Valentine bells..

With Valentine day just two weeks away, it's going to be love all around. It will be talked on Television, will be written about in newspapers, will also be the flavor of the blogs and then will be on the hit-list of the saffron brigade. Well, we are also entering into the last 50 days of MBA, so it's also likely to be the most talked about subject in the campus also (well not many care about studies these days and those who care actually talk about the same thing but in financial terms like mergers and acquisition, takeovers, value proposition etc etc. Basically it all boils down to the same hot topic). These 50 days are going to be tough on some souls here who are actually left with very little time to express their feelings. Well, we are still waiting for some more people to succumb to their heart beats and meanwhile I think I am falling in love with one of the songs from movie Philadelphia..

"Sometimes I think that I know
What love's all about
And when I see the light
I know I'll be all right"

---------

Just don't get me wrong (those who have watched this movie, you know what I am talking about) I like this movie because maybe sometime back in the past, I wanted to be a lawyer and what a brave movie it is considering it was made in 1993 when the gay rights were not even an issue back then in US. "The best thing about being a lawyer is that occasionally if not usually, you become a part of the justice being done and that itself is a great feeling".

Well said, and I hope that people here would be able to do justice to their feelings. Let's hope..

It's all about bull..

So finally they have found the culprit for the stock market mayhem. I never thought that a bull can do so much damage and for the first time share market is not so bullish about this "bull". The story goes that traders got fed up of looking at the backside of this bull during the past two weeks (as there was nothing to do in the market) so they have finally decided to look at it's better (sober) side. I keep hearing the phrase " the market is not efficient", now I know that "it's all about the bull". Well, in this case you actually can't say "Cut the Bull" (that also we keep hearing often). Let's see where the bull takes us.

No rate cut for January

And that proves that the interest rates are not decided in India, but rather in USA. Great going and so finally we might have to wait for some more weeks to see RBI backing off from it's present stand of keeping a relatively higher interest rate. Meanwhile the debate on the rate cut is likely to continue (in campus) today also.

No customer is a wrong customer..

Marketers always believe in the power of Word of Mouth marketing and Viral marketing where some key influencer(s) are targeted and who are believed to spread the good word about the product. In simple words, these individuals commands a power in the society and acts more like 'cheap' brand endorsers. But well, there is another school of thought emerging up and I really admire his fresh thinking.

Duncan Watts of Yahoo research believes that there is nothing like key influencers in absolute terms. A marketing program targeted towards these selected few is flawed and is no better than good old mass marketing. He argues that the key factor is the readiness of the market. If the society is ready to embrace some change then it will take the lead from almost anyone. There will be first movers but almost anyone could be the first mover. This is called accidental influential. [really a great idea]

Take an example: In viral marketing those people are targeted who do nothing other than forwarding mails. I get a lot from a couple of guys and most of the time I delete without even reading them. Sometime gmail saves me time by putting it directly in the spam folder. At the same time I do read mails from friends who write to me once a while (even when it's a forwarded trash). So you see, these people have more power than the the friendly 'spammers'.

Well, that's a disturbing news for the companies which put a lot of money on seminars and PR work. A new trend doesn't need to endorsed by Big B or SRK because if the market is not ready then no matter what it will fail and if it is ready then people like me or you can start a trend. That's a good news that no customer is a wrong customer.

Why RBI has to cut interest rates?

This is the most heated argument doing rounds in the hostel with Rajat at one end asking all sort of fundamental (innocent ones with a lot of 'Why's) questions and with Sunny and Shila at the other end trying to quench his thirst for macroeconomics by throwing all sort of jargons. This is something that Prof Banik should feel proud about because out of all things forgotten at the end of first two trimesters, Economics comes first and well if you thought it's OB then believe me it comes way behind economics (I still remember our Professor telling us that may be after 10 or 20 years, HR is what we will need most, but well that is still 10-12 years right?). Did you also mentioned stats? well, can't say that you are wrong!

Well, we haven't answered the original question yet, right? Anyways reserving that for tomorrow's morning lecture. Hopefully the discussion will get some more participants to pitch in.

Goodies for SALE

Where are you? Time to go shopping..

