Tata Value Homes announced three day online exhibition starts from 13 July to 15 July through a valid invite code. The registration process for the three day event will start on Wednesday (8 July). Only customers with a valid invite can buy homes of their choice across 11 projects in seven cities.Brotin Banerjee, MD & CEO of Tata Housing Development Company said, "We at Tata Housing, place our consumers at the focus of our operations. Our online platform has received an overwhelming response from our consumers with over 1500 booking till date. Though it was started as an experiment, it has now emerged as the fastest growing channel of sales for the real-estate industry."At the exhibition, home buyers can avail a special offer of getting an extra room with their home at no extra cost.He further added "We are confident of recreating the perfect home buying experience online through this exhibition."
Read More
Ronita Mitra has resigned as the SVP and Head of Brand, Media, Digital and Consumer Insights of Vodafone India. Sources close to the development have confirmed the news to Businessworld.At Vodafone India, Mitra was responsible for driving brand affinity through highly engaging communication and brand engagement though activation programs resulting in leadership in brand health metrics, including the IPL sponsorship.Mitra has 21 years of experience in business marketing and brand building across multiple categories and industries, including FMCG, financial services and telecom. The experience covers managing brands in India with significant global exposure.Her experience includes launch and re-launch of brands across categories and industries.Previously she has worked with FMCG organisations such as Johnson & Johnson, Bestfoods, Marico and Castrol. She has also worked in the financial services sector with ICICI Bank.She was behind reviving the reputation of the ICICI Bank brand post the 2008 crisis at the bank and launched the new brand identity of ICICI Bank articulated as 'Khayaal Aapka'.
Read More
Microsoft Corp plans to announce a new round of layoffs as early as Wednesday to cut costs further, the New York Times reported.The latest job cuts are in addition to the 18,000 jobs that Microsoft said it planned to cut a year ago, the newspaper said, citing sources familiar with the matter.The layoffs are expected to affect employees at the company's hardware group, including the smartphone business that it acquired from Nokia last year, the newspaper said, adding that Microsoft had more than 118,000 employees globally at the end of March.
Read More
With this partnership, Celltick will provide a fully managed high-value interactive service on the home screen for BSNL's 77.2 million mobile subscribers through its patented LiveScreen platform.Anupam Shrivastava, Chairman & Managing Director, BSNL, said, "This partnership enable us to realise our vision of delivering high value, easy to access services and provide real and substantial benefits, further enhancing the experience of BSNL mobile's subscribers".With BSNL BUZZ, BSNL subscribers can experience value added services and content promotions such as news, contests, subscription packs, coupons and advertising.The service will also deliver location-based information services in seven local languages such as Hindi, English, Bengali, Tamil, Malayalam , Kannada and Telegu. BSNL BUZZ, live app, is embedded in every BSNL Mobile SIM card within the network, enabling interactive Cell Broadcast.BSNL BUZZ comprises of two services that are enabled through Cell Broadcast Technology - Cell Info/Mass Alerts and Interactive Cell Broadcast. Cell Info/Mass Alerts services includes non-interactive messaging service for sending out messages to millions of BSNL users, communicating BSNL service offerings, social awareness and emergency messages.Cell Broadcast is an interactive messaging service. This service is enabled by a combination of cell broadcast technology on the user SIM card and dedicated messaging software on networks servers, and it supports - DND capability, local languages in native scripts, segmentation, silent & no-intrusive messages, menu based responses facilitating interaction for users. This is a powerful tool promoting BSNL services, content, government social campaigns, market research and advertising campaigns.
Read More
Chinese stocks dived on Wednesday after the securities regulator said the tumbling stock market in the world's second-biggest economy was in the grip of "panic sentiment" as investors ignored a battery of support measures from Beijing. Amid signs of the market freezing up as companies scrambled to have trading in their shares suspended, the People's Bank of China said it was watching closely and would guard against systemic regional financial risks. The CSI300 index of the largest listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen fell 5 percent in early trade, while the Shanghai Composite Index was down 4.3 percent. Both indexes had plunged around 8 percent at the market open. Around 30 percent has been knocked off the value of Chinese shares since mid-June, and for some global investors the fear that China's market turmoil will destabilise the real economy is now looming as a bigger risk than the euro zone crisis. "Today is all about China, with Greece in the background now that it's been given a new deadline," said Ayako Sera, senior market economist at Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank in Tokyo. "Shanghai's early losses were like a cliff-dive, which had a huge impact on investor sentiment." The ChiNext growth board of small-cap companies, which has seen some of the biggest swings in valuations, fell 1.6 percent. Over 500 China-listed firms announced trading halts on the Shanghai and Shenzhen Exchange on Wednesday, taking total suspensions to about 1,300 - 45 percent of the market - as companies seek shelter from the rout. "I've never seen this kind of slump before. I don't think anyone has. Liquidity is totally depleted," said Du Changchun, an analyst at Northeast Securities. "Originally, many wanted to hold blue chips. But since so many small caps are suspended from trading, the only way to reduce risk exposure