Innova Crysta and Fortuner Continue to Reinforce Supremacy with Over 50% and 60% Segment Share

True to its reputation of delivering ever better cars, Toyota Kirloskar Motor’s (TKM) legendary products Innova Crysta and Fortuner continued their undisputed  market leadership. With their magnificent design and unbeatable performance, both the Innova Crysta and Fortuner have carved a niche for themselves in their respective segments. Dominating the MPV segment, Innova has sold more than 900,000 units over the years, holding a segment share of more than 40%. Despite a segment degrowth, in the month of February 2020 the Innova Crysta recorded one of the highest segment shares with 52.91% since its launch in 2016. On the other hand, the Fortuner has held a segment share of 54% in the last one year alone. In February 2020, Fortuner recorded the highest segment share of 63.9% as compared to last one year.

Staying strong by its ‘Customer First’ philosophy over the last two decades, Toyota Kirloskar Motor has introduced serval products and services, setting new benchmarks and creating lasting bonds with its customers. While the Innova has been the undisputed leader in the MPV segment, known for its luxurious features, comfort, safety and powerful performance, the Fortuner with its bold design and imposing presence has distinctively given a new dimension to the driving experience, winning hearts across the country.

Commenting on the success witnessed by both the products, Mr. Naveen Soni, Senior Vice President, Sales and Service, Toyota Kirloskar Motor said, “At TKM, we have always strived to listen to our customers’ voice and offer products and innovations that align with their ever-evolving needs. The Innova and Fortuner have been significant milestones in our journey of two decades in India. We are overwhelmed with the sales performance and truly appreciate the phenomenal response we have received from our customers over the years.”

“Thanks to this response and the confidence entrusted in the products, regardless of the ongoing slowdown, both the brands have been able to hold their respective segment leadership and continue to cater to the changing requirements of our customers.” he added.

The Innova often referred to as the segment creator, has maintained a leadership position since its launch in India way back in 2005, continuing to be the most preferred MPVs in the country. Moreover, the 2nd Generation Innova - Innova Crysta also received a warm welcome from the customers during its launch in 2016. Earlier this year, in order to smoothen the transition to BS-VI, TKM introduced the BS-VI compliant Innova Crysta at an introductory offer for limited time period.

Known for its compelling design and strong identity, the Fortuner has achieved a cult status in the SUV segment ever since its launch in 2009. Sought-after for both off-roading and city driving, the Fortuner unbeatable performance and great riding comfort has made it the undisputed choice among SUV owners in the country. Even during the recent degrowth being faced by the industry, Fortuner has continued to hold its segment leadership share in the medium SUV segment.

The Death of Marketing - Medvarsity Online Limited Officially Shuts Down its Marketing Team

On March 1, 2020, Mr. Gerald Jaideep, the CEO of Medvarsity announced on LinkedIn that he is aiming for Medvarsity to grow over 100% this year, and therefore, shutting down his marketing function. It led to debates - both online and offline.

In an era wherein the term marketing is perceived as a fading concept and many organization are bringing a change to their business strategies in order to flourish in the disruptive and evolving ecosystem, the organization took this radical step to set a precedent for other organizations in its niche and bring a shift in the modus operandi by building a team that will formulate newer and innovative ways to drive organizational success.

Exit team marketing, and enter  Team Growth – a group of professionals that will be working to reinvent the organization’s actual potential, take initiatives to provide better services to the end-users and make a simultaneous effort to explore possibilities and untapped opportunities to set new horizons for the growth of the organization. With the technological transformation of the healthcare ecosystem, the approach of education is changing, and the change is translating to the operations at various organizations in the education technology domain. In this scenario, the organization executed management scrutiny to identify the gaps needed to be filled in order to create a better value for the customers, stakeholders, and learners. After identifying the need for a fresh approach to generate business opportunities and to be in alignment with the contemporary trends, the organization recognized the requirement of an incredibly talented team that can leverage the blend of technology and traditional methods to scaleup the impact of the organization on the Indian healthcare community.

“We, as an organization, believe that we have entered the phase III of our mission to impact healthcare through education in which we are looking to take our business to the next level and set goals that will not only pace-up the growth of the business but also provide great value to our stakeholders and learners. In this direction, I believe that Team Growth, being a group of experienced and highly-skilled professionals, is capable of bringing the much-needed transformation in the ways with which we look to grow and achieve our new goals and execute them to bring our initiative to fruition,” quoted Mr. Gerald Jaideep – CEO of Medvarsity Online Ltd.

