title: Mario Andretti

text: The next rung on the racing ladder on the East Coast of the United States was to race in sprint cars in the United Racing Club (URC). Andretti was able to get a ride for individual races in the URC sprint car racing series, but was unable to secure a full-time ride. He once drove from Canada to Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania hoping to find a ride in an event, but he went empty-handed. He bypassed the series when he was offered a full-time ride in a United States Automobile Club sprint car for 1964.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti won the 1964 Joe James-Pat O'Connor Memorial USAC sprint car race at Salem Speedway in Salem, Indiana. Andretti continued to race in USAC sprint cars after moving into champ cars. In 1965 he won once at Ascot Park, and finished tenth in the season points. In 1966 he won five times (Cumberland, Maryland, Oswego, New York, Rossburg, Ohio, Phoenix, Arizona, and his second win at the Joe James-Pat O'Connor Memorial at Salem Speedway), but finished behind Roger McCluskey in the season championship. In 1967 he won two of the three events that he entered.


title: Mario Andretti

text: From 1956 to 1979, the top open-wheel racing series in North America was the USAC National Championship. It was often referred to as Champ Car racing, or Indycar racing, referring to the famous Indianapolis 500 race which was the centerpiece of the championship. The races were run on a mixture of paved and dirt ovals, and in later years also included some road courses.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti made his Champ Car debut on April 19, 1964, at the New Jersey State fairgrounds in Trenton, New Jersey. He started sixteenth and finished eleventh. Andretti was introduced by his USAC sprint car owner, Rufus Gray, to veteran mechanic Clint Brawner. Brawner was not impressed since sprint car drivers Stan Bowman and Donnie Davis had recently died, and Brawner's current driver, Chuck Hulse, had been critically injured. Chris Economaki recommended Andretti to Brawner, so Brawner watched Andretti race at Terre Haute, Indiana. Brawner was convinced that he had found the new driver for his team. The two stayed together for six years. Andretti finished eleventh in the USAC National Championship that season. Andretti won his first championship car race at the Hoosier Grand Prix on a road course at Indianapolis Raceway Park in 1965. His third-place finish at the 1965 Indianapolis 500 in the Brawner Hawk (a mechanical copy of the current Brabham Formula 1 design) earned him the race's Rookie of the Year award, and contributed towards Andretti winning the series championship. He was the youngest national champion in series history at age 25. He repeated as series champion in 1966, winning eight of fifteen events. He also won the pole at the 1966 Indianapolis 500. Andretti finished second in the IndyCars in 1967 and 1968. He also won a single non-championship drag race in 1967 in a Ford Mustang. In both 1967 and 1968, Andretti lost the season USAC championship to A. J. Foyt and Bobby Unser, respectively, in the waning laps of the last race of the season at Riverside, California—each by the smallest points margin in history.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti won nine races in 1969, the 1969 Indianapolis 500, and the season championship. He also won the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb, which was part of the USAC National Championship. He was named ABC's Wide World of Sports Athlete of the Year. Between 1966 and 1969 he won 29 of 85 USAC championship races.


title: Mario Andretti

text: In 1973, USAC split its National Championship into dirt and pavement championships. Andretti had one win on the pavement and finished fifth in the season points, and finished second in the dirt championship. He competed in USAC's dirt track division in 1974, and won the dirt track championship while competing in both series. Andretti also competed in the North American Formula 5000 series in 1973 and 1974, and finished second in the championship in both seasons.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Formula One is the highest form of open-wheel racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), motorsport's international governing body. Although originating in Europe, by the 1960s it included races worldwide. At Andretti's first Indianapolis 500, in 1965, he met Colin Chapman, owner of the Lotus Formula One team, who was running eventual race winner Jim Clark's car. Andretti told Chapman of his ambition to compete in Formula One and was told "When you're ready, call me." By 1968 Andretti felt he was ready. Chapman gave him a car, and the young American took the pole position on his debut at the 1968 United States Grand Prix at Watkins Glen in his Lotus 49.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti drove sporadically in Formula One over the next four years for Lotus, March, and Ferrari, while continuing to focus on his racing career in America. At the 1971 South African Grand Prix, on his debut for Ferrari, he won his first Grand Prix. "That was a big moment, one of those I’ll always cherish,” recalled Andretti. "Kyalami was a fun circuit to drive with lots of elevation changes and Ferrari gave me equal equipment to my teammates. It was a good weekend." Three weeks later, at the non-championship Questor Grand Prix in the U.S., he brought the Italian team a second victory. The day before the Questor GP, he had finished 9th in the Indy car race at Phoenix International Raceway. At the end of the season, Ferrari called Andretti and made him a pitch to be his No. 1 driver but |Andretti declined. "F1 didn’t pay much back then and my contracts and commitments were so lucrative over here I couldn’t give that up for the security of my family. The timing wasn’t right yet, so I had to turn him down; but I always figured I’d get another opportunity."


title: Mario Andretti

text: It wasn't until 1975 that Andretti drove a full Formula One season, for the American Parnelli team. The team was new to Formula One, although it had been successful in both Formula 5000 and IndyCar racing in America with Andretti driving. The team had run Andretti in the two North American end-of-season races in 1974 with promising results. Andretti qualified fourth and led the 1975 Spanish Grand Prix for nine laps before his suspension failed. He scored five championship points in the season. Andretti continued to compete in IndyCar, missing two Formula One races in the middle of the season to do so.


title: Mario Andretti

text: When the Parnelli team pulled out of Formula One after two races of the 1976 season, Andretti returned to Chapman's Lotus team, for whom he had already driven at the season-opening Brazilian Grand Prix. Lotus was then at a low point, having failed to produce a competitive car to replace 1970's Lotus 72. Andretti's ability at developing a racing car contributed to Lotus' return to the front of the Formula One grid, culminating in lapping the field in his victory at the season ending race at the Mount Fuji circuit in Japan. Since mid-1975 Lotus had been developing the use of ground effect, shaping the underside of the car to generate downforce with little penalizing drag. For his part, Andretti worked at setting up his cars for the races, exploiting subtle differences in tire size ('stagger') and suspension set up ('cross weighting') on each side of the car to optimize it for each track, an approach imported from his extensive oval racing experience in the United States. In 1977, at Long Beach, he became the only American to win the United States Grand Prix West, and the last American as of 2022 to win any US Grand Prix. The Lotus 78 "wing car" proved to be the most competitive car of 1977, but despite winning four races, more than any other driver, reliability problems and collisions with other drivers meant Andretti finished only third in the championship.


