Vikram Hospital Bengaluru Donates Wheel chairs to Multiple Sclerosis Society of India

Vikram Hospital, Bengaluru, the trusted multi-specialty healthcare facility organized a workshop on multiple sclerosis (MS) in the city today along with free consultation for MS patients. On this occasion, Vikram Hospital, Bengaluru donated specialized wheel chairs to Multiple Sclerosis Society of India (MSSI) for MS patients. The program was aimed at sharing recent advances in the understanding of multiple sclerosis (MS) and its therapy, which would ultimately benefit families and patients affected with this chronic disorder.  There were additional lectures on mechanism of MS disease, Memory issues in MS followed by group yoga activity, relaxation and physiotherapy.  The workshop was attended by over 75 patients and their family members. 

Following this, free consultation with Neurologists, Physiotherapist , Nutritionist & Ps

ychologist was made available for all MS patients.

Dr Rajesh B Iyer, Consultant Neurologist and Epileptologist, Vikram Hospital, Bengaluru said, “Being a prolonged disease that affects individual at their prime, the socio- economic burden of MS is vast in the country. We have seen rise of MS cases in Bengaluru in the last one year. During our regular screening, we come across a minimum of 20 MS patients per 1000 neurology cases in Vikram Hospital. On an average, there are about 1000 MS patients in Bengaluru alone”. 

He further added that “our main objective is to spread awareness about MS in society, as early diagnosis can result in better prognosis. MS, if left untreated can lead to disabilities. Early treatment can prevent disability. Also we need to improve the quality of life of MS patients, who already have disabilities. ”

MS is a chronic central nervous system (CNS) disease, which affects the brain, spinal cord, and optic nerves. Even in the absence of new symptoms, the disease is a continuously active. Treatment is available in the form of injectable and oral medication, but is not affordable by all as it is expensive. Symptoms of MS includes  Blurring of vision, double vision, tingling numbness of any part, imbalance of body while walking and as the disease progresses, there could be bladder dysfunction, cognitive changes and difficulty to walk.

Dr Somesh Mittal, CEO Vikram Hospital Bengaluru said, “Awareness about Multiple Sclerosis and early treatment  is the need of the hour in today’s age and time. Vikram Hospital has been supporting MS patients by arranging logistics support as well as running specific programs for MS patients within the hospital. We have customized our diagnostic packages for MS patients like the MRI - MS protocol etc. This coupled with the fact that we have neuro - radiologist who are able to identify changes in the disease. Staff nurses here have been trained to administer the MS medications appropriately. We provide free injection room services to MS patients.  

He further added “It has always been our constant endeavour to offer affordable healthcare and with our expertise in the field of Neurology, we would like to extend it to all.

Prasad K and Rani, of MSSI said, “We are glad that Vikram Hospital, Bengaluru has continued with its support for spreading awareness on Multiple Sclerosis. This is the third year of our association and we are thankful to them for donating specialised wheelchairs and for conducting the free camp for MS patients. Their commitment is a step forward in realising the dream of providing affordable healthcare and access to treatment for MS patients to reduce MS-led disabilities. We extend our deepest gratitude to the team at Vikram Hospital for their unhindered support to the cause.

India is Not Economically Rich But Emerge Data Rich Over Next 3 Years: Nandan Nilekani

India is not yet economically rich but will emerge data rich over the next three years, said Nandan Nilekani, chairman, EkStep, and former chairman, Unique Identification Authority of India.

He was addressing the sixth C K Prahalad Memorial Lecture organised by the

Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) spoke on the ‘strategic implications’ and ‘the right strategy’ to be adopted by the country to use the data for the public good. “It is not a technology issue, but a policy issue. There are three main components — data colonisation, privacy and a ‘winner takes it all’ approach.”

The amount of data in the world today is equal to every person in the U.S. tweeting three tweets per minute for 26,976 years and every person in the world having more than 215 million high-resolution MRI scans a day, according to data collated by U.S.-based Waterford Solutions, e-mail and file management solutions company. 2.7 zettabytes of data exists in the digital universe today.

