Thursday, June 26, 2008

New XLRI curriculum on the cards

Jamshedpur, Jun 23 XLRI is gearing up to introduce a new curriculum for its two flagship courses from the next academic year (2009).

The B-School faculty has already discussed the new curriculum, which has a more “hands on” element to it than the existing one. Prof Sharad Sarin, professor (marketing area) has been responsible for the changes suggested in the business management (BM) course.

Speaking to FE on Monday, XLRI director Father E Abraham said, “We have a faculty council meeting coming up next month where we may finalise the report.”

The committee on curriculum revamping spent several months studying contemporary managerial needs, interacting with several B-Schools, understanding industry needs and has even entertained feedback from several of its alumni in trying to assess the gaps in its present course format.

In the process, while some electives have been updated, some new ones have been added to both the PM&IR and the BM courses.

Citing an example, prof Madhukar Shukla, who teaches OB & strategic management, said while ‘personnel management’ has been revised, a new elective on ’socio-political change’ has been introduced.

XLRI feels understanding the political power shifts and the implications of developments like Companies in the Middle East buying properties in the US will help the students.

Citing an example again, he said a student will be taking up an elective subject, which integrates other subjects and has to be studied over three terms.

Though XLRI had originally desired to introduce the new curriculum strictly in the academic year beginning 2009, some subjects will be some more time to be introduced.

The B-School had last carried out a major curriculum review exercise in 2002.

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

B-schools should depend less on visiting faculty

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About eight years ago, as part of the annual survey of business schools that we do, I along with my survey team visited for the first time a well-known B-school in Pune. It came as a surprise to us that the school did not have a single permanent faculty member and was totally dependent on visiting faculty.

This would have meant a low rank for the school though it had strong brand presence. For starters, our survey methodology gives high weightage to permanent faculty and their research output. When we pointed this to the founder of the institute, he suggested that we change the parameters of evaluation, saying that the visiting faculty model works fine for his institute, and that he could not afford permanent faculty just to have a better rank. This was the mindset of many of our “edupreneurs” then.

Over the years, though, things have changed in some B-schools but in the majority of them, including some top branded ones, permanent faculty is still considered a liability rather than an asset. Hiring visiting faculty even with doubtful academic credentials makes better business sense for them as it helps in generating huge surplus. The present going rate for visiting faculty in most of the B-schools is Rs400-1,000 per hour. A full course that consists of 30 hours of teaching costs the institute about Rs20,000. On the other hand, a good, full-time faculty costs about Rs1 lakh per month.

Unfortunately, the prime concern of many B-schools is attracting students, who in turn are strongly influenced by the placement performance of the institute. The brand of some B-schools is in fact driven primarily by good placements. So their focus is entirely on arranging good placements which they manage by “networking” with industry.

This often means some corrupt practices. Some of the visiting faculty members are those who actually recruit from the campuses. Giving them teaching assignments with a relatively better pay package is not without conditions. There is a tacit agreement that in return they would recruit a few students from their campus.

The other source of visiting faculty is the existing permanent faculty of local university departments or some top B-schools who are hired to teach a course. In the national capital region, for instance, the faculty members of some top B-schools teach more in lower-rung private B-schools than in their own institute. This is clear misuse of the freedom and time they get. Instead of interacting with industry and doing research, which can also be a source of additional income for them, they prefer moonlighting.

There are some “entrepreneurs”, too, who have quit or lost corporate jobs and work full-time as visiting faculty and keep hopping to various B-schools on an hourly basis.

We have interacted with many students on this issue and most of them opine that visiting faculty lack commitment. The visiting faculty from industry, though they have good exposure of field practices, often lack academic rigour and theoretical inputs. It is also seen that these visiting faculty members often do not follow a structured approach in teaching that is essential, especially for foundation courses. In many cases, evaluation of students also does not take place properly as the teachers are preoccupied with a busy corporate life or teaching in other institutes. Generally, after teaching for few hours a day, they are not available to the students to clear doubts or to play a mentoring role, which is also very important from the students’ perspective.

Ideally ,the visiting faculty should be selectively drawn from industry and should be specialists in their field, and should be engaged for some electives. The foundation courses should be taught only by permanent faculty members, who themselves ought to be properly trained.

