Suspendisse feugiat mi sed lectusaoreet nec interdumBy Trenz Pruca

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Highlight:Interview with TATA Nano spokesperson

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Member Speak 14

ISRO: A role model for frugal engineering

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Fashion - onomics 15

Metre se chalo ya boli lagao 16

Dummies guide to auctions 17

Insights into the world of Nano 2

Under the spotlight (The smart Cube) - Interviews

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PG Avenues (Masters in Engineering Management @ Dartmouth)

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Guest Article (CCS) 12

Recruitment trendz @ NSIT (Special article)

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The United Kingdom in the 1970s: A General Perspective

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The Ghost Rat 19

Warren Buffett and his Investment Philosophy

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What was the inspiration behind the making of the Tata Nano? The thought behind the making of the Tata Nano was to give the Indian customer an affordable, safe and all-weather form of personal mobility. A large gap exists between the average-priced two-wheeler and the existing low-priced car. That is why lakhs of families ride two-wheelers in potentially dangerous configurations, most often in potentially dangerous situations. It is this economic and social condition that led our Chairman, Mr. Ratan N. Tata, to conceive the Nano. As he said at the unveiling of the Nano on January 10, 2008, “I observed families riding on two-wheelers – the father driving the scooter, his young kid standing in front of him, his wife seated behind him holding a baby. It led me to wonder whether one could conceive of a safe, affordable, all-weather form of transport for such a family.”

What are the main features that set the Nano apart from a conventional car?The Tata Nano offers an incredibly spacious passenger compartment which can comfortably seat four adults. With a length of just 3.1 metres, width of 1.5 metres and height of 1.6 metres, the Tata Nano has the smallest exterior footprint for a car in India but is 21% more spacious than the smallest car available today. A high seating position makes ingress and egress easy. Its small size coupled with a turning radius of just 4 metres, makes it extremely maneuverable in the smallest of parking slots. The 2-cylinder engine – delivering 35 PS @ 5250 rpm and a torque of 48 Nm @ 3000 rpm – enables the car to have a top speed of 105 km/h and negotiate inclines with a gradeability of 30%. It offers fuel efficiency of 23.6 km/litre, certified by the Automotive

Research Association of I n d i a ( A R A I ) u n d e r mandated test conditions, which is the highest for any petrol car in India. The high fuel efficiency, coupled with a low kerb weight of 600 kg, ensures that the Tata Nano – at 101 gm/km – has the lowest CO2 emission amongst the cars in India. What was the most

interesting challenge faced during the development of the Tata Nano?By far the greatest challenge has been to produce a car within the cost goals we set.

Tata Motors has reportedly filed 34 patents related to the innovations in the Nano. Is there any scope of

technology transfers taking place between the Tata Nano and the luxury brands Jaguar and Land Rover?No, there are no technology transfers between Tata Motors and Jaguar Land Rover. W h a t w a s t h e total investment on the project and by when is t h e p r o j e c t expected to break even?The project cost is a l i t t le over Rs 2000 crores. The Tata Nano is a profitable project.

What are the production targets for the current and next financial year?The capacity at our Pantnagar facility is 50,000 cars per annum. The capacity at our upcoming Sanand plant is 350,000 per annum.

As expected for a car with such a small price-tag, the customers are a bit apprehensive about the safety of the Nano. What safety standards have been incorporated in the Nano?The Tata Nanoʼs safety performance exceeds current regulatory requirements – it passes the roll-over test and offset impact, which are not regulated in India. It has an all sheet-metal body, reinforced passenger compartment, crumple zones, intrusion-resistant doors, besides mandatory seat belts and complies fully with existing Indian safety standards. Tubeless tyres – among which the rear ones are wider endowing extra stability – enhance safety.

Are you looking at the commercial vehicle segment as a target market for the Nano?No.

There are already talks of Bajaj-Renault-Nissan launching their ultra-low cost car in 2011. How do you see this new market segment shaping up in the next 3-5 years?Worldwide there is a shift towards smaller, fuel-efficient, environment-friendly cars, which the Tata Nano is.

What are the potential export markets envisaged by the company?Tata Motors displayed the Tata Nano Europa, which is meant for Europe, at the Geneva Motor Show this year. The company has said that plans are that the Tata Nano Europa will be ready for launch in 2011. The company has also said that it will develop a version for the US market, which is expected to take about three years.

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1Insights into the world of NanoLittle needs to be or rather much has been said about the ‘people’s car’ which had its commercial launch on March 23, 2009.In early 2008, the news magazine Newsweek identified the Nano as a part of a "new breed of 21st-century cars" that embody "a contrarian philosophy of smaller, lighter, cheaper" and portend a new era in inexpensive personal transportation - and potentially, "global gridlock".Following is a tête-à-tête with the Tata Nano Spokesperson.

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The Tata Nano, as launched in India, can itself be exported to other countries. Tata Motors is finalizing specific countries and timelines. Will first time car buyers be given preference for the Nano? All the booking applications will be treated at par and will be subjected to a computerized random selection procedure.

The front and rear tyres of the Tata Nano are of different sizes. How is the customer expected to manage with only one stepney?The spare tyre in the Tata Nano is same as the front tyre i.e.135/70R12. However there is absolutely no concern in case the rear tyre gets punctured since the spare tyre can also be fitted at the rear.

UC Recommends:Part 1: Blogs

Marketing Practice (marketingpractice.blogspot.com) – This blog truly lives up to its tagline – the worldʼs largest online resource on Indian brands. Over a span of three years, Harish B, a professor of marketing has analyzed over 400 Indian brands ranging from the Bajaj Chetak (Hamara Bajaj) to Center Shock (Hilake Rakh De) on this blog. Updated daily, the blog is well archived with categories such as ʻMarketing Fundamentalsʼ, ʻWhy Brands Fail?ʼ and ʻGreat Marketing Storiesʼ. Highly recommended for all marketing enthusiasts!

Freakonomics Blog (freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com) – This one comes from the authors of Freakonomics. Just like in the book, Dubner & Levitt along with a few of their friends sneak a peek at the hidden side of everything. The blog is highly interactive with the bloggers often posing questions asking for advice or looking for the correct answer for which they give away ̒ Freakonomics schwagʼ. Posts titled ʻHow Marriage Helps You Get Your Drinks Fasterʼ and ʻCould Women Have Prevented a Financial Crisisʼ should certainly kindle your interest in this blog if nothing else does.

Seth Godinʼs Blog (sethgodin.typepad.com) – Seth Godin is a world-famous Marketing guru well known for his concept of Permissions Marketing. His book 'The Purple Cow' , which dealt with the concept of a remarkable product or service was widely popular. On the blog, Seth disses out no-frills, no-nonsense marketing advice. Most posts are restricted to 3-4 lines, but convey a world of meaning.

Khan Academy (khanacademy.org) – Salman Khan is, unlike his eponymous Bollywood counterpart, more about brain than brawn. After an MS in Electrical Engg and an MBA from Harvard. Khan started uploading videos on a wide variety of topics from mathematics to sciences to finance to computers onto the Internet, particularly Youtube. His finance related videos are simple to understand and convey the concepts with great clarity.

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Please tell us a bit about your profile.In my current role as an ʻAnalystʼ Iʼm required to undertake exhaustive research, exploit secondary (scanning the information and data points ava i lab le in pub l ic sphere and proprietary databases) and primary (establishing contact and conducting interviews with industry experts) domains. Then on, all the relevant information is pieced together and analyzed, to crystallize the key themes for which the client has sought answers.

How has been your experience so far at The Smart Cube?To be honest, it has been nothing short of brilliant; very capable set of people, thoroughly professional in conduct, and at the same time all knowing how to have their fair share of fun. I guess, what Iʼm trying to say is, just how many companies would run a river expedition right on the international border or send you out to some obscure, harsh, and hence gorgeous, location in the H i m a l a y a s , a n d a l l o f t h i s subconsciously making you a better fit for the organization.