“A tsunami is going to hit us,” Nilekani said. “Most Indians will be digitally rich before they become economically rich.”

“There is a knowledge asymmetry when it comes to giving loans to the poor. Now with GSTN, Aadhaar and UPI, one can find out if a small businessman is worthy of being given a loan as his banks can digitally look at the performance of his business. The GSTN network will lay a large platform for businesses through its e-way bill and BharatBill payments. The Aadhaar will provide the base. India has a robust authentication structure in place, like PAN, which can safely authenticate a person. India is in a unique position.”

India is working on a paperless and cashless service delivery system that will enable the government, citizens and entrepreneurs to interact with each other through an open digital platform. The India Stack programme is the largest application programming interface that is being developed in order to enable 1.2 billion Indians to get access to goods and services digitally.

“The right thing to do is to enable the data to empower its user. It can be used for reskilling them. Also, the government can manage its economic data. For example, it can say whether the demand for cold rolled steel has gone up or down,” Nilekani said. “For digital democracy, government must unlock public data and bring in a new law to prevent misuse of data.”

Globally, more than 200 billion high definition movies, which would take a person 47 million years to watch, have been created and, according to estimates, the volume of business data worldwide, across all companies, doubles every 1.2 years, says Waterford Solutions. YouTube users upload 48 hours of new video every minute of the day. 571 new websites are created every minute of the day.

He also gave examples of companies such as Apple, Amazon and Google which have a reservoir of data and with use of technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning are able to build new businesses much faster than others. This could threaten incumbents and make it difficult for other players to enter into a new segment due to lack of data.

Nilekani cited the example of Netflix, a company which until fours years ago was in the business of distributing content from others.

Titan Enters Into the US Market with Amazon Global Selling Program

In line with Amazon’s vision to transform the way India sells, Amazon today announced its partnership with iconic Indian lifestyle brand ‘Titan’. Available in 30+countries and renowned worldwide for world-class innovation and award-winning designs, Titan’s collaboration with Amazon will now help them foray into the US market and reach out to Amazon’s wide and loyal consumer base internationally.

Under the partnership, Amazon through its Global Selling Program will enable Titan to take its vast range of watches to millions of global customers across ethnicities on Amazon.com in the US and eventually across other Amazon marketplaces. Titan has continuously maintained innovation and consumer sentiment at its core and its segment-focused brands like Fastrack and Raga, along with internationally recognized award-winning products like Edge are the most popular among customers across the world. Apart from watches, Titan will also launch its wide range of Fastrack accessories and further plans to add additional products from its robust product portfolio to Amazon’s global marketplaces. Through this collaboration, Titan watches will now become easily available to millions of overseas Amazon customers, strengthening the brand and emphasizing the integrity that the Titan name has always stood for.

Sharing his views on the partnership, S Ravikant, CEO, Watches and Accessories, Titan Company Limited said, “Somewhere in the world a Titan watch is being purchased every three seconds. While this is a reflection of Titan’s popularity, it is also propelling us to expand our boundaries. Titan has over 200 million customers and 7000 retail stores spread over 30+ different countries. But with global demand heading north, Titan is westward bound; our entry into the US via Amazon’s Global Selling Program allows us access directly to the American market. We are very pleased to partner with Amazon and we are certain that we will be able to offer value for money to our mainstream online global consumers seamlessly through this partnership.”

“We are thrilled to have Titan, one of India’s most recognized and loved lifestyle brand, onboard and are excited to help fuel the brand’s growth by offering unprecedented reach to global consumers. Through this program, we will offer Titan an end-to-end solution and help the brand cater to the growing appetite for quality Indian products amongst global consumers. Since its inception in 2015, our Global Selling Program has grown multifold and has been constantly taking ‘Made in India’ products global. We are delighted that the program is enabling emerging companies as well as iconic Indian brands such as Titan to leverage the opportunity to access a large base of hundreds of millions of Amazon customers.” said Gopal Pillai, Director & GM, Seller Services, Amazon India.

