Marketing review

Tata Motors launches Safari variant Dicor
Tata Motors has launched the Safari Dicor, a diesel variant of its sports utility vehicle Safari. The new variant is fitted with a common rail direct injection (CRDi) engine and the company says it plans to offer the CRDi engines on its other models as well.

The 3-litre Safari Dicor is priced between Rs7.83 lakh and Rs12.70 lakh. The company expects the new variant to boost the model's sales by 25 per cent.

Safari has been selling about 250-300 units of the Safari every month. The company's passenger vehicle sales last fiscal grew 27.9 per cent, and sales are expected to slow down this fiscal.

Bata does away with the 95-paise tags
Bata India has withdrawn its famous 95-paise pricing and now Bata chappals, shoes and other footwear will come without the 95 paise though prices may still end at Rs299, Rs199 or Rs99.

However, 95 paise will not be there anymore.

The famous Bata pricing was a take-off on pricing trends in the US and Europe where it is common to find products priced at $1.99, etc.

Also, the price tag was devised to communicate to customers that Bata values even their five paise.

Bata India officials said the company had decided to do away with the most distinctive pricing in the country because five-paise coins have now gone out of circulation.

Air Deccan tickets now selling at Reliance Webstores
Tickets of Air Deccan are now available at Reliance WebWorld's nationwide broadband chain through the week. Reliance would get 5 per cent standard commission on the sale of tickets. The facility is targeted at fliers without a credit card or internet access.

With a web guide to help them, travellers can buy, reschedule, cancel tickets and even get an immediate refund at any of the Reliance Web World centres.

This marks the first e-ticketing foray for Reliance WebWorld.

The e-ticketing facility will be available at 241 Reliance broadband centres across 104 cities within the country between 10 am and 11 pm.

Some 40 per cent of Air Deccan tickets are sold online and the rest through the airline's call centre, travel agents and at the airport. Air Deccan also sells its tickets through HPCL petrol vendors.

Tata Tele launches `Indicom Gem' mobile
Tata Teleservices has launched `Indicom Gem' a branded mobile phone, exclusively designed and manufactured for Tata by Huawei, the Chinese global telecom equipment manufacturer.

Indicom Gem comes equipped with polyphonic ringtones, group SMS and a large capacity phone book. It is also T-SIM-enabled, thus providing additional memory for the phone book and SMS, and weighs 70gm.

The company has launched a special launch offer for Indicom Gem under which a customer, on paying Rs1,999, would get an activated handset. Other freebies along with the offer include free talk time worth Rs1,500 for calls to local Tata Indicom mobiles.

Mangal Pandey-The Rising publicity extends to online blogs by Aamir Khan
Mangal Pandey himself or Aamir Khan will begin posting comments on Mangal Pandey - The Rising blog on MSN Spaces and interacting with users as publicity before the release of the film.

Other promotions include allowing movie buffs to access all the inside information on the movie, exclusive pictures, trailers etc on the MSN Mangal Pandey mini site. Other MSN initiative includes conducting an MSN Mangal Pandey look-alike contest. The Mangal Pandey look-alike contest would require the user to match his image to Aamir's look in the movie.

Participants would have to replicate the much talked about moustache and long hair. The winner will be flown to Mumbai to attend the premiere and to meet Aamir Khan as well as win a whole bunch of goodies.

The Mangal Pandey - The Rising web site is designed and powered by Movie Talkies, MSN's entertainment partner in India. The Rising is its biggest project till now.

HCL launches PC for Rs 9,990
HCL Infosystems has launched a fully functional Linux-based low-cost personal computer at Rs9,990.

The PC comes with a 1-GHz processor from Taiwan's VIA Technologies, 128MB RAM, 40GB hard disk, 15-inch digital colour monitor, 52X-optical drive, keyboard and scroll mouse. It will support applications such as word processing, spreadsheet, power-point presentations and Web browsing, email clients and audio-video playback. It will also be bundled with multi-lingual fonts.

Ajai Chowdhry, chairman and CEO, HCL Infosystems said this was the start up model, and additional features such as an Internet modem, would have to be added.

The company is expanding capacity from 750,000 PCs a year at its manufacturing plants in Chennai and Pondicherry to produce around one million units a year.

This low-cost PC has provision to operate on a car battery and for eight hours without power.

Xenitis unveils PCs priced at Rs 9,790
Chennai: The price war in personal computers has just begun. Now the Xenitis Group has launched a personal computer (PC) priced at Rs 9,790

It is priced marginally lower than that launched by HCL Infosystems a few days ago at Rs9,990 with the processor from Via Technologies' Xenitis PC is based on the Intel platform.

ITC unveils fragrance range
Cigarettes-to-hospitality major, ITC, has launched a range of personal care products for men and women under the brand Essenza de Willis.

The first range under the brand comprises two sets of fragrance products — Inizio Femme (for women) and Inizio Homme (for men). The men's fragrance is based on "Oriental Woody Fruity" concept and the Women's parfum is based on "Floral Fruity Musky" concept.

All day fragrances have been designed by two of the leading international fragrance houses in France.

According to the company the fragrance products are world-class in quality and aimed at the high-end of the market. They will initially be available at Wills Lifestyle Stores in Delhi and subsequently will be sold at other similar lifestyle retail outlets in the country.

The fragrance range has undergone extensive product testing in India as well as in laboratories in Europe, to ensure that the Indian consumer has a memorable product experience.

— Compiled by Mohini Bhatnagar