Author: Raja

Business and technology consultant, as well as a devotee volunteer for the Kanchi Kamakoti Mutt

Law School Admissions in India

     So, finally your child is in her senior secondary years and is contemplating to take law or confused between law, economics and finance.  This is fine and this confusion at this stage is considered very normal.  It is perfectly OK to even not put all the eggs in one basket and can even contemplate taking engineering or medicine, just to keep options open in this competitive world we live in. So, for those minds who are still contemplating, either as a student or as an anxious parent, I have managed to do some extensive research in understanding the admission process for a five year integrated law undergraduate degree and have captured hopefully some good observations that would be beneficial to this audience.

     Usually a student could send some indicator signals even during his or her high school years as to what her or his aspirations are.  But they also slowly evolve over time and also may also be dictated by a joint peer group.  My advice is by the time they are in their final year of school, for getting the focus, it is better to firm up the one choice or maximum two choices and start preparing for the same, along with the tough final board exams.  For those who have a fair idea about law being their choice of study for their undergraduate, it would be preferred if they take up the arts or commerce stream  during their eleventh and twelfth so that  one does not need to unnecessarily read the science subjects that they would not even care about during the law program.  Having said that, I have seen many a science students as well getting into the law program which would have made their final two years of school a little tougher.

     Now you have chosen law as a choice either in your 11th or start of your 12th.  First thing you need to pretty much understand is that the exam patterns across all the law entrances across India would have English, Logical reasoning, Mathematics, Legal Reasoning and General knowledge & current Affairs, or variations of these. The last two, Legal reasoning and Current Affairs & General knowledge is something every law aspiring student has to really put some hard effort and do a lot of studying to be on the top. The other three areas, especially for those who are from English medium and have taken Mathematics in their high school is just a matter of accuracy within the stipulated time, and should not be considered to be tough sections to handle.

     Now that you have a broad perspective of what to expect, like the IITians and Medical aspirants, it is recommended to take some coaching  for cracking the law entrances.  Coaching is not mandatory but definitely provides the right rhythm to set you for the final tests. The competition here is also heavy and all the reservation in seats applies. The duration of coaching depends on various factors – the student’s available time given that the board exam is very important as well, proximity to a good coaching center, your decision to focus only on law and your financial situation, to just point out a few factors. My recommendation is irrespective of the duration of coaching, it is better to take class room programs (usually conducted twice a week in evenings and weekends) and supplement them with online tests. This way you get to see a future peer group and get a basic reading of where you stand inside your coaching center which can give you a good extrapolation of where one would land in term of law schools.  Just to name a couple of coaching centers which may be a good place to enroll – Sriram Law Academy in Chennai and Career Launcher across India. These two institutes has enough knowledge about the entire process and are able to answer almost all queries that you would ask them, and they have been fairly decent in accessing its students and where they would land in terms of law colleges.  For those who cannot go to Chennai, I would recommend you to enroll in their short term online programs to ensure you take as many tests as possible.  More the tests, timing them and evaluating them would be the nut to crack. No big deal- some regular hard work and focus would do the trick to open up the top law schools for you.   But from January to March or April, just concentrate on your final year exams which would become critical if you do not get into any desired programs.  During your final years of school, it is very important to participate in the Mock United Nations (MUNs) that happens across various schools in your city and in other cities – even Harvard MUN gets hosted in one Indian city very year. This hones your researching and debating skills which would be the seed for being a good lawyer later. The parents are hence advised to encourage their wards to participate in good MUNs on behalf of the school.   Even in law colleges, they do have MUNs in their undergraduate program along with MOOT courts which would give you a good continuity.

     The various entrances that one would face between the April and May months of the year of admission would be CLAT (Common Law Aptitude tests) for the 18 National Law Universities across India (as of2017), Maharashtra CET (MAH LAW CET), LSAT India (for getting admission to almost all private law colleges in India), AILET for NLU Delhi and a few state entrances like AP LAWCET, Rajasthan RULET, Telangana TS LAWCET, etc.  Remember, when one applies to the state LAW CETs, you need to write the tests in certain cities of that state as they would not have a center in your city which is outside their state. Then there are a few worthwhile private colleges that have their own entrance tests like Symbiosis (common test for their colleges in three cities but separate admission process), Christ University in Bengaluru, Bharathiya Vidyapeeth University in Pune and Kalinga KITTEE in Orissa, and a few worthwhile government institutes like BHU CET and Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastra University IPU CET that are worth writing.  Do understand that since you have most of these tests happening around a 6-7 week window, there are lots of dates that would have more than one tests happening and hence you need to pick and choose your battles here.   There are couple of private institutes that I want to mention here which do not have their own entrance tests but go with either CLAT or LSAT and the students’ academic scores – SASTRA university in Thanjavur and Nirma University in Ahmedabad which are also worth considering. For those in Bangalore, where I belong, if nothing else clicks and you have no other choice, and if you are desperate to get into law, then MS Ramaiah, KLE Society Law College and University law College of Bangalore University are the choices you are left with.

     Before I start to talk about the law schools in details, one thing you should never do is to with ratings that are available online like the Outlook, The Week, EduVidya, College Dunia, India Today and Career360 to name a few.  Certainly do not take any of these surveys in isolation to make a decision, as most of these surveys are paid ones and you would see no-name, unheard off and lousy schools making a great ranking.  Also many good colleges do not participate in most of the surveys which is something you need to watch out for. NLU in Delhi is never ranked anywhere but this is certainly a law school to long for and certainly in my books in the top three schools in India.  If you want to use these surveys, get the latest annual ones across many different surveys and do a weighted average of the rankings – by which I mean, if many of the surveys talk about certain schools in the top 10, they are certainly in the top 10 to a degree of belief.

     Next, being an engineer, I see lots of difference in how I would evaluate an engineering school vs a law school.  An engineering school is evaluated by the quality of the full time professors available, the quality of the laboratories that exist, by the infrastructure there is across the various engineering disciplines, their syllabus being current and more relevant for employment, and by the research and affiliations they would have with international engineering bodies. When it comes to law schools, few things take the cake – older the law schools, bigger the alumni and better known is that school within the law fraternity and hence it works out to be great for placements and internships.  Usually a law school would have just one big academic building and this is it- a few good full time professors, an extensive library which has both an extensive hardcopy collection and a large online collection, many esteemed visiting professors, and a large auditorium.   Kindly check for this first hand before any admission process is closed. Third and most important is, if the school is in Mumbai or in NCR region, automatically you get large law firms coming in to swoop you for placements in the former and you would establish close contacts with leading High court and Supreme court law professionals while you are in the latter which would help you to get great internships and contacts for your career.  Pune due to its proximity with Mumbai hence has some its placement advantages.  This goes without saying that by inference that even lower grade law schools in these two regions would be able to attract good students and get them good placements as well.   One good yardstick one can use to choose their law schools is that they must have been around for the past 10-12 years, which means after the five year degree, they do have 6-7 alumni batches that can be used as a good measure for evaluating that school. Also it would be better if the university also has a good one year Master’s program in Law.

     I would start off with a strong statement that like doing management degree, one needs to do law from a top school which would be the cream of all the available law schools in India.  In terms of competition, the law is not that heated up yet like the engineering JEE or the medical NEET but the number of students getting interested in law as a career in India is definitely increasing over the past few years.  Let us first start with the National Law Universities – NLUs as they are called- these are the autonomous government law institutes just like the IIMs for management. Each of them is their own university and one gets a degree from that particular NLU.  The admissions to these NLUs are through CLAT – this is the most prestigious entrance tests.  As I told you earlier, Sastra and Nirma use just CLAT scores for their admissions.   There are 18 of them, all the coaching institutes would be classifying them in 3 to 4 buckets.  Tier 1 is the ones in NLSIU Bengaluru, NALSAR in Hyderabad (~ 55 acres) and WBNUJS in Kolkata. NLSIU is the oldest of them all and was established next to the Bangalore University campus in 1988 in a total of about 23 acres. Hyderabad and Kolkata were established a good decade later in 1998 and 1999 respectively. From a campus perspective, the Kolkata School has 4 buildings in total including the separate boys and girls hostels in about 5 acres– nothing big or fancy. If you get into any of these three, your career is set – not to worry.  One has approximately 191 seats in total for all these three in general quota (for the exact number of seats, kindly refer to that particular law school and not use the number I quote as an absolute reference as things change year over year).  Generally the top 190 ranks in CLAT get into these institutes (unless their preference has been elsewhere).

     Then we can talk about the Tier 2 schools in Bhopal NLIU, Jodhpur NLU and Gandhinagar GNLU. It is hard to differentiate the rankings between Jodhpur and Bhopal as they usually land neck and neck. These three schools established in 1997, 2001 and 2003 in that order, have been endowed with huge 50 to 60 acre campuses with lots of open spaces and a great surrounding away from the bustling city – a really healthy environment for the students to thrive. Jodhpur and Bhopal are unfortunately not directly connected with most of the metro cities as one needs to traverse through Jaipur or Bhopal and travel from there to these cities by rail or road. Gandhinagar NLU on the other hand is about half an hour drive from the Ahmedabad airport.  The 200 to 450 rankers generally land in these institutes.

     Then comes the next rung which although established between 2005 and at late as 2015 (Nagpur) would not be in my recommended list based on the feedback I have  received from alumni from the other top six institutes,  and the placement they have or do not.  If you want a NLU tag, then go for Raipur, Lucknow and Patna in that order where most of the South Indian’s prefer not to go due to perceived safety concerns.  Chanakya was responsible for holding the 2017 CLAT and I can say it was shabbily handled – every time they announced a date for the seats (they are four rounds), all the time they missed the time twice due to technical issues.  In fact, their first round of allocation this year had a withdrawal of that allocation for a day due to some wrong seat allocation.  Given this is how a professional institute can mess up, this does not speak well about the administrators of that particular college. And given my ‘rule of thumb’ mentioned earlier that older the law college , the better it is and you must at least have five alumni’s passing out to judge that school and get decent placements, I would rather not join the other NLUs yet.

     Before I move on, I wanted to mention as of this year, the fees for an Indian here in these NLUs ranges between Rs 2 lacs to Rs 2.5 lacs/year, including hostel- a few newer ones do not have a hostel inside their campus or anything associated with them, and hence it is worthwhile taking a look at the campus before admitting your ward.   And for admission, one needs to write just the CLAT and there is no need to apply separately to each of the 18 NLUs as they get allotted according to a system that values both merit (your CLAT score) and preference of University.  From end of May, one needs to be active on the Internet as most of these results, seat allocations and counselling happen online – once allotted a seat, you need to pay Rs 50K online to confirm your seat within couple of days after the seat gets allotted or you need to forego the seat.  And I must also mention here that all the NLUs have a free high speed internet inside their campus for their students.

     Before I move on to the state entrances, I would like to mention three other government university – National Law University Delhi (NLUD) which conducts the AILET every year and this is the toughest of all entrance tests in general, Banaras Hindu University Varanasi that conducts BHU UET and even the lesser known National Law University in Himachal Pradesh  HPNLET.  NLUD does not get involved in any survey or ratings games and they belong to the top four law universities along with Bengaluru, Hyderabad and West Bengal and they have a total of about 73 seats to compete for.  Given that this is in the state capital (same logic would apply to GGS IPU that I mention later) and is a central university, with all the network of the High courts and Supreme courts, this is definitely worth a test to concentrate to achieve high along with CLAT and LSAT. I mention the one in Shimla because this is a NLU at the end of the day and situated in a fabulous place, but nothing else I can add at this point.

     Having done with the central autonomous NLUs, let me mention a few states that have their own law exams – honestly, like NEET and JEE, they must mandate only one CLAT and one LSAT for admission to all law colleges in India and this is something we the people have to recommend to the higher authorities. Every state has their own timelines and at some point, it becomes difficult to manage mapping them all.  And to write most of these state’s entrance test, as a non –domicile status, where the number of seats allotted to such category is even low,  you need to go to some cities in that state to write them. A few mentions are Maharashtra (MH CET LAW), Rajasthan (RULET), Cochin (CUSAT). Andhra Pradesh (AP LAWCET) and Telangana (TS LAWCET).  Check their calendar as they have a long timeline and they close after all the prime law colleges close although their tests are scheduled around the same time period with other major ones. If you have not landed in anything good, and if you belong to that state, then it is worthwhile to go after it.   Many of these are painfully slow in processing, give no updates for a long time and sometimes never, never use Internet to update anything, and have an extended timeline, some closing admission in time when the first semester of the NLUs gets over.  Out of all these, I would still recommend MHCET LAW for students all over India and others state entrances to only for students for that particular state.  Maharashtra has only 15% of their seats allotted to other state students but they have a few colleges that are worth trying – Government Law college in Mumbai (over 150 years old and has the likes of Dr. B R Ambedkar, Bal Gangadhar Tilaq, Soli Sorabjee, Ram Jethmalini, etc. as their alumni) and ILS law college in Pune, which are both pretty decent.

     Now I would go with the Law School Admission  Test (LSAT) – this is the standardized test conducted for all the law colleges in the USA and Canada, and which focuses only on Reading comprehension, logical and verbal reasoning.  There is an Indian version called LSAT INDIA conducted by Pearson VUE that happens around a Sunday of May that is important for getting admissions to private law colleges.  This is for getting admissions to some good private colleges like Jindal and they all go by the percentiles (instead of marks) and your score sheets gets sent to the top 10 colleges that you would choose while submitting the application for the test – these ten colleges would certainly have your information and test scores, and start contacting you even before you write the LSAT India test on their own – not to worry. Higher the percentile, the better it is.  For OP Jindal State University in Sonepat, Haryana which charges around Rs 7.5 lacs/year (includes hostel), there are good tuition fee concessions up to 50% if your percentile is > 95. Most of these private institutes sell more than what they can offer, and I believe strongly these are more for rich kids who have a lineage of politicians or lawyers in their family who would like to spend a good five years here and get a degree – someone who joins here should get used to the peer pressure in terms of wealth being displayed.  Again, if you ask me, there is Jindal for LSAT and nothing else close to it in terms of standards and I prefer not to mention any other college names here.   You need to apply to each of these private colleges separately.

     Now I can say in most instances, the first three Sundays of May would be the three major tests that one needs to take – CLAT, AILET, and LSAT India. Other tests would work around these dates and some will clash with these dates as well and hence it is prudent for you to concentrate on these three and have the other tests work around it.  There are good private colleges like Symbiosis, Christ University and Kalinga KIIT who would have their own entrance tests much prior in April and first week of May so that their admissions try to close even before one gets the results of CLAT and AILET so that they get the good students first.  For the students, they try to grab a seat here, pay the fees and wait to get lucky and make a decision to move elsewhere foregoing part or the entire fees paid to these institutes.  Since these seats usually gets thrown up after the first seat allotment of CLAT and AILET, these seats gets filled by the waiting list candidates and one would be surprised as to the amount of seats getting opened up here for the second allotment.  Again, I view it as a conniving trick by these good private law colleges to get some ‘free money’ up front and they are used to the first allotted seats getting vacant and hence they do not create any hassle about it.  Businesses that thrive due to the anxiety of the parents – something we need to cut across and have the government go after only CLAT and LSAT India as the entrance tests for these seats and allotment made accordingly after one fills up the NLUs.

     Now let me talk about a few institutes before I talk about a few good private and state law colleges.  First is Institute of Law – Nirma University in Ahmedabad which goes only with your CLAT and LSAT scores and give you admissions.   From a syllabus perspective and their internships, they seem to be doing pretty well. Next comes Kalinga KIITEE which usually would be the first decent law alternative to close admissions – they are from Bhubaneshwar and considered to be a good institute as the founder has done a great job in the engineering  and technology side. Then comes Sastra University, in Thanjavur which goes only with your CLAT score and your 12th score to get admission, purely by merit – there is no management quota here.  I am mentioning this here because this is the only decent alternative left in Tamilnadu now. Then I would mention about MS University in Vadodhara– they used to have a good name earlier, but definitely a good alternative for anyone from Gujarat to study in.

     Now comes the private and state colleges worth mentioning in my book of law admissions:

  • Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastra University (Delhi State government) – has its own IPU CET but given that this is in capital region, and is a decent university otherwise as well, something worth taking.
  • Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, UP – again, has its own law test AMU LAW with only three centers in India – two in UP and one in Kerala. Old institute tag gives it some decent reputation.
  • Banaras Hindu University (BHU) – they have its one test UET BHU. Worst part is although this is open throughout India, they do not have any centers in South India – they had Chennai earlier but this year they made all South Indians travel to Delhi to take the test.  Sounds ridiculous but you are their mercy in these things unfortunately – they would advertise all the centers, get the fees and then a week or less prior to the test would ask you to come to some other city to take the test.
  • College of Legal Studies, Dehradun – has its own entrance test ULSAT although they accept good CLAT and LSAT scores. Approximately Rs 5 lacs as fees that includes hostel. More famous for its energy related courses but has a wide variety of Bachelor’s option in law, one specializing purely in Energy law.
  • New Law College, Bharathiya Vidya Peeth University in Pune:  this conducts its own test BVP CET and a unique way in which they make twice the money in these tests is they conduct two different tests in consecutive days for BBA and BA stream – I find this ridiculous.
  • Army Institute of Law , Mohali – has only four open seats and one cannot get any information whatsoever from them – you need to be watching for news about this as their website is not updated, and
  • Lloyd College, Greater Noida – has its own test called LET.  I am just mentioning it here, purely because this is in the NCR region and they do have some sort of MOU with NLSIU and other NLUs – something to look into if nothing else works.

