BSE EBIX And LIC Join Hands For “Distribution Of Insurance” Products

BSE Ebix Insurance Broking Private Limited, a joint venture of BSE and Ebix Singapore Pte Ltd., announced the signing of Insurance Broker Agreement for distribution of Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) products on its state-of-the-art hi-tech platform. Under this agreement, BSE EBIX will offer their clients insurance products offered by LIC such as Life and Health, using its omni-channel digital presence. This partnership of two like-minded organizations aims at offering customer centric solutions backed by technological innovations and best in class services. 

EbixCash, a subsidiary of Ebix, Inc. (NASDAQ: EBIX) is in the process of seeking IRDA approval to transfer its share ownership in BSE EBIX from its parent Ebix Singapore Pte Ltd. to EbixCash Limited. 

Insurance is an important risk mitigating tool which protects the economic interests of individuals and organizations. BSE EBIX aim is to reach out to every citizen of India and provide insurance solutions to serve customers spread across the country, and ensure they are secured and protected. The launch of LIC products by BSE EBIX is a major development from the Company’s perspective since Life insurance is traditionally one of the fastest growing insurance segments in the country. 

Mr. Ashishkumar Chauhan, MD & CEO-BSE, said “At BSE EBIX, our objective is to reach out to every citizen of the country and provide insurance solutions as per their needs. Our partnership with LIC not only aims at providing relevant insurance products but will also provide best-in-class services to their customers through our unique digital initiatives. Further enriching the client experience, BSE EBIX's digital capabilities support servicing and help our clients select relevant policies.” 

BSE EBIX’s strategy is to have an unrivalled ‘Phygital’ pan India reach by combining the physical presence of tens of thousands of PoSPs with an omnichannel digital channel, thereby allowing its PoSPs to have access to extensive real-time quotes from insurance companies and to complete the entire transaction online on behalf of their customers. Through its technology, BSE EBIX empowers PoSPs to deliver best of the Insurance products and provide comfort to the end customers by transacting physically at the speed of digital technology. This presents a huge opportunity for BSE EBIX to build its Life insurance portfolio. 

BSE EBIX had beta launched its operations on February 7, 2020, with the offering of private car and two-wheeler auto insurance. The company aims to revolutionize not only buying of insurance from a consumer perspective but also enable insurers to distribute insurance products in a highly efficient manner, while automating and integrating complex back-end processes seamlessly with front end distribution. Currently, there are seven General Insurance companies in Motor, five Health Insurance Companies for Health Products and three Life Insurance Companies for Life Products on the BSE EBIX platform. Besides, we also issue Policies through offline mode with two more Insurance Companies.  As on date, BSE EBIX has registered over 10,500 Point of Sale Persons (PoSPs) out of which 4,677 are certified and ready to do business through BSE EBIX Portal. 

Upstox Onboards Three Senior Executives To Strengthen Its Leadership Team In Indian Market

* Appoints Harish Narayanan as Chief Growth Officer (CGO), Jayant Chauhan as SVP - Finance and Saurabh Agarwal as VP - New Initiatives

Upstox, one of India's leading investment platforms, today announced the addition of three senior executives to its leadership team. The company has appointed Harish Narayanan as Chief Growth Officer, Saurabh Agarwal as Vice President - New Initiatives, and Jayant Chauhan as Senior Vice President - Finance. With this hiring, Upstox aims to extend operations, as well as move closer to its broader goal of encouraging more equity participation in India.

Ravi Kumar, Co-Founder and CEO, Upstox said, “It gives us great pleasure to welcome Harish, Saurabh, and Jayant to Upstox's leadership team. They bring with them immense experience and expertise.  I'm confident that with them onboard, we will succeed in our endeavor to take Upstox's products and services to the next level and fulfill our drive of encouraging equity participation across the nation.”

Harish Narayanan, Chief Growth Officer at Upstox, will be responsible for driving full funnel business growth, marketing, operational excellence, and strategic collaborations. Prior to joining Upstox, Harish served as the Chief Marketing Officer at Myntra, where he was responsible for all aspects of marketing, including brand, digital, performance, content, social, loyalty, B2B, creative design, and private brand. He was also leading the Brand Solutions and Creative teams as part of his responsibilities at Myntra.

