What: Chennai's Great Lakes Institute of management (GLIM) has equipped its students with some knowledge of Mandarin, Chinese history and culture.
The result: placement offers from companies with business interests in China.
Campus placements
GLIM, which is in the midst of placing its first batch of students, has received firm offers for 20 students from Infosys Technologies, HCL, DCM Shriram and the Godrej Group.
According to S Sriram, executive director, GLIM, along with these, in-principle offers to four students for a China posting have come in from Orchid Chemicals and an UK company.
Some of the companies expected to visit the campus are TCS, Cognizant Technology Solutions, IBM and IDBI, as well as business groups such as Reliance and Murugappa to place people in businesses across the group.
The average salary for the 20 students who have been hired is Rs 500,000 to Rs 600,000.
The highest salary so far has been about Rs 800,000, offered by a software company to a student with eight years of work experience.
Languages in the curriculum
The decision to introduce the China focus to the curriculum was triggered by the investment bank Goldman Sachs' BRICs report, which forecast that China, along with Brazil, India and Russia, would be among the world's leading economies by 2050.
The China-based courses were mandatory for students with work experience of less than two years, said Sriram.
Mandarin is to be followed by Spanish lessons for the next batch.
About GLIM
GLIM is a not-for-profit organisation that was promoted largely by a group of Non Resident Indians. Among the well-known Indian promoters are the Tata group, HDFC and Jamshyd N Godrej.
GLIM contact details
Phone: (044) 5216 8228
Web site: www.glakes.org
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