     Last but not the least, I kept two private colleges that are worth the trouble after the six top NLUs and NLUD to the very last – Christ University and Symbiosis Pune (the other two institutes in Hyderabad and Noida are definitely not worth it).  Definitely something to really go after given that their reputation in both management and law is very high.  Although not a Bangalore bias as I am from this city, I would rate Christ a little better than Symbiosis Pune.  Both of them have strict uniform codes for the students, and both do not have an in-house hostel although they have associated with certain hostels nearby.   Both would not be too transparent in the way they do admissions which is a setback, as they do have their own entrance tests CULET and SET respectively.  Christ campus is the best amongst all law colleges in India as this is part of their other streams as well and not exclusive to it – they do have a 6 to 7 places to eat within their big campus for the students and have an extensive library and compete with the local NLSIU (the top NLU in India) for Internships.  Symbiosis Law in Pune has its own building (no concept of campus) which is away from their main set of buildings and closer to the Pune Airport (walking distance) but looks very stuffed up  and seems to be a good place for most of wealthy Maharashtrians to get their wards in. Symbiosis has an advantage of better placements due to its proximity to Mumbai.  So, between them it is a toss honestly.

     One mention I wanted to say here is even if you are a local Bengelurian, due to the bad traffic here, it is better that the ward stays somewhere nearby the university as law is all about doing work beyond the normal 9 to 4 pm schedule of classes.  And any private hostels surrounding Christ smells bad and is a hell hole and I would rather prefer 3-4 students joining together and getting an apartment although it would be on the expensive side in Koramangala area and be able to commute within couple of kilometers.

     Now coming to an interesting piece that I keep asked about – what about OCIs students (who hold a foreign passport and have parents of Indian origin and are of Indian origin) – how do they get classified?  The Bar Council of India does NOT allow OCIs to practice law in India today, unlike engineers or doctors who can work in India, this would most likely change in years to come – their only resistance at this point is to not allow foreign law companies to come and establish here and steal their lunch and dinner. Of course, any OCIs can act as a researcher or an advisor after their degree.  The way any private college treats OCIs is very simple – as long as they have studied their 10th and 12th (and a few institutes add the clause of at least 7 years studying in Indian schools) , they get classified under normal Indian quota. In the NLUs and NLUD, same logic applies.  But in NLUs you can also be considered as in NRI category and pay higher fees in US$ (or INR equivalent) as long as you have a sponsor for the same – again, I still cannot fathom the fact that OCIs can get clubbed with NRIs if the OCIs are legal tax resident of India earning in Indian currency!.  But if you are a non-OCI and hold a non-Indian Passport, you are classified as a foreign citizen only in all the institutes, be it private or government (there are a few exceptions though).

     Last note that I wanted to make is for the students in Bengaluru looking for a Bengaluru option for pursuing law – although I would not recommend any of them personally, some schools that do have a decent local studentship are MS Ramaiah, Alliance, NA Global. KLA Society Law College and Bangalore Institute of legal Studies.  I would still have University Law College of Bangalore University and the Law College in University of Mysore above any local institutes.

     Hope this has cleared most of the anxiety that the parents face in sending their child to the law programs in India. Law education is just started to boom given you have an increasing statistics for the past few years in the test intakes and is going to be on par with the JEEs and NEETs soon.   Unfortunately not much good information is available on the web for students and parents, and I thought I would lay it down as I see it today that would be helpful for most of the audience.

     Before I close this blog, there are two websites that one should keep in mind while doing research and getting the right information:   www.legallyindia.com  and www.barandbench.com  – these give you some reliable pointers and are a good resource to find most of the queries answered.  The other sites that are out there are pretty much not to the mark – they provide anywhere from stale information to wrong information.      The author is a, educational consultant and a blogger out of Bengaluru and had to do this research extensively last year for seeking admission to one of his close relatives and this blog is just an outcome of the same research that is being shar

Nokia and Alcatel-Lucent – an integration challenge

Nokia recently in mid-April announced its intent to buy-out Alcatel-Lucent for Eur 15.6B (then valued at $16.6B, and recently at $17.3B, thanks to the Euro slide against the US$) to become the second largest telecom infrastructure company in the world, behind Ericsson from Sweden.   The Chinese giant Huawei is seen as their biggest threat presently ranked third and they are growing rapidly in all technology fronts.  Given that all these giants are seeing their mobile infrastructure business coming down and there is a huge potential in the IP/cloud /TV & Media area, this consolidation may still be questionable as originally Nokia had wanted only ALU’s wireless business, if insider reports are to be believed but they ended up with ‘all-or-nothing’ package.

    For some background, Alcatel –Lucent (ALU) has about 52K employees worldwide, of which 6000 are in France approximately, and was facing weak growth prospects having not turned a profit for a while now. Nokia has a worldwide strength of about 62000 of which 6900 employees are in Finland.  Hence it is safe to say that the employee strength in their ‘head-quartered’ country is about 11-12%.  Nokia (the former NSN) and ALU have a market cap of about $26.3B and $11B.  ALU’s revenue was pegged at $15.4B and they have about $6.8B in cash.   Remember that ALU was still going through their SHIFT Plan for the past couple of years – this plan made them concentrate on four areas: IP routing and transport, Wireless, IP platforms and Fixed networks.  Looks like executing to these plans had been their challenge recently.  With this acquisition, Nokia gets a significant boost in their North American market, their research capabilities (thanks to the former Lucent labs) and also gets to add on to their Optical business, which is a big win for them.  As for ALU, not sure what their gain is.

      Given that Nokia approached ALU with a buyout target which was a couple of billions lower than the one announced, and before meeting with the French President , it is safe to say that there has been some good monetary provisions made for any potential ‘structural repercussions’  if this transaction goes through.  France, a much loved labor oriented socialist country, has announced there would be no job loss there but it is up to anybody’s guess as to what happens in a ‘protective’ European community  

    Let me digress a little about Nokia and sync up the readers about they are now – they are not what we know them to be (a mobile company).   This is the Nokia Services Network (name changed after Nokia bought out the share of Siemens from Nokia Siemens Network) and the original ‘mobile’ Nokia Research division (Nokia Technologies) and the HERE (aka OVI or Services division of ‘mobile’ Nokia once, largely still the NavTeq acquisition assets).  HERE maps seem to be making a good business in the entire automotive and embedded navigation segment through the European vehicle manufacturers and since this does not fit into the scheme of things of the present Nokia, it is being seen as a unit that would be sold soon, if the price is right.  No suitors till date for this unit.   But they are making close to 300M euros.   And if the present Nokia does have thoughts of entering the mobile handset market again, through the Alcatel acquisition (yes, there are Alcatel phones but not sure if they are part of ALU), they cannot use the Nokia name for a few more months hence, according to the agreement with Microsoft.

     It had been an integration challenge both for Nokia and Siemens, and for Alcatel and Lucent when they decided to merge with each other.   When it comes to integration, my guess is Cisco has it to an art form as most of their business is driven through inorganic routes.  This Nokia-ALU combine may not put too much pressure on Ericsson at this point as they are already structured along the future potential  Cloud, IP and TV/media areas along with being the leaders in the BSS/OSS segment and in the Radio systems area.   If there is a hole in Ericsson strategy going forward, it may be on the Optical side where lots of companies like Ciena, Infinera etc. specialize and in the network energy space that takes care of Data centers (given the boom of E-commerce, esp. in the Asia region).   

    Before I look one level down from their individual structure of Nokia and ALU, let me highlight where Huawei stands.  They, like Samsung of the mobile client world, seem to be pitching in all areas to cover their wide base.  They seem to have a solid Wireless (BTS, Small Cell) and Wired (Fixed Access, Datacom, Transport network) stream, carrier software (aka BSS), Core networking products, Data center and Network Energy (hot field of interest now), IT which encompasses both cloud and storage, and all enterprise products (to compete head-on with Cisco) as well as a reasonable consumer division (which takes care of most of the client like mobile, media and home).

      Now when it comes to Nokia and ALU, there are lots of high level domain redundancies in their IP networking and Access suites like Customer Experience Management  (ALU had acquired Motive a few years ago), Small cells , Subscriber Data management  and their IP Multimedia system.  Of course, the usual operation support function like HR, recruitment, IT support, sales and marketing would all have deep impacts.   But a good part of recent investments by ALU in Analytics, Cloud, and content device management would stay and grow together as Nokia has not yet concentrated in these segments along with their recent alignment towards anything Internet Protocol.   The original Bell Labs of ALU would have to merge with Nokia Technologies and form a giant of a research division that would be regarded as the best in the world.

     Nokia would like to compete effectively with Ericsson with their Global Services arm, and would make Core networks, IP (to do a lot of homework here with ALU’s arm to have a cohesive story) and Transport networks to be their contribution to the merger and have ALU bring in expertise through the future areas with high potentials highlighted above and their RF, wireless and optical product lines.  If these two European entities combine and integrate well, they can be a formidable company going forward.

    Convenience and availability must not be the force to drive any mergers or acquisitions, but must be a carefully thought-out process, both on the strategic front and also on the execution front on the merged product lines.  If I make a comparison to the world of Tennis, the top two singles players combining to play doubles will not make them the best doubles pair.   The markets they want to operate in, the areas where there are potentials upticks that they need to invest, the ‘cash cow consolidation’ wherein what is making money  today can be combined to partly pay for the future,  and the technologies that can give them that extra push are the main thrust areas to look into before any mergers happen. 

     Telecom , per say, is a highly capital intensive segment, and with the huge payments done by the Operators to acquire spectrums, they would have little in terms of investing for the future by buying newer technologies offered by these telecom infra company .   Adoption of newer 5G or Nanocore technologies esp., in the emerging markets is going to be slow.

Microsoft and Linkedin – not an obvious slam dunk

        Microsoft recently this June has reached a deal to acquire LinkedIn for $26.2 Billion and not going too much into whether the shareholders and regulators would approve it, let us assume for this blog this is a done deal.  Yes, slam dunk used here intentionally as the NBA finals where Cleveland managed to beat the favorites Golden State is still fresh in everyone’s mind.   And the title is relevant another way as well because Paul Allen, one of the founders of Microsoft, owns the Portland Trail Blazers team.

      Microsoft is buying LinkedIn at a price that is about 25% less than its all-time high, but still at a 50% premium from where it is presently.  There are about a third of all the global working professionals as members of LinkedIn.  Although we see LinkedIn as more a professional C2C social network, of late, it has been trying to get into the social space much to the annoyance of the members already there.  For that, the LinkedIn members believe there is a Facebook.   What may not be obvious it that they are already big in the B2B space in terms of recruitment which  seems to be their cash cow today.

    Yes, LinkedIn gets most of its revenues through licenses and subscription charges from the recruitment space with their Recruitment platform and the Talent Solutions offering.  It has been faced with hard reality recently – slowing growth and has been offering weak financial guidance, and they would have been eager to jump on any sugar daddy that came their way.  Salesforce, a CRM giant, was also in the reckoning to buy them, as admitted by their CEO, but their valuation of LinkedIn was much lower.   By selling at a premium, LinkedIn seems to have made its shareholders rich given this may have been its only option, as even the ads business was slowing down.  Office 365 for Microsoft has been growing well for the past two years and has displaced Google in this space – a big enterprise cloud play by Microsoft.  Ah Hah:  Licenses & Annual Subscription + Office 365 = Good Synergy in Business Model?    Also their combined strength may also give them better revenue in the ads space.

    When one does the math, Microsoft has paid about $60 for each of the 433 Million members professional data (mostly), their connection details, their group subscriptions and some of the personal information that one has shared(contact numbers, education, email etc.).  If the premium was not there, your information was only worth $40 for Microsoft.  And Microsoft rightfully feels they got a steal.  Compare it to what Facebook paid for WhatsApp in 2013, $19B for about 600 million users, which works out to approximately $31 per head and that too only for your phone numbers!  Some social network experts said Facebook paid only $2B for WhatsApp users which works out to $3.33 for each phone number, and 4/5th of the money paid was more out of “Goodwill”, whatever that means.  When Facebook got Instagram the previous year for $1B for 30M users which worked out to $33 per user for the photos they shared but an evaluation by a leading bank couple of years later put that value at $80 per user as it had grown well and big under Facebook (Facebook announced they had 1B active mobile users in Instagram in April 2014).  Not bad for Mark (What a purchase, he can say!), whose main revenue source is ‘ads’ and more the user, merrier he can be.  Once he integrates his acquisition well, a business model would eventually evolve to monetize the entire user base and they get to strike gold.  Remember, there is no such thing as a free lunch is the old adage and it still applies.   Can you and I live without WhatsApp now – we are all hooked and addicted which is making Facebook smile. Every corporate need to make money for their stakeholders and for the rich to become richer, right?

       LinkedIn on its own had made some purchases recently – Lynda which offers video tutorials and training and a great online medium for learning, and Connectifier which  uses AI and machine learning  solutions to search for appropriate profiles for talent acquisition.  Again, once integrated, with a solid analytics engine, this can be a money bagger for anyone who has the names, their connections, what they want to learn, and whom they want to recruit, with all data available open without any privacy issues as you had built your own LinkedIn profile, viewable to all. And campus placement would just get easier with the lowering of the age of LinkedIn membership to 14 and the Student portal available so that students have access to all the best places they want to join.   

       Recruitment in years to come is never going to be paper resume based, it is purely going to be a social recruiting through digital profile play – by going digital, we get to see the associations that the person has, conference and groups (s) he attends and recommendation he may have from previous bosses and sub-ordinates which may speak a lot about the candidate.   Hiring processes can become very fast and even passive candidates who seem to be better fits can be lured into new opportunities.  Data analytics of unstructured data would make Microsoft guide you what you want to learn next, whom you want to meet next, what you want to write about to get noticed, and above all, unknowingly the next job falling on your lap without you even applying for it.  In short, if all works out great, LinkedIn may be the sole or primary Learning and Development, and Recruitment solution of the WORLD. Whaav… now it is making some sense, is it not? They would wish that everyone pays them to avail their services.

      Microsoft, mapping it back to the 1980s has either acquired companies for the information, data and content that they possess or to kill a potential competitor that is the wings. They acquired top software engineers from Xerox to develop their WORD, bought out Forethought which had a presentation program to develop PowerPoint and bought out Fox Software for their FoxPro and had Access use their database engine.  They acquired Hotmail with 8.5 million subscribers then in the 90s and integrated them to their MSN services.  Their later bigger acquisitions from 2000-2015 like Visio for their graphics software, Skype technologies for their VoIP service Skype, Nokia for their smartphone hardware capabilities and Yammer, a smaller version of LinkedIn for their intra-organization social networking utility have not paid them much dividends.  In fact, Nokia acquisition may have been their biggest mistake to date.  Consumers do not want to see a Desktop like UI on their phones as well and they would like to pick and choose what apps and games they want to possess and the Store part of the Windows story did not offer them much. With an enterprise mindset that Satya Nadella comes with, I guess their phone business would just be an also ran but cloud software and services is where they want to invest and capitalize on.

     With LinkedIn, they may have hit a jackpot, depending on whom you talk to.  They get a huge free database of about a third of the world’s workforce, with a constant profile page for every professional and a reachable email to connect with, and a sense of their network across the world – they get your digital business card stored which is paper-less and easily accessible, and they can keep track of you and manage your relationship as well.  For now, LinkedIn is their CRM bounty.  They get to build their own bigger CRM around LinkedIn, many of the relationships already coming in for free.  Combine that with the fact that they would own the single biggest asset of the world in terms of recruitment and learning and development that you and I have to pay for to use, they are smiling to their bank all the way.    And I am sure there is more to it in this acquisition than what I can infer as an outsider through this blog.

     Just as a baseline, the top four  staffing  and recruitments companies(Adecco, Manpower, Randstad and Allegis) generate a combined revenue of about $70 billion and up, and even if LinkedIn gets 10% of this in the next 5 years, $7 billion revenue is not something to be sneezed at.   Talent solutions (Hiring and L&D) division today generates nearly 2/3rd of its total revenue and is in the order of $1.9B the year closing 2015 with projections in 2016 to be around 20% above this number.  For a $93B company like Microsoft, adding another 5% to the total revenue over the next few years would take them to a privileged $100B club just through LinkedIn. They seem to be SMAC on target.

