Microsoft Releases Office 365 Home Premium

Microsoft announced worldwide availability of Office 365 Home Premium, a reinvention of the company’s flagship Office product line for its consumers in Pakistan and 161 other markets in 21 languages.

Office 365 Home Premium is a cloud service designed for busy households and people juggling ever-increasing work and family responsibilities. The new offering includes the latest and most complete set of Office applications; works across up to five devices, including Windows tablets, PCs and Macs; and comes with extra SkyDrive storage and Skype calling — all for US$ 79.99 for an annual subscription, the equivalent of US$ 6.67 per month.

“The New Office is full of features that will allow people to access information from wherever they are allowing them to effectively manage their work life and find time to do things they want to strike the requisite balance” said Amir Rao – the New Country Manager for Microsoft Pakistan.

Microsoft also announced that it will now deliver many new features and services to the cloud first, transforming the company’s traditional three-year release cycle. Now, new features and services stream to subscribers as soon as they are ready, keeping subscribers always up to date while eliminating the hassles of upgrading.

“This is a major leap forward,” said Kurt DelBene, president of the Microsoft Office Division. “People’s needs change rapidly, and Office 365 Home Premium will change with them.”

“Office 365 was chosen as the productivity cloud platform of choice by Serena Hotels Pakistan, as it enables our employees to work effectively from different locations and improves their productivity by giving them access to the latest versions of familiar tools securely from any device. This is key for us to improve internal collaboration which ultimately will result in improved customer service,” said Moiz Ismaili, Senior Manager IT, Serena Hotels Pakistan which has chosen Office 365 for their email solution.

Globally, the company also released updated versions of the traditional Office suite: Office Home and Student 2013, Office Home and Business 2013 and Office Professional 2013. Office 365 for businesses will be released globally with new capabilities on Feb. 27.

Time to Do the Things You Want

In a recent global survey, nearly 60 percent of people said they don’t have the time to do the things they want to do, and more than 80 percent said they could save one or more hours a day if they were better organized. Office 365 Home Premium is designed to help people be more productive from virtually anywhere and find the flexibility to do the things they want.

“Between kids and career, I’m never completely at home or completely at work — and thanks to technology, that suits me just fine,” said Jen Singer, an author, blogger and mom of two teen boys. “With Office 365 Home Premium, I can work around my kids’ schedules, so I can drive the soccer carpool, coordinate errands while at a doctor’s office and still hit my deadlines at work. And, with one subscription for everyone in my family, it’s an absolute steal.”

To help people find more time to do the things they want, Microsoft is introducing Time to 365 (http://www.office.com/timeto365), a new crowd-sourced website where people can find and share tips, tricks, ideas and inspiration from around the world. Contributors include experts such as “techorating” pro Janna Robinson (http://www.jannarobinson.com) and everyday working parents who have found ways to simplify their lives. Tips on the site include, for example, an idea for organizing your grocery list with OneNote on your phone, a pointer on how to pick the right-sized TV for your living room and ways to use Office applications to help plan a child’s birthday party.

NADRA to Get Contract for Deployment of Biometric Verification System for SIM Sales

NADRA is set to deploy Biometric Verification System for sale of new SIMs, said a statement issued by National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA).

Statement said that NADRA has prepared Biometric Verification System for Telecom operators, all preparations for Biometric Verification Systems have been carried out and NADRA is ready for launch from 28th February, 2013.

In this regard, NADRA has demonstrated its services and applications to Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) and Cellular Mobile Operators including representatives of Mobilink, Telenor, Ufone, Warid and Zong.

Proof of concept has been carried out with some telecom operators and a draft contract has already been forwarded containing minute details of operations.

NADRA has proposed flexible architecture to telecom industry with its recommendations on basis of security and performance.

NADRA has requested Telecom operators to finalize contract and deployment plans so that target date of 28th February, 2013 is achieved amicably.

Teleom industry had previously shown concerns regarding the deployment of biometric verification system.

Cellular companies are of the view that each mobile phone company will have to invest at least Rs. 500 million (or Rs. 2.5 billion in total) to deploy biometric solution, that too for just their service centres, franchises and 10,000 retail outlets, as compared to 200,000 retail outlets that were previously operational.