Come January and the whole city is painted with the fliers notifying SALE. Everything is up for grabs right from apparels to furniture and bed room linen to bathroom fixtures. The shopping really becomes a pain these days. You don't need it but still you buy it with the expectations that you might need it in future. Ever wonder what the 'sellers' gain from the SALE? I have certain hypothesis like 'Winter Sale' means what did not sell well last year is up on the offer and 'Fresh Stock' word attached to it signifies that its coming straight from the godowns. The logical explanation for missing buttons and loose thread is "shipping and handling defects" (the same will be termed wardrobe malfunction if the discovery is made by someone else other than you).

Normally there are two kinds of SALE that you see in India the stock clearance one and the other 'occasion related' (Holi, Deewali, Pujo, Pongal, New Year, Christmas etc etc) SALE. While the occasion based SALE targets the family savings, the stock clearance sale mainly strives for a preponed purchase as the company has to fill the shelves with the new stock. I am confused about the way the companies are trying to clear their stocks. Some brands are putting on goodies for SALE like three times in an year and I think that they sell more during these 2-3 months than what they sell during the entire year and that's a clear indication that people believe that these goods are really overprices during the 'normal' season.

Or what else could explain the sheer volume of visitors to the Genesis showroom which is running a promotion of 50% flat discount since last two weeks. Normally on any weekend evening I hardly find 4-5 customers in the showroom but last Wednesday it was like 100s of them crowding both the floors and some even waiting outside for a entry. The same with John Players. They were having 40% off and there was a big crowd in the shop which normally sees 20-30 visitors on average and I guess less than 20 purchases a day. But during promotion time, I myself witnessed about 10 bills being made in a brief 40-45 minutes period.

Given the increase in footfalls, I was amused that how these companies are funding the sale because it doesn't make a business sense to keep those stock piling up while you know that their real perceived price is 30-50% low than the marked price. So what is the catch? And I doesn't have to look for long..

Westside who is running promotion of upto 50% off has done a great thing. I visited their stores somedays back and I wanted to see whether the thing that I have bought have become cheaper or not? (Feels like shit if you can relate to the feeling of getting duped because of your bad timing, any investors here??) So, I saw a change in the store layout. What was there a couple of weeks ago was missing and it was replaced with other goodies (I hope you understand). There was sale only on selected items (it ring any bells?) and majority of that was something you won't buy until you are desperately longing for that item. Later I found out that John Players did exactly the same thing. They shifted all the 'non sale' item to the second floor and well given that move, you are not left with enough options to choose from.

Pantaloon's sale was not even worth checking as it was a winter sale in Chennai where there ain't no winters. (Great, but who knows they might be targeting those people who are traveling to North in the recent future and might need a pullover or two. See, you just can't really doubt the genius of Biyani type).

I like window shopping but the girls always insist to walk into the stores. They like touch and feel well, if I enter a shop I really feel embarrassed in walking out without buying something (something which my closest friend hate about me and I think it always burns a hole in my pocket too). So I did buy a shirt and the T-Shirt that I liked was not available for sale and which I thought was really overpriced at the MRP. Late in the night I checked online and bought it (the risk is that whatever you buy online people feel it's from Paymate gift coupons, great!). Well, they sent me a Hrithik poster also but I think it would have been a lot better if they mention their next 'Sale' date so that I don't make a fool of myself for buying in the 'regular season'.

"Save the white brothers"

On the day when ICC removed umpire Bucknor from the third test, I wrote it on my blog that it's merely an eye wash and soon BCCI will be celebrating the result and will glorify this move as a victory. And it did happened in the same chronological order. (I am not boasting of my insights I just want to drive the point home that it's so simple to understand these things for even a common man, why the jokers at BCCI fail to read that?) Just look at the happenings after that, West Indian board hit out at ICC. All the biased reporters started bitching BCCI for 'hostage crisis'. Reporters like Dilip Premchandran whose biasness is not hidden from anyone and who feels that he is the only cricket expert left on this earth (rest according to him are a bunch of jokers who watch only one over of the match and write a report). Well, so finally a bunch of jokers at our BCCI handed the power to the ring master in a typical circus like drama and the ring master finally announces that the tour is on. Poor cricketers. Now it all depends on them, if they win from here, the moment will go into history books with all the people shouting shame Australi!, Shame Australia! but if they loose, the attribution will be on their low morale.

About taking cricket as hostage, I don't see it as a problem. India is the cricket superpower and I can't see why people have a problem with that. Nobody questions the integrity of United Nations which has been held hostage time and again by America and just by the virtue of their 'yearly grants' to the organization. If Indian spectators and marketing companies brings in the majority of the cricket revenue, why people have problems if they want to see the justice being done. And no, we are not talking about injustice, we are just talking about a fair trial process.