How do you find the work and work environment at TSC? Work has been good, environment has been excellent. Work being extended to your plate, both in terms of quality and quantity, is a pure reflection of the capabilities you demonstrate; and rest assured, if you have performed well, it

will be duly acknowledged, you wonʼt need to go and market it for yourself. To answer this in an anti-cliché, Yes, I do look forward to head to my desk on a Monday

Please describe for our readers a typical day or week at work.We will stick here to description of a day, wonʼt bore with that of a week. - You land up in the morning; settle in

after grabbing a quick cup of coffee.- Squeeze in a couple of hours of

work.- A brief team meeting to make sure

everything is in place, and if not corrective measures to make it fall in place.

- Another hour and half hour of work before your belly starts to plead.

- Lunch, this is something many people look forward to, spending some quality time with your friends, this half hour or forty minutes time-out surely freshens you up for the second half of the day.

- Post lunch itʼs again work, of course this time interspersed with more (or less) coffee breaks, depending on how close you are to dozing off or h o w m u c h m o r e i s l e f t t o accomplish in the day.

- Catch up with teammates for an informal discussion.

- Done for the day, you wind up your stuff and bravely dive in to the chaotic traffic to head back home.

Nishank Sethi graduated from NSIT in 2008 with a B.E. in Instrumentation and Control Engg. He is presently working with The Smart Cube as an Analyst. In this interview, Nishank speaks to Aurora about the work and work environment at TSC and his future plans and lends some sound advice to NSITians.

The Smart Cube (TSC) is an international professional services firm that specializes in prov id ing h igh-va lue r e s e a r c h a n d a n a l y s i s services to clients globally by tapping a highly qualified and yet economically preferable pool of analysts. With three d is t inct serv ice l ines – Strategic Research, Financial Research and Data Analytics – the company is at the top e n d o f t h e K n o w l e d g e Process Outsourcing (KPO) value chain.

This year was the second time when TSC recruited NSITians on campus. From the class of 2008, only 3 students were able to make it through while in the class of 2009 a total of 10 students have been selected. Itʼs been one of the most sought after recruiter in the Non-Technical domain.

Under The SpotlightThe Smart Cube is an international professional services firm that specializes i n d e l i ve r i n g H i g h Va l u e a n d Customized Business and Investment Research and Analysis.Following are the conversations of the students from NSIT who were selected in the firm. They share their experiences of the work as well as the selection process.

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Please give us a brief introduction to your profile.Well, I hailed from the ʻpariahʼ section of NSIT - I didnʼt boast a good percentage; neither had I done significant projects during my tenure at this institution. What I had achieved, though, was a better understanding of myself - who I was, where I came from and where I intended to go. Throughout my college days at NSIT, Iʼd tried to engage myself with different activities and always strived for a greater source of learning. It was the experiences which Iʼd picked up in working for various societies in college, laying down contr ibut ion for our symposiums, and undertaking varied internships during our gap months which came in handy for me. Add to that, a whole new diverse level of interaction with a number of people in and out of college. Iʼm not quite a stifler for books. I rather prefer sharing experiences in the flesh. C o m b i n e d , t h e s e f a c t o r s w e r e instrumental in making me who I am and ultimately helping me strike a chord with the management at TSC.Now, my job should be in the Strategic services domain where we are required to research, collate and analyse data for our clients and add “value” to their respective organizations.

Did you set any targets for yourself before the start of the placements season? What attracted you towards The Smart Cube?To be honest, I didnʼt even know that a firm by the name of ʻThe Smart Cubeʼ even existed. One could perhaps relate that to a few reasons. Once the placement session rolls in, students start off by securing a “C” grade job. Post a sufficient number of students being placed in such firms, the hunt for prime “A” grade firms kicks on. TSC isnʼt a big name on campus, say like a Deloitte, and hence fewer people sat for it. Itʼs only after you research their profile, body of work, and respectable pay packet, that you say to yourself, “Hmm, itʼs not too bad dude; in fact, it might just open up avenues like few other would.”Also, I had a very meagre aggregate percentage to go with. So, as it was, I had few options. I took whatever came my way, and hey, I got lucky.

Please tell us about the selection procedure followed by TSC at NSIT.In all, there were four different rounds of selection. The details of each round are as follows:

(a) Written test: Now, the first round itself took us by surprise. After breezing through the presentation comfortably, students were quite at ease awaiting their respective written test sheets, only to be left dumbfounded. The written exam was based on “ bus i ness awareness”. It was quite different, for us NSITians, for the usual bracket of a “management firm”. Generally, under such heads you expect an aptitude-oriented test, but TSC was different, and so was the outcome - I made it!It shows that one must be prepared to face any type of written test for any company in any domain.(b) Group discussion: This was the stage that changed my perception for TSC. I have always been wary of group discussions. Somehow, I donʼt like them. One of the reasons for my dislike is that one normally doesnʼt get sufficient time to share his / her views on a topic. You are not given that “space”.TSC selected a reasonable strength (about 50-60) of students for group discussion from an earlier cohort of more than hundred odd competitors. We were o r g a n i s e d i n g r o u p s o f t e n (approximately) and sent in for group discussion to various panels.I had the Managing Director (for operations in India), Mr. Sameer Walia s i t t ing on my panel . The group discussion lasted for about ten-fifteen minutes. I neither initiated nor concluded the group discussion. I had just one “entry”, for less than fifteen seconds, to my name. Our panel of students never allowed the discussion to creep into a “fish market”, but our discussion was inconclusive. I had, therefore, spoken for the least amount of time and hence lost hope. The decision took me by surprise. Completely! I was the only student from my panel to make it to the next round. This really pumped me up and I thought to myself - itʼs now or never. Mr. Sameer Walia had clearly gone for the basics and stressed upon the requirements of a group discussion.I have been reasonably familiar with group discussions.I fell back on the inimitable ʻKISSʼ principle - keep it simple and straight. You speak when you know that you have something to share; else you just listen attentively and take in the information.The dec is ion sen t a degree o f reassurance and I ceased to look back. My scheme of things seemed to resonate with those of TSC.

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Karan Sehgal is a Class of 2009 student of B.E. (Electronics & Communication Engineering). A gregarious student, he is an integral part of Crosslinks and the Debating Society, while contributing regularly to college fest iva ls and other extra-curricular activities. We spoke to Karan about the recruitment procedure of The Smart Cube and his reflections on the placement season.

I s t h e c o m p e n s a t i o n a t T S C satisfactory?Pretty much so.

What are your plans for the future?Well, say two-three years down the line, I do see myself still having a wonderful time here at TSC (that is unless the company chucks me out or a masterʼs opportunity comes along!). Any piece of advice that you would like to give to the juniors?Read a lot. There is no such enabler as information, and donʼt just read for the sake of stuffing it in your head (you can always rely on Google to archive it for you), question it, look for reasons. Given any subject, form a hypothesis by yourself, then go ahead and discover whether the reality confirms to your hypothesis or is contrary to it, unearth the reasons why it is so, hopefully you will end up tuning your logical thought process for the better.

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1 (c) Data crunching: This, again, was something new. In a way, TSC was successfully carving a niche for itself. F e w c o m p a n i e s w o u l d t e s t i t s candidates on “data crunching”. However, this would be an integral part of what an analyst at TSC shall be expected to do. Hence, the “data crunching” program.Youʼre given a few paragraphs on a sheet of paper and you got to edit the s a m e i n a b o u t fi f t y w o r d s i n approximately fifteen minutes. This was a real test for me since I am known to be big on words. Somehow, I managed to come through.(d) Personal interview: It was getting real close. The anxiety was obvious. However, I tried to remain confident. I knew this might be my last chance. The interview went fine. Not too good. Not too bad. It was a mixed bag of questions. I was asked a few “guess estimates”, points on my resume, and experiences from college life. The average length of an interview was perhaps 20-25 minutes.

