Coffee Day India Rally Gears up for its 3rd International Motorsports Season

The much-awaited Coffee Day India Rally 2017 is all set to bring forth an action-packed international rally this season in the coffee town of Chikmagalur. Organized by The Motor Sports Club of Chikmagalur (MSCC) and sponsored by Coffee Day Group, India will witness high octane action amidst the coffee estates of Coffee Day in the fifth and final round of FIA Asia Pacific Rally Championship, to be held from November 24 to 26.

With nearly 45 entries including the best known names in motorsports, Coffee Day India Rally will see a thrilling battle among all the contenders this season. The three-day extravaganza will witness concurrent running of the FIA Asia Pacific Rally Championship (4-wheel drive and 2-wheel drive) and the FMSCI MRF Indian National Rally Championship.

The list of competitors is headlined by Gaurav Gill, the only Indian to have won the FIA APRC title and the current defending champion, driving for Team MRF. Also on the APRC grid are Gill’s team-mate, Ole Christian Veiby from Norway, a regular on the World Rally Championship circuit, and the factory driver for Skoda, and New Zealand’s Michael Young, besides Kerala-based PG Abhilash, Sumit Panjabi and Sri Lankan Shafraz Junaid.

Gill along with his partner Stephane Prevot from Belgium is leading the APRC points table with 136, just six ahead of Veiby and his fellow-Norwegian co-driver Stig Rune Skjarmoen. Both Gill and Veiby will be driving the Race Torque-prepared Skoda Fabia R5 car.

The INRC entry list includes Amittrajit Ghosh, Arjun Rao Aroor, Rahul Kanthraj, Karna Kadur and young Dean Mascarenhas besides a clutch of home-grown talent.

Venkatesh M, Director, Coffee Day Hotels and Resorts, said: “Coffee Day India Rally was initiated 15 years ago with the intent to place Chikmagalur on the international motorsport map. Due to its tough terrain, the rally has been a one-of-a-kind challenging event with spectators enjoying the special thrill of speed amidst nature. Coffee Day has ardently promoted the rally consistently over the years. With constant efforts from our dedicated team at Coffee Day Global and Motor Sports Club of Chikmagalur, we have managed to amplify the dynamics of the rally over the years. It gives us immense pleasure to associate with our international partners consistently for 3 years. The successful attempts to organize the rally as per international standards has resulted Coffee Day India Rally to be one of the most anticipated rallies in the National motorsport calendar.”   

Farooq Ahmed, Chairman Coffee Day India Rally and Member and Vice-President of Chikmagalur Motor Sports Club of Chikmagalur, said: “Coffee Day India Rally is one of the exciting motorsport events in the country. Our biggest milestone was achieved when Coffee Day India Rally entered the Asia Pacific Cup Rally championship circuit in 2015. The rally in Chikmagalur has expanded the horizon of motorsports among the young and enthusiastic rally drivers in the country. We are expecting thrilling performances this year as the entries have some of the biggest names from Indian motorsports.”

The APRC participants will cover 502 kms of which 207.54 Kms comprise Special Stages, beginning with the Super Special Stage at the Amber Valley school grounds on Friday, November 24 while the INRC cars will do 225.39 kms with 81.63 Kms of Special Stages. The entire rally route is located in the Coffee Day Global’s estates bordering Chikmagalur.

Gary Lee Appointment as Chief Financial Officer and Vice President, Canon India

Canon India, today announced the appointment of Gary Lee as the Chief Financial Officer and Vice President. Under his new role, Lee would be overseeing the Finance & Taxation, Legal and Corporate Communication divisions at Canon India. He takes over the roles and responsibilities from Anuj Aggarwal who has been elevated to Canon Marketing Philippines as a Vice President.

This transition is a significant move by the organisation to elevate its leadership across geographies and cultivate globally competent human resources.  The objective is to build a global management system, targeting optimal use of human resources in operations worldwide. The criteria involves examining and identifying professionals for senior management positions and develop the skills of these future leaders by rotating them through key positions overseas.

Commenting on this imperative move in the thought leadership arena, Kazutada Kobayashi, President & CEO, Canon India said, “Employees have always been integral to Canon’s success story across the globe. I have personally been associated with Canon for over 37 years now, where I have spent 30 years working in various overseas operations in geographies including Germany, the Netherlands, Hong Kong and India. At Canon India, we consider our employees to be the biggest assets of our organisation and with this leadership transition, I am extremely proud to see Canon India becoming an integral part of this Global leadership movement.”