Anyways, the big issue was sorting out the racist thing. Rasheed Latiff (an Asian) got banned from a test match because of claiming a controversial catch but these white shameless buggers escape without getting the stick and shamelessly keep repeating the authenticity of the catch. Now, if ICC can't do the justice with their strongest member then it's always right for BCCI to form it's own rival organization and mind you Mr. Derek Pringal and all others who are hitting against Indians and Indian board, the problem is not that BCCI is holding cricket as hostage but the bigger problem is that "people like you will loose your job if India start playing against its neighbours only". Nobody read your columns in India and overnight your 'rate per word' will fall to nothing. It's not cricket what is troubling you all. It's actually the money dear. And well, if the jokers at BCCI would understand even a single bit of the game and emotions involved, they would have by now bought out ICC locks, stocks and barrel and would have left Australia playing England only. (We have no problems with the New Zealanders and South Africans dear and for English, I understand why all reporters are playing "save the white brothers" game).

Some good articles on the recent crisis..

greatbong hitting it hard
Derek Pringel's save white brothers cry
Dilip Premchandran's most biased article
Peter Roebuck calling 'spade a spade' (He is an Australian by the way)
Shake the tree for the sake of the game
Prem Panicker's superbly written piece

Engineers make the marketing look lot easier..

Even before the 'PEOPLE CAR' was out, speculations about its performance were rife and most among the elite (Competitors, reviewers, environmentalists, politicians, journalists etc etc) gave it a big thumbs down. The best comment came from Maharashtra chief minister Mr. Vilasrao Deshmukh that " if so many people are going to buy this car, where they will keep it? Where they will run it?" Well, I think that the person who is spending 1 lakh from his/her pocket can figure out all this. They are no fools.

Reports were that this being the cheapest car on the road only few people will want to own it, will be most polluting and has a dabba shape (plastic body). But well, the launch and the coverage thereafter says it all. In the words of RATAN TATA " a promise is a promise". And well, he stood firm on his words.

Ofcourse, it's the cheapest car on the road but is cuter than Maruti 800, Zen Estilo and our big old Ambi and it is lot safer than the 800 and bikes. It can't run at 100 kmph but I can bet my money on the fact that if they say 70 kmph, it will go to that speed without shaking. The Euro IV compliant engine ensures that it remains less polluting that any car on the Indian roads today and the price tag offers unmatched value.

Two days back, we were having a small discussion on the future of the car and most of my friends felt that it's too costly for a bike rider to switch to it and too cheap for a CAR and thus it will be hard for the company to even break even. My personal view was that let's leave the marketing to the company (they can always do the segmentation and targeting) but what is more important is that this car is an engineering marvel adn will bring a new trend of cost efficient design. It will inspire a whole new generation of automobiles (Renault, Suzuki, Ford, Hyundai etc now all aspire to bring their own cutie little bird on the road) and it's a moment of pride as an Indian. With the kind of buzz the cute little bird is creating on the road, it makes me believe that good and sound engineering can make the marketing look lot easier. You never know from where the customers might come.

The excitement among auto drivers just support this basic belief.

Bucknor is Buckled finally...

Going.. Going.. and Gone

The infamous old man of the game Bucknor has been shown the door but, it's just and eye wash by ICC because no sooner than later some other cricket boards like West Indian will start lobbying for him. And may be Bucknor himself will file a law suit claiming for damages like 'Darell Hair' did.

Anyways, I am hypothesizing that BCCI (an organization run by some mentally challenged people) will call a press conference soon and start boasting of it's glory and the muscle power. Poor old fellows will shift the attention from the real issue and then start celebrating. After all, we are Indians and even a sight of victory is enough for us to get high on it and then end up getting really low, really really low. We lost the first test just because of our this Indian spirit (well it must be powerful like the real 'spirit' because most of our board members are always high on it). 5 wickets down and there you go partying letting the opposition off the hook "oh chak diye fatte yaar!!" Well, let's wait for another drubbing of our cricket team. And the only possible scenario in which the tour can be called off is the communist opposing it. Well, so much for the Indian cricket. Good luck India. Hope the result is not 4-0.

Dear cricketers, ff you have some sense of pride left in you, then go and thrash the Australians on the field. Even if you can't at-least die trying. You know you can't get it done off the field (your sick board) so do it on the field.
Good luck guys..