In the contemporary regime of business, terms such as growth hacker are gaining prevalence and replacing marketer which may be a concept of yesterday soon. Many companies are adopting the growth model and witnessing a significant shift in terms of revenue rise.  Moreover, the latest trends warrant a much more radical approach to achieve the desired results. In this scenario, the organization looks forward to bringing not only change to the operations but also imparting a change in the approach of its people and inspiring progressive thinking in the workforce at large. 

“There are possibilities for business to grow beyond the traditional way of marketing, and the digital education sector has a lot to offer to the players. It was important for us to bring a transition in terms of strategic planning in order to pave a new path to growth for the organization. As Team Growth, we are working to connect the dots of the current business scenario and market trends of online medical education to design strategies that are not only new but also augment the revenues. Through our new methodologies, we look forward to adding value to the vision of the organization, which is making a substantial contribution in the evolution of healthcare in India by providing courses that help the medical fraternity to upskill and propagate career growth,” added Bibhuti Acharya – Associate Vice President, the Head of Growth Team at Medvarsity Online Ltd.

The future foresees a certain enhancement in opportunities for the medical education technology and more so when the education technology industry is growing at a massive rate across the globe. The execution of the growth model in the organization will impart the much-needed pace required to thrive in the current dynamics of the agile business world.

Ansat Chopper to be Equipped with Modules for Transporting Infants

Kazan Helicopters (part of Russian Helicopters/Rostec) received a permission from the Russian Federal Air Transport Agency (Rosaviatsiya) to equip Ansat helicopters with a special module for transporting neonatal patients. This equipment can be used to provide evacuation and airborne medical care to infants.

Ansat equipped with the neonatal transport module passed whole range of necessary certification tests. During the ground testing stage, the certification team demonstrated the capabilities of the model to conduct emergency evacuation of the crew, medical workers and a neonatal patient. Flight tests evaluated the performance of the module and verified its electromagnetic compatibility with the standard equipment of the helicopter.

The new module was developed together with the Ural Optical and Mechanical Plant (part of Shvabe holding company) specifically for neonatal air transport. The manufacturer of the Ansat medical module, Kazan Aggregate Plant, developed a special platform for the incubator to replace the more traditional stretcher design. No redesign of the helicopter interior was required.

"The capability to install a neonatal medical module for Ansat had been in demand for a long time. Thanks to cooperation of Rostec holding companies and other partners, the helicopter now comes with upgraded equipment, allowing medical teams to continuously monitor the condition of a child, maintain the vital body functions and conduct intensive therapy during the flight," said Managing Director of Kazan Helicopters Yuri Pustovgarov.

The incubator comes with a set of medical equipment, including an artificial lung ventilator, a monitoring unit, an aspirator, and an infusion pump. The neonatal module can be installed optionally on all Ansats equipped with base medical modules.

Ansat helicopters are used for rescue operations in various regions of Russia, the geography of their application is constantly expanding. The development program of the Russian air ambulance fleet has been in implementation since 2017 and is now part of the National Healthcare project.

Ansat is a light multipurpose twin-engine helicopter, serial production of which is deployed at Kazan Helicopters. According to the helicopter certificate, its design allows converting it into a cargo version or into a passenger rotorcraft that can lift up to seven people. In May 2015, a supplement to the type certificate for the modification of the helicopter with a medical module was obtained. Ansat is certified for use in the temperatures ranging between -45°С and +50°С, and in high mountains.

Vedantu Offers Free Access to Live Classes & Content to Students, Parents to Support Uninterrupted Learning Amidst COVID-19

As the pandemic of COVID-19 grips the world, Vedantu, a pioneer in LIVE online tutoring in India is offering support to students, parents and schools in Bengaluru, New Delhi, Kerala and Hyderabad to provide Free access to its complete learning platform. Vedantu will offer Free access to all LIVE classes of Vedantu Master Teachers, Study  Material, Tests & Assignments, LIVE Doubts feature during this outbreak, where students & parents can be rest assured as they can continue their learning from the safety of their homes. Vedantu’s vision is to make the best quality education accessible to everyone and is committed to help students have uninterrupted learning.

Students will get free access to Vedantu’sLIVE Classes, Tests, Doubt Solving, Ample Study  Material, Class recordings & Notes. It will cater to Grades 1 to 12 covering subjects like Maths, Science, Social Studies, Physics, Chemistry etc. Courses for JEE & NEET are available too. Apart from this,  co-curricular courses for all grades such as Turbo Maths, Rocket Pro, Photography, Coding would be made FREE too.