is to sell blue chips." Souring BoomThe plunge in China's previously booming stock markets, which had more than doubled in the year to mid-June, is a major headache for President Xi Jinping and China's top leaders, who are already struggling to avert a sharper economic slowdown. Beijing's interventionist response has also raised questions about its ability to enact the market liberalisation steps that are a centrepiece of its economic reform agenda. China has orchestrated brokerages and fund managers to promise to buy at least 120 billion yuan ($19 billion) of stocks, helped by a state-backed margin finance company which the central bank pledged on Wednesday to provide sufficient liquidity. Unlike other major stock markets, which are dominated by professional money managers, retail investors account for around 85 percent of China trade, which exacerbates volatility. "It's uncommon to see so many shares posting consecutive daily limit falls, and the index futures swinging so wildly," said Wang Feng, CEO and founder of hedge fund firm Alpha Squared Capital Co and a former Wall Street trader. "It's a stampede. And the problem of the market is that all the players move in the same direction, and are too emotional." A surprise interest-rate cut by the central bank at the end of June, relaxations in margin trading and other "stability measures" did little to calm investors. The barrage of official commentary and new support measures continued on Wednesday. Deng Ge, a spokesman for the China Securities Regulatory Commission said in remarks posted on its official channel on Weibo, China's version of Twitter, that there had been a big increase in "irrational selling" of stocks. China's insurance regulator said "qualified" insurers could increase their ratio of equity assets to 40 pct from 30 pct by buying blue-chip stocks. But the market sell-off has extended beyond the mainland, with Chinese stocks on U.S. exchanges falling as much as 6.1 percent on Tuesday, according to the Bank of New York Mellon index of such securities. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index fell 4.7 percent, with shares of Chinese brokerages taking a pounding. (Reuters)
Read More
ContactCenterWorld.com, the Global Association for Contact Center & Customer Engagement Best Practices recently announced Sanjay Mehta (Managing Director, Teleperformance India) as one of the Industry Champions for the year 2015! This prestigious recognition comes in the wake of his untiring efforts to build Brand India BPO by leading the industry into the now much acknowledged India Non-Metro solution, which allows the industry to not only leverage the vast demographic dividend of the country but also deliver exceptional quality at very competitive costs. Leaders like Mehta have transformed the dynamics of the BPO industry by embracing smaller non-metro cities to attract a bigger pool of talent and offer quality performance and delivery at competitive costs. Recognized as a powerful orator and thought leader in the industry, Sanjay is also the Chairperson of the BPO Committee of the Indo-American Chamber of Commerce and a member of NASSCOM ($146 Billion Industry association for Indian IT-BPO). His views are often solicited by prominent Media Houses, Industry Analysts, Consultants and the Central & State Governments towards industry expansion to the projected goal of $50 billion per annum. In the past, Contact Center World has recognized Teleperformance India for its Community Spirit Program and exceptional Client Partnership.
Read More
UDigital, the recently announced digital media venture founded by Ronnie Screwvala, B.Saikumar and Ajay Chacko, announced its brand name on Tuesday (7 July) -- Arré. The venture plans to go live with Arré later this calendar year.Arré is an original content destination that will be a unique storytelling platform across genres and formats.Arré is one of the most commonly spoken words across India – a friendly, Indian colloquial term that is popularly understood as ‘Hey’. While its origins are in Hindi, it is an expression that’s not only understood throughout the length and breadth of the country but has also been included in the Oxford dictionary of the English language, as an ‘all purpose Indian-English interjection’.Arré portrays a range of emotions;from the ‘surprised and the questioning’ to the ‘friendly thumbs-up affirmative’ to ‘disagreement and protest’ to ‘Arré yaar!’ It crosses boundaries of language, audience groups and geographies. Arré is Indian, young, cool, bold, opinionated, fearless and entertaining. It’s the wow moment of digital content.Arré will express itself across mediums, from text to graphic art to podcasts and video in multiple genres such as reality and fiction, factual and opinionated as well as pure entertainment. Arré is working with collaborators across the spectrum in developing original content; from writers, artists, journalists and storytellers to independent filmmakers, established production houses as well as upcoming talent in fiction, reality and non-fiction genres.B.Saikumar, Founder and Managing Director, UDigital, said “Arré was born out of the need to create a truly disruptive digital product. Our philosophy is to continuously challenge the ‘moulds’ of format, media and structure to create content that is reflective of good storytelling in a digital environment. Much like the name, we hope to make Arré, the brand, a part of daily conversation in India and globally!” The Accent on the é in Arré is reflective of the variedexpressions and emotions that the brand will straddle, as well as its international outlook.The logo and visual identity of Arré is being designed and developed by AREA 17, an interactive agency based in Paris and New York.
Read More
Tennis legend STEFFI GRAF has been appointed the Ayurveda brand ambassador of Kerala. A decision in this regard was taken by the state cabinet, Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said. The Kerala Tourism Department was given the sanction to rope in Graf to promote the state under the department’s ‘Visit Kerala Scheme’. However, the details regarding the remuneration that she will be receiving has not been disclosed.
Read More
