Mother of all settlements

A week back, the ambani settlement was announced, putting months
of speculation to rest.In the days that followed, lot was said
and reams of words have been written...

Everybody will be aware of the broad details of the settlement
but i simply cant resist the temptation....so here i am with a post
on corporate indias first family.

Anil gets to keep his favorites REL,reliance capital.He also gets
infocomm.Interestingly, Anil boycotted the inaugaration of infocomm,
a ceremony that had the prime minister in attendance.In addition to this
,if newsreports are to be believed Anil also gets ad agency MUDRA,
a travel biz and DA IICT.Mukesh takes for himself Reliance industries and
IPCL.Clearly, in terms of market cap Mukesh gets approx. 60% of the Ambani empire.
But actual numbers will be difficult to arrive at because any value assigned to
infocomm is only hypothetical..Anil will also get a some dough from mukeshs personal
resources.

When the ambani feud became public..Anil was painted as the bad boy.All media
reports said Anil will get REL and capital plus a good amount of cash.
The final deal is not all that bad for Anil.At this point ,i will stop
talking of history and will try to make a few intelligent guesses about the
future prospects of both the brothers..

Historcally, demergers have been very good(AT&T being a case in point).
So the deal will see a lot of value being created..Mukesh gets RIL and IPCL..
Unlike the enterprises with his brother,Mukesh gets businesses that are mature.
These are also cash rich ventures.But news in the grapevine, suggests that
while Infocomm will be carved out, RIL will have to take its debt.
This will affect the debt equity ratio..assets will come down significantly
but corresponding debt will remain..

More imporantly,Mukesh has always had his plate full.In the early 90s it was the jamnagar refinery .after that ,he over saw the merger of reliance petrochemicals with RIL.Then
it was infocomm..It will be interesting to see the path that Mukesh takes..
Mukesh also has all his top lieutenants with him.Kamal nanavathy,anand jain,manoj modi,
the meswani cousins are all still with him.The capabilities that this team brings to the
table is amazing to say the least.

There are 2 important areas that will probably attract 1)biotech 2)retail
Reliance lifesciences is a big player in stem cell research..The biotech sector
is in a very nascent stage and I for one ,am very eager to see what Mukesh
does to indian biotech..Retail presents huge opportunities.Reliances mantra of
large scale could drastically change the face of indian retail..Given Indias size
the 1500 crores that pantaloon generates as turnover is small change.

Anil should be a very happy man.Hes not only got a good deal.He has also
got the more glamorous businesses.Infocomm, energy ,advertising and finance ,
if Anil does things the right way he will find himself in the covers of magazines
every week..and if things go wrong, he will find himself in the front pages
of newspapers practically everyday.Anil has his task cut out.Whether he finds
enough time to maintain his reported relationships with miss worlds and
miss universes is a question to ponder.He needs a good team of executives.
Thankfully amitabh jhunjhunwala and tony are still with him.

Hes already committed few thousand crores to Reliance capital,so most of the money
he gets from Mukesh will go there.How he will raise money to finance the huge
projects that REL envisioned remains to be seen.Also infocommm ,needs money if
it has to stay competitive..Anil is a master ,when it comes to raising money
and he certainly will prove it one more time..


If all goes well, we will have two enterprises marching upwards in the forbes
list of companies..and I join others in praying that things go only well

All time favorite

Heres a list of my all time favorite books..
the list will reflect my tastes and u will find that
theres nothing serious in my list..

Its in no particular order

Godfather
To kill a mocking bird
Fountainhead
As the crow flies-jeffrey archer
Kane and Abel-jeffrey archer
Straight from the gut-jack welch
alchemist-paul coelho
Da vinci code
Evening news-Arthur hailey
Timeline
Doctors-Eric segal

One book i should never have touched- Family by mario puzo

its "male-in law rapes a woman" kinda story that
will put the fatwas to shame...