Jayant Chauhan, joining as Senior Vice President - Finance at Upstox, will be overseeing growth and profitability while delivering measurable improvements across multiple performance metrics. Jayant was the SVP - Global Strategic Finance at OYO before joining Upstox. He was a member of the global leadership team and was in charge of strategic finance functions such as capital raising, mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, corporate financial planning and analysis, cost structure analysis and optimization, business finance, investor relations, and IPO readiness.

Saurabh Agrawal, Vice President - New Initiatives, will lead the company strategy and new initiatives. He has more than a decade of expertise in the financial and banking services industry, with specialization in the payments ecosystem, stakeholder management, business growth, issue resolution, and programme management. Before joining Upstox, Saurabh worked at Revolut India where he was in charge of capex and opex, product and business development, as well as hiring and license acquisition. He has also held several positions with Deutsche Bank and Paytm in the past.

The current customer base of Upstox is over 9 million. The company has recently revamped its platform, which includes a number of new features and an intuitive design that promises to make investing simple, stable, seamless and secure.

Nielsen And The Trade Desk Unveil New Strategic Data Measurement Partnership For Open Internet In Europe, Asia, Mexico And Canada

* The Trade Desk will contribute data to the Nielsen Identity System to international markets 

Nielsen (NYSE: NLSN) and The Trade Desk (Nasdaq: TTD) today announced a strategic partnership to power identity resolution for open internet measurement in key international markets around the world. The Trade Desk will help fuel Nielsen’s demographic data starting with France, Italy and the United Kingdom. Japan, Australia and Germany will launch on April 1, with plans to launch in other Asian and European markets, in addition to Canada and Mexico, on a regular cadence following the initial releases in 2022. 

Nielsen will integrate demographic data provided by The Trade Desk into the Nielsen ID System to provide more scope and accuracy in Nielsen’s digital ad measurement for the open internet, connecting digital impressions to demographics across millions of devices. Advertisers and publishers can use Nielsen Digital Ad Ratings with more confidence knowing that the solution is aimed towards appropriately assigning and deduplicating audience demographics across mobile and PC platforms when a digital ad is viewed. With this initiative, Nielsen becomes a preferred measurement provider of The Trade Desk and builds on the two companies’ long standing relationship.

“This strategic partnership with The Trade Desk immediately scales Nielsen’s Identity System globally, and showcases our commitment to independent measurement and marketplace interoperability, facilitating an open ecosystem for the media industry, with audiences de-duplicated across multiple platforms,” said Karthik Rao, Chief Operating Officer, Nielsen. "We continue to evolve our technologies and methodologies as we move toward Nielsen ONE and this is a very important milestone for that vision of true cross-platform measurement across all screens, underpinned by a strong digital measurement capability.”

The Trade Desk is committed to working towards accurate and transparent measurement in service of an optimal advertising experience on the open internet. As part of this strategic partnership, The Trade Desk will provide demographic data to Nielsen’s Identity System. In doing so, this will help to advance more robust measurement and reporting across digital media, particularly over-the-page advertising, in key international markets that have most room to benefit.  

“As the world’s largest independent demand-side platform, The Trade Desk is in a prime position to provide the open internet with a standard of measurement that improves data-driven decisioning, advertising performance and transparency,” said Michelle Hulst, Chief Data Officer, The Trade Desk. “We have long believed that it takes all of us to support the digital media ecosystem, especially in the world of measurement, and look forward to advancing the open internet together with Nielsen internationally.”

As part of the Nielsen ID System, the Nielsen ID Graph is calibrated against, and validated by, Nielsen’s people-based panels and truth sets. This deal will further position Nielsen to scale its ID Resolution System globally and truly deliver deduplicated audiences across linear and digital platforms as part of Nielsen ONE, its cross-media measurement solution.  

ABOUT NIELSEN

Nielsen shapes the world’s media and content as a global leader in audience measurement, data and analytics. Through our understanding of people and their behaviors across all channels and platforms, we empower our clients with independent and actionable intelligence so they can connect and engage with their audiences—now and into the future.

