PTCL and CBA Sign Agreement

Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL), has inked an agreement with the CBA (Collective Bargaining Agent), extending numerous financial benefits to the employees, coupled with additional EOBI pension benefits safeguarding their post retirement life.

The agreement was signed at a ceremony held at PTCL Headquarters, which was attended by senior members of PTCL management and representative of the employees union.

SEVP (HR) Syed Mazhar Hussain termed this agreement a landmark development in the history of the company. He marked it, an emblem of mutual respect and a key driver of employee motivation. He expressed that this shall auger well for boosting the morale of the employees and in turn shall result into a better corporate performance.

The agreement between the top management and the employees union is regarded as a great moment for everyone in the organization and is considered a monumental step towards building a more trusting relationship between the employees and the management.

This will explore new horizons for the employees of PTCL and will consequently increase the mutual trust and confidence of the employees and positively impact their performance. PTCL is promoting an open door policy for the employees and this Agreement would go a long way in achieving a new beginning and development of employee friendly environment.

The president of CBA Mr. Ziauddin along with office bearers thanked the President & CEO, SEVP HR and other members of PTCL management for approving the package for the employees and vowed to give their best on behalf of the employees for the common interest of the company.

Source : Propakistani.pk

Dell Unveils its New XPS 15 Ultrabook to Take on the Macbook Air

Dell has unveiled a successor to its flagship XPS 15 laptop and has made it even sleeker yet powerful than before.

The new XPS 15 comes with a 15 inch touch-enabled display with resolution of 3200 x 1800 pixels and the new 4th-generation Intel Haswell processors under the hood. Still, the entire package weighs in at just 4.4 pounds and is 18mm thin.

The ultrabook’s display comes with IGZO (Indium Galium Zinc Oxide) Technology which saves power and gives a sharper image. On the hardware side, it can have up to a quad-core 2.2Ghz Intel Core i7 Haswell processor, 16 GB of RAM, 512 GB SSD storage option and Nvidia’s GeForce GT 750M GPU.

The laptop comes with the latest Windows 8.1 pre-installed. The hardware bit is made of carbon fiber and magnesium alloys. Connectivity options include 3 USB 2.0 ports, 1 USB 2.0 port, HDMI, Mini DisplayPort and a full SD card slot.

Battery life is quoted at 13 hours, thanks to the new display and processor tech.

This all looks quite good right? Well here’s the bad bit: It will cost $1499, and that’s for the starting model which won’t have this display (instead a 1080p one), and will come with a Core i5 processor and integrated graphics.

Comparatively, its biggest competitor, the Macbook Air is priced closely but lacks several goodies which you’ll find here. It’s true that specs and statistics aren’t everything but if they were, the XPS 15′s top-of-the-line model would be among the better laptops which you can find today.

Samsung, HTC, LG and ASUS Caught Tempering Benchmark Apps to Appear Better

Way back in July, Samsung was caught rigging benchmark scores for its Galaxy S4 flagship smartphone.

Three days ago, that happened again, this time in the case of the Note 3. That, coupled with it getting caught posting fake reviews on HTC’s user reviews page must’ve tarnished its image to a lot of extent but now, its looking like the other companies aren’t any good either.

According to a new and detailed report by AnandTech, companies including HTC, LG and ASUS are doing exactly the same with their flagships.

How is it done? You see, different benchmark apps (majorly for Android iOS) are available at Play Store to demonstrate how the investigated Android device will perform in varying conditions. In case of the Note 3 as soon as the benchmark was started, the phone’s 4 cores kicked in at a full speed of 2.3Ghz which gave it a 20% speed boost and helped it thrash the similarly-specced LG G2.

When those culprit lines of code were identified and were removed from the benchmark app, the result was considerably less overwhelming then before.

This new report, however, identifies even more phones including the LG G2 (yes, no one’s the underdog here), HTC One, One Mini, ASUS Padfone Infinity, Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 and the new Galaxy Note 10.1 2014 as the culprits.