Authors of whom i should have read more-Stephen king, J R R tolkien,
Alistair maclean

I have read everythng written by sidney sheldon and john grisham..
I have a confusion with the names ,they get no mention
in my list


People reading this, i would like take a look at yours as well,
do mail me ......

suggestions ,feedbacks as always welcome

AU REVOIR

Its that time of the year, when my senior
friends enter a new life..
since time immemorial,i have been very close
to my seniors.So every passing academic year meant
my missing a few gud friends..This year has been the
worst ..

I knew a whole lot of people and a few have been
very close to me.These are people, with whom
i have spent most of my leisure time and most of the
time when i was away from classes when clases actually happened.
I have discussed a mind boggling array of topics with these people
for endless hours..

I will make every effort to ensure that i stay in touch with
these guys all my life..I dont want to name anybody ,coz
i just might end up missing somebody..I wish all my senior friends
who have entered corporate life,all the very best.

tomorow by this time ,venkat will be on his way to join IIM L.
Iam sure he will set the place on fire...
My cousin, whos been with me thru the gud times and bad
has cleared all the hurdles and will join univ of houston,
this time next month...

I wish both dinesh and venkat , the very best..

as i complete this post, my only thoughts are about
ensuring that atleast a handful of my juniors feel the sameway
about me as i feel about venkat,dinesh,neeraj,santhosh and others.....

A tea drinkers guide to the galaxy and beyond

I have spent more than a dozen years in an entirely
different part of madurai and over the years i had developed
the habit of consuming large amounts of tea.After a dozen years,
i knew the right places that serve tea the way it should be served.
It was a painstaking process,whenever i was out(which was practically
all the time)i used to visit a teashop.After a few years,no tea stall
existed in that part of madurai,that has not had me as a customer.
To give a quantitative perspective that region had more than a hajaar
tea stalls.At the end of it all, i had identified a few places
and i wud go there practically every hour.

Sadly, i had to relocate and i had to start the process all
over again.After nearly a month here, i have found a set of
places..Actually ,the scope extends to nearly two kilometres
in either direction from my house i.e from TCE on one end
to maapillai vinayagar on the other.

I will traverse from TCE through to maapillai vinayagar....

First on my list is the list is the shop right in front of
TCE.There are 3 or 4 shops that dot the road.But this is the one
that attracts students.The tea served here is kind of OK.The
place also offers a few other items .Iam not sure about their
names.Suffice to say that these items are made of egg and they
taste good.


My second choice is aarthi drive in..been here a few times
but had tea only once.They serve tea in metallic cup
n saucers.I have never seen a metal cup n saucer in use
anywhere before.The tea tastes good,but this is not a place
where you go just for your customary cup of tea.go here,
if u want to have grub and then follow it up
with tea.

I am very fond of tea from vending machines.Madurai
is not very heavy on vending machines.But i have found 2 places
that make use of tata kaapi vending machines.


One is a shop attached to a petrol bunk.If u are going from TCE to
palanganatham,you will find numerous petrol bunks but this is the
second (of only two) on your right.The place also has a sify iway.

Next is a place called 'my madurai',adjacent to TVS LAKSHMI..
Its a fast food joint,not very hippie though.

Tea from the tata kaapi vending machine is very gud..But tastes
a bit too sweeter.

There are lots of places along the bypass road, that serve 'OK' tea..
But today i found a place that serves good tea.I was searching for a shop
that sells business today and horror of horrors there wasnot one place near
palanganatham that sells english magazines..My quest took me to
bye pass road and there was not one shop that sells decent mags in the main road..
So i ventured into the side roads.I was directed to S S COLONY, north gate..
people said there are 2 shops there that sell all kinds of journals..

The search ended at a hotel called gowri annexe.I bought BT and
decided to put my taste buds to test .The tea was great.
Thats the power of serendipity..My search for BT ended with my finding a gud
teashop.

