ITV

Tag: F1

  • Amaron Pro-Racing launches 3rd season of Amaron Karting Challenge

    Amaron Pro-Racing launches 3rd season of Amaron Karting Challenge

    MUMBAI: Amaron Pro Racing, a corporate motorsport initiative of automotive and industrial battery maker Amara Raja Batteries, has announced the launch of the third season of its karting challenge ‘Amaron Karting Challenge Season 3’.

    The winner will be rewarded with a scholarship of up to Rs 1 million. The winner will also be nurtured by Amaron Pro Racing Academy with Meco Motorsports to race in the Rotax Max National Karting Championship. Amaron scholarship programme will further support the winner to get into international racing.

    AKC Season 3 will target top 300 schools in India with over 150,000 students from 12-16 years inviting them for the action on the track. The entire process of registration and bringing the amateur participants on the tracks will be supported via sustained online contact programme throughout the season including an elaborate school contact programme wherein kids would be educated on the sport.

    The company says that this event is the only talent hunt in India that scouts and discovers talent at the grass root level. Amaron Karting Challenge Season 3 will span across 9 locations – Coimbatore, Goa, Mumbai, Delhi, Kolhapur, Chennai, Chandigarh, Bengaluru and Hyderabad. Six participants from each region and a total of 54 racers from across India will compete in the grand finale to be held on 7th February 2011 in Hyderabad.

    Amara Raja Batteries MD Jayadev Galla said, “We are extremely proud to bring Amaron Karting Challenge Season 3 to all motorsports enthusiasts of India. Motor sports have always been the bastion of the cr?me de la cr?me but with Amaron Karting Challenge we expect to reach out to masses and see many more winners in times to come. We will strive to discover and support the budding race enthusiasts in scaling national and international motor racing events.”

    Amaron Pro Racing head motorsports Mackinlay Barreto commented, “India is all set to arrive as a global motorsports destination. With F1 arriving in India next year, the timing is most appropriate for all young racing enthusiasts from India who dream to make it big in the world of motorsports”.
     

  • F1 returns to the BBC

    F1 returns to the BBC

    MUMBAI: Formula One Administration Limited and BBC Sport has announced the return of Formula One (F1) to BBC Television.

    The five-year deal will run from 2009 to 2013 and includes exclusive rights to TV, radio, full broadband and mobile.

    BBC Sport director of sport rights Dominic Coles said, “The biggest motorsporting event in the world is returning home after 12 years.

    “We were delighted when Bernie Ecclestone approached us about the return of F1 to the BBC. F1 is a crown jewel of sports broadcasting, so to bring the rights back to their traditional home from 2009 is tremendously exciting.

    “Fans will be able to enjoy uninterrupted, state-of-the-art and innovative coverage from BBC Sport, across all of our TV, radio and new media platforms, for the first time since 1996.”

    Bernie Ecclestone said, “I am delighted to conclude this new deal with the BBC. It is an exciting time in Formula 1 and the BBC has some innovative new ideas to consolidate and expand our UK fan base.”

  • India now a focus market for Animax

    India now a focus market for Animax

    MUMBAI: Until now India was not as important a market for Sony Pictures Entertainment’s (SPE) anime channel Animax and that reflected in its poor and negligible ratings. But now, with the repositioning of Animax Asia, which took place on 1 June, 2006, the network will be pushing it in India will renewed vigour.

    Animax Asia has been repositioned as a lifestyle channel for the youth and will target the age group of 15 – 24-year-olds. One of the reasons for this shift was the fact that animation from Japan was moving towards a more youth-driven demographic. Hence, keeping with the pace of change, Animax too was repositioned.

    Speaking to Indiantelevision.com, SPE Networks Asia vice president Animax programming and production Betty Tsui says, “In the last couple of years, we were not very focused on the Indian market because we underestimated the Indian youth’s consumption of animation. Our focus initially was on the kids’ but now we will be targeting the youth and the Indian market with renewed focus.”

    “We are not a kids’ channel and we’re not competing with the likes of Cartoon Network and Pogo. Animax will be creating a category of its own. We are not followers. Animax will be charting out its own path,” she adds.

    Apart from the re-positioning, Tsui also informed that Animax will also be looking at targeting the youth with the gaming and mobile platforms. “We will be connecting with the youth not only with animation but also with gaming and mobile. However, it is still too early to talk about it,” she says.

    Animax is also undertaking an extensive lifestyle survey of their target audience in order to understand what’s important to them and where they get their messages from. Once the results of the survey are out, the channel will be analyzing the responses received and accordingly bring about changes in the channel and its promotions.

    Queried whether the channel was looking at going totally Hindi, unlike the Hinglish feed that it has now, Tsui says, “One of the questions in the lifestyle survey that we will be conducting will be Animax’s language preference of our target audience. Based on the results, we will take the necessary changes. South Indian languages may also be a possibility as we are open to everything.”

    The channel has streamlined its programme structure to target the youth segment and has also introduced an on-air creative campaign – Imagine Nation – to capture the minds of the youth. Imagine-Nation features popular personalities that are connected to the creative world of games, film, anime and design from the Asian region to share with viewers their success stories, aspirations and passion for their work. For starters, F1 driver Narain Karthikeyan and Indian Idol 2 winner Sandeep Acharya will be featured on this from India.

    “We will be featuring people who are successful but not necessarily in the conventional sense of the term. Our aim is to inspire our viewers to pursue their dreams, whatever they may be,” says Tsui.

    The programming line up will be spruced up with popular anime that have garnered massive followings in Japan and around the world. Animax features programmes of various genres, from action (Blood+, Trinity Blood) to sci-fi (Ghost in the Shell), romance (Paradise Kiss and Honey & Clover) to drama (Black Jack, Jigoku Shojo), and also favorites like (Dragon Ball).

    A new integrated brand campaign in India will also be rolled out in a couple of weeks.