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PESHAWAR: Microsoft, an international IT company, is considering the establishment of Microsoft Innovation Centre in Peshawar in collaboration with the provincial Information Technology department.
This was revealed by a Microsoft delegation during a meeting with the IT department’s senior officials here on Friday. Science and Technology and IT secretary Zafar Ali Shah chaired the meeting, where Microsoft delegation was led by Microsoft Pakistan’s country manager Nadeem Ahmad Malik.
The participants discussed the opportunities, possibilities and venues of collaboration and cooperation among the IT department, Microsoft and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa IT Board for the promotion of information and communication technology in the province with a special focus on e-governance. They also discussed matters related to collaboration and cooperation with regard to intellectual property rights. — APP
Published in Dawn, August 29th, 2015
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Comments (71) Closed
Aug 29, 2015 10:20am
The Change has come.
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Aug 29, 2015 10:20am
Who is the CEO of MSFT? Cant remember his name
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Aug 29, 2015 10:49am
One Step towards e-governance.Thumbs Up!
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Aug 29, 2015 10:53am
@Apoorva He is an INDIAN, by name Satya Nadella....many people of Indian origin occupy top posts in big companies of the world....Google, Adobe, MasterCard, Pepsi Cola, and many more.......Indians are found to be brilliant and intelligent who have made a mark for themselves across the world....among the richest and most well off community in the US, UK, Germany, Australia, Canada, UAE, etc.....
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Aug 29, 2015 11:00am
@Apoorva Non other than an Indian Mr. Satya
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Aug 29, 2015 11:09am
Thanks to Satya Nadella.
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Aug 29, 2015 11:18am
@Apoorva Satya Nadella. An Indian, as usual
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Aug 29, 2015 11:29am
@Apoorva Apart from many Indian CEOs of top MNCs, there are a growing number tech start ups across the world set up by Indian immigrants......All the top companies of the world including such renowned names like Microsoft, Google, Oracle, Coca Cola, SAP, Kellogs, Amazon, Yahoo, Intel, Motorola, Phillips, Samsung, Nokia, McDonalds, Sony, Hyundai, LG, etc and even Chinese companies like Huawei, Haier, Alibaba, Tencent, Xiaomi, Lenovo, Philcomm, Baidu, etc have the second R&D units along with manufacturing centres in India , in most cases the second ones outside their nation.....
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Aug 29, 2015 11:29am
@JA .. nothing to do with Satya Nadella, no thanks to him. It is a Microsoft Pakistan's initiative. KP Govt is driving e-government, Microsoft will invest and get their returns - simple business 101.
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Aug 29, 2015 11:32am
IT knowledge is badly needed and this is very much welcome.
What about elsewhere in Pakistan.
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Aug 29, 2015 12:11pm
Once again, the US is at the forefront of assistance to Pakistan. Be it education, health, investments, defense and jobs.
Thank You, USA!
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Aug 29, 2015 12:12pm
I have one in my University at IIT Kharagpur. It didn't made that kind of news on its establishment.
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Aug 29, 2015 12:13pm
Excellent
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Aug 29, 2015 12:32pm
Good Job, KP IT department! Its actually working. Other provinces must follow
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Aug 29, 2015 12:33pm
@Apoorva Its Satya Nadella....many more big giants have Indian origin people as CEOs....Google, PepsiCo, MasterCard, Adobe, etc...scores of tech start ups in the US and across the world are today started by Indian origin people...most of them successful....Among the most thriving, prosperous and well placed communities in the world from the US to UK, Australia, Canada, UAE, etc...many Indian origin people in the US, Canada and UK Governments as well. Intelligent and smart, they have earned plaudits across the world.
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Aug 29, 2015 12:41pm
@Prakash even in small NITs there are Microsoft R&D centres. If these news are published in most reputed newspapers like this one ,then Indian newspapers will have to buy servers as big as required by Google or Facebook.