AnTuTu and Vellamo were the apps which saw most tempering attempts, something expected given their acclaim.

The only companies which emerged as the innocent were Motorola, Apple and Sony that didn’t indulge themselves in such practises at all. 

Truth betold, not many people base their judgement of a product on benchmarks solely but still, fooling users and critics alike into believing that a product is better than it is isn’t a good thing to do, by any means.

via Ars Technica and AnandTech

Source : Propakistani.pk

Sindh Government to Ban Skype, Viber, WhatsApp and Tango for Three Months

Sindh government has plans to block instant messaging apps including Skype, Viber, WhatsApp, Tango and other similar applications for at least three months.

Sindh Information Minister Sharjeel Memon confirmed this during a press briefing today.

According to Sindh Minister, terrorists are using these instant messaging apps for communication. He said that terrorists are switching from conventional communication channel to internet based instant messaging and this is why his government has decided to ban these applications.

Pakistan is pretty familiar with the “BAN” word and this is another example of curbing the communication networks in the name of security.

cellular networks, VPN, Skype and various other services have remained blocked during the past in the name of security.

Sindh Information Minister believes that his government will contact Pakistan Telecommunication Authority to get the decision implemented.

Our sources at PTA, however, said that PTA is liable to Ministry of Information Technology and Telecom and may not entertain Sindh Government’s request.

It merits mentioning here that decision isn’t implemented yet, and may require necessary approvals from federal government.

It won’t be out of place to mention here that blockade of any service is implemented by PTA on orders of MoITT only.

Users are already storming the Sindh Government with criticism over the decision.

Source : Propakistani.pk

Pakistan is Finally Set to Auction 3G Licenses

After the appointment of Chairman and Members of Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, the government of Pakistan is all prepared to auction 3G licenses in Pakistan.

The government, in this regards, has finalized the policy directive for the auction of long awaited 3G licenses in the country.

As per information that we have got, a high-level committee has been formed to expedite the auction process.

Pakistani consumers have been waiting for 3G networks to get better data connections over mobile phones for years. Earlier in 2011-12, at least two efforts for auction 3G licenses failed due to various reasons.

Even now the auction has been made possible through a Supreme Court order thatdirected the government to immediately appoint Chairman and Members for early auction of 3G. After which the appointments were made in almost a rush.

It merits mentioning here that new telecom licenses, such as 3G spectrum, can’t be auctioned without PTA chairman and members.

As soon as the appointments were made, activity for auction of 3G licenses went high. Chairman  PTA and Minister IT and Telecom has already briefed the senate’s standing committee on Telecom and confirmed that policy directive has been finalized.

Minister further told the senate body that a high-level committee – constituted by the Prime Minister himself – will approve the policy for further proceedings on the auction.

This special committee is chaired by federal minister for finance, while members include Ms. Anusha Rahman, Minister for Information Technology & Telecom, Akhlaq Ahmad Tarar, Secretary (IT & Telecom), Syed Ismail Shah interim chairman PTA and others.

The realization of 3G auction can take at least three more months.

In its next step, after the approval of policy directive (which is likely during current week), PTA will hire a consultant to prepare IM for the auction of 3G spectrum. Later on this IM will be floated and telecom companies (local and international) will be given around one month to prepare themselves for the auction bidding.

Experts say that bidding for 3G licenses is likely to take at least three to four months from now.

Anusha Rehman, Minister for IT and Telecom, during a briefing to media yesterday said that at least four telecom companies operating in Pakistan have shown serious interest in acquiring 3G licenses. Along with local operators, government is also hoping that foreign operators will take part in the bid.

Pakistan government is eyeing USD 800 million to USD 1 billion from the auction.

It is likely that government will auction three 3G licenses, with a base price of USD 210 million. Local and International companies will be invited for the bid, with a possible ban on defaulting telecom companies. However, final details for the participation criteria and pricing of spectrum will be revealed after the finalization of IM.

Source : propakistani.pk