In my view, it’s the permanent faculty that should be the true measure of a B-school’s brand. How competent they are in terms of teaching, how empowered they are to try out new ideas, whether or not they get an enabling environment to do research and interact with industry is very important.

Perhaps keeping this aspect in mind, the tenure system—where good faculty has lifetime job security—was adopted by many universities and colleges abroad. A true academic institute gives direction to society by creating knowledge besides disseminating it. Such an institute is also faculty-driven.

But many of our edupreneurs do not give much weightage to this aspect of institute and are happy being a glorified placement agency. This is also a major deterrent for competent youngsters to take up the profession of teaching.

Our edupreneurs should understand that their social responsibility is not in just establishing swanky campuses or getting jobs for students but also in cultivating good faculty.

Premchand Palety is director of Centre for Forecasting and Research (C fore) in New Delhi, from where he keeps a close eye on India’s business schools. Comments are welcome at businesscase@livemint.com.

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Oxford rates Indian students among the best

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Oxford (PTI): The legendary Oxford University considers Indian students among the best in the world and would like more of them joining its campus, Chancellor Chris Patten has said.

The university, which produced the likes of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia, has presently 257 Indian students on roll. But it is one-third the number of students from China.

“We want more Indian students because we want the best in the world to come to Oxford,” Patten told PTI. Most of the Indian students are in the Said Business School.

“About a quarter of the students are doing MBAs…but I would like to see more in social sciences and humanities, doing both under-graduate and post-graduate work,” he said.

Though Indians are less in number, they have won more scholarships than the Chinese. Last year, they had won 54 different scholarships, including the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship, according to an Oxford journal.

“They (Indians) probably got more than China,” the Chancellor said. He said the number of scholarships may go up as the university improves its financial position.

“I hope as we develop our endowments we will be able to offer many more (scholarships) to post-graduate students in the next few years,” Patten said. The university has developed a Master’s programme in South Asian studies.

For a one-year MBA programme, it could cost as much as Rs 40 lakh, including the cost of tuition fee, boarding and lodging and the out-of-pocket expenses.

“It is a different world out here…We are gaining immensely,” said Karandeep Singh Vohra, pursuing MBA at the Said Business School.

Thursday, June 19, 2008

IIM-A maps global pathway

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The institute is sure to figure in the top bracket on the FT MBA global rank list for B-schools after its executive programme completes three years in 2009.

In late 2007, when the Financial Times (FT) released its annual ranking of the best business schools in the world, there was an uproar in Indian B-school circles.

While the Indian School of Business (ISB) Hyderabad’s one-year Post Graduate Programme for executives made it to the 20th position in the FT Global MBA 2008 ranking list, the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIM-A’s) Post Graduate Programme in Management for Executives (PGPX) was not included.

Next year, IIM-A could use the same ranking to gain a global footprint.

Having entered its third year, the PGPX will now be eligible to be listed for the FT MBA rankings.

The FT MBA ranking is considered one of the most prestigious B-school ratings in the world and uses over 20 parameters to determine the rankings. The criteria include weighted salary, placement success rank, alumni recommendation rank, international mobility rank, doctoral rank and research facilities.

To be eligible to participate, a business school must be internationally accredited by a body such as the AACSB, Amba or EQUIS; it must have a full-time MBA programme operational for at least five years; and its first class must have graduated at least three years ago.

When PGPX did not find a place in the FT MBA list, institute director Samir Barua had written an e-mail to all alumni members.

In the email, he said: “If the same criteria were to continue for inclusion in the list for ranking MBA programmes, the PGPX would qualify only in 2010. Till then, no programme of IIMA would qualify for ranking of MBA programmes by the FT.

For the PGP, the Institute has been informed by the FT that the programme qualifies for inclusion in the list of programmes for ranking as Masters Programme in Management. If the institute decides to participate in this (Masters Programme in Management) ranking by the FT, then the PGP will be included under this category.”

The institute has just bagged the European Quality Improvement System (EQUIS) accreditation, the international system of quality assessment, improvement and accreditation of higher education institutions in management and business formed by the European Foundation for Management Development (EMFD), becoming the first B-school in the country to have obtained the same.