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Aug 29, 2015 12:59pm
Lahore and Karachi has already MS Innovation Centers.
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Aug 29, 2015 01:00pm
Pakistanis innovation is the best and is known world over, hence MSFT naturally wants to take advantage of it.
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Aug 29, 2015 01:02pm
No thanks MSFT , we Pakistanis always supported opensource , creativity and free software, we will never support money oriented closed software which curtails our freedom to modify code , we always used Linux and will continue to do so.
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Aug 29, 2015 01:12pm
It is O.K. to beat the chest about the origins of the heads of these multi-nationals. The fact remains that their own country could not use them. They had to leave their country in search of better opportunities.
It is only the U.S., the U.K. et al that realises their potentials and allows them to flourish.
They are all loyal citizens of their own adopted country... hopefully!
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Aug 29, 2015 01:14pm
@sonny afridi Microsoft has open sourced major parts of its .NET framework, and made several of its flagship development platforms freely available (of course not in the sense of GNU free but free nonetheless). Microsoft isn't the ideal software company in the world, but nor is GNU. A balance has to be struck, and business as well as creative freedom have to be supported. I see Microsoft as a far more positive influence today in the world, and along with Intel, the force responsible for making personal computing a household phenomenon, than any other single company in this world. Not everything is black and white.
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Aug 29, 2015 01:17pm
Satya Nadella is an Indian-American, Indian-born but had to leave the country to achieve success. Why don't we talk about that part when we start celebrating the success of our diaspora?
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Aug 29, 2015 01:46pm
In Pakistan most users use opensource software only like Linux,Open BSD, Net BSD etc, we Pakistanis love our freedom more than anything else.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:06pm
I use ArchLinux on my laptop,desktop and I use ubuntu phone, i will soon replace it with KDE Plasma once it is ready.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:15pm
I always buy Laptop with freedos on it, to ensure i don't pay MSFT Tax and i install KaOS on it.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:23pm
@Waqar In India apart from Microsoft, there are such centres and R&D units engaged in cutting edge tech innovations like Google, Yahoo, Intel, Motorola, SAP, Samsung, Phillips, Siemens, Adobe, Oracle, Sony, Panasonic, LG, Amazon, Kellogs, Nokia, and many more...and then there are a lot of Chinese companies like Huawei, Haier, Lenovo, Tencent, Alibaba, Philcomm, Xiami, Baidu, etc...all have their R&D units, in many many cases often the second ones outside their own nations....many automobile giants are also setting up their R&D units here in India.
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Aug 29, 2015 03:07pm
Well done to all involved.
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Aug 29, 2015 04:11pm
Its all for the good work of IK. He is one honest and result oriented guy in pakistan.
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Aug 29, 2015 04:30pm
@sonny afridi Open source is good for education and learning purposes. Can you get free car, colthes, other material things around you? If not then why you want free software? Programmers, developers and all others who are behind these softwares put hard work in it. It's their bread and butter. Did you seriously ever developed a software? Can you imagine the hard work behind MS Office, Windows etc?
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Aug 29, 2015 04:46pm
Actually setting up a 'Cyber Command Spy Center Net Work Hub' at a sensitive point in Pakistan.
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Aug 29, 2015 05:05pm
We should purse open source.
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Aug 29, 2015 05:41pm
@MrA2Z Better than using pirated software.
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Aug 29, 2015 05:46pm
Microsoft days are over. We need to invest in open source technology.
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Aug 29, 2015 05:52pm
Please stay away from proprietary solutions. It is time to adopt open source technologies. As an example, look at TurnkeyLinux - a one stop shop for most of what is needed for any e-governance or educational needs. For cloud, stay away from Amazon or Azure and adopt one of the the several open source alternatives. That is also the right way to develop an indigenous core expertise in this essential domain.
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Aug 29, 2015 06:00pm
I take it as one step forward for kpk other province needs to improve security first like kpk
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Aug 29, 2015 06:18pm
Bad idea. The Taliban or other anti-American group will attack the place.