Titan Company brought about a paradigm shift in the Indian watch market when it introduced its futuristic quartz technology, complemented by international styling in 1984. With the launch of Sonata and Fastrack watches that are highly affordable, trendy and chic, Titan completely transformed the Indian watch  market.  The fifth largest integrated own brand watch manufacturer in the world, Titan has also built 'Tanishq' the leading jewellery brand over the past few years. Titan also made its foray into eyewear  through Titan Eye+ offering a variety of differentiated products to the end consumer. Titan Company Limited has transformed itself into India’s largest lifestyle company driven by innovation and design with a strong focus on customer centricity, over the last three decades. Renowned worldwide for world-class innovation and award-winning designs, Titan is now collaborating with Amazon to reach out to a wider consumer base internationally.

Launched in India in May 2015, Amazon’s Global Selling Program facilitates easy, simple and convenient access for all Indian sellers - including entrepreneurs, SMEs, manufacturers as well as large brands – to sell their products to consumers across the globe. The program has witnessed a 70% increase in seller base as compared to last year with a total of over 23,000 Indian sellers currently on the platform selling globally across Amazon’s 10 global marketplaces. The program offers a comprehensive suite of end-to-end solutions that include assisting sellers with imaging, logistics, tax advisory and remittance. With over 65 million Indian products listed on Amazon’s global marketplaces, Global Sales has expanded selection of popular Indian products into several categories.

Under Global Selling Program, Amazon has supporting content on its website on different international tax and custom processes to help sellers understand the processes clearly.  To enable sellers familiarize themselves with the tastes & preferences of the local country and to launch relevant selection, Amazon’s global selling team also help sellers understand the demand patterns in various countries. The team also gives guidance on how sellers can improve discoverability of their products on each marketplace. Some of this includes guidance on the type of deals they can run, the kind of advertisements they can run on these platforms and how they can use social media channels to drive awareness about their listings on the various marketplaces.

The e-commerce giant has launched an impressive selection of products across categories with mammoth Indian brands such as Biba, Fab India,  Chandrika, Himalaya, Manyavar,  Amul, Liberty and Organic India to name a few.

Brigade Group’s Revenue Up 21% & Net Profit Increases by 32%

Brigade Enterprises Limited’s Consolidated Revenues grew by 21% for the first quarter ended 30^th June, 2017 to Rs.565 crores, as against Rs.466 crores recorded during the first quarter of the previous fiscal. The Consolidated Net Profit increased by 32 % to Rs. 29 crores from Rs. 22 crores in the first quarter of the previous fiscal.

Commenting on the company’s performance, M.R. Jaishankar, Chairman and Managing Director, Brigade Enterprises Limited, said “Despite subdued market conditions, we have continued to perform well. The positive disruptions in the market i.e. implementation of GST & RERA is a step in the right  direction by the government which will provide the necessary impetus for growth of the economy, which in turn will propel demand  in the real estate sector. We are confident of scaling up our performance in all domains of real estate that we operate in.”

Financial Highlights

Consolidated Q1 Performance (Q1FY18 Vs  Q1FY17)

·  Total Revenues stood at Rs 565 crores vis-a-vis Rs 466 crores, an increase of 21%

·  EBITDA stood at Rs. 136 crores vis-a-vis Rs. 125 crores, an increase of 9 %

·  EBITDA margin stood at 24 % vis-à-vis 27 %

·  PBT stood at Rs.44 crores vis-a-vis Rs. 34 crores, an increase of 29 %

·  PAT stood at Rs.29 crores vis-a-vis Rs.22 crores, an increase of 32 % 

Standalone Q1 Performance (Q1FY18 Vs Q1FY17)

·  Total Revenues stood at Rs.429 crores vis-a-vis Rs.407 crores, an increase of 5% 

·  EBITDA stood at Rs 118 crores vis-a-vis Rs. 117 crores, an increase of 1%

·  EBITDA margin stood at 28% vis-à-vis 29%

·  PAT stood at Rs. 36 crores vis-a-vis Rs. 26 crores, an increase by 38% 

Consolidated Operational Performance

·  Real Estate space aggregating to 0.31 million sq. ft with a total value of 183 crores was sold during the first quarter ending 30^th June, 2017. The average price realisation was Rs. 5,863 per sq. ft.