title: Mario Andretti

text: At the end of 1977, Andretti was approached by Ferrari as a potential replacement for Niki Lauda. "I had a handshake agreement with Colin and he’d already agreed to pay me what Ronnie Peterson was making, which was the highest salary in F1. So I asked Mr. Ferrari what was he willing to pay me.He said, 'You know, Mario, I can’t put a price on your talent so you tell me.' That SOB threw it right back in my lap! Well, [Andretti's wife] Dee Ann was sitting next to me and I asked her what should I do and she said ‘double it.' And Mr. Ferrari agreed. The next day I got a telex from him saying 'Let’s just leave things alone' because he’d just had a visit from Colin (who'd) followed me to Maranello and raised hell with Mr. Ferrari. Can you imagine? So I told Colin he'd always been good to me but you don't want an unhappy driver. Then I told him I wanted $10,000 a point — you got nine points for a win back then — and he had to agree.'


title: Mario Andretti

text: In 1978, the Lotus 79 designed by Chapman exploited ground effect even further. Andretti dominated the season and took the title with six wins. He clinched the championship at the Italian Grand Prix. There was no championship celebration though because his teammate Ronnie Peterson crashed heavily at the start of the race; he was hospitalised and died that night from complications resulting from his injuries.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti found little success after 1978 in Formula One – he failed to win another grand prix. He had a difficult year in 1979, as the new Lotus 80 was not competitive, and the team had to rely on the Lotus 79 which had been overtaken by the second generation of ground effect cars. In 1980, he was paired with the young Italian Elio de Angelis, and briefly with test driver Nigel Mansell, but the team was again unsuccessful.


title: Mario Andretti

text: For the 1981 season, Andretti decided to move to the Alfa Romeo team ran by Carlo Chiti. Although the car was reasonably competitive (Andretti finished fourth on his debut with the team in Long Beach, a general lack of reliability resulted in yet another unsuccessful campaign. Like other drivers of the period, Andretti did not like the ground effect cars of the time: "the cars were getting absurd, really crude, with no suspension movement whatever. It was toggle switch driving with no need for any kind of delicacy...it made leaving Formula One a lot easier than it would have been."


title: Mario Andretti

text: The next year, Andretti raced once for the Williams team, after their driver Carlos Reutemann suddenly quit, before replacing the seriously injured Didier Pironi at Ferrari for the last two races of the year. Suspension failure dropped him out of the last race of the season, but at the Italian Grand Prix at Monza he took the pole position and finished third in the race.


title: Mario Andretti

text: In a 2012 interview, World Champion Alan Jones stated that Ferrari, looking for a proven top class driver, had actually contacted him to drive for the team in late 1982. Jones however was enjoying his time back in Australia and took too long to give Ferrari an answer (a move Jones regrets) so instead they contacted Andretti who had no such hesitations. Ironically, Jones later decided to make a comeback to F1 in 1983 (unlike Andretti) and had he taken the seat at Ferrari it is likely they would have kept the former World Champion for that year which would have seen him drive a very competitive car (Ferrari won the Constructors' Championship in 1983).


title: Mario Andretti

text: There was almost a return to F1 for Andretti at the 1984 Detroit Grand Prix when the Renault team put him on standby to replace regular driver Patrick Tambay if the Frenchman had been unable to race, as was the case at the previous race in Canada. However, in the event, Tambay was able to take part in the race.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti was also considered as a replacement, again for Tambay who had been injured in Canada, at the 1986 Detroit Grand Prix, this time for the Carl Haas-owned Haas Lola team. Andretti declined, but recommended his son Michael Andretti. When Michael was unable to obtain the FIA Superlicense required to allow him to race in Formula One, the drive went to Eddie Cheever.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti had continued to race, and occasionally win, in the USAC National Championship during his time in the Formula One world championship. In 1979 a new organization, Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART), had set up the IndyCar World Series as a rival to the USAC National Championships that Andretti had won three times in the 1960s. The new series had rapidly become the top open-wheel racing series in North America.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti joined CART full-time in 1982, driving for Patrick Racing. He started from row two in the Indianapolis 500 that year but was involved in a wreck on the approach to the start when rookie Kevin Cogan suddenly spun out. Three minutes after the wreck Andretti was heard saying "This is what happens when you have children doing a man's job up front," and he and Cogan were later involved in a shoving match.


title: Mario Andretti

text: In 1983, he joined the new Newman/Haas Racing team, set up by Carl Haas and actor Paul Newman using cars built by British company Lola. Andretti took the team's first win at Elkhart Lake in 1983. He won the pole for nine of sixteen events in 1984, and claimed his fourth Champ Car title at the age of 44. He edged out Tom Sneva by 13 points. It was the first series title for the second year team.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Mario's son Michael joined Newman/Haas in 1989. Together, they made history as the first father/son team to compete in both IMSA GT and Champ Car racing, as for the former, it was their fourth time in an endurance race together as co-drivers. Mario finished seventh in points for the 1991 season, the year that Michael won the championship. Mario's last victory in IndyCar racing came in 1993 at Phoenix International Raceway, the year that Michael left Newman/Haas to race in Formula One. The win made Mario the oldest recorded winner in an IndyCar event (53 years, 34 days old). Andretti qualified on the pole at the Michigan 500 later that year with a speed of . The speed was a new closed course world record. Andretti's final season, in 1994, was dubbed "The Arrivederci Tour". He raced in the last of his 407 Indy car races that September.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti won once at the Indianapolis 500 in 29 attempts. Andretti has had so many incidents and near victories at the track that critics have dubbed the family's performance after Mario's 1969 Indianapolis 500 victory the "Andretti Curse".


