Mobmerry Installs Beacons to Transform Physical Shopping Experience

By Manu Sharma

In the face of the global $1.2 trillion e-commerce industry, retail brands are in need of a way to evolve a new physical shopping experience Due to beacons, technology is changing the way customers shop. In India, Interaction One, a Bangalore-based start-up focused on innovation and building memorable mobile experiences, is set to transform the retail and lifestyle industry with the launch of Mobmerry that is using beacons to window shop your city.

Mobmerry, the app hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS), cloud platform helps connects retailers to consumers through product discovery, real-time notifications of new products, deals, and discounts in the consumers’ immediate area. Interaction One will be the first company to deploy over 1000 beacons across Bangalore, making it one of the largest beacon deployments in India. This will make Bangalore the first city to be lit up and connected virtually.

Speaking to the media, Krishna Prasad, CEO and Co-founder, Interaction One says, “We are a technology startup and are backing on beacons to transform retail in India. The convergence of the physical and digital world is considered to be the future of retail. In the same way that e-commerce brands use mouse tracking, heat mapping, engagement analysis and social media to assess shopping habits, physical stores are beginning to replicate such analysis with beacons. Thanks to your influx of smartphone, you could become a walking hotspot for advertisements shortly.”

In fact, Beacon technology, which is used by retailers to ping promotional messages to customers’ smartphones, is being incorporated into shopping malls. The beacons are used to ping shoppers with promotions and discounts and help retailers get a grasp on who’s shopping and how often, and improve customer experience.

According to a report published by SAP, The Internet of Things (IoT) will generate US $329 billion of revenue in the retail sector by 2018. Retail is expected to be one of the biggest sectors benefitting from the rise of IoT. The future of the retail sector is in Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) applications i.e. beacons. The app is available free for android and iOS platforms. 

“Mobmerry has managed the initial funds through bootstrap of $0.5 million from the parent company but as we move on, we would require VC funding as plan to Pan-Bangalore with an investment of $3-4 million over the next two years and besides also expand Pan-India with $20 million investment during the same period,” remarks Prasad.

“We are already in talks with several major retailers like JC Penny, Macy’s and Target Corporation in India,” adds Prasad.

For merchants, beacon technology will prove invaluable. Beacons provide businesses with large amounts of available data such as how long consumers spend at certain locations, busiest days of the week, and number of people who walk into the location per day. This information can help merchants make tweaks and changes based on the data collected to make their business more efficient.

With 30 odd stores onboarded in Indiranagar, Bangalore, such as Aviraté, Celio, Guess, Jack & Jones, Kazo, Lee, Vans, Vero Moda, Wrangler to name a few. Mobmerry is on its way to providing technology and revolutionising the retail industry in India.

Beacon technology has been provided by Kontakt.io, a Polish hardware company funded in 2013.Trevor Longino, Head of Marketing and PR at Kontakt.io said, “As a company, we are constantly looking for ways in which our beacons can make a difference. We are glad that with such a large deployment we will be able to bring local businesses into the Internet of Things era and by that taking the whole local beacon market to the next level.”

Mobmerry has also partnered with Virtuous Retail, an institutionally owned developer-operator of community-oriented premium Lifestyle Shopping Centres for its latest flagship development, VR Bengaluru on Whitefield main road. Mobmerry will deploy over 300 Beacons across the centre to enhance shopping experiences for VR Bengaluru’s patrons.

Bimal Dayal Replaces B.S.Shantharaju As CEO-Designate of Indus Towers

Indus Towers, the world’s largest telecom tower company, today announced the appointment of Bimal Dayal as the Chief Executive Officer-Designate with immediate effect. He succeeds B.S. Shantharaju who has been with Indus Towers for over six years and will be retiring with effect from 31^st March 2016. During the next six months, Shantha will smoothly transition Bimal to the new role. Bimal has been associated with Indus Towers since 2010 as the Chief Operating Officer (COO).

