In a view to increase revenue, Chennai Metro Rail Limited (CMRL) is inviting big names from the corporate world to pick up co-branding rights of stations.
According to the source, talks are on with a few companies, including real state developer DLF, World Trade Centre (Bengaluru-based Brigade Group holds licence to build this in five southern cities) and the Ozone Group
For Phase II project
In this project, a company’s name can be prefixed in front of a station’s name. apart from this, we are exploring various other options like giving them rights to advertise inside stations and for announcements inside trains as well, added by the official.
Auctioning names of stations is not new for Chennai Metro Rail. They have begun implementing it in a few stations such as Thousand Lights, Nandanam and Teynampet. For instance, a few months ago, Thousand Lights Metro Station would be renamed as Spencer Plaza Thousand Lights Metro Station for three years said by CMRL.
What is significant in phase II is that they are contemplating giving branding rights even as the station construction is yet to begin.
A source told THE HINDU that they may even consider giving companies the option of designing, building and operating a station. There are a few options that we have been discussing now; one is that the companies pay us a bulk amount (a few crores) depending on location and space. The rights will be given for a certain period Companies stand to benefit from this as it would give them good visibility and promotion.
DLF, which has already tied up with Chennai Metro for providing last mile connectivity from Alandur to DLF Cybercity through air-conditioned tempo vans, which discusses to explore various avenues of the partnership, the detailed design process is under way with CMRL and we will take this up in gradual steps. The distribution of the Metro line as well as the location of the station is yet to be finalised was said by. N.C. Somaiah, vice-president, operations, DLF Cybercity. Officials from the Brigade Group said that talks were on with CMRL but refused to divulge details, saying it was too early to provide comment.
S. Vasudevan, chairman and managing director of the Ozone Group, said, “We are in discussions with them for the station at Koyambedu because of its contiguity to our property. We are looking at exclusive connectivity from our project to the Metro Station.” He also added “We are also talking to them on a proposed station at Navalur in OMR. We have an Special Economic Zone (SEZ)development there. We are looking at whether we can connect our SEZ and the station,”
On an average, over 95,000 people swap through Chennai Metro so Corp orates feel that the tie-up would give them more brand visibility and ensure that public remember the company name.
