Associate Members
'RAI' – MICA Career Development Programme in
Visual Merchandising and Creative Communications
Retailers
Association of India (rai) is the
voice of Indian organised and modern retailers. Launched
by the key retailers of the country, rai represents
the modern retail industry of India. The organization
is spearheaded by stalwarts in the field as B. S.
Nagesh of Shoppers Stop, Kishore Biyani of Pantaloon,
Noel Tata of Trent (Westside), Sumantra Bannerjee
of RPG Retail, Nandan Piramal of Piramyd, B. A. Kodandarama
Setty of Viveks, Vinay Nadkarni of Globus, Ved Prakash
Arya of Pantaloons R. Subramanian of Subhiksha. Gibson
G. Vedamani is the CEO of Retailers Association of
India (RAI).
With the growth of the retail sector
in India, its academic pursuit has also emerged. MICA
runs two courses in this direction, Retail Communication
Management (RCM) and Visual Merchandising and Creative
Communication (VMCC). The draft course content and
delivery mechanism was designed after extensive discussions
between RAI and MICA to help the fledgling retail
industry to source appropriate industry professionals,
support internship and placements for the graduates.
The RAI- MICA agreement for programme in visual merchandising
and creative communications (VMCC) was inked in July
2006.
RAI supports various MICA activities
in the Retail Area. It partly sponsored the ‘MICA
Retail Yatra’, a unique pedagogy by MICA. It
advises on faculty, curriculum development, projects
and placements for RCM and VMCC programmes. RAI has
been involved in the selection process of students
for the VMCC programme. A 15-day induction programme
was conducted by RAI for the first batch of VMCC programme.
RAI also helped in the placements of Professional
Programme in Visual Merchandising and Creative Communications.
AMAP
The ‘Audience Research Laboratory’
that will provide data on television viewing in urban
India was set up in MICA in conjunction with Audience
Management and Analytics Limited (aMAP) and Optimum
Media Solutions (OMS), the media arm of Mudra Communications.
The laboratory became operational from October 28,
2006.
The lab will be helpful for students and faculty in
conducting research in viewing behaviours of television
audience. “With two data machines to collect
overnight live data on television viewing and nine
computers to record and monitor programmes from at
least nine channels for over weeks, the laboratory
provides a first-hand data to media researchers,”
said Ravi Dixit, Director aMAP that has helped MICA
with the infrastructure for the lab.
aMap is an overnight audience ratings
service from DecisionCraft Analytics, who has now
established itself as a key ratings player. With its
sample size of 6,000 metered homes across India, aMap
says it is giving a tough competition to TAM Media
Research (TV audience ratings body floated by AC Nielsen).
The laboratory would help students,
faculty and professionals from the partner organisations
Giving them an opportunity to undertake path-breaking
research in understanding the viewing behaviour of
television audiences. “The new facility would
help in reviewing TV viewership from all angles and
enable cutting edge work in this field. It is the
birth of a new movement in career research and also
a rare initiative. The advantage of the new system
is that the data is available overnight compared to
other institutions, which provide data a week later
or even after months,” explains Ravi Dixit.
Hughes Communications India Limited
Hughes Communications India Ltd. (HCIL)
is a joint venture between Hughes Network Systems
(HNS) & Escorts Ltd. HCIL is an equipment provider
as well as a service provider of satellite broadband
solutions in India, serving more than 250 enterprise
customers and 39 of the top 50 brands in India. The
2001 Comsys VSAT report named HCIL as the largest
VSAT service provider in the Asia Pacific region.
HughesNet, Hughes’s latest offering in the satellite
broadband space, is the world's leading broadband
by satellite service for consumer, small business
and enterprise markets. HughesNet is targeted at large
enterprise, dealers/distributors, suppliers of corporates,
professionals, small office/home office and all consumers.
HughesNet Global Education is a premier satellite
based education and training service for corporates
and working professionals from HCIL. Its platform
seamlessly integrates the strengths and advantages
of the traditional method of education with the latest
in technology. Using a very powerful interface, HughesNet
Global Education enables a student to have highly
interactive sessions with fellow students and instructors
all over the country, using video, voice and data.
MICA has launched three programmes so far using the
HCIL platform viz. the six months Executive Development
Pogramme in Data Analytics (EDPDA), the one-year Executive
Development Programme in Media Management(EDPMM) and
the six month Post Graduate Certificate Programme
in Advertising Management (PGCPAM).
This setup expands the reach of the
institution helping it reach out to larger audiences
without placing any constraint on the physical infrastructure.
MICA’s real time education
delivery works in partnership with a global online
education organization Direcway Global Education.
This organization has several franchises across the
country. Essentially these franchises are computer
labs which are connected through a central server
to a Virtual Private Network (VPN) with us. The organization
sets up a studio on the campus which is connected
to the same VPN. The faculty goes to the studio on
campus, delivers the session and the participants
attend it at the franchisee location. So we can have
a participant in Bangalore attending the session simultaneously
with a participant from Jammu and Kashmir. MICA is
now in the process of developing the programme in
asynchronous mode where participants can take the
course at the time of their choice. This would enable
people in different time zones to participate in MICA
programmes.
Sage Publications
Sage Publications
is a renowned international publisher that publishes
460 journals in subjects as wide ranging as Business,
Humanities, Social Sciences, Science, Technology,
Medicine etc.
Sage Publications and MICA collaborate
to bring out the ‘Journal of Creative
Communications.’ The journal promotes
inquiry into contemporary communication issues within
wider social, economic and technological contexts
and provides a forum for the discussion of theoretical
and practical insights emerging from such inquiry.
The journal actively cultivates a new language of
inquiry into the contemporary communications phenomena
and aims to become a repository of knowledge flowing
from it. The journal facilitates the understanding
of the process of communication by publishing articles
that develop communication theory and by reporting
empirical research with an emphasis on practical applications.
The journal publishes articles in
the areas of marketing communications, communication
management, mass and new media, development communication,
culture studies, and organizational communications.
The journal is open to publishing cases based on empirical
and interpretive research though with a thoughtful
discussion of results.
Electronic Access: Journal of Creative
Communications is available electronically on SAGE
Journals Online at http://crc.sagepub.com
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