Monday, September 17, 2001		Newsscape

Piped gas will not be the only commodity from British Gas reaching homes in Surat in the next one year, The Times of India said. Having already obtained Foreign Investment Promotion Board approval for an initial investment of $9 million (approximately Rs 60 crore) for a broadband project in the south Gujarat city, British Gas will start providing both, the Internet and a dedicated TV channel by 2002.Of the $9 million, $7 million (approximately Rs 45 crore) will go into BG Broadband India (BGBB) and $2 million to BG Broadband Networks India. The company is in the process of building a state-of-the-art hybrid fibre coaxial network, which will be used primarily by BGBB to provide high speed broadband Internet access to residential customers and become fully operational in 2002.

Two Indian companies NIIT and iFlex have been selected by Microsoft Corp in its much-talked about worldwide .Net partnership programme to develop solutions using Visual Studio .Net, according to a news item published in The Economic Times. There are only four more Asian companies among 70 selected worldwide from various countries and will be supported by Microsoft's technical team at Redmont and India. While iFlex is developing a Commodity Exchange application, NIIT will work on e-procurement .Net solutions, named ComEx that would aid in secure B2B transactions.

Red Hat, a firm proponent of open source technologies, has tied-up with Software Technology Group (STG) to promote Linux education in India, The Hindu says. The alliance is a part of Red Hat's effort to spread Linux education in the country and raise awareness of Linux at the desktop and enterprise level. In the coming months Red Hat plans to launch several new education products around new technologies.

According to a survey by research outfit Kotak Securities, the usage potential of WAP has been hyped up far beyond its market potential. Hindustan Times while quoting excerpts from the report said that the usage potential of WAP has been hyped up far beyond its market potential and other applications like Bluetooth and Dense Wave Division Multiplexing have more potential and would be tapped once the current slowdown fades.

Pakistan and China will actively collaborate for the setting up of science and technology parks and technology incubators at various sites in Pakistan, Dawn reports. This was decided at a meeting held at the ministry of science and technology between the officials of the ministry and a Chinese delegation, headed by Prof Kong Deyong, the president of the National Research for S&T Development of China. Ataur Rahman said China's successful experience in the promotion of high-tech industry and commercialisation of research results through the establishment of technology parks and incubators would be useful for the country in its endeavours to establish industry linkages for commercialisation of its research results. China has established 53 technology parks and zones in the country under its Torch programme, which aims at development of high-tech industry.