All this investment is likely to go into NADRA’s pockets as evidently they are going to deploy the solution for telcos, despite, there are other solutions available in the market which claim to be cheaper (in terms of price) than the one quoted by NADRA.

There are voices which suggest that deployment of new system for sale of new SIMs is just designed to benefit NADRA.

The new verification system will require each citizen to approach retailer, franchisee or Customer Service Centers of Cellular Operators personally and provide his/her fingerprints for authentication against CNIC data held with NADRA. On successful transaction, SIM will be activated. All this operation will be performed online and will take 15 seconds end to end.

Moreover, security related segments believe that such measures will help Government of Pakistan to curb use of illegally issued SIMs for terrorism, extortion and street crimes. Pakistan has significantly high cellular density in the country.

Although, it has changed the dynamics of communication means, yet their misuse has created security risk. Prior to Biometric Verification Services, methods adopted to regulate SIM issuance were prone to frauds. Now, with fingerprint matching facility, it is expected that same will bring authenticity and will reduce the risk of SIM issuance against fake identity to almost zero.

HP to ensure labor rights in its Chinese manufacturing companies

Hewlett Packard (HP) has issued labor guidance directives to its Chinese manufacturers in order to bring a halt to the use of low-paid student interns and other temporary workers in their factories. Chinese manufacturers often rely heavily on the use of student interns and temporary workers as a means to reduce production cost. HP says it has vowed against such violations of human rights and wants to protect the rights of its workers when they are hired.

These guidelines came after the acknowledgement of Foxconn (Hon Hai Precision Industry Co), a major Chinese manufacturer on which both Apple and HP rely for some of their products. Foxconn admitted that it had hired interns as young as 14 years of age. Apple has also taken a number of steps to improve the employee rights standards in Foxconn due to overwhelming criticism from the world over. People are of the opinion that the laborers who make such “class defining” items should be given reasonable protection and privileges.

HP is optimistic that its directives will improve the working conditions for the employees in the Chinese manufacturing companies. The guidelines include hiring of mostly full-time workers. HP insists that the interns and temps when employed are not forced to remain on job against their will and are free to file grievances against the company. HP also ensured that the intern working hours would be even below the allowable legal limit.

Vimpelcom set to issue dollar and rouble notes

Vimpelcom, the Russian Telecommunication giant with assets in various emerging markets including Italy and Pakistan. has hired banks to issue notes of dollars and roubles in order to refinance existing problems.Telenor has 31% shares in Vimpelcom while Vimpelcom holds stakes in Orascom, the parent company of Mobilink.

Reuters reported that Vimpelcom plans to issue a five-year rouble Eurobond having initial guidance set at the 9 percent area. Barclays, Citigroup, ING, and Royal Bank of Scotland will be leading to manage the financing.

The Russian giant is buried in debts which grossed $26.6 billion at the end of September 2012 out of which $2 billion will mature this year. In 2012 Russian borrowers managed to raise a total of around $53 billion through Eurobond issues and have issued more debt this year to profit from positive risk sentiment towards emerging markets.

Dell Laptops to be distributed by the KPK Government

Following the footsteps of the Punjab Government, the provincial government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) has announced the provision of 25,000 Dell Laptops to the students in the province. The Dell Laptops model selected is Inspiron3420. The first round of distribution will be conducted on Feb 10 at Peshawar University.

Speaking about the initiative, Project Director KPK, Adeel Khan, said “This project is a great leap in terms of equipping our youth to meet the challenges of the modern world and to keep Pakistan a competitor in the global knowledge economy. Dell’s involvement goes a long way in guaranteeing the success of this initiative.”

Shahzad Aslam Khan, Country Manager Dell Pakistan & Afghanistan, said “We look forward to working with KPK as they increase technology access and the learning potential for students. Mobile computing devices have become essential to daily life — at work, at home and increasingly, in academic institutions. Students are leveraging devices of all kinds to access information, collaborate with their peers and teachers, and produce dynamic content inside and outside of the classroom.  At Dell, we believe these devices can help support teaching and learning – and have the potential to personalize the learning experience for each student. Dell is delighted to work with KPK in this important program and is committed to providing these devices by meeting aggressive time lines and ensuring highest product quality.”

It is worth noting that the first lot of laptops distributed by the Punjab Government were also manufactured by Dell.