R&D HUB Hyderabad Updates

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Lab in Hyderabad to test and grade diamonds and jewellery

Hyderabad, Nov 26 (IANS) International Gemological Institute (IGI), the world's largest independent gem certification and appraisal institute, is setting up a laboratory for testing and grading of jewellery and diamonds in Hyderabad.
The laboratory, which will become operational in January next year, will be the 10th such facility of GI in India.
Tehmasp Printer, India managing director of IGI, told reporters here Monday that the 2,500 square feet laboratory and the institute were coming up at Panjagutta in the heart of the city.
He said the IGI was pleased to start its operations in the historic city of Hyderabad, where the diamonds originated. He pointed out that the Golconda mines in the city yielded the world's first diamonds, which were invaluable.
Printer said the lab in Hyderabad would offer a window service, where loose diamonds can be deposited for grading them in five days. The IGI charges Rs.3,500 for diamond certification for each carat.
With the growing diamond market, the setting up IGI lab is expected to benefit jewellers in the city, who were hitherto sending the gemstones to Chennai lab for evaluation.
IGI uses 14 parameters to judge the carat weight, clarity, color and cut of a diamond.
The IGI, which offers courses to meet the increasing demand for gemologists, also started two?day buyer seller knowledge meet in Hyderabad. Printer said such interactions were aimed at future development of the gemstone market by bringing together those who offer IGI certification and the jewellers who trust IGI certification.
IGI plans to organize such meets in other cities in India.

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Royal DSM sets up service centre in Hyderabad

Source: Business Line, Dated: December 4, 2012;



New facility: (From left) Ponnala Lakshmiah, Minister for IT, AP; Alphonsus Stoelinga, the Dutch Ambassador in India; and Rolf-Dieter Schwalb, DSM’s Chief Financial Officer, at the Hyderabad DSM facility on Tuesday. — P.V. Sivakumar

Global life-sciences firm hopes to treble India revenues in 3 years

HYDERABAD:
Global life sciences company Royal DSM expanded its footprint in India today by opening its shared services centre in Hyderabad.

The Dutch firm, which is into nutrition, pharma and engineering plastics sectors, will be making the facility its core centre for all global financial transactions, including accounting services. This is part of its plans to treble its turnover from India from the current $200 million in the next three years.

EMPLOYEE STRENGTH

“Currently, the Hyderabad facility has an employee strength of 75, which will be increased to at least 250 in the next three years. The facility will be later used for other services, such as information technology operations, procurement and human resources management globally,” Bharath Sesha, president of DSM India, told media-persons.

He said India, along with China and other emerging economies, is expected to contribute to about 50 per cent of the company’s global sales in the next five years. Last year, it clocked a global turnover of €9 billion.

“To achieve this, the company is investing in new manufacturing facilities, as well as looking out for acquisitions, with a clear focus on addressing nutrition and energy-efficiency solutions,” he said.

The firm is in the process of setting up a manufacturing facility for pre-mixes in the nutrition sector in Gujarat, which is expected to be commissioned next year. It has three production units at Toansa (Punjab), Rangangaon (Pune) and Ambernath.

amitmitra@thehindu.co.in

[Gudavalli]

HostAnalytics to invest $10m in next 3 years for R&D centre

Start-ups and companies embracing bring-your-own device to work concept will drive the adoption of cloud-enabled services. To tap this segment, HostAnalytics, provider cloud-based financial applications for planning, consolidation, reporting and analytics, has expanded its research and development wing at Hitec City in Hyderabad.

According to its chief executive officer Dave Kellogg, HostAnalytics has committed an investment of $10 million in the Hyderabad centre over the next three years.

The Hyderabad office has been contributing to the global product development. “Because HostAnalytics was founded simultaneously in India and the USA, Hyderabad has always been strategic for our distributed research and development strategy,” he said adding that it currently had 80 engineers in India and will add more through campus recruitments and lateral hires.

HostAnalytics recently closed a $17 million series D venture capital funding this year from investors Advanced Technology Ventures, Trident Capital, StarVest Partners and Next World Capital. Among others, it serves Essar Oil, WD-40, Sprouts Farmers Market LLC, NEC, and Splunk.

“Cloud allows businesses agility and a lower total cost of ownership and is rapidly becoming the preferred software delivery model for enterprises of all sizes,” he said citing a Gartner study, which said the global spending on software as a service (SaaS), or cloud-based applications will remain strong through 2015 and the spending on SaaS was expected to be about $22 billion.

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AAI to set up high-tech R&D and training facility in Hyderabad

NEW DELHI: In a bid to develop in-house capabilities in air navigation services, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) has tied up with a renowned American technology provider to set up a high-tech research, development and training facility in Hyderabad.

The proposed technical centre would provide comprehensive laboratory capabilities to support AAI's daily air traffic management operations and maintenance, besides carrying out performance analysis and R&D.

The AAI and the MITRE Corporation last week signed two agreements to establish the Hyderabad centre and for transfer of technology and knowledge.

Among this would be a sophisticated technology to train air traffic controllers (ATC), called 'Human-in-the-Loop' (HITL) computer simulation capability, AAI officials said.

HITL simulation is a virtual, real-time ATC simulation that requires human interaction with airborne and ground automation to manage air traffic in an operational scenario. It helps identify ATC problems, develops solutions for them and achieving cost-efficient deployment of the new solutions.

A real world example is the US Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) use of HITL simulation, developed by MITRE, to allow ATC personnel test new automation procedures by directing simulated air traffic while monitoring the impact of new procedures to be put into action.

MITRE is also offering its portable ATC simulation system that can be used to train personnel at any location with the use of a few laptops.

AAI, which has partnered with MITRE since 2006 for many of its Communications, Navigation, Surveillance and Air Traffic Management (CNS-ATM) activities, is the first sponsor of MITRE for HITL Technology.

By virtue of this, AAI becomes only one of the very few advanced aviation research organisations in the world to possess such a capability, the officials said.