Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Thursday, March 25, 2010
The Zain Airtel Deal
Analysts have really covered the deal threadbare with the company management sharing a lot of data with the deal signing. Howeve, I find the data has not been used crrectly in that analysis in a bid to be cautious. Airtel is a great India brand, defnitely because of its advertising and branding but also because it is an operational leader and the true Navratna. It is a great purchase for Airtel, with Zain Africa showing profits of $175 m in the last 12 months and a per user value of $8 which is truly behind $13 from leader MTN but is a great place to start for someone who can build in operational efficiencies. New Capital Expenditure will have to be factored in to truly realise Airtel strategy of the mistakenly named "minutes factory"
Bharti's model is not strictly pricing a minutes factory as half baked reports suggest but the company would make significant investments in infrastructure and use marketing and branding to maintain a premium in brand cognition while maximising capacity utilization. Access to 45% of Africa's population which is also seeing a surge in development because of its rich OIL deposits would easily lead them to the target of sharing the lead market share with MTN and probably even reach the company's goal of getting 120 million subscribers in Africa a probable one. Airtel already has 120 million subscribers in India
Great Purchase. $175m and 42 million subscribers. ARPU at $8, MTN ARPU at $13 good target.
3G bids are soon to be opened in India after a rocky trail of denials and postponements. Then there is 4G, the sector is significantly infrastructure intensive and the deal is likely to be expensive in the initial run, but given a pedigree like Airtel, it can manage both markets unlike previous large deals and attempts by Tatas, Ambanis and others for loss making assets and no operational excellence history. Even the Birla Scion has been ble to make a better stab of it at Hindalco where he is able to produce the acquisitions end products , soda cans here in India cost effectively. Airtel's ticket is its ability to realise a complete infrastructure with a longer term window in each market, their experience in 23 circle in India over just 10 years bearing them out.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
The other one after Financial Media is Gaming!
UTV expanded in the media and entertainment market when the demand was booming and supply seemingly had gne social in the rest of the world. They hve done fairly well for themselves, in no small measure due to the JV with Bloomberg. the Bloomberg UTV financial enterprise is definitely the best news source for the alive markets of the country with CNBC and ETNOW not living up to their brand and sticking to the shallow salty marshes when it comes to analysis speak. In no small measure, Screwalla went ahead and challenged the big guns on TV during the Budget Telecast sweepstakes. However, that one is maybe a little tougher than the UTV team supposes it to be. NDTV Profit is a non competitor right now but may soon get fangs if one misdirected investor finds them worth it. Such is the magic of fresh investment with intelligence like mine freely available to these sundries in the lean times.
Moving on, UTV has grander plans, having recruited 50-60 game developers in locations int he US and UK for its JV with Disney in social gaming. It's answer to Avatar and to games like Mafia Wars online is kicking off with an online social game called Mythium in the next 2-3 weeks. Our first child of digital media, Pentasoft has in the meantime recovered from some of its own excesses and is still around, but a lot of global media houses are notw cottoned on to this democratic land for spinning big business from social web's breakthrough 2009
The other one after Financial Media is Gaming!
UTV expanded in the media and entertainment market when the demand was booming and supply seemingly had gne social in the rest of the world. They hve done fairly well for themselves, in no small measure due to the JV with Bloomberg. the Bloomberg UTV financial enterprise is definitely the best news source for the alive markets of the country with CNBC and ETNOW not living up to their brand and sticking to the shallow salty marshes when it comes to analysis speak. In no small measure, Screwalla went ahead and challenged the big guns on TV during the Budget Telecast sweepstakes. However, that one is maybe a little tougher than the UTV team supposes it to be. NDTV Profit is a non competitor right now but may soon get fangs if one misdirected investor finds them worth it. Such is the magic of fresh investment with intelligence like mine freely available to these sundries in the lean times.
Moving on, UTV has grander plans, having recruited 50-60 game developers in locations int he US and UK for its JV with Disney in social gaming. It's answer to Avatar and to games like Mafia Wars online is kicking off with an online social game called Mythium in the next 2-3 weeks. Our first child of digital media, Pentasoft has in the meantime recovered from some of its own excesses and is still around, but a lot of global media houses are notw cottoned on to this democratic land for spinning big business from social web's breakthrough 2009
Another brokerage advert
While 15% of India's investing population is a pretty thin amount, Kotak securities tried to capitalise on its reach in the markets with a bland ad for its brokerage on financial TV..The 10-15s spot ( likely the 30s standard, swishes past you with a sickening impact in the stomach. That Asia's best Capitalised Market represents only 3% of its population and is targeted more at online connossieurs that are also not more than 15% of India's population..does not bode well for our market depth. With taxchanges in Mauritius, the proportion of retail investors in the market will hopefully change for the better
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Replicating Farmville in China
This one: Replicating Farmville in a Shopping Mall in Shenyang in the North East
China trouble?
Here's some snaps the China daily just produced...
It's a fggy scene in China's luxury and commercial scene today even as the new year rolls on 
