Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella highlights how Microsft could play in connecting rural India

After Facebook, it’s Microsoft’s turn to pitch for Digital India. During his visit to Hyderabad on Monday, Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella highlighted the role the White Spaces project by Microsoft could play in connecting rural India.

“One of the things I feel that is most important is connectivity. So, there needs to be a market-based solution and also a local entrepreneur that goes out and creates that last-mile connectivity that offers affordable solutions,” said Nadella during his address at T-Hub, the Telangana state government-backed technology incubator.

Infosys CEO and MD Vishal Sikka and Keerti Melkote, founder of Aruba Networks, which was acquired by HP earlier this year, were also present at T-Hub.

“We are collaborating to work on the White Spaces technology that Microsoft has been pioneering. We want to bridge the last-mile connectivity problem, but Satya Nadella wants local entrepreneurs to come forward and  partner with Microsoft for this technology,” said KT Rama Rao, minister for information technology and Panchayati Raj for Telangana.

The pilot for White Spaces project, which utilises the unused spectrum from television to carry low cost internet connectivity, has been active in Srikakulam district of Andhra Pradesh.

Discussions are on between the AP State government and the Central government to scale it up as part of the Rs 333-crore AP Fibre Grid project for rural broadband  connectivity.

During the course of a breakfast meeting with the chief minister of Andhra Pradesh N Chandrababu Naidu, the state government requested the Microsoft CEO to help set up a Centre of Excellence in Vishakhapatnam.

For utilisation of ICT in citizen services and drive digital inclusion, the AP government signed a memorandum of understanding with Microsoft India to harness Microsoft Cloud technology. According to the MoU, Microsoft India will apply Microsoft Azure Machine Learning and Advanced Visualization to predict and address specific problems in the fields of education, agriculture and eCitizen services.

By : ET Bureau

Satya Nadella made every Microsoft employee take a class on ‘unconscious bias’

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Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella

At today’s annual Microsoft shareholder meeting, CEO Satya Nadella identified diversity as a major focus and said it will contribute to the company’s bottom line.In the last year, all Microsoft employees took a mandatory class in how to overcome “unconscious bias” and listen to their colleagues so they can “bring their best ideas to the table.”

Unconscious bias is the idea that people are more likely to make snap judgments based on appearances. While this can be helpful in some cases- that subway seat is empty for a reason (look closer, it’s got liquid on it) – it can lead to bias against people from different backgrounds and genders, in hiring and in day-to-day work. Google instituted a similar class for employees last year.

Nadella acknowledged that Microsoft has fallen short of the diversity goals he committed to at last year’s meeting, with the company recently disclosing that the number of women and minorities at the company actually dropped off thanks to its recent rash of layoffs, especially in the Nokia phone unit.

But Nadella reaffirmed that this is a continued area of focus for Microsoft.

“Even with these steps forward, we’re still not where we want to be,” Nadella says.

The Reverend Jesse Jackson took the stage, as he did during Microsoft’s meeting last year, during a question and answer session, to address Microsoft and ask it to commit to setting hard and fast diversity goals, including making more startup capital available to minority groups. Jackson said that he met with Nadella privately earlier this week.

Nadella responded by reiterating some of Microsoft’s progress in that area, including the “YouthSpark” program that gives startup cash to young technical entrepreneurs and its success in improving representation in the ranks of leadership.

“When we sort of say everything at Microsoft starts with our mission, and we want to talk about empowering the world and empowering every person on the planet, it has to start with diversity and inclusion right here at Microsoft, and us, representing the world internally,” Nadella says.

By: Matt Weinberger

Source: businessinsider

Microsoft Corporation CEO Satya Nadella to Visit Hyderabad in December 2015

Microsoft Corporation CEO Satya Nadella is scheduled to visit his hometown Hyderabad early in the next month, i.e., in December. An official of the Telangana State Government had confirmed the visit ofSatya Nadella to Hyderabad city in the month of December. However, the official has not yet spoken a word on the date and other details of his visit. All the other details are not yet revealed by the official.

Satya Nadella is expected to meet Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao alongside his Andhra Pradesh counterpart N. Chandrababu Naidu in Hyderabad. Besides the encounter, the CEO will be visiting the Microsoft India Development Centre in Hyderabad. This is the second visit of Nadella to Hyderabad after heading over as the Chief Executive of the global tech giant last year.

Microsoft Plans to Set up Data Center in Hyderabad

Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella will be visiting Hyderabad in the month of December to meet both the State Chief Ministers, K.Chadrashekar Rao and N.Chandrababu Naidu. Earlier, during his first visit in the month of September, Nadella had Telangana chief minister and spoke to Naidu over the phone. Now, the CEO wishes to meet both of them at one place and seems to hold discussions with the state government on the topic of setting up a data center in the city.

Already, there are data centers which were launched in Pune, Mumbai, and Chennai. Although the metropolitan city, Hyderabad was deemed to be the first city to have a data center, however, it did not materialize. Telangana Information Technology Minister K. Tarakarama Rao had also called on Nadella during his visit to the US in May this year. This visit likely shows that the Microsoft company is planning to expand its operations in Hyderabad while AP CM, Chandrababu Naidu is also seeking to woo it to have its presence in Andhra Pradesh.

However, all the technical aspects of setting up a data center will be revealed only after the meeting between the company’s CEO, officials, and the state government. During Satya Nadella’s speech to the Company’s employees on expanding the Hyderabad center in September, he hints that the company is planning to set up a data center for cloud computing.

Microsoft has its India development center in Hyderabad which was set up in 1998. The development center in Hyderabad is the largest Research & Development center of Microsoft outside its Redmond (US) facility.

Source: techgig

 

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