At the end of the day ,I know where to go for my next issue of
BT..and as an added delight i get a gud cup of tea tooooo


PS-none of the shops mentioned above serve tea the same way..
the 5 shops sell tea at 5 different prices-:)

neeraj-(of the mobile fone fame)

Neeraj boarded the pandian xpress chennai yesterday.
He will be joining cognizant on the 17th..
I wish n pray hes posted in chennai(dude has promised
me luncheons and dinners whenever i land in chennai..
buddy before u know it, i will be beside you)

Hes gone there with lots of expectations..
CAT being one of them.Time willl tell if cognizant
will provide him enough opportunities to pursue his
interests.Hes already onto some kind of a relationship
with an unseen cognizanter(am I using the right word..).
Iam not a virtuoso when it comes to relationships,
but i wish neeraj luck in that fron as well.

Last but ceratinly on top of my wishlist,
neeraj get a gud mobile fone and stick to it.(reliance lg,
samsung r220,second hand with bill 1108, samsung model not
known all these in a span of 12 months)


BESTO buddy..

mail ur mock results to me

moi in the hotseat 2

HR INTERVIEW

I had to wait for nearly 3 hours..
In the meantime ,names of people who had their
tech interview with me were called.People
who took their tech interview much later than
me ,walked out of their HR interviews.So i was
worried if TCS has done the right thing by
throwing me away..

Meanwhile, one panel focussed a lot
on the history of sware firms,stock details of
TCS,the way sware companies operate..I was praying
for an opportunity to go to that panel.

After sometime ,it was my turn..
and horror of horrors, the interviewer was
a lady..The HR interview was the exact opposite
of the tech interview.No introductions..no handshakes
(Not that i was willing to extend my hand anyway)

THE LADY: introduce yourself
ME :blah blah blah
(i completed my intro with my interests)
THE LADY:so what was the last book you read??
ME :favorite author is jeffrey archer.
read the prison diary.talked about
his experiences.
THE LADY:Any other book of his
ME :apart from his short stories,
i guess i have read everything..
but i like the fourth estate and kane and abel.
(luckily for me, the lady had read the fourth estate)
THE LADY:names of the two main characters??
ME : tells her
THE LADY:who do you think is better??
ME :dont want to differentiate between the two.
i feel both the protaganists are equally
good..Tells the reasons
THE LADY:opinion about tcs
ME : speaks for 3-4 mins about tcs
(she served coffeee)
THE LADY:do u mind if i have coffee??
ME :nooooo
THE LADY:you take these biscuits..pushes
a plate of good day biscuits..
ME :(the offer was tempting..but
i dont accept favours from unknown ladies)
so no thanks
THE LADY:what do u think about tcs' business?
(takes her coffee)
ME :talks for quite sometime..she still
with the coffee..so moved onto
their clients..top executives..
(shows some interest)I talk about
how TCS calculates its revenues...
and how to a stock market analyst or
a common investor, the model they prefer,
is not suitable..
(she asked me to repeat this twice)
talked about this in vivid detail..
quoted s.ramadorai extensively..
said how as an investor, am not too happy
with the model they use( the model they use
is good if you take a long term view..but for
Quarter to Quarter numbers its not advisable)..
Explained how as someone who understands the
functioning of an IT company, i can see the
wisdom in TCS' model..said a few years down the line
my father's belief in TCS will pay rich dividends..
(I used a lot of time to compare TCS with infy and wipro
entirely in the perspective of how they calculate their revenues..
am not sure ,if that was good ..people in the know ,please advise...
got carried away a bit)

THE LADY:have you been to the TCS website??
ME :yeah
THE LADY:what new info did you get
ME :(couldnot believe this)talks for a lot of time..
use a lot of names of people,of products,of policies....

