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Understanding Rural and Low Income Customers in Asia
An important segment that marketers cannot ignore in Asia is the bottom of the pyramid and those Asian consumers living in rural areas. The challenges, marketers face in trying to address these consumers are high and risky due to the fragmented nature of the rural market and the low margins of this trade. There is no denying though that rural consumers want to access brands, if only because they are a promise of quality. For Asian marketers interested in tapping the huge rural markets in Asia...
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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Emerging Market for Medicines
When Haruo Naito, chief executive of Eisai, the Japanese pharmaceutical company, signalled his continued interest in western markets by inaugurating his company’s European headquarters in the UK last month, his mind was already elsewhere. "We have already finished our investments in all major areas in the US and Europe," he says. "Now we are thinking about new areas. We are very interested in emerging markets, especially China, India, the Middle East, Turkey and north Africa."
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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Business groups to lend money to SMEs through microfinancing
MANILA, Philippines – Businessmen have committed to helping Filipinos affected by the global economic crunch by lending money for capital to small scale entrepreneurs through microfinance activities. “We have pushed corporate social responsibility (CSR) to the corporate sector for many years from the conferences that we have organized. We have seen CSR evolve as a practice and a responsibility in each corporation’s CSR strategy,” Marilou Erni, League of Corporate...
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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Australian group seeks BoP business opportunities
A T THE tail end of a business conference in the pretty Papua New Guinean coastal town of Madang late last month, a posse of high-powered Australian suits slipped into tropical mufti, climbed aboard a charter plane and flew deep into the wilds of the Southern Highlands interior. Dropping into remote villages over three days, they visited markets and surveyed crops, talked to tribal elders and field workers. They asked lots of questions about how people were making a livi...
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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Moving Beyond the Moving Anecdote
ANN ARBOR, Mich. — For years, groups working on poverty-fighting ventures have used stories, anecdotes, and milestone markers to highlight their work and secure funding. Unfortunately, these things don’t actually measure the effectiveness of an organization’s effort. Nor do they showcase any unintended consequences, long-term changes, or missed opportunities. But Ross professor Ted London, after several years of field research, has developed a tool that organizations can u...
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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In a “wise” move Timorese women venture into business after decades of conflict
When Timor-Leste descended into a political crisis in April/May 2006, just five years after the restoration of independence from Indonesia, Mrs. Joaquina Da Silva, a 33 year-old mother of four was among the first group of women displaced from the capital, Dili. She then fled to the safe havens of Baucau which is her ancestral homeland. ’When our house was destroyed in Dili, I came here with my displaced family and just nothing else,’ she says, her voice chocking with emotion....
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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Reliance in fresh approach to MTN
India’s Reliance Communications has made a fresh approach to acquire MTN, reviving its earlier interest in joining up with the South African mobile carrier to create an emerging markets telecommunications giant. News of the move follows the sudden collapse at the weekend of talks between MTN and Bharti Airtel, India’s biggest cellular operator by subscriber numbers and Reliance’s arch-rival. The talks with Bharti broke down amid differences over how to structure a proposed...
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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Reliance takes over wooing elusive target MTN
For India’s Reliance Communications, the breakdown of talks between its arch-rival Bharti Airtel and MTN must be a relief. A combination of Bharti, India’s number one mobile operator by subscribers, and South Africa’s MTN would have created a formidable competitor with 130m subscribers across 22 fast-growing markets in south Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Now, as Reliance pursues its own deal with the South African operator, Bharti’s experiences may ho...
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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