   Integration being a challenge in any of these large name companies coming together in terms of employees and organizations, that apart, once a cohesive story builds up around the combined entity in the next couple of years, we would most likely see a subscription model that everyone has to pay for, and they may not be alone with Facebook also likely to follow that route and users like us are stuck because we need to pay for our addiction for these cloud services. It would not be big news if they get to invest in some telecom company for their technology and infrastructure so that they get to rule the way we communicate globally all the way. Google would not be sitting and twiddling its thumb either– we will have to wait for some action on their front and their story to fall in place.  Stay tuned.

    In the meantime back to basketball, we are in the fourth quarter of the seventh game of the conference finals and the scores are tied.  It is time for the real players to make it count and win the game.

   How it all started?  On the evening of the day when the news of acquisition came out. I was sipping coffee with my friend, and asked him a simple “Why”? He drew a blank, just like me, but his wife sitting next to him who works for a leading job portal said “The value is in recruitment, stupid”. Now I get it, that too after a week… Whoever said “A woman can never be wrong” is absolutely right!

 The author of this blog is a business and technology consultant and a corporate trainer for Business Intellects based out Bengaluru, India.

Making Things better for a coaching center

There are two major things in running a coaching center, other than the real estate and infrastructure part.

  • Discipline:   Not to be too liberal and not to be too strict – somewhere in between is a good place to be in. Giving some relaxation is fine but students must not take undue advantage of the same.  The instructors must be between being too formal and getting too close.  Some suggestions are:
  • Make it very clear what is non-negotiable in terms of behavior and punctuality and what is slightly relax able and reinforce them periodically.
  • The peer groups or students have to be properly managed so that they do not disturb the other groups or students to the extent of instilling a lack of enthusiasm in learning in others.  All students must be able to participate actively without any fear or inhibition. 
  • Appreciate their participation openly and praise good performance in public. At the same time reprimand bad behavior then and there. Every student has a right to learn and must not be disrupted by a few elements in the class.  The expected student behavior must be reinforced and reminded regularly.
  • If operating under the peer group concept, the students have to be grouped in such a way that there is a good mix of students in each group of various merits and peer to peer learning must be facilitated more rather than within the peer group only. 
  • Attendance and timing – these are non-negotiable for any professional life that they would get into – having a strict 90% and above attendance record is essential and having the late comers stay out for that day of class would give them the necessary motivation to be on time the next day.    5 min lateness could be tolerated as the limit and if they are not in by that time, then they should not be allowed in.
  • Projects and homework turned in on-time (with one day grace perhaps). 
  • Checking the notes of students regularly during and after the lecture would help them to be focused.  A good record of each students and his/her record has to be maintained
  • Learning methodology – this is more about how the learning happens and what are the objectives and expectations of the course and the students.
  • Learning Goals: The center needs to have good success criteria or benchmarks to measure progress of the student and course activity and to regularly measure and auto-correct the same in a very transparent manner.
  • The projects and homework must be very probing in terms of concepts and practical applications of what was taught in class.  They must be able to research independently within a certain degree and assisted to think out-of-the-box to arrive at potential solutions.   One should never make homework being seen as a burden to their learning process.  Try not to target one unique solution for any problem but rather give probing questions so that the students can come out with a few options and discuss them clearly.
  • Video and audio aids online to supplement the learning must be used regularly and some unique materials in those aids should be tested constantly to ensure that the students are using those aids.
  • The fundamentals and concepts must be the heart of the focus and then problems solved around it.  The understanding of concepts should be tested which would be most beneficial for the students.  Getting to have a Q&A session after every cohesive chapter would be nice – this can have real-life practical applications of the concepts learnt.
  • Focus must be not on covering the entire material or syllabus but rather to encourage active learning from the students.  It is important to provide the students real life examples and personal experience so that the students can visualize practical applications of what they are the concepts. 
  • The learning goals must be clearly defined and communicated to the students, and must be separated from in-class course instructor learning and in-home projects and study-work. Give positive, constructive feedback on student performance and their behavior.
  • Lesson plan for each session or a bunch of sessions should be clearly defined and an in-class test should be conducted every fortnight.  This can be online that can be submitted from home. 
  • Have a fun day every quarter for students to present on a topic that has been taught in class but described in their own words with audio and visual aids.
  • Three Learning checks:  did they understand the fundamentals, are they solving School/CBSE /ICSE related questions and are they able to solve competitive exams (JEE, CET etc.) type of questions – all three must be covered across all their subjects.  Helping students identify their own errors are part of the teaching methodology would be most beneficial.
  • Combination of black board + handouts + visual and audio aids + tests must be there and used effectively.  Each of them must complement each other in terms of learning.
  • Encourage the students to take on many competitive tests as possible and give them pointers regularly as to what is coming up and how to deal with it.
  • Constant motivation by the parents and elders at home can better the student’s success.  This can be enabled by regular meeting with parents and go through the students and overall course progress.  The parents must also be more focused on the concepts being learnt and not get too hung up on the scoring well in the competitive exams as the sole objective. 

Bucketing (labelling) in lateral hiring

Imagine this. You have applied for a specific job online that you think you like or confident you can take on.  And after a few days, you get a standard (auto) reply in the negative.  Chances are that your resume was never sent to the hiring authority but rather filtered by a clueless recruiter.  (S)he has skimmed your profile amongst the thousand profiles (s)he may have received and cursorily seen couple of words in it and then had put you in the ‘reject’ folder.   I would then say you have been ‘bucketed’.  There are lots of other words used to describe the phenomenon – Tagging, Labeling,Cookie cuttingetc.   It is not what you know or what you can do, but rather what the recruiter thinks you don’t know or what you cannot do.  

      During lateral hiring, the assumption for the recruiter of the hiring company is that you should have almost all of the required skills stated in the job description, and anything beyond those skills does not matter to him/her.   As one gets more experienced, one evolves gradually to be less hands-on and are more valued for your execution skills, positive behavior and your overall holistic systems knowledge – the companies would term it as ‘you need to have a bigger responsibility’.   And there is a good chance that more senior the role is, irrespective of the domain in many cases, the more value that you bring in are these non-technical skills that you had acquired within your past and present organizations.  With that said, being bucketed does not help either the job seeker or the employer.  Assuming instantly that the job seeker would not be capable of learning and doing the job advertised is a complete farce as one completely oversees the other value that the seeker can potentially bring in to the organization. One can overcome this tag or label only after a couple of discussions have taken place as only an open dialog can address mutual expectations. 

    Lateral hiring itself is difficult for experienced folks as what you have done in your first few years sort of puts you in a pre-defined bucket and whatever you would have done in the later years may not be seen as offering any value. After about 12 years in the professional market, you need to realize that it is NOT what you know but WHOM you know that is going to land you in your next job.  The more experienced you are, it is always better to have the HIRING manager be able to see your profile rather than have some junior recruiter, who may not have any clue of what the job really needs, dictate your destiny.    (S) he would see couple of jargons in your profile and immediately label or tag you and moves on assuming you cannot be a fit to the present opportunity.  There is an assumption made that your X domain expertise will not be useful to the Y domain expertise that they are looking out for.  Here I am assuming X and Y domains both fall into a common superset and there are some commonalities between them.  I am not talking about metallurgy and literature, or farming and power transmission as the two domains, just to put my line of thought in perspective, although personally I know of a friend of mine who quit an electrical transmission and distribution company and became a successful vanilla farmer.

  The irony also would be that an employee who is already inside the company may not even have half the skills that they are looking out for in the new candidate but still has learnt the art of survival from within.  And many of us have had prior working relationships with executives in the higher branches of the management of various companies to wonder how these folks are actually there at such critical high decision making levels? Again, this is sort of a Tagging and Labeling we unconsciously get trapped into ourselves.    

  The college degree that you had got hopefully may help you get the first job but may not be same domain you would be actually working down the road in your career.  Putting it differently, I would say that you do not get to use about 80% of what you have studied but still are able to make significant contribution to the organization you work for.

    There are reasons beyond one that an employee is valued within any organization, be it at any level which most of us may not be aware of while passing an unnecessary judgement from outside.  It is also not right for a recruiter to assume that a lateral hire is not capable of learning and executing in the newer domains but can be brought in for other values that (s)he brings to the organization.   Normally recruiters do not operate with an open mind and they blame the volumes of resumes they get for a particular job for not going through most of them.  It is important for all profiles to be considered properly, evaluated for what the skill sets and values they bring in, have a short dialog with the job seeker and then to make a decision one way or the other – this is the proper “Due Diligence”.  

      No successful entrepreneur would have made it if they had been bucketed to a particular domain or expertise.   In fact, their accomplishment is to think outside a defined box and offer a unique solution that they can market.  It is also known that a person in his/her mid-life(40s)  would have other interests in both personal and professional life that (s)he would like to experience,  which means (s)he would be more than open to newer ventures , within his risk appetite.   I am also of the opinion that  (s)he also can innovate and learn quickly by applying ideas and learning from his/her discipline onto another newer discipline in a precise methodical manner.   Doing something new every now and then keeps one motivated and hungry to learn to be able to execute and deliver and I know that most of us have this craving within us to be the best in what we do.  I also feel that they get bored after a while in doing what they are doing and want to do something different.

    Some examples to remind you that your past does not dictate your future, and it should NOT: Scott McNealy, one of the co-founders of Sun Microsystems – a major server company, had a Bachelors of Arts in Economics.   John Chambers, the former CEO of Cisco, the networking giant actually had a Bachelor’s degree in Science and Art and a Law degree and started off his career as a Sales engineer with IBM. As we all know Bill Gates of Microsoft fame, Larry Ellison of Oracle and Steve Jobs of Apple fame are drop-outs and still made their name; in fact, Steve got his hands wet with Pixar which brought to us Toy Story and other successful animated cartoons.   Rowan Atkinson, the actor of Mr. Bean fame, does have a Master’s degree in Electrical engineering from Oxford.   

       My point is as you climb the convoluted career staircase based on aspirations and accumulated expertise, each step can be different but must be climbed to get to the next step that may turn in a different direction – all previous steps do materialize.   If these individuals were bucketed or tagged, they would not have gone anywhere and done anything close to what they have achieved.  

Knowledge Hierarchy and Innovation equation

        For many folks who have been accustomed to standards and best known practices, the DIKW Pyramid clearly talks about the hierarchy and the relationships between the four levels of hierarchy.    Data is the fundamental unit which is just observations which is hard to interpret alone.   Once you infer something from data, it attains some meaning which is termed as information.  Once you process and organize the information and give it some structure and then analyze it, it becomes Knowledge. When you apply knowledge in action, you develop competency.    Knowledge is more theoretical and competency is more practical. And eventually, when you start becoming more effective and are able to make clear decisions, all attained by experience and continuous learning, you are termed wise.   Thus, if one can define them loosely in an equation:

Information = Relevant Data + meaning or value

Knowledge = Processed Information + analysis or synthesis

Competency = Knowledge + application   (this is just a step defined in between K and W)

Wisdom = Competency + experience

    People confuse knowledge with intelligence which may not be correct.    Creativity and Intelligence are more associated with some action and related to Innovation.  Intelligence takes into account the ability to reason, be culturally aware and also be situationally correct.

Intelligence = Depth of Competence + reasoning ability

Creativity = Intelligence + Fun, according to Albert Einstein

Jiddu Krishnamurthy, a well-known Indian philosopher, adds Freedom to Einstein’s definition which I would approve as you need freedom to be creative.  In a bounded environment, creativity is limited.

      Some of these definitions may differ from some other definitions by researchers and scholars and are subject to other interpretations as well,  but these are just defined in layman’s terms to give a clear picture to understand the information hierarchy and what more does  it take to be innovative. The skills required for these two would be different, as the former is more execution relevant and the latter is more about using knowledge to create something new.

     Disclaimer:  All the above definitions and relationships already exist in some form and author has just compiled them cohesively together.

IPL6 –figures behind the action -Compilation on May 2013

Overall statistics:

  • Pepsi ATOM MVP is more favorable to a bowler or a bowling all-rounder and in fact less favorable to a pure batsman. How else can you explain an Irfan Pathan, Umesh Yadav, Awana or a Praveen Kumar placed well the likes of Raina, Dhoni or a Rohit!  None of these bowlers seem to have any match winning performances but the above batters did many a times!  Praveen does not even have a 3-wicket haul this time. We need a good metric that combines good batting with good averages, consistency and strike rates, along with catches and run outs effected, and with bowling figures with economy rates and strike rates as part of the equation, add to whether their performance lead to a match winning performance which is key. I have come close to it by starting in some direction but it needs a lot of data and man power and automation to get this done.
  • Once the MVP or the new metrics are in place, we must go back and do a report card against each player for what he was paid and what he has contributed to clearly show the huge discrepancies in most of the cases.
  • The Champions trophy team representing India may not be a bad one given that all the 15 players are in the top 100 in the MVP list – credit must be to the batsmen because their points are harder to make it to the MVP list. Even that apart, I strongly feel Irfan Pathan must have made way for Stuart Binny unless BCCI wants to fill that minority quota! And given the form Murali Vijay is in, I would rather take Cheteshwar Pujara who is more technically sound and is out of the injury and can even open.
  • The probable list though is something worrisome as none of the players in that, except for Praveen Kumar perhaps, are worth even to be considered – their performance does not warrant them to be there as other players can make a bigger difference. I would say Mohit instead of Shami, Rahane instead of Gambhir, Parthiv instead of Ambati, Mandeep instead of Tiwary and P Ojha instead of Rahul Sharma as a spinner backup.
  • Age has been the most determining factor in choosing the team as India may be eying the next World cup couple of years down the road and building a team for the same.  But present is present and we need to send the best team to win any day, irrespective of age as long as recent performance backs it up.
  • Encouraging people who have come to the news for all the wrong reasons like Rahul Sharma and Praveen Kumar for drugs and violence respectively, is not appreciated. In fact, we must be tough on these and ensure discipline and behavior is maintained well.
  • It would be a wasted player if the top three batsmen do not consistently perform and frequently do big scores – couple of fifties through the season for these three players’ calls for a replacement at the top.  By not being to do big scores, the later batsmen who have little time to settle are under lots of pressure.  On the other hand, if they have a nice platform, they can build on it.
  • Just checking the KXIP bowling: Both Praveen and Piyush do not even have any 3-wicket haul this time and their salary is $800K and $900K, I guess. What a waste. On the same team, this new comer Sandeep Sharma has taken 3-wickets twice in four matches he has played, and that too away from Mohali – would not a medium pacer like him do better in Mohali if he plays a full season????
  • 3 out of the four teams that qualified for IPL6 semifinals have Indian captains – only Hyderabad has either Sangakkara or White.  By the same token, out of the bottom 4 teams, only one had an Indian captain – Gambhir for KKR, the other being KXIP, DD and PWI.  So, it is fair to conclude that an Indian captain is a better bet for leading IPL teams – I cannot reason it out, but still it makes sense.
  • Fair play award usually sets the tone for the team and speaks a lot about their leadership – captain and the coach. Chennai has won it three times so far and they are the leaders this year, and Rajasthan and Punjab have won it once so far. If you look at this year, unfortunately, not only Delhi and Kolkata play well, they did not play fair as well as they are the two teams at the bottom of the fair play award table.  Although no correlation exists between fair play and qualifying, the spirit of the game is important and we need to remember the Game is bigger than any individual and their ego and anger!
  • Home advantage seems to be a beneficial thing for most teams as the win record at home is 70.83% – 51 games won vs. 21 lost, out of a total of 72.  Mumbai and Rajasthan have won all home games, and Bangalore and Hyderabad have won all except one.  Pune and Delhi are the ones who do not seem to take advantage of the home crowd to pull a win and they have the worst record here.
  • When teams bat first, Win – loss ratio is 34:37 and when teams chase, they have Win-Loss ratio to be 38:35 overall – somewhat equal chance of win and loss in either case. Some teams are better batting first like Mumbai and Chennai, and some teams are better chasing like Rajasthan and Hyderabad. Delhi is the only team that has highly inverted ratio leading to a loss in either case.  Chennai is the only team that has more wins than losses, either batting first or chasing – seems to me that they do not bother much as to where they are playing as they do not have a clean record in either scenarios. Chennai and Mumbai have had good success in the top order to post big scores to defend by batting first, although the quality of bowling of Chennai, esp. at death, is lower than Mumbai’s.
  • All – rounders are the ones best suited for the limited format versions of the game.  India’s success with the World cup in 1983 was due to the fact that it had lots of good and utility all-rounders in Mohinder Amarnath, Madan Lal, Roger Binny and lead by Kapil Dev.  In this IPL6, we see teams what have good all-rounders winning matches – SRH with Perera and Sammy, RR with Shane Watson, MI with Pollard and to a little extent CSK with Jadeja and KXIP with Azhar M.   The inverse inference is also applicable as when these all-rounders to not perform, the teams perish with them:  PWI with Yuvraj and Angelo, KKR with Kallis and Yusuf, and DD with Irfan Pathan. In a sense, an all-rounder does not need to excel in both bat and bowl in the same game, but can be a good batter who can bowl, or a good bowler who can bat, and in all the cases, he would be the person counted upon to finish the game.