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Aug 29, 2015 06:35pm
KP Govt is creating a conducive environment for businesses to flourish. Keep up the good job. Rest of the Provinces should follow the suit. Information and knowledge should be freely available and should reach every corner of the world. Politicians have a big role to play. Slowly but surely, terrorism will disappear.
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Aug 29, 2015 06:41pm
I installed an Indian software its hyper technology is very advanced and giving good results
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Aug 29, 2015 08:11pm
Excellent! This is a real change in KPK alongside hydel power projects, local body elections, accountability for everyone including ministers, independent police, education reforms... way to go PTI. what else you need folks.
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Aug 29, 2015 08:11pm
@Apoorva Its funny that, Indians are a huge percentage of IT industry, but their contribution to research and new ideas, is ZERO, Zilch. India, never devised any new programming language, or any operating system, new architectural paradigms or algorithms. Indian IT industry is all about low-skilled service sector, back office and internet coolies.
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Aug 29, 2015 08:20pm
@Zeeshan USA was always there for Pakistan. 1965 war, 1972 war, NATO treaty etc.... all examples of USA supporting Pakistan.
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Aug 29, 2015 08:45pm
anyone remember Bills Gates requested IK for such ideas and IK with bit change aceepted those ideas and now implementing them .... our media should rectify such news and give true news.
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Aug 29, 2015 08:48pm
@Micheal They are actually called back offices. It cost companies like MS or Adobe just 10%-15 % in salaries compared to the people hired in the US. Large number of IT people are available in India and every one cannot be granted and H-1b visa. Nothing is invented there, meant for low tech. IT jobs.
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Aug 29, 2015 09:04pm
You better watch out; guess lots of Pakistanis don't know who is running MS.
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Aug 29, 2015 09:06pm
@Maxx and yet indians are the ceos of so many top IT/Computer science enterprises.
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Aug 29, 2015 09:07pm
@N.Sid while the actual salary might be lower cost of living in india is much lower than in the US and hence when you take purchasing power parity or ppp into account the salaries that indians get payed by multinationals in india are the same as when people get paid in the us.
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Aug 29, 2015 09:07pm
Thank you Khan sahib ,good policies is working.
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Aug 29, 2015 09:19pm
@Maxx you have no idea what you are talking about; who created SUN/JaVa, Yahoo, to name a few.
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Aug 29, 2015 09:39pm
@Syed Ali They are all developed in USA, not India. Yahoo was founded by Jerry Yang and David Filo in January 1994. Java is a programming language and environment invented by James Gosling, an American and others in 1994.
The initial design for what became Sun's first Unix workstation, the Sun-1, was conceived by Andy Bechtolsheim when he was a graduate student at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California.
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Aug 29, 2015 09:45pm
Even in my University Lpu Punjab have Microsoft, Cognizant, Google R&D centers. we a center for Apple app development.
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Aug 29, 2015 09:58pm
@Maxx : Vinod Dham- Inventor of Intel Pentium series of microprocessor.
Rajeev Motwani- Man behind the google search engine algorithm.
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Aug 29, 2015 10:41pm
@Prakash Satya Nadella studied at Manipal Engineering college,Karnataka.
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Aug 29, 2015 11:13pm
@N.Sid Not true my friend. I work for Cisco and we do some cutting edge stuff in here. Similarly have friends working at Google, Microsoft, Adobe and Red hat. They do amazing stuff too. The total no. patents awarded to R&D teams in India has grown exponentially. Every major American IT firm has the biggest development center in India outside the US.
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Aug 29, 2015 11:40pm
@sonny afridi
Pakistan should start launching R&D centers for Open Source. That is going to guarantee not only catching up but overtaking a lot of other countries in the IT.
Is Pak government following policy of supporting Open Source companies when new contracts are tendered??
Anyone has some information on this?
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Aug 30, 2015 12:03am
Love these type of discussions.