Please elaborate on the interview round for the benefit of our readers.As I have already mentioned, I was hurled a variety of questions to contend with. Itʼs something which you expect from an interview with a financial firm. The “guess estimates” were quite interesting and logical. The reason I say they were logical is because they were based on my background to a large extent.My dad works for the Indian Foreign Services, and hence Iʼve been to quite a number of countries around the world and had myriad experiences of the same. Consequent ly, my “guess estimates” were quite international in their outlook and focussed more on globalisation, world economy, etc.Also, I was asked to explain my role in the various societies that I had been a part of at NSIT and my responsibility in each of them. Furthermore, some details on college symposiums and their agenda wrapped up the non-technical discussion.After this, a few technical questions were put up to me, but they were quite basic. Iʼm sure each one of you would have been able to answer them. It ended on a happy note with me elaborating upon my future goals and career aspirations and, obviously, hoping to make it through. We shared a good laugh; I shook hands with each of the panellists, and headed for the door.

Any advice – general or specific in terms of reference material and writing a résumé - that you would like to give to your juniors?As clichéd as it may sound, your resume shou ld be a reflec t i on o f you r personality. Itʼs a piece of document which should give your evaluator the first signs of you being interested and capable. For a non-technical firm, itʼs advisable to document well a portion of

your “intuitive” side. You should look to be a bit different, and have it documented on your resume - be it extra-curricular or otherwise. Your technical projects are important, but your “X” factor is equally necessary. Also, a lot depends on the type of company youʼre sending your resume across to. The domain of its work, its functional details, is as important as your own. In that regard, one must be able to link his/her resume details to the requ i rements fo r a s t rong candidature. You should know who you are and where you come from, and I donʼt know if there is any book/magazine/newsweekly which can take you there. Of course, one must be updated on news and general affairs; however, itʼs not the end of it all. Ideally, you should have a fair idea of what you wish to do post graduation and try to avail opportunities in that field.I never really prepare for interviews. Itʼs not because I donʼt feel the need to; but because I feel what I have and what I can be should be known to me and should be told by me in a manner to be understood by not only me. I did get lucky, but even if I didnʼt, I knew I wanted a job in this field. That is what I am trying to explain. Identify your s t r e n g t h s ; a n d w o r k o u t y o u r weaknesses, to tread along the path you wish to travel. Off the rack, I would advise my fellow students to study a companyʼs web site before appearing for it. Itʼs the best way to seek acquaintance, unless of course, you have someone you know who works for that firm. I would like to end with a

phrase which my mother says to me - “Do your best and let God do the rest”.I c a n b e r e a c h e d a t karansehgal19@gmail.com and I would be happy to help. All the best to all of you!

GUESSTIMATESGuesstimates are the evergreen set of problems that anyone will frequently come across in oneʼs selection process with any Non-Technical recruiter.

Usually one has to come to conclusive answer to the problem given by assuming basic data such as population of the state and then narrow down your approach. The answer (guess) should be quite close in line with the actual answer, only then it is considered to be a good guesstimate. Some typical examples:

1. Number of planes in the Indian sky at this moment.

2. Estimate the number of cars in Delhi/NCR.

Lookout for more tips in our next edition.

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Please give us a brief introduction to your profile.My academic profile is as follows:

- CBSE AISSE(2003) 95% - CBSE AISSCE (2005) 91%

- NSIT-IT (2005-09) 73.4%

Did you set any targets for yourself before the start of the placements season?Having decided to make a switch from a technical work-profile to one which was more finance-related, to gain the necessary work-experience that would help me later in a B-school interview, I planned to apply to all the non-technical companies that visited campus. Not to put too fine a point on it, but I was fortunate enough to be recruited in a year when non-technical companies were still actively hiring.Some of the companies I was interested in are Evalueserve, Dunnhumby, Grail Research, The Smart Cube, RA Net,

McKinsey Knowledge Centre and the Bain Capability Centre.

Please tell us about the selection procedure followed by TSC at NSIT.There were 4 rounds and each was an elimination round.First Round - This round required one to complete a written test/questionnaire. The test had about 25 multiple choice questions on Business Knowledge/Awareness and could be completed comfortably within the stipulated time. Some examples of the questions asked were: - What are the functions performed by the World Bank?- What are The Brettonwood Sisters?- What was Indiaʼs GDP last year?- What is depreciation?- What is Freddie Mac?-Conversion from INR to USD (at current exchange rate, which wasnʼt mentioned in the question)- Walmartʼs revenue in the last financial year

Second Round - The second round was the Group Discussion round. Each group had about 10-12 students but the moderators did not let the discussion become a “fish-market”. Everyone was given a chance to speak. This round was meant to check the oral-communication skills of an applicant.The topics were fairly general. Some topics that I can recall are:- BRT- boon or bane?

- Is the Republic Day Parade an unnecessary expense?- Should gay marriages/prostitution be legalized?

Third Round - This one was Precise Writing. An article on the automobile industry in China was given to each student and he/she had to capture the gist of the article in 50-60 words. This round was meant to judge the written communication skills of the student.

Final Round - This was the Interview round. I was interviewed by a panel of three, comprising the MD of the company and two others from the HR Department. However, it was the MD who asked all the questions. It would be advisable to prepare answers to some questions beforehand. These questions are mostly HR-related and need to be convincing; even more so because they concern oneʼs decision to take the CAT, or make a switch to a

non-technical line. For instance, if the person sitting across the table isnʼt convinced that you will join the company and not choose to do an MBA, they might not recruit you. Some of these questions could be:- Why XYZ Company? More specifically, why an analyst?- Why not an MBA?- What has engineering taught you that will help you as an analyst at The Smart Cube?- Do you read the newspaper? (It might also be helpful to know the headlines, currency exchange rates, SENSEX value, gold prices and crude oil prices on the day of the interview. I was asked 2-3 things from this list.)One could also be asked to analyze a trend. For instance, after asking me the price of crude oil, the interviewer asked me to discuss where it might be heading and the impact it would have on oil production by the OPEC countries. Also, I would recommend that students prepare some guesstimates for non-technical companies. I was asked to estimate the number of customers who visit the Costa Coffee in Dwarka in one day.There could also be questions related to Business Analytics. I was asked to name the 2 candidates in the fray for the US Presidential Elections (this interview was in August 2008). Further, I was asked to discuss the impact of Obamaʼs win on Infosys. (I could assume whatever I wanted about his policies. At that time, I didnʼt know about his stand on outsourcing. So I explained how Infosys would be affected in both cases – that is if he were for or against it. Another point I mentioned was the limit on H1B visas.)There were other Business Analytics questions that were put to the other candidates. Some of them that I heard later in the auditorium:- How would you invest 1 million USD in

a business?- The interviewer gave the name of a

company and the candidate had to give as many of its competitors as possible in all verticals. So if the interviewer said ITC, one would have to mention all of ITCʼs competitors in product lines where ITC had a market segment. So it could be stationery (Classmate products), Fast Moving Consumer Goods or FMCG (Sunfeast Biscuits etc.), apparel (Wills Lifestyle), tobacco products, hospitality (Maurya Sheraton and others) and so on.

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Jahnavi Kundu is a Class of 2009 student of B.E. (IT). She has maintained an impeccable academic record throughout her life in addition to being involved in technical projects and co-curricular activities. Here, Jahnavi shares her thoughts with us on the placement season in general and The Smart Cube in particular.

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Any advice – general or specific in terms of reference material and writing a résumé - that you would like to give to your juniors?Most other companies would have had an aptitude test in lieu of the one on General Awareness. To that end, one could practice basic DI and Quant. Questions for these two sections are available in the preparation material of any CAT coaching institute.The newspapers / columns that I follow regularly are:- The Hindu (particularly the Editorial and op-Ed pages)- Mint- Paul Krugmanʼs column in the HinduIʼve now converted my calls for FMS-MBA and XLRI-PM & IR. I shall be joining the former. You can send me any q u e r i e s y o u m i g h t h a v e a t kundu.jahnavi@gmail.com. All the best!

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1UC Recommends:

Part 2: Books

The Undercover Economist – Written by Financial Times columnist and Bastiat Prize winner Tim Harford, this book is Microeconomics 101 applied to the real world. Harford elegantly explains why your coffee is priced as expensive as it is and why sweatshops arenʼt as bad as Naomi Klein would have us believe. Economics minus the boring graphs and statistics, reading this book is like spending an ordinary day in the market wearing X-ray goggles.