·  During the quarter, 3 Real Estate projects were launched – Brigade 7 Gardens, Brigade Buena Vista & Brigade Xanadu amounting to over 2 million sq. ft.

·  During the quarter, Brigade Tech Gardens have started the construction with 3.3 million sq. ft of leasable area.

·  Leasing and Hospitality segments contributed Rs. 71 crores and Rs.51 crores respectively to the consolidated revenues for the first quarter ended 30^th June, 2017.

·  The Debt Equity ratio of the Company on 30^th June, 2017 is 0.66:1

·  The Weighted average cost of debt as on 30^th June, 2017 has reduced to 9.84% as compared to 10.39% as on 31^stMarch, 2017.

Qualified Institutional Placement

The Company raised Rs. 500 crores through a Qualified Institutional Placement in April, 2017. The issue received a very good demand from both domestic institutional investors and foreign institutional investors.

Brigade Showcase 2017

The 10^th edition of Brigade Showcase, the exclusive property exhibition was held on 5^th and 6^th August, 2017 at the Sheraton Grand Hotel at Brigade Gateway. The event featured over 30 of the Group’s projects in South India across residential and office segments. The event was well received by the customers. 

Future Outlook

Launches to the extent of 6.26 million sq. ft are planned for the next three quarters. This  comprises of  Residential space aggregating to 2.82 million sq ft,, Office & Retail space totalling to 3.01 million sq ft and Hospitality  space of 0.43 million sq ft.

Awards and Recognitions

·  Brigade has been recognized for being amongst the best in the Construction and Real Estate industry, at the Great Place To Work For 2017 Awards.

·  Brigade Palmgrove, Mysuru won in the ‘Villas & Row Houses’ category at the CREDAI Karnataka’s CARE Awards 2017.  

·  Orion East won in the ‘Shopping Malls’ category at the CREDAI Karnataka’s CARE Awards 2017. 

·  Orion Mall won the  Images Most Admired Shopping Centre of the Year: Metro South at the Images Shopping Centre Awards 2017

·  Orion Mall won the Images Most Admired Shopping Centre of the Year: Marketing and Promotions-South at the Images Shopping Centre Awards 2017

·  Orion Mall won the Images Most admired Shopping Centre of the Year: Best Sales Per Sq.ft-South at the Images Shopping Centre Awards 2017

Stay from Junk Instead Relish on Natural Delicious Food by Pop’l Food Truck

Now, experience food that is tasty and healthy. Pop’I- Bengaluru’s most happening food truck- is now near you in Whitefield, Inorbit Mall.

Pop’l offers customers a chance to experience a variety of food options from Thai Curry, Stir Fried Asian Greens, Whole wheat pasta (Penne), Mexican Vegetables with Lemony couscous, Vegetable Lemongrass Sauce, POP’I Khichdi, Sprouts Khichdi, Masala Dal Khichdi, Healthy Sweet Tooth, Aloe Vera Halwa, Granola Bars, Healthy Coolers, Pine apple- Ginger- Aloe Vera, Coconut Mojito, Kiwi-Plum-Coconut, Spinach-Apple-Carrot-Lemon and Roasted Beetroot-Coriander-Lemon-Ginger amongst others.

In the hustle bustle of Bengaluru when our 9-5 jobs almost consume us and there is no time to breathe, live or let alone eat, comes Pop’l Food Truck, a healthy option to save the day! Every occasion is a time to celebrate, and where there is celebration there is food. The portions are generous, the flavours reflect love, hospitality is a way of life and food is a culture.

“Pop’l Food Truck is a labour of love and passion for food. Due to hectic work schedules, it becomes immensely difficult to pay attention to one’s diet and fitness regime. Hence was borne the idea of a Food Truck with healthy food options.  This is one of our firsts and we hope to impress patrons with these delectable healthy treats!” say the founders of Pop’l Food Truck, Mr. Vishal Gupta & Rashmi Upadhyaya.

