Keeping in view the hike in newsprint cost, the Indian Newspaper Society (INS) has decided to effect an industry wide increase of 30 per cent in card rates. The decision was taken at a meeting of the Executive Committee on August 11.
Yet another major state-owned bank has undergone a brand makeover to woo the Gen Next. Union Bank of India has embarked on a rebranding exercise with the appointment of Mudra Communications for its advertising duties. The bank would be spending Rs 75 crore on its 360-degree re-branding campaign.
First it was ‘Dikhane Ka Jee Kare’ and now it is ‘Har Koi Poochega’. Greenply Industries Ltd has pegged the ‘show-off’ tendency in people to showcase its latest range of Greemlam laminates.
The people are ready, the marketers are prepared, so can media be far behind? Even as Kerala reverberates with Onam festivities, though still 10 days away, print, television and radio players in the southern state are busy lining up programmes to celebrate Kerala’s biggest festival with all the pomp and gaiety.
There was a time when laptops were priced above Rs 1 lakh. But now, the laptop is ready to shed its luxury tag and become a mass product. Prices of laptops have be steadily coming down, contrary to the general inflationary trend in the market, and with the launch of Zenith Computers’ EcoStyle, the laptop has broken the sub-15k price barrier.
Sify Technologies Ltd has inked a pact with Google Inc to bring the Google Apps suite of communication and collaboration tools to Indian Internet users. These applications would include tools such as mail, chat, online documents, calendar and sites. Sify plans to launch these services for its users in the coming months.
Ken Creative Studio, the production arm of Bangalore-headquartered multinational conglomerate Ken Group, has positioned itself for overseas growth by launching its production arm in the US for developing original animated feature films and TV series.
God’s own country all set to celebrate Onam with the usual fervour on September 12. It is the time of the year when people in Kerala put their best foot forward and gyrate to the clapping rhythms of Kaikottikali, besides loosening their purse strings. Tapping into this gaiety, all agencies work overtime during this period as most of the businesses in Kerala meet their annual targets during the season of Onam, hence the work for some of the top agencies in Kerala almost quadruple. This also means big bucks for agencies.
‘Hum sirf bolte hi nahi, hum superhits bajaate bhi hai’, with a claim like that SFM, the FM radio brand from Sun TV, is embarking on a revamp exercise across its 42 stations in the country. The revamp of the sound of its stations and programming is in keeping with SFM’s tagline: ‘Jhoomo Jamke Jhoomo’.
Daily Thanthi, the second largest circulated daily in Tamil Nadu, is launching its Mumbai edition on September 5. This will be the third edition of the newspaper outside Tamil Nadu, the other two being Bangalore and Pondicherry. Initially, Daily Thanthi would be printing 50,000 copies in Mumbai.
The Phase II of FM licensing has been both exciting and challenging for the radio industry. With the Phase III to be announced soon, exchange4media finds out from FM players what they expect from the Government in the Phase III rollout.
It helps to bring a rumour under the scanner. WPP has put to rest all speculations on the Bates 141 and Grey Worldwide merger. Responding to exchange4media’s take on the rumour, Bates 141 and WPP has issued a statement categorically stating that there are no plans to merge Bates 141 and Grey Worldwide.
Today, it is not possible for a radio station to survive if it is producing niche content. We did start it in Bangalore, but it did not work. Within six months of operations, we migrated to ‘only Kannada’ format. Everybody followed us after that. In Chennai, from the very beginning the brand positioning of Mirchi has been as a complete Tamil channel and that has worked wonders for us.
Cricket will always remain at the top because in India, we are exposed to the game from childhood. There is mass interest in cricket, and it is a reflection of the changing demographics of the country… (however) We have realised that there is a niche community of people who like to watch certain sports that are not common likings for everybody… Our attempt is to broaden our sports offering vis-à-vis other channels.