The Undercover Economist – Written by Financial Times columnist and Bastiat Prize winner Tim Harford, this book is Microeconomics 101 applied to the real world. Harford elegantly explains why your coffee is priced as expensive as it is and why sweatshops arenʼt as bad as Naomi Klein would have us believe. Economics minus the boring graphs and statistics, reading this book is like spending an ordinary day in the market wearing X-ray goggles.

The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life – In times of crisis such as this, it might do us some good to turn to the philosophy of one of the richest people in the world. This tome provides a well-rounded account of the rise and rise of Buffett, an investor nonpareil who has used a strategic Graham-Dodds approach of Value Investing to invest in successful firms such as Coke and GEICO. Beautifully researched and written by Alice Schroeder, this book also gives us a brief glance into the philosophy of Buffett, his belief in the internal scorecard and the ovarian lottery which has led him to donate huge chunks of his wealth to The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life – In times of crisis such as this, it might do us some good to turn to the philosophy of one of the richest people in the world. This tome provides a well-rounded account of the rise and rise of Buffett, an investor nonpareil who has used a strategic Graham-Dodds approach of Value Investing to invest in successful firms such as Coke and GEICO. Beautifully researched and written by Alice Schroeder, this book also gives us a brief glance into the philosophy of Buffett, his belief in the internal scorecard and the ovarian lottery which has led him to donate huge chunks of his wealth to The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The Dilbert Principle - Scott Adams - Originally referring to companies' tendency to systematically promote their least-competent employees to management  in order to limit the amount of damage they're capable of doing, The Dilbert Principle is a book that full of Adams' trademark biting humor. Full of out of the world suggestions ( like how abusive women make good leaders ), Adams puts forward an extremely irreverential way of looking at corporate life.

The Black Swan - Nassim Nicholas Taleb - is a refreshing new look at the world of finance. Taleb discusses literary, scientific and mathematical examples to show how uncertainty is an essential part of markets, and how an understanding of uncertainty can help us approach it better.

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Parul Batra graduated from NSIT in 2007 and completed her MEM degree from Dartmouth College in December

2008. Presently she is working with McKinsey & Co, Los Angeles. Here, Parul shares her views on the course and the culture at the university and outlines avenues available to students after MEM.

My profileI graduated from NSIT with a B.E. in Computer Engineering in 2007. I had always been interested in business, specifically in the technology industry, because of its dynamic and ever changing nature. While in college, we developed software to track lost mobile phones and remotely access any information on your cell phone. We also created a business plan around this software which was selected in Worldwide Top 8 in SIMagineʼ06 (an international Java Card applet competition).After graduation, I moved to Dartmouth for the Master of Engineering Management (MEM) program which seemed

ideal because of my prior experience and future interest in the field of technology and business. My academic performance at the university was very strong and I graduated with the highest GPA in the batch. My non-academic performance was strong too, comprising of - leading the MEM council, working for the MEMPC and being the brand ambassador for India.I graduated in December 2008 and am now working with McKinsey & Company as a Business Analyst in their core consulting group in Los Angeles.

About the courseThe MEM program is very flexible and offers a great variety of both engineering and business courses. There are some mandatory courses of each kind, but electives can be chosen by an individual according to their interest. These can be at the Business school,Engineering school, Medical school, Law school or any other department (say Economics). Essentially, you define the course for yourself by choosing the kind of courses you want to take, and the MEM provides you with the opportunity to

PG AvenuesMasters of Engineering management

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delve into the field of your choice (fields as diverse as finance or marketing or environmental engineering). The curriculum is very interesting, updated, and relevant to the market and the professors are highly qualified and amazing instructors.

The Dartmouth CultureDartmouth is a very tight-knit school and has a strong community. There a r e m a n y s o c i a l e v e n t s t o encourage students to get together a n d g e t a d i v e r s e c u l t u r a l experience. A whole bunch of extracurricular activities are offered that include dance classes, sports, outdoor activities and state-of-the-art gym. During my time there, I took a whole bunch of dance classes and participated in outdoor activities like hiking, camping and skiing. There are official parties almost every other week and unofficial parties every other night (Dartmouth is a big party school!).

Avenues after MEMYou can go wherever you want to after graduation. Both the kind of courses you take, and where you decide to go after graduation – are decisions made by you depending on your personal interest. Most people tend to pursue MEM because of their interest in the business side, and hence most students take a techno-business (or core business) job. There are a lot of research opportunities too, but few opt for those, because most MEM students by definition want to get into the industry with business oriented roles. For someone hoping to enter the teaching line, I will not recommend the MEM as it is designed more from an industry perspective than an academic perspective. However, there have been students in the past who went ahead to do their PhD after MEM, and then got into academia.

Prospective StudentsMEM students come from very diverse backgrounds and have varying profiles. The core requirements are1. Strong background in engineering.2. Keen interest in business (must be demonstrated by some

initiative taken during college or in the past).3. Strong extra-curricular and leadership skills (demonstrated

by leadership roles in college or other community activities).4. A clear idea about future career goal and an understanding

of how MEM will help you achieve that. Anyone who enjoys the business of technology, is interested in making a complete or partial transition to that side, and is looking for exposure, should apply for MEM. There is no fixed ʻsetʼ of students who should look to apply. It depends on you future interest – if MEM fits in with your future plan and will help you get where you want to be – then you should apply!

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1 Karyl Singh is a Class of 2009 student of Biotechnology at NSIT. She has received admits from Dartmouth College and Duke University for the MEM program. In

this essay, Karyl s h a r e s h e r p r o fi l e a n d t a k e s u s t h r o u g h t h e a p p l i c a t i o n procedure for MEM followed by some excellent advice for future MEM aspirants.

I first heard about this program when our senior, Parul Batra, from the batch of ʼ07 went to Dartmouth College to pursue her Masters in Engineering Management. A couple of months later when I made up my mind to follow up my B.E. with a masters degree from the US, I found MEM to be the most attractive option. I was looking for a program that would provide me with an understanding of the essential principles of business and law while honing my technological knowledge and analytical skills. The MEM program fit the bill exactly and I found it to be the best suited to my requirements. It is the right course for anyone with the ultimate career goal of being a leader at the i n t e r f a c e o f b u s i n e s s a n d technology.

At Dartmouth, the applications are invited September onwards with the earliest deadline being January 15th. There are two other application periods with the deadlines being March 15th and March 15th onwards respectively. In the other MEMPC universities the deadlines are around the same time in January. The chances of receiving financial aid are higher in case of early applications. The application procedure is fairly simple and the application requirements consist of the usual- Statement of Purpose, Letters of Recommendation, transcripts etc. Like all good universities, while selecting students from a huge pool of applicants, they look for good GRE, TOEFL scores, academics etc. However, a greater emphasis is laid on the activities the student has been involved in during his years at undergrad, the various internships/trainings and projects he/she has been a part of and most importantly his/her inclination towards pursuing MEM, all of which reflect in the SOP. I had scored 1400 in the GRE and 116 in TOEFL and had an overall score of 70% in college. But, in my opinion, it was the various internships and projects that I had been involved in that made my application stand out. I had worked on a project in a defense software firm in the first year followed by an internship in the biotechnology lab at Yuan Ze University, Taiwan in the second year. In the third year of my B.E. program, I did laboratory training at AIIMS. I got an opportunity to carry out research-based analysis

T h e M a s t e r o f E n g i n e e r i n g M a n a g e m e n t ( M E M ) p r o g r a m combines professional engineering practice with core business and management subjects typically found in an MBA program. Offered by members of the Master of Engineering Management Programs Consortium (MEMPC) that includes Dartmouth C o l l e g e , D u k e U n i v e r s i t y , Northwestern University, Stanford University and Cornell University, the degree allows new graduates and working professionals to acquire the management skills necessary to advance in today's technical world. Aurora presents a special insight to the MEM program as a career option for NSITians after graduation. We i nv i t e Pa ru l Ba t ra (Compu te r Engineering, Class of 2007) and Karyl Singh (Biotechnology, Class of 2009) to share their perspectives on the program.

