Garmin India Unveils Smart GPS-Enabled Lifestyle Watch-Instinct

Garmin has announced the launch of its lifestyle watch - Instinct, which is a GPS-enabled smartwatch with built-in 3-axis compass and barometric altimeter plus multiple global navigation satellite systems (GPS, GLONASS, and Galileo respectively) support and wrist-based heart rate monitor. 

The Garmin Instinct comes in a fiber-reinforced polymer case and is thermal, shock, and water resistant (US military standard 810G). The fiber-reinforced polymer case adds strength and durability, and the chemically-strengthened, scratch-resistant display is high-contrast enough to read in bright sunlight, Garmin said.

Seamless GPS Integration: Built-in 3-axis compass and barometric altimeter plus multiple global navigation satellite systems (GPS, GLONASS, and Galileo) support help track in more challenging environments than GPS alone.

Monitor and Train: The Instinct GPS watch monitors heart rate, activity, and stress throughout the day when users are ready to train, they are covered with preloaded activity profiles for running, biking, swimming and more.

Instinct is loaded with various multiple sports modes like running, cycling, swimming, climbing, skiing, rowing, weightlifting and yoga.

Garmin Connect: The watch can be paired with the phone and Garmin Connect online fitness community for automatic uploads, live tracking and the GroupTrack feature. Designed for the outdoors, the new Garmin Instinct will be available in three colours- Flame Red, Graphite and Tundra at Rs 26,990. 

Emirates Introduces Special Fares in India from January 2019

The new year has begun and it is bringing sense of celebration in the air. To kick-start the year with the beginning of new dreams, hopes and adventures, Emirates has launched special fares for travellers from India to select destinations from the airline’s global network, providing opportunities for travellers to explore new cultures, relax on the beach or just enjoy a city break to over 159 destinations.

Fulfil your 2019 dreams with an African adventure, have a memorable sunny holiday in Dubai whilst shopping at one of the world’s leading retail havens or visit family down under in Australia by securing these special, limited-time only fares when booking between between the 8th till the 15th of January 2019 for a travel period from the 15th of January 2019 right till the 30th of Nov 2019.

With return fares starting from as low as Rupees 17,857 to Dubai, there is now more reason to embark upon new adventures in 2019. What is even better is that Emirates’ global network of destinations will enable all travellers – including both leisure and business travellers –  to plan their dream holidays.

Emirates customers can join the award-winning frequent flyer programme, which allows customers to enhance their travel experience and be rewarded every time they travel. Skywards Miles can be earned every time a passenger travels and then redeemed for rewards tickets, as well as a host of products and services from Emirates and a wide selection of partners. Join Emirates Skywards online and start enjoying rewards.

Fly Better with unmatched in-flight and on-ground experiences

Emirates believes in making every flight experience extraordinary. By making continued investments in refreshing the world’s biggest fleet of Airbus A380s and Boeing 777s, passengers travelling with Emirates can Fly Better on every single flight.

With door-to-door chauffeur services to and from the airport, luxury on-ground lounges and on-board enhancements, First and Business Class travellers Fly Better with a seamless travel experience. An onboard shower spa, fine dining and lounge bar are some of the exclusive experiences for First Class travellers onboard the A380

Passengers travelling on the Boeing 777 Business Class enjoy unprecedented levels of comfort with wider and more ergonomic seats. Kick back, relax and choose from up to 4,000 channels of the latest TV and on-demand content in multiple languages with Emirates’ award-winning ice inflight entertainment system. As the perfect living space, the A380 Business Class offers travellers their own personal minibar and with the A380 Onboard Lounge, where they can choose to enjoy their flight in private, or by networking with other passengers.

Economy Class travellers can also experience the comforts of flying with Emirates’ unique offering that is loaded with extra value. Amenity kits ensure that passengers arrive feeling refreshed, and environmentally-friendly soft fleece blankets make families traveling with children feel as cosy as at home. Inflight meal services, inspired by the destination, are served to children first, ensuring that they are attended to. Young flyers will be nothing short of delighted with the non-stop entertainment on board; featuring the latest cartoons, animated movies and Disney classics. Ignite the wanderlust in young travellers with Emirates’ Lonely Planet Kids packs, filled with interesting trivia facts and creative craft.

Emirates passengers booked on an Economy Class roundtrip ticket to Dubai can also enjoy additional baggage allowance on their return journey during the Dubai Shopping Festival 2019 – a highly anticipated five-week festival offering extraordinary discounts and rewards in various shopping outlets. Customers travelling back from Dubai to Emirates destinations within Canada, North America, Central America, South America or Africa can enjoy one extra piece of baggage*. Those travelling to other destinations within the Emirates network can also take advantage of an additional 10kgs of excess baggage. The offer is applicable to bookings made between December 17, 2018 until February 2, 2019, for travel between December 26, 2018 and February 4, 2019.

As part of the Emirates experience, customers also enjoy complimentary beverages and regionally inspired meals, as well as the famed hospitality of the airline’s multicultural cabin crew. 