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti finished all just five times, including his 1969 Indianapolis 500 victory. Andretti was the first driver to exceed while practicing for the 1977 Indianapolis 500. In 1969, after 4 years of bad luck and 4 non-finishes, Andretti dominated the Indianapolis 500 en route to his only victory in the race. The race is notable as it is the only Indy 500 in history where the winning driver ran the whole race on only 1 set of tires.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Between his 1969 victory in the race and 1981, Andretti dropped out of the races due to part failures or crashes. His luck seemed to turn around in 1981. Andretti finished second in the 1981 Indianapolis 500 by eight seconds behind Bobby Unser. The following day Unser was penalized one lap for passing cars under a caution flag, and Andretti was declared the winner. Unser and his car owner Roger Penske appealed the race stewards' decision. USAC overturned the one lap penalty four months later, and penalized Unser with a $40,000 fine.


title: Mario Andretti

text: At the start of the 1982 Indianapolis 500, second-year driver Kevin Cogan, teammate to polesitter Rick Mears, suddenly spun right when accelerating for the green flag. Cogan bounced off A. J. Foyt, slamming Foyt's steering rod. That contact turned Cogan's car left at a 90 degree angle to the field where he was promptly t-boned by Mario. Andretti was livid and engaged in a shoving match with Cogan before walking off. In an interview, 3 minutes after the wreck, an irked Andretti was heard saying "This is what happens when you have children doing a man's job up front." Andretti's Patrick Racing teammate that year was the eventual race winner, Gordon Johncock, who started next to Andretti in the middle of row two. In later years, Johncock pointed out that Andretti had jumped the start, and could have avoided the spinning car of Cogan had he been lined up properly in the second row next to Gordy.


title: Mario Andretti

text: In the 1985 Indianapolis 500, he was passed for the lead by Danny Sullivan in Turn One on lap 20. Immediately after completing the pass, Sullivan spun in front of Andretti. A caution flag for the spin minimized the time Sullivan would lose to Andretti by pitting to replace his tires. Sullivan took the lead for good 20 laps later when he passed Andretti without incident. Andretti dominated the 1987 Indianapolis 500, leading 170 of the first 177 laps of the race. His lead was so large, that he was advised to slow his pace to preserve his equipment. In a cruel twist of fate, when Andretti started running slower, his reduced engine rpm's created a harmonic imbalance in his turbocharged Ilmor/Chevrolet V8 that led to a broken valve spring with 20 laps to go.


title: Mario Andretti

text: The 1992 Indianapolis 500 was run in extremely cold weather which resulted in a large number of wrecks by cars on cold tires. Andretti accelerated off of turn three for the restart at the end of the 83rd lap. Under acceleration, Mario's car got loose in the middle of turn four and rotated 270 degrees to smash nose first into the wall. Andretti was taken to the hospital with six of his toes broken and would shortly be joined by his son Jeff Andretti who smashed both legs after a wheel came loose on his race car on the 109th lap of the race. Mario would only miss one race due to his injuries, and returned to run 6th in a race just four weeks after his crash.


title: Mario Andretti

text: The 1993 Indianapolis 500 was Andretti's last notable run, and he had just come off a victory at Phoenix. On pole day, Andretti was the first car to complete a qualifying run, and sat on the provisional pole position. Andretti's speed held up all afternoon, but with less than an hour to go, Arie Luyendyk topped his speed, and took the pole. On race day, Andretti was a factor most of the afternoon, leading the most laps (72). While leading on lap 134, Andretti was penalized for entering the pits while they were closed. A stop-and-go penalty dropped him only down to second place. In the final 50 laps, he began developing handling problems because of his tires, and slid down the standings to finish 5th. Andretti's last race at Indy was the 1994 Indianapolis 500.


title: Mario Andretti

text: On April 23, 2003, in the lead up to the 2003 Indy 500, Andretti took to the track for the first time in ten years in a major open-wheel car at the age of 63. He participated in a test session for son Michael's AGR IndyCar team. One of the team's regular drivers, Tony Kanaan, suffered a radial fracture of his arm a week earlier in an April 15 crash at Twin Ring Motegi. If Kanaan was not cleared to drive in enough time, tentative plans were being prepared for Andretti to qualify the car for him. He would turn the car over to Kanaan on race day, though no plans had been made for Andretti to actually drive in the race. During the test, Andretti ran at competitive speeds, but running over debris saw his car becoming airborne and the attempt ended with a spectacular crash. Andretti was able to walk away from the wreck with just a minor cut on his chin. This was Andretti's last significant on-track activity at Indianapolis.


title: Mario Andretti

text: His first race start with a Ferrari was in 1965 with a Ferrari 275 P during the Bridgehampton 500 km at Bridgehampton Race Circuit he did not finish the race.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti won three 12 Hours of Sebring endurance races (1967, 1970, 1972), and the 24 Hours of Daytona in 1972. In early sportscar races he competed for the Holman Moody team, but later often drove for Ferrari. He signed with Ferrari in 1971, and won several races with co-driver Jacky Ickx. In 1972 he shared wins in the three North American rounds of the championship and at Brands Hatch in the UK, contributing to Ferrari's dominant victory in that year's World Championship for Makes. He also competed in the popular North American Can-Am series in the late 1960s and early 1970s.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti competed at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in four decades. In 1966 he shared a Holman Moody Ford Mk II with Lucien Bianchi. They retired after their car dropped a valve at 10:30 pm. In 1967, during a 3:30 am pit stop, a mechanic inadvertently installed a front brake pad backward on his Ford MkIV. As Andretti passed under the Dunlop Bridge before the Esses, he touched his brake pedal for the first time since leaving the pits. The front wheel instantly locked, turning the car hard into the dirt embankment at . The wreckage slid to a stop with Andretti badly shaken, the car sideways to oncoming traffic and the track nearly blocked. His teammates, Jo Schlesser and Roger McCluskey, crashed trying to avoid Andretti's car. McCluskey pulled Andretti to safety, and Andretti was taken to hospital for x-rays.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti did not return to Le Mans until his full-time Formula One career was over. In 1982, he partnered with son Michael in a Mirage M12 Ford. They qualified in ninth place, but the pair found their car being removed from the starting grid 80 minutes before the start of the race, as an official discovered an oil cooler that was mounted behind the gearbox, which was against the rules. The car had passed initial inspection four days before the race. Despite protests and complaints, Andretti's entry was removed altogether, replaced by a Porsche 924 Carrera GTR. Their return in the following year was more successful as they finished third. The father/son team returned in with Mario's nephew John. They finished sixth in a factory Porsche 962. Following Mario's retirement from full-time racing, he decided on a return to the circuit to add a Le Mans victory to his achievements. He returned in with a second-place finish. He said in a 2006 interview that he feels that the Courage Compétition team "lost [the 1995] race five times over" through poor organization. He had unsuccessful efforts in the following years with a thirteenth place in , and then a DNF (Did Not Finish) for . Andretti's final appearance at Le Mans was at the 2000 race, six years after his retirement from full-time racing, when he drove the Panoz LMP-1 Roadster-S at the age of 60, finishing 15th.


