&ldquo;What does the consumer want? What does the market want?&rdquo;
&ldquo;Who the hell is the consumer? Where is he? Is he listening?&rdquo;
&ldquo;Why will he buy this stupid vanilla product, that too a twentieth &lsquo;me too&rsquo;?&rdquo;
&ldquo;Why can&rsquo;t they make an innovative product instead?&rdquo;
&ldquo;Isn&rsquo;t the idea already done?&rdquo; 
&ldquo;Slice of life? Isn&rsquo;t that too generic?&rdquo;
&ldquo;Idea! Our ad will be more emotional!&rdquo; 
&ldquo;Yeah!

Where do I begin?

Business Standard

Elder Health Care is heralding a brave new age in the FMCG space &mdash; selling licensed brands of likely competitors.

Elder gets bolder

Results of the Common Admission Test (CAT) could get delayed with Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and Prometric, which conducted the online test, still to decide a new date for conducting the exam for students who could not give their exam due to technical glitches.

Lack of clarity on re-exam date may delay CAT result

India is now the new battleground for two of UK&rsquo;s ultra luxury car makers.

Can the ghost scare bentley?

German denim brand Mustang has entered India via an exclusive retail tie-up with Shopper's Stop, which has already launched the brand at its outlets in Hyderabad and Mumbai, and intends to take it to Delhi and Bangalore shortly. Mustang's entry into India is a part of the company's effort to move beyond its core markets of Germany and East Europe. Mustang Group CEO Theo Birkmeyer was in Mumbai to unveil the brand at the Juhu property of Shopper's Stop. He spoke to Viveat Susan Pinto.

'Mustang is making up for lost time by moving fast'

The Gitanjali Group is stepping up its focus in the organised retail segment. The company has acquired a 76 per cent stake in Salasar Retail, a chain of mid-size departmental stores across India and will soon re-brand the Salasar stores as Maya.

Gitanjali buys mid-size retail chain

Sanjiv Bajaj wants to make a mark in consumer finance. The market may be tough but he has his plan ready.

Money trail

Over the last one and a half years, The Economist has used interesting campaigns to boost its presence in the country.

The fine print

Shivinder Mohan Singh, the managing director of Fortis Healthcare, is best known for his attempt to do a McDonald&rsquo;s in healthcare &mdash; large in scale and low in prices. The chain started from Mohali (in Punjab) in 2001. Over the years, it has bought hospitals (Escorts Heart Institute and Wockhardt Hospitals) and put up new ones across the country. That has helped Singh to build the country&rsquo;s second-largest hospital chain with over 5,000 beds. The ambition is to occupy the top slot in double quick time. The Singh family, of course, is flush with funds, having sold its stake in Ranbaxy to Daiichi Sankyo of Japan last year for almost Rs 10,000 crore. Singh tells Vandana Gombar and Joe C Mathew about the Fortis business model as it has evolved over time and the road ahead.

'We are moving towards a larger addressable market'

    Name the person and the name he gave to the theoretical proto-hypertext computer system he proposed in 1945. This has been referred to as the vision behind search engines.

Answers to last week&#39s quiz (#124)

Big Bazaar, the hypermarket of Pantaloon Retail, has come out with a breakfast cereal range under its private label, Tasty Treat. Big Bazaar already sells noodles, pasta, vermicelli, soups, namkeens, chips, toast, khari, papads, jams, pickles, carbonated drinks, ketchup and fruit beverages under the brand. It has now added breakfast cereals to the range.

Big Bazaar: Private label push

Twenty-five years after it brought Maggi instant noodles to India, Nestle has extended the brand to ready-to-eat pasta. It has come out with Maggi Nutri-licious (nutritious and delicious) Pazzta. There are two flavours: Masala Penne and Cheese Macaroni.

Nestle: Pasta time

    This fictional character is a $5-billion cash cow for its company. But its popularity seems to be waning and the company has plans to rebrand its personality by moving away from its clean image. The first project for this exercise has been code named Super Secret. Name the character.

The Strategist Quiz (#125)

The market for ayurvedic beauty products is growing fast. Many companies have entered the segment with branded products in categories such as skin care, hair care, soaps and essential oils.

KIT: The Indian market for ayurvedic cosmetics

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Gujarat Institute of Disaster Management (GIDM), the institute set up by state-run Gujarat State Disaster Management Authority (GSDMA), is in tie-up talks with Illinois Institute of Fire Services, University of Illinois.

Guj's disaster mgmt institute in tie-up talks with US-based varsity

The Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) have finally broken their silence. Three days after the computer-based Common Admission Test (CAT) came under fire for its technical glitches, the IIMs and Prometric and NIIT, the companies have revealed that 10-11 per cent of students have been affected so far. Citing a virus 'Conflicker' being responsible for glitches in the computer-based test at some centres, they said necessary steps are being taken to repair the damage.

IIMs, Prometric blame virus for CAT glitches

Glitches continue, lack of feedback still an issue; IIMs assure &lsquo;damage control&rsquo;.

CAT day 4 sees less turmoil

IIMs nearly dumped computerised CAT...

Compared to the chaos that marred the first four days of the Common Admission Test (CAT) this year, students across the country today appeared pleased that despite some delays and small errors, the exams were not rescheduled at most centres across the country.

Students happy on Day 5

Pulsar&rsquo;s new variant, to be unveiled next week, will retain the looks of a big bike, but the engine will be 135 cc.

Page 678 - News