The Engineering students of SRM University-AP never failed to excel in the competitive placement drives with their unrivalled fervour. The Department of Computer Science and Engineering students are beyond thrilled about their placement with Marquee offers up to ₹26.50 LPA. G Lakshmi Sai Bhargavi, Sneha Teja Sree Reddy Thondapu, Addepalli Srilekha, Jaya Ganesh Kumar Gudipati, V S S Mani Saketh CH, Sashank Venkata Challapalli, Nallanukala Tejaswini, and Satti Venkata Rama grabbed marquee offers with incredible salary packages.

The placement team of the university considers and analyses major recruiting companies’ criteria to equip our students to meet the various levels of constantly transforming industry demands. Students are instructed and trained from the very beginning of their programmes to know the pulse and challenges of the tomorrow they are exposed to. “The Placement team helped me a lot by introducing many Marquee companies at the beginning of academic years, which made me work faster on my skills”, says Mani Saketh with gratitude. “The way they helped us by conducting constant training sessions and responding very quickly whenever we had a single doubt or concern is commendable”, he added.

Making students industry-ready has always been a significant concern of the university. The courses provided in the university are supported not only by soft skill training but also by professional training. “There is always the possibility of starting from scratch here. Daily technical assessments helped us understand the industrial standards and requirements”, said Srilekha as she recollected her training days.

The Directorate of Corporate Relations and Career Services firmly believes that the latest placement offers marks just the beginning of the 2023 placements. Year after year, there is a considerable increase in the number of students recruited from the university. The placement team expects much more quality offers in the new placement season.

Marketing a product or service is a challenging task in an ever-evolving marketplace. The latest book publication from the Directorate of Corporate Relations and Career Services portrays how marketing and entrepreneurship are not only creative but also cohesive and interesting. Mr Sourav Biswas, Regional Placement Manager of the Directorate of Corporate Relations and Career Services, has co-authored the book Marketing for Entrepreneurs with Dr Punit Kumar Dwivedi, Dr Biswarup Neogi, and Mr Saurabh Bharti. It offers entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs a rich fare of stimulating ideas, a new vision of challenging insight, and the proper marketing and entrepreneurial solutions. It was published by Scientific International Publishing House and launched in August. The book targets an audience with a plan to start innovative ventures in the future.

A brief about the book

Entrepreneurs face most difficulties in two significant areas: selling their products/offerings and finance. Initial stage cash flow is required to develop the product and sustain it. If companies don’t achieve sales, their failure is impending. To bring products or services to the market, entrepreneurs must communicate their offerings to the external environment.

Entrepreneurship and Marketing have traditionally been viewed as two different subjects of study. Increasing awareness of the significance of innovations and entrepreneurship in marketing and the importance of marketing for fruitful entrepreneurial ventures has led to an effort to combine entrepreneurship and marketing as the discipline of entrepreneurial marketing. In the area of entrepreneurial marketing (EM), there seems to be an agreement among researchers and entrepreneurs to undertake marketing in different ways that seem different from the established model of the market.

Mr Sourav Biswas was a member of the IIPC (Industry Institute Partnership Cell) cell as well as a convener of the Innovation council while he started working on the book. He came across many cases where students had started their innovative ideas, which the college funded. But in 90 percent of cases, companies can’t make a profit, or it has been closed within 2-3 years due to a lack of Marketing mix (product, place, price, and promotion). Based on this observation, the authors tried to find a way to help young entrepreneurs to succeed. They envisioned a future where many more entrepreneurs come forward with innovation and proper marketing strategies.

The moment he got the placement offer was surreal for Edala Naveen from the Department of Computer Science Engineering. Naveen was incredibly pleased with the opportunity. He has been placed at Crossover with an exciting offer of 44.91 LPA. He will be working at the company as an innovator to handle multiple technology stacks and develop projects and research work for use across the group of companies. He believes that his role in the company itself beckons interesting challenges and that he is in a well-poised position to make maximum use of it.

The training he received from the university has largely been from the ISCP and ISES subjects. These subjects are beneficial in preparing for GRE and IELTS and thus helped him clear the assessments for the placement. He secured high scores for CSAT and GRE and aced IELTS with a score of 8.5 in 9. He could also crack the coding tests with the knowledge he earned from the ISCP classes at the university.

Naveen was in awe of the Next Tech Lab of the university, which was a robust support system for him throughout the process. “Not only did the student-run nature of the lab help me have a safe environment to fail faster, but it also helped me to maintain the sense of autonomy that ultimately provided me with the confidence to attempt and clear the role’s requirements,” he said.

He was impressed with the personnel and staff who had helped him by availing resources and knowledge when he reached out to them. The constant assistance from the Directorate of Corporate Relations and Career Services was a valuable addition to his preparation for the technical interviews. He conveyed his gratitude to his former professors; Dr Prateek from Screenwriting, Dr Anupama Ghattu from Teaching and Learning, and Dr Priyanka from Computer Organisation and Architecture. Their patience and welcoming learning environment allowed him to express and learn from his mistakes.