“Since we are completing three years of the PGPX programme, we will be eligible for the FT-MBA global rankings. Once listed, we are confident of placing the programme on a global map,” said Arvind Sahay, chairperson, PGPX, IIM-A.

IIM-A had also taken up internet marketing initiatives considering that for most executives across the world, the web would be the first information access point. It had also designed separate brochures for Indian and overseas students.

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

B-schools will grow out of the classroom

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Harvard Business School is celebrating its centenary by looking back at the years gone by and gearing up for future endeavours. A team of faculty members, led by Srikant Datar, senior associate dean and the Arthur Lowes Dickinson professor of business administration at Harvard University, discussed how the next 100 years of management education are going to look like. The team held discussions with deans from 30 of the world’s premier B-Schools, over 400 executives and conducted six detailed case studies which will be out in the form of a book by the end of next year.


What have been the main findings of the study?

There is going to be a greater emphasis on experimental learning when it comes to management education. With the main focus on individual, there will be more of individual classes and less of classroom teaching. This will mean a further shortage of faculties.

The deans discussed the need to bridge the gap between ‘knowing’ and ‘doing’. It is one thing to know something which is quite different from having the ability to do it. Very little emphasis is given to introspection in management education.

So, there is a need to give attention to an individual. Certain things need to be changed. Everyone is worried about globalisation. However, our courses on globalisation are very functional, with the syllabus emphasising on the global nature of the work.

What needs to be done is to integrate global thinking. For instance, at Stanford, there is a global context management course in the first quarter itself, which is an innovative practice — to get the big picture first before anything else.

What about the impact of globalisation on management education?

B-schools have to ensure students understand the exact meaning of globalisation. Does this mean that B-schools set up global campuses? I think for a truly global perspective, a classroom is not enough. B-schools will eventually end up organising projects in other countries — provide the framework, explore how is it to work in other countries with different market and culture and then discuss the experience back home.

More than global campuses, I see alliances being formed, mainly for executive MBA programmes. Some B-schools have already set up campuses — Chicago has one in Barcelona and another in Singapore, and INSEAD has one in Singapore. I think, B-schools worldwide will establish alliances without setting up their own campuses and offer exchange opportunities for executive MBA programmes — Chicago has 33 international exchange programmes.

Setting up of new campuses will be a problem — not from the supply side but from the demand side. Since these alliances will have a significantly high number of local staff, finding faculty members is going to be a big challenge.

What about the duration of management courses and changes in content?

The trend of two-year MBA programme will change. In Europe, for instance, an MBA is a year-long programme. B-schools in the US — other than the top ten — find it difficult to frame two year MBA programmes. I am not sure if one year is enough for an MBA. There is a need to add more value to the two-year MBA programme or reduce the duration to one year.

Also, there are specialised courses — like the one-year finance specialisation — that are very popular. For instance, at INSEAD, finance specialisation is a 10-month programme, whereas the regular MBA is a 16-month programme. In the 10-month intensive programme, 60% course of the 16-month programme is covered. So, if the programme is made even more intensive, more topics will be covered in short duration.

Although I still believe that students need to spend more time to get the most out of an MBA degree. At a colloquium, deans also discussed what the B-schools need to do if they want leaders and not managers to emerge from their programmes. Stanford has a developed an Individual Leadership Lab, where people discuss introspection, self awareness and advantages of working in small teams.

What about the availability of faculty members?

In the US, there is already a 10% shortage of faculty members. The challenge is, as the faculty-student ratio is getting smaller, we need to think about the size of the faculties and their skills. Our study shows that at HBS, the student-faculty ratio is 10-12:1. So, for 2,000 students there are 200 faculty members. At Stanford, for 700 students there are 75 faculty members.

This is a big resource challenge, especially in India. US is already facing this problem and the study suggests that the focus has to shift to individual classes. Also, about 35-40% of staff members and students in the US come from elsewhere. It will be a while before Indian B-schools will be in a position to do something like this. The need is to have faculty members who are analytical in their approach and have excellent communication skills.

How will the business schools in India gain from this study?