THE LADY:your marks are pretty low
ME :curses everybody silently
THE LADY:i cant believe ,i have wasted time with you(throws my resume)
ME :laughs
THE LADY:utters some profanities( not too bad actually,but
when quoted here, will spoil the sanctity of my blog)
ME :Laughs
THE LADY:asks for my position in the class
ME :Uttered a number that was close to my
position, bottom up....
guess she took it the other way
THE LADY:any questions??
ME :(wanted to ask ,if the offer for the good days
still valid....but didnot get to that)
no
ME :thank you

moi in the hotseat 1

TECH INTERVIEW:

(The interviewer stands by the door and calls me in.
As I walk in he moves out.Shouts from outside
"take your seat".Speaks with somebody and then enters the
room

Pats me and extends his hand,introduces himself.
I reciprocate his gesture as immaculately as
possible.He moves across and takes his chair)

Takes my resume and the TCS questionnaire
that i had already filled.Moves straight to
the page where i had mentioned my interests
(both tech and otherwise)and my projects
and such stuff.My project was about
the stock markets and i had listed business
affairs as my interest.As luck would hav it,
he shared my passion.


TCS guy:So do you buy shares?
me : not exactly, my father does.
I help him
TCS guy:So you can play around with your fathers money
(smiles)
me:(smiles) sort of
TCS guy:thats actually the right thing to do.when you start working,
You will not make enough money to afford mistakes.

TCS guy:recommend a few stocks
me:how much money do you have
TCS guy:my pay is on the lower side,so lets say
i have managed to save 20000
me: if u want to buy large cap
go for infosys,TCS in the IT sector.
JET AIRWAYS,biocon ,bajaj auto .....
depending on your preferences.I also reasoned
why these stocks are good atleast for the medium term..
used a lot of jargons.He was pretty impressed

TCS guy:What about midcap

me:hdfc bank,eveready industries,SCI,elgi.........
added a few other names..threw lots of fundae.
TCS guy: what about ipcl, waste??
me:speaks for quite some time..basically
tell him whatever i know about the global oil prices
and very politely tell him iam not interested in the
petrochem sector.

TCS guy: (looks at the paper that i had listed)
4-5 people who came before you, had the same thing.
me: explains.basically confuse him saying it was
a team effort .Lot of people had presented it at various
colleges..

TCS guy:do u have certificates??

me: extend the entire folder to him..
TCS guy:takes a lot of time chacking everything..
occasionally turned to me ,to find out the college
which hosts a particular event.
(At this point, his mobile phone rings, he cuts the call..
but the caller was persistent.so the interviewer,
said write something about the waterfall model, and leaves
to attend the call)

me:the moment he enters, start talking.
requirement specification-meet the client,understand
his needs..........then analysis...........
design.........coding........
testing and maintenance................
(spoke for a long time , told him whatever i knew,
left the details of cost estimation and testing)

TCS guy: explain the different testing methods??
me:black box,white box,regression ,smoke,
stress, performance....................

TCS guy: c program for fibonacci series??
(He had asked the same question to
the guy who was in when i was asked to wait
outside the room.once he came outside ,
he said he had not written the code for fibonacci
series well..rathinam, the guy who was next inline,
and waiting with me ,took a piece of paper
and wrote a few lines..I glanced through it)

me:(blesses rathinam)starts writing something..
I use a lot of comments,printf ,scanf statements
around the few lines that i had earlier glanced.

TCS guy: explain the code

me:(Thanks all the gods)blah blah blah.........

TCS guy: differentiate between c++ and java??
me: Not comfortable with java
TCS guy:what comes to your mind ,when i say java
me:coffee
TCS guy:laughs
TCS guy:ok differentiate c and c++
me:uses 2 minutes
TCS guy:what are the seven osi layers
me:(thanks rathinam once again)
PLEASE DO NOT TOUCH STEVES PET ALLIGATOR
writes P D N T S P A
vertically

TCS guy: laughs
TCS guy: do u have any questions
me:no
me:nice speaking to you

(extend my hand ,thank him and walk out)

If my technical skills baffle you,
do forgive me..thats how prepared I was.
Never really thought i would clear the tech interview.
But was lucky ,the guy who interviewed me had the
same kind of interests.

placement report 2

I have already talked about our tryst with honeywell.
so let me move onto other interesting activities in the
placement scene..