“With an impeccable growth trajectory for building core competencies of people, business transformation and operations, Gary Lee brings with him extraordinary leadership skills. We welcome him to this wonderful country. Anuj Aggarwal’s contribution to the growth of Canon in India has been monumental. I wish him the absolute best and I am confident that he will continue adding more feathers to the progress of Canon Marketing Philippines,” added Kobayashi. 

Having added to Canon India’s progress for nearly 15 years, Anuj Aggarwal, former Vice President & Chief Financial Officer, Canon India remarked, “I have spent a considerable tenure of my career with Canon, starting as a Manager Finance in 2000, moving to the role of the Chief Financial Officer in 2007 and then being elevated as the Vice President in 2015. At Canon, employees are constantly empowered to prosper and grow in life. Our HR team plays an integral role in motivating all employees to challenge their abilities and strengthen their skills. With the endeavours of all our employees, today we have accomplished the position of a pioneer in the imaging space in the country. Moving forward, I feel privileged to be acknowledged for serving my organisation at the Global platform, as Vice President in Canon Marketing Philippines. I look forward to the new avenues.”

Canon India has already established its leadership in the imaging world and under Mr. Lee’s management the company aims at achieving further heights. Mr. Lee has more than 20 years of experience in Accounting, IT and Finance. With his strong and diverse experience, he has helped improve the company’s operation efficiency by integrating information technologies into different business operations, and has led his team to several significant accomplishments.

Joining the India operations, Gary Lee, Chief Financial Officer and Vice President, Canon India, said, “India as a nation, has consistently exhibited a great deal of potential for the imaging business. I am elated to witness Canon India’s growth journey over the past two decades and I am honoured to be selected for this new role to serve in this dynamic nation. Our world-class imaging portfolio joined with the staggering ability and enthusiasm of our organisations Global offices, provides us a remarkable opportunity to further elevate the fate of imaging in India. I envision contributing to this great journey of Canon in India and expanding on the strong footprint that we have built over the years.” 

Along with this global leadership movement, several other overseas assignment opportunities contribute to increased exposure and learning for Canon employees. These include, Canon Global Assignment Program, Service Engineer Attachment Program, Canon Asia Global Assignment Program and Canon Asia Short-term Assignment Program.

BankBazaar Revamps Mobile App to Simplify your Financial Needs

BankBazaar.com, India’s leading Personal Finance marketplace, has revamped its mobile app with a host of new improvements. These include gold/silver and fuel rate trackers and personalised graphs for better visualisation of expenses in the Personal Finance feature of the Android app. For the first time, a comprehensive number of Personal Finance features have been aggregated on one single interface to provide users a complete view of their finances.

With the new upgrade, the BankBazaar app now allows users to check specific details of their financial transaction history, letting them control their money better. Some of the other useful features include daily gold/silver and fuel rate updates, daily tips on money management and latest news from the world of finance. Moreover, the EMI calculator further simplifies all those complicated loan calculations, making the app a one-stop destination for everything related to personal finance.

Rati Shetty, Chief Product Officer, BankBazaar.com says, “Our mission has been to help consumers access the right financial products and make their financial journey simpler. The introduction of Personal Finance feature in the BankBazaar mobile app is another step towards simplifying money management for users and encouraging responsible fiscal behaviour.”

With more than 1M downloads, the BankBazaar app is one of the most handy personal finance apps available. The introduction of the provision to check Experian Credit Report on the go makes the app all the more versatile. Not just that, it also lets you track your bank balance and Credit Card dues. When put together, these features provide a holistic view of your finances that can help you:

1.     Track better: The fuel trackers help you keep a city-wise watch on the rates, and let you manage and track your fuel spends. The option to view all monthly spends in graphical form will let you manage your money better.

2.     Plan better: The Credit Card and EMI trackers keep you updated about your payment deadlines. When you have a clear picture of your balances and the payment deadlines, you can plan your finances better. With regular alerts prompting you to make the payments, you have lesser chance of missing a payment and letting it affect your Credit Score.

3.     Save better: With all information available over a highly simplified interface on your mobile phone, you can manage your finances and control your expenses. These will eventually help you save better.

It is now simpler than ever to track all your finances on the go using your phone. Be it your credit, Credit Score, savings or expenses, the BankBazaar app can help you keep a track of every aspect of your finances and get a better handle on your money.   

                             

BankBazaar.com hosts the widest range of financial products from over 50+ of the biggest public and private sector banks, NBFCs, and Mutual Funds players in India. It gets an average of 20 million visitors per month. The company raised US$110M through funding from investors such as Amazon.com, Experian, Fidelity Growth Partners, Mousse Partners, Sequoia Capital, and Walden International.

