Speaking about the association, Sanjeev Mohanty, CEO and MD, Jabong said, “We are very excited to launch Mexx exclusively in India and more than anything else we are thrilled that our brand ideologies are similar. With Mexx on board, we continue to broaden our international brand offering and have few other exciting names in the pipeline.”
The Mexx Spring-Summer’16 collection that will be available online takes inspiration from the following trends: Street, collection and Atelier.
Commenting on the partnership, Umit Eroglu, CEO, Mexx, said, “We are very excited to launch Mexx in India and to have Jabong as our experienced and knowledgeable partner for optimizing our online presence. Based on our global brand awareness and the outstanding price-quality mix of our collections we are very confident about the desirability that our brand will have with the Indian consumers.”
Jabong has in the past launched high-street brands such as TopShop, TopMan, Dorothy Perkins, Missguided to name a few.
Flipkart will offer complete collection of furniture from Godrej Interio, which includes designs for living room, dining room and bedroom, the company said in a statement.
“Our combined strengths in product development and marketing and distribution is going to help expand the footprint for the brand, while at the same time enable an all new furniture shopping experience for our customers,” said Sandeep Chandrakant Patil, Senior Director Business, Flipkart.
Godrej Interio is looking at a long-term partnership with Flipkart to make its offerings available to a larger online customer base across the country, the e-commerce head of Godrej Interio, Shanu Singh said.
The online furniture market is valued at USD 130 million and is expected to grow at a compounded annual rate of 75 per cent and reach over USD 700 million by 2020, according to industry experts.
This growth is to be attributed to the fact that furniture and the home-decor category is evolving beyond its utilitarian value to become part of one’s lifestyle choice.
Growing interest exhibited by smaller cities, such as Jamshedpur, Aurangabad, Bhubaneshwar and Lucknow also contribute significantly to the growth of this category, experts added.
“Given the threat to the livelihood of our partners, at the expense of reliability, we are temporarily suspending surge with immediate effect,” Uber tweeted.
Uber did not specify if the surge pricing would resume after the second phase of the odd-even traffic scheme ends on April 30.
It also pledged to work with the Delhi government to provide reliable mobility solutions to people in the city, “especially at a time when the citizens need us the most”.
Ola cab services also announced rollback of “peak pricing” in Delhi NCR.
“To make the government’s odd-even initiative a success, Ola has temporarily pulled out Peak Pricing in Delhi NCR,” its business head (north) Deep Singh said in a statement.
Kejriwal warned of strict action against online cab aggregators, especially Ola and Uber, over arbitrary surge pricing, a technique used by the cab aggregators to hike the fares owing to higher demand.
The Delhi government on Monday directed the impounding of taxis charging exorbitant fare from the public.
Delhi Transport Minister Gopal Rai had said that apart from impounding taxis, they would also seize the licences of the taxi drivers and cancel their permit.
He said the order was applicable to all kinds of cab services including online aggregators as well as private taxis, radio taxis and black-and-yellow taxis.
The demand for taxis has shot up on account of the odd-even traffic scheme that started on April 15 and will run till April 30.
Under the scheme, aimed at battling pollution, diesel and petrol driven private vehicles with odd registration numbers can ply only on odd dates and those with even registration numbers on even dates.
Passengers complained that taxis were over-charging taking advantage of the scheme.
“Now anyone, with just their phone, can have that front-row experience without having to be there,” technology website The Verge quoted Neal Mohan, chief product officer, YouTube, as saying.
Just as watching a concert in 360 degrees can give you an unmatched immersive experience, spatial audio allows you to listen along as you do in real life, where depth, distance and intensity all play a role.
Mohan’s announcement arrives just after Facebook unveiled its plans for expanding live-streaming and its own design for a 360-degree camera, the report said.
“As a user, you don’t need to do anything,” Mohan said, adding, “There is no fancy technology to purchase or integrate.”
Just open the YouTube app on your smartphone and you are ready to go.
According to Mohan, along with 360-degree live streaming, they are also launching spatial audio for on-demand YouTube videos.
“We are working with companies like VideoStitch and Two Big Ears to make their software compatible with 360-degree live streams or spatial audio on YouTube and more will be available soon,” Mohan noted.
He said that the company would also make 360-degree live streaming and spatial audio technologies available at all YouTube Space locations around the globe.
Using Tata Communications’ service, ATN will offer a mix of news, sports and entertainment content to Canadian viewers on virtually any device later this summer. The service will come with potential for further international expansion.
Speaking about the association, Shan Chandrasekar, President& CEO, ATN said, “With consumer internet traffic growing exponentially every year, it was imperative for us to expand our content delivery strategy to ensure a reliable viewing experience for our customers.”
Through the first phase of deployment, ATN’s South Asian cultural content will be made available through several linear channels, across multiple formats such as iOS and Apple TV, Android, Roku, Fire TV and SMART TVs. This will complement ATN’s current national distribution of more than 50 linear services, enabling the network to future-proof its offering as the way people consume content continues to evolve.
“The way today’s millennial like to consume content, anytime, anywhere, on any device, is a far cry from the way their parents used to watch traditional TV just ten years ago. Tata Communications’ cloud based Media Ecosystem will arm us with the ability to accelerate time to market and bring richer content experiences to our viewers today and in the future,” added Chandrasekar.