title: Mario Andretti

text: In 1986, he was inducted into the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Hall of Fame. In 2000, the Associated Press and RACER magazine named him Driver of the Century. He was the Driver of the Year (in the United States) for three years (1967, 1978, and 1984), and is the only driver to be Driver of the Year in three decades. Andretti was named the U.S. Driver of the Quarter Century in 1992. He was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 2001, the United States National Sprint Car Hall of Fame in 1996, the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 1990, the Hoosier Auto Racing Hall of Fame in 1970, the Automotive Hall of Fame in 2005, and the Diecast Hall of Fame in 2012.


title: Mario Andretti

text: On October 23, 2006, Andretti was awarded the highest civilian honor given by the Italian government, the Commendatore dell'Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana (known as the Commendatore), in honor of his racing career, public service, and enduring commitment to his Italian heritage. In 2007, Andretti was honored with the "Lombardi Award of Excellence" from the Vince Lombardi Cancer Foundation for making "a "Hall of Fame" contribution to a sport, profession, or business in a manner that exemplifies appreciation of God, country, society, family and self."


title: Mario Andretti

text: In 2007, Andretti was named the "Mayor" ("Sindaco") of the "Free Commune of Motovun in Exile" ("Libero Comune di Montona in esilio"), an association of Italian exiles from Motovun.


title: Mario Andretti

text: In 2019, the city of Indianapolis renamed a street "Mario Andretti Drive", as part of the celebrations of the 50th anniversary of his first Indianapolis 500 win.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Mario was instrumental in keeping championship car racing at Road America. CART severed its ties with the track as a legal resolution of payment issues from the 2002 and 2003 series events at the track. Andretti was the middle man between CART President Chris Pook and Road America President George Bruggenthies. After six weeks both sides came to terms and signed a two-year contract. The event was renamed the "Mario Andretti Grand Prix of Road America".


title: Mario Andretti

text: Both of Mario Andretti's sons, Michael and Jeff, were auto racers. Michael followed in his father's footsteps by winning the IndyCar title, with Mario's nephew John Andretti joining the series in 1988. This meant that the Andrettis became the first family to have four relatives compete in the same series. With Mario sharing driving duties with sons Michael and Jeff at the 1991 Rolex 24 at Daytona, driving a Porsche 962, the Andretti clan finished 5th.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Mario's grandson Marco completed his first full season in the Indy Racing League (IRL) in 2006, driving for his father Michael's Andretti Green Racing team. Marco finished second in the 2006 Indianapolis 500 and so became the first third-generation recipient of the race's Rookie of the Year Award.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti lives near his grandson Marco in Bushkill Township, Pennsylvania. His late wife Dee Ann (née Hoch) was a native of Nazareth, Pennsylvania, who taught Andretti English in 1961. They were married on November 25, 1961. She died on July 2, 2018, following a heart attack.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti has kept active after his retirement from full-time racing. He makes numerous speaking engagements to audiences and is a spokesman for longtime sponsors Texaco/Havoline, Firestone and Magnaflow performance exhaust. He was occasionally a spokesman for the defunct Champ Car World Series, though he frequently attended IRL races to watch Marco compete. Andretti is vice chairman of a winery named Andretti Winery in Napa Valley, California. He owns a chain of gasoline stations, a Toyota dealership in Moon Township, Pennsylvania (just outside Pittsburgh), car washes, car-care products, go-kart tracks, a clothing line, video games and replica cars. He also test drives cars for "Road & Track" and "Car and Driver" magazines.


title: Mario Andretti

text: In July 2006, Andretti took part in the Bullrun race across America. The first pitstop was at the Pocono Raceway in Andretti's home state of Pennsylvania with Gate No. 5 aptly named Andretti Road.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Since 2012, Andretti has been the official ambassador for the Circuit of the Americas (COTA) and the United States Grand Prix promoting awareness of Formula 1 in the United States and all forms of motorsports at COTA.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti played himself on three episodes of the United States television show "Home Improvement". Along with his son Michael, he appeared in the 1996 IMAX film "Super Speedway", which details the process of rebuilding one of his past cars. He is a major character and sometime narrator of the 1972 film "The Speed Merchants". In the 2006 Pixar Animation Studios film "Cars", Andretti makes a cameo appearance as himself, but because all of the characters in the film are sentient cars, his appearance is that of the Ford Fairlane in which he won the 1967 Daytona 500. He later had another voice role in the 2013 DreamWorks Animation film "Turbo", as the traffic director at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti appeared in the Sylvester Stallone film "Driven" in a cameo. He served as the grand marshal of the 2004 Baja 1000 off-road race, as seen in the documentary film "Dust to Glory". Andretti was featured in the 2007 documentary "A State of Vine", where he commented on his winemaking activities. In November 2015, he guest starred on an episode of "Jay Leno's Garage", driving Leno in multiple fast cars and talking about his racing career.


title: Mario Andretti

text: Andretti wrote a column for the "Indianapolis Star", where he wrote about other drivers, equipment and cars.


title: Mario Andretti

text: These are the wins of Andretti Racing Enterprises, the team headed by legendary mechanic Clint Brawner. Andretti Racing Enterprises (the former Dean Van Lines team) was formed after Al Dean's death in 1967 and was financed during the 1968 season by Firestone.


title: Taraxacum

text: Taraxacum () is a large genus of flowering plants in the family Asteraceae, which consists of species commonly known as dandelions. The scientific and hobby study of the genus is known as taraxacology. The genus is native to Eurasia and North America, but the two most commonplace species worldwide, "T. officinale" (the common dandelion) and "T. erythrospermum" (the red-seeded dandelion), were introduced from Europe into North America, where they now propagate as wildflowers. Both species are edible in their entirety. The common name "dandelion" ( , from French , meaning 'lion's tooth') is also given to specific members of the genus.


