AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

NT Bureau
Chennai, Aug 24:

        Union Minister of Communications and Information Technology A Raja has said that the expansion of IBM's Global Delivery Centre in Chennai was a reflection of the State's enormous potential and hoped that both IBM and Tamilnadu would benefit tremendously from the new centre.

        Inaugurating the IBM's Global Delivery Centre at DLF Park here yesterday, the Union Minister said the Government was also taking a fresh look at the technology driven law, Information Technology Act 2000.

        He also informed that India had announced a special incentive package for semiconductor manufacturing and other high tech industries in March to create a conducive environment for hardware manufacturing.

        'State Wide Area Networks (SWANs) are being established to extend data connectivity of 2 MBPS upto the block level in the country', he said adding that one lakh broadband enabled internet Common Services Centres (CSCs) were being established in rural areas of the country to connect the citizens of rural India to the World Wide Web.

        On IBM's 'Reinvent Education Programme' launched last year, Raja said that the programme would help to improve the quality of teaching and learning in the middle and secondary school sector through the development of new curriculum and teaching methodologies.

        Speaking on the occasion, IBM India private limited, managing director Shanker Annaswamy said the new centre and the team would allow IBM to accelerate the development of innovative technology solutions for the clients across the globe.

        'IBM will ramp up its operations in Chennai by hiring technology graduates and IT professionals with skills in remote infrastructure services, IT strategy and architecture, business consulting, enterprise solutions, testing, business intelligence and data warehousing', he added.

        He also said that IBM's 'Reinvest Education Programme' focused on professional development and training for teachers to meet the national objectives for education reform. 'Through this programme students studying from VI to XII standards in Tamilnadu and Andhra Pradesh would be benefited on subjects especially science and mathematics', he said.