On the lighter note - Good news for our freedom fighters...

Mahatma Gandhi, Subhash Chandra Bose and most of the freedom fighters must be savouring each and every moment of cricket these days (from heaven). Come on, nobody would have thought that someday an Indian would be able to racially abuse an Englishmen (Well Symonds have English origins though he chose to play his cricket for Australia). It's like a dream come true, isn't it? Bhagat Singh did dream about a day when Indians would be treated equally but well, I want to send him the message that we have managed to beat his expectations. People belonging to developed countries are now accusing us of racial abuse.

Great, I can see human right organizations of Australia putting up road shows and awareness campaign against Indians in near future. I can't stop laughing my head out imagining that 20 years from now, people in Australia would be watching movies like "Maine 'Sandy' ko nahi maara", ''Sandy my father'' etc etc. Just imagine Andrew Symonds being thrown out of one of those Indian Railway's trains and then awakening of a whole nation.

Hahaha, with Dollars (though US and not Australian) going down and Rupee rising up, of-course martyrs from our freedom struggle must be smiling up there.

Racist? Who?

Harbhajan and Haneef - What is common between both these gentlemen? If I would have asked this question one week back the clueless answers would have circled around the obvious facts like "their name starts with H" "they both have 'a' as the second letter in their names", "they are both Indians" and like that. Today you ask these questions to anybody who is following the news and they will say that they both are the victims of RACIAL ABUSE. Not much water has passed under the bridge since Dr Haneef's case when the Australian government agencies were first to pronounce their verdict without any proof and later have to cut a sorry face by dropping the charges. Now, they are calling Harbhajan racist but the way his case was handled surely points out to the root of racism.

Who is racist? Talking about racial abuse, I don't know what problem Symonds has in being called as monkey (I am unaware of the relation between monkey and ethnicity what I know that we all had simian ancestors, we even have monkey god 'Hanumana'). I never thought it to be a racial remark (one of our classmate keeps calling everybody as monkey) and demeaning or defamatory. Umpires were blind - acceptable, the third umpire was not even able to read braille script (he erred with the presence of technology also) - again acceptable but match referee have gone one step further and have shown signs of racism by choosing to selectively listen to selective people. Umpires didn't hear it, Sachin heard it but referee chose not to hear him and Ponting who didn't hear it, referee chose to hear him. Well, this whole 'hearing matter' was confusing and was an eyewash because it was already decided who is going to get the axe. Match referee deliberately delayed the verdict to avoid a possible walk off by the Indian team. How come a match referee can ignore the plea of Sachin and selectively listen to arguments made by Ponting who has no credibility among any of the Asian teams? Well, the whole matter shows signs of racism and that too very very focussed towards Indian players.

Harbhajan or Haneef are not the victims of racial abuse or racial discrimination, rather they are victims of a mindset which makes people point fingers at the Asians for any unexplained happening. Racial abuses have a history and and we all know which races continued to practice it as late as 1990s. Ask Africans, they are in better position to tell you. I am not so happy to see that some people like Prokter are carrying forward that legacy with them. Racism is not about saying something when provoked, it's more deeply rooted in the mindset. Or what else would explain the remarks made by the CEO of Orient Hotels against TATAs of India. Well, be it business or cricket (which is again has become more of a business and less of a game) it's a shame for India not to have put up a fight against blatant Racism all around us. I think that Sharad Powar should escalate the matter and call the tour off.

"Jake Rakho Saiyan..

Maar Sake Na Koi". (One who is protected by God himself can't be killed by anyone). Well, not even a 500 Feet "free fall"...

A window washer who fell from 47th floor is still alive and Doctors are saying that he will be walking all by himself in a couple of months. No kidding, see for yourself

Railway stations to get a face lift..

Indian railways have decided to put up 22 of its railway stations up for a face lifting job before their possible public listing (IPO) announcement. Alright, I am cooking up the last part but who knows? In typical Lalu's tone, "Laloo hain bhaiya, agar maatha ghum gaya toh? (He is Lalu and nobody knows what will be his next move). Several railway ministers came and went but Lalu can claim that he is the only one to have heard the railways singing "Mujhko bhi toh lift kara de".

Everybody would like to believe that Indian Railways is on the right tracks but well, I can bet my ten bucks that these people must be taking flights themselves. If they have then I will bet another ten bucks that their houses must be full of cockroaches. These cockroaches thrives in the air-conditioned compartments of most of the trains. Well, they must be really lucky or what else could explain their survival on pantry car's food (oh! I just forgot that Cockroach can survive anything even in the absence of food and water). Anyways they are lucky that they travel free and are expanding their empire from one corner of India to another corner.