Vedantu's LIVE classes and the entire program can be easily accessed at home from your Mobile, Desktop & Tabs

Vamsi Krishna, CEO and Co-Founder, Vedantu said, “At Vedantu, we believe that best quality education should be accessible to everyone, anytime. We believe Online Learning is a safe option in these risky & uncertain times. The students can study from the safety of their home and avoid travel and public places.  We are constantly working on solutions that will drive evolution, fundamentally changing the pattern of teaching and learning today. We are here to support by  making our platform free during this crucial time. We are closely monitoring the impact of COVID-19 and are here to assist students & schools with all their learning needs.”

Schools across Delhi, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Kerala can reach out to Vedantu for teaching students remotely. Vedantu’s platform is also available for the schools to ensure that the education is uninterrupted.

About Vedantu:
Vedantu is a LIVE interactive online learning platform for students. It offers individual and group classes delivered by experienced teachers in a LIVE real-time, virtual learning environment. Students also access content, take assessments and get their learning reports on the platform. 150,000 students study LIVE every month on the platform and more than 25 Million users every month from 1000+ cities and 40+ countries access free content, tests, doubts, videos on Vedantu’s platform and its channels on YouTube. To know more about Vedantu log on to https://www.vedantu.com or download the Application on your Android or iOS device.

Sentara Healthcare Partners with CitiusTech to Deploy Data Platform on Microsoft Azure

Sentara Healthcare, one of the nation’s oldest not-for profit health systems, has completed the deployment of a next-gen enterprise data platform (EDP). It provides a single, consolidated view of provider, payer and enterprise information from Sentara Healthcare and Optima Health Plan, a wholly owned subsidiary.

“Sentara is committed to delivering high quality healthcare and innovative services that meet the unique needs of the communities we serve,” said Michael Reagin, Sentara Healthcare senior vice president and chief information and innovation officer. “We collaborated with CitiusTech to develop an EDP that provides us more flexibility and scale to continue meeting the changing demands of our patients, care teams and partners across the care continuum.”

Sentara partnered with CitiusTech, a Microsoft partner, to architect, build and implement its EDP. It leveraged CitiusTech’s BigData solution H-Scale, to deploy an end-to-end data management platform to ingest, curate, transform and reconcile data from five different sources on a daily basis and create a 360-degree view of the patient record. Sentara built a robust enterprise-class system in less than two years gaining benefits of quick time to market along with significant implementation savings.

By implementing a cloud-first strategy, Sentara Healthcare has ensured that the EDP uses HIPAA compliant PaaS service offerings of Azure and can scale for large data volume. This is expected to save close to $1.5 million every year by moving away from an on-premises model.

“Next-gen interoperability and real-time data access have become imperative for healthcare organizations to enhance quality of care and align with value-based models.” Says Rizwan Koita, CEO of CitiusTech. “Sentara Healthcare with its cloud-first strategy has built an industry leading data platform using CitiusTech’s H-Scale on Microsoft Azure to support data-driven performance.”

Gareth Hall, director of business strategy for Worldwide Healthcare at Microsoft said, “Microsoft Azure enabled CitiusTech to deliver a cloud-based enterprise-wide healthcare data management solution. This enabled Sentara to get a holistic view of patient information across their enterprise. CitiusTech H-Scale, combined with Azure, helps customers achieve scale in healthcare data management.”

CitiusTech has further enabled Sentara to leverage aggregated information and generate actionable insights by deploying artificial intelligence and machine learning models at an enterprise scale. This is expected to save approximately $3 million a year through efficiency improvements across the organization.

UL Launches IoT Center of Excellence to Help Innovators Access India and Global Markets

UL, a leading global safety science company, has expanded its Bengaluru facility to help product innovators address compliance and market access challenges in the fast-growing and increasingly complex world of connected devices. The new facility added 12,000-square feet of laboratory space with scope for further expansion, making it one of the most technologically advanced electromagnetic compatibility (EMC), specific absorption rate (SAR), wireless and interoperability testing laboratories in India. The facility, accredited by the National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories (NABL), enables UL to service a diverse range of products for customers across consumer electronics, information technology, mobile and telecommunications, medical devices, industrial products, lighting and appliances industries.

