ebook reader giving Amazon a clear edge over its competitors.

As for the product itself, I would recommend it highly to anyone who likes reading. I own one and it is way better than any tablet experience. Also, the battery life of a Kindle beats any tablet out of the park.

Of course, the simple disadvantage being that reading is all you can do on a Kindle but with the screen size of phones reaching ginormous proportions, I think tablets might already become a secondary option for most people and they can consider buying a kindle instead.

If you are an avid reader, and don’t own Kindle, now may be the time to pick it up!