Rakesh Bharti Mittal, Chairman, Indus Towers said, “I would like to congratulate Bimal on his new role and wish him success. I am confident that under his leadership the Company will scale greater heights and further strengthen the strong foundation that Shantha has built.”

“I also wish Shantha the very best for his future endeavours. He will leave behind a great legacy with his exemplary leadership and outstanding business performance.”  He further added.

Bimal brings with him a unique blend of Indian and global experience. His exposure spans from global majors like Ericsson and Qualcomm to Tata Telecom. In his capacity of Managing Director of Ericsson in Sri Lanka, he successfully steered the company to become the country’s number one player in telecom infrastructure.

Talking about his elevation,  Bimal Dayal, Chief Executive Officer - Designate, Indus Towers said, “I very humbly accept the mantle and would be constantly working towards making Indus Towers an institution loved by Customers and Partners as well as a great place to work.”

Talking about the development, B.S. Shantharaju, Outgoing CEO, Indus Towers, said, “It was a great personal challenge for me to ensure that Indus Towers, born as the world's largest telecom tower company, is well respected amongst Employees, Customers and Partners.”

“Having known Bimal for the last five years, I am confident that Indus Towers will continue to thrive in his capable hands. He will bring a renewed vigour and dedication, Indus Towers will grow from strength to strength. I wish him all the best.” he added.

Bimal brings with him 28 years of rich industry experience and holds a double Bachelor’s degree in Engineering and Law. Further he holds the alumni status for Harvard Business School, where he pursued the Advance Management Program.  

Rs.139.23 Crore Divident Paid to Government By PSU Bharat Electronics Ltd

Navratna defence PSU Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) has paid a total dividend of 292% for 2014-15.

S K Sharma, Chairman and Managing Director, BEL, presented the 232% final dividend cheque of Rs.139,23,29,672 (Rupees one hundred and thirty nine crore twenty three lakh twenty nine thousand six hundred and seventy two only), for 2014-15 to the Defence Minister, Manohar Parrikar, at New Delhi today (Wednesday, October 21, 2015). 

This is the dividend payable to the Government of India on the shares held by the President of India and Government nominees.

In February 2015, BEL had paid 60% Interim Dividend for the year 2014-15.  

Amazonbusiness.in Begins B2B Delivery for SMBs In Bengaluru & Mangaluru in Karnataka

Amazonbusiness.in has announced the expansion of its offering in Karnataka. Started by Amazon in May 2015 as an invite only platform, Amazonbusiness.in has now opened registration for membership. Over the last few months, Amazon business has extended its service from a few pin codes to 113 pin codes across Bengaluru and has begun delivering to Mangaluru. A members-only website, AmazonBusiness.in is specifically designed to help small and medium businesses, such as offices, entrepreneurs, department stores, kirana stores, clinics, hospitals, hotels and restaurants, buy the products they need online at wholesale prices and in bulk quantities.

In keeping with the festive spirit, Amazonbusiness.in, now has an exhaustive selection with thousands of products from hundreds of brands to choose from. The categories offered include Health and Personal Care; Food and Beverages; Cleaning Tools and Supplies; Kitchen and Dining; Bed, Bath and Furnishing; Office and Stationery; Gift Cards and Computers and Accessories.

Excited with the growth and expansion, Kaveesh Chawla, General Manager, Amazonbusiness.in said, “We have received overwhelmingly positive response from businesses in Bengaluru since our launch in May this year. Our vision is to become the preferred destination for small and medium businesses to buy everything they need. We continue to innovate on behalf of our customer and make online shopping convenient and value adding for them. Keeping the growing demand in mind, we have expanded our operations in Bengaluru and have begun deliveries to Mangaluru.”

Amazonbusiness.in offers a purpose built experience for small and medium businesses and provides wholesale prices, bulk quantities, tax invoices, assisted shopping and credit solution from ICICI and HDFC that offers interest-free credit for up to 48 days. Customers can order from anywhere, at any time of the day and get FREE door-step delivery within 1 to 2 business days in Bengaluru and 2 to 4 business days in Mangaluru. Customers need to place a minimum order of Rs. 1000 and can pay using NEFT/RTGS, Credit/Debit Card and Net banking.