Currently Tata Communications provides ATN Canada with video transport solutions to deliver media content via broadcast to customers in Canada. With the expansion of OTT services, ATN will be able to reach more viewers.
Commenting on the partnership,RanguSalgame, CEO, Growth Ventures, Tata Communications, said “We are excited to expand our relationship with ATN Canada by becoming their sole provider of global OTT connectivity through our flexible, scalable content delivery network,” says. “This globally scalable model enables ATN Canada to launch news, sports and entertainment content to all their customers across Canada, and globally in the future.”
Today we would like to introduce you to MagicSewa, a transport start-up with an all-sedan fleet of 100 per cent CNG taxis that provides reliable, secure and value-for-money city cab service across NCR.
The inception of MagicSewa
MagicSewa was launched by Rakesh Agarwal, a social and an entrepreneur who has been working closely with auto drivers’ community since 2002. The idea behind this venture is to redefine mobility by offering a quality driven, secure, convenient, transparent, energy efficient and 100 per cent law compliant cab service in NCR.At present it’s a bootstrapped venture and is growing through self-funding and that of family and friends.
Speaking about the opportunity in this space, Rakesh Agarwal, Director & CEO, MagicSewa said, “The size of the opportunity is massive. Considering that we travel every day, the lack of public transport infrastructure has resulted in a shift in consumer habits towards instant gratification, on demand services and convenience. With multiple established players offering services only via mobile applications, it is safe to assume that it is largely done online.”
Back in 2008, Agarwal created an animated movie which envisioned connecting commuters with auto rickshaws using dialogue recognition technology. This was at a time when android didn’t exist and the iphone had just made its entry in India. However, work on the venture began seriously a year and a half ago and it was finally launched last December.
The challenge
Agarwal believes that there are already several established players in the segment, capturing market share is probably the biggest challenge. Apart from that, there are several parameters that could go wrong. From partnering with the right drivers, ensuring safety of passengers and working constantly towards taking lakhs of cars off road are things that need to be monitored closely and constantly.
“We are completely compliant with the law, unlike other players who have had multiple run-ins. Surge prices are a big pain point for customers and we keep our prices consistent irrespective of the demand. Our aim is to provide both an affordable and safer alternative to commuters, expressed Agarwal.
The mechanism
Based out of Delhi, the team MagicSewa consists of 40 members and drivers are treated as partners and not as employees.It follows the commission based model and has partnered with existing drivers and empanels them to drive for Magic Sewa.
More than 50 per cent bookings originate from South Delhi and one third of the calls for drop at the airport or railway stations.
“Conceptually, our services are similar to those of other leading cab aggregators. However, having entered the market at a later stage, we were able to correct the faults in our offering that were noticed in other players. There have been multiple news stories regarding incidents with women so we made safety our priority. Apart from GPS trackers, we have fitted panic buttons and monitor all night rides with women passengers, added Agarwal.
Agarwal has been working with the auto rickshaw drivers’ community since 2000, thus he is familiar with their environment and committed to their wellbeing and overall development. He informed that venture has also facilitated drivers’ purchases and bank financing of the cars, and invest in training the drivers. Drivers keep 85 per cent of the fare.
The Odd-Even scheme
According to Agarwal, the Odd-Even scheme may not have been very effective in terms of bringing air-pollution levels down but it has definitely impacted traffic. He mentioned that people still need to follow a routine, get to work and will look for alternatives, and that’s where we come in.
During Odd Even phase I, MagicSewa was a newbie and team was busy in establish the venture. However, this time MagicSewa is prepared. Commuters have been bracing themselves up for Odd-Even by creating or joining carpools, looking up public transport options and of course checking cab prices.
Despite the rise in demand during Odd-Even, MagicSewa intend to keep the prices consistent and also planning to introduce more cars on the road to meet customer expectations.
“We are currently operating only in Delhi-NCR and our immediate goal is to expand to other cities. We are looking to capture a significant market share in all the markets we go to”, concluded Agarwal.
Since its global launch in January, Netflix has already concluded partnerships with leading infocomm players in Asia including Singtel and StarHub in Singapore and PCCW Media’s now TV in Hong Kong.
Prior to Netflix, Zameckowski was running the international operations of Victorious, a Kleiner Perkins-backed startup in the mobile video space with a focus on building new business and international partnerships for the US-based digital company.
Before Victorious, Zameczkowski spent eight years at Google/YouTube both in Europe and Asia, where he most recently managed the YouTube Music business across the APAC region based out of Singapore. He was among the first few employees to be part of the video-sharing platform, when it was acquired by Google, and first came to Asia close to five years ago when he was based in Hong Kong in his capacity as Head of Partnerships for Greater China and Southeast Asia. He also worked for six years at Warner Bros. Television as Sales and Business Development Manager, licensing content to broadcasters and VOD platforms in Europe.
“One of the next steps in Netflix globalization is about building and leveraging strategic partnerships in the region that will drive our memberships in Asia-Pacific,” Zameczkowski said.
Zameczkowski is based in Singapore and reports to US-based Bill Holmes, Global Head of Business Development at Netflix. He holds an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management and The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, as well as a Master’s degree from ESSEC Business School.
