Super 9 Winners - Vodafone Gujarat

From : DNA

From : Rajasthan Patrika

From : Sandesh

From : Standard Herald

From : Western Times

Vodafone on Expansion Mode in Guj

From : DNA

Ahmedabad: Reaching out to the number one mobile service provider in Gujarat Vodafone will be easier with the telecom service provider plans to add more than 150 retail stores and 1000 ministores in two years.

The company launched its 1000th store in Gujarat at Naranpura in Ahmedabad. The store is designed as per the global retail store standards.

Vodafone's retail presence has been witnessing 15% growth year on year. "We have 9,000 retail stores across the country of which 1,000 stores are in Gujarat. We are adding 150 retail stores and more than 1,000 mini stores in two years," said Kavita Nair, senior vice president of retail and digital at Vodafone India.

Currently, the company's presence is one store per 20 villages in Gujarat, which will be taken up to 16 villages in two years, said Brajesh Bajpai, Business Head - Gujarat at Vodafone India. He added that the customers can walk in the stores for any service like buying new card, problems in service or paying the bill.

The company has also witnessed good growth in 3G users in Gujarat. “Our 3G business has witnessed 60% growth in the state,” said Bajpai. Vodafone has been benefited the most by mobile number portability (MNP).

The company has added 6,78,610 customers through MNP since of implementation in 2010-11, said Bajpai. As per data published by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai), 1.07 crore mobile subscribers applied under MNP as on July 31, 2014.

Bajpai also agreed to a lot of complaints about call drop and other problems. “For improving connectivity, we have added around 400 more towers in our network in one month,” he said.

For Amdavadis, printed word holds an irreplaceable charm

Brajesh and our book review blog featured in today's DNA Ahmedabad (Page 2 of Main Paper) article on Booklovers

For Amdavadis, printed word holds an irreplaceable charm

The adage – ‘Wear the old coat and buy a new book' — goes very well for Amdavadi bookworms who are still hooked to the woody aroma of the printed pages. These bibliophagists appreciate Kindle, but say digitisation cannot replace the charm of printed words. dna’s Himali Doshi finds out how the city-folk declare their undying love for printed books on Book Lovers Day


‘Begin reading today and change your life’
Brajesh Bajpai, business head, Vodafone Ltd Gujarat, owns a 1,500-book library. An active blogger on http://whichbooknext.blogspot.in, he and wife Karishma summarise and rate the books they read across all genres. ‘My library grew naturally when my wife Karishma brought home her own large collection of books,” he says revealing how he thought of making a library. “The print form is being challenged by lower costs and easy accessibility of e-books, but will survive for its own unique reasons,” he says with hope. His favourite author is Devdutt Pattnaik whose “Mahabharata” he rates highly, with all its renditions, versions and speculative fiction.

‘Read books and let your imagination soar’
“When my family moved from Sindh, my grandmother brought with her only a few clothes but a trunk full of books,” says Prakash Ramrakhiani who has a 5,000-book library which he calls 'Danai' meaning 'knowledge' in Greek. His love for books soared when he began receiving books as a prize for standing first in class.” His favourite authors are PG Woodhouse, W Dalrymple, John LeCarre and Frederick Forsyth. That books would be redundant soon was speculated even 20 years ago, he remembers and feels e-books can never replace the smell of fresh paper or the charm of holding a book in the hand. His message for the young is that they should read all genres to develop mind and thought.

‘Food for thought weighs more than food for stomach’
Founder of 'The Riverside School', Ahmedabad, Kiran Bir Sethi has about 1,000 books in her personal library. Lending and borrowing books was an essential the part of growing up she remembers and insists that parents should encourage their kids to make their own collection. Though she loves e-books she says, reading printed books gives her unparalleled pleasure. “Youngsters read a lot of stuff on social networking sites, but they need to be inspired to read books” she says. Among her favourite books are 'The difficulty of being good' by Guru Charan Das and MK Gandhi's 'My experiments with truth'.

Published Date:  Aug 11, 2014

"Ab Gujarat Jeetega" - Vodafone's new Campaign Strategy in State

From DNA

From The Times of India

From The Economic Times

From The Economic Times (Gujarati)

From The Financial Express (Gujarati)

From Sandesh

From Divya Bhaskar

 

From NavGujarat Samay

From Jai Hind

From Rajasthan Patrika

From Prabhat

From Standard Herald

From Young Leader

Women employment in Gujarat < 15% at Vodafone Gujarat it is 20%

From : DNA Ahmedabad Edition

Why corporates are scared of hiring women - Women employment in Gujarat is less than 15%

Ahmedabad: Is it something like women do not have brains or they are less efficient? Then, why are women not being hired by corporates in Gujarat? The theme of International Women’s Day 2014 is Inspiring Change. It says that although women’s equality has made positive gains, the world is still unequal. Therefore, the industrial state of India, Gujarat, too, is unequal.

According to data available with the state government, the men-women working ratio in Gujarat is 100:15.

There are over 21 lakh people working with different sectors out of which just 3 lakh are women. Following the alleged rape of a journalist by Tehelka editor Tarun Tejpal, industry associations and many corporate houses have started introducing anti-sexual harassment policy while some companies have decided not to hire women to avoid such circumstances that may tarnish the company’s image.

