Archive for February, 2010

If you’re a diabetic, your doctor would have told you this  - “With Diabetes your chances for heart diseases are now higher”!

So what happens if your medication prescribed for diabetes also comes with an added risk for cardiovascular disease? Scary? Yes it is! And this is what’s happening with GlaxoSmithKline’s Avandia or  rosiglitazone.

A Senate Finance Committee report had some hard-hitting words for GSK and this was what was said:

GlaxoSmithKline, knew the type 2 diabetes drug had possible harmful cardiac effects several years before a 2007 New England Journal of Medicine study initially raised concerns about Avandia.

It all began three years ago when Dr. Steven E Nissin conducted a study and found that Avandia raised the risk of heart disease and this snowballed into a Congressional inquiry and report resulting in a drop in stock value for GSK. NYT reported the following:

A Congressional investigation released Saturday concluded that GlaxoSmithKline had threatened scientists who tried to point out Avandia’s risks, and internal memorandums from the Food and Drug Administration show that some government health officials want Avandia withdrawn. The drug is still being taken by hundreds of thousands of patients, and sales last year were $1.19 billion.

GlaxoSmithKline has today fired a rebuttal and has in its 30-page “white paper” response made it very clear that:

It has been “proactive in investigating the safety data” of rosiglitazone and has kept all regulatory agencies, including the FDA, aware of its investigations.

They have even gone on to say that they rumours of them trying to silence people were simply efforts made to ensure the right information goes out about their product.

Avandia is a very popular drug for Diabetes and for the hundreds of thousands using it everywhere nothing couldn’t be scarier than this. The best advice we can give is to contact your doctor and not decide things yourselves.

As for GSK, trying to arm-wrestle out of this with a 30-page rebuttal may not be enough. Coming clean on research results funded by them and allowing this to be evaluated or going back to the lab to improve the medicine maybe the way to go.

Finally the word from FDA : The FDA warns that patients who are taking Avandia should be monitored for signs and symptoms of heart failure, including excessive and rapid weight gain, difficulty breathing and/or swelling. “This work is ongoing and no new conclusions or recommendations about the use of rosiglitazone in the treatment of type 2 diabetes have been made at this time,” the agency announced.

While GSK handles this reputation management problem, what transpires next should be interesting indeed! Watch this space for updates!

Joining the race of car recall is Maruti Suzuki (Suzuki Motor Corp has 54.2 percent stake). The biggest carmaker in India is heading to call back 100,000 cars of hatchback model A-Star from the Indian market. The reason cited is to replace a faulty fuel pump gasket, which could potentially lead to fuel leaks. The company in a statement said,

The car recall belongs to Aug 2009 lots. In November 2009, we came across an anomaly reported in the fuel tank in some of the vehicles and by December 2009, we started contacting the customers through letters

The company further says the recall actually began in November, but did not disclose the move until late February. This latest development comes at a time when quality related concerns is already gripping the auto industry with recall from Toyota and Honda already in the bandwagon.

A-Star being a popular model in Europe, Maruti had made it a point to apprise the European regulatory authorities about the recall, but the question remains! Why Maruti did not make this disclosure in India. Maruti says the recall will have very little effect on the company, but the impact was felt elsewhere. The investors packed Maruti’s stock to an all time low at 3 percent after the recall announcement.

Maruti being a leader in car market in India have never bullied on their stand, but from the Reputation management point of view had they disclosed the recall earlier, the investor would not have panicked as it reflected on the share market. Secondly there will be doubts about the way company handle information and  disclose them to investors. Finally will this affect Maruti’s reputation or are they going to put up a better show than Honda and Toyota, have to wait and see how it takes shape.

Related Posts:

• Honda- Recall for faulty airbags
• Toyota- Problems deepening
• Toyota, Honda- Industry Jinxed?
• Toyota- Damage control mode

No.10 Downing Street has been abuzz with speculations of the alleged bullying tactics of  the  British PM Gordon Brown. Meanwhile the founder of the National Bullying Charity helpline has told the media that they are receiving fresh calls for help from Downing Street Staff. Though the  Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O’Donnell came up with a quick denial and brushed aside the concerns with Brown as mere media speculation, a book  has come up with the news that the cabinet secretary had in fact asked Brown to curb his “volcanic temper”. Amidst all the allegations and counter allegations, the public is left wondering.

Well, going by the signs, all is not well at the No.10 Downing Street and it is only a matter of time before these bickering might snowball into a major controversy. Prima facie, the whole episode  appears as a PR mishandling issue and these internal issues might prove a major embarrassment to the Prime Minister’s office if more 10 Downing Street employees choose to take the matter to the media. Mr. Brown has to gather his acts smartly and make sure that the PR practices are in place in the highest office.

What is more worrying about the Gordon Brown revelations is not just the vile temper of the PM but the fact that the National  Bullying Helpline having felt the need to intervene. For many, the alleged outbursts of Mr. Brown might appear childish but the fact that these have come out into the open from within the iron walls of the Downing street in itself is a warning call for the Prime minister’s office  to set out on an urgent damage control and reputation management exercise to stall his rating from plummeting in the public eye.

