The super challenge as the Merifitness Initiative called Tandurusti Ki Pariksha (read paathshala) turned pretty tough on the Intercom members on the first weekend of the month. Nevertheless, there couldn’t be a better way to start adventure sport culture at IO. So the trekking expedition took off at 9 am sharp from the bottom of the famous Ralamandal hill. At scorching 42 degrees, not to mention the humidity, members truly got the taste of ‘heated trekking’ that day. To top that, there were many other fitness-challenge activities that didn’t let them rest even for a while. There were tugs of War, Skipping and Yoga positions. Team members enthusiastically participated in the event that left them feeling fitter than before.

More recruitments

The search for potential candidates continued with Intercom ads calling talented people for all positions. The spree ended much days later with five potential people were selected for the first training batch. Their induction saw a warm welcome by Intercom seniors who inspired each of them to give their best shot.

Of good byes and hellos!

June also had exits and entries of team members. IO bid farewell to Arpit deshpande on 30th June. He received warm greetings and best wishes by the team members who bid him good bye through sweets and flowers. On the other hand, IO family extended a warm welcome to new joinees – Mrunal ghatole as the SEO and trainees Kavita Hedaoo, Abhishek Srivastava, Jyoti Rohom, Rupali Soni, and Dhawal Dawar. IO team wishes all of them the very best for the future.

Birthday bashes

More flowers, more balloons, more smiles and more cheers were added to the usual birthday celebrations this month. Vijay Porwal got a surprise call on his cell on June 4th wishing him an official birthday. Soon after he received cards and sweets from the Intercom family. Then there were merriments and joys shared on June 28th and 30th with Ashish Zarkar and Sunil Rathore’s birthdays. Intercom family extends warmest regards to all these members.

Time is an equal opportunity employer. Each human being has exactly the same number of hours and minutes every day. Rich people can't buy more hours. Scientists can't invent new minutes. And you can't save time to spend it on another day. Even so, time is amazingly fair and forgiving. No matter how much time you've wasted in the past, you still have an entire tomorrow.

— Denis Waitley (Noted writer)

For most people, many facts related to several things don’t make sense unless the facts have something extremely personal for them. This month, lets explore some such impersonal facts that make sense only when we view them closely and more personally

Take for example the facts about what inspired Earth Hour in 2008. When 2.2 million homes and 2100 businesses in Sydney turned off their lights for one hour on March 31, 2008, it reduced the city’s energy consumption by 10.2% for one hour.

Now how does it affect me? You would say. What if someone told you that this 10.2% energy consumption means taking 48,616 cars off the road for a year! Suddenly the thought of your favourite car dawns on you.

You would find it difficult in comprehending the fact that ceiling fans instead of air conditioners whenever possible can cut a lot of electricity cost. Lets look at another perspective of it. The differential in operating cost is approximately 30 paise per hour for fans as opposed to Rs 10 for air conditioning. Replacing the metal blades of a fan with fiber blades can save 20% energy overall. Makes sense?

However, if air conditioning is all that you have, each degree set above 22° Celsius will use 3-5% less energy. The recommended temperature to set the thermostat at is 25° Celsius, which is both comfortable and cost efficient.

Another effective way of saving power using it wisely is going for multi-coated glazing windows that help in restraining cool air escape. It is also advisable to install weather-strips under doors, windows, and ducts to avoid air leakage. Getting multiple coated glazes on glass windows also reduces air conditioning energy usage by about 40 percent.

In a country like India we can install green meshes on west facing windows and doors, so that it blocks direct sunlight heat and reduces the load on the air conditioners. This can be uninstalled in winters to let sunlight come in and reduce the need of heaters. Many businesses also have a large number of plants with drip irrigation, which helps to reduce the heat as it increases moisture in the air.

For more tips and interesting ways to use electricity wisely, watch out for the next newsletter.

"I feel very lucky to be working here as I always am able to update my knowledge of designing here. The company has provided me with a great and fruitful working environment. I have learnt a lot with my Team leader and seniors. Apart from a great working environment, I am glad the company is active on extracurricular front too like celebrations and sports. Thanks to all members of Intercom family."

- Vijay Sahu

Dear Friends and partners,

Hope this letter finds you in the best of work spirits. If I had to describe in one word how our performance has been during the last month, it would be- steady. We have developed at least 10 websites on Magento customization. Last time I shared with you that we had started working on Moodle customization. Now we are also working on Scrom with Moodle customization as the focus is on e-learning. This has given another level to our work. The work on the i-phone application development is almost on the verge of finishing apart from the fact that we are almost ready with Merifitness portal, which shall be launched shortly. We have already done customization and integration with Drupal sites, which has been quite an achievement during the last two months.

In addition to that, from next month onwards our team would be excited to work on Symphony framework, which is a level up the Zend framework. This month we also intend to work more on Magento but with ERP integration.

I hope we all continue the good work as always. Happy Monsoon!

God Bless

Nidhi Mongia, COO