The concept is making a comeback with companies like Bajaj, Titan, Kingfisher, Nirma and Airtel using their old jingles enmeshed with new visuals.
The National Aviation Company of India (NACIL), the entity that came into being after the merger of national carriers Air India and Indian, has increased its working capital limit to around Rs 9,500 crore (Rs 95 billion) in order to meet the recent hikes in fuel prices.
Although a merger with low-cost carrier SpiceJet would have made the Kingfisher-Deccan combine the largest carrier in Indian skies, it would have put a huge burden on the Vijay Mallya-controlled carrier's financials, feel experts. SpiceJet's losses have almost doubled to Rs 133 crore (Rs 1.33 billion) this year -- of which Rs 123 crore (Rs 1.23 billion) were incurred in the March quarter -- as compared with last year.
Inflation is affecting consumer spending and advertisers say they will now spend only on media which gives them the highest measurable returns. TV, for instance, grabs the biggest ad pie due to its mass appeal and the ready availability of TRPs, used to assess its returns.
Even as growth in traffic on chartered flights has fallen 6 to 8 per cent over the past year, rising fuel prices are forcing private charter operators to raise tariffs a substantial 20 per cent from September 1. India has more than 50 non-scheduled operators, which include helicopter operators like Global Vectra, aircraft operators like Ran Air and Taj Air and companies like Deccan Aviation Ltd that fly both helicopters and aircraft.
Domestic airlines will save around Rs 2,500 crore annually if they import aviation turbine fuel directly rather than buy it from state-owned oil marketing companies. This would help them shave off around 14 per cent of their burgeoning fuel bill and cut the industry's projected loss of Rs 8,000 crore for the current financial year by a little less than a third.
A draft circular issued by the DGCA on June 17 had said that any pilot of a wide-body aircraft (these are used mostly for overseas flights) should have a flying experience of at least 7,000 hours, including 2,000 hours on a jet aircraft and 1,500 hours on a wide-body aircraft on international routes.
An Evalueserve study says that globally, the revenue from this sector is likely to grow from Rs 1,000 crore (Rs 10 billion) in 2006-07 to over Rs 8,000 crore (Rs 80 billion) by 2015.
After rationalising flights and routes, major domestic airlines like Kingfisher, Jet Airways and SpiceJet are introducing sharp cutbacks in staff and salaries to cope with slower passenger growth and rising aviation turbine fuel costs. Manpower typically accounts for 10-15 per cent of an airline's total costs.
State governments have raised serious reservations against a plea by the aviation ministry and domestic carriers to reduce sales tax on aviation turbine fuel. Worse still, states like Kerala which had reduced the tax rate from 28.5 per cent to 4 per cent to encourage carriers to buy from the state have decided to take back the benefit alleging that it is not being passed on to the customers as promised.
Even as domestic carriers are lobbying hard to fly abroad in an effort to utilise capacity better, Mumbai-based full service carrier Jet Airways has deferred the commencement of its Delhi-Hong Kong operations. Sources in the company said that the flights, which were supposed to begin from June, may have been delayed till November.
The Tatas and the Dubai-based Istithmar Group may increase their stake in Delhi-based low-cost carrier SpiceJet, which has a 10 per cent market share in Indian aviation market. While the Tatas, who currently hold 7 per cent stake in the company through Ewart Investment, may hike their shareholding to 15 per cent, Istithmar is likely to raise its stake from 13 to 30 per cent, sources said.
Mumbai-based low-cost carrier GoAir has decided to stop its flights to Chennai from the coming week. This is the fourth destination to which the carrier has opted out after Kochi, Coimbatore and Pune.
Poor bandwidth availability and last-mile connectivity might have slowed the use of unified communications as a technology, but now it's emerging as a strategic tool with corporations for employee retention and going green. Corporations are encouraging the use of UC, helping them to curtail business travel. This, they believe, results in lowering carbon dioxide emission into the atmosphere.
The US slowdown coupled with rupee appreciation, talent crunch and rising salaries, and the 2010 sunset clause on tax holiday for IT firms, is putting knowledge process outsourcing firms in a bind.
After losing out to Bangalore-based GMR group for the controversial Delhi airport modernisation contract, Anil Dhirubhai Ambani group is now set to battle it in Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic, for which bids are shortly to be invited. Late last week, ADAG company Reliance Airport Developers Private Limited submitted an expression of interest to the Prague airport authorities. the ADAG company is willing to take a 100 per cent stake in the airport.
Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel's plans to make India a maintenance, repair and overhaul hub for aircraft in Asia are set to crash. China, once again, has left India way behind. While over 300 MRO companies are in operation in China, only three have set up shops in India - Max Aerospace, Airworks and Indamer.
Depending on the fleet size and its age, airlines buy 30-50 per cent of the components that they need, and take the rest on lease. Expenditure on spares and components is a considerable part of engineering and maintenance, which account for over 9-10 per cent of the total operating expense of an airline. For instance, Air India, which has a large and ageing fleet, has to provide $35 million-$40 million for spare parts during any time of the year.
More and more companies are opting for outsourcing data centres. Data centre operators are also called managed service providers (MSPs). These MSPs include Reliance Communications (RCom), Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Bharti, Netcore, and Ctrl S. The biggest outsourcers are enterprises, banks and financial institutions. IT managers in the Asia-Pacific region rely on outsourcing data centre operations more than their peers.
JobStreet India, a sister portal of JobStreet 18 -- one of Asia's leading online recruitment companies -- has revamped its job site with a 'Smart Apply' feature.
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