Some National Team analysis:

     WI Team and individual performances:  After their recent success winning the T20 World cup, their team members seem to be in fine knick in the sub-continent and have played a significant role in each of the IPL teams.  CSK has Bravo an all-rounder and Holder, a budding young fast bowler.   RCB has a dangerous mature opener in Chris Gayle and a good opening wicket taking bowler in Ravi Rampaul (they did not play Chris Barnwell at all). Darren Sammy had been a great all-rounder for SRH. Pune had Marlon Samuels who has to return early in this IPL due to injury. Mumbai has Keiron Pollard, a massive finisher and Dwayne Smith who can also open well in this format, and both are good at the field and can help in bowling.  RR had the leggie Samuel Badree who played only couple of matches, the fast bowler Fidel Edwards who did not play this season and Keron Cooper who seems to be a good death bowler with his medium pace.  KXIP never had a West Indian player in its role this year.  DD had a decent all-rounder in Andre Russell who played early in the season.  And Of course, KKR had the clever spinner in Sunil Narine.  Overall this IPL may have belonged to West Indians as they have taken a lot of credit in each game that has been played and have players who have had live practices in the shorter format of the game. They would be a great force to reckon with in Champions Trophy although the conditions in England would be totally different and I hope they adjust fast and well.  With their long list of all-rounders, they stand to gain a lot under Bravo’s captaincy; he being with Dhoni for 6 years would go a long way in honing his leadership skills. With Gayle and Smith to open, Marlon to come as one-down, Ravi Rampaul and Fidel Edwards to open their attack, Narine to give that spin option , with Sammy and Pollard to finish the innings in the middle , and Keron to do the death overs, this is going to be interesting.

   Looking at the other side of the coin, this has been a bad season for all Sri Lankan players except for T Perera(good all round performance) and S Senanayake (9 wickets from 8 matches) perhaps, and of course the consistent-at-death bowler Malinga.  The flop show list includes Dilshan, Muralitharan, Sangakarra, Jayawardhene, Angelo Mathews, Ajanta Mendis, Janith Perera and Jeevan Mendis.  This is of concern to the Sri Lankan team esp. at the point that Jayawardhene, Sangakarra and Dilshan are just having a few more months or year to retirement, and certainly looking like well beyond their peak in their shorter format performance.

IPL Teams Analysis:

Chennai Super Kings (CSK):  They have won the toss 7 times – 3 at Home (twice batted and one fielded first) and 4 Away (twice each batted and fielded), chose to bat 4 times and field 3 times.  All the 6 full games they won and they lost the last game which was shrunk to 8 overs. So, if they win the toss, it is fair to conclude they would win, except for a rain affect shortened game.    And they have the best AWAY win records (with 62.5% which is a big asset).

  • They never had any 4 wicket haul at all by any bowler, and generally the bowlers were expensive, esp. at the death.  Ashwin although economical, is not the strike bowler he used to be and not fully utilized either by Dhoni.
  • They have the best fielding unit with 11 run outs to their credit.
  • Hussey, Raina and Dhoni were the big scorers here and Vijay is yet to strike any big form.
  • Played: 16; Won: 11; Lost:  5; 
  • Won/Lost  at Home: 6 Won vs. 2 Lost ; Won/Lost  Away: 5 Won vs. 3 Lost ; 
  • Won/Lost  Batting first:  6 Won vs. 1 Lost;  Won/Lost chasing :  5 Won vs. 4 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first at home: 3 Won vs. 0 Lost ; Won/Lost Chasing at home: 3 Won vs. 2 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first away: 3 Won vs. 1 Lost ;  Won/Lost Chasing away: 2 Won vs. 2 Lost  ;
  • Batsmen with most runs(50s/100s): Mike Hussey with 646 runs(5/0), Suresh Raina with 466 runs(3/1),  M S Dhoni with 398 runs(3/0)  and Murali Vijay with 271 runs (2/0) ; 
  • Bowler with most wickets(Average): 25 by Dwayne Bravo(17.84), 17 by Mohit Sharma(15.76) and 15 by R Ashwin(23.4) ; 
  • Most consistent batsman (>=30 runs/innings): 9 – M Hussey , 7 – S Raina, and 6-M S Dhoni  ;
  • Most economical bowler(wickets): 6.23  by Mohit Sharma(17) , 6.62 by R Ashwin(15) & 6.72 by Albie Morkel(4) ;  
  • Most consistent bowler (>=3 wickets/innings): Twice each by M Sharma (3 /10 and 3/21), R Jadeja (3/20 and 3/29) and D Bravo (3/27 and 3/34).  Ashwin is no more a threat he used to be as he has no 3-wicket haul and is not used as strike bowler by
  • Best Fielder – non Wicket-keeper (catches): Dwayne Bravo (12) from 16 matches
  • Surprise find: Mohit Sharma – a medium-pace bowler who made his debut this season both for IPL and T20; 
  • # of times in Semifinals:  6  ;  # of times in finals:  4 ;  # of times IPL champions:  2; 
  • Top players paid the most :   M S Dhoni($3M), R Jadeja($2M), S Raina($1.3M), M Vijay($900K), R Ashwin($850K), S Badrinath($800K),Albie Morkel($500K), Mike Hussey($425K), D Bravo($200K), Faf Du Plessis($120K)
  • Top players paid most in 2013 in Auction: Chris Morris ($625K) and Dirk Nannes($600K)
  • Captain’s performance:  M S Dhoni:  398 runs with 3 Fifties and average 36.18 and 167.22 Strike rate, 13 catches and 2 stumping and a win record of  68.75%
  • Not Worthy Performances by ‘Stars’:  M Vijay has not done much to make a difference(only four scores over 30), Dirk Nannes (4 wickets from 5 matches at 39.5 average and 7.96 economy rate)
  • Fair Play Award Rank for IPL6:  Leaders this year  (Won it three times out of 5 so far overall)
  • Previous results from IPL5 and IPL4:  Runner-up in IPL5 and Winner in IPL4

Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB):  Have won the toss 5 times, chose to bat twice (1 Won and 1 lost) and field 3 times (all 3 won).  It is fair to say that every time they won the toss at home, they chose to field and chose to Bat when they are away. Whenever they win the toss and field, they have won all the games.

  • Their top order has been very consistent this season with Gayle, Kohli and AB firing almost every other game. From the records, it is seen that Gayle is more threatening at home but Kohli and AB are equally good at both home and away.  They do not seem to have any other batsman performing, nor had the reason to bat itself.
  • Bowling has been mediocre at best, although RP Singh took 3-wickets three times, they were all at home ground.
  • Played: 16; Won: 9; Lost:  7;   had two tied games – one lost and one won in Super over.
  • Won/Lost  at Home: 7 Won vs. 1 Lost ; Won/Lost  Away: 2 Won vs. 6 Lost ; 
  • Won/Lost  Batting first: 5 Won vs. 5 Lost ;  Won/Lost chasing : 4 Won vs. 2 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first at home: 3 Won vs. 1 Lost ; Won/Lost Chasing at home: 4 Won vs. 0 Lost  ;
  • Won/Lost batting first away: 2 Won vs. 4 Lost ;  Won/Lost Chasing away:  0 Won vs. 2 Lost ;
  • Batsmen with most runs(50s/100s): Chris Gayle with 708 runs (4/1), Virat Kohli  with 634 runs (6/0), AB De Villiers with 360 runs (2/0); 
  • Bowler with most wickets(Average):  23 by Vinay Kumar(21.43) in 16 matches and 13 by three –   R Rampaul(20.07),  J Unadkat(28.46), RP Singh(25.76) in 10, 13 and 11 matches respectively ; 
  • Most consistent batsman (>=30 runs/innings):   9 by Virat Kohli, 8 by Chris Gayle, 6 by AB De Villiers;
  • Most economical bowler(wickets): 6.92 by Ravi Rampaul(13) ;  
  • Most consistent bowler (>=3 wickets/innings): Both RP Singh (3/13, 3/27, 3/27) and Vinay Kumar (3/18, 3/27, 3/31) have done it three times, although RP has played only 11 matches vs. Vinay’s 16.  Unadkat has one 5/25 to his name and Zaheer a 4/17 in the last game with CSK.   RP Singh got all his three wickets hauls playing at Home.
  • Best Fielder – non Wicket-keeper (catches):   Vinay Kumar with 8 and Virat Kohli with 7 catches from 16 matches, AB DE Villiers has 8 catches(but he may have been  a WK in couple)
  • Surprise find:  Moises Henriques is worth a mention for his utility all-round performance; Unadkat can be groomed to be a good bowler- has potential.
  • # of times in Semifinals:   3 ;  # of times in finals:  2 ;  # of times IPL champions: 0 ; 
  • Top players paid the most :   Chris Gayle($2M), Virat Kohli($1.8M), S Tiwary($1.6M), AB De Villiers($1.1M), Vinay Kumar($1M), Zaheer Khan($900K), C Pujara($700K), T Dilshan($650K), D Vettori($550K), A Mithun($360K), M Muralidharan($220K), Andrew MacDonald($100K)
  • Top players paid most in 2013 in Auction: Jaydev Unadkat($525K), RP Singh($400K), Moises Henriques($300K), Ravi Rampaul($290K)
  • Captain’s performance: Virat Kohli with a win record of 56.25% and the 2nd top scorer for RCB with 634 runs that includes 6 Fifties with an average of 45.28 and strike rate of 138.73 and has taken 7 catches. His 634 runs are the most by any captain in any IPL.
  • Not Worthy Performances by ‘Stars’: Saurabh Tiwary (109 from 9 matches at an average of 27.25), Zaheer Khan out due to injury for most of the matches, Muralitharan not being that effective anymore, Dilshan had not much to write about with his bat, and Vettori was never played.
  • Fair Play Award points:  Ranked 4th out of 9 this year
  • Previous results from IPL5 and IPL4: Finished 5th in IPL5 &  Runner-up in IPL4

Sun Risers Hyderabad (SRH): They have won the toss 6 times- chose to bat 5 times(4 times away and 1 time at home) and field once(that too at home).  They won only once (that too at home) and lost 5 times.  When they are away and win the toss, they choose to bat – again, may not be reading the conditions well and hence want to put a tall score and allow the home team to chase it.

  • Whenever Parthiv and Dhawan fared well as an opening pair, they have had good success.
  • Glad to see lots of local Andhra talent being utilized by the franchisee to give them an arena to perform – H Vihari was a revelation, thanks to the opportunities although he needs to improve significantly on his strike rate.
  • Perera as an all-rounder made it count with his batting at the finish, along with the big hitting and was very decent with the ball as well.
  • Although their bowling unit can be rated well with the likes of Steyn, Mishra and Ishant, not much damage seen in terms of high number of wicket hauls by them. Many an occasion though they have managed to restrict their opponents to lower scores.
  • Played: 16; Won: 10(Includes one Tie game with RCB that they won in Super over); Lost: 6; 
  • Won/Lost  at Home:7 Won vs. 1 Lost  ; Won/Lost  Away: 3 Won vs. 5 Lost ; 
  • Won/Lost  Batting first: 4 Won vs. 4 Lost ;  Won/Lost chasing : 6 Won vs. 2 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first at home: 2 Won vs. 0 Lost ; Won/Lost Chasing at home:  5 Won vs. 1 Lost;
  • Won/Lost batting first away: 2 Won vs. 4 Lost ;  Won/Lost Chasing away: 1 Won vs. 1 Lost  ;
  • Batsmen with most runs(50s/100s): Parthiv Patel with 293 runs (1/0), S Dhawan with 278 runs(3/0) and Hanuma Vihari with 240 runs (0/0) ; 
  • Bowler with most wickets(Average): 20 by Amit Mishra(18.9), 19 by T Perera(24.42), 18 by Dale Steyn(20.05) and 14 by Ishant Sharma(31.07)  ; 
  • Most consistent batsman (>=30 runs/innings): 4 times by both T Perera  and S Dhawan, and 3 times by Parthiv, C White and H Vihari ;
  • Most economical bowler(wickets): 5.65 by Dale Steyn(18) ;  
  • Most consistent bowler (>=3 wickets/innings): 3 times by Amit Mishra (4/19, 3/19, 3/26), 2 times by Perera (3/20, 3/45) and Darren Sammy had taken a 4/22 once.
  • Best Fielder – non Wicket-keeper (catches): CameronWhite with 10 catches and Ashish Reddy with 7 catches, both from 12 games
  • Surprise find:  Hanuma Vihari; 
  • # of times in Semifinals:  3  ;  # of times in finals:  1 ;  # of times IPL champions: 1(as Deccan Chargers) ; 
  • Top players paid the most :   Dale Steyn($1.2M),  C White($1.1M), K Sangakkara($700K), Parthiv Patel($600K), Ishant Sharma($450K), JP Duminy($300K)-did not play this season, S Dhawan($300K), Amit Mishra($300K),
  • Top players paid most in 2013 in Auction:  Thisara Perera($675K), Darren Sammy($425K)
  • Captain’s performance: K Sangakkara with no scores over 30 and with 55.55% wins in 9 games (5 Won and 4 Lost) – at home, won 4 and lost 1 & away, won 1 and lost 3, Cameron White had only one fifty score and an average of 16.18 but had a 71.43% win record having won 5 and lost 2 off the 7 games he captained – won all three home games, and won and lost 2 games each away from Hyderabad.
  • Not Worthy Performances by ‘Stars’: Cameron White – 178 runs with only 1 fifty at an average of 16.18, Kumar Sangakkara-120 runs with his highest score of 28 and an average of 13.33
  • Fair Play Award points: Ranked 7th this year
  • Previous results from IPL5 and IPL4 (as Deccan Chargers): Finished 8th in IPL5 (out of 9) and 7th in IPL4 (out of 10)

Pune Warriors India (PWI): Has always been the worst or second worst in three years of its IPL.  They won the toss 9 times- chose to bat 5 times and field 4 time. They won the toss 4 times at home (3 times batted and once fielded) and 5 times away (2 times batted and 3 times fielded).  They pretty much lost all their matches except one (away when they beat CSK) – with three captains this season, this would have been a confusing thing in terms of answerability and getting support from the team members. Whenever they field after winning the toss, they have lost – shows a lot about reading the conditions badly and the opponents badly, and not able to bowl and restrict to be able to chase with their modest batting. 

