Mumbai, 28 February 2008: Bird Marine, the youngest entity in India’s fastest growing travel conglomerate Bird Group, today signed an agreement to represent and market European luxury yacht manufacturer Cranchi in India. The agreement signed between Gaurav Bhatia, Executive Director, Bird Group and Mrs Alessandra Cranchi, Managing Director, Cranchi s. p. A, marks a new era for both companies. Cranchi have been looking for the right partner to market their brand in a fast growing and promising Indian market. The Bird Group are looking at adding new brands to the existing portfolio of their first venture outside the Travel & IT Industry, Bird Retail, launched exactly one year ago.

The Group announced the formation of a new company, Bird Marine, as part of the Luxury Retail vertical. Bird Marine would represent Cranchi and other leading brands in the industry. Mr Gaurav Bhatia elaborated, “For nearly forty years we as a group have been serving the ‘air’ and ‘land’ markets. Bird Marine is aimed at us entering the ‘sea space’. We plan on developing a marina in a yet-to-be-disclosed location on the western coast in India to properly serve this market.” He added “With increased levels of income and business prosperity, the demand for luxury brands in India is phenomenal and with a long coastline, luxury yachts have a niche that has yet to be properly tapped. We are quite confident that the Marine segment has tremendous potential for rapid and sustained growth and are keen to provide the market with the best that the world has to offer.” Mrs Cranchi is very optimistic in her view on the relationship. “We are pleased to have Bird Marine as our partners in India. The parent company ‘Bird Group’ has a promising track record, an extensive network within India and access to tremendous resource. They also represent similar values to those reflected by our organization and we are confident of a successful and fruitful long term business relationship with Bird Marine.”

 Notes to the Editor

About Bird Group

The Bird Group is one of the largest diversified groups in the aviation, travel and information technology arena. Bird Group is a conglomerate of several companies encompassing a wide range of travel & tourism services covering eight verticals- Travel Technology, Airline Representation, Hospitality, Passenger Aviation Services, Cargo Management, Consultancy, Education and Retail. Bird Group’s beginnings date back to 1971 with the formation of Bird Travels. Since then the company has represented or engaged in joint ventures with several International brands, is recognized as a technology leader within the Industry and is credited with being a pioneer of back-office processing in India. Based in Delhi, The Chairman of the Bird Group is Mrs Radha Bhatia, a woman entrepreneur who has been conferred on with several awards and has leadership positions in several industry associations. With a turnover of over 66 Million US Dollars, a workforce of nearly 4,500 employees, 50 fully automated offices across the Indian subcontinent and multiple collaborations with leading global business organizations, the group continues to grow and strengthen its network of services.

For more information, visit the Bird Group website at www.bird.in

About Bird Luxury Retail

Bird Luxury Retail’s first venture was initiated in April 2007 with the starting of Bird Automotive and the inauguration of the Bird Automotive BMW Showroom in NCR. Currently, Bird Automotive is the dealer for BMW in North India and is actively in discussion with other luxury brands.

About Cranchi

Since 1970, the year when the company was set up with Tullio Monzino, the balance of Cantiere Nautico Cranchi® s.r.l. has been positive and, for this season too, has already announced record results. In the period between 1 September 2005 and 31 August 2006, the turnover of Cantiere Nautico Cranchi s.r.l. grew, according to the definitive figures, by more than 14.63%, arriving at over 111 million euros. Sales showed a considerable increase, arriving at 667 boats produced. The merit goes not only to the new generations of boats and the excellence of those tested products that continue to receive the favour of the public in every corner of the world but, above all, to the efficiency of the production system and the general state of health of our production poles. In the 2005-06 season, Cranchi produced 667 boats, including more than 400 of over 10m, almost 100 of the MEDITERRANÉE line alone. A curious fact: from the presentation of the first Mediterranée to today, Cranchi have produced over 500 of this model.

For more information, visit www.cranchi.it

For further information please contact:

Charles Carneiro
Head- Marketing & Corporate Communications
The Bird Group
Tel: +91-9810406050
Email: cc@bird.in

Amita Tandan
Account Director
Text 100
Tel: +91-9810415636
Email: amitat@text100.co.in