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during my internship at Standard Chartered Bank, also during the third year.

I had applied to Dartmouth, Duke and Cornell for MEM and to Carnegie Mellon for Masters of Science in Biotech Management. I had been planning to apply to Columbia and USC, when I got an admit from Dartmouth, followed by Duke and Carnegie Mellon. Since Dartmouth had been my most ambitious application, I decided not to apply any further. I chose Dartmouth over other places for various reasons. The small size of the classes as compared to the other universities which offer MEM and the high faculty-to-student ratio were some of the factors that made me opt for Dartmouth. Also, an opportunity to be taught by an eminent faculty from the Tuck School of Business and the availability of financial aid attracted me to Dartmouth. The job opportunities available after graduating with an MEM degree from Dartmouth are tremendous. Some of the jobs that MEM graduates have pursued have been those of Application Engineers, Business Analysts, Economics Consultants, Entrepreneurs, Financial Analysts, Forensic Analysts, Global Markets Analyst, IT Managers, New Product Strategy Analysts, Operations Leadership Program Associates, Plant Managers and Systems Managers.

For all those students who wish to apply to this program in the future, I would just like to stress on the fact that it is important to maintain decent academics and to get good GRE and TOEFL scores. But since they would be competing with a highly meritorious and skilled set of applicants, which would even include people with a couple of years of job experience, it is extremely important that they build their resume by being a part of good projects, internships and trainings and also involve themselves in college activities. This would also make it easier for them to get letters of recommendation from the professors they would have worked under. And the importance of letters of recommendation and the statement of purpose is not to be underestimated. As we all have realized, NSIT offers us plenty of time not only during our summer and winter breaks, but also during the semesters and we must make sure we utilize this time well. Hereʼs wishing all MEM aspirants loads of luck!

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Over the years, India has tried varied approaches to improve student enrollment and the overall quality of education. As Prathamʼs Annual Status of Education Report (1008) shows, there is a huge gap between our policy aspirations and on the-ground achievements. In the process of realizing our education goals, a two tier system of school education has been created. In this system, those who can afford fees choose private schools and those who cannot, are confined to state-run schools. The gross inequality of schooling opportunities is the result of our current approach to education. The school voucher is a tool to change the way governments finance the education of the poor. School choice for the poor through education vouchers is one of the most radical and original ideas of Milton Friedman, whose reasoned case for unfettered free markets has transformed the minds of leaders, entrepreneurs and students across the world. A voucher is a coupon offered by the government that covers the full or p a r t i a l c o s t o f educa t i on a t t he s c h o o l o f t h e studentʼs choice. The s c h o o l s c o l l e c t vouchers from the s tudents , depos i t them in their bank accounts and the banks then credit the school accounts by equivalent money while debiting the a c c o u n t o f t h e g o v e r n m e n t . N o m o n e y a c t u a l l y changes hands, only the voucher moves from the student to the school, and back to the government.In the present system, the schools are accountable to the government. The voucher system makes them accountable directly to the students since they pay for their education through vouchers. If the student does not like the school, she can take the voucher to another school. Under the voucher system, the money follows the student. In the present system, the money follows the school. $Centre for Civil Societyʼs flagship project, the School Choice Campaign (SCC) was launched in 2007 and is a campaign to bring about the much-needed reforms in the system of school education in India today using the three pronged approach of Education Vouchers, Regulatory Reforms and Encouraging Entrepreneurs. School Choice Campaign seeks to achieve the Right to Education of Choice for all. SCC believes that while the Government has a constitutional mandate to educate every child, it cannot accomplish this task by building more

government schools. It has to remain a sponsor and facilitator, and let entrepreneurs execute the task of delivering the service. This will bring choice of schools even to the poor while increasing the quality of education delivered through competition. Thus the slogan “Fund Students, Not Schools!”SCC launched Indiaʼs first School Voucher Project, the ʻDelhi School Voucher Projectʼ, on 28 March 2007. To understand the effect of School Choice, school vouchers worth up to Rs. 3,600 per year per child were awarded to 408 students from 68 wards in Delhi. The vouchers will be provided for a minimum of three years.After the completion of the first year of the Delhi Voucher Project, an independent assessment study of the project was conducted by the Centre for Media Studies (CMS). Some of the main findings of the study were as follows:- Overall, the voucher students have performed better than those studying in Government schools and at par with the

students in private schools in English, Mathemat ics and Hindi in all grades.- The study found that the majority (63.1 p e r c e n t ) o f t h e voucher beneficiaries e x e r c i s e d t h e freedom of choice after receiving the school voucher and switched over from a gove rnmen t t o a private school.- A high majority (94 p e r c e n t ) o f t h e v o u c h e r p a r e n t s

mentioned that their children were happy with their present school. 61 percent of the voucher parents felt that their children had also become more regular with school work. More than fifty percent of the voucher parents noticed that their children had become more disciplined and studied more in their new school. - A high majority (nearly 90 percent) of the voucher students and those attending private schools perceived that being educated in their present schools would provide them with opportunities for a better future. In comparison, a lesser percentage (61 percent) of children attending Government schools had the same opinion.The Delhi Voucher Project is an experiment which is testing how school choice can help poor children attending government schools to improve their learning levels. This study has provided evidence that ʻchoiceʼ when exercised can assist students from weaker economic backgrounds to learn better.

School ChoiceFund Students, Not Schools!

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For more information on the School Choice Campaign, write to SCC at joinus@schoolchoice.in, or visit www.schoolchoice.in. Centre for Civil Society is an independent, non-profit organization working for the outreach, research and advocacy of innovative community and market based ideas for critical public policy issues facing India today, particularly in areas of education, livelihood, governance and environment.

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Are you aiming for the so called non-technical firms that have been visiting the campus? If the answer is yes, then itʼs the right time for you to do some soul-searching and get in familiar with the recruitment trends of non-technical firms at NSIT. We have tried to do some homework for you. Hereʼs a glance at the analysis of the placements with respect to non-technical firms over the past three years.

If you are trying to find a regular pattern to your particular branch, itʼs of no use at all. One thing is for sure that recruitment done by non-technical recruiters does not follow a particular trend. Itʼs the ability of students in a particular batch that makes them fit for the job. Those who can ʻthink out of the boxʼ go home carrying a golden axe that day and others have to wait for their day to come. The big word beginning with ʻRʼ has surely impacted the placements in every domain, be it software, electronics, mechanical or our very own non-technical domain. By now you must be saying how is that possible? We have seen the average package being quoted as INR 5.45 LPA. The impact, though, has been in the form of a sharp decline in the number of recruiters from overall 83 companies in 2007-08 down to 72 in the year 2008-09 (till February 2009). The number of non-technical firms coming to NSIT for recruitment has fallen down from 14 in 2008 to merely 9 in 2009. However the number of students recruited have to be taken into account as well. In the Class of 2008, 83 offers were made by the top notch firms in this domain as

compared to 72 offers made to the Class of 2009. Statistically the average number of offers made per firm has risen from 9.65 to 9.96 for overall recruitments. This can be attributed to two facts altogether. First, companies have hired way too aggressively than previous years because the recruitment calendar kicked off on 19th July, way before Lehman Brothers shattered everyoneʼs dreams and second, the awareness quotient or knowledgeability of students has increased considerably. The challenge for the Class of 2010 lies in the fact that they will have to prove their worth to the recruiters by letting them know that itʼs not NSIT that makes them talented but itʼs the students that make NSIT full of talent. Also, at the same time they need to be careful by not taking everything for granted and not being over-confident.

Ankur Gupta is a pass-out of B.E. (Electronics & Communication Engineering) from NSIT. He was the Executive Head of the Student Placement Committee for the Class of 2009.

