Oppo & Muthoot Win Semi-Naming Rights for 5 Kochi Metro Stations

As Day-2 of the CMRS’ inspection of Kochi Metro’s 13 km 1st stretch came to an end, news emerged that two Kerala registered companies have won the bid for the semi-naming rights for five stations on the entire 25.6 km Line-1. Oppo Electronics (Kerala) Private Ltd. has won rights to the Edapally & MG Road stations, and Muthoot Fincorp Ltd. has won the rights to the other three at Aluva, Kalamassery and Kaloor.

The Kochi Metro Rail Ltd. (KMRL) had invited bids for this exercise in February 2017 and set a minimum license fee of Rs. 1.8 crores per year. The exact bid amounts submitted by all firms for each station are unavailable at this time (in this case highest bidder wins), but it appears that the KMRL received the highest bid for Edappally Station and the lowest for Kalamassery Station.

The KMRL is expected to earn a combined total of Rs. 15.20 crores a year, and in return, both companies will get rights to append their names after the actual station name, redo the stations’ interiors to reflect the brand’s theme as well as receive an average advertisement space of 2,500 sqft inside the stations.

Map of Kochi Metro’s 1st stretch which includes 3 of the stations offered for semi-naming:

Aluva – Palarivottom section – View Kochi Metro map and information

Gurgaon’s Rapid Metro was the first operator in the country which offered semi naming rights. Some of the stations on its 5.1 km line are called Indusind Bank Cybercity, Vodafone Belvedere Towers and Micromax Moulsari Avenue. Delhi Metro has already semi-renamed many stations in the NCR and has plans to rename another 10. Following Gurgaon & Delhi’s example, the Noida Metro Rail Corporation in December 2014 announced that they will similarly auction the station naming rights along the 30 km Noida – Greater Noida metro line prior to it opening in late-2017. In western India, Mumbai’s WEH Station was renamed to Magicbricks WEH in August 2016 after the real estate platform owned by the Times Group put in the highest bid.

For more updates, check out the Kochi section of The Metro Rail Guy!

– TMRG

written by

Global traveler who prefers mass rapid transit

2 Responses to "Oppo & Muthoot Win Semi-Naming Rights for 5 Kochi Metro Stations"

  1. arvind says:

    Although branding is good for stations, it’s not good to rename stations with brand suffixes. It will confuse people

    Reply
    • Peter Hook says:

      Agreed. Such names are a bit “tacky”. And, as the years roll by, some commercial enterprises will go bankrupt.

      Reply

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