title: Taraxacum

text: Like other members of the family Asteraceae, they have very small flowers collected together into a composite flower head. Each single flower in a head is called a "floret". In part due to their abundance, along with being a generalist species, dandelions are one of the most vital early spring nectar sources for a wide host of pollinators. Many "Taraxacum" species produce seeds asexually by apomixis, where the seeds are produced without pollination, resulting in offspring that are genetically identical to the parent plant.


title: Taraxacum

text: In general, the leaves are long or longer, simple, lobed-to-pinnatisect, and form a basal rosette above the central taproot. The flower heads are yellow to orange coloured, and are open in the daytime, but closed at night. The heads are borne singly on a hollow stem (scape) that is usually leafless and rises or more above the leaves. Stems and leaves exude a white, milky latex when broken. A rosette may produce several flowering stems at a time. The flower heads are in diameter and consist entirely of ray florets. The flower heads mature into spherical seed heads sometimes called blowballs or clocks (in both British and American English) containing many single-seeded fruits called achenes. Each achene is attached to a pappus of fine hair-like material which enables wind-aided dispersal over long distances.


title: Taraxacum

text: The flower head is surrounded by bracts (sometimes mistakenly called sepals) in two series. The inner bracts are erect until the seeds mature, then flex downward to allow the seeds to disperse. The outer bracts are often reflexed downward, but remain appressed in plants of the sections "Palustria" and "Spectabilia". Between the pappus and the achene is a stalk called a beak, which elongates as the fruit matures. The beak breaks off from the achene quite easily, separating the seed from the parachute.


title: Taraxacum

text: The species of "Taraxacum" are tap-rooted, perennial, herbaceous plants, native to temperate areas of the Northern Hemisphere. The genus contains many species, which usually (or in the case of triploids, obligately) reproduce by apomixis, resulting in many local populations and endemism. In the British Isles alone, 234 microspecies (i.e. morphologically distinct clonal populations) are recognised in nine loosely defined sections, of which 40 are "probably endemic". A number of species of "Taraxacum" are seed-dispersed ruderals that rapidly colonize disturbed soil, especially the common dandelion ("T. officinale"), which has been introduced over much of the temperate world. After flowering is finished, the dandelion flower head dries out for a day or two. The dried petals and stamens drop off, the bracts reflex (curve backwards), and the parachute ball opens into a full sphere. When development is complete, the mature seeds are attached to white, fluffy "parachutes" which easily detach from the seedhead and glide by wind, dispersing.


title: Taraxacum

text: The seeds are able to cover large distances when dispersed due to the unique morphology of the pappus which works to create a unique type of vortex ring that stays attached to the seed rather than being sent downstream. In addition to the creation of this vortex ring, the pappus can adjust its morphology depending on the moisture in the air. This allows the plume of seeds to close up and reduce the chance to separate from the stem, waiting for optimal conditions that will maximize dispersal and germination.


title: Taraxacum

text: Many similar plants in the family Asteraceae with yellow flowers are sometimes known as false dandelions. Dandelion flowers are very similar to those of cat's ears ("Hypochaeris"). Both plants carry similar flowers, which form into windborne seeds. However, dandelion flowers are borne singly on unbranched, hairless and leafless, hollow stems, while cat's ear flowering stems are branched, solid, and carry bracts. Both plants have a basal rosette of leaves and a central taproot. However, the leaves of dandelions are smooth or glabrous, whereas those of cat's ears are coarsely hairy.


title: Taraxacum

text: Early-flowering dandelions may be distinguished from coltsfoot ("Tussilago farfara") by their basal rosette of leaves, their lack of disc florets, and the absence of scales on the flowering stem.


title: Taraxacum

text: Other plants with superficially similar flowers include hawkweeds ("Hieracium") and hawksbeards ("Crepis"). These are readily distinguished by branched flowering stems, which are usually hairy and bear leaves.


title: Taraxacum

text: The genus is taxonomically complex due to the presence of apomixis: any morphologically distinct clonal population would deserve its own microspecies. Phylogenetic approaches are also complicated by the accelerated mutation in apomixic lines and repeated ancient hybridization events in the genus.


title: Taraxacum

text: As of 1970, the group is divided into about 34 macrospecies or sections, and about 2000 microspecies; some botanists take a much narrower view and only accept a total of about 60 (macro)species. By 2015, the number has been revised to include 60 sections and about 2800 microspecies. 30 of these sections are known to reproduce sexually.


title: Taraxacum

text: About 235 apomictic and polyploid microspecies have been recorded in Great Britain and Ireland alone.


title: Taraxacum

text: Dandelions are thought to have evolved about 30 million years ago in Eurasia. Fossil seeds of "Taraxacum tanaiticum" have been recorded from the Pliocene of southern Belarus. Dandelions have been used by humans for food and as an herb for much of recorded history. They were well known to ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, and are recorded to have been used in traditional Chinese medicine for over a thousand years. The plant was used as food and medicine by Native Americans. Dandelions were probably brought to North America on the "Mayflower" for their supposed medicinal benefits.


title: Taraxacum

text: The Latin name "Taraxacum" originates in medieval Arabic writings on pharmacy. The scientist Al-Razi around 900 CE wrote "the tarashaquq is like chicory". The scientist and philosopher Ibn Sīnā around 1000 CE wrote a book chapter on "Taraxacum". Gerard of Cremona, in translating Arabic to Latin around 1170, spelled it "tarasacon".


title: Taraxacum

text: The English name, dandelion, is a corruption of the French "dent de lion" meaning "lion's tooth", referring to the coarsely toothed leaves. The plant is also known as blowball, cankerwort, doon-head-clock, witch's gowan, milk witch, lion's-tooth, yellow-gowan, Irish daisy, monks-head, priest's-crown, and puff-ball; other common names include "faceclock", "pee-a-bed", "wet-a-bed",


title: Taraxacum

text: The English folk name "piss-a-bed" (and indeed the equivalent contemporary French "") refers to the strong diuretic effect of the plant's roots. In various northeastern Italian dialects, the plant is known as "pisacan" ("dog pisses"), because they are found at the side of pavements.