Recruitment Trendz @ NSIT: A Non-Technical PerspectiveBy Ankur Gupta

Where have NSITians been going all these years?Anindus Dunnhumby Futures First RA Net InductisBain & Co. EMB Consulting Grail Research Inforte The Smart CubeDeloitte Evalueserve ICF International McKinsey & Co. Watson Wyatt

Discipline wise break-up of the offers made to students Non-technical recruitment as a percentage of overall recruitment

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For an organisation that has a budget just one-tenth of that of NASA, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) seems to have come a long way with the launch of Chandrayaan-1, Indiaʼs first mission to the moon. Not only was Chandrayaan-1 technically sound (with some instruments from NASA as well) but what was refreshing was the cost effectiveness of the satellite.

Chandrayaan-1 cost a total of $74 million, almost four times cheaper than SELENE, Japanʼs lunar orbiter launched in 2007, which cost $279 million. A perusal of the expenditure reveals further an excellent allocation of funds. $20 million of the total cost went into valuable reusable infrastructure, such as building a trio of Earth-stationed trackers of moon-mission data - the Deep Space Network, the Spacecraft

Control Center and the Indian Space Science Data Center, all located at Byalalu near Bangalore.

A Madras School of Economics study five years ago revealed how India gets a 200% return for every rupee invested in its space program. It is also interesting to see that average salary of ISRO scientists is one-eighth that of the scientists in US and Europe. The low salaries add to the frugal engineering costs and are a major reason for India's comparative advantage in satellite production and launch costs. More credit is due to Indian scientists as lower pay has not induced them to leave for higher-paying jobs abroad, or compromise on quality in producing advanced technology.

In the offing is a set of biological experiments in space, followed by the ambitious plan of the manned space mission slated for 2015. Surely with an efficient organisation such as ISRO the world has found itself an ideal model to sustain space programs even in these recession-hit days.

Abhishek Bhardwaj is a 3rd year student of B.E. (Instrumentation & Control Engineering) at NSIT.

ISRO: A Role Model for Frugal EngineeringBy Abhishek Bhardwaj

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1Members SpeakFollowing are the contributions from our members.

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The story of the Fashion weeks goes way back to 1943 to World War II. After the first fashion week in NYC, Fashion Capitals soon emerged. Many of us assume that the word ʻfashionʼ strictly translates to ramps, models, elaborate designs and  glamour. The moolah associated with the fashion weeks is the flip side that we rarely see. The fashion industry rolls in the dollars faster than any

corporate big-wig and creates waves more than a merger of two mammoth multinationals. Each show takes months of meticulous planning and investment of resources. That their revenue manages to more than supersede the break-even mark is no surprise! This multi-million dollar worth of industry leaves everyone in fiscal delight! Fashion-onomics is surely profitable!

In times of crisis like today, it would seem natural to turn to this booming industry for a bail-out package! And it does not let you down! Where pundits predict an upswing from 2010, the fashionistas have another story to tell. No financial indicators or complex analysis. They predict the stock marketʼs performance just by looking at womenʼs hemlines. The Hemline Theory states that the stock markets move in the same direction as the hemlines of womenʼs skirts! Short skirts are considered bullish, take the roaring ʼ20s and the swinging ʼ60s for instance. Longer dresses in the ʼ30s and ʼ40s were considered bearish.

With most economic theories not managing to rescue us anyway, perhaps we can rely on this fashion analogy to prove to be prophetic once again. Women can do as directed and come to the rescue with shorter skirts! Even if the stock markets donʼt rise, the temperatures will soar for sure! 

Neha Chawla is a 4th year student of B.E. (Computer Engineering) at NSIT.

Fashion-onomicsBy Neha Chawla

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The first image that comes to my mind when you say auto rickshaw is James Bond in both Octopussy and the Visa advertisement. Now that might just be popular culture acting up on us, but it also might be that we are trying to run away from our present and the demonic reality that is the problem of auto rickshaws.

Poor service and minimum respect for customer safety and comfort are problems that plague this particular mode of public transport. The biggest and quite possibly the main problem that is faced is based on the fare-meter - its application or rather the refusal of auto rickshaw drivers to go by the meter. In this short essay we take a look at this specific problem within the ambit of Delhi and with comparisons to other cities and countries.

To put matters into perspective, there are problems in the system that auto rickshaws function under. In an investigative paper titled “Auto rickshaws in Delhi: Murder by Regulation”, Danish Faruqui and Raghav Sud at Centre for Civil Society indicate that the  problem begins at the governmental level itself. There is an elaborate limited number license raj that prevails at the local levels. There are nine types of certificates that auto rickshaw drivers are supposed to carry when they ply. There is red-tapism at every possible imaginable level. The same process has to be repeated at the end of eight years. These activities cost both time and money to the auto rickshaw drivers. Also, at the base level, fare revision has generally been delayed while banking and financial loans for buying an auto rickshaw are rather difficult to obtain and realistically speaking non-existent.

Those are the problems with public policy. Now on to the not so governmental or noble ones. Auto rickshaw drivers are overcharging the customers by putting the customer who is harried and needs fast transport on the spot for a quick decision. The customer either goes into the rather quick out-of-meter settlement or is left hanging. With an unwritten code being followed among auto rickshaw drivers, this is becoming a menace to civil society.

Other than this there is tampering of the meter, poor implementation of the law which stipulates Delhi auto rickshaw drivers to follow and charge the meter calculated fare; unfair, poor and corrupt policing and improper grievance redressal systems. But there have to be problems other than those just of ethics. There are those harrowing experiences which tourists and even locals go through with respect to poor service, horrid behavior, high level of fleecing for money and leching at female customers. The incentive to circumvent the system has to have an economic reason.

The predominant problem is that there is a time cost added to the resource cost of fuel and auto rickshaw. An auto rickshaw driver is compensated in proportion to the fuel cost only. So if he drives more, he makes more money. So during heavy traffic he loses out on making money and

therefore tries to charge more. Short distance commutes are avoided for the same purpose that there is no incentive to make money, and if there is a community line he might end up losing money. This is despite the fact that a customer cannot be refused by law.

Also in Delhi, there is a lot of choice in public transport methods which means that anyone who is taking an auto does it invariably out of choice of single travel or because other modes are unavailable or due to paucity of time. Ergo, auto rickshaw driver can also make them dance to his or her tune.

The dynamics at the heart of it is different than those maybe in Sri Lanka where probably an almost perfect market is at work with respect to auto rickshaws. Also there is a cap on the number of autos - so we know a limited resource garners more weight due to its scarcity unlike Bombay or Bangalore where that isnʼt so.

Assuming similar demographics in India at least with respect to people cheating out of habit - a similar percentage of rotten apples among auto rickshaw drivers and policemen and even customers, it is safe to say that a couple of probable solutions may go a long way in redressing this problem.

One must also remember that this is a problem that promotes bad economics, is the propelling force behind the falling value of money, leads to poor ethics and also incentives to other transport modes to do the same too, and so such a problem should be nipped in the bud itself.

A couple of possible ways to make it better is that there is a component of time in the algorithm to calculate the fare of an auto rickshaw. This refers to both peak hours and waiting time. This means that a person taking an auto in peak hour pays more to the auto rickshaw driver, which gives him incentive to take a customer. Also the cap on the number of autos should be removed as the market will be closer to a perfect competition and rotten apples of the lot will be pushed out of the market.

Apart from differential rates, better and cheaper technology has to be put in place for the meters. Tamper proof meters will go a long way in saving the cause of both the buyer and seller in the auto rickshaw market. At the government level, there should be faster grievance redressal for auto rickshaw drivers and less number of steps in the process of procuring, renewing and upgradation of licenses.Apart from positive solutions to solve this quandary, civil society must also be sure not to give in to varied demands of rogue auto-drivers. Only then can we expect a smiling Vijay Amritaj - like driver in case of emergency or otherwise. Only then can we be James Bond?

Roshan Shankar is a 3rd year student of B.E. (Computer Engineering) at NSIT.

Meter se chalo ya boli lagaoBy Roshan Shankar

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Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Flintoff made headlines recently as the two were each auctioned for an astounding USD 1.55 million (Rs. 7.35 crore) before the start of this yearʼs edition of the Indian Premier League. More recently, Mahatma Gandhiʼs personal items, including his iconic round eye glasses, went under the hammer for USD 1.8 million (Rs. 8.54 crore), six times the reserve price or the value of items as estimated by the auction house Antiquorum.

