Selling Mexican food in India is a no-brainer. Last year, in Bangalore, I bought taco shells and stuffing imported from Sweden! Grupo Bimbo, where are you?
Mexican operators like Taco Inn, Coco Express, El Fogoncito and El Tizoncito should follow Taco Bell’s foodsteps. It is still early days.
Yum Brands Bets on Taco Bell To Win Over Customers Overseas – WSJ.com
To expand Taco Bell, which has been the company’s most profitable U.S. brand, Yum plans to put the chain in Spain by the beginning of next year and in India by April. Right now, there are about 240 Taco Bells in 10 countries outside the U.S., with the majority in Canada and Puerto Rico.
The challenge will be going to countries where Mexican food isn’t popular and persuading customers to try the Americanized version sold at Taco Bell (!!!). Mr. Novak says the lack of authenticity in the chain’s Mexican cuisine is an advantage. “It owns its own category,” he says.
Other American food companies are trying to export Mexican food to other countries. General Mills Inc. sells its Old El Paso brand in about 20 countries.
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Implementation of this ‘health city’ idea is long overdue. With 46 million Americans without health insurance, and increasing number of them retiring baby boomers with insufficient or no insurance coverage due to preexisting medical conditions, it is only logical that the medical tourism and overseas living trend will accelerate for older Americans in the years to come. Besides health care facilities in Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean, full-fledged retirement villages can be built by Indian companies to cater to retiring Americans with lifetime savings under $200,000 and monthly pensions under $1500.
The Economic Times
Indian hospital major Narayana Hrudayalaya plans to set up a health city in Mexico that will also cater to patients from the US. “Our next project will be a health city in Mexico. We may tie up with some American hospitals for this project,” said Devi Shetty, eminent cardiologist and chairman of the Narayana Hrudayalaya group of hospitals.
“The health city in Mexico will be a 3,000 to 5,000-bed facility and we are looking for joint ventures,” he said adding that the government of Mexico had requested the group to set up a large health facility.
Sources said the health city would come up either in Mexico City, the capital of Mexico or at Guadalajara, the second largest city in Mexico. Shetty said the proposed health city would also cater to the requirements of patients from America.
“We foresee healthcare delivery problems in the United States. They also have problems in undertaking a 20-hour journey to India for heart and other surgeries. As Mexico is closer to America, they will find it easy to undergo treatment there,” he said.
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BusinessWeek
Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve checked in with Indian IT and BPO outsourcing companies on how the global financial meltdown is affecting their businesses. So far, so good—even for those with a relatively high exposure to financial services clients. The near-shore scene is similar. Beni Lopez, CEO of Mexico-based Softtek’s near-shore operations, tells me there are a couple of forces at work. Under pressure because of concerns about the economy, some North American companies are trying near-shoring services for the first time. Meanwhile, some of Softtek’s existing customers have cut back on the services they require because of budgetary pressures. So far, “Softtek hasn’t felt the pain,” Lopez says. The company expects revenues to grow at more than 30% this year, roughly the rate of growth it has experienced for the past five years. One source of stability is its domestic Latin American business, which represents more than 50% of revenues. Brazil is growing fast, for instance.
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Eco-absorbed scores in line with National Geographic survey results from earlier this year.
Televisionpoint.com News
Based on interviews with more than 11,000 respondents in India, Brazil, China, France, Germany, Mexico, Spain, UK and US, the study unearthed both local and global characteristics that develop the current theories on a number of widely-debated issues.
Brazil, China and India are among those who claim to be most alarmed by climate change, while respondents in the US, UK and Germany demonstrates far lower levels of concern. Likewise, consumers in China, Brazil, Mexico and India would be significantly more willing than their North American, British and German counterparts to spend extra on environmentally-friendly products.
The survey revealed that 86 per cent of Indians would rather buy from companies that are trying to reduce their contribution to global warming. Further, 50 per cent of Indian respondents would be more likely to buy environmentally-friendly goods in the next 12 months, if they were at the same price and standard as their usual brands.
43 per cent of the Indians would be willing to pay a little extra for those goods. Interestingly, Indians believe the oil and fuel sector is the most damaging of all economic sectors in terms of the environment, while banking is perceived to be the least damaging. 57 per cent of Indian respondents also agree that their government is making a significant effort to combat climate change, the second highest proportion, behind only China
Further, 89 per cent of Indian respondents agree that tackling the issue of climate change means changing the way we live our lives. 50 per cent of respondents can be classed as eco-absorbed. The eco-absorbed are those who are very focused on the issue of climate change and India has the third-highest proportion (50 per cent) in the world – behind Brazil (58 per cent) and Mexico (56 per cent ) but far ahead of countries such as Germany (15 per cent) and the UK (17 per cent).
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