Second Billionaire Flies Into Space

 Amazon guy Jeff Bezos is amazing! Invested his millions into building Blue Origin, and flew into space (or the edge of it, definitions vary-take your pick) on July 20, 2021. Some pics taken from the live coverage by CNN. 

Taking off around 8 am Texas time. 20 July 2021.

Up and about, around 3 minutes flight.

After 3 more minutes in weightless glory up there,  gliding back on a parachute, after a drop of some height.

Parachutes open, to make the drop slower and palatable.

Landing- while raising some dust.

Looks like the captain of Starship Enterprise?

Lasted less than 15 minutes. Open for tourists soon. Interested?

Until Death Do Us Part?

 Not necessarily. There's another D word that can do the parting, by playing its part in the parting.

This is a tongue-in-cheek look- cheeky, if you prefer- at some high profile splits.

Melinda- Bill, you didn't pay the bills on time...again!

Bill- My WORD, you do get on my nerves at times.. I never claimed that I EXCEL-led at mundane stuff like this. I am a programmer by training, not a bill-payer.

Melinda- I suggest you go jump out of that WINDOW there. I don't need you if you can't make yourself useful around the house. 

Bill- Ok, fine, I was anyway sick of being tied in..I want to be an EXPLORER again.. see ya!

Jeff Bezos to MacKenzie (before the split)- You are an Amazon.. I mean, amazing!

MacKenzie- I object to that slip of the tongue. You meant I have put on weight, didn't you?

Jeff- No, darling, how could I?

MacKenzie- Ok, how about I lighten your wallet just a little bit? Won't that be amazing? You'll hear from my lawyer soon... express delivery!

Book Lauch- Digital Marketing Cases From India

We launched our new edited book- Digital Marketing Cases from India- at IIM Indore on Sept 10, 2018. This is a collaborative project between us and Jaipuria Institute of Management Indore, and many alumni from different institutions-- IIM Indore, IMT Nagpur, IIMK, and Jaipuria Institute and PESIT among them-who have authored the cases. The book is published by Notion Press, and is available through Amazon and Flipkart in India.

Some pics with Prof. Subin Sudhir, Prof. Romi Sainy (my co-editor) and Prof. Rishikesha Krishnan, Director IIM Indore, who released the book.

The book is ideal for use along with any text on Digital Marketing for courses in Schools of Business.

Melon ki Aag

This is the story of a Hindi film- a potboiler, if you go by standard definitions.

There are two melons, one rich, one poor. They fall in love. Background song- aha aaye melon ki bela dekho aayee..

But there is a serious problem. Chacha of one of the melons is not happy with the rishta. He therefore kidnaps the other melon, putting a stop to their milan.

The background song- ghadi milan ki aayee, aaja tu chhutti lekar aa ja.. but it's no go.

The first melon now thinks of a plan to flee with the second, as in Happy Bhag Jayegi. But first, he has to find her. So, he puts on his x-ray goggles and asks Alexa for her location. Voila- she's being held in the Flipkart warehouse in his town, among a zillion products.

So the melon dresses up as a delivery boy, and picks her up against a false delivery invoice. On the way, they go to a Domino's and pick up a pepperoni pizza in case they are hungry. And buy a ticket to Mauritius, where they plan to disguise themselves and return to India- no questions asked. 

Is tarah do sitaron ka zameen par hai milan, aaj ki raat. The End.

Completely vegetarian fare, combines the best of current technologies and film ideas. Only some elements are copied.

Program for Trent Executives

We are doing an extremely interesting training program. It is an exciting blend of marketing, operations and finance for store managers and merchandisers/buyers of Tata Trent which is into fashion retailing, along with a few more product categories in their department stores.

Organised retail in India has had a chequered growth compared to its global counterparts, because of consfusion over its impact on small conventional stores selling similar goods. Government policy has also further muddled the issue, and FDI in multi-brand retail is still frowned upon.

The situation is made even more interesting by the disruptive e-commerce players in India, such as Flipkart, Amazon and Jabong, which are making losses but increasing sales rapidly.

An enthusisatic group of participants and a lot of senior management visiting to keep everyone on their toes is another unique feature of this program. To more such programs at IIM Indore....