Two of India&rsquo;s largest selling cars &ndash; Alto and i10 &ndash; operate in different price segments, but they are now taking their fight for market leadership to another level.

Power play by Alto, i10

Business Standard

Brand-building is undergoing a tectonic shift in the changing socio-economic milieu of the country; conventional tools will no longer work. This was the central message of the Business Standard Brand Derby 2010 Summit held at the Leela Kempinski hotel in Gurgaon on July 16. The Brand Derby, an annual survey, ranks the top brand launches in a year. In the 2010 Derby, 3 Idiots had won the Derby. The survey is published in The Strategist, a weekly supplement of Business Standard.

Brand apart

3 Idiots happens to be the biggest grosser of all times in Bollywood. Sample this: the film has so far made Rs 335 crore; overseas, it has grossed $16 million (Rs 71 crore). Meanwhile, the budget for the film, which released in December 2009, was Rs 35 crore. The investors have multiplied their money more than ten times.

Chased excellence, success followed

When it was launched in June 2009, little did people know that Tata DoCoMo will change the rules of the game. The telecom space was already crowded, and it was next to impossible for a newcomer to create a difference. But that&rsquo;s what Tata DoCoMo did with its pay-per-second plan.

Singing to DoCoMo's tune

General Motors India launched the Chevrolet Cruze, and the Chevrolet Beat, at a time when its credibility was at stake. General Motors, its parent in the US, had filed for bankruptcy. Customers in India were worried what would happen to service and spares. But the company had an action plan ready. On June 1, when news broke out that General Motors had filed for bankruptcy, General Motors India President &amp; Managing Director Karl Slym gave almost a dozen television interviews. Phone calls from the media, dealers and vendors kept pouring in right through the day. By the end of the day, Slym was tired but unruffled. For several weeks he had prepared himself and his team for such an eventuality.

Cruising its way to the top

The Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) would start the summer placements for the post graduate programme (PGP) batch 2010-12 from November 12, according to a release from the institute. The institute has decided to modify the basic process to include the cohort-based system used in the final placement process for the PGP batch 2008-10 in March.

IIM-Ahmedabad summer placements from Nov 12

Hyderabad-based Indian Business School (ISB) is aiming to become the biggest B-school in the world, chairman Rajat Gupta said today.

ISB aims to become world's biggest B-school

Press Trust of India

Yellow Pages in New Zealand invited people to come and build a house out in the wilderness on a tree. One &mdash; Tracy &mdash; of 200 applicants was selected and her story of building the house using 65 suppliers off the Yellow Pages was followed on a regular basis as the campaign idea to promote Yellow Pages and its usefulness. Tracy&rsquo;s story was followed avidly on both traditional and new media as viewers got involved with her tears and joys of getting her tree-house restaurant going.

Madhukar Sabnavis: Innovative campaigns

    This company in 1936 held a public contest to rename itself in order to shed its founding family name. It received 27,000 responses, but finally chose to use a name which had no meaning. Name the company.

Answers to last week's quiz (#160)

&nbsp;

    Which mobile handset manufacturer is developing phones for the Indian market that can also double up as a mosquito repellent?&nbsp;
    &nbsp;
    Name the person and the cereal brand he started after visiting the Battle Creek Sanitarium and getting treated by John Harvey Kellogg in the late 1890s?&nbsp;
    &nbsp;
    Which company is known to be the first to have promoted its brand by introducing the concept of coupons?&nbsp;
    &nbsp;
    This brand is more than 100

The Strategist Quiz (#161)

The Indian newspaper market is the biggest in the world.

KIT: the Indian Newspaper Market

THE WEALTH OF NATIONS
Authors: Adam Smith and Andrew S Skinner 
Publisher: Penguin 
Price: Rs 796
ISBN: 0140436154.
BUFFETOLOGY
Authors: Mary Buffett and David Clark 
Publisher: Simon &amp; Schuster
Price: Rs 796
ISBN: 0684871718.
SEVEN STAGES OF MONEY MATURITY
Author: George Kinder
Publisher: Bantam Doubleday Dell Pub
Price: Rs 796
ISBN: 0440508339.
ALL THE RIGHT MOVES 
Author: Janis Landis 
Publisher: iUniverse
Price: Rs 843
ISBN: 0595001092.
RED-HOT COLD CALL SELLING
Author: Paul S Goldner
Publisher: Amacom Book Division
Price: Rs 997
ISBN: 0814478808.
ECONOMICS EXPLAINED
Authors: Robert Heilbroner and Lester Thurow
Publisher: Simon &amp; Schuster
Price: Rs 796
ISBN: 0684846411.
KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT IN THE NEW ECONOMY
Author: Rick Blunt
Publisher: iUniverse
Price: Rs 843
ISBN: 0595167241.
GENDERSELL
Author: Judith C Tingley 
Publisher: Simon &amp; Schuster
Price: Rs 843
ISBN: 0684864371.
TESTED ADVERTISING METHODS
Authors: John Caples and

The top 10 business bestsellers

Sony Computer Entertainment, which markets PlayStation2 (PS2), PlayStation Portable (PSP) and PlayStation3 (PS3), will launch PlayStation Move (PSMove), an upcoming motion-sensing game controller platform for the PS3, in India in September.

Sony Computer Entertainment: Move in action

Ranked third in industry research, the institute is number one in many research areas like supply chain and energy.

Penn varsity in talks with Indian institutes for tie-ups

Heinz is all set to launch a slew of packaged food products in India. It had entered the country in 1994 after it had acquired Complan malted beverage and Glucon-D energiser from Glaxo. Six years later, it came out with its Heinz ketchup. Ten years after that, it has lined up condiments, juices and snacks.

Heinz: Heinz again

High-quality research should be second nature to a top business school, believes B S Sahay, Director Management Development Institute (MDI), Gurgaon. In an interview with Chitra Unnithan, Sahay says the issue of faculty crunch faced by business schools in the country can be tackled with adequate time allotted to research.

Q&A: B S Sahay, Director, MDI Gurgaon

Cadbury&rsquo;s &lsquo;Kuch meetha ho jaaye&rsquo; (Let&rsquo;s save something sweet) positioning for its Dairy Milk chocolate has just got a fresh lease of life. Over the last 60 years, India&rsquo;s largest confectioner has tried to cover every feel-good factor there is in everyday life. It all started with &lsquo;The real taste of life&rsquo; which was a montage ad showing young girls breaking into a dance, an old man kicking a ball, boys throwing chocolate at a bus and so on. This was followed by the cricket ad where a girl breaks into an impromptu dance. This campaign catapulted the confectioner&rsquo;s fortunes and market share to new heights.

Well begun is half done

Premier B-schools are taking steps to sharpen their focus on doctoral programmes. They hope the strategy will help in attracting more participants, while improving the quarlity of research work on their campuses in the coming years.

IIMs sharpen focus on doctoral programmes

The oldest management institute in the country, the Indian Institute of Social Welfare and Business Management (IISWBM) in Kolkata, is on an expansion drive. It plans to set up two new campuses at Rajarhat and Salt Lake, both on the eastern fringes of Kolkata. The Rajarhat campus will be spread over three acres while the Salt Lake campus will be set up in over 58 katha or less than one acre.

India's oldest B-school set to expand

With Pulse and other innovations, Yahoo! wants to get the eyeballs back.

Yahoo! refreshed

The Timex Group, one of the world&rsquo;s largest watch makers, set up operations in India in 1992. Over the years the market has evolved and a number of players, both national and international, have rolled out aggressively. Timex India is now catching up and looks ready to provide some strong competition.

Page 637 - News