  • Their flop was due to the fact that only 9 times a batsman has hit 30 runs and above this season, and only 3 times a bowler has taken a 3 wicket haul. They had three captains and their regular captain Clarke withdrew before the tournament!
  • Except for Bhuvneshwar Kumar, their bowling was below par. 
  • Other than Aaron Finch, no other batsmen seem to be consistent and wanted to get a big score or stick around – I did not see a fire-in-the-belly approach anytime.
  • Something has to be done to this franchise they seem to be the bottom team for the past three years. 
  • Played: 16; Won: 4; Lost: 12; 
  • Won/Lost  at Home: 2 Won vs. 6 Lost ; Won/Lost  Away:  2 Won vs. 6 Lost ; 
  • Won/Lost  Batting first: 3 Won vs. 4 Lost ;  Won/Lost chasing : 1 Won vs. 8 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first at home: 1 Won vs. 2 Lost ; Won/Lost Chasing at home: 1 Won vs. 4 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first away: 2 Won vs. 2 Lost ;  Won/Lost Chasing away: 0 Won vs. 4 Lost  ;
  • Batsmen with most runs(50s/100s):  456 runs by Aaron Finch(4/0), 434 runs by Robin Uthappa(2/0) and 238 runs by Yuvraj Singh(0/0); 
  • Bowler with most wickets(Average): 16 wickets by Ashok Dinda(29.06) and 13 wickets by Bhuvneshwar Kumar(28.53) ; 
  • Most consistent batsman (>=30 runs/innings):  7 times by Aaron Finch, 6 by Robin Uthappa and 4 by Yuvraj;
  • Most economical bowler(wickets): 6.50 by Bhuvneshwar Kumar(13) ;  
  • Most consistent bowler (>=3 wickets/innings): Twice by Bhuvneshwar Kumar (3/18,3/25) and 1 time each by Ashok Dinda(3/31) , Angelo Mathews(3./14), W Parnell(3/27) and Ali Murtaza(3/15)
  • Best Fielder – non Wicket-keeper (catches): 7 by Mitchell Marsh from 9 games and 6 by Manish Pandey from 7 games
  • Surprise find:  Bhuvneshwar Kumar($60K) and Aaron Finch, for a guy who was NOT sold in the auction initially, he has turned out to be the highest run scorer to prove his stake and managed to captain the star-less team; 
  • # of times in Semifinals:   0 ;  # of times in finals:  0 ;  # of times IPL champions: 0 ; 
  • Top players paid the most :   Robin Uthappa($2.1M), Yuvraj Singh($1.8M), Ross Taylor, Angelo Mathews($950K), Ashok Dinda($500K), Marlon Samuels($400K)- 2 matches and 8 runs, Luke Wright($200K), Wayne Parnell($160K)
  • Top players paid most in 2013 in Auction: Ajantha Mendis($725K)-2 wickets from 3 matches, Kane Richardson($700K)- 2 wickets from 3 matches, Abhisek Nayar($675K) – 2 wickets, hit 66 runs from 11 matches, Michael Clarke($400K), Ross Taylor – 63 runs in 5 matches at an average of 12.6
  • Captain’s performance: A Mathews – captained 5 with a win record of 20% – won 1(at home) and lost 4 (2 at home and 2 away), Aaron Finch – captained 10 times (5 each at home and away) with a win record of 20% – won 1 and lost 4 each at home and away,  Ross Taylor – captained one and won it against CSK at Chennai (100%)
  • Not Worthy Performances by ‘Stars’:  Yuvraj Singh(238 runs with No fifties and just 4 scores of 30 and above. and 19.83 average and only 6 wickets), Angelo Mathews(172 runs with No fifties and 3 scores of 30 and above, and 24.57 average and just 5 wickets), Abhishek Nayar(66 runs with 11 average and 2 wickets from 11 matches), Rahul Sharma(9 wickets from 11 matches at 31.22 average), Ross Taylor(63 runs from 5 matches at an average of 12.6) and Robin Uthappa(only 2 scores of 50 and above).
  • Fair Play Award points:  3rd  best this season
  • Previous results from IPL5 and IPL4: Finished last in IPL5 and Finished 9th in IPL4(out of 10)

Mumbai Indians (MI): Won all Home league games, same as RR.  Like RR and KKR, they have been lucky at the toss having won 11 times and choosing to bat almost all the time except for twice (in away games -in their first and last league matches).  6 times they have won the toss at home and 5 times away. Once Rohit wins the toss, it is fair to say he elects to bat mostly.  Mumbai did have a strong batting line up that was in form and batting first gives them the liberty to post good scores, so that their  bowlers can defend them – with the likes of Malinga at the death and M Johnson taking wickets in the beginning, it is not surprising their  overall results have been great. They are knocking very close for the past three years, having been in the semi-finals all the three times and once in the finals, and may be this is the year for them to get crowned.

  •  All their players have struck well and hence there were other good players who did not get too much of a chance to play – they had a problem of plenty which is a good problem to have. 
  • Overall their bowling is just Ok with some big names in it – but the resurgence of Johnson taking wickets early and Malinga being his best at the death with his Yorkers seem to be doing a lot of good.
  • Played: 16; Won: 11; Lost:  5; 
  • Won/Lost  at Home: 8 Won vs. 0 Lost ; Won/Lost  Away: 3 Won vs. 5 Lost ; 
  • Won/Lost  Batting first: 8 Won vs. 2 Lost ;  Won/Lost chasing : 3 Won vs. 3 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first at home: 7 Won vs. 0 Lost ; Won/Lost Chasing at home: 1 Won vs. 0 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first away:1 Won vs. 2 Lost  ;  Won/Lost Chasing away: 2 Won vs. 3 Lost  ;
  • Batsmen with most runs(50s/100s):  526 by Rohit Sharma(4/0), 456 by Dinesh Karthik(2/0) and 325 by K Pollard(2/0) ; 
  • Bowler with most wickets(Average): 22 by M Johnson(17.13), 19 by Harbhajan Singh (20.68) and 17 by L Malinga(21.05) ; 
  • Most consistent batsman (>=30 runs/innings):  8 by Dinesh Karthik, 7 by Rohit Sharma, 5 by Dwayne Smith and then 4 times each by Pollard and Tendulkar
  • Most economical bowler(wickets):  6.66 by Harbhajan Singh(19) and 6.71 by L Malinga(17) ;  
  • Most consistent bowler (>=3 wickets/innings): 2 times by Harbhajan Singh(3/14,3/27)
  • Best Fielder – non Wicket-keeper (catches):   Pollard with 11 catches from 15 games, and Rayudu took 8 catches from 16 games
  • Surprise find:  None in particular but M Johnson was a revelation in bowling by taking early wickets ; 
  • # of times in Semifinals:   4 ;  # of times in finals:  1 ;  # of times IPL champions: 0 ; 
  • Top players paid the most :  Rohit Sharma($2M), S Tendulkar($1.8M),  Harbhajan Singh($1.3M), Dinesh Karthik($1.2M), Lasith Malinga($1.1M), K Pollard($900K), P Ojha($800K),Munaf Patel($700K), Mitchell Johnson($300K), James Franklin($100K)
  • Top players paid most in 2013 in Auction:  Glenn Maxwell($1M)-played in the last 3 league games only(36 runs at 18 average and took no wicket), Nathan Coulter-Nile($450K) – played only the last league game(hit 9 runs and took 1 Wicket), Ricky Ponting($400K)
  • Captain’s performance:  Ricky Ponting (52 runs from 6 matches with 10.4 average  and 50% captaincy win percentage out of 6 matches) and Rohit Sharma (296 from 10 matches at 42.28 average and 1 Fifty, and 80% captaincy Win percentage in 10 matches).  As a non captain, Rohit had a better record having aggregated 230 runs in 6 matches with three scores of over fifty – does feel that captaincy is taking a toll on his batting!.
  • Not Worthy Performances by ‘Stars’: Munaf Patel(played 3 matches and took 3 wickets), S Tendulkar(287 from 14 matches at 22.07 average and only 1 Fifty), Ricky Ponting(52 runs from 6 matches at an average of 10.4)
  • Fair Play Award points: Ranked 6th out of 9 this year
  • Previous results from IPL5 and IPL4: Semi-Finalists in both IPL5 and IPL4

Rajasthan Royals (RR):  Won all Home leagues games, same as MI.  Seems to be lucky at the toss, having won 10 times and chose to field(3 times at home and 2 times away) and bat(once at home and 4 times away) 5 times each. They have won 6 times (4 times fielding and 2 times batting) and lost 4 times (once fielding and 4 times batting). It is fair to say that if they win the toss, and chose to field they have a higher probability of a win and if they chose to bat, they have a higher probability of a loss. And they have won all their matches at home when they have won their toss which makes me believe they understand the Jaipur ground condition well.

  • Stuart Binny as a great utility all-rounder was a good thing for RR and he seems to be a decent finisher they needed with 4 not-outs scores of >30 to his credit.
  • The 18 year old Sanju Samson is another revelation who has a decent technique and nice aggression to back it. Hope he learns from the Dravids, Watsons and Hodges to make it big soon.
  • Faulkner has been their main bowler and the only bowler with two 5-wicket hauls.  K Cooper has been slightly consistent as well with some 3-wicket hauls.
  • Their entire team is built around Shane Watson who alone can take any game away.
  • Rahane, after being dropped from being selected for the Champions Trophy, made it a point for making his bat speak for him with some consistent 50+ scores.   But again, like Rohit Sharma, he has been given a lot of chances in the big stage but he had not made it count at all.
  • Played: 16; Won: 10; Lost:  6; 
  • Won/Lost  at Home: 8 Won vs. 0 Lost ; Won/Lost  Away: 2 Won vs. 6 Lost ; 
  • Won/Lost  Batting first: 3 Won vs. 4 Lost ;  Won/Lost chasing : 7 Won vs. 2 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first at home: 2 Won vs. 0 Lost ; Won/Lost Chasing at home: 6 Won vs. 0 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first away: 1 Won vs. 4 Lost ;  Won/Lost Chasing away: 1 Won vs. 2 Lost  ;
  • Batsmen with most runs(50s/100s): 513 runs by Shane Watson(2/1), 449 by A Rahane(4/0) and 416 by Rahul Dravid(4/0) ; 
  • Bowler with most wickets(Average):  26 by James Faulkner(13.96), 17 by Kevon Cooper(22.35) ; 
  • Most consistent batsman (>=30 runs/innings): 8 times by Shane Watson, 7 times by A Rahane and 6 by both Rahul Dravid and Stuart Binny ;
  • Most economical bowler (wickets): 6.58 by J Faulkner (26), 6.66 by Shane Watson (11);   Sorry discounting Chandila who had 6.24 from 8 matches!
  • Most consistent bowler (>=3 wickets/innings):4 times by J Faulkner(5/16,5/20,3/16,3/20), and 3 times by Kevon Cooper(3/15,3/23,3/30)
  • Best Fielder – non Wicket-keeper (catches): 9 by A Rahane in 16 games, and 6 each by Shane Watson and Brad Hodge in 14 and 15 games respectively
  • Surprise find: James Faulkner as a good strike bowler and Stuart Binny as a good utility all-rounder ; 
  • # of times in Semifinals:  2  ;  # of times in finals:  1 ;  # of times IPL champions: 1 ; 
  • Top players paid the most :  Shane Watson($1.3M), Rahul Dravid($500K), Brad Hodge($475K), Sreesanth($400K), Shaun Tait($300K)- 1 wicket in 3 matches, Owais Shah($200K) – 24 runs from 2 matches, Brad Hogg($180K)-went wicket less in the only match he played
  • Top players paid most in 2013 in Auction: James Faulkner($400K), Fidel Edwards($210K)
  • Captain’s performance: Rahul Dravid  with 62.5% winning percentage, 416 runs with 4 fifties at an average of 29.71 and 110.05 strike rate, and 3 catches
  • Not Worthy Performances by ‘Stars’: Sreesanth, Chandila
  • Special mention:  Ajinkya Rahane($60K), and Kevon Cooper($50K)
  • Fair Play Award points:  2nd best this season
  • Previous results from IPL5 and IPL4: Finished 7th in IPL5 (out of 9) and 6th in IPL4(out of 10)

Kings Eleven Punjab (KXIP): They won their toss 7 times(3 times at home and 4 times away) – chose to field 5 times(3 times at home and 2 times away) and bat 2 times(both away).  They won 4 times (always chasing) and lost 3 times (twice batting and once fielding). If they choose to bat after winning the toss, it is always away which makes me feel that they have not understood the ground well and want to get a big score to de-risk their play.

  • Sorry, Adam Gilchrist is not the threat he used to be. Fully understanding this, a great player like him also hung his shoes at the end. He did have some good scores towards the last few games but the way he made it was not Gilly style.
  • No Great starts in this team, but seems like Shaun Marsh has silently been performing well, and David Miller has stuck big as a great finisher for them.
  • There is a lot of talent available to be groomed here – Mandeep, Manan, Gurkeerat and Sandeep, and I hope they stay the course and make it in due course to the big leagues.
  • Played: 16; Won: 8; Lost: 8; 
  • Won/Lost  at Home(Includes Dharamsala):  5 Won vs. 3 Lost; Won/Lost  Away:  3 Won vs. 5 Lost ; 
  • Won/Lost  Batting first: 2 Won vs. 5 Lost ;  Won/Lost chasing : 6 Won vs. 3 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first at home: 2 Won vs. 2 Lost ; Won/Lost Chasing at home:3 Won vs. 1 Lost  ;
  • Won/Lost batting first away: 0 Won vs. 3 Lost ;  Won/Lost Chasing away:  3 Won vs. 2 Lost ;
  • Batsmen with most runs(50s/100s): 418 runs by David Miller(3/1), 300 runs by Shaun Marsh(3/0) ; 
  • Bowler with most wickets(Average): 15 wickets by both Azhar Mahmood(22.00) and Parvinder Awana(27.46) ; 
  • Most consistent batsman (>=30 runs/innings):  6 times by David Miller and 4 times by Shaun Marsh ;
  • Most economical bowler(wickets): 6.62 by Praveen Kumar(12) ;  
  • Most consistent bowler (>=3 wickets/innings): 2 times by Sandeep Sharma(3/21,3/23) and Azhar Mahmood(3/21,3/35)
  • Best Fielder – non Wicket-keeper (catches): 8 catches by Miller in 12 matches and 6 catches by Mandeep in 16 matches
  • Surprise find: Sandeep Sharma – a medium pacer who took 8 wickets from 4 matches includes two 3 wicket hauls, Mandeep Singh with 3 scores of 30 and above and total runs of 260 with a strike rate of 116.59 ; 
  • # of times in Semifinals:   1 ;  # of times in finals: 0  ;  # of times IPL champions: 0 ; 
  • Top players paid the most :   David Hussey($1.4M), Adam Gilchrist($900K), Piyush Chawla($900K), Praveen Kumar($800K), Shaun Marsh($400K), Ryan Harris($325K), Azhar Mahmood($200K),David Miller($100K), D Mascarenhas($100K)
  • Top players paid most in 2013 in Auction: Manpreet Gony($500K), Luke Pomersback($300K)
  • Captain’s performance: Adam Gilchrist- captained 13 matches(7 at home and 6 away), won 7(4 at home and 3 away) and lost 6(3 each at home and away) – 53.84% win record, D Hussey – captained 3 matches – won 1 at home and lost 2 away from home(33% win record)
  • Not Worthy Performances by ‘Stars’: David Hussey(235 runs from 12 matches and 0 wickets at an economy rate of 8.27) , Adam Gilchrist294 runs from 13 matches but not hitting the ball well and is not a threat anymore), M Gony(7 wickets from 8 matches with economy rate of 9.14 and average of 36.57), Ryan Harris(1 wicket from 3 matches), Piyush Chawla with no 3 wicket haul at all and an average of 38, Praveen Kumar with no 3-wicket haul and an average of 31.08
  • Fair Play Award points:  Ranked 5th out of 9 this year
  • Previous results from IPL5 and IPL4: Finished 6th in IPL5 (out of 9) and 5th in IPL4 (out of 10)

Delhi Daredevils (DD): Lost all away matches so far.  Also when they win the toss, they lose the match and thankfully, they have not been too lucky with the toss. They won 5 tosses, chose 3 times to Bat (2 away and 1 Home) and 2 times to Field (1 each at home and away).

  •  Delhi lost all their away matches, and except for one 4 wicket haul by Umesh, none of bowlers in the entire 16 games even took a 3 wicket haul any day which is a disgrace for a team that had M Morkel, Yadav, Irfan Pathan and Ashish Nehra.
  • They need two more good batsmen to support David Warner henceforth, and some re-jigs in their bowling department which has a lot of old Indian bowlers like Ashish and Ajit who are well beyond their peak.
  • Played: 15; Won: 3; Lost: 13(includes one Tied match they lost during Super over vs. RCB); 
  • Won/Lost  at Home(includes Raipur): 3 Won vs. 5 Lost ; Won/Lost  Away: 0 Won vs. 8 Lost ; 
  • Won/Lost  Batting first: 1 Won vs. 6 Lost ;  Won/Lost chasing : 2 Won vs. 7 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first at home: 1 Won vs. 2 Lost ; Won/Lost Chasing at home: 2 Won vs. 3 Lost  ;
  • Won/Lost batting first away: 0 Won vs. 4 Lost ;  Won/Lost Chasing away: 0 Won vs. 4 Lost  ;
  • Batsmen with most runs(50s/100s): 410 runs by David Warner(4/0), 331 by M Jayawardhene(2/0) ; 
  • Bowler with most wickets(Average): 16 by Umesh Yadav(31.75), 11 by Ashish Nehra(28.72) and 10 by Irfan Pathan(38.2) ; 
  • Most consistent batsman (>=30 runs/innings): 6 by David Warner, 4 by M Jayawardhene and 3 by Ben Rohrer ;
  • Most economical bowler(wickets): 5.88 by Shahbaz Nadeem(9) ;  
  • Most consistent bowler (>=3 wickets/innings): 1 by Umesh Yadav(4/24) – no other bowler even took 3-wickets ever.
  • Best Fielder – non Wicket-keeper (catches):  6 by David Warner(16 matches) and 5 each by Johan Botha(6 matches), S Nadeem(12 matches), V Sehwag(13 matches) and Umesh Yadav(16 matches)
  • Surprise find: Siddarth Kaul shows good promise(4 wickets from 6 matches) , Nadeem seems to be economical and a great fielder, and Ben Rohrer(193 from 8 matches with 1 Fifty and 3 scores above 30 and strike rate of 137.85  and took 3 catches); 
  • # of times in Semifinals:   3 ;  # of times in finals:  0 ;  # of times IPL champions: 0 ; 
  • Top players paid the most :   Irfan Pathan($1.9M), V Sehwag($1.8M), M Jayawardene($1.4M), Kevin Peitersen($1M)-did not play due to injury, David Warner($750K), Umesh Yadav($750K), Venugopal Rao($700K)-played one match, Morne Morkel($475K), Andree Russell($450K), Naman Ojha($270K), Ajit Agarkar($210K)
  • Top players paid most in 2013 in Auction:  Johan Botha($450K), Jesse Ryder($260K)
  • Captain’s performance:  M. Jayawardhene – captained 14 matches, won 3(all at home) and lost 11, David Warner- captained 2 matches, most both (one at home and one away)
  • Not Worthy Performances by ‘Stars’: Irfan Pathan-142 runs at an average of 17.75 with no score over thirty  and 10 wickets at an average of 38.2, Virendra Sehwag-295 runs at an average of 24.58 with his two highest scores being 95 no and 30, Mahela Jayawardhene-331 runs at an average of 22.06, M Morkel with 7 wickets from 10 matches at an average of 47.85, Umesh Yadav with only one 4 wicket haul and expensive at 8.78 runs/over.
  • Fair Play Award points:  Ranked 8th out of 9th this year
  • Previous results from IPL5 and IPL4: Semi-Finalists in IPL5 and finished last in IPL4

Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR): They have not won any games chasing away from home this season.  They seem to be the luckiest in terms of toss, having won 12 times – chose to bat and field 6 times each. They won the toss 6 times at home(batted and fielded 3 times each)  and 6 times away(chose to bat 3 times and field 3 times).  They won the match 4 times(3 at home and 1 away) and lost 8 times(3 at home and 5 away).  It is fair to say that the toss does not give them an advantage as they seem to be poor in deciding what to do in getting a favorable result for them.  

