Yum Foods’ Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) is to set to make a splash again in the Indian market, for which it has signed on FCB-Ulka as its creative partner and Lodestar as its media partner. Details like the account size are yet to be finalised.
The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has painted a rosy picture on growth prospects for the consumer durables industry this fiscal.
Yahoo! India is bringing the ‘Big Idea Chair’ Award to India for the very first time. It is one of the most prestigious awards known the world over and will be presented at the Effies 2005. The Chair will be awarded to the brand that has successfully transformed itself with effective brand positioning, intelligent use of media and creativity.
Karaoke Machines, fun as they might be, are not always available to all. But what if we could carry one in our pockets and sing along at our convenience? Mobile2Win (M2W) has come up with the ‘Phone Karaoke’ application, where one can enjoy all the benefits of an actual Karaoke Machine, literally at the press of a button.
Buena Vista International Television - Asia Pacific (BVITV-AP) has promoted five members of its Asia Pacific sales team. Joyce Yeung has been promoted as Executive Director, Asia; Greg Johnson as Executive Director, Australia/New Zealand; Mark Chan as Director, China; Amit Malhotra as Director, India; and Ramez Sheikh as Manager, Indonesia and emerging markets.
Buena Vista International Television-Asia Pacific (BVITV-AP) has sold the format rights for its reality TV series ‘Extreme Makeover’ to Sony Entertainment Television (SET) and has also announced that AXN Asia has acquired the rights to localise BVITV-AP’s reality competition series, ‘The Amazing Race’.
Rediff has started experimenting with a new format of selling music online with the launch of singer Sanjay Maroo’s album for online music download containing an exclusive range of Maroo’s songs, thus becoming India’s first online music e-tailer, and is all set to go ahead with its plan for paid online music downloads.
Comedy promotes comedy or so is what STAR India thinks. The idea has led to STAR Gold and one of STAR One’s Laughter Champions, Ahsaan Qureshi, working together, where Qureshi will be lending his voice to the promos of ‘Hulchul’. The movie is scheduled to premiere on STAR Gold on October 23 at 1:00 pm.
The Walt Disney Company (India) Pvt Ltd has appointed T N Prabhu as Director, Walt Disney Internet Group. Prabhu will be based in Mumbai as a part of the India management team to ensure the success of the Walt Disney Internet Group as an integral part of The Walt Disney Company’s overall India strategy.
At a time when Indian channels are busy buying licenses of successful international gameshows to push up their TRPs, SaharaOne Television is forming a deal with FremantleMedia to develop, produce and license gameshow formats for Indian and international markets.
Lakshmipathy Bhat, who headed the Colombo operations of Grey Worldwide, has moved to FCB Ulka as General Manager, in charge of Bangalore operations. He replaces Abhinav Sharma, who has moved to Bates, Malaysia.
Taurus Mutual Fund, which has unveiled an aggressive marketing and brand building initiative, has signed SSC&B Lintas Delhi as its creative agency. Industry sources peg the account to be in the region of Rs 5 crore to Rs 7 crore.
Dentsu Inc and Sandeep Goyal-owned Mogae have announced a joint venture for the Middle East. The new agency, Dentsu Marcom Middle East FZ LLC, will be a 51:49 JV between Dentsu Inc and Mogae and will be headquartered in Dubai.
The year seems to be seeing its share of reincarnations. Earlier, it was Everest Integrated re-launching itself as Everest Brand Solutions and now it is coming from the WPP domain. O&M’s younger brother now drops rmg from its name to be called David. The new entity will be a region-wise phenomenon with 10 offices across Asia Pacific.
Malayalam publications are not really in a good phase at present, with both National Readership Survey (NRS) 2005 and Indian Readership Survey (IRS) 2005, Round 2 showing a dip for the segment. However, IRS still offers some consolation for the publications with both Malayala Manorama and Mathrubhumi showing growth.
The Indian Readership Survey Round 2, 2005 has shown some interesting trends as far as business publications are concerned. Unlike what has been seen in various surveys so far, business dailies have dropped in this round. Interestingly, business magazines defy the trend that magazines as a category are seeing and have grown.