TCS

walked into our campus on the 2nd of june.
The schedule by our placement cell was for
3 days.But TCS people were not too kind to the
idea of working on a weekend.What followed was a mess.

TCS angered a lot of people. there were too many people
who attended the process and therefore there was not enough
space in the K S audi .some quick fixes were worked out
and the presentation was telecast at the K M Audi.
the presentation began with a short video clip that
was a testimony to the versatility of the tatas.But the presentation
was too long and It talked about aspects not very important
to a budding sware engineer.As a result lots of people dozed off.

The eligibility criteria was relaxed.The test was changed to
a pencil and paper format.There were two sessions of written
tests.The written test results were announced well past midnight.
The interviews were scheduled( actually there was no schedule)
for the next day.The sheer numbers ,nearly 380 people to be interviewed
in a single day,made the logistics very difficult.

A few were lucky.they were done with their HR And tech interviews
within an hour.There were others who werent sure about their
tech interview results and had to wait for hours before
their selection or rejection, could be confirmed.There were
still others who after the passage of a few hours doubted
if they had cleared their tech interviews..This resulted in an
increased flow of adrenalin...there was anxiety all around.

The tech interviews as a rule were very cordial.The interviewers
went out of their way to make sure, the prospects were comfortable.
The customary handshake and introduction was all there..Not too many
people were eliminated in the tech interview..
The HR interview was a different story..Few people came out of their
interviews with smiling faces..Once all the interviews were over,
TCS took a long time to come out with the results.. the results
were announced at ten thirty ...

For all the anger and anxiety that TCS caused, the end was pretty
happy..Its not always that 248engineers get a job in the
course of 12 hours............

I will write about my tech and HR interviews ,once am dome with my other pressing
commitments

of b-schools and b-school surveys

B-schools mean business..and b-schools hav
spawned many new innovative business ventures....

there are hordes of institutions offering coaching for mba ntrance
exams...dozens of magazines for cat prep..and b-school
news is one important segment in many a newspaper.
the number of websites catering to wannabe mbas
is countless.b-school blogs are dime a dozen.

The number of best bschool surveys done every year will
run into hundreds.There was a time when i used to
look at the survey results, with lot of enthusiasm..
when we decided to shift our house, we had
to throw away lots of magazines, that i had
carefully collected over the last several years..
i had nearly half a dozen copies of BT bschool
survey editions, from as many years..a few outlook
aima indiatoday business india editions.


But these surveys have become meaningless.
This years' bschool survey by BT is full of
crap.BT had the gumption to arrive at the list
of top bschools, with a sample size of just 400
odd individuals.there is little solace in the fact that
the 400 ppl are drawn from a pool of mba wannabes,
current mbas, recruiters, functional heads........

As though the overall list is not baffling enough,
individual rankings by current mbas, wannabe mbas,
recruiters are very confusing..the wannabe mbas top ten
includes IMT,alliance,amity and tiss..TISS is a top institute,
but how many UG students want to pursue their masters there??
regarding Amity and alliance, i know of enough wannabe mbas
who wouldnot touch these institutes with a barge pole.In the
functional heads top ten XIM finds a place but not XLRI.
It has k j somaiya,jbims ,tiss,imt but not sp jain,iim k,
iim l....

Sadly this years' survey has not pointed
on niche mba courses..and there is no listing based on verticals.
A top five for marketing, top 5 for finance etc would
have been a greater help.No mention of IRMA and NITIE.

Oddly enough,this years' article moves onto
not so relevant areas like do you need an mba,
will you be at a disadvantage if you dont have a
MBA degree?,where will you be a few years down the line,
after you top IIM A B r C..