The biggest challenge is availability of faculty members. Indian schools will adapt quickly to the changes. However, providing more facilities is the need of the hour. For instance, when Stanford introduced its new curriculum, it re-designed the campus saying new changes can not be incorporated in old structures. This will be easier for Indian schools which are developing now. All the three resource aspects — faculty, money and facilities — are a challenge. Indian schools will have to do things in their own way.

Sunday, June 15, 2008

MBA level course in healthcare management to begin from July

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PANAJI— An MBA level course in healthcare management, first of its kind in the state, aimed at producing managers in the healthcare, pharmaceutical and insurance sectors, will be started in Goa from July, this year by Marian Institute of Health Care Management.

Addressing a press conference to mark the launch of the new institution this evening Fr Romualdo D’Souza, the brain behind the new course and entity said that Marian Institute of Health Care Management would be an autonomous body with an intake capacity of 60 students. The course would focus more on healthcare sector.

Earlier Dr V N Jindal, the dean of Goa Medical College (who is also a member of the executive council of the institute) said that healthcare sector was the third largest growing sector after information technology and bio-technology in the country and there was heavy demand for trained professional to man the job arising in the sector.

He described Fr Romualdo D’Souza as a visionary in the educational sector and said that he has taken a wise decision to start such a course. The course would give a big boost to upcoming medical tourism in the state and the state would then be able to further promote it as a medical tourism destination.

Others who spoke during the press conference included Dr R G Wiseman Pinto, Mr A K Burman, secretary of Goa Pharmaceutical Manufacturers’ Association and Mr Vijay Mendes, director of Professional Oral Care Pvt Ltd.

The new institution has been supported by the Archdiocese of Goa and Daman would be temporarily housed in Caritas building and a new building would be built on a plot of land given by

Archdiocese.

The role of healthcare manager has been growing rapidly as the healthcare industry grows and demand for trained personnel has been growing fast to respond to many critical problems faced by hospitals, pharmaceutical and other firms.

The students would have a wide variety of elective courses to choose as they qualify for management career in the sector of their choice and would be able to derive benefit from an interdisciplinary full-time faculty and expert part-time faculty from industry.

Some of the courses included in the second year of the programme are: financial management of health institutions, venture capital and finance of innovation, economics of healthcare and policy, healthcare services delivery: a managerial economic approach, legal aspects of healthcare, healthcare marketing, management and economics of pharmaceutical and bio-technology industry, e-health, business and impact and healthcare entrepreneurship.

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Think as a leader

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My two years In business school could be summed up in one sentence. I learned to be competitive, I became more confident and the institute prepared me to face a tough life ahead.

Most of us felt that the learning was not limited to classroom teaching. The competitive spirit of every individual was palpable and the atmosphere within the dormitories was very vibrant, to say the least.

The case study methodology allowed us to think in a structured manner and be more analytical. But as I look back, I find a gap in this methodology. We were made to think like a manager but not as a leader. The emphasis was on numbers, technicalities and logical analysis. We were geared up to thinking that every problem could be solved with the right tools and objective assessment.

In real life, however, the key to success is strong leadership. As India makes it to the top, lead by the services industry, building inspirational leaders at an early stage of the career is paramount to stay ahead in a global environment.

While a few subjects such as organisational behaviour did try to address the softer aspects, they fell short of achieving the objective. There was very little attempt to teach leadership skills and the importance of being modest, tolerant and leading a balanced life. The students would be immensely benefited if B-schools devote more time on providing guidance on career planning.

If I were to be invited to spend some time with the young graduates of today, I would try and communicate a few simple messages:

Do what you love to do; money and recognition will follow. When it comes to learning, be open and maintain humility — you can learn from anyone. Have the drive to learn something everyday and make yourself useful. And finally, “positive attitude” will be your greatest friend in life.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

IITs & IIMs reject ministry’s quota call

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New Delhi, June 5: The human resource development ministry today asked the Indian Institutes of Technology and the Indian Institutes of Management to try and admit more backward class students from the coming academic year.

But the IITs and the IIMs have rejected the proposal, setting the stage for a fresh spat between India’s Delhi-based education czars and the premier engineering and management institutions.

The IITs this year are each admitting 9 per cent of their students from the OBC category. The IIMs are admitting between 3 per cent (IIM Calcutta) and 8 per cent (IIM Lucknow) OBC students this year.