A possible strike is in waiting for British Airways as the second ballot results of its 13,000 cabin crew members is to be announced shortly. After the first strike called by the cabin crew members was luckily overruled by the High Court due to the busy Christmas season, seems this time a sure strike is in the offing from March 1.

With the BA cabin crew strike still looming on the UK travelers, things even got worse when the pilots union of Lufthansa started a strike today over worries of pay and job security. BA which lost over £400m is planning for a layoff for its present staff and a salary freeze this year in order to save £140m a year. It’s crunch time for BA with nothing less than an acid test ahead.

Things can’t get any worse for BA with the ongoing unrest among the cabin crew and the airline, at the same time comes the threatened walkout, seems like nothing is going well for BA. All this unrest is also damaging the reputation of the airline. Well, the extent of damage on BA is widely seen with the internal bickering proving out to be a PR disaster for the airline specially when BA is really struggling to survive. This is not the first time this inner conflicts is proving fatal for the airlines online reputation, in the past also few disgruntled employees of London Heathrow airport Terminal 5 aired their anger on Facebook,with rude comments about passengers.

Being a top airline company BA seems failing to make both the ends meet, the airline should give a thought on repairing its reputation and getting back the lost faith of its customers by putting into act the effective tools of reputation management. As the adage goes, A stitch in time saves nine!

The real question is how many people won’t be booking a flight with BA over the summer period with fear of the staff threatening about going on strike again. The staff have 2 choices, either get over it and realise in order for a business to survive then they need to streamline  or watch BA come to a disastrous end.  BA is a global company and needs to be able to compete on a global scale, it can’t if there is a lot of wastage, might be unfair but unfortunately a fact of life for open global market.

Related BA Posts

• BA – Glug Glug Glug
• BA – Is this strike all bad
• BA – What lies behind the strike
• BA – Legal action to save reputation

Tiger Woods apology and press conference yesterday went off without a glitch except for a couple of nervous stops in the beginning. He tried to talk about everything a reporter would have wanted to question him. His mom was present and his wife’s family, he even thanked Accenture, and the golfing community for understanding the timing of his apology.

The read out speech asking for atonement, telling the Paparazzi to stay away from his family and saying he was sorry thrice was all very well.

In celebrity reputation management terms, Tiger did all that he needed to do, touching upon spirituality and Buddhism and his therapy and the millions of kids who idolized him – he said it all!

But I wasn’t moved, there were tears and he touched on all aspects, yet watching it one was left with questions of how it seemed only rehearsed.

• This is a man who was an expert in leading a double life and perpetuating a holier-than-thou persona off the golf course.
• The Tiger brand thrived on his presumed golden image – the star with no faults –  a star like no other.

The extent of the damage on the Tiger Woods brand to me seemed more evident yesterday in the public apology. Again we are not talking about the golfer Tiger Woods but the brand which projected him as the ideal on and off the field.

Tiger is definitely not out of the woods yet, with his problems or image, the public still feel cheated and only time and a phenomenal comeback in the game can really solve this.

Conclusion: For now this ‘mea culpa’ can be only termed as the tiniest step in rebuilding his brand. The golfing circuits need the Tiger brand back and up; after all he is the one who brings in the crowds!

The largest broadcasting network in the world, BBC, is in a soup. Their refusal to co-operate with the filming of the light hearted entertainment ‘bubble’ has come as a jolt for many. Bubble was supposed to debut on Friday, but the latest confusion in BBC management has come as a dampener. The participant Nick Robinson who is BBC’s political editor along with their two other senior journalists George Alagiah and Huw Edward has been banned from taking part the program. The move is out of fear that it will hamper the reputation of it’s journalism and the way media works. Though the program format is popular across other countries, but BBC think  bubble treats audience as idiots.

BBC further added that Bubble is all about seeking attention and amassing popularity by confining three people in a house for several days with no access to the outer world. They will be shown video clips asking them to distinguish between the fake and authentic news. Sky News and ITV news who are supposed to be supplying the content on videos and news for the show are happy to be part of it. BBC’s news for the show will be from archives and stories from that corresponding week.

Why is BBC News so panicky about Bubble, and their apparent double standards? Supporters of the programme are wondering why they are so paranoid. Seems like BBC has not recovered from the lost confidence in its journalism after 2004 Hutton Inquiry and the 2007 fakery scandal of Queensgate documentary.

BBC being a reputed house needs to put things in order in the finest way possible, Reputation management is the need of the hour before viewers start thinking that all they do is force feed news everyday. Secondly are viewers being told that they are not smart enough to make out the difference between authentic and fake news stories?

Apple’s iPad has caught up with yet another controversy. Previously, it was the host of features, which were missing making it lose out to be a better choice than a notebook, now even the name ‘iPad’ has become an issue. It seems as if Apple has a habit to be in the news for various reasons .