Brands available on Amazonbusiness.in the Health and Personal Care category include Colgate, Dettol, Johnson’s, Sunsilk, Pampers, Olay and more. In the Home and Kitchen department, there are brands like Bombay Dyeing, Ocean, Signora Ware, Lock & Lock, Corelle, and Princeware. Brands like Cello, Classmate, Reynolds, JK, Parker and many others are featured in Offices and Stationery section.

Roder.in To Make Outstation Cab Travel In India More Affordable

InstaCab, a venture founded by IIT KGP alumni, is an InterCity cab aggregator has rebranded the product and services to new brand name: Roder.in. Roder.in aims to make over-expensive outstation cab travel affordable and accessible to everyone. Moreover, Roder.in has expanded the services to 12 more cities in North India.

The venture of the parent company, Vecto Technologies Pvt Ltd,started off as a marketplace for taxi industry, the first product was launched in Aug 2014. After generating GMV of Rs 1 million in just under 4 months, the team identified serious problems in the outstation taxi industry, which had been neglected by the major players in the market.

They aim to eliminate “the return-fare” concept from the market by optimizing resources so that customer only pays for the distance travelled. With a fleet of 2500 drivers, does not own cars, its“one-way rates” operations are spread across more than 350 routes covering North India (increase from 32 routes last month), providing good connectivity with well-maintained cabs at affordable prices. Roder.in has expanded and started accepting booking requests from the following cities: Chandigarh, Amritsar, Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Agra, Dehradun, Rishikesh, Haridwar, Jaipur, Ajmer, Pushkar, Kanpur, including Delhi-NCR.

Roder.in will continue expansion to new markets in North India for the next quarter to create a wide network of cabs, with which customers will be able to avail one-way rates to travel between cities across North India.

Roder.in, offers three types of cars: mainly hatchbacks, sedans and multi-utility vehicles. With this, the initial months of this year from January to October has seen over 1500 outstation trips with average size being to the tune of 5,000, generating a GMV of around Rs 8 million.

Roder.in is a technology platform and aggregates cabs for outstation travels. They maintain and optimize fleets across cities in a particular region to provide one-way rates to the customers. They charge commission per ride provided to the operators. They focus heavily on driver verification and cab verification to ensure customer safety.  

Save 100 Million Litres of Water with Eco-friendly Car Wash

About 71% of the Earth’s surface is covered by water but still water scarcity is one of the biggest problems faced across the globe. Although many start-ups are advocate various social causes and have awareness campaigns, water conservation still remains to be an untouched domain in the start-up space.

As per a recent case study, there will be no drinking water in India by 2040, if the consumption (read wastage) of water continues at the same rate. Among the mega cities in India, Bangalore is the second highest waster of water. Out of the total water supply of 1300 MLD (million liter per day) , more than 40% of city’s water goes to waste, out of which more than 250 MLD is lost due to leakage and household wastage while the city still faces the deficit of 150 MLD against the huge demand. Bangalore loses as much water as Mysore, Mangalore, Hubli or Belgaum consume.

Among other things, water wastage during car wash is one of the common concerns. Have you ever imagined, how much water do you consume when washing a car? A normal water wash generally takes 10 buckets of 10 liters each, i.e. 100 liters of water on an average. Bangalore has 10 lakh cars and it estimated that 10 crore liters of water per week is used for car washing which is equivalent to emptying the Bellandur lake 50 times!

To save the 14 million liter water from going to waste every day, Bangalore based Cartisan is promoting Eco-friendly car wash campaign. It not only saves the water but keeps your car body in a good condition.

Here’s how it works:

·         Eco-friendly waterless car wash saves hundreds of liters of precious water.

·         We use unique moisturizing agents, lubricants and protectants.

·         Special micro-fibre towel is used to avoid scratches while wiping.

·         Water wash leads to dullness of the car paint and leaves run off marks whereas the eco-friendly car wash leaves high gloss shine and protective barrier on car’s paint.