Pitney Bowes Study Finds a Market Driven by a More Demanding, Frequent and Global Online Shopper

Pitney Bowes, a global technology company providing innovative products and solutions to power commerce, released the 2017 Pitney Bowes Global Ecommerce Study – the first study to comprehensively analyze the global ecommerce landscape from both a retailer and consumer perspective. The study is based on survey results of 1,200 retailers from eight countries including India and 12,000 consumers from 12 global markets.

The study offers a detailed portrait of trends impacting online retailers and consumers around the globe. Some of the report’s most interesting findings are summarized below:

India saw incremental global purchases.

Asia Pacific saw the largest year-over-year incremental cross-border purchases, with India (18%), China (12%) and South Korea (8%) contributing most. Indians are purchasing cross-border with greatest frequency with 1 out of 5 purchasing daily / weekly. India is the only country that has interest in quick delivery for a cost, and are split across free longer delivery and quicker shorter deliveries for a fee.

For many online shoppers, 2016 was a holiday to forget…

Nearly half (47%) of online shoppers globally reported frustration with everything from shipping, to returns, to lost products and miscalculated duties and taxes during the 2016 holiday shopping season. Shoppers in Asia Pacific – particularly India (73%), Hong Kong (69%) China (64%) and South Korea (58%) – reported the most challenges. In the US, 36% of online shoppers experienced problems, up 5% from the previous year.

“As consumers become more experienced with online shopping, they’re shifting more of their holiday spend online and expecting better and better service from retailers, said Lila Snyder, President, Global Ecommerce and Presort Services, Pitney Bowes. “Online shoppers have an entire global marketplace at their fingertips. They expect that there is always a way to get the product they want, shipped where they want, when they want it. This creates both opportunities and challenges for retailers.”

She continued, “With even more purchases expected to be online this year, retailers need to double-down on the elements of the consumer experience that matter most – delivery, returns, tracking and world-class customer care.”

A more experienced, demanding and frequent global online shopper

• Online shopping is ubiquitous in major global markets, but is showing signs of plateauing, with 94% of consumers having made a domestic online purchase – flat year-over-year.

• Consumers are shopping online more frequently. More than one-third of global consumers make online purchases at least once per week.

• 70% of online shoppers have made a cross-border purchase.

• Online shoppers are exercising a wider range of options when it comes to shipping, collecting, or returning their items:

“Click-and-collect” – purchasing online and picking up in store – is now common practice for 40% of global online shoppers, up from 28% the previous year. In the US alone, this option is exercised by 46% of online shoppers versus 27% in the previous year. And the practice is most common in Hong Kong where 69% “click-and-collect.”

• Consumers prefer free shipping with longer delivery times (75%) over paying for expedited parcel shipments (25%).

Online shoppers in India increasingly prefer online marketplaces over retailer websites

• 67% of online shoppers turn to marketplaces like Amazon, eBay, Flipkart, Rakuten, Tmall and JD.com to search for products.

• This trend is most prevalent in Germany, India and China.

• Product assortment, better deals and easy checkout are the top three reasons for online marketplace purchases.

Retailers are beginning to recognize the growth opportunity in global ecommerce. Business plans reveal a tipping point may be on the horizon.

• 62% of retailers have a cross-border ecommerce business today. And the vast majority of retailers who don’t offer cross-border, plan to in the next 12 months. If these retailers execute against their stated business plans, 93% will offer cross-border shopping by this time next year – that equates to a 50% increase in cross-border retailers in just one year.

Credit cards versus e-wallets – a dead heat…

·         Credit cards (like Visa and MasterCard) and e-wallets (like PayPal and AliPay) have been locked in a battle for payment option supremacy for several years. When this survey asked consumers what type of payment option they prefer when making a purchase outside of their home country, 41% chose e-wallets and 39% chose credit cards – the exact inverse of the results from the previous year.

• Preferred payment options vary by market.

• India is the only country equally uses credit cards, E- wallets, and debit cards/ bank transfers.
• “It is important that cross-border retailers focus on the consumers they are trying to reach, not necessarily the consumers they are most used to when developing their strategies around payment options and just about any aspect of their global ecommerce solutions,” said Snyder.

CleverTap, Exotel Partner to Provide Mobile Marketers with Better SMS Marketing Solutions

CleverTap, the pioneering provider of a mobile analytics and user engagement platform, today announced their integration with Exotel’s cloud telephony solution as part of their holistic product offering. With this partnership, CleverTap’s diverse range of clients can engage with users via SMS in a more timely, personalized, and effective manner. This further increases the efficacy of CleverTap’s industry-leading analytics and segmentation engine, helping clients run multi-channel SMS campaigns to increase user engagement and retention.