title: Taraxacum

text: In Swedish, it is called "maskros" (worm rose) after the small insects (thrips) usually present in the flowers. In Finnish and Estonian, the names ("voikukka", "võilill") translate as butter flower, due to the color of the flower. In Lithuanian, it is known as "Pienė", meaning "milky", because of the white latex that is produced when the stems are cut. The Danish name "mælkebøtte" (sometimes "fandens mælkebøtte") means "milk bin" ("the devils milk bin") and also refers to the milky latex (and its ability to spread). Similarly, it is called "maslačak" in Croatian, the name coming from the word "maslac" or "maslo" (butter and clarified butter, respectively). The Welsh ("dant-y-llew"), German ("Löwenzahn"), Norwegian ("løvetann"), Portuguese ("dente de leão") and Spanish ("diente de león") names mean the same as the French and the English names. In Czech it is known as "pampeliška" where the "liška" part directly translates to a "fox", possibly due to the colour of the flower. In Irish it is "caisearbhán", deriving from "curly-haired" and "oats". In Japanese it is タンポポ (pronounced "Tampopo").


title: Taraxacum

text: Raw dandelion greens contain high amounts of vitamins A, C, and K, and are moderate sources of calcium, potassium, iron, and manganese. Raw dandelion greens are 86% water, 9% carbohydrates, 3% protein, and 1% fat. A 100 gram (oz) reference amount supplies 45 Calories.


title: Taraxacum

text: The raw flowers contain diverse phytochemicals, including polyphenols, such as flavonoids apigenin, isoquercitrin (a quercetin-like compound), and caffeic acid, as well as terpenoids, triterpenes, and sesquiterpenes. The roots contain a substantial amount of the prebiotic fiber inulin. Dandelion greens contain lutein.


title: Taraxacum

text: Taraxalisin, a serine proteinase, is found in the latex of dandelion roots. Maximal activity of the proteinase in the roots is attained in April, at the beginning of plant development after the winter period. Each dandelion seed has a mass(weight) of 500 micrograms or 0.0005g (1/125 of a grain).


title: Taraxacum

text: The entire plant, including the leaves, stems, flowers, and roots, is edible and nutritious, with nutrients such as vitamins A and K as well as calcium and iron.


title: Taraxacum

text: The flower petals, along with other ingredients, usually including citrus, are used to make dandelion wine. Its ground, roasted roots can be used as a caffeine-free coffee alternative. Dandelion was also traditionally used to make the traditional British soft drink dandelion and burdock, and is one of the ingredients of root beer. Dandelions were once considered delicacies by the Victorian gentry, who used them mostly in salads and sandwiches.


title: Taraxacum

text: Dandelion pollen may cause allergic reactions when eaten, or adverse skin reactions in sensitive individuals. Contact dermatitis after handling has also been reported, probably from the latex in the stems and leaves.


title: Taraxacum

text: Szabo studied nectar secretion in a dandelion patch over two years ( in 1981 and 1982). He measured average nectar volume at 7.4 μl/flower in 1981 and 3.7 μl/flower in 1982. The flowers tended to open in the morning and close in the afternoon with the concentrations significantly higher on the second day.


title: Taraxacum

text: Dandelions are also important plants for Northern Hemisphere bees, providing an important source of nectar and pollen early in the season. They are also used as a source of nectar by the pearl-bordered fritillary ("Boloria euphrosyne"), one of the earliest emerging butterflies in the spring.


title: Taraxacum

text: Dandelions are used as food plants by the larvae of some species of Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths).


title: Taraxacum

text: Dandelions can cause significant economic damage as an invasive species and infestation of other crops worldwide; in some jurisdictions, the species "T. officinale" is listed as a noxious weed. It can also be considered invasive in protected areas such as national parks. For example, Denali National Park and Preserve in Alaska lists "Taraxacum officinale" as the most common invasive species in the park and hosts an annual "Dandelion Demolition" event where volunteers are trained to remove the plant from the park's roadsides.


title: Taraxacum

text: With a wide range of uses, the dandelion is cultivated in small gardens to massive farms. It is kept as a companion plant; its taproot brings up nutrients for shallow-rooting plants. It is also known to attract pollinating insects and release ethylene gas, which helps fruit to ripen.


title: Taraxacum

text: It has been a Western tradition for someone to blow out a dandelion seedhead and think of a wish they want to come true.


title: Taraxacum

text: Five dandelion flowers are the emblem of White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. The citizens celebrate spring with an annual Dandelion Festival.


title: Taraxacum

text: The dandelion is the official flower of the University of Rochester in New York State, and "Dandelion Yellow" is one of the school's official colors. "The Dandelion Yellow" is an official University of Rochester song.


title: Taraxacum

text: The ability of dandelion seeds to travel as far as a kilometer in dry, windy and warm conditions, has been an inspiration for designing light-weight passive drones.


title: Taraxacum

text: In 2018, researchers discovered that dandelion seeds have a separated vortex ring. This work provided evidence that dandelion seeds have fluid behavior around fluid-immersed bodies that may help understand locomotion, weight reduction and particle retention in biological and man-made structures.


title: Taraxacum

text: In 2022, researchers at the University of Washington demonstrated battery-free wireless sensors and computers that mimic dandelion seeds and can float in the wind and disperse across a large area.


title: Taraxacum

text: Dandelions secrete latex when the tissues are cut or broken, yet in the wild type, the latex content is low and varies greatly. "Taraxacum kok-saghyz", the Russian dandelion, is a species that produced industrially useful amounts during WW2. Using modern cultivation methods and optimization techniques, scientists in the Fraunhofer Institute for Molecular Biology and Applied Ecology (IME) in Germany developed a cultivar of the Russian dandelion that is suitable for current commercial production of natural rubber. The latex produced exhibits the same quality as the natural rubber from rubber trees. In collaboration with Continental AG, IME is building a pilot facility. , the first prototype test tires made with blends from dandelion-rubber are scheduled for testing on public roads over the next few years. In December 2017, Linglong Group Co. Ltd., a Chinese company, invested $450 million into making commercially viable rubber from dandelions.


title: Tumbbad

text: Tumbbad is a 2018 Indian Hindi-language period horror film film directed by Rahi Anil Barve. Additionally, Anand Gandhi served as the creative director, and Adesh Prasad served as the co-director. Written by Mitesh Shah, Prasad, Barve, and Gandhi, the film was produced by Sohum Shah, Aanand L. Rai, Mukesh Shah and Amita Shah. Starring Sohum Shah in the lead role as Vinayak Rao, it follows the story of his search for a hidden treasure in the 20th century India village of Tumbbad, Maharashtra.