Passengers across all cabins can share their travel experience on social media and stay connected throughout the flight, with pre-loaded 20MB of free Wi-Fi data. In keeping with the trends and never being out of touch, Emirates also invests into technology and introduced 3D seat models on their website in July 2018. It is the first airline in the world to introduce web virtual reality (VR) technology on its digital platform, allowing passengers to visualise the seats, spacious cabins and products of the Economy, Business and First-Class cabins along with the onboard lounge, and Shower Spa on the Emirates A380, before the flight.

To book your next flight with Emirates contact your local travel agent or visit www.emirates.com.

India’s Millennials Driving ‘Home Furnishing Democracy’: Interio Index Survey

When it comes to home furnishings, 54.3% millennials, aged between 25 and 35, believe home furnishing decision is a truly collective process, with each member of the family having a say.  However, such commitment to ‘home furnishing democracy’ appears to decline with age, according to a research study commissioned by India’s leading furniture company, Godrej Interio. The Interio Index is a light-hearted survey designed to understand the decision-making process behind Indians’ choice of home furnishings, and what it reveals about the relationships and influence within the family.

The study found 47.6% of respondents aged between 35 and 45 consider home décor a collective decision. In the age group of 45­-55, 39% of respondents, and 35.4% in the age group of 55+ recognised home décor as a collective decision.

For India’s older generations it tends to be the husband or the wife who has the final say; this is the case for more than half of Indians aged over 35 (51%), compared to just 42% of those aged under 35.

According to Anil Mathur, Chief Operating Officer, Godrej Interio, the Interio Index points towards a trend of collective decision-making which is particularly prevalent amongst India’s younger generations. “As per our findings, millennials believe that furniture choice and interior design should be a collective process involving everyone in the house. For instance, in the living room or the dining room, 41.3% of millennials feel that decisions are best made after involving everyone in the household. As a brand, Godrej Interio makes a conscious effort to appeal to all members of the family; an approach that is becoming increasingly important concerning India’s younger generations. The reality is, that – in the future – everyone will have a say,” he said.

According to the data, the trend towards family ‘crowd-sourced’ decision is evident across different rooms within the home; 35.4% millennials believe that bedroom furnishings should be the result of joint decision-making, a view shared by just 21.1% of those over 55.  The trend is further reflected in the kitchen décor space, which nearly a quarter of millennials sees as the result collective decision-making (23.6%) compared with only 15.3% of those aged over 55. Living room furnishing decisions are also subject to the same trend with household democracy giving way to individual decision-making according to the age of respondents; here, 41.5% of millennials believe in the power of ‘collective design’, compared to only 22.3% of those aged 55 or above.

When it comes to these rooms, India’s older generation prefers the unilateral approach. In the living room, for instance, nearly half of the respondents (48.1%) aged over 35 consider the husband or the wife of the family as having the last word on design, compared to just 39.7% of millennials or younger age group. The trend is recurring in the bedroom space as well, where the husband or wife exercises the final say on décor for 54.9% of those above 35, compared to 48.5% for those who are younger.

The Interio Index also revealed the decision-making and negotiation within Indian couples’ bedrooms.  According to the data, in a situation where one spouse wants a hard mattress, and one opts for a regular mattress, the following trends in behaviour become evident:

o   With the increase in age, the husband’s choice of mattress tends to become more resolute. While only 26.9% millennials believe that the husband would have the final word on which mattress to use, the number jumps to 37.1% for those over 55

o   The intention to negotiate by trading the veto on one furniture decision in the house for another rises with a decline in age. While only 16.6% of those over 55 would negotiate more than one-fifth (21.5%) of millennials would

For majority of Indian families, a wedding represents an auspicious time to invest in home furnishings. Such activity is increasingly a family affair, and the decision-making process will be a collective one. Home furnishings are becoming genuinely democratic across Indian households!

Cabinet Approves Dena Bank, Vijaya Bank and BoB Merger

The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved the merger of Bank of Baroda, Vijaya and Dena Bank to be effective from April 1. The merged entity will create the second largest public sector bank in the country after State Bank of India. 

The merged entity will create the second largest public sector bank in the country after State Bank of India. There will be no retrenchment of employees after the merger, the government said. 

There will be no retrenchment of employees after the merger, the government said. “After the merger, all employees of Vijaya and Dena will be shifted to Bank of Baroda,” Law and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said after the Cabinet meeting. 

Of the three banks, Dena Bank is the weakest bank with the highest NPA ratio of 11.04% and business of merely Rs 1.72 lakh crore, followed by Vijaya Bank that has Rs 2 lakh crore worth of business and 4.10% of NPA. 

BoB has Rs 10.2 lakh crore worth business and an NPA of 5.4%. According to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, the merger of two weak banks with a strong one will take care of their bad loans and provide better business opportunities with expertise draw from all three. Upon commencement of the scheme, all business, assets, rights, titles, claims, licenses, approvals and other privileges and all property, all bor­rowings, liabilities and obligations of Dena and Vijaya banks will be transferred to BOB, Prasad said.