Under the OBC reservation law, cleared by the Supreme Court on April 10, all central government higher education institutions have to implement 27 per cent OBC quota within three years — that is, by the 2010 academic session.

At meetings with direc- tors of the IITs and the IIMs today, the HRD ministry asked the institutes to try and “accelerate” the implementation of OBC reservations, government officials and institute directors revealed.

The meetings in Delhi had officially been called to discuss the level of preparation for the expansion in student intake this year because of the OBC quotas.

But with elections in several states later this year, and general elections due next year, HRD minister Arjun Singh is learnt to have told his officials to try and convince the institutes to raise OBC quotas from this year. Arjun didn’t attend the meetings.

“The IITs said they were already hard-pressed because of the government decision to start six new institutes this year,” an official said.

Each of the six new IITs is being “mentored” by an existing IIT. The new IITs in Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Orissa, Gujarat and Punjab are being mentored by the IITs in Kanpur, Chennai, Guwahati, Kharagpur, Mumbai and Delhi, respectively. In the absence of any infrastructure for the new IITs, some of the mentor institutes might also have to host students from the new IITs.

Implementing even 9 per cent, as they have promised, will be hard, the IITs told the ministry, sources said.

Sources in the IIMs confirmed that the B-schools were even more forthright in rejecting the ministry’s suggestion.

“Accelerating the pace of implementing OBC quotas is impossible for us. The SC verdict came just two months before the start of the academic session. We are sticking to the existing roll-out plan,” an IIM director said after today’s meeting.

Tiffs between the HRD ministry and the IIMs are not uncommon — the last dispute erupted earlier this year over when to implement their highest-ever fee hike, despite opposition from Arjun.

Such differences between the ministry and the IITs have, however, been less frequent.

Monday, June 9, 2008

Education ventures mean serious business for IIM, IIT graduates

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Working in the education sector was always a weekend activity, not a potential employment avenue. But in an emerging wave, students from the best academic institutes are getting inclined towards making a mark in the field of education.

Think of an Indian Institute of Management (IIM) or Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) graduate, and the first thing to come to mind is a plush job either in investment banking, consultancy or IT. However, the likes of Vardan Kabra and Ankita Diwekar-Kabra — students of IIM-Ahmedabad 2004 batch — are changing this thinking.

This duo conceptualised the Fountainhead Education Foundation — a custom-designed pre-school and childcare centre in Surat for children between the age of one and five adapted from internationally renowned methods.

“I got a Rs 7 lakh pre-placement offer from Procter and Gamble (P & G). But neither did I take it up nor sit for the placements. I believe that quality education should be a big business. There are not enough choices for students when it comes to schools and colleges today. And most want to get into whatever the limited options are available. The problem is that there is not enough competition.

The moment there is competition in this sector, it will undergo significant changes, like the telecom industry,” Vardan says.

Vardan’s is not a lone case. Following his footsteps in 2005, two of Vardan’s juniors at IIM-A, Sharat Chandra and Praveen Y decided to take the plunge into education. Coming from an IIT background, Sharat and Praveen decided to pursue their passion for science by creating Butterfly Fields, a supplementary school, which comprises various kinds of activities and experiences, specifically designed to make a child understand the underlying concepts or principles of science through games.

“Education is not just something to be looked at on weekends, we have a serious business plan. Having trained more than 3,000 students from various schools in Hyderabad, we are expanding our presence to other cities. We have also got offers from Indian schools in the UAE to set up our centres, which are being considered,” says Sharat.

The foray into education was not an easy decision considering he had a pre-placement offer from one of the leading international banks.

But within one year, the duo have managed to catch the eye of private equity investors who are keen on picking up stake in the company. More recognition followed after they created a mini-museum-cum-science centre at a school in Hyderabad, which hosted a visit from scientists of NASA. The company has a team of eight, where most of the employees are IIT graduates and more are expected to join soon.

Even as their classmates bag prestigious offers from top corporate houses across the world, these entrepreneurs say that they would prefer to pool in their own resources and create their own paycheques. For most of them, finance is the main constraint, but they eventually manage to find their way around it. Vardan’s Fountainhead, which started with an initial funding of about 13 lakhs from family and friends, has now tied up with a local diamond businessman to set up another 10 acre campus with an investment of Rs 5 crore.