A couple of months ago, a meeting of members of an industry association was called in Ahmedabad where most of the promoters were seriously thinking of putting a full stop to recruiting women, said a member of that association. “If companies do not hire women, it will never come across any complaint of sexual harassment,” said the official.
There are few such corporate companies which have almost stopped hiring women. One of them is a pharmaceutical company while the other is a conglomerate. However, there are also some companies that have more than 50% women on the payroll. There are companies in education, healthcare, IT, telecom, hospitality and other service sectors where women employment is more than 15%.

In Vodafone Gujarat, the total employee strength is over 700 employees of which women’s share is 20%. “We have always laid great emphasis on equal rights and opportunities for our employees and our policies encourage women employees to aspire for and achieve their career ambitions,” said Brajesh Bajpai, business head of Gujarat, Vodafone India. 

Writing More Important

From : DNA

Vodafone rings m-pesa in Gujarat

From : DNA

Ahmedabad: Vodafone, the largest telecom subscriber of Gujarat, has launched a facility to have digital money. Forms of cash and plastic money will soon be replaced by digital money or mobile commerce, called m-pesa, by Vodafone.
On Monday, Vodafone India and ICICI Bank announced the launch of m-pesa, a unique mobile money transfer and payment service in the state. M-Pesa is the trademark of Vodafone. It empowers the un-banked and under-banked sections of the population gain access to fi­nancial services via the mobile phone.

M-pesa effectively leverages the combined strengths of Vodafone's global expertise in the domain of mobile payment and significant distribution reach in India plus the security of financial transactions provided by ICICI. This service is available across 170 tehsils, 29 dis­tricts through 2,000 specially trained authorised agents and across 312 Vodafone exclusive re­tail/mini stores across the state.

First ecosystem has to be creat­ed, said Brajesh Bajpai, the busi­ness head of Gujarat, Vodafone India. "We have not launched a product or service. But it is a con­cept for consumers. For this, we will have to educate consumers, retailers and aggressively market this service," he said.

At present, transaction charges on m-pesa are less compared to credit card charges. Charges over m-pesa transactions are not fixed forever, said BP Singh, operations of director west, Vodafone India. "As and when the volume of m-pesa transactions increases, there are high chances of transaction charg­es coming down. At present, we have launched a service to help one transfer money whenever re­quired," he said.

This service is launched cater­ing to the need of the masses, said business head of m-pesa, Voda­fone India, Suresh Sethi. "Today, more than 95% of the villages in India do not have any banking out­let. Financial inclusion is a na­tional priority and we believe that with m-pesa, we now have the ideal offering to facilitate the same across the country in com­pliance with all applicable regula­tions," he said.

Garba venues escape slump wrath in Ahmedabad

From DNA 


Scared of negative sentiment, slowdown and inclement weather, Navratri organisers were almost down and out. Suddenly, telecom companies, which had been silent on this nine-day festival for the last two years, stepped up as saviour for the organisers of garba nights beginning Saturday.

Since 2008, the garba organisers have been complaining of difficulties in getting sponsorships.

But, every year, they somehow managed to get sponsorships either through branding or barter system. This year, too, the trend is pretty much the same.

“Like every year, even this year, it was difficult for us to attract sponsors till Saturday,” said Jaydeep Mehta, director of True Events. “After two years, the telecom is back again. Not only the telecom operators. Even the mobile phone companies have shown interest. Not the big companies, the domestic brands,” he said.

Every year, the garba organisers keep two associate sponsors and four co-sponsors, said Mehta.

“Owing to the slowdown, the sponsors have slashed their budget. In that case, we have got four associate sponsors and eight co-sponsor instead of two. This fulfils our motive,” he said.

Companies have budgets earmarked for events. But they want to get maximum mileage out of it, said Arvind Singh, the business head of Expertz. While Shiv Corporation is organising garba nights at Rajpath Club, Expertz is conceptualising them.

“Our cost of organising such events has increased with revenue being 50% of the total cost.

Suddenly, telecom has become the saviour. Now, we hope not to incur losses this year,” said Singh.

The telecom sector has increased its scale of spending this year compared to the previous year, said Brajesh Bajpai, the Gujarat business head of Vodafone.

“Navratri is an important festival for us as part of our marketing and customer engagement activities. Being the undisputed market leader in Gujarat, we constantly aim to stay connected with our large customer base in Gujarat and this Navratri, too, we have allocated strong resources for the event. Our scale of activity is actually much larger and wider than last year whereas the budget allocation is similar to last year,” said Bajpai.

The unexpected rain has also played spoilsport. “A few clients even backed out last week.

Probably in the name of rain, they withdrew their sponsorships. So, we had to manage sponsorships from other groups and companies. And, with the budget having shrunk, we will have to rely more on the sale of tickets instead of bartering of tickets,” said Meghal Shah, a garba organiser and event manager in Ahmedabad.

According to Shah, sponsorship from automobile, finance and education sectors has been minimal. “For automobile, it is like recession. While educational institutes crib about the fall in number of students, finance sector believes that garba events are just not their cup of tea. In such a situation, food and beverages and telecom have helped garba organisers to a great extent,” he said.

Every year, organisers face difficulty in attracting sponsors for the nine-night event, said Anand Doshi, director of Sharda Communications. “With the grace of god, event management companies organise the event. Like every year, it was very difficult to raise money this year, too. But we do it by hook or by crook,” asserted Doshi.

DNA Money - COO of Vodafone believes while 4G is great tech, even 3G is yet to realise full potential in the country

From : DNA Money
On : 4 April 2013

Only 1.7% of Vodafone subscribers in Gujarat use 3G

DNA - June 2007