An S&P 500 company, Nielsen (NYSE: NLSN) operates around the world in more than 55 countries. Learn more at www.nielsen.com or www.nielsen.com/investors and connect with us on social media.

Jaguar Land Rover Has Announced A Multi-Year Strategic Partnership With NVIDIA

* As part of Jaguar Land Rover’s Reimagine strategy, the partnership will transform the modern luxury experience for customers starting in 2025 

* Software experts from both companies will jointly develop AI-powered autonomous driving and connected services for all future vehicles built on NVIDIA DRIVE  

* Next-generation safety and unique, brand-focused digital services enabled by NVIDIA AI 

Jaguar Land Rover has formed a multi-year strategic partnership with NVIDIA, the leader in artificial intelligence (AI) and computing, to jointly develop and deliver next-generation automated driving systems plus AI-enabled services and experiences for its customers. 

Starting in 2025, all new Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles will be built on the NVIDIA DRIVE™ software-defined platform—delivering a wide spectrum of active safety, automated driving and parking systems as well as driver assistance systems. Inside the vehicle, the system will deliver AI features, including driver and occupant monitoring as well as advanced visualisation of the vehicle’s environment.  

This full-stack solution is based on NVIDIA DRIVE Hyperion™, which features DRIVE Orin™ centralised AV computers; DRIVE AV and DRIVE IX software; safety, security and networking systems; plus, surround sensors. DRIVE Orin is the AI brain of the car and runs the Jaguar Land Rover Operating System, while DRIVE Hyperion is the central nervous system. 

Jaguar Land Rover will also leverage in-house developed data centre solutions with NVIDIA DGX™ for training AI models and DRIVE Sim software built on NVIDIA Omniverse™ for real-time physically accurate simulation. Jaguar Land Rover’s software-defined features and its end-to-end verification and validation architecture will enable the delivery of innovative assisted and automated driving services throughout the life of the vehicle via over-the-air software updates.  

Thierry Bolloré, Jaguar Land Rover Chief Executive Officer, said: “Collaboration and knowledge-sharing with industry leader NVIDIA is essential to realising our Reimagine strategy, setting new benchmarks in quality, technology and sustainability.  

“Jaguar Land Rover will become the creator of the world’s most desirable luxury vehicles and services for the most discerning customers. Our long-term strategic partnership with NVIDIA will unlock a world of potential for our future vehicles as the business continues its transformation into a truly global, digital powerhouse.” 

Jensen Huang, NVIDIA founder and CEO, said: “Next-generation cars will transform automotive into one of the largest and most advanced technology industries. Fleets of software-defined, programmable cars will offer new functionalities and services for the life of the vehicles. We are thrilled to partner with Jaguar Land Rover to reimagine the future of transportation and create the most advanced cars.” 

Jaguar Land Rover aims to achieve net-zero carbon emissions across its supply chain, products and operations by 2039.  

Honda H’ness CB350 & CB350RS Now Available At CSD Stores

Celebrating its longstanding commitment as a mobility partner for the CSD beneficiaries, Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India today announced the availability of H’ness CB350 & CB350RS at Canteen Store Departments (CSD) across the country.

These middle weight motorcycles from the Honda BigWing product range are introduced for the first time at 35 CSD Depots.

Speaking on this special occasion, Mr. Yadvinder Singh Guleria, Director – Sales & Marketing, Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India Pvt. Ltd. said, “Honda 2Wheelers India shares a long-term alliance with Indian defence community. We take pride in serving them with our quality products & aftersales service. Celebrating 75th year of independence, we are delighted to make our new BigWing motorcycles - H’ness CB350 & CB350RS at CSD network across India. Availability at CSD approved special price makes it convenient for the defence personnel and CSD beneficiaries to buy their favourite Honda 350cc motorcycle and start their exciting new ride.”

Buying process for CSD beneficiaries

Ensuring convenient and hassle-free buying experience, personnel can log on to https://afd.csdindia.gov.in/ for CSD portal registration, dealer selection and choose their favourite model. Once availability is confirmed by the selected dealer, personnel can upload dealer documents (availability certificate & proforma invoice) and customer documents (canteen card, KYC, payment transfer details etc.) after which the digital copy of Local Supply Order (LSO) is issued.