The controversy saga continues; with the name ‘iPad’ in trouble. A Japanese electronic company ‘Fujitsu’ has alleged Apple for stealing their name ‘iPad’. According to Fujitsu their handheld computing device launched in 2002 was named iPad. There are also other takers for iPad like  Siemens, which claims to be using the name iPad for their engines and other equipments. But in case of Fujitsu the name iPad is used for a similar kind of product like Apple’s.

Apple’s products have always been in the buzz for varied reason, similarly iPhone too had its share of woe  when it rhymed with Japan’s Aiphone which led to confusion.  Luckily Apple escaped with an agreement for a slight alteration of the Japanese spelling.

Though Apple has time till the end of Feb 2010 to prove this claim against Fujitsu, but it has to be seen how they defend this latest assault on the reputation of their brand. We strongly feel that Apple needs to realize that PR and reputation management are two different things and needs to be dealt accordingly. Being in news for all the bad reasons, is not good business. Remember reputation management is like a goal keeping, you save many but people tend to remember the one you missed.

When Apple launched its much hyped iPad, it brought along a fair share of brickbats as well along with the bouquets. May be people had over expectations about the product much before the release of the product at the beginning of the year. The possibility of Apple iPad replacing the notebook does seem a remote possibility now considering its shortcomings.

The absence of a camera makes video chatting impossible while the inbuilt mini SIM slot that it has only supports the AT&T network which means that you cannot use it with any another service provider or use it as a cell phone outside the US. Apple iPad supports only Mackintosh features thereby making it incompatible with other software applications as well. The absence of built in USB slots would mean that the customers have to shell out extra from their pockets  after spending so much on their Apple iPad. The lack of  high definition output in terms of both video and audio does not facilitate a comfortable reading of e-book.

The worst part is that Apple iPad has become a target for scammers as well who have managed to poison the search results to redirect the hits to their malware spreading sites. When customers search for the Apple tablet device in search engines, the poisoned search results would download a rogue program.  Ever since Apple announced the launch of iPad,  it has been one of the hottest topics doing the rounds in the Web.

With the growing user anticipation for this new product, it is most likely that many users will be victimized by the latest FAKEAV attack. Users are thus advised to be wary of malicious links and to instead go to reputable news sites to get the latest information about the iPad,” explained Carolyn Guevarra, the Communications Specialist  of TrendMicro, a company that specializes in providing network antivirus and internet content security software.

From the reputation management point of view, we feel that if Apple can take effective steps in plugging these loopholes, the damage will only be marginal. The first step would be to regain the customer confidence, and what Apple does in this direction will be of much interest to all of us.

A while ago Web Faceoff series conducted a survey asking users to vote between Twitter and Facebook as their favourite social networking site. Well the results, Facebook marginally managed (48%) over Twitter (40%). And now here comes something new – Google’s Buzz.

Google had minimal success in the social-networking field compare to Twitter and Facebook. But with this latest tool, Google is looking to give them a run for their money, and are hopeful to catch up with the leaders of the social networking world. They have closely integrated with their Gmail service to target a percentage of that market.

Google is famous for keeping things simple and easy, but with “Buzz” things were not quite upright. The major concern was their feeble approach to privacy.  Secondly, it was about “Auto-suggest” not like Twitter or Facebook where it will  suggest, but Buzz will allow users to follow you automatically.

So is it worth to shift base from Twitter or FaceBook? Another nagging issue was to do with convergence, most of the users didn’t like the idea of having one service for all. They would prefer their email to be here and social networking to be there and did not want to mix it. So it was all about changing human habits.

True to it’s reputation, last weekend google buzz team quickly amended the tool based on users’ feedback.

“It’s been an exciting and challenging week for the Buzz team,” says Buzz/Gmail Product Manager Todd Jackson. We’ve been getting feedback via the Gmail help forums and emails from friends and family, and we’ve also been able to do something new”

Started on a shaky note, Buzz is already showing signs of potential. Will it be able to phase out Facebook? It’s too early to predict, but then anything can happen. How do you rate “Buzz”? Share your views.

December, 09 all flights of Flyglobespan were cancelled after its parent company, Globespan, entered administration. An attempt to enter a financing deal with Jersey-based Halycon Investments broke down that led to Flyglobespan collapse.

The firm blamed for the deadly blow to Globespan was E-Clear, a credit card processing company. When passengers book tickets online with their credit card, the money goes into the booking site (E-Clear) and is then passed on to Flyglobespan. So it’s all about the way money reaches the airline after it was processed by E-Clear

It was learned that E-Clear withheld £35m from Globespan, this was money that had been paid for tickets, but was not been passed on to the airline. They also diverted £1.5 million to keep its struggling sister company Allbury Travel alive.

E-Clear was forced into administration by Globespan’s in an effort to reclaim the missing cash and Allbury Travel was closed.

This disgraced episode only raises few doubts, No credit card company can hold money of this size particularly if that business depends on cash flow, so what was Globespan doing to retain the non-payment?  Secondly why did they continue to use E-Clear when payments were not being processed?

This is a strange situation and it’s getting murkier by the day and it’s time for some close introspection about the reputation of credit card processing companies. Airline reputation management is going through its most turbulent times.