India Business

On the first of this month the STAR Group which runs channels like STAR Plus, STAR Movies and more made an interesting decision which could see other media houses following suit. STAR has launched a new channel ‘STAR CJ Alive’ in association with South Korea’s CJ O.This is however not an entertainment channel. It’s a 24 hour , round the clock shopping channel. It’s a venture the company hopes that customers will adopt especially here in India because shopping has largely been a conservative experience. Will the consumer be confident enough to order a product whose quality he might completely not be able to trust?

When Robert Crow the Vice President of RIM more famously known as the company which makes the BlackBerry came out of the Indian Home Minister’s office yesterday after a hectic meeting he seemed to be in a really good mood. At least that’s what his grin seemed to suggest. A few minutes later when the media reported that the Home Minister had pretty much read the riot act out to Blackberry, we knew that Crow’s smile was an apparent one hiding the realization that BlackBerry has  found itself in a big mess here in India and faces being banned by the end of the month.

BlackBerry has been in the news recently for its dealings with the Saudi government . Barely had RIM put out that fire by negotiating with the Saudi government regarding the sharing of encrypted data that a potentially bigger flare sparked up in India. The issue has been on the same lines – the sharing of encrypted information exchanged across BlackBerry handsets.

If there’s one sector in India which is yet to explode and discover its full potential ,it’s probably the Hospitality and Tourism Industry. While the sector is growing steadily every year there is still a lot more organization required to start drawing in the type of money that it really is capable of. Opportunity aplenty, the Hotel Industry in India is naturally blessed to make the most of the Indian landscape, natural history and culture that the country is blessed with and it is a good step that a long overdue implementation in attracting future servicemen to India’s hotel and tourism Diaspora has finally happened. I am talking about the fresh announcement by the government that the Central Board Of Secondary Education or the CBSE will introduce and henceforth offer the Hotel Management subject at a standard 11 and 12 school level.

There’s a popular saying in these parts which goes – “A Delayed Monsoon Is A Denied Monsoon”

Things last year were so bad that I had said that we were even prepared to accept a delayed monsoon. If the water bearing clouds of the South West Monsoon fail then India has no choice but to resort to importing food crops, vegetables and pulses. It’s a complicated weather system and the monsoons are pretty much the lifeblood of India.

It’s still June .Figures from the Met department have shown that the going so far has been good .The monsoon’s progress has been slow but it isn’t a big worry.Normally around the third week of June, the monsoon reaches Central India. This year the rains have come to South India and just 2 days back entered Central India.

10.7 billion dollars – that’s the amount spent by Bharti to acquire Zain’s African operations. Makes one wonder just to what level a company will go to further itself. Not very long ago, Sunil Mittal, the boss of the Bharti Group had stated that in an article to Forbes Magazine that he was like a “Junkie Looking For His Next Fix”. With Zain in Africa, Mittal has got his big fix .In one way Bharti was obsessed with acquiring Zain after the MTN deal did not work out. Now that they have, Bharti’s African safari has just begun.

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What a bizarre month it’s been if you’re an ardent follower of cricket!

Lalit Modi’s off field activities have dominated the headlines even more than the great on field action. The hours after Chennai won the IPL trophy were dominated not by news of Chennai partying and rejoicing or even the highlights of the final but rather the suspension of Lalit Modi as the Chairman and Commissioner of the Indian Premier League.

While it might seem strange that the face of the IPL has gone from being a marketing whizkid to the villain he is seen now, the actions of Lalit Modi are not surprising. Allegations still standing, Modi has fallen a victim to his ego and despite his abilities hasn't been able to manage his own greed.

If you’ve been watching the third season of the IPL then you’ve obviously noticed the rapid increase in the ads compared to the last two years. Apart from the plethora of Zoozoos, Munch Chocolate Bars and an inane bunch of irritating product catalogues of pretty much any consumer product in India, we’ve also seen two very interesting marketing campaigns .For the purposes of this articles they’re both relevant. Maxx Mobiles and Karbonn mobiles are among a new breed of Indian handset and mobile accessory makers who are furiously targeting India’s mobile market.

In July when Pranab Mukherjee presented the First Union Budget Of the 2^nd UPA government, a roadmap for the long term growth of India seemed to be emerging. Today’s Budget is a further continuation of this. I did not see any hardcore reforms and from my pre-Budget expectations its clear this is no surprise. Conservative as hell, this Budget reeks with the nature of the man who read it out in Parliament today.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying it’s a bad Budget, it’s a pretty decent Budget but an opportunity lost to accelerate India’s growth furthermore. More could and should have been done. Still trying to push India into a double digit growth rate is an earnest effort.

Railway Budget 2010 – I’m sorry we didn’t cover it earlier. I hope you understand because just like the rest of India, we too were watching  Sachin Tendulkar hammer the South Africans by belting the first double hundred in the history of One Day Cricket!

And after the full on explosion provided by Sachin, it took one whole day to recover from the magnitude of what we witnessed in Gwalior. Sachin Tendulkar’s innings totally ‘pwned’ Mamata Banerjee’s Rail Budget!

Better late than never but, here is The India Street’s review of the 2010 Indian Union Railway Budget.

Presenting her second rail Budget, Mamata Banerjee the loudmouth from West Bengal has made her focus clear.