About Honda BigWing - Honda’s Exclusive Premium Motorcycle Business Vertical

Reaching closer to its premium biking fans, Honda’s premium motorcycle retail format is led by more than 80 BigWing touchpoints across India. While BigWing Topline houses Honda’s complete premium motorcycle range (300-1800cc), Honda BigWing delights mid-size motorcycle fans (300-500cc). Customers can also avail the online booking option on our website www.HondaBigWing.in for a seamless and transparent booking experience.

Microsoft India Announces Winners For The Second Season Of Cloud Champions 11 Program

* Recognizes 11 Cloud Solution Providers and 2 Indirect Providers for accelerating SMB cloud growth

Microsoft India today announced the winners of the second edition of Cloud Champions 11, a unique engagement program that strengthens Microsoft’s commitment to partners in India. In its second year, Microsoft recognized 11 Cloud Solution Providers (CSPs) for accelerating cloud growth for SMB customers between September and December 2021. The program also recognized two Indirect Providers who have a direct relationship with Microsoft to provide customer support, pricing and billing. The program saw participation from nearly 700 partner organizations across 71 cities in India, of which half were from Tier 2 and 3 cities. This reach and inclusion are a testament to the community that has come together with Microsoft, driven by a common goal of growth and engagement.

Open to all Microsoft CSP partners in the country, the program evaluated participants basis their cloud business growth across Microsoft Azure, Modern Work, Security and Business Applications. The program engaged on multiple levels with the partner organizations with trainings, masterclasses, peer learning, fun engagement sessions, sales trainings, and rewards and recognition for the sales teams. Through a voice of partner initiative, Microsoft closely engaged with its partners, and regularly incorporated their feedback to improve program engagement.

Harish Vellat, Country Head - Small, Medium and Corporate Business, Microsoft India said, “With the second season of Cloud Champions 11 program, we recognize our next set of partners who have been at the center of our vision to make more possible for our customers and delivering innovative cloud solutions. These partners have provided a huge support to help us enable the SMB ecosystem in India in their digital transformation journey.”

The winners will receive professional mentoring from business coach Mitali Chopra, and delightful culinary experiences. The sales teams from the winner organizations will be getting access to sales coaching and certifications from Microsoft. With the help of business coaching provided under the program, last year’s winners have established growth practices and unlocked business opportunities. 

More information on the program is available at https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/campaign/cloudchampions11/.

DMI Finance To Provide Seamless Digital Personal Loans To Google Pay Users

DMI Finance Private Limited (“DMI”) today announced the launch of a personal loan product on Google Pay to make reliable credit accessible for pre-qualified users of Google Pay.

This product leverages the dual advantages of Google Pay’s customer experience and the digital loan disbursal process of DMI and will also help bring new-to-credit users into the ambit. Eligible users are pre-qualified using criteria set by DMI Finance and the product offer is made available to them via Google Pay. These users will have their application processed in near real-time with access to the money in their bank accounts.

This launch with Google Pay of an integrated, personal loan journey for its users continues DMI’s focus on building innovative digital financial products in partnership with leading players in the digital finance ecosystem.

The program will disburse up to INR 1 Lakh per loan which would be repayable over a maximum of 36 months. This partnership is being launched over 15K+ pin codes.

Shivashish Chatterjee, Co-founder and Joint MD, DMI Finance, said: “We are excited to make our Personal Loan product available on Google Pay in India. At DMI, we focus on working with truly world-class collaborators to leverage our combined strengths to deliver the best possible digital credit experience to a rapidly growing customer set. Our teams have worked closely together to bring transparent and seamless credit to millions of Google Pay users. We look forward to scaling this new partnership in the years to come and make the promise of financial inclusion a reality for many millions more.”

Sajith Sivanandan, Business Head, Payments and NBU, Google APAC, LatAm, Africa and EMEA, said: “Access to reliable credit is critical to economic revival as we emerge from the difficulties posed by the pandemic. Experiences that can make this available to them within a few taps on their mobile phones will offer incredible convenience. We are very excited to collaborate with DMI Finance to make this possible for Google Pay users, as it brings to life the promise of financial inclusion enabled by technology.”