‘National Employability Study 2011’ report concludes that only 3.25 per cent of engineering graduates are truly groomed for software-industry and can be hired without any further training. Also there is lack of good English language capabilities and the percentage accounts to 73 percent.

The challenge before small and medium companies is to hire industry ready software engineers. Unlike big companies, they can’t afford to train employees after hiring them. For small companies they need to hire talent who can learn on job and can start contributing right from the start. The report also observes small businesses to be vital for the economy. The key drivers of the economy are not ‘small number of large companies’ but then ‘large number of small companies’.

Hiring from campuses does not always work. Small companies too lack in budget to hire employees with high salary. So, they have to devise a way to hire good talents at affordable cost.

The Slovenia Economy minister Darja Radic had a meet with Virbhadra Singh, MSME minister of India. In a discussion, Radic said that Slovenia being a member of the European Union can provide a gateway for Indian MSMEs to reach out to whole of Europe. Indian MSMEs can form strategic tie-ups with Slovenian businesses and capture European markets. Mrs. Radic is currently on a visit to India and is leading a delegation.

Mr. Singh in a notion of collaboration has assured full cooperation for deepening bilateral trade between India and Slovenia. He also re-emphasized the importance of MSME sector in the growth of national economy.

Special Focus is to be laid on IT MSMEs

The ministers opined that there is great scope for collaboration and growth of MSMEs in the IT sector. So, there is discussion on finding ways to collaborate in this sector. The IT sectors’ contribution for the economic growth of the country is close to 50%.

A recent official statement from the MSME Ministry reveals that proposals are made to send IT delegation to European nations. The objective is to set up IT units there, employ local people and provide technical support.

MSME ministry suggested establishment of Indo-Slovenia Industrial Estate and unleash potential of MSMEs and promote business tie-ups.

There is also scope for sectors like glass manufacturing and renewable energy as the Indo-Slovenia MSMEs can always collaborate and expand.

Recession had hit the plastic industry in 2009 but now the industry has started to recover. The products of this sector are used both for industrial units and household sector. High percentage of respondents (61.5 per cent) says that the market picked in 2010. About 16.6 percent reported that it has worsened and 21.8 percent respondents have found that there is no change. Consumer sentiment in 2010 surpassed expectations according to 17.9 per cent participants, while 61.5 per cent reported average improvement and 20.5 per cent indicated negative consumer sentiment.

Liquidity crunch is a major concern for 32 per cent respondents and poor consumer is still a bigger challenge for 46.1 per cent respondents. For 21.8 per cent respondents, lack of infrastructure is the main hurdle for growth.

Companies that have taken a step toward shifting their base in northern India are Himalaya Drug Company, Charak Pharmaceuticals, Dhoot Papeshwar and many more joining in the group. Karnataka currently has 179 ayurvedic manufacturers, out of which 119 fall in the small and medium enterprise category. Laxminarayana Shenoy, state programmed officer at NRHM opines that there is not enough raw materials for all the companies in the state.

Amalaki (Amla or Indian gooseberry), Amrutaballi (Sida Cordifolia), Ashwagandha, Brahmi , Alalekai and Arjuna plants were the main raw materials available to the state of Karnataka until five years from now. But due to deforestation their total forest cover declined and so their availability ceased. Sourcing such raw materials from neighboring states only brings materials that are of inferior quality.

The Chhattisgarh State government is giving subsidy to farmers for cultivating plants of medical value. It also provides tax concessions to manufacturers of natural medicines. Labor cost is also low in Chhattisgarh in comparison to Karnataka.

The Karnataka State government has also imposed restrictions for entry into forests. The government has established Medicinal Plants Conservation Authority (MPCA) that is developing protected forests in 13 selected locations of the State. This has further fueled the migration of manufacturers to other northern states of the country. Other states do not restrict people from going into forests to collect such raw materials.

According to WHO, the traditional medicine industry is estimated to be Rs 8,000 crore and it is growing at 15-20 percent rate annually. By 2020, the ayurvedic industry is going to reach to the size of Rs 15,000 crore.

An ASSOCHAM study "Cluster Development for Inclusive Growth in Orissa” has been released by D. S. Rawat – the National Secretary General.  The total funds required as basic and essential infrastructure to such clusters is Rs 480 crores. Rawat opines that once the clusters become functional, they will contribute in inclusive growth, help generate 10% revenue per annum to exchequer and also upgrade existing clusters.

The summit ‘Conclave Orissa: Unfolding Investment Opportunities’ will be attended by 400 potential investors and chief minister Naveen Patnaik will be inaugurating the summit. The focus areas for MoUs are forestry, food processing, commercial sea ports, agriculture, non-conventional energy, herbal, tourism and infrastructure.

In first quarter of 2011, consumer demand has declined. This is the reason for the slowdown in growth of the PC market. Small and midsized business (SMB) buying PCs has goaded the market to achieve success in the first quarter. Contribution also came from government buying as it was the financial year’s last quarter.

The major multinational PC vendors too experienced double digit growth in shipments of mobile PC during the 2011 first quarter. More than half of total PC shipments were contributed by the multinational brands during this period. Contributions came from Acer, Dell, HP and Lenovo that accounted for 50.4 per cent of total shipments. HCL, the local vendor accounted for 7.1 per cent of PC shipments during first quarter of 2011.

India-French chamber of commerce and industry has been formed to boost economic activity that involves France and its other investors. Currently seven French companies are operational in India and they are in the mood of expanding activities in newer parts of India. Diplomats from France are paying visits to Tripura to gain a first hand idea about investment prospect in the border state.

‘Cluster Pulse’ had been operational on similar projects in Ghana, Uganda, China and Canada. The company will be helping small and medium enterprises in these countries to develop telecom, ICT, fan and other such equipments. After observing the company’s good cluster development work, representatives from the countries have approached it.

Jagat Shah, chief executive officer of Cluster Pulse, says, “We were contacted by Switzerland’s IT industry representatives to help them in developing an ICT cluster.” ‘Cluster Pulse’ is also involved in a $120 million (over Rs 500 crore) World Bank-led multi-agency project. This project is meant for financing and developing SMEs in India. Business Development services (BDS) will be offered by Cluster Pulse under this project to engineering and machine tool industries of Rajkot in Gujarat.

At present finding domain names is very challenging as already 1.8 million domains have been registered and more are added every day. But, this tool makes it possible for website users to search for the perfect domain name for their sites. It suggests domain names that Indian audiences can understand and also gives address names that incorporate lucky numbers of users.

The tool is certainly going to enhance user’s experience while registering names for their website’s domain and for suggesting new names that are Indianised. It is this Indianised name localizer that simplifies the user’s experience of searching for names while domain booking.

It is possible for companies to download Openbravo software, free of cost. According to Bartoli, out of the total generated business, India alone serves 30 to 50 percent in Asia-Pacific region. The company being headquartered in Spain is funded by some venture capitalists.

Companies are shifting to open source solutions due to the huge costs involved in ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) solutions. Openbravo would soon open a development centre in India. The ERP market size in India is US 1.5 billion.