Our seminar series is called SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES. We had 3 seminars so far and one National conference under this series.

SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES 1
This was an SPSS programme for 3 days by a team of professionals from PSG College, Coimbatore and was attended by 15 faculty including 5 from other institutes.

SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES 2
This was a one day seminar on insurance and was addressed by senior insurance professionals from 5 different insurance companies to acquaint the students and staff on this sunrise industry. Besides own students, the seminar was attended by 30 students from 6 different institutes.

SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES 3
This was a 2 day National level conference on finance and banking  sponsored  by AICTE. The programme was attended by scholars from 9 states in India. Faculty from IIM L, Kerala University, Mangalore university etc. attended the conferece. The national confernce in Finance and Banking is intended to be an annual event in September. The programme was supported by Travancore Management Association and inaugurated by Mr. A.P Kurien, Chairman Association of Mutual Funds of India. Executive Director of South Indian Bank gave the Key note address. For more details of this confernce refer to the Conferences page in this web site.

SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES 4
This was publication of a book named "Finance and Banking-An anthology of contemporary researach by Dr. P.S James and Dr. Roji George of the institue. It was published by Excel books and covers contemporary research in areas of Capital Market, Corporate Finance, Corporate Governance, Derivatives, Banking, Financial Services. This must possess book for libraries and researachers in Finance and Banking is priced at Rs. 1800.00. We hold a few copies which can be purchased from us direct at Rs. 1000.00 by sending a DD for the amount in favour of Saintgits Institute of Management.

SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES 5
This is a one day seminar on Publishing and is scheduled on 3rd January 2009 at Kochi and is being conducted as a joint programme of SIM and Association of Indian Management Scholars (AIMS). Dr. Om Prakash Gupta, who is the resource person is a faculty in College of Business of Prairie View A&M University, USA. He is a former professor of Purdue Univeristy, Ball State University, Washington University, IIM Ahmedabad and the founder director of Nirma University. This is a must attend seminar for all those who wish to publish in reputed journals.

SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES 6

NCFB 2009: The second national conference on Finance & Banking- NCFB 2009 was conducted on 28^th & 29^th August 2009 at SIM. The conference was inaugurated y Shri R Anand, Partner, Earnst & Young, Chennai in the presence of Shri Giby George, Regional Head- ICICI Bank, Cochin who gave the keynote address in the inaugural function.  Shri Alex K Babu, Managing Director, Hedge Equities, Cochin gave a talk on capital market. Forty one researchers from varied areas like Capital Market, Corporate Finance, Corporate Governance, Banking, Financial Services and Insurance presented their research papers.  The various sessions were chaired by Dr. Amitah Guptha (University of Delhi), Dr Matiyur Rehman (Independent University, Dhaka, Bangladesh) Dr Malabika Deo  (Pondicherry University, Pondicherry). The proceedings of the conference was published as an edited volume titled 'Finance & Banking: A Collection of Contemporary Research (Edn) by Excel Publishers, N. Delhi (Editors : James P S, Roji George and Roshna Varghese)

 SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES 7

NCFB 2010: The Third National conference on Finance & Banking- NCFB 2010 was inaugurated by Dr Martin Maurer, Secretary General, Association of Foreign Banks in Switzerland in the presence of Mr R Vijayendiran, Head of Portfolio Managers of BNP Paribas                                                                          who gave the keynote address in the inaugural function. Dr.K.V.S.S.Narayana Rao, Professor, Finance of NITTIE, Mumbai handled a special session on Research in Finance in the afternoon session of the first day. Forty eight researchers from different parts of the country presented papers in the various technical sessions on Capital Market, Corporate Finance, Corporate Governance, Banking and Insurance. The various sessions were chaired by Dr.K.V.S.S.Narayana Rao, Dr Malabika Deo  (Pondicherry University, Pondicherry), Dr.Srinivasa Rao Gangadharan (IFMR, Chennai) and Dr. Shrikrishna S. Mahajan (Shvaji University, Kolhapur). The conference was conducted in association with Travancore Management Association, Kottyam.  The proceedings of the conference was published as an edited volume titled 'Rediscovering Finance & Banking'  Excel Publishers, N. Delhi (Editors : James P S, Roji George and Roshna Varghese)

SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES 8

Emerging Dimensions in Marketing',

conference on trends in marketing was held on 19th and 20th November 2010 with the objective of bringing to a common platform the academicians and marketing professionals to share knowledge and insight. It provided an opportunity for disseminating new research findings & discussing practices, techniques and contemporary trends in marketing.  Further it served the objective of facilitating interaction between the practitioners and academicians to identify areas to work together and develop avenues for research.

The conference had four major sections - Inaugural, Academic, Plenary and Valedictory in which academicians and senior executives from industry from shared their experiences and thoughts.  32 select papers were presented

The Scheme of the Conference:

The conference was scheduled to be a two day programme to be.