Why not we keep Kashmir on the side, develop new centers of excellence in the sub-continent. Or even compete to build a better Kashmir on each side of LOC. It will be a game changer for everyone. More jobs, human development. Win win for all. I hope I see this in my lifetime.
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Aug 30, 2015 01:07am
@Micheal Another example of "India shining". Most
of these companies come to India because of very low wages.
A software engineer in USA costs $50,000, can be hired for
measly salary of $10,000. If Indians start earning high wages
these companies will find other sources of cheap labour-
Kenya or Nigeria or Egypt or even the erstwhile enemy Vietnam.
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Aug 30, 2015 03:10am
This is a good idea. Whether Pak uses OpenSource to generate ideas and productivity is a noble thought, having a .NET innovation center will only help spur competition.
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Aug 30, 2015 03:27am
@Arindam Mukherjee FYI Mahatma Gandhi was an NRI. Indians are willing to travel and shine anywhere in the world and that is because of the grooming and culture at home. Jai Hind
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Aug 30, 2015 03:30am
@Maxx In your case ignorance is a bliss. FYI Intel pentium chip was designed by an Indian. Amar Bose is the man behind Bose speakers to name a few.
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Aug 30, 2015 04:05am
@Apoorva Satya Nadella. He replaced Steve Balmer.
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Aug 30, 2015 04:11am
@Micheal There are many Pakistanis doing the same. There are more Indians in the tech industry simply because of their large population in the U.S. No doubt Indians have contributed very significantly.
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Aug 30, 2015 04:22am
@Akhand Bharat that's true because they can hire good engineers there at less than half of what they pay American engineers here in the U.S. Remember the actual innovation happens in U.S. Apple, Intel, Microsoft, Oracle, Facebook and lots of others. India has thousands of good Engineers in India, name one cutting edge technology company indigenous to India.
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Aug 30, 2015 06:12am
@Maxx well u might feel on top of the world but again ur lack of knowledge is ur problem...
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Aug 30, 2015 06:35am
@Dipak Singh So this Indian gentleman you mentioned, moved to the USA forever? Why do Indians avoid India like a plague, how bad are things there? I know communities share toilets if there is one.....Must be nice living in the USA
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Aug 30, 2015 08:47am
@Zak lol very well known!
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Aug 30, 2015 10:52am
@Micheal Dear Indians, Please don't expand too much and don't post the points which you are not clear about, CEOs of many companies mentioned by Micheal are not Indians, CEO of samsung is Jong-Kyun Shin, McDonald's - Steve Easterbrook, coca cola - Muhtar Kent, SAP - Bill McDermott, Intel - Brian Krzanich and so on.
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Aug 30, 2015 11:28am
@N.Sid Oh! really, then why do Google and others come to India leaving aside other nations for setting up their units leaving aside other choices like China, Europe, etc.....does Google and others engage in back office work....??? u are plain jealous and lacking in knowledge....brush it up and see the real picture...
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Aug 30, 2015 12:31pm
@Akhand Bharat That proves my point...either Indian have to land in US and with the level playing field they get there, they shine and perform well.
Similarly When American companies you mentioned like Cisco, Google, Microsoft so on and so forth establishes there office in India, because of the low wages, the Indians gets some sort of a platform to perform.
The common denominator here is the American, west technology, there cutting edge tech....not the stifling, and medieval environment and the place which India is. This is the reason for the Indian diaspora.
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Aug 30, 2015 12:35pm
@HellonEarth They are the co-partners, no the main inventors...and they are US citizens. They are not developed in a place called India.
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Aug 30, 2015 12:37pm
Ravi, And your point is???
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Aug 30, 2015 04:07pm
@Micheal There is hardly any Google service in China. They have their own search portal called Baidu. US companies won't set up back offices in Europe because of the cost factor...same salary structure as in US. Yes in Vietnam, Philippine, Malaysia, Indonesia they are doing so.
http://www.androidauthority.com/google-need-return-china-601590/
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