  • None of the batsmen who played more than 5 matches had an average of >30 which is deplorable.   Kallis seems to be beyond his peak when it comes to strike rates, and Yusuf batted when it did not matter anymore (KKR was already close to be being out of the tournament).   Eoin Morgan  having had a decent batting average must hone his skills better to be a finisher for KKR.
  • The same goes with bowling – Narine needs 1-2 more good consistent, economical and wicket taking bowlers
  • Their main owner who was all over the TV in the past five years was hardly to be seen – is there an issue here?
  • Played: 16; Won: 6; Lost: 10 ; 
  • Won/Lost  at Home(includes Ranchi): 5 Won vs. 3 Lost ; Won/Lost  Away: 1 Won vs. 7 Lost ; 
  • Won/Lost  Batting first: 2 Won vs. 5 Lost ;  Won/Lost chasing : 4 Won vs. 5 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first at home: 1 Won vs. 2 Lost ; Won/Lost Chasing at home: 4 Won vs. 1 Lost ;
  • Won/Lost batting first away: 1 Won vs. 3 Lost ;  Won/Lost Chasing away: 0 Won vs. 4 Lost  ;
  • Batsmen with most runs(50s/100s):  406 runs by G Gambhir(4/0), 332 runs by Yusuf Pathan(1/0) , 311 runs by J Kallis(0/0) and 307 runs by Eoin Morgan(1/0),; 
  • Bowler with most wickets(Average): 22 wickets by Sunil Narine(15.9) and 16 wickets by Jacques Kallis(24.62) ; 
  • Most consistent batsman (>=30 runs/innings): 6 times by Eoin Morgan and 5 times each by G Gambhir and J Kallis ;
  • Most economical bowler(wickets): 5.46 by Sunil Narine(22) ;  
  • Most consistent bowler (>=3 wickets/innings): 3 times by Sunil Narine(4/13,4/22,3/17) – all at home,  and 2 times by J Kallis(3/13,3/24)
  • Best Fielder – non Wicket-keeper (catches):  Manoj Tiwary – 10 catches from 10 matches and 6 catches from 16 matches by Narine.
  • Surprise find:  NONE; 
  • # of times in Semifinals:  2  ;  # of times in finals:  1 ;  # of times IPL champions: 1 ; 
  • Top players paid the most :   G Gambhir($2.4M), Yusuf Pathan($2.1M), Jacques Kallis($1.1M), B McCullum($900K), Sunil Narine($700K), Shakib Al Hasan($625K),  L Balaji($500K), Manoj Tiwary($475K), Brett Lee($400K), Eoin Morgan($350K), Brad Haddin($325K), Ryan Ten Doeschate($150K), James Pattinson($100K)
  • Top players paid most in 2013 in Auction: Sachitra Senenayake($625K)
  • Captain’s performance: G Gambhir – 406 runs with an average of 25.37 and strike rate of 118.36 with 4 fifties and with just 37.5% winning rate
  • Not Worthy Performances by ‘Stars’: Yusuf Pathan-332 runs with an average of 25.72, Brendon McCullum-played only one game, Manoj Tiwary-146 runs with an average of 18.25 with no fifty and a strike rate of 104.28 and a highest score of 33, Brett Lee – 4 wickets from 3 matches.
  • Fair Play Award points:  Ranked last this year
  • Previous results from IPL5 and IPL4: Winners of IPL5 and semi-finalists in IPL4

All data collected after all the 72 matches of the league stages were done with.

For all bowling, fielding and batting statistics, the player must have played a minimum of 5 games in IPL6.

Most statistics referenced from espncricinfo.com  and the official website iplt20.com.

     From the revenue figures listed in the Aril02 issue of Live Mint, looks like only Rajasthan Royal have been able to make a profit for the past couple of years, and KKR and Pune Warriors say they are profitable this past year.  RCB seems to have incurred the heaviest loss in 2011-12 whereas the other three franchisees (KXIP, DD, MI) are showing their losses are narrowing down already .  SRH predicts after this year’s loss, they hope to be profitable next year.  CSK revenue figures are not obvious as they seem to operate within their parent company that owns them.  Overall, there is no consistent data available to show the revenue numbers or the profile/loss statement for any of the franchisees online which , in my opinion, must be available in a very transparent manner to all.

Disclaimer:  Although best attempt has been made in ensuring the names and the details behind the statistics are correct, any error needs to be pardoned as I believe they may be only a few and does not distort the message being conveyed.

Teams of IPL9 (Apr/May 2016) – observations and analysis

This is a compiled list of the most significant players given below (not all the players) in each of the eight teams that is playing in the ninth chapter of IPL.  The first thing that strikes out after having seen 11 matches (till RCB vs DD) has been the absence of Chennai super Kings and Rajasthan Royals, two of the premium franchisees of the first eight IPLs.

Observations:

  • Going by the number of empty seats in almost all grounds thus far, looks like some of the interest is fading.  It is also worthwhile to note that the high prices of certain tickets is keeping spectators away from the stadium, added to all the negative publicity that IPL had got over the past year .
  • Most of the matches so far has been  one sided without a close finish which makes me feel that either  the players are warming up or their team chemistry is not in place yet.
  • Most of the teams seem to be lacking batting depth with no quality all-rounders filling in the middle-overs spots, and most of the teams do seem to have only two or three good bowlers.
  • Every team seems to also have holes in their fielding which does not bode well while  defending smaller totals, and slower runners between wickets which may be a disaster if you are chasing huge totals.
  • Gujarat Lions with three wins thus far is roaring, thanks to it inheriting the best all-rounders (Jadeja, Raina, and Bravo) of this format and the better fielders of the now defunct CSK team.  With Brendon and Aaron Finch and supported by Dwayne Smith as a backup, they seem to be having the best hard-hitting opening pair of IPL9.  Bravo and Faulkner also make the best death bowling pair in the tournament, with their effective slower balls.
  • Pune Supergiants given that this is captained by MSD who likes tried and tested players and would not like to change the team that much, would not be able to exploit their deep pipeline of players.   Their star find may be Murugan Ashwin and with two Ashwins for spin, they look set for some quality eight overs. But MSD who believes that fielding does win matches has to throw this thought in the back-burner as he has a lot of less agile legs and slow pick-up-and-throwers in his team – R Ashwin, Ishant Sharma, RP Singh, Irfan Pathan, Ishwar Pandey,  Ashok Dinda and Rajat Bhatia, which would make him concede about 10 runs more every game.  His best fielders are all his foreign players and Rahane, and those are the five he should use at the right fielding positions.   He has been a lucky charm to all the teams he has led so far in the limited overs format.
  • Kolkata Knight Riders seem to be a stable team and most of them have been together for a few years and looking like the team to beat in this episode of IPL. Andre Russell would be the only foreign player to play in all matches and the other three spots seem to be open for rotation depending on the ground conditions, although I expect Shakib to play in most of the games as a genuine all-rounder and Narine as their main spinner. Gambhir’s batting forte is his Indian players and this is unique amongst all the teams that is playing, and with Gambhir in top form in the initial games, thus making a statement to BCCI that he is ready to replace S Dhawan, this IPL9 may give him back his Indian Jersey in all formats for the next 1-2 years.  Anyway India is playing mostly tests and mostly at home!  KKR support seems to be most loved this season as even the Eden Gardens gets filled for their games, despite some stands in other stadiums giving a barren look.
  • Kings XI Punjab after having been to the finals couple of years ago, have been in the doldrums since and they seem to be a Miller and Maxwell show. Sandeep Sharma has been showing good potential for a while but they do not seem to have a cohesive batting or a bowling story and they seem to be short in both departments.  Their batting can be aided by Shawn Marsh and their bowling can be strengthened by Mitchell Johnson and Mohit Sharma, and their opening batting pair of Vijay and Vora needs to be more consistent.
  • Mumbai Indians again has this purely talented but inconsistent Rohit as the captain and their opener and with no Malinga, they need to depend on the rising star Bumrah to do the opening spell and death bowling damages. With only Bhajji being their star spinner, they seem to lack strength in their Indian bowling department with only Vinay having some international exposure.  They cannot afford to rest Guptill and Anderson at all which they seem to be doing for the first few games.   The Pandya brothers, with so much hype on Hardik, seem to be a joke at best – I still cannot believe how he made it to the Indian team.  Using either Parthiv or Buttler in the playing eleven, both being wicket-keepers are very tricky for them.  Given the present form, they need to have Buttler in the team and definitely Guptill or Simmons, because they need the other two spots for a foreign bowler or an all-rounder – the choice is being between Southee, McCleneghan or Anderson.
  • RCB time and again have always depended on their top three for all their runs, and whenever Gayle hits, they do not have issues.  Even with AB and Kohli firing in the last match, Delhi was able to maul them in their home ground which is famous for even 200 plus scores being chased at ease. After their top 3, which seems to be the same design flaw in this IPL edition with many teams, they seem to be lacking good batters who can hit or finish. But they have certainly strengthened that middle over with Shane Watson which was the spot that Yuvraj was tried for in the previous year. Shane Watson brings them a good all-rounder and if Mitchel Starc is back after his wedding, their pace bowling department looks decent but they do not seem to have any quality Indian bowlers to fill in their other 12 overs. They cannot choose from their good arsenal of foreign bowlers either due to their four limit, but it is good to have Milne, Badree, Weise and Richardson as their replacement for Starc and rotate them around. 
  • Delhi Daredevils is the only team captained by a bowler who ideally bats at 11! They would be batting centered on De Kock and bowling centered around Zaheer and Mishra for their season.  With Zaheer beyond his peak and giving away 50 runs against RCB, this does not tell a good story.  Having the need to play De Kock, they seem to be playing Sanju Samson as a non-wicketkeeper and placing him the outfield is a mistake as he does not seem to have a good arm – throws the ball back like Amla.  They would be playing Carlos Braithwaite and Chris Morris as all-rounder options pretty much throughout, and they need to play JP Duminy in every match as well.  I cannot understand how they can get Imran Tahir to play at all, but they can play Coutere Nile if Braithwaite is not able to. Shreyas Iyer, a star in domestic cricket last season, has started off as a flop and it is time that Mayank Agarwal replaces him.
  • Sunrisers Hyderabad again is a team centered around David Warner – if he fires, any score is reachable. Unfortunately with Yuvraj, Ashish and Kane Williamson all injured presently, they are counting on them to come back to the team soon to raise its level of play – so expect some good matches in the latter half of their rounds. Without these three, this team looks despicable and Shikar Dhawan is adding to their misery.   Henriques is forced to come at three whereas he can do more damage coming in later after Morgan- these two can be their finishers, but unfortunately once Kane is back, only one of them can play.   Rahman and Bhuvie can be their bowling spearhead and Boult can come in anytime to replace Rahman.

Analysis:

  • Gujarat Lions – Having got some of the best fielders, which was one of the key arsenals of CSK, and with their good death bowling pairs, they are a team to reckon with and in my opinion, would make it to the final four, given that they have won three in a row so far. Their foreign players may not change much – Finch, McCullum, Bravo and Faulkner being their four, and if need be, will bring in Smith as an opener somedays and Steyn for Faulkner on other days. They seem to be short of one good Indian bowler with Jaddu, Bravo, Faulkner and Praveen Kumar or Dhawal making the four options.  That fifth spot would be taken up on rotation by a spinner and this could be the target four overs for the opponents to capitalize. Raina has to come to form, and Dinesh Karthik having been ‘undervalued’ this time around, after enjoying two years of surprising glory, needs to bat well.  If other team gets their top three batsmen early, they will not be able to get adequate runs on the board which is something that the opponents would try to exploit and vice versa, if their top three fires, then they are on a way to a 180 plus score which they can defend in most grounds. The good thing they seem to have done is they have used most of their bench players in their first three games on rotation which is good as they would not stay rusted for a long time.
  • Pune Rising Supergiants again will play three of their four foreign players in every match as batters– Faf du Plessis, Steve Smith and Pieterson. The fourth spot of the foreign all-rounder can be either Mitchell Marsh, Albie Morkel or Perera.  Chances of Adam Zampa or Bolland playing in any match look remote.  Rahane and Faf make a fairly consistent opening pair, but they are not major six hitters, which may make their power play overs not that rewarding.  His pace bowlers looks like his liabilities, and if they do not do well, his spinners would also be taken to the cleaners which makes me believe he is going to bleed a lot of runs all the time.  He needs to expect to chase a 180 plus score every time or try to defend a similar score to give his bowlers enough leeway. My opinion is this may be the first time MSD would never lead his team to the final four!  But with Dhoni at the helm, he has ways to make the team click and take them to the playoffs and it is not easy for me to write-him off yet.    Never say Never.
  • KKR unless they mess up, should be going through the final four because they look composed and settled. With Narine ready and ably assisted by Chawla, and with their foreign players mostly making up their other bowling options, they seem to be set.  They seem to placing their bets on Indian players for their batting and if Yousuf Pathan can return to form with some heavy heating, and Andre adding to the fireworks, they need a score of 160 plus to be able to defend with their good bowling.  Their long pole in the tent seems to be their batting, and again, like the Lions, if the opponents take care of their top 3 to 4 batters within a few overs, they would struggle to get a big score. But they seem to be one of the better teams to be able to defend a lower score, thanks to their effective spinners and good pacers.
  • Kings Punjab does lack in their spin department with the likes of Axar Patel leading it with only Sahu and Maxwell as the other spinners. Their batting can be either too good if both the Ms fire or can be bad if both fail – so I think we would see extremes in their scores.  If their opening pair fails, then it puts a lot of pressure on the 2Ms which would curtail their natural game and no fun to watch.   Unfortunately I do not see them making it to the final four.
  • Mumbai’s bowling would be around Bhajji and Bumrah, and batting around Rohit and Buttler. Rayudu has to raise his batting up a notch in the middle and Parthiv has to deliver almost every game.  I would still say that they would find it hard to get a good mix for any given match, and both batting and bowling look vulnerable at best. They need to play a more consistent team henceforth and ensure stability sets in for them to have any chances of a playoff spot. With them playing in one of the smaller stadiums (Wankhede), where a par score would be 180 to 200, they should have this in mind while planning most of their home games. I would still say they do not look  today like a team that would enter the final four.
  • RCB is a team that can hit 200 plus on any given day, given that Kohli and AB are in their best form but if Gayle becomes their liability, they do not seem to have a foreign player to replace him other than David Weise as an all-rounder. So, only the fourth foreign spot is up for toss and they have a wide array of bowlers to choose from.  Binny has to be play and excel as an all-rounder and Chahal has to be more respectable as a bowler for them to see any playoff berth.  This game can be cruel to the two best batters of this format in this world being on the same side, hitting consistently but still may not be able to make it to the playoffs.
  • Delhi seem to have a good bowling attack – Zaheer, Mishra, Morris, Brathwaite/Couture Nile, JP Duminy, Negi and Shami. They can definitely restrict their opponents to a respectable score to defend.  But other than De Kock, the batting lineup is inexperienced as best but with lots of promise – Mayank, Karun, Sanju and Shreyas.   If any one of them strike in any given game, and later the all-rounders in JP Duminy, Brathwaite and Morris blast their way through, I guess they do stand a chance.  Their weakest link is the fitness of Zaheer and his captaincy as this is the first time he is leading a team.  But with Rahul Dravid as their coach now, having been a mentor to RR for quite some years, anything is possible. 
  • Hyderabad’s chances look better if they get Dhawan to perform and the injured players come in. Then their foreign player combination gets set –Warner, Williamson, Morgan/Henriques/Cutting (the last two if they need an all-rounder option) and Rahman/Boult.  Their Indian bowling would be spearheaded by the best T20 pacer this year – Ashish Nehra and ably assisted by Bhuvnesh Kumar and Yuvraj.  There are lots of baggage in their playing eleven – Karn Sharma, Ashish Reddy and Deepak Hooda, which they need to carry on their shoulder. Deepak was supposed to provide the fireworks for them in the middle overs and Naman Ojha has to perform with his bat well.   Remembered they fired late in the season last time around and this seems to be their habit. Even if one of their injured players does not make it, they do not seem to have a chance.