To modify one of Oscar Wildeʼs famous quotations, we usually know the price of everything but the value of nothing. A well designed auction is an excellent method to find the actual value of a good or a service to its buyer. The IPL player auctions and the auction of Mahatma Gandhiʼs items are examples of the English auction. This is the most popular form of auction, where participants try to outbid each other with subsequent higher bids. If no competing bidder challenges the standing bid within a given time frame, the item is sold to this highest bidder. This form of auctioning is commonly used by auction houses such as Christieʼs and Sothebyʼs to sell antiques and artworks. At times, the auctioneers might indulge in chandelier bidding by fixing their gaze at a point in the room and calling out nonexistent bids, thereby creating the appearance of greater demand or extending the bidding momentum.

A specific form of the English auction is the candle auction, a timed auction that originated in the 15th century. In this form, the auctioneer lights a candle and accepts bids only as long as the candle is burning. Successful bidders observed that just before expiring, a candle-wick flares up slightly and they hollered out their final bid at this opportune moment. Some of the ingenious online bidders have taken a leaf out of the successful candle auction bidderʼs book and they place their bids on auction sites such as eBay at the very last moment giving other bidders very little time to respond, thus winning the bid. This method is known as auction sniping, and such snipers are often aided by software such as BidNinja and StealthBid.

  The Dutch auction is the polar opposite of the English auction. The auctioneer begins with a high asking price which is lowered until some bidder is willing to accept the auctioneerʼs price. It finds its roots in the famous Tulip mania of the 1600s – the first recorded speculative bubble, when ordinary tulip bulbs sold for more than 10 times the annual income of a skilled craftsman. More recently, a modified version of the Dutch auction known as OpenIPO has been used for distributing stock in an initial public offering of some companies including that of Google in 2004.

The sealed-bid first-price auction is the method commonly used for government contracts. In this, all bidders simultaneously submit sealed bids and the highest bidder wins the contract and pays the price submitted as the highest bid. The bidders can only submit one bid each and the bidding process is confidential, as opposed to English and Dutch auctions.

The sealed-bid second-price auction, also known as the Vickrey auction after its inventor, Nobel laureate William

Vickrey, is identical to the sealed-bid first-price auction except that the winning bidder pays the second highest bid rather than their own. This may seem odd at first glance, but then even in the English auction the price is set by the second-highest bidder because bidding stops when the second-highest bidder drops out. As economist Tim Harford puts it in The Undercover Economist, “the problem with the Vickrey auction is not substantive but stylistic: in a traditional auction nobody ever finds out the maximum price the highest bidder would have been willing to pay, but in a Vickrey auction that fact is made public.” The New Zealand government used the Vickrey method to auction radio spectrum in 1990 with dreadful results. New Zealanders wanted to know why a bidder who had offered NZ$100,000 for a license only had to pay NZ$6 or why one who had offered NZ$7 million was only coughing up NZ$5,000.

A carefully crafted auction provides an excellent price-discovery mechanism, especially for scarcely available goods and extremely precious items. The seller and the bidders have incomplete information about the payoffs and strategies available to other players. Every bidder has their own estimate of the value of the good, but they do not know the value as anticipated by other bidders in the room. In auctions such as those of IPL players, the seller (the BCCI in this case) has the challenge of estimating the reserve price of each player by gauging the worth of the player to prospective bidders. There is a risk that the reserve price may be too high and the good may remain unsold.

At times, the winning bid may exceed the intrinsic value of the auctioned asset, or the value of the asset may be less than the value anticipated by the bidder – thereby making the bidder worse off on absolute terms. This is known as the winnerʼs curse. The winnerʼs curse seems to have struck the Kolkata Knight Riders both literally and metaphorically, who acquired Mashrafe Mortaza, the Bangladesh pacer for USD 600,000 – twelve times his reserve price of USD 50,000 - in a fierce bidding battle with Kings XI Punjab. 

From the sellerʼs perspective, the importance of a good design that imposes high stakes cannot be overemphasized. Also, a successful auction needs plenty of serious bidders. Auction theory continues to evolve as game-theorists and economists continue to experiment with auction designs.

Abhimanyu Sanghi is a pass out of B.E. (Electronics & Communication Engineering) from NSIT.

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1 Dummies Guide to AuctionsBy Abhimanyu Sanghi

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In many ways, the transition to the 1970s was like an inevitable hangover to the exuberance, counter culture and social revolution that were witnessed in the 1960s. This came to the fore in the form of decline and distortion of the ideals of the hippie movement, the economic gloom of massive inflation the world over, the Watergate scandal and the Vietnam War. However, coming to the United Kingdom, the 70s could very well be described as the decade of strikes, blackouts and good music. Hereʼs what happened.

In 1970, when Edward Heath took over as Leader of the Conservative Party, his term as Prime Minister was plagued by industrial unrest in the form of strikes. The strikes were all-pervasive, with as many as sixteen strikes taking place simultaneously at one time. In addition, to curb rising inflation, which was also resulting in increasing wages every other week, the government introduced the "Three-Day Work Order", which was to come into force at midnight on 31 December, 1973. According to it, commercial consumption of electricity would be limited to three consecutive days each week. The three day week only lasted for three months, till the first week of March, but owing to its unpopularity among the masses, Heath lost the elections in October of the same year.

The loss of the Conservative Party in the 1974 elections led to Margaret Thatcher challenging and unexpectedly defeating Edward Heath, and she in turn became the first female leader of the opposition. She went on to stay on as the Leader of the Conservative Party till 1990. During the Seventies, it was believed that support for the British monarchy had reduced, but the Silver Jubilee year of 1977 laid to rest the family's fears of being irrelevant in a more modern Britain. Elaborate parades and street parties were thrown in the Queen's

honour, and the Queen met with millions of her subjects on a tour throughout the Commonwealth.

The 1974 elections propelled the Labour Party into power, with Harold Wilson as the Prime Minister. He was succeeded by James Callaghan in 1976, also from the Labour Party. They struggled for years against rising inflation, which peaked at 26.9% in the August of 1975, but wished to avoid large increases in unemployment. In order to try and bring it down, in 1978-79 the government sought to introduce limits on wage hikes, by agreeing to a 'social contract' with the Trades Union Congress. Subsequently, the talks broke down, and widespread strikes followed, which was described in the British media as the ʻWinter of Discontentʼ.

The elections of 1979 were held in May, and are regarded as the pivotal point in 20th century British politics. The Conservatives under Margaret Thatcher defeated James Callaghan's incumbent Labour government in what would prove to be the first of four consecutive general election victories for the Conservative Party, and extended Thatcherʼs role as Prime Minister till 1990. Thatcher's political and economic philosophy – which came to be known as Thatcherism - emphasised reduced state intervention, free markets, and entrepreneurialism. She began her economic reforms by increasing interest rates to slow the growth of the money supply and thus lower inflation. She introduced budget cuts and reduced expenditures on social services such as education and housing, and placed limits on the printing of money and legal restrictions on trade unions. When some Conservatives expressed doubt over Thatcher's policies and British media started discussing the need for a policy U-turn, at the 1980 Conservative Party conference, Thatcher addressed the issue directly, saying, "You turn if you want to. The ladyʼs not for turning!" Such was the Iron Lady of Great Britain, and she is still remembered as a revolutionary figure that revitalised Britain's economy, impacted the trade unions, and re-established the nation as a world power.

Udit Anand is a 3rd year student of B.E. (Electronics & Communication Engineering) at NSIT.

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1The United Kingdom in the 1970s: A General Perspective By Udit Anand

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A Trojan horse that apparently originated in China infected close to 1300 websites in 103 countries including India and tapped into confidential data over the past two years. The National Informatics Centre (NIC) of the Department of Information Technology under Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, India was affected by the Chinese trojan which first struck the computers at the office of the Tibetan Government in Exile (TGIE) and the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (OHHDL), both based in Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh. The malicious software could monitor the text files in the infected computer and also supposedly log keystrokes and turn on webcams and microphones of the infected terminal to capture and record audio and video.

