Rice: Pakistan Must Cooperate Fully

Mumbai 26/11: The Pakistan connection

India's 7 hottest IT destinations

Thanks to its treasure-trove of skilled manpower and high growth of software export, India is a true IT powerhouse.

And despite the current slowdown in the United States, Indian companies' overdependence on the American economy, and a weak dollar, the Indian IT juggernaut is on a roll. So where in India has the IT boom really taken off? And which are India's hottest IT spots? Read on. . .

1. Bangalore

Bangalore's (or Bengaluru's) ten-fold growth in quick time can be traced back to the IT boom over the past few years. Bangalore's main activity is information technology and information technology-enabled services. Being the leading contributor to India's IT industry, it has been dubbed the Silicon Valley of India.

Home to many software majors, like Infosys and Wipro, Bangalore accounted for 33 per cent of India's Rs 144,214 crore ($32 billion) IT exports in 2006-07.

A recent study also revealed that the rupee millionaire club in Karnataka's capital is the largest in India.

Bangalore also boasts of having the largest number of households with an annual income of Rs 10 lakh (Rs 1 million) or more. Needless to say, the city owes it all to the IT boom. Little wonder then that Bangalore is the number 1 IT desitnation in India.

Image : Infosys campus in Bangalore.

All about the Bengaluru International Airport

It was a project desperately waiting to take off. Finally, after several years of deliberation and dilly dallying, the Bengaluru International Airport is ready.

The official date for the first flight to take off from the newly constructed airport in Bengaluru has been decided as 0001 hours, March 29, 2008.

An international airport was long overdue in Bengaluru, which has a large number of people from the international community visiting it, thanks to the city attaining the status of India's Silicon Valley.

Ironically, all these years, Bengaluru did not have a full-fledged airport and was relying on the services of the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited airfield. The government had entered into an understanding with HAL and was making use of their airfield for both domestic and international flights.

However, as the years passed by, it became necessary to have a bigger airport as the number of passengers and flights were on the rise. But it was not an easy task to actually set up the airport.

History

First land was identified at Devanahalli, a village 30 kilometer from Bengaluru. The estimated cost of the project was Rs 1,334 crore (Rs 13.34 billion) with the state government's share being Rs 350 crore (Rs 3.50 billion). However with time the project cost went up to Rs 1,412 crore (Rs 14.12 billion) at the time of signing the concession agreement, and at the time of completion the cost stands at Rs 1,930 crore (Rs 19.30 billion).

World's 10 most women-friendly companies

US-based Working Mother magazine has recently evaluated the presence and prominence of coloured women in the US corporate world and has drawn up a list of the best companies. The list has been made primarily on the basis of diversity programmes for such employees.

The companies were chosen mainly on factors like representation, recruitment and retention of women of colour.

The magazine said it noticed a dramatic increase in the number of women of colour, who are senior managers. Also, women of colour represented 13 per cent of all new hires last year, 14 per cent of all employees, and 7 per cent of top 20 per cent earners at the winning firms.

The list includes two big American conglomerates -- PepsiCo and Citigroup.

According to the magazine, PepsiCo has about 10 per cent employees who are 'women of colour', with seven per cent of them being executives/managers.

Vikram Pandit-led Citigroup has a higher representation of women of colour in its ranks, making up 22 per cent of the total employees. However, when it comes to executives or managers, there is only about four per cent of such people.

Noting that nearly 28 per cent of new hires last year at the Citigroup were women of colour, the report said the figure was up from 25 per cent in 2006.

Other prominent names in the '2008 Working Mother Best Companies for Multicultural Women' list include Colgate-Palmolive (13 per cent), Credit Suisse (14 per cent), Deloitte (16 per cent), Ernst & Young (17 per cent), IBM (8 per cent), MetLife (14 per cent), PricewaterhouseCoopers (16 per cent) and Wal-Mart (20 per cent).

To know more about these companies, read on. . . .

Pepsico (10% employees are women with colour)

PepsiCo is a conglomerate that manufactures, markets and sells a wide variety of carbonated and non-carbonated beverages and snacks.

The company is headquartered in Purchase, New York while its research and development headquarters are at Valhalla, New York.

The Pepsi Cola Company began in 1898, but it only became known as PepsiCo when it merged with Frito Lay in 1965.

Indra Nooyi is the conglomerate's chief executive officer since 2006.

PepsiCo owns five different billion-dollar brands. These are Pepsi, Tropicana, Frito-Lay, Quaker, and Gatorade. The company owns many other brands as well.

The company's net revenue as on March 22, 2008, stood at $8,333 million as against $7,350 million in March 24, 2007.

World's 10 most expensive pens

The history of pens dates back to 4,000 BC, when people used crude instruments for writing -- consisting of hollow straws or reeds that carried some liquid, says penscollection.com. In 500 BC, people began to make pens from the wing feathers of such birds as geese and swans.

The shaft of the feathers was hardened and the tip was shaped and slit to make writing easy. These feather pens were known as quill pens, and they were widely used until the development of steel-nib pens in the 1800s.

By the late 1800s, inventors had perfected an early version of the fountain pen. This pen represented a major improvement over previous pens, because it featured an ink reservoir and a capillary feed. After several modifications, pens attained the current form. Companies across the world started experimenting further to come up with some really pricey ones.

To know about world's 10 most expensive pens, read on...

1. The Limited Edition Mystery Masterpiece

A joint creation between Mont blanc and Van Cleef & Arpels, this is the most expensive writing pen ever created. It costs $730,000!

Each pen has 840 diamonds and more than 20 carats of gemstones set in a Van Cleef & Arpels patented 'Mystery Setting' that conceals the stone settings. There are three variations of the pen, set either with rubies, sapphires or emeralds, and accented by diamonds. Artisans took over 18 months to create this pen.

Image: The Limited Edition Mystery Masterpiece.

World's 10 biggest shopping malls

From Mumbai to Shanghai to California, shopping malls are sprouting up by the dozens every year. And with the retail sector booming, more such swanky shopping plazas are waiting to be built. But all is not as bright as it is projected to be.

While footfalls in most malls are increasing by the day, the volume of actual sale remains more or less static, barring the festive seasons, when sales shoot up. But this too is restricted to select outletss.

However, there is no denying that shopping malls have become an indispensable part of our lives, today.

To know more about the world's 10 biggest shopping malls (area wise), read on...

1. South China Mall

Located in Dongguan, this mall has leasable space for over 1,500 stores in approximately 6.5 million square-feet of total floor area.

It has seven zones modelled on: Amsterdam, Paris, Rome, Venice, Egypt, the Caribbean, and California.

Although the mall opened in 2005, it still suffers from lack of retailers. Much of the retail space remains empty.

Analysts say that the main reason the mall is so far largely unoccupied is that it is located in the suburbs of Dongguan, which is not well connected by China's public transport system.

Image: A view of the South China Mall.