     The third and fourth spot for the playoffs seem to have some choices now – Hyderabad, Pune, DD or RCB, but my choices would be Pune and RCB.   At this point, I may be wrongly writing off Mumbai and definitely writing off Punjab but as I see it, this may be reality. Best results in T20 comes with good batting, excellent fields and tight bowling.   And once you are in the playoffs, the team that performs that day becomes the winner – no statistics can infer winning from the playoff stages.   The best bowling unit though today seems to be Delhi and KKR.

      Remember the T20 format is definitely batting friendly and cruel to the bowlers in the Indian wickets and hence it is important that the team has to have a good six to seven deep batting strength to score well and be able to defend with good bowlers.  A great fielding team is critical for success as this can save about 10 runs every match and make a critical runout happen.   The middle order must have two good all-rounders in any team. The fifth option of a bowler can by design be set weak if the other four bowlers can come with respectable quality. Assume the fifth bowler quota gets hit for even 50 runs in their four overs, if the other four bowlers can still get a max average of 8 runs an over, a score of 170 can be defended or chased if they have a strong batting lineup. But more than one bowling quota of four overs gets hit, and then you are in for trouble.  And if your top order does not perform, again you can be in trouble.

      As a side note, not seeing my favorite team CSK in action, I am supporting RCB for the entertainment value they have provided and are likely to provide this season.  IPL and T20 is all about a three plus hour entertainment which seems to be an effective channel to wind down the summer days.

     The author is from Bengaluru and is a cricket fanatic and an avid blogger.  Some of the blogs related to cricket along with various other domains of his interests can be found in www.rajavenkata.com .   He is a business consultant and a corporate trainer by profession.

Is your Recruiting on solid grounds?

Recruitment, as defined by the Business Dictionary, is the process of finding and hiring the best qualified candidate for a job opening, in a timely and cost-effective manner.  The process itself includes analyzing the requirement of the job – the must haves and the nice to haves, attracting the employees for the same through targeted advertising, screening and selecting applicants, hiring and integrating the new employee to the organization. 

     And during recruiting, there is no such thing as an ideal fit – this never exists. And better fits always costs more, just like a tailor-made suit would be more expensive than the one available readymade in retail stores.   If cost is the main driver and the job opening is budget bound, look for ‘less-expensive’ candidates and settle for someone with lesser experience and a little lesser fit.  If time is of essence, and it is critical to get someone immediately, get the best qualified candidate from the available screened list and hire quickly.    Remember, recruiting comes with several boundary conditions set by the organization and the hiring team.

Now let us dissect each of the verbs in the definition:

  • Analyzing the requirement:  The recruiter must know clearly what exactly is  the hiring team looking out for, what technology area that they want the candidate from, what level of experience  they need, any salary bounds, what compromises can be done, etc.  At the end of this process, it is a good practice to formally quiz the recruiter to ensure he has understood the requirement well and is confident to get the right folks.  
    • The requirements must be clear, precise to the role and realistic– you cannot expect a technical lead or a manager of say 10-12 talents to also do hands-on technical work 100% of the time – if he has to manage talents well, then all he can do is offer technical insight and monitor the work progress of team regularly and sometimes roll up his sleeves and start working.   Managing talents well is an art by itself and if you are looking at successful employees, you need to create successful managers first.   The immediate boss is the embodiment of the entire organization for all his/her employees.
  • Screening:  Based on 2 to 3 essential skill sets that are absolutely needed for the job, the recruiter parses through various job portals and internal referrals and generates a few resumes that will meet the requirement. He must be able to use all different channels to get the best talents, with preference given to local candidates(unless there is a void of skill set in that geography) and look out for a diversified set of candidates who can offer more than what the job requires (but not fall into the trap of over employing anyone).
  • Selecting:  This is done at two levels:  First the filtering of screened resumes by the recruiter through a short call with all the candidates which would translate to a bunch of 5-10 resumes that meet the requirements; from here on, the hiring team actually selects 3-5 resumes and have a direct personal discussion with the candidate.   The recruiter needs to get updated resumes from candidates with their photos attached, and have a video call with them during the first level.  It is important because in certain countries, the so-called candidate who takes the phone interview may not be the candidate who comes for the personal round! Surprise, Surprise!
    • Itis equally important to value the candidate’s time in a similar way the hiring teams time is being managed – having all the necessary personal interviews in one day with the required stakeholders sets the right tone, and the last two interviews must be with the Talent office team who would check on general expectation, soft skills, etc. and a 15 minute wrap up with the hiring manager who would talk about the next steps and thank the candidate for attending.  The first interview must be with the recruiter for 15 minutes who would describe the process being followed during the day and what to expect that day and in the coming weeks.  One must not look at bringing in the candidate each day for every interview which would frustrate the candidates very much. Once selected, it is important to inform all candidates within 2-4 days of the interview, one way or the other.  If the candidates see this professionalism, the company automatically goes high on their potential next employer list.  Every action that the company’s employee does must be with the intent to lure the candidate to join them.   Consider the candidate as the customer irrespective of the market conditions, and you need to sell the opportunity well to them.
    • As part of selecting, it is important to do all the required reference checks – some mandated by the law, and some mandated by the job itself.  Examples can be employment and education verification, professional references that can vouch for the candidate, any required medical checks, license (to operate a vehicle or operate machinery) checks, psychometric tests etc.   Do not roll out an offer without doing these mandated checks.
  • Attracting:  All the candidates called for the personal round needs to be sold about the company – the benefits, the growth potential, the culture and environment of work place, etc. The recruiter must be able to keep the candidates engaged in this process and infuse excitement in them. He must be following up with the candidate every week once the offer is given till (s) he joins so that the candidate ‘feels important that they are valued’.
  • Hiring:  This is when the offer is rolled out and a discussion happens with the candidate around the offer.  If all parameters fit well, it is important to ensure the candidate takes the offer and all efforts should be made by the hiring team to have the candidate on board as soon as possible.  It is also critical for the recruiter to have the second best candidate talked to and ensured that if something goes wrong with the first candidate, this candidate is made to join immediately.   In certain hot markets and hot domains, it is always better to roll out both the offers even for one opportunity so that any last minute absenteeism in joining is taken care of, and since this is a hot domain, there would always be projects available for both the candidates.
  • Integrating:  This is where most of the recruiters and even the organization believe it is not the recruiter’s responsibility.  Essentially since the recruiter has been the single point of candidate prior, it is important that the recruiter takes care of all the candidates till their probation gets over (or first six months) and develop the appropriate training plans for them to fill the voids in skills that are essential and were noticed as gaps during the interview process.  Stopping with a training plan is not enough but they need to ensure that the training gets completed by the candidates.  It is important to have a successful probation to all the candidates joining and this is one of the success metric for any recruiter’s performance appraisal.

     How many of these actions does your recruiter actually do?  Most of them would just parse through some resumes and give it to the hiring team based on their understanding of the requirement, and just schedule the interview. Is it not?

    It is always critical to hire the candidates quickly as due to changing times, the budget for the job opening may not exist for a long time.  Think about the reverse view of the same – if the budget indeed goes away and no one can be recruited in time and the company goes about their work normally, then may be this position was redundant in the first place.   Have you given this a thought?

    Organizations are about people and the quality they bring in.  Knowledge management is about managing the collective intellectual capacity of the employees put together.  It is a known fact now that diversity increases innovation and being innovative gives the company the much needed competitive edge.  Getting new products in newer technologies and offering better solutions to customers always gives one the leadership position. While recruiting, it is important to have the best recruiters for the job who understands the job fitment and requirements better, is on top of the market conditions, has a good knowledge about the organization from both the strategic and tactical sides and one who has had lengthy conversations with the hiring manager to understand what is absolutely essential for the role and what are the nice haves.  They must be able to make a judgement call on what the candidate brings in to the equation, more than what the job actually prefers and sell them back to the hiring team.

    Recruitment is more about the process of getting the employee into the organization, rather than the end product (employee). Recruitment is about acquiring the best talent there is available, and ensuring (s)he is welcome in such a way that they give their best to the company.  It just should not stop in screening, scheduling interviews and rolling out an offer letter – these are just a few tasks that are part of the process. 

     Let us NOT confuse recruitment  with Human resources (I hate this name personally – prefer to call it Talent Office) as latter is about ensuring the employees lives a good career inside the company by giving him/her  the best in terms of opportunities, growth, responsibilities, work-life, etc.  Once you call an employee a resource, our mind has the nasty habit of looking at them as machines and not humans which is not healthy.  Recruitment can be part of the Talent office though, as long as their roles and responsibilities are clearly specified and understood.  The PEOPLE office hence should have at least three verticals that have some overlaps in their functionality – Recruitment, Talent Office and Learning & Development.  And let us be clear who has the responsibility of hiring – it belongs to the hiring manager ONLY and the recruitment team is just a facilitator in the process.

      Recruitment should ideally own integration of the employee for their first six months and should own their training and development during this period to ensure proper training takes place for the employee so that he is more successful in his job – this is filling the voids they found during recruitment which are needed in the job.    He works with the L&D department to ensure that the needed courses are properly scheduled.  A proper way to appraise the performance of a recruiter is to correlate it from the probationary performance appraisal of the recruit after 6 months.  If he has brought the best and made him better in the first few months, then this recruiter is a golden egg for the organization.   

     Talking about appraising the recruiter, a few KRIs have to be listed: 

  • How good was the engagement of the new employee between the time of the offer and the day they join as measured by the employee’s feedback on the joining date?  A good way to measure is how quickly he has facilitated the candidate to join – minimal is better.   Also you can also infer the recruiter’s performance through the acceptance number compared to the offers rolled out.
  • How good was the skill fitment based on the feedback from the interviewing panel – this would really give you an indicator how good pre-filtering was done by the recruiter?     If this is not happening well within the first couple of candidates, I guess another talk with the recruiter by the hiring team is essential.
  • How many resumes did the recruiter manage to qualify and how many of them were appropriate – Qualify just means that the candidate has most of the skills needed for the job, and being appropriate is measured by talking to the potential employee and going through the resume and seeing whether the skills required for the new job was actually worked upon by the candidate and the candidate fits into all the conditions of the hiring team– for this, the recruiter needs to be knowledgeable in the area he is recruiting from, and this goes back to the previous point, look out for a recruiter who has been in the same area for many years.   While sourcing resumes, how many channels did he use to get the resumes – referral, social media, sourcing consultants, etc.?   Reducing recruitment cost would be a good criterion which may translate to using the sourcing consultants as a last resort only. 
  • Feedback from the hiring manager and the interview panel, and the employee on the joining day about the technical knowledge and professional conduct of the recruiter is also another measure.
  • Key element nowadays is diversity and minority recruitment –the  more diverse the company is, more different perspectives comes into any decision which makes it more effective.  Diversity is measured by two angles – how diverse the set of candidates are in terms of gender, age, experience, etc. and how diverse are the skills sets of any candidate which may translate to buying more for the same price – you can either catch a shrimp or a whale with the same fishing technique!  Studies show that diversity increases innovation which translates to better operations for the company.  Is the recruiter voluntarily or involuntarily rejecting experienced candidates?  The last point is more prevalent in emerging markets as more experience is usually directly correlated to higher salary, they consciously want to fit a younger profile within the company and they wrongly associate experience with non-trainability.
  • Did the recruiter document what the person needs to be trained at during the first few months to carry out his work effectively and was this mapped back to what the interview panel actually found? A training chart has to be published for every candidate by the recruiter in assistance with the hiring team as part of the probationary process.
    • An evaluation after 6 months whether the employee really met the requirements based on his skills and training and how effective he was performing at his job.

    I always believe in the “Rule of Two”.  Ensure you have two and only two technical or domain skills (non soft skills) that one needs to qualify a candidate.  More the number of skills, the lesser the number of resumes that can qualify.    Usually testing technical skills is more objective and testing soft skills is more subjective. The more senior the role is, it is imperative that the candidate comes in with loads of honed soft skills.   The more quickly you need a candidate, the more compromising you need to be as filling up a role may be more important than finding that exact candidate. Sometimes close enough is good enough as long as a good on-the-job training is planned.  The faster the need to  ramp up a team, it is best to have a daily lunch session with hiring panel to look at resumes, select a few and speeden the process.

   When the hiring manager sits in some other site than where the job opening is, and this is common with multi nationals having teams outside of their headquarters, the most common complaint (s)he has is the lack of transparency of the  recruitment process and the quality and quantity of resumes he gets.  Again, the hiring process is owned by the hiring manager and given the global nature of today’s work force, it is imperative that good regular communication happens with the recruiter to ensure they get the best candidates for the interview process and to keep the pressure on the recruiter to get the best.      

    Hiring managers need to ensure the following during recruitment:

  • Is the recruiter the right person for the job?  Does he understand the technology that the company works in?  Is he someone who has been through many industries or focused on your own industry?  Is the recruiter capable of asking relevant questions to the candidates?  It is always good to interview the recruiter first and ensure the expectations are correct and the ‘two must haves’ are applicable to all candidates.
  • Set the success criteria and how many qualified appropriate resumes you would want to see every week and how many interviews needs to be scheduled and with whom.
  • Is the recruiter getting a good mix of screened candidates from different channels? Is he consistently getting only sub-standard candidates?  If this is the case, immediate having a quick discussion with the recruiter would help to ensure the proper correction happens.   From a practical perspective, there is a stronger likelihood of a ‘local’ candidate joining the organization than one from another city – make it a point to source more ‘local’ candidates.
  • More importantly, are there any compromises happening on the ethics front?  Is the recruiter working hand in glove with certain external consultants and are they having some ‘understanding’ in the background?  It is not uncommon to notice this if you look hard. Recruiting, along with vendor management and facilities management, are few of the common roles where ‘income from other sources’ is not so uncommon.
    •  It is time to get suspicious if the recruiter always sticks to a set of consultants even if they do not give proper resumes and keeps blaming the market for the quality, and is not able to accept resumes from other consultants with whom you would have better experience in your earlier avatar.  It is better to audit the whole exercise after every recruit to see if any violation has been there for business excellence.  
    • You can get suspicious if you have called a few candidates for interview, and only one stands out as the ‘closest match’ – this may mean that the other candidates are just ‘fillers’ having been set-up by the recruiter who would know well in advance they would be rejected for various reasons (technical fit, salary, etc.).  It is an expectation that all the 4-5 candidates that get interviewed face-to-face must be close enough to choose from which means the recruiter had done a fantastic job.
    • In a few cases, in larger private or publicly held organizations, candidates pay money to get a job. Then the recruiter works with certain senior managers within to interview and select ‘this candidate’  and everyone gets a piece of the pie.  Nobody notices such infraction because this is just some little noise in one tiny corner of a huge company.
  • Is the recruiter doing his best to get good referrals from existing employees?  This is the best way to get good results as good employees always get good referrals and they can also start engaging with the potential candidates to make them join earlier.   The referral bonus schemes must also be motivating enough for the employees to bring in good folks. Never let go of a referral from your super performer – the chances are they are also good.   Even here, there are incidents where the recruiter would sell the referred candidates to the hiring manager only if offered ‘some piece of the referral bonus’ – one way to beat this is to ensure the existing employees refer their candidate formally through the internal system and send a brief note directly to the hiring manager and recruiter about their friend.
  • It is also equally important to interview all external consultants and be measuring their contributions regularly.   It is imperative you put some hard expectations on the recruitment consultants and not necessarily go with whom your recruiters go with.  You may know a particular consultant from a different organization that has done wonders for you and it is always nice to invoke their services so that you know what you are getting. 
  • If you are recruiting for fresh graduates, are you recruiting from the very best of institutes? Yes, they could have higher expectation but if you want the best of talent, this is the best avenue to bring in the best. Remember, a second tier institute usually may not shape up a good well-rounded candidate.

