Placements 2005 was a resounding success at FMS, and was an affirmation of the faith of the corporate world in the ability and quality of the FMS students, faculty and fraternity. It could not have been a more eventful placement season at the institute which is celebrating its golden jubilee and as always FMS kept its appointment with excellent placements.

FMS has traditionally had the best placements in the country with respect to choice of jobs on offer for candidates and is usually insulated from downturns in the economy; but the economic boom this time has probably ensured the best ever placements for the campus. FMS, with an optimum batch size of 90 prides itself on having a student friendly placement process, managed by students with most candidates bagging a job of their choice.

"FMS has always had equitable placements across sectors, a sign of a mature and evolved process, without heavy dependence on a particular sector. The placements across sectors and multiple offers this year is an indication of the quality of students in FMS and reputation the institute has in the country." says Dr.Madhu Vij Professor in Charge , Placements. More than 40% of the batch had an offer in hand even before the placement day through a PPO or a lateral offer.

Though FMS enjoys one of the best relationships with the who's who of India's corporate world, the international flavor on campus this year was unmistakable, backed by a strong global alumni community.

The financial services sector led the pack as the recruiter of choice and the highest number of offers was made from this sector. This is a clear indication of the bright future of this vertical with so many international companies making their presence felt in India both to recruit talent for their global operations and to start their operations in India.

The presence of consults on campus including niche financial consults like Stern Stewart & Co was an encouraging sight symbolizing the return of consulting as a major recruiter.

Companies on campus that offered general management profiles were TAS, Aditya Birla Management Corporation, Bharti amongst others.

FMS, the traditional bastion of marketing in India attracted the best from the sector with ITC leading the pack making 7 offers including 2 PPO's.

Leading recruiters from FMCG sector includes Asian Paints, Cadburys, Dabur, GSK, Nestle, Pepsi, Reckitt Benckiser, Seagrams and Perfetti Van Melle.

IBM and HP were the leading recruiters with other companies including Sapient, CSC, Covansys, Infosys, Wipro and Igate making offers to the candidates.

The year saw a considerable increase in the salaries offered by the companies as well as entry of newer companies. The Average Domestic Sal was 8.1 l.p.a as opposed to last year's 7.04 l.p.a. But the significant observation was the preference of candidates was for profiles as opposed to salaries. The BPO sector, which was one of the highest paying, (in excess of 10 l.p.a), saw a few takers while niche finance profiles like treasury and risk management saw the maximum interest generated.

One of the hallmarks of placement process this year was the profiles and the offers to lateral candidates .Lateral Candidates needed to have more than 24 months of work experience to sit of the lateral placements. All the 18 lateral candidates had multiple offers from the lateral process and many of them opted to return to the industry with previous work experience with a profile of the choice.

In keeping with the increasing trend for companies to make Pre Placement offers to candidates based on their summer internship, FMS saw an astounding 35% of the batch being made PPO's and PPI's (Pre Placement Interviews). This is one of the highest across campuses. The Highest domestic salary on campus was 13 Lac p.a from HSBC Bank through the PPO route.

FMS, with the help of its global alumni community has attracted international companies and this year saw a host of such companies. GE FMP and IMLP recruited for the famous GE global training program to train candidates to take up leading positions throughout the GE group worldwide. L.N.Mittal group, visited campus for the first time for M&A advisory for positions across Europe. The Metdist Group, one of Europe's biggest financial conglomerates made an offer for an international position for the first time Citigroup recruited for its positions in Europe through Citibank International (TMEA). Deutsche Bank recruited for its biggest retail operations outside of Europe.

" I always wanted to go into the business consulting domain and this is a good break"

" It's a very exciting to be the first ones to help Deutsche Bank set up its entire retail operations outside of Europe. The learning I would achieve is tremendous and I hope to be at the top of the pyramid in Deutsche Bank Retail operations in very quick time"

"I'm very excited to be picked up by Citigroup for their operations across Europe"

"FMS has once again proved that it is the quality of jobs that are important and ultimately the bottom line is that the students should be happy with their offers. The diversity of the jobs on offer this time was indicative of the overall boom in the economy and our equity in the industry. I wish to congratulate all the students of the batch of 2005 and wish them luck in their respective careers."

Once again, India's oldest B-school came out a winner as it has been doing so in the past 50 years. The future looks even more exciting for FMS, as it marches on to become a truly international campus, backed by one of the most stringent selection processes, excellent Faculty and a global Alumni community more than 10,000 strong. Placements 2005 is just a snapshot of what the future holds for FMS.