These articles make great reading..but BT should
have kept these articles in cold storage ..


LAST WORD:BT this year has not done justice to
IIM I and IIM K.

The art of remembering things

I had wanted to post my thoughts on the engg
admission process for quite sometime now..especially
after the decision do away with the entrance tests..

Venkat has come out with his views
(the nth time hes posting about the education system,
he hates it so much that he would love to change it).
I have retained his title to my post as well.Am sure
he wil not mind.

heres the link to venkats post

http://idontbother.blogspot.com/2005/06/art-of-remembering-stuff.html

He has said a lot many things....

So, let me just add a few things.....

For every mark ,from 600/600 down to probably 450/600, there will
be thousands of students.No matter ,what criterion you use
for prioritisation, there will still be a tie.So sundry factors
will come into play.There will be 2000 people with
600/600 and you find them across branches..

This decision,promotes learning by rote n offers
no incentives for application of knowledge.educationists
are very worried about the lower number of people making it to
the iits every year ,from Tamil nadu.This decision if anything
will only bring the numbers down.It also has larger implications...
someone who prepares for IIT JEE n takes it
will have a gud idea about competitive exams
n therefore will be more than willing to take
up GATE GRE CAT GMATn civil services...now
the numbers might just come down..we will have to wait for a few
years to get the right numbers though....

This decision will take money away from coaching
centres n put it in the pockets of engg college owners...
unsure of their childs future, parents wil shell out
money to deemed universities, n gud self financing institutions...
So this system in effect,takes money from a bad to worse place....

this certainly is no way to improve rural education...
rural education cannot improve at the cost of
urban society... n what needs to be done is
this..raise the ruarl schoool students to
levels maintained by top schools..dont pull down the
good students to lower benchmarks ..

raise the bar

we are in an era which has seen progressive steps
in fields as diverse as media,education,law, research to
name a few..decisions like these take us back to
the pre christ times...

Atleast we were lucky..


we are on our way out

Making a paradigm shift-quite literally

My father,his job and a lot many things had
conspired against me..The result, we had to shift
to a new house. we are moving away from
the one region that was very close to my heart..
As if that was not bad, the new place happens
to be a wee bit closer to *CE.

After more than a decade at my earlier place,
I luvd that part of madurai, more than I did
Madurai itself...(My own true friends,
frequent visitors to 5point someone, wil
vouch for my madness about madurai)

This new place seems to be in a faraway land.
My first reaction, as i moved in here was
God !! are we back to pre-indus valley civilization....
The place is a refreshing change ,compared to
the pell mell that characterised my earlier abode..

POSITIVES here:

veery serene
got a gud climate(still within the confines of madurai tho)

NEGATIVES

too close to *CE
faraway from everything else
ostracized from the rest of madurai



Will post more once i get a feel
of the things here....

FAQs

Why is your GradePointAverage not higher?

Because it is directly proportional to the mark you get.


The qn on cgpa is one thing that
any interviewer will ask a normal
engg student.There are others,
who take exams very religiously and
therefore miss out on the privilege of answering
this question..

the answer to this qn is taken from another
blog..iam not sure about the blogger's name
or the blog's url to giv proper credits..

shocking revelation

well, first things first...

TCS committed hara kiri..it has recruited
250 students from *CE.and even more
shocking is the fact that i happen to
be part of the herd.
I heard abt this at 11 pm yestersay night...
life is a paradox.this news is probably
the best that an engg student(more than
half an engineer actually, considering that
i hav fulfilled 3/4ths of my course
requirements) at crossroads, can xpect....

barely 12 hrs later, at eleven am today,
i had what wil remain as the lowest trough
in my life....at eleven today, i was before a
motley bunch of morons ,trying to
xplain things....

to put things straight, they were fair n just..

at this juncture, i dont want to add
nething else..

n oh yes, wil tell more of the tcs story
once internet connection in my house is restored..