Naveen considers this placement an excellent stepping stone to launching a career. He aspires to continue his higher education alongside this job. In the near future, he wishes to gather the experience and technical skills necessary to give back to the community through education.

Addepalli Srilekha from the Department of Computer Science and Engineering is excited to step into a new phase of life with her incredible marquee offer of CTC 26.50. She is placed at Paypal, an American multinational fin-tech company that operates an online payments system that supports online money transfers. She is selected for the position of data scientist, where she will work for the Resolutions and Protections Team.

She had the assistance of the Directorate of Corporate Relations and Career Services at every stage of her placement journey. Constant support and guidance were given to the students and different sessions were held in an organised manner which covered various aspects such as coding, interview handling skills, Resume building sessions, etc. One-on-one feedback sessions were also conducted by the placement panel, which was extremely helpful for the students.

Srilekha always wanted to work in data science, so she began her training with Python, SQL, Excel, and a few data visualisation courses. She has consistently learned all the fundamental concepts of computer science, such as data structures, operating systems, and database management systems. She also participated in Competitive Coding Contests from the beginning, which helped her develop an interest in coding and problem-solving. To learn the fundamental concepts, she used to refer to University materials and a few online resources. She has also done much hands-on coding and regularly applied the theoretical knowledge she gained.

The training received at SRM University- AP was highly relevant, timely, and beneficial for Srilekha. For students at various levels, various types of training were provided. “There is always the possibility of starting from scratch here. Daily technical assessments helped us understand the industrial standards and requirements”, said Srilekha as she recollected her training days. Company-specific tests were also administered, and regular alum connect sessions were organised to assist students in understanding the organisations’ recruitment and operations.

She is thankful to Dr Jatindra Kumar Dash, Dr Murali Krishna Enduri, and Dr Priyanka S for their excellent teaching, which was a great help for her during the placement season. “Dr Jatindra Kumar Dash greatly aided my understanding of Machine Learning Algorithms. Because of his guidance, I was able to answer every ML-related question in the interviews”, said Srilekha with gratitude. The classes she took helped enhance her subject knowledge and gain hands-on experience.

She studied FLAT and Compiler Design for two semesters under Dr Murali Krishna Enduri. This subject helped her understand the insights of Automata theory and the structural workings of compilers. These two subjects are Srilekha’s favorites solely because of Dr Murali Krishna Enduri. Dr Priyanka S taught her two crucial subjects that played a significant role in the placement season: Introduction to Python and Operating Systems. Her classes were very organised, and the teaching strategies were very effective.

Srilekha aspires to come up with new ideas and innovations at her workplace and climb up the ladder of her career with determination and hard work.

Mani Saketh is beyond happy to get placed with a Marquee offer of CTC 21 LPA in his third year of under graduation at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering. He is placed at Western Digital, the company that introduced hard discs to the world. An immense commitment to obtain a Marquee offer was the driving force of his placement journey. He believed in keeping hope, persistence, and perfection alive at heart as they procreate the momentum to learn anything.

The company he got placed in basically works on HDD’s, SSD’s, Pendrive, NAND Flash-based Storage devices, etc. It is a hard disk drive manufacturer and data storage company. It is also the parent company of SanDisk. It was his internship that led him to this enormous placement offer.

He is in awe of the robust support system that the Directorate of Corporate Relations and Career Services is. “They helped me a lot by bringing many Marquee companies at the beginning, which made me work faster on my skills. The way they helped us by conducting various training sessions, responding very quickly whenever we have a single doubt or concern is commendable”, said Mani Saketh with most gratitude.

He was part of the Marquee Training Batch, where he got the freedom to practice whatever he wanted. But at the end of the day, all he wanted was to show some progress. Students who attended the Marquee training session used to solve coding questions, and if anyone failed to find the solutions, they had discussions in peer groups. This helped the students with the benefits of self-learning. The interactions among students during the problem-solving sessions encouraged their communication skills and improved their efficiency in resolving any coding question.

Mani Saketh thanked Mr Laxmanan Angu Raju, one of the senior managers of the Directorate of CR&CS, for having hope and confidence in him. According to him, getting placed at Western Digital wouldn’t be possible without the help of Ms Akhila, CR&CS executive. The mentoring and training of the placement team stayed with him throughout the placement session. He also thanked Dr Jaya Lakshmi Tangirala, his placement mentor, who made him realise the importance of CSE core fundamentals in the initial days of placement training.

As of now, Mani Saketh wants to convert this internship offer to a full-time offer and would like to work in the organisation for at least three years. Later, based on his interest, he wants to study further and grow in the company.