Nasscom Foundation on Monday said it had partnered with Genpact and Mphasis to provide a seed grant of Rs 6000,000 to early stage enterprises that focus on creating sustained social impact.

The forum would award catalytic grants to early stage enterprises with an impact focus that address gaps in skilling for employment, primary and secondary education, health care, accessibility, women's safety and other relevant areas, a statement added. The grant money for the winning projects would be complimented with industry-led mentoring support, it said.

The National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom), apex body representing the Indian information technology (IT) industry, is planning to set up a Centre of Excellence (CoE) with the help of the central government to train professionals in the nuances of big data and business analytics.

Speaking to mediapersons on the sidelines of the two-day Nasscom summit on big data and analytics, which started here on Thursday, Nasscom Chairman B V R Mohan Reddy said it had been working with the Centre on this.

Nasscom on Thursday signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Symantec to develop certified cyber security professionals. With this initiative, Nasscom aims to take the number of cyber security professionals in the country from 63,200 to a million. Sector Skill Council (SSC), Nasscom and Data Security Council of India (DSCI), along with Symantec, will focus on training and creating new job opportunities in the field of cyber security.

“The nature of threats are evolving every day. We need manpower to tackle the present day aspects of cyber security which includes conflict management, secure coding, legal issues among others,” said Gulshan Rai, National Cyber Security Coordinator.

The trade association of Indian IT companies, National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom), on Friday, termed the reports of the U.S. investigation into IT companies as ‘unfortunate’ and ‘an attempt to create negative sentiments about these companies’.

The apex body also said attempts were being made in certain quarters to create this negative impression without looking at ‘facts and logic’. It said such efforts would have detrimental impact on the strategic partnership and mutually beneficial economic and trade relationship the two countries were striving to nurture.

With growing new technologies creating huge mountain of data, it is critical to build its leadership and capabilities in big data laboratories for analytics, said R Chandrashekhar, president, National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom).

He was speaking about the growth and prospects of Global In-house Centres (GIC), which are captive IT centres of global companies in India.

PUNE: The International Institute of Information Technology-Bangalore (IIIT-Bangalore) and Peesh Venture Capital (PVC), a NASSCOM investment partner, have entered into a strategic partnership to accelerate and fund India's Internet of Things and Mobile App start-ups. The goal of this public-private partnership is to produce successful Indian mobile app companies from India.

The initiative will seek to combine IIIT-Bangalore Innovation Centre's incubation facilities and knowledge ecosystem with PVC India-focused Rs 310 crore venture capital fund that invests in entrepreneurs with disruptive ideas.

Nasscom Foundation, the not-for-profit arm of information technology (IT) industry body Nasscom, on Wednesday suggested to its member companies to spend a higher portion of their corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds towards the government’s ‘Make in India’ and Digital India campaigns.

“A lot of companies are not imaginative enough on CSR activities,” Ganesh Natarajan, chairman, Nasscom Foundation, said during an event here. “We have a group working towards this where large companies can give us money to spend towards CSR activities.”

It could well be one of the biggest selfies clicked, with more than 1,600 waving to the drone flying across the conference room of the annual 23rd Nasscom Leadership Forum (NLF) in Mumbai on Wednesday.

The 2015 NLF saw one of the highest numbers of delegates registering for the event in two years. The NLF has more than 1,600 delegates from 30 countries, up from 1,400 in 2014 and 1,300 in 2013.

Currency volatility, macroeconomic headwinds and changing technology are likely to pull down growth of Indian information technology and business process management services exports to 12-14 per cent in 2015-16, according to sector body Nasscom.

This is lower than its growth forecast of 13-15 per cent for 2014-15. The export revenue grew 12.3 per cent on a reported currency basis in 2014-15 and 13.1 per cent on a constant currency basis.

Indian information technology services are expected to have a growth rate of 11-13 per cent for FY16, lower than the forecast (‘guidance’) for FY15 of Nasscom, the sector's apex business association, says a study.

Based on a survey by research and advisory firm Offshore Insights, it predicts the sector will grow at 11.5 per cent for FY15, lower than Nasscom’s 13-15 per cent. Nasscom earlier this month said the sector might only manage to be at the lower end of its guidance.

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