title: Tumbbad

text: Barve began writing the script based on a story a friend had told him about in 1993, by Marathi writer Narayan Dharap. He wrote the first draft in 1997, when he was 18 years old. From 2009 to 2010, he created a 700-page storyboard for the film. It was optioned by seven production companies who backed out and went on the floor (went into production) three times. It was first shot in 2012 but after editing, Barve and Shah were not satisfied. The film was then re-written and re-shot with filming completed in May 2015. Pankaj Kumar served as the director of photography while Sanyukta Kaza was its editor. Jesper Kyd composed the original score while Ajay–Atul composed one song.


title: Tumbbad

text: "Tumbbad" premiered in the critics' week section of the 75th Venice International Film Festival—the first Indian film to be screened there. It was also screened at: the 2018 Fantastic Fest, Sitges Film Festival, the Scream fest Horror Film Festival, the El Gouna Film Festival, 23rd International Film Festival of Kerala, Morbido Film Fest, Brooklyn Horror Film Festival and Nitte International Film Festival. It was released on 12 October 2018 to mostly positive reviews with critics praising the visuals. Made on a production budget of , the film grossed a total of at the box office, making it a profitable venture. "Tumbbad" received eight nominations at the 64th Filmfare Awards winning three for Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction and Best Sound Design.


title: Tumbbad

text: In 1947, Vinayak Rao tells his 14-year-old son Pandurang about the Goddess of Prosperity. She is the symbol of unlimited gold (wealth) and grain (food) and the earth is her womb. When the universe was created, she gave birth to 190 million gods. Hastar, her first and most beloved offspring, was greedy for all her gold and food. Hastar managed to acquire the gold from the goddess but the other gods attacked him just as he was about to acquire her food. Then, the goddess saved him on the condition that he could never be worshipped and would be forgotten by history. For years, Hastar slumbered inside his mother's womb. However, the residents of Tumbbad, where Hastar has been trapped in his mother's womb, defy this ancient taboo and build a temple dedicated to Hastar. This earns the ire of the gods and they curse the village, causing an incessant downpour of rain over it.


title: Tumbbad

text: In 1918, in Tumbbad, Vinayak's mother and the mistress of the local lord (addressed as "Sarkar") meets him at his mansion. This includes offering him sexual services in the hope of acquiring a single gold coin kept with the Hastar idol. Meanwhile, at their home, Vinayak and his younger brother Sadashiv worry about having to feed the monstrous old woman, the Sarkar's ancestor, chained up in a separate room. The Sarkar later dies, and the mother proposes leaving Tumbbad for Pune. Vinayak insists on finding the treasure that is rumoured to be hidden somewhere in the mansion. Sadashiv gets badly hurt after falling from a tree, forcing his mother to take him for help. She tells Vinayak he will have to feed his grandmother that night. She also warns him that if the old woman wakes up, he should invoke the name of "Hastar" to make her sleep. Meanwhile, Sadashiv dies on the way to the doctor.


title: Tumbbad

text: The mother directs her carriage driver to Sarkar's mansion where she retrieves the gold coin. As Vinayak tries to feed her, the monstrous and hungry old woman attacks and shackles him to eat him who invokes Hastar's name, causing her to fall into slumber. His mother returns, and the next day she and Vinayak leave Tumbbad for Pune. She forces Vinayak to promise never return to Tumbbad, despite his protests to stay and search for the treasure.


title: Tumbbad

text: Fifteen years pass, and Vinayak grows up. Desperate to escape his life of poverty, Vinayak returns to Tumbbad. The old woman, with now a tree growing out of her body, warns him he will be cursed to become immortal and turned into a monster like her if he touches the treasure i.e. Hastar. She explains that a well leads to the goddess' womb where Hastar dwells, in exchange for ending her prolonged suffering. Vinayak keeps his promise and sets her on fire, thus killing her. Although Hastar stole the goddess's gold, he was unable to acquire her grain. Therefore, being hungry for years, he desires flour. Vinayak physically trains himself to climb up and down a long rope and makes dolls out of dough to lure Hastar inside the goddess's womb. While he is distracted by the food, Vinayak swipes at Hastar's loincloth containing the gold. Vinayak regularly repeats the procedure to steal dropped coins. He offers his first gold coin to the opium merchant Raghav to pay off a debt. Each time he needs more money, Vinayak returns to Tumbbad to steal from Hastar.


title: Tumbbad

text: Raghav openly wonders about the treasure rumoured to exist in the Tumbbad mansion while also questioning why Vinayak can only retrieve a few coins at a time. Vinayak and his wife give birth to their son Pandurang. When Sergeant Cooper gives him only two days to come through with the money, Raghav sells his widowed daughter-in-law to Vinayak as a mistress, who tells Vinayak of Raghav's plans to visit Tumbbad to help himself to the treasure in exchange for money. Vinayak is then shown following Raghav to the Tumbbad mansion where he tricks him into descending into the goddess' womb where Hastar viciously attacks Raghav and turns him into a monster, conjoining him into the walls of the womb. Vinayak burns Raghav alive to end his suffering.


title: Tumbbad

text: In 1947, Vinayak takes Pandurang to the mansion to train him for the same purpose and is told not to bring the dough doll down. But he secretly brings a dough doll and Hastar unexpectedly attacks. They barely manage to escape and Vinayak chides his son for nearly getting them touched. Pandurang suggests stealing Hastar's loincloth and they make dozens of dough dolls to distract Hastar. However, the two of them become trapped inside the womb when multiple clones of Hastar appear for, one for each doll they possess. With no hope of escaping, Vinayak ties the dolls to his body to act as bait, to allow his son to return safely. Once the coast is clear, Pandurang climbs back to the surface to see his father being mutated into a monster outside the well. Vinayak presents him with the stolen loincloth that he stole from Hastar, but Pandurang refuses to take it. Sobbing at seeing what his father turned into, Pandurang reluctantly sets Vinayak on fire and leaves.