Even if you forget about the cockroaches for a while and try to enjoy the ride, it becomes boring after a while. The same hawkers going around selling the same things (this is not valid for the Rajdhanis or Shatabdis but they do have cockraoches) and the same people around with the same problem that "trains are too slow and the journey becomes too long". Even a journey of 300 kilometers might take upto 6-9 hours. Ab 200 miles ke liye koi flight leta hai kya? Check in 1-2 hours in advance, driving out of city may take 1-2 hours, 2 hour in flight cursing why it's not taking off, 30 minutes in baggage claims and then again 1 hour of driving in the city makes it look like more or less the same. On top of that pay around Rs 2000 as taxes plus the airfare. Low cost is no more low cost. Yeah they are low in comparison to each other (relatively lower) but exorbitantly high when compared to Bhartiya rail.

So the government has protected railways from the competition by increasing the fuel surcharge and other taxes on the airlines. Clear indication that government don't want anybody to save time. Lalu's explanation is pretty simple "Our people don't have money but they have lots of time, so they want a cheap transportation mode" (the other reason is that if people will have extra time then they will start watching cricket again and Sharad Powar's weight in the coalition will increase). I know I am again cooking it up. But well, the fact of the matter is that though it has turned around, railway still continues to haunt many people like me. They are too slow, continue to remain filthy and have not been able to keep pace with growth of demand.

Now, the recent move to offer the 22 railway stations for a face lift is really a welcome move. It will surely push the prices forward but then the cross subsidy method where the AC fare subsidizes the non-AC fare will keep things in control. I have been to most of these 22 stations and I can say that without any exception they all are filthy and poorly maintained. Security is inadequate (I haven't ever seen the metal detectors working and what else people can sneak through the sides) and during the peak hours it just looks like another crowded street of Delhi (minus the cows and bulls). Out of these 22, Gaya to be mentioned specifically. It's the gateway to famous tourist attraction Bodh Gaya and perhaps your first tryst with this railway station will paint you the real picture of Hungry India Poor India (HI-PI).

Corporates like Reliance, TATA and DLF are bidding for the contract but it is still to be seen that who gets it (I personally want to see who will be interested in bidding for small towns). Railways contracts have a notorious legacy behind them and no doubt political parties are so interested in fighting for the railway ministry.

Anyways, let's hope that the Professor G Raghuraman of IIM A who advocates a public private partnership knock some sense into the think tank of railway. Well, wherever there is money, there comes a will (no it's not Bill Gates, comeon! he has sobered up a lot lately). So what next? An IPO, who knows? May be*.. Why not?

*I am hypothesizing purely

And now you have Reliance Tech Also..

After the recent victory dance of Rupee against Dollar, few would have thought that IT services company's days are far from over. But wait, Reliance (R-ADAG) have recently announced their foray into IT services with their Tech Arm Reliance Tech (Link Here). No wonder, IT has still a lot left in it otherwise a shrewd business empire like Reliance, would have never thought of entering the arena.

I am not very amazed with their entry into IT services because it coincides with the fact that other big players are also changing their focus to Indian market. Given Reliance's experience in playing around with Indian conditions (recall that conversation between Guru Bhai and a Rajiv Gandhi look alike in the movie Guru) it's no surprise what they are up to. Just recently two big organizations namely Indian Railways and State Bank of India have announced their IT ambitions. With politicians like Lalu Prasad Yadav at the helm of affairs it's no surprise that Reliance's experience can come handy. The telecommunication vertical is also heating up as Bharti and Idea have announced their IT budget which is in the range of 700 mn$ - 1 bn+. The market looks really lucrative as R-Adag brings their domain expertise and they already have demonstrated their capability in the telecommunication software area.

Well, they may be a little late in joining the band wagon but the party is far from over. The IT space has yet not matured in India, in-fact it's just picking up. What was earlier considered as a non profit (low billing) area is fast becoming a natural hedge against depreciating Dollar. Reliance's entry just gives a hint of that. What else, it has deep pockets, manpower and momentum and they can always poach the best (whatever it takes) from the best. It's so easy to start a company these days. You just need to have the appetite and of-course the money power to support it. Rest, you can always acquire from others.