Speaking on this latest development, Kuldeep Dhankar, Head of Business at CleverTap, said, “In today’s hypercompetitive market landscape, a satisfactory customer experience drives business growth. Thus, it is vital for businesses to have the right technology in place to deliver the best possible user experience and stay one step ahead of the competition. At CleverTap, we adopt a customer-first approach and take into account all the feedback and requests that we receive. Based on their requests, we decided to integrate SMS as a user engagement channel on our platform. Exotel’s proven track record convinced us to choose their service offering. This will help our clients run personalized engagement campaigns right from our dynamic platform using push notifications, in-app messages, web notifications, emails, and now SMS as well.”

Elaborating on the announcement, Shivakumar Ganesan, CEO and Founder at Exotel, said, “We are delighted to partner with CleverTap to integrate Exotel’s solutions with their offerings. Technology can empower businesses to transform and create a profound impact. The combination of Exotel’s cloud telephony solutions with CleverTap’s next generation mobile engagement platform creates an enhanced user experience which is of significant value to the marketplace today. We value our relationship with CleverTap and remain committed to their success, as they continue to transform their services.”

Vivo Strengthens its V Series Portfolio with V7 Launch; Pre-Booking Starts on Flipkart from November 20

Vivo, the global premium smartphone brand, announced the addition of V7 to its successful V series at an event in New Delhi today. With the launch of V7, Vivo extends its strong focus on camera and music with the revolutionary 24MP selfie and 16MP rear camera.

Priced at Rs 18,990, Vivo V7 will be available in two colours such as Champagne Gold and Matte Black across all retail stores from November 25, 2017 and can be pre-booked on Flipkart exclusively from November 20, 2017 onwards. An additional 5% cashback offer is available for customers using HDFC Credit & Debit cards to pre-book  V7. They can also avail Rs.2000 off on exchange of their old smartphone.

The V7 extends the lineage of exceptional photography and features with a 24MP selfie and 16 MP rear camera. Besides a powerful camera, V7 also features a sharp 5.7HD FullView display with minimalistic bezels to provide users with a more immersive smartphone experience.

Commenting on the launch, Kent Cheng, CEO, Vivo India, said, “Vivo has always endeavoured to provide the best-in-class performance, especially when it comes to selfie camera capabilities. With the launch of V7, we are offering consumers another compelling proposition featuring an excellent camera and powerful performance at a competitive price point.”

Cisco and INTERPOL Collaborate to Jointly Combat Cybercrime

Cisco, the worldwide technology leader, and INTERPOL, the world’s largest international police organization, have announced an agreement to share threat intelligence as the first step in jointly fighting cybercrime.

Headed by INTERPOL’s global cybercrime center, the INTERPOL Global Complex for Innovation (IGCI) in Singapore, the alliance will see the two organizations develop a coordinated and focused approach to data sharing. This not only will allow for quick threat detection around the world, but also pave the way for potential future collaboration on training and knowledge sharing.

Noboru Nakatani, Executive Director of IGCI, commented: “The exchange of information and expertise between the public and private sectors is vital in combating cybercrime. No country or company can do this alone. INTERPOL’s agreement with Cisco provides us, and law enforcement in our 192 member countries, with access to important cyber-threat information which will help us not only detect attacks but also help prevent them.”

John N. Stewart, Senior Vice President and Chief Security and Trust Officer at Cisco, shared, “As cybercrime continues to escalate around the world, defenders from both the public and private sectors must meet the threat with equal force. Visibility and comprehensive threat intelligence across the cyber domain are critical to enable detection, analysis, and protection against emerging threats. We are pleased to collaborate with INTERPOL to exchange threat intelligence and find other knowledge-sharing opportunities to fight cybercrime globally.”

Naveen Menon, President of Cisco, Southeast Asia, said, “This agreement, signed in Singapore, demonstrates the country’s growing importance in the Asia Pacific region and on the world stage as a center for battling cybercrime and driving cybersecurity innovation. We are part of a diverse region with differing levels of technological maturity. This initiative represents an important step in creating a unified strategy to reduce digital risks and enable economic growth without the fear of digital threats and attacks.”

Cisco's best-of-breed security offerings and its architectural approach help customers secure their organizations more effectively from the network to the endpoint to the cloud. Cisco’s comprehensive security portfolio is designed to work together to see a threat once, and stop it everywhere, changing the security equation. In addition, Cisco blocks 19.7 billion threats a day through its Collective Security Intelligence, enabled by Cisco Talos, the security intelligence and research group.

Cisco’s agreement with INTERPOL supports the organization’s programs targeting both “pure cybercrime” and cyber-enabled crimes to assist member countries with identifying cyberattacks and their perpetrators.