If you start doing your bit for conserving water, you can start with something as small as making sure that your water taps don’t leak unnecessarily. If you waste a lot of your time and water every week washing your car, it’s time to stop the same. You’ll be surprised to see how a small activity like a dry car wash can save hundreds of litres of water every week with minimal efforts. Moreover, if a car is washed in the street, it can lead to water pollution in the river due to pollutants like grease which in the end is harmful for sea life. Waterless car wash is an easy way to prevent water pollution due to car wash.

Waterless car wash has been lesser known in the car owners’ community. Cartisan on-boards service providers who have expertise in waterless car wash. Cartisan also hires car cleaners and their experienced service advisors extensively train them to wash cars without water. Cartisan hopes to provide more employments and at the same time spread awareness about the eco-friendly car wash. They have seen an incredible response so far and the car owners have welcomed the waterless wash. Moreover they offer the doorstep eco-friendly wash at almost 80% discounted prices as compared to regular wash, to spread awareness.

Cartisan has saved around 1 Lakh litres of water so far in Bangalore and Mumbai. They has also tied up with Myles cars, a self-drive car rental service in Bangalore to provide car cleaning services to their entire fleet and is saving 10000 Litres of water every week additionally.

Do your bit today for your city by getting an eco-friendly waterless car wash done by trained professionals. It not only saves the precious water but also leaves your car with a glossy shine and makes the body paint last longer than usual. It’s time to encourage startups working in the space of water conservation.  

abof.com – A One-Stop Online Portal for Fashion Products

Announcing the launch of abof.com (all about fashion:  ae-bof), an online one-stop fashion portal for apparel, footwear and accessories for men and women, Kumar Mangalam Birla, Chairman, Aditya Birla Group said “The e-commerce sector is a sunrise sector from an investment point of view. While a lot has happened in the last couple of years, a lot more is yet to happen in this space. With abof.com, we aim to offer a wide but curated range of merchandise and a differentiated shopping experience that can compete with the best in the world. We see abof emerging as the most admired player in online fashion within the next 3 years”. 

Elaborating further Mr. Birla mentioned that the Aditya Birla Group is already India’s largest fashion player through Madura Fashion and Pantaloons. “Therefore, it made sense for us to enter into fashion e-commerce to further strengthen our pole position in the business of fashion in India. We see the potential to build another billion-dollar business of the Group in this space” commented Mr. Birla.

Built with a vision to become India’s most admired online fashion brand and to provide a personalized shopping experience, abof has leveraged best-of-breed technologies. Its experience has been built as mobile first, and it works seamlessly across a wide range of devices including desktops.

The snappy and glam-led platform is targeted at millennials, the aim being to offer the latest styles, a daily dose of proprietary fashion content and style tips. The webstore provides the trendiest looks of the season from around the world through its curated collection of products handpicked from brands, and from its own brand ‘abof’.

“Today’s millennial generation wants everything fast and personalized. Within fashion, we identified this as a white space that can be tapped into by a focused player,” avers Mr. Prashant Gupta, President and Chief Executive Officer, abof.com.  “abof.com is a result of our quest to address this gap in the market.  We are building India’s most admired online fashion store and fashion brand, even as incumbents race towards becoming a fashion marketplace offering deeply discounted branded products”, he added.

abof.com is equipped with India’s first-of-its-kind 3D virtual trial room - a tool where customers can instantly view themselves in any product by inputting their basic body proportions. The tool allows one to layer various garments to check out looks.  The webstore also uses a unique style quiz to understand a customers’ preference and shows only relevant personalized content. abof has built an ecosystem of best-in-class partners across technology (e.g., IBM, Cognizant, Razorfish, Oracle), fashion brands, marketing, and operations.

Additionally, the consumer experience at abof.com is designed to treat consumers like celebrities.  It uses premium packaging that ensures garments are intact during transit, and has superior delivery services throughout the week including Sundays.  abof has established a world-class supply chain infrastructure that is fully tech-enabled.  Delivery and customer care services have been set up to cater to more than 400 cities across the country.