QuEST Global to Unveil FOTA Blueprint Solution for the Automotive Industry at CES 2019

QuEST Global, the pioneering engineering services provider, will showcase a highly secure Firmware-Over-The-Air (FOTA) blueprint solution at Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2019. Built with Adaptive Delta technology, the FOTA blueprint solution enables real-time management and updating of automotive firmware. It can be seamlessly customized for any vehicle that needs periodic software upgrade in the digitally connected ecosystem or even otherwise. The solution, developed by Mobiliya, a QuEST Global company, enables two way connectivity between multiple Electronic Control Units (ECUs) and Cloud through the device gateway to allow fleet managers schedule maintenance, reduce downtimes, and in turn, increase efficiency.

The delta update downloads only the differences between a new version of software and its prior version, thus reducing the amount of data (small size binary delta) transmitted. The full new version of the software is then reconstructed locally. For millions of vehicles that need regular software updates, delivering such delta updates is an effective mechanism to reduce airtime requirements, and cloud and transmission costs.

The solution is highly flexible and can be quickly and effortlessly integrated with the existing ECU infrastructure of various OEMs and Tier-1s. By analysing large volumes of data generated by the ECUs of vehicles, it can enhance operational efficiencies and user experience manifold.

Other salient features of this solution are:

Fault-tolerant architecture
Generation of smallest possible delta
In-place update for faster performance
Adaptability to various ECU characteristics
Analytics and reporting for the real-time vehicle status
Improved performance of software upgrades regardless of ECU specification

Krish Kupathil, Head – Digital and Hi-Tech, QuEST Global, said, “With the recent developments in the connected vehicle ecosystem, automobiles have become increasingly complex. These vehicles require regular updates with new features and versions throughout their lifespan. Currently, the upgrade process is tedious with a lot of manual intervention involved. This disruptive and innovative FOTA blueprint solution not only ensures faster time-to-market for OEMs through the quick and efficient deployment of value-added services, but also reduces software upgrade cost significantly.”

Star Suvarna Joins Hands with CRY to Support Girl Child Education

Star Suvarna, one of the leading entertainment Kannada channel join hands with Child Rights and You (CRY) to support girl child education. The channel is going a step ahead by focusing on gender bias through their new TV show Mounaraga. The program is an upcoming fiction show which speaks about gender equality and voices out against the female foeticide in the country.

One of the leading NGOs in India, CRY has been working tirelessly in the domain of child rights for the last four decades.  Around 2.39 lakh girls aged less than five year die every year in India while almost 1.2 crore of Indian girls have been aborted since 1981, such is the sad state of the ‘Girl Child’ in our country. To address the criticality of the situation, Star Suvarna’s has come to the fore and contributed Rs 6,00,000 towards to CRY to support the girl child campaign while launching the new show-Mounaraga.

“It is important for responsible TV shows like Mounaraga to raise awareness on crucial social issues like foeticide – which are hidden, rarely discussed, but very prevalent, and other issues such as child labour, child marriage. These are issues which also need to be dealt with sensitivity, and compassion. We are really happy that Star Suvarna has come forward to highlight violations towards children, to emphasise the need to give children a childhood, educate them, so that they are able to break out intergenerational poverty.   We would also like to thank them for their contribution towards girl child education and for joining hands with us in our endeavor to make a lasting change in the lives of children,” said Suma Ravi, Regional Director (South), CRY.

“Star Suvarna is making a small attempt to propagate the cause by condemning female foeticide and girl child discrimination. We are bringing a story to make people more empathetic towards the cause also raise awareness on some critical issues” said Sai Prasad - Business Head, Star Suvarna.

Mounaraga is the story and struggle of a girl who survives female foeticide but is born mute. Deprived of father’s love and affection even before her birth, for being a girl child and mute Raga faces the hardship of life every day.

In support of gender equality, the channel has also started a campaign called #letherlive on social media. Parents are urged to tag a picture of them with their daughters using the #letherlive.  Several successful female celebrities of Kannada film Industry have come forward to show their support for the cause. Stalwarts like Sudharani, Haripriya, Sudha Belavadi, Samyuktha Hornad, Mayuri have shown their support by speaking about the #letherlive campaign. The campaign has already garnered huge support from television viewers.

India Military Will Use Drones, Unmanned Tanks, Robotic Weaponry in Future Wars

In an ambitious defence project, the government has started work on incorporating artificial intelligence + (AI) to enhance the operational preparedness of the armed forces in a significant way that would include equipping them with unmanned tanks, vessels, aerial vehicles and robotic weaponry.

The move is part of a broader policy initiative to prepare the Army, Navy and the Air Force for next generation warfare and comes amid rising Chinese investments in developing critical applications of AI for its military.

Secretary Defence Production Ajay Kumar said the government had decided to introduce AI in all the three forces + as it would be a "big area" considering the requirements of future warfare.

He said a high-powered task force headed by Tata Sons Chairman N Chandrasekaran was finalising the specifics and framework of the project, which would be implemented in a "partnership model" between the armed forces and the private sector.

"It is India's preparation for next generation warfare. This (AI) is where the future is going to be. We need to prepare ourselves for the next generation warfare which will be more and more technology driven, more and more automated and robotised," he told the media.