Another mountain range is making its debut as the backdrop for a song-and-dance sequence in an Indian movie—if it made the editor’s cut, that is: the Andes in Peru, and the ruins of the Inca city of Machu Picchu located high amid those mountains.
Strictly speaking, we’re talking Kollywood not Bollywood, even if the latter has become the catch-all term overseas for all movies coming out of India. “Endhiran” (Robot), in which Tamil megastar Rajnikanth plays a scientist and a robot and which opens Friday, flew its stars to Peru to film one of the music scenes.
Fernando Astete, director of the Machu Picchu Archaelogical Park, recalled the shoot approximately two years ago.
“We have seen some Indian movies here,” said Mr. Astete. “It was the quintessential music that we see in those movies, with the man falling in love and courting the woman. There were also some Brazilian elements all mixed in. It was something quite exotic.”
The anthropologist said it was quite unusual to get a film crew like this. “Normally we get films about the discovery of Machu Picchu, the Discovery Channel, what was Machu Picchu like, films by National Geographic, that kind of thing,” said Mr. Astete. “The idea was to promote Peru in the vast market of India,” he said. Mr. Astete said the agency that markets tourism to Peru, Promperu, helped the film’s crew with the paperwork in order to be able to film there.
For sure India needs more design thinking in products and services; with many engineers running the show, good design, sadly, is thought of an expense.
Nussbaum: | Co.Design
If you’re a business or an NGO with an operation in Asia or Latin America, where do you go when you want some serious local design thinking? You might start by calling my colleague and friend Carlos Teixeira, a Brazilian-born assistant professor at the School of Design Strategies, in Parsons The New School for Design. Carlos is speeding the transfer of design thinking expertise by building his own network called NODES.NODES connects Parsons to Idiom Design and Consulting, a key design thinking-based consultancy in India. Idiom founder Sonia Manchanda is a close friend of Carlos and recently helped launch SPREAD to spread the word of design thinking in her country. Here’s what the Idiom Web site says about it:“SPREAD was hence born as the design outreach program of Idiom. Since its induction three years ago SPREAD has successfully worked with various institutions and business houses conducting workshops, seminar programs and lectures to make design a weapon to transform and grow our economy and to better plan our lives and environment. SPREAD makes design thinking, tools and processes accessible to design and business students, practitioners and even school children.”
Today, along the NODES network, one can see the thinking between the Parsons design knowledge network lab and Idiom’s SPREAD project. As NODES expands to other consultancies and schools, Carlos expects increasing knowledge to flow South to South among consultancies in Asia, Latin America and Africa as well as between South to North.
Business is beginning to follow. European and U.S. corporations are increasingly using local innovation consultancies for their local business. And other emerging market countries are starting to hire consultancies schooled in design thinking. Idiom was recently hired by companies in Sri Lanka who have heard of its strategic design capabilities and Brazil-based Crama has new business in Angola for the same reason. Mexico-based Insitum has opened offices in the U.S., Brazil and Colombia, and works in Canada.
Ybrant Digital, a Hyderabad-based provider of digital marketing solutions, has acquired dream ad, an Argentine advertising network company, in all all-cash deal for an undisclosed sum.The acquisition, its fifth so far, will give Ybrant access to the Latin American region by adding four more countries – Argentina, Chile, Uruguay and Mexico – to its global footprint, bring dream ad’s 39-strong headcount and 300 active clients into its fold, and help Ybrant better represent its publishers and their global traffic.
“dream ad is the exclusive sales house for Microsoft Advertising in Latin America. Besides, it is primarily into banner and keyword search space, which we will be able to leverage by selling our products through those outlets,” Suresh Reddy, chairman and managing director of Ybrant, told mediapersons here on Wednesday.
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Leading global multiplex player Cinepolis is entering India. The Mexico-based firm, considered to be the fifth-largest cinema operator
globally, has initiated talks with real estate developers in the country for its multiplex operations. Once it starts operations, it would become the only international multiplex player in the domestic market.According to sources, Cinepolis India, which is a wholly- owned subsidiary of Cinepolis Mexico, has earmarked $350 million for its India operations.
Replying to ET’s e-mail questionnaire, Cinepolis India country manager Minal Saini said, “We are committed to India. Our initial target is to have presence in 40 cities. In the next 5-7 years, our goal is to have 500 screens.”
The exhibition chain is expected to position itself as a premium destination
. “We are looking at cities with the right combination of affluence, movie watching propensity and population.