The three key challenges manufacturers and product design companies encounter are efficient global market access, finding EMC and wireless expertise, and speed-to-market for product launches. The new UL facility offers automated data collection, custom-designed test chambers and fast access to technical experts across a multitude of disciplines. The presence of a semi-anechoic chamber provides local product design engineers and developers, a convenient nearby testing facility. Further, the Center of Excellence (CoE) offers global experience and UL experts advise to companies at every step of the product launch process, from designing to preparing for market access, to help ensure compliance to regulations before and during production.

“India is a top priority market for UL. The Bengaluru laboratory expansion combined with UL’s existing global network of laboratories and engineering talent­­ - offers our customers in India a seamless end-to-end service solution with unparalleled technical expertise, helping them navigate risk and enabling greater speed-to-market for their products and solutions,” said Ghislain Devouge, Global Vice President and General Manager Consumer Technology for UL.

“At UL, we strongly endorse the ‘In India, for India’ strategy, and have been regularly investing in building capability and capacity. This IoT CoE will help the market in multiple ways – first, enabling our domestic customers to develop smarter products, meet regulations and supply to the world; second, assisting our global customers to comply with India regulations and seamlessly access the Indian market; and third, giving confidence to the regulators and players in the ecosystem that they can access best-in-class global knowledge, technical expertise, and seamless service locally,” said Suresh Sugavanam, Vice President and Managing Director of South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa for UL.

In today’s interconnected world, manufacturers who add wireless capability to existing products for industrial, consumer and medical applications must meet the complex and varied wireless regulatory requirements, which can differ by the market. Additionally, when regulations change, manufacturers may have to conduct new testing even if their products were already in the market, such as the Indian Telegraph (Amendment) Rules, 2017, Mandatory Testing and Certification of Telecom Equipments (MTCTE). Put in place by the Telecommunication Engineering Center (TEC), a nodal agency under the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), the regulation requires all telecom equipment to undergo mandatory testing and certification before sale or import for use in India. An Indian accredited laboratory designated by the TEC must carry out the testing and based upon its test reports a certificate is issued by the TEC. UL laboratory in Bengaluru is ready to be designated by TEC, and the expanded facility will further help the industry comply with the MTCTE regime.

POCO X2 Recognised as the Highest-Rated Smartphone on Flipkart

POCO, now an independent smartphone brand, announced that its latest smartphone, POCO X2, has become the highest rated smartphone on Flipkart (for smartphones with over 10k user ratings). Launched last month, POCO X2 has emerged as a clear winner with spectacular ratings and reviews from users for its performance, camera and display. POCO X2 seems to have ticked all the boxes, achieving 4.6 rating points (out of 5) with more than 20,000 user ratings as of 13th March, 2020.

POCO X2 is equipped with a display powered by the RealityFlow 120Hz engine -- a category-first. It has a 20:9 tall-body design wrapped around a 3D curved glass body, which enables a large cinematic screen experience of 16.94 cm (6.67 inch). It is also the first smartphone in India to feature the Sony IMX686 camera sensor that can elevate the photography experience of users.

Commenting on this milestone, Manmohan Chandolu, General Manager, POCO India said, “We are ecstatic with this achievement and want to thank all our customers who have been a part of this new-yet-fruitful journey. Since POCO X2’s launch last month, we have received an amazing response from across all categories of users and I am confident that it is just the beginning. We intend to continue the momentum and keep up with the gusto.”

POCO X2 is available via Flipkart.com.

Product images: POCO X2

Availability

POCO X2 will be available in its next sale on 17th March 2020, 12 noon in 6GB + 64GB, 6GB + 128GB and 8GB + 256GB storage variants for INR 15,999, INR 16,999 and INR 19,999 respectively via Flipkart, with an additional instant discount of INR 1,000 on ICICI credit card and EMI transactions.   

About POCO

POCO is an independent brand born out of Xiaomi in India. Its first product, POCO F1 was launched in August 2018, and since January 2020, POCO has become an independent entity. POCO F1 was India's No.1 smartphone in the ‘above INR 15,000 price segment’ in the online smartphone market as per third party statistics. Currently, POCO has an independent product and marketing team, and shares resources from Xiaomi in terms of supply chain, logistics, manufacturing and after sales.

POCO is a consumer technology brand, based on the philosophy of 'Everything you need and nothing you don't' with a key focus on its POCO fans’ requirements. It's built on relentless pursuit of technology which its fans truly need, thus democratizing decision making and continuous product updates to ensure relevance.