Banedanmark Aims to Deliver Denmark’s First High-Speed Line On-time and On-budget Using Smart Technology

The Danish Parliament passed an act approving the construction of a new dual track, electrified railway running from Copenhagen to Ringsted via Køge, Denmark. Capable of handling passenger train speeds of up to 250 kilometers per hour, the new line will be Denmark’s first high speed railway, and its largest rail project for many years. Responsibility for establishing the 60-kilometer line, which will include four tunnels, 88 bridges, and require the expropriation of around 290 hectares of land, fell to Banedanmark, Denmark’s national rail owner-operator. Its stated aim was to construct the line on time and within budget, setting a best-in-class example for all European rail projects, in a competitive market, using state-of-the-art technology. Construction of the new line commenced back in 2012 with completion scheduled for late 2018.

The Banedanmark team used an extensive list of Bentley software on the project including:

Ø  ProjectWise, which helped ensure data could be shared between all parties involved across 20 different contracts on the project. The connected data environment provided by ProjectWise was split into pre-tender, post-tender, and as-built information, ensuring that only the right users had access to information relevant to their organization, contract, and role. This well-coordinated process resulted in contract costs that were 9.3 percent lower than estimated, and an overall budget saving for Banedanmark of 10 to 15 percent.

Ø  MicroStation, chosen to ensure that all project information could be visualized within a comprehensive modeling environment. The flexibility offered by the DGN format and tools within MicroStation made it possible for the team to combine data generated using Bentley applications and third-party software for tasks including consistency and clash control, creation of multi-discipline sections or hypermodels, quantity takeoffs, quality checks, and high resolution visualizations and animations.

Ø  Bentley Rail Track, used to create 3D models of the minimum infrastructure gauge. Built-in Danish design standards and validation enabled Banedanmark to create models and animations approximately 10 times faster than using other techniques.

Ø  PowerCivil for Sweden, which enable the team to easily extract earthworks volumes. The 3D models were then used by the contractors for machine control, increasing the accuracy and speed of works. Finally, mapping functionality within PowerCivil for Sweden made it possible to exchange data with ArcGIS, Banedanmark’s GIS in operations and maintenance.

As a result of its achievements on the Copenhagen – Ringsted project, Banedanmark implemented a strategic project called The Digital Railway of Future. The project’s mission is to look at implementing the same methods and requirements on all construction projects in the future, and to explore the potential for using models and intelligent data generated during design and construction within asset management, implementing a whole lifecycle approach to BIM.

Gita Mohshizadeh, CAD manager, Banedanmark, said, “Bentley’s commitment to providing the tools necessary to support the whole lifecycle of assets and interoperability with other design and construction software means that Banedanmark’s project information is usable, well-coordinated, and well-documented.”

Air India to Buy Six Boeing 787 Dreamliners By Raising $740 Million

The government may be looking at disinvesting Air India, but the flag carrier is going ahead with its fleet expansion plans and looking for interim financing worth $740 million (around Rs 4,720 crore) for buying six 787 Dreamliners.

The airline has invited offers from from banks and financial institutions to arrange bridge financing for the amount for 15 months to buy these Boeing planes. This could mean that a single plane could cost $123.3 million.

Earlier in March, Air India had sought $470 million or around Rs 3,100 crore from banks and financial institutions to buy four Dreamliners from Boeing. Of the six, three aircraft have been delivered, while the rest would be delivered by October. No government guarantee was given for the three aircraft which were delivered already.

The government has now indicated that they would issue guarantee for all the six aircraft and Air India is looking at refinancing the bridge loan for the three delivered planes, and interim bridge financing for the rest for a period of 15 months.

Loan requirement

“In addition to the government guarantee, Air India will offer the aircraft as security. The facility should be a direct loan without the requirement for formation of a special purpose vehicle structure, which requires title transfer,” the tender document, issued last Friday, said.

“Air India would prefer to have a bullet repayment for this facility or a suitable moratorium period for payment of principal amount under this facility. The bidder with the lower all in costs would be selected,” it said.

As part of fleet expansion plan, in 2006, Air India had placed orders with Boeing for 68 aircraft -- 27 Dreamliners, 15 777-300ERs, eight 777-200LRs and 18 737-800s.