The conference was inaugurated by Mr P V Ramesh, State Marketing Head and GM, Zuari Cements, who talked about need for innovation in marketing and emergence of  commodity branding. Our Director, CEO, GM, Director Academics & Research and Principal were present. 

 ·         Academic sessions were held in 8 tracks with two parallel tracks  -with 4 papers in each track. Each participant was allotted 15 minutes for presenting the paper and 5 minutes for the QA session. An external faculty to function as chair and internal faculty and student team in supporting role. The external chairs were Dr Omkumar Krishnan, IMT Ghaziabad; Dr Githa Hegde, Chair Mktg, Welingkar Bangalore; Dr Lubna Nafees, IMTG;   Dr S K Nagarajan, Associate Professor Mktg, Annamalai University; Dr Francis Cherunilam, Professor CUSAT and Dr Molly Koshy, Professor SMS Cochin. 

 ·         A plenary session was held after the 4 panels of academic sessions on day 1, from 3.00 to 5.00 PM; chaired by Prof A Sreekumar, Dean Management Studies, Goa University. Panelists included Dr Githa Heggde & Dr Lubna Nafees representing the academia;  Mr Jacob Thomas, VP Lowe Lintas Market Research, and Mr Oommen Mammen, Director KVM Group of Institutions and former GM Marketing, Smith & Nephew. The discussion focused on the theme 'Marketing in the Post Recession Era'. The discussion and interaction were well appreciated by the audience. 

 ·         The day 1 programme ended with a conference dinner at Windsor Castle, which was attended by most of the participants including all outside state participants. 

 ·         Day 2 morning in two parallel sessions, 4 tracks were held. Of the 32 papers scheduled for the two days 29 were presented and 3 in-absentia. 

 ·         The conference concluded on 20^th by 3.00 pm after a valedictory function chaired by Director. In the key note address, Dr Francis Cherunilam spoke about how India emerged with out much damage from the recession and warned about the possibility of a double dip recession. Certificates and mementos were presented by Director and Dr Cherunilam. 

Details Papers Presented. 

 ·         Call for Papers were issued in July 2010 by post and email. About 3000 mails were sent to all available data bases calling for abstracts. Website was updated to provide current information to those accessing website. Printed brochures were sent to about 450 leading institutions.  

 ·         92 abstracts were received and 72 were shortlisted. Of the 57 full papers received, 47 were selected for abstract publication. From this 32 papers were selected for final presentation in the eight tracks.  

 ·         Papers were presented by faculty from outside Kerala, from MBA institutions in Kerala and 8 by PhD Scholars. Schedules were strictly followed. And organizing of the presentations were highly appreciated. 

Accommodation & Transport 

 ·         The Chief Guest and Panelists who needed stay were accommodated in Contour Resorts, Changanacherry and rest of the delegates at Kottayam - Hotel Shakthi/YMCA. 

 ·         Transport facility from the college was used. Student teams under the leadership of     Mr. Shankar  of S3 ensured all hospitality required till they reach campus. 

Publication 

 ·         A book of Conference Abstracts was prepared and sent to all important MBA Colleges in Kerala and 20 other organizations 

 ·         10 papers were short listed by a panel of two senior professors and identified for publication by Excel under the title, 'Marketing in the Post Recession Era' 

 ·         The publication is expected to be ready by end December. 

Publicity 

The event generated good coverage and publicity for Saintgits through news paper report before the event and a detailed coverage in Mathrubhumi & New age post event. It is to be carried in ET in Campus. 

The event co-ordinator places on record his sincere thanks to the management for all support, presence  and complete funding, Associate Dean, faculty and staff for support provided and the participants for the intellectual contribution and creation of a great academic fraternity.

SIMTHESIS KNOWLEDGE SERIES 9

A one day seminar on Environmental Management was organized in Saintgits Institute of Management on 20^th Dec 2010. The seminar was addressed by Dr. John Bryden and Dr. Karen Refsgaard from Nrowegian Agricultural Research Institute, Norway. Nineteen external participants from near by institutions participated in this seminar along with S3 MBA students of SIM.

An introduction to systems thinking and systems approaches to the integrated assessment of environmental, economic and social outcomes of different policy options or market scenarios by Dr. John M Bryden was the introductory session. Dr. Karen Refsgaard, Senior Researcher, engaged the next session on Institutional, economic and social issues around solid and human waste, including recycling systems and ecological sanitation in particular.

This was followed by student presentations. Three teams of students presented papers on current environmental issues. They are as follows

1.       Eco Aesthetic Perspective in the myth of Kalluruthy- Ms. Kalyani Krishnan & Ms. Saumya M.R.,  from DCSMAT, Tvpm

2.       Sarpa Kavu - Conservation of Medicinal plants by Reshma R & Viswesh Viswanathan, from SIM, Kottayam.

3.       Bio-medical waste disposal in Hospitals by Chinnu Mary Mathew and Simi Sundaram, from SIM, Kottayam

Dr. John Bryden also engaged another session on Institutional, economic and social issues around renewable energy as a regional development option in rural regions. This was followed by an interactive session with the participants on the themes discussed by the speakers.