        The company itself must ensure they do not advertise for external candidates, even if this is part of a process they need to follow if they have some candidates already in mind for the opportunity.  This can be disappointing and discouraging for the external candidates.   They should think of rotating certain ‘valuable’ employees to newer roles and look out for their replacement in their former roles. Also ‘selfish’ managers here must also let go of their good employees to other roles with the organization if the talent is interested, and the senior management must mandate that a good percentage of senior roles be filled only by internal candidates – this would be great for global companies to transfer employees  to other countries. Look out for managers readily offering some of their employees as this could be ‘bad performing ‘employees that they want to get rid of.   This happens! Merit must have its way and only the better performing employees must be given opportunities with the company that they want to pursue.

      They must look around only if they cannot fill with any internal candidates and once they feel they need to go out, then all external candidates must be viewed on equal footing, except may be for internal referrals.   The recruiter must also keep his or her options open and must not have ‘someone’ in mind while he starts screening the candidates, as it would sound hollow when he talks in a more ‘eliminating voice’ even during the first call.    An example here would be to pick on something not related to the job and he may say “you do not seem to have this”, “your experience does not relate directly to what we want” – if you have been called, it looks like you have been qualified for screening and these statements just give a negative vibe.  And the worst thing is when he is trying to lowball you on the salary front even in the first call which is something uncalled for – he may say “your experience is much higher than what we want” or “you seem to have worked in unrelated areas than what we need”. The proper way is to go through the resume with the candidate over this call, and understand what each other’s want rather than making initial decisions during the call itself.       

     Now the debate is how many recruiters does a company need?  A company, however big they can be, does not necessarily need a big full time recruitment team, but just a handful permanent trustworthy team who would be able to standardize the process across recruiters who can be hired on contract for a specific time period.  The on-contract recruiters should be paid based on the metrics listed above and the small recruitment team must have a smaller base pay and a high variable pay so that they work for the best interest of the company, similar to the way the top executives are getting measured.

     Recruiting  less experienced candidates  (< 12 years) works more on “What You Know” basis whereas for more experienced candidates (> 12 to 15 years) it usually works on “Whom you Know” basis.  Hence it is important to have an extensive professional network as your career progresses, and keep oneself ahead of the technology by acquiring new technical skills every 3-5 years.   Senior leadership would always bring in the folks who they were comfortable working with and whom they can trust – there would always be enough churns at the senior level when a new CEO is appointed externally who would more likely get his ‘comrades’ from prior organization to be placed at critical positions and since the ‘old gang’ becomes uneasy with this, they start to attrite and this is an opportunity for other external seniors to fill in these positions.  Have you not seen this happen? Infosys now under Vishal Sikka is top heavy with former SAP employees!

     Recruitment in one geography can be totally different from another, and similarly recruiting for certain technology areas can be tougher than others.   Some companies have turned recruitment process to an art , and on the other side of the spectrum, in many companies it would look more like a joke because you do not feel that they on top of things when it comes to recruiting.  Recruitment can be tough when the market is hot as it would be difficult to get the right candidates but there are personal ways any recruiter can role model best intent to get the right people even in those tough markets.  At the end of the day, a company wants a good talent pool who can passionately contribute to the organization and this is possible only with a strong recruiter driving things properly.

    In these days, where there are more recruiting consultants than the available jobs, obvious if you get calls from different sources for the same position, recruiting the best need not be a challenge. There are enough smart talents out there who will be thrilled to join a good organization if approached properly and engaged professionally.  The success of the team unfortunately is directly related to the recruiter one has and hence getting the most knowledgeable, ethical recruiter with excellent communication is the need of the hour.

How to buy an Inverter Battery – a layman’s struggle in India

     This is March 2014 and already into summer in Bangalore and despite the fact that elections are coming later this summer, unadvertised power cuts have started regularly.  And my old Amaron inverter batteries having pushed their limits are giving way after a little over three years.  Now it was time for me to replace these batteries and I thought I would go with Tubular ones with their promise of longer life that comes with added cost.  I managed to do some two weeks of extensive research to know the technical jargons and what they mean so that I can confront the dealers more intelligently – as Alexander Pope said “ A Little learning is a Dangerous thing”, I am treading ‘dangerously’ through this article but wish to share some knowledge with my audience.

     For those of you lucky ones who do not need to worry about power cuts and hence UPSes and inverters, bless your soul. And for these souls I just blessed, if you want to carry on with me on this article, kindly do so.  For us unlucky ones who see nightmares of power cuts looming after elections, thanks to the usual excuse of lack of water and power generation and bad distribution, here is some help from a layman perspective – feeling slightly ashamed of not able to use my electronics brain more prudently! . 

    (Power) Inverter put simply is a device that gives us power from the stored battery  – it converts the direct current into alternating current, thus helping us run the electrical devices that are connected in our homes like fans, lights, TVs and even small home appliances.   Although there are huge inverters which can run heavier electrical appliances, for a common man, it is enough if it provides for a few fans, few lights and a TV which you may want to work when the main powers are down and this is where my article concentrates.  In my case, I have an inverter but just the batteries that needed changing and hence this article is how to buy a battery, that too in India.  I am not going to talk about what INVERTER itself to buy as this may be more electrical oriented and may not be my cup of cake.    It is not advisable to connect the heavy load appliances that work on 15A socket to the home inverter and when you do the electrical wiring to your house, have them separately on a different phase.

    Before I go any further, there is an excellent source of info about inverters with questions and answers that can provide you a balanced opinion:   www.upsinverterinfo.com.  I have managed to publish a few points here and there from this site to make some of my points clearer.  Also remember to do adequate research based on your requirements before you buy and  avoid lots of ‘fake’ batteries available in the market – always go with the some sort of brand that have a good dealer network in your area and a decent warranty.

    There are generally two types of batteries:  Lead-Acid batteries and Sealed Maintenance Free (SMF) batteries.  SMF are the “Buy and Forget” types where there are no  emissions, completely sealed, does not need water topping and has a very short charging time.  The downside of lead-acid is it emits fumes while charging as the battery gets heated up that is not environmentally friendly.  Always remember to keep these batteries in a ventilated open cool space away from any heat source.

    Even with Lead Acid inverter  batteries, there  can be two types – the normal flat-plate ones and the Tubular ones.  Tubular batteries are more reliable, charges faster, comes with higher battery life(~1.5x) , has less water loss than the normal flat plate but all these come at a cost for the same aH rating.  So, a prudent customer would like to negotiate price of the tubular to be < 1.5x than a good flat plate battery. 

   And in Tubular they have different form factors based on dimensions called differently by each manufacturers as Jumbo, Short, Flat etc. but think of them of being in two forms – TALL or Normal, and then check the dimensions.  If you do not have more floor area, you need to choose the TALL one but they do not fit into normal trolleys.  HADI that gets advertised usually come in TALL tubulars.

    Before one buys a battery, it is important to understand what lighting fixtures need essential backup and what would be the total wattage consumed by them.  This would set the limit of both the inverter to buy and the associated batteries to be used – one must have ENOUGH backup.  Then one must think of how much backup time one needs for these.   Let us say a few lights, fans and a TV add up to 400W and we want the backup for 3 hours.

    No inverter converts power at 100% efficiency – meaning the actual power derived from the circuit is much higher than the real power delivered – we can call it efficiency although a better word is power factor(PF).  Usually a PF ranges between 0.7 and 0.8 and you must add the additional losses due to the wiring itself which cannot be that easily factored in.  So the inverter has to be a rated at 400 W / 0.8 PF = 500 VA. So, it is safe to buy an inverter that can deliver a little higher and  go for a 600 VA inverter to run the 400W load. 

     The batteries available now in the Indian market are 12V and hence  one needs to go for a 600 VA/ 12V x 3 hrs. = 150 aH battery.   One needs to connect two or more batteries in series to get higher voltages  (as some inverters would require a 24V or 36V DC power source) at the same current, and while doing so, one needs to ensure to use the same battery type of the Equal capacity(same voltage and same aH rating) and never mix makes and sizes.  The weaker capacity causes the imbalance by quickly discharging and always the weakest link.  This applies to batteries getting old – even if one battery is worse than the other, one needs to unfortunately replace both the batteries at the same time.  Extrapolating from my previous example, for the same 150 aH and for the same 3 hours of back up time, if we use a 24V DC source, we will need a 1.2 KVA inverter.   Once you have the inverter, look at its specifications to see if it needs 12V, 24V or 36V which would make you buy, 1, 2 or 3 batteries respectively.

    The inverter batteries come in the range of 80aH to 150aH for flat plat ones, and from 100 aH to 200aH for Tubular ones in the Indian market.  In the flat plate inverter batteries, we have TATA Green, Amaron Current and Exide Inverter Plus among the brand names. In the tubular types, we have Okaya, Exide (Inva Tubular, Ceil, Inva Red and many other groups), Amaron, Luminous Inverlast, Su-Kam, Prestolite and Amco.  I did not see much of an action in the local Bangalore market for either Prestolite (Tudor India) or Amco.  We even have local Peenya makers like SunTrac who seem to be providing batteries which are much bulkier.   Exide seems to enjoy a premium in the market, thanks to the perception of higher quality, number of dealers and also in pricing.  There is NO reason for one to match the inverter brand to the battery of the same brand, if they are producing both but it would help you in terms of service when a problem arises as they cannot blame each other for it. Among Inverters, the leading names today are Su-Kam, Luminous and Microtek, although it looks like Exide also makes them now.

    When one looks for Batteries, we have either the C10 and C20 type which denotes the capacity rating of the battery, although I am still trying to understand what it really means – the former seems to be more tailored towards solar inverters(used on daily basis))  and the later towards the home power inverter(for infrequent power cuts) now. C10 is better than C20 as a lower aH rating of C10 corresponds to a higher aH rating in the C20 [Capacity at C10 = 0.8 x Capacity at C20, meaning 100 aH at C10 rating will have 125 aH at C20 rating] – C20 just inflates the capacity!   Both of them offer the same aH rating under different load conditions and manufacturers publish them accordingly in their website. For the same aH rating, higher C rating translates to higher battery costs. C20 takes a longer time to discharge than C10 for the same aH rating which makes it more suitable for home applications.   Please check this for more info:  http://revanbattery.com/technical-information.htm

    Now you have an idea of the battery rating and the capacity you want to buy, how many Tubular batteries and what dimensions based on the space available to store your batteries.  Now let us get introduced to something more technical which most of the dealers and distributors themselves may not know:

  •  The quality of the tubular batteries is on its spine tubes. These spine tubes have to be die casted in high pressure (100 bar +) – there is a machine from Germany called HADI that is used to do this invariably and most of the top brands use it, although I would insist on you getting this in writing in a specification sheet  for the battery you want to buy. Only top brands can afford these machines and if you are buying from the local brands, it is usually a low pressure or a gravity type one which result in lots of voids and non-uniformity. HADI tubular have low self-discharge, corrosion resistant and have longer life.
  • # of Cycles of deep discharge at 80% Depth of Discharge (DoD) – higher the better.  80% DoD means these deep-cycle batteries can be discharged down to 80% repeatedly and the more charge-discharge cycles the battery is able to do it, the better it is.
  • Manufacturing date is very important – the older the battery has been in combination between the transit+Go-down+dealer, the more charge it may have lost just without being connected – this is called “ Self discharge” which decreases the shelf life of batteries. When the battery reaches your home, it has less than full charge which must be compensated at the dealer end by a “Freshening up” or “Top up”.  It looks like the battery would reach you within 2 months from manufacturing best case and faster from the factory during the summer season when the new stocks arrive and when the needs goes up.   Again, here HADI tubular works out better due to its low self-discharge

   Now you are ‘knowledgeable’ and ready to buy but do not know which brand to get and here are some tips and my observations against each:

  • Exide – highest cost amongst batteries and lots of dealers and they take pride being marketed as a premium brand. I believe they are the largest battery manufacturer in India – the name itself stands for “Excellent oXIDE”.     Their website is one of the better ones although they do not necessarily have all their product lines listed.  You can buy online as well but only the flat plate batteries- their prices are higher online than with the dealer which is the case almost with any battery manufacturer- cannot understand the logic behind it.  They also do have the “don’t care” attitude because once you start bugging them for information; they do not necessarily provide it and actually get offended by our “recently gained smartness”. Exide has the widest range to choose from.  Their best line is Inva Tubular – the IT series, but they have the same batteries in another brand called CEIL that they do not advertise and which is much cheaper and with lesser warranty.   They try to ‘sell up’ first – meaning offer the highest price IT series and then as you tell them about your budget, slowly come down to other series which are much cheaper.  I have some great interaction with their Kolkota head office but cannot say the same about their local support.  They do not even have any social presence in Facebook.
  • Luminous – has its Inverlast series and may have the lowest warranty in its class compared to others.  Their website is not complete as they have a write up only on the LT500 but not on the other batteries in terms of cycle times, if it is HADI or not etc.  Have a good Facebook presence and they seem to be active there as they respond to queries within a day. They have their dealer network advertised in their website which is useful.
  • Su-Kam – has their Bazooka and the BIG series, but looks like they are more selling into the people who buy their own inverters.
  • Okaya – very confusing website and their  information contradicts each other in their website.  Do have an online store which is more expensive than others.  Have only one dealer in SP road here that can provide the quotes.  But their support network is pathetic to say the least – they do not reply to queries.  Generally cheaper batteries but they have some HADI lines as well. Sounds like a Japanese company but I believe they are from Hyderabad.   Generally, if you Google for batteries, Okaya has lots of mentions of complaints – not sure how truthful they are though.
  • AMCO – nothing to write home about on their Cheetah series, not very email centric – more Chennai based and do not care much about other cities and not sure if they use latest technologies or not in their manufacturing.  Nothing is written about them in their website.
  • PRestolite – again, little help from the website- has their product lines and you need to search under Tudor India. Their TALL lines are cheaper than most. Again, no detailed information about their batteries on their website
  • Amaron – has their CURRENT Series but starts only at 150 aH and above.  Absolutely nothing on their website in terms of specification or product  data.
  • SunTrac – talked with their manufacturing head and learned a lot about the process, their website does not read well and they are local manufacturer from Peenya – all their specifications are in C10 rating, much bulkier and it looks like they manufacturer for other OEMs.

  Let us talk about the final stage of the buying – dealers seem to be much better off in pricing than any online stores.   None of the dealers of any manufacturer would push you to make a sale – if you want to, buy it or get lost sort of an attitude. They give a price and that is it- none of the dealers I interacted with were able to answer or understand any of my question on technology and specification above to give a fitting answer confidentially. They drop the ball and disappear out of sight. They would even go to the extent and ask you if you are a dealer or a customer! Dealers feel intimidated by the questions being asked- they are usually happy with people who have not done their homework, who just walk in, buy something and get out. I was not willing to do it as this is not a small purchase – it costs anywhere between Rs 15K to 25K for a pair of batteries that I needed to buy and based on our usage, I estimated a life time of about 5 years for a good RoI.  Also realize that none of the manufacturer or the dealer are very email centric nor want to commit to a written quote, nor have information about their batteries in detail on their website.

   The way to start is to send an email to all the manufacturers about what you want and what you are looking out for. Some of them do reply and provide you with a rate and the name of a dealer you can work with.  Demand that you need a dealer close to your house which is very critical because if you want him to top up the water every 4-6 months and if there are any issues, it is always better to have someone close by.  Also ensure your dealer has been around for some time and not the run-of-the-mill type who is bound to close soon ( I have seen lots of battery shops disappear about a few months in my neighborhood itself)- you can easily get a feeling of wanting to do business (or not)  from their body language and their store once you visit them.  It would not be long before you realize that each dealer would sell one brand more because the commissions he gets out of them is higher and he would bad-mouth the other brands to convince you – so be aware of these and take them with a grain of salt.

   At the same time, you can also send an email to all the dealers closer to you and ask them for the best price.  Then visit them one evening to make sure you have your presence felt and they understand you are not just asking but can be serious for a buy.   They would say : “ if you buy  now, I would get you the best deal “ – do not fall into this trap as there is never a ‘best deal’ unless you do your homework. By talking to 2-3 dealers of each manufacturer, you may have an understanding of a ‘ bottom  price’ close to which they would not do a deal within which you need to squeeze them.  And do this for 2-3 manufacturers you have decided. Ensure you get a pricing that is all inclusive – taxes, delivery, and connecting.

   Talk around for the best exchange your old batteries can get – again here, the dealers would make it look they are doing charity work whereas every battery is recycled properly and you can get a decent price for the same. In your final quote, ensure you pay the amount after the exchange. Once you buy the batteries, ensure you have the warranties for those batteries and they have topped-up the charge before delivery to compensate for any storage related self-discharge.   Higher the warranty provided, the better deal you can get. The warranty is split between total replacement and pro-rata adjustment (discounts on getting new batteries) – try to maximize the total replacement warranty which increases your confidence on the product you are buying.