One such venture by IIM alumni, Education Initiatives (EI), has managed to attract a number of investors. The company, which deals with school education and assessment has received its first round of investments from a consortium of investors including Footprint Ventures, Novak Biddle Venture Partners, the ICICI Bank supported IFMR Trust and industrialist Gautam Thapar.

Officials of the company say that the fund will be used to give a wider reach to its testing division as well as expanding operations abroad which has generated interest from schools in West Asia and Singapore.

“Close to 2 lakh students from 1,800 schools have taken our assessment test so far and following the company’s expansion across more states, close to 10 lakh students are expected to be covered in the next three years,” said Sudhir Ghodke, Director of EI and a graduate from IIM-Ahmedabad. The company’s flagship test is conducted for classes 3-10 and assesses students’ comprehension in mathematics, science and english.

Two years ago, four enterprising students of IIM Ahmedabad had decided to opt out of placements to create their own lingerie brand despite getting one crore salary offers. But then education beckoned and they launched a company called Quetzal Online Private Limited. The company deals in educational software and services in the form of websites like engineerprep.com for engineering and tenaday.co.in for MBA entrance exams.

Similarly, K S Bhaskar from IIM-Calcutta started Ascent Education, which provides assistance for CAT preparation. Bhaskar claims that since 2002 over 15 per cent of its students make it to the top B-Schools in India like the six IIMs every year.

Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Banaras Hindu University set to get IIT tag

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Almost 40 years after it first mooted the idea of getting converted into an Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), the Institute of Technology at Banaras Hindu University (IT-BHU), Varanasi, is now ready to don the IIT tag. The Ministry of Human Resource Development as part of the Eleventh Five-Year Plan has allowed IT-BHU to be converted into an IIT.

While IT-BHU is excited about the development, the biggest advantage, it says, will be the financial and social benefits post conversion. Says SN Upadhyay, director, IT-BHU, “The institute will have funding and brand image similar to that of the IITs. It will have financial, academic and administrative autonomy similar to them.”

An IIT status is crucial for the institute as it expects to receive more funding from the government from the next academic year. Currently the institute receives about Rs 50 crores per year and will be entitled to a grant of Rs 110 crore per year apart from Rs 30-50 crore towards research funding. The institute is also said to receive funding towards improvement of its infrastructure.

An IIT status will also help the institute attract good number of quality students with better IIT-JEE ranks. Says Upadhyay, “The academic standards of our college have always been at par with the IITs. With this official recognition, we will be able to attract better students and quality faculty too. This in turn will help us attract better companies on campus for placements.”

The conversion will take around a year with the government modifying the BHU Act 1915 in Parliament.

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

FBS records 100% Summer Internship Placements

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The Summer internship programme at Fostiima Business School (FBS) sees all students getting absorbed in highly paid summer internships at companies like Citibank, ICICIPru, RPG Telecom, Mphasis, Avalon and Mastek. Students submit a project report at the end of the internship, the quality of which matters in final selection and has to be of a high standard.

FBS has been promoted by alumni of IIM-A, each having some 35 years experience of the corporate world. Their colleagues and other IIM alumni are in senior positions in Banks, Logistics, MNC’s, VC’s and Software companies from Lagos to Manchuria and Trinidad to Dublin, not to mention Hong Kong, Singapore, London, Mumbai, Bangalore, New York and Silicon Valley etc. This ensures FBS students of excellent campus placements at reputed corporate houses.

The IIM Ahmedabad linkage also offers another great strength. The FBS trustees have more than 250 years of combined corporate experience and a network of colleagues in senior positions in MNC’s, Global Consultancy companies, Indian Government etc. This ensures FBS students of excellent campus placements at reputed corporate houses. To name a few, Citibank, Johnson & Johnson, Thermax India, ICICI Prudential, RPG Telecomm, Naukari.com, Mphasis, Avalon and Mastek - where the entire 2007 - 09 batch has been absorbed in highly paid summer internships.

The campus shall soon be adding unique features like video conferencing. This shall facilitate professors from leading US, UK and European business schools to provide interactive lectures.