Why and how did it start?

As intelligence reports suggest, it was started to keep an eye on the movements of Dalai Lama and other exiled leaders of Tibet, and also to extract information as to what the countries lending their support to these exiled leaders were contemplating. Thus, this malware was passing back information back to the four servers in China.

Governments around the world are increasingly getting dependent on computer networks to make life easier for citizens, their operations and to work more efficiently. This inter-connection of networks between the governments has led to a danger of hackers and phishers getting hold of confidential documents and misusing it with dangerous consequences.

The infection spread out via email and executable DOC, JPEG, PDF files etc. Tracking GhostNet: Investigating A Cyber Espionage Network - a report released by Canada based Information Warfare Monitor (IWM) after a 10-month long research states that the infected computers include those of diplomats, military personnel, secretaries to ministers and journalists. Ghost RAT created a remote access tool (hence the name RAT) to extract information from infected computers by forming a GhostNet, a network of inter-related computers. It directed the infected computers to download the

Ghost RAT trojan that enabled the attackers to gain control over the computer.

The Dangerous Consequences

The amount of damage that a group of hackers can cause to a government network that is heavily networked is infinite. A hacker attack can paralyze airport operations, traffic control, banking services and transactions in a country that is networked, just as we saw in the movie Die Hard 4.0 (We always thought that just because it is being shown in the movies, it cannot be true, isnʼt it?). Terrorism is evolving from guns and grenades to the internet. The doomsday scenario of hackers is to get control of missiles or even satellites. Just think of Indiaʼs Chandrayaan-1 being controlled by the hackers!

Abhishek Khatri is a 4th year student of B.E. (Information Technology) at NSIT.

The Ghost RatBy Abhishek Khatri

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The world of investment has had its share of heroes but none of them have had as long and as successful a time as Warren Buffett. For the past fifty years or so, Warren Buffett has proven that one can give good returns on investment consistently if one invests wisely. Much of what Warren Buffett is is due to his simplistic, yet extremely powerful approach to investment called focus investing. This article intends to introduce you to a brief history of Warren Buffettʼs life, the main concepts behind focus investing and lastly, qualities of Warren Buffett that have made him such an endearing figure in the world of business.

HistoryWarren Buffett was born in Omaha to Howard Buffett, a local stockbroker. Having a good acumen for mathematics, he began reading his fatherʼs books on the stock market at the early age of 8. In his adolescent and teenage years, he had a string of entrepreneurial successes. Buffett attended the business school at the University of Nebraska and went on to Columbia Business School where his investment philosophy was largely shaped under the tutelage of noted security analysts Benjamin Graham and David Dodd. Buffett worked at Buffett-Falk Co. and Graham-Newman Corp. as an investment salesman before starting his own firm, Buffett Partnership Ltd. In 1969, he discontinued the partnership and went on to buy Berkshire Hathaway. He has been its chairman ever since.The interesting part is of course, how did he become so effing rich? Buffett has some basic tenets when it comes to investing. Broadly, they can be stated as: considering stocks as businesses, managing a focused, low-turnover portfolio and finally, understanding the vital difference between investment and speculation.These are also the tenets of Focus Investing.

Considering Stocks as Businesses – When one treats a stock as a business, oneʼs approach to the markets is of a businessman more than an investor. When Buffett invests in a business, he looks at all aspects of the business i.e. how the business functions, the kind of attitude the upper management has and whether the business has enough scope to expand reasonably in the long term. Judging a business solely on the basis of its market price is something that Buffett believes to be very shallow, and fraught with danger.

Managing a focused, low-turnover portfolio – Buffett believes that when you hold a small number of stocks which have gone through the process of scrutiny mentioned above, you are likely to make a greater return on investment than when you hold a large number of stocks. Holding a small number of stocks can be risky, but if proper research has gone into the selection of these stocks, Buffett maintains, the risk of loss is very low.

Understanding the difference between Investment and Speculation – Buffett recognizes investment as an aid to ideas that will eventually create value in society. This can be contrasted with mere speculation, which is undertaken to make short term profits from the price swings in the market. Understandably, Buffett holds the stocks in his portfolio for long durations like 15-20 years and does not believe in short term buying and selling.

Examples of Buffettʼs Success - Though Buffett consistently gave returns that beat the Dow Jones Industrial Average by more than 10 points, some of his investments deserve a special mention. These are given below:

1) GEICO – The Government Employees Insurance Company was a firm with simple concepts that worked – give insurance to people with good track records and sell directly without intermediate agents. GEICO, however, was on the verge of bankruptcy in the 70s. Buffett, seeing that the original business fundamentals were strong and the price on offer was remarkably low, invested an amount of 45.7 million dollars to gain a 48% stake in it. Subsequently, GEICO gave impressive results, leading to Buffett buying out GEICO and making it a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary.

2) General Re – This was a company dealing in reinsurance. A reinsurance company insures other insurance companies for a premium and takes on some part of the insurance firmʼs risk. In 1998, General Re had a majority of its capital in bonds (nearly $19 billion). Buffett bought out General Re using Berkshire Hathaway stock. This allowed Berkshire Hathaway to sidestep much of the price volatility that came about in late 1998. Another important management decision taken by Buffett was the elimination of the companyʼs investment unit that consisted of 150 people. This was replaced by one man – Buffett himself!

3) Coca Cola – Buffettʼs significant investment in The Coca Cola Company came around 1988. As a business, Coca Cola had strong fundamentals – its chemical composition has remained unchanged over the last century and yet there is tremendous growth in demand. By Buffettʼs estimates, even a conservative estimate wouldʼve yielded a 25% margin. By 1999, Buffettʼs investment in Coca Cola of $1.023 billion was worth $11.6 billion.

Apart from these, Warren Buffett added a number of enterprises to Berkshire Hathaway including Seeʼs Candy shops, Nebraska Furniture Mart, Borsheimʼs, The Scott and Fetzer Company and Executive Jet Aviation. All these purchases went through a good deal of scrutiny and were carried out only because Buffett had strong belief in the vision of the owners of these businesses and saw strong value-creation potential in the future.

The obvious question that comes to mind is: If that is all there is, why do most investors not follow Buffettʼs strategy? There are a number of reasons that Buffett comes up with, the biggest one being that people make irrational decisions all the time. Buffett has been a prominent advocate against the Efficient Market Hypothesis, which states, in very simplistic terms, that no one can perform better than the market in the long run and that the prices in the market represent the complete information required by an investor to make investing decisions. In his famous lecture The Superinvestors of Graham-and-Doddsville, Buffett mentions 9 different people who have used the fundamental tenet of realising value in business and weighing it against the price offered to make investment decisions that have consistently outperformed the stock market. Also, corporate structure is such that there is considerable pressure to show short-term profits, even if they turn out to be sub-optimal in the long run.

Warren Buffett and his Investment PhilosophyBy Sharat Nambissan K.P.

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Despite being one of the richest men in the world for a long time, Buffett leads a remarkably simple and frugal life. He still lives in the house he bought in 1958, and does not keep a cell phone or a desk computer. He has also pledged to donate 85 % of his fortune to various charities, including a major part to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. In this sense, he embodies the belief that money is only as useful as the value it creates. His investing decisions continue to bring handsome profits to his companyʼs shareholders and his attitude towards life has inspired millions of people. In a way, it would not be completely wrong to say that Warren Buffett is a modern day yogi.

References:1. The Essential Buffett – Robert G.Hagstrom, John Wiley and Sons,2001.2. The Superinvestors of Graham-and-Doddsville - Hermes, the Columbia School of Business Magazine.3. Warren Buffett – Wikipedia.4. Warren Buffett: Investment Genius or Statistical Anomaly - John Price, Edward Kelly,2004.5. Various other internet resources, mostly online articles have been referred.

Sharat Nambissan K.P. Is a 4th year student of B.E. (Computer Engineering) at NSIT.

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