Since recovering remarkably fast from the effects of the global meltdown, the real estate (RE) market is currently experiencing some strong headwinds. In most metros, volumes are sliding, inventories are piling up and with the macro-economic and political scene not looking rosy at least from a near-term perspective, consumers are preferring to wait it out, fully aware that given the market conditions the chances of price appreciation are unlikely. They now have the upper hand and with a greater choice available they are becoming very discerning and discriminatory. A perfect market situation.

Going beyond the conventional?

Business Standard

What&rsquo;s a magazine company doing on television? The Rs 140-odd-crore Vikatan Group is the publisher of nine popular Tamil magazines. In the late nineties it got into television. Last year Vikatan became one of the top five TV content companies in India. Many of the most successful daily soaps in Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam come from Vikatan. Remakes are popular too. For instance, the biggest hit on Zee Television for the last two years, Pavitra Rishta, is a remake of Vikatan&rsquo;s Tamil soap, Thirumathi Selvam that aired first on Sun TV.

From content shop to media major

With age, our commitments increase. Be it your child, wife or parents, they all demand financial security. And this is the very thought that HDFC Life Insurance plays on as it launches its online term insurance Click 2 Protect. The campaign, consisting of five different commercials, delineates different life situations that require a man to secure his family, in case he meets with death. The campaign, says the company, is aimed to make the potential consumer &ldquo;feel concerned&rdquo;.

Budgeting for the uncertain times

If expensive cars and luxury buses have been the head-turners on Indian roads so far, there is a more cost effective way to be the next showstopper. Thanks to the recognition of fleet graphics as a strategic advertising tool and the latest technology available to slap your message on cars, buses or sundry other vehicles, vehicle wrap is gaining ground as a cost-effective and environment friendly way to spread your message. From Nokia&rsquo;s Chat.r.Box with its signature palm-marks wrapped on a Toyota Qualis, to the Chevrolet Beats dressed in Levis jeans or a Volvo bus dolled up in green as the Sprite Xpress &mdash; you can&rsquo;t miss them on the roads.

Vroom to a new look

Cafe Coffee Day, the largest coffee chain operator in the country, is eyeing the home consumption market with keen interest. It recently launched the Coffee Day WakeCup, a single serve coffee brewing system, priced at Rs 4,000 for the basic version and Rs 5,000 for the automatic version.

Cafe Coffee Day: Homeward bound

123 call karo, aur phir dekho, ki mobile kya kya kar sakta hai,&rdquo; said actor Irrfan Khan in the ad campaign by Vodafone, which was launched in the fag end of 2011. The ad, which ran till January this year, promised a host of value-added services-from recipes to movie reviews-which a subscriber could access by dialling 123 from her Vodafone number. (For the southern markets, the campaign features actor Prakash Raj.

Vodafone: Decoding 123

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ISBN

The top 10 business bestsellers

Currently pegged at Rs 13,600 Cr, the medical education sector is set to witness growth at CAGR 20 per cent and is likely to reach a level of Rs 54,000 Cr by 2020. More than 50 per cent of the sector comprises of under-graduate and post-graduate medical education, followed by nursing, dental and paramedical training and education.

KIT: Medical education sector

    In the 90s a computer virus was discovered that would erase all PC hard disks annually on March 6th of every year. What was the name given to it and why? IBM&rsquo;s PCs were most affected.

The Strategist Quiz (#239)

    The initial design of this vehicle had two soft doors with vinyl windows, a cloth roof and a metal bar as a safety measure. The manufacturer concluded that people would not want a &lsquo;half a car&rsquo; and therefore shelved it for something better. Name the company and the brand.

Answers to last week's quiz (#238)

The first salvo this time was fired by The Times of India. Its television commercial released in November 2011 for the southern markets revolved around this man with a newspaper who seemed to be dozing off at the first given opportunity &mdash; during a rally, at an award function, while a body-building competition is underway. It&rsquo;s only towards the fag end of the commercial that you realised there is nothing wrong with our protagonist. The thing to blame was his newspaper &mdash; The Hindu, going by the look and feel &mdash; that simply put him to sleep. &ldquo;Stuck with news that puts you to sleep?&rdquo;, the commercial asked. It provided the answer in the very next frame &mdash; yes in bold type face &mdash; &ldquo;Wake up to The Times of India.

Knocking the competition

Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore (IIM-B), in association with TENVIC, a professional sports consulting company, will launch a two-day sports-based executive education programme for middle and senior managers.

IIM-B to launch two-day sports-based exec learning programme

The recently launched Date commercial for mild premium beer brand Heineken catches the eye for more reasons than one. The edgy cinematography and exciting soundtrack apart, what is instantly recognisable is the voice of singer Mohammed Rafi who belts out Jaan Pehchaan Ho, a song from the 60s Bollywood movie Gumnaam. The commercial, created by Wieden + Kennedy, Amsterdam is a sequel to the &ldquo;The Entrance&rsquo; commercial unveiled by the agency a few months ago.

Heineken eyes the uber-premium

South Indian film star Dhanush, who shot to fame after his song Kolaveri Di went viral, decoded the song's success mantra for the management students of the contemporary film industry course at IIM-Ahmedabad.

Kolaveri Di singer at IIM-A

The 2011 test volumes of the Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) programme reached an all-time high of more than 0.8 million, according to an announcement by Educational Testing Service (ETS) officials. GRE is a standardised test conducted for securing admission in graduate schools abroad.

Test volumes of 2011 GRE programme at all-time high

The overall agenda of IITs is to 'make' quality engineers and not to 'produce' replicated models. The IIT students are industry drivers with their capability to think out of the box and to provide end-to-end solutions nurturing the bottom line.

Student&#8217s corner

Industrial training institutes (ITIs), the poor cousins of polytechnics or engineering colleges are in for an image makeover.

New chapter: ITIs to get B-school style grading

The advertising campaign of Birla Sun Life Insurance, the life insurance arm of Aditya Birla Financial Services, with Yuvraj Singh as brand ambassador may be sailing a bit too close to real life. Taking forward the 2009 refrain of &lsquo;Jab tak balla chalega...&rsquo;, the new advertisement has the cricketer, who is battling cancer, talk about the blow to his health in a bid to urge consumers to be more cautious in life.

Advertising industry dismissive of outrage from Yuvi fans

US watchmaker Timex, known mainly for its sporty range of watches, has a share of just eight per cent in the organised watch market in India &ndash; a distant second to one-time partner Titan, which has an overall share of close to 60 per cent. But the American brand, which ranks third in the world after Swatch and Casio, has big plans for India, a market it entered nearly two decades ago.

On the Timex watchlist

A Confucius Institute will be inaugurated in Mumbai University in the new few months, according to Rajpal Hande, Director, Board of Colleges and University Development, Mumbai University. This will be the first Confucius Institute in India.

Confucius Institute to set up first branch in India

Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow (IIML) students&rsquo;-run fund Credence Capital has outperformed Nifty even in the recent choppy waters of equity market. While benchmark Nifty witnessed fall of nearly 14 per cent, Credence generated a return of 5 per cent in its equity fund, while the derivative fund returned a whopping 35 per cent.

Page 533 - News