title: Tumbbad

text: Director Rahi Anil Barve said the title is derived from Shripad Narayan Pendse's Marathi novel "Tumbadche Khot". He wrote the first draft in 1997, when he was 18 years old. From 2009 to 2010, he created a 700-page storyboard within eight months, which he said was the "anchor on which everything was based." Barve wrote the script based on a story his friend had told when they were in the Nagzira wildlife sanctuary in 1993 "which made him crap his pants." It was a story by Marathi writer Narayan Dharap. Years later, when he revisited Dharap's story, he found it "utterly bland, mundane and forgettable." He realised "it was my friend's narration... that left an indelible print- no, scar on my psyche" which "kept the story alive." Barve took the story's basic premise about a scheming moneylender and another of his works, about a girl left alone with her grandmother who is possessed by a demon, and began writing a screenplay. He managed to find a producer, but they backed out in 2008. He obtained financing and principal photography began in the monsoon of 2012.


title: Tumbbad

text: Sohum Shah was cast in the role of Vinayak Rao, for which he gained . Since the production took six years, he maintained his character's look for the entire period. Shah said that he was surprised after hearing the story for the time because he "hadn't seen anything like this in Indian cinema." He found it similar to "Vikram Baital" and "Panchatantra". Barve said the story's main theme was greed, and that the first half hour of the film is in the "universe of Dharap's stories." The film shows Hastar who, according to mythology stated in the movie, was banished to the womb of the mother goddess for being greedy for food and gold. The film is divided in three chapters which Barve said was also a metaphor for the "journey of India, as we see it today." It had gone on the floor three times and was optioned by seven production companies who backed out. Barve feels this was because he had "no frame of reference for them, nothing like "Tumbbad" had even been tried before." Shah worked on his Marathi diction and accent since the character of Vinayak was a Marathi. Anand Gandhi served as the co-writer, creative director and executive producer. Barve's initial idea was to tell three different stories of Tumbbad village in the film; Gandhi and Mitesh turned it into one person's story. The myth of Hastar was the last addition to the story to serve as a backstory. The screenplay was written by Barve, Prasad, Gandhi and Mitesh Shah.


title: Tumbbad

text: "Tumbbad" first went into production in 2008 with Nawazuddin Siddiqui in the lead role but was quickly shelved as the producer backed out. It was then shot in 2012 after Shah and Gandhi came on board. The film has minimal dialogue and was shot with constant physical movement with few cuts. Barve said, "we shot in the rain at age-old locations, where no human had ventured for at least a hundred years. For me, "Tumbbad"s locations, the feel of its stuffy air, and the lonely rainy atmosphere that defies the feeling of time's passage is as central as its characters." After the editing, Barve and Shah realised the film was "not able to achieve what it set out to do." It was then re-written and re-shot and the filming completed in May 2015. The Mutha River in the Onkareshwar area was taken as a reference for the set creation. In three weeks, the set of the small town around the temple was recreated. A doppelganger set of an old Pune city was created for the film. Sohum Shah wore the typical attire worn by Konkanasth Brahmans in Maharashtra. It was shot in natural light. Some scenes were also shot in Mahabaleshwar and the Tumbbad village. The visual effects were produced by Sean Wheelan's team at Filmgate Films, who were also the co-producers. Pankaj Kumar served as the director of photography and Sanyukta Kaza edited the film. Kumar had shot Barve's short film "Manjha" in 2006 and learned of "Tumbbad"s story from Barve.


title: Tumbbad

text: Barve created a story book for reference. Kumar called the filming process "long, strong and intense." It was decided the film's look would be "moody and gloomy"; the village had to look timeless "without a clear demarcation between day and night." The shooting was done without any sunlight on Red Camera in digital format. Kumar said that the film's entire shooting schedule revolved around lighting, noting the constant rain and grey tone gave a "constant sense of gloom and dread." He wanted the film to be shot only during the monsoon with its constant rain as he wanted a feeling of "wetness at all times": "We wanted the audience to feel drenched when they came out of the theatres." However, due to a shortage of rainfall that year, Kumar did not get sufficient rain. The crew used artificial rain for the scenes and had to wait for hours for cloud cover. "Tumbbad" was shot in several locations across Maharashtra including Saswad and villages of the Satara district. Some scenes were shot on constructed sets in Mumbai, including the womb sequence. Kumar said that the team did extensive recce for a few years as they were looking for "large landscapes without modern infringements, without towers and structures." They also did not have the budget for the visual effects to erase the contemporary architectural elements.


title: Tumbbad

text: The film had four colour schemes including blue, cold grey, red and gold. 50 lanterns and lamps were used for several scenes to avoid modern-day lighting techniques since it was a period film. The scenes inside the womb took 15 to 20 days to shoot without any visual effects. The character of Hastar was created with heavy prosthetic makeup that required six to seven hours to prepare. Shah wore contact lenses throughout the film for the grey eyes. The entire film was shot over 100 to 120 days with four shooting schedules in 2012 and 2015. After the shoot, the team felt that the film was "halfway there" to becoming something that "audiences hadn't seen before." After that the script went through re-writing, some scenes were added, and the story was "enhanced". The sets were rebuilt and the womb was added. The film's production designers were Nitin Zihani Choudhary and Rakesh Yadav. For their research, they used photograph's from the 18th and 19th century during the British Raj. The interiors of the cave were shot at the Purandare Wada near Pune. It was made to look old and "consumed by earth"; the crew spread moss all over the site. An entire market was created at Satara that included several shops, but it was not used very often in the film.


title: Tumbbad

text: The film's post-production took two-and-a-half years to complete. Kaza had asked Prasad to write the dialogues again after she re-arranged the grandmother's tree scene while editing it. She used the "only usable stable shots and put them in a certain order and then called Adesh and asked him to re-write the dialogues according to the edit." Its initial runtime was close to 200 minutes which was edited to 100 minutes. The film's climax inside the womb was shot with only one source of light—an oil lamp. The film was produced by Film i Väst and Filmgate Films along with Eros International and Aanand L. Rai's Colour Yellow Productions.


title: Tumbbad

text: "Tumbbad"s title track was composed, arranged and produced by Ajay–Atul; it was sung in Hindi with lyrics written by Raj Shekhar. It was released on 6 October 2018. The original score was composed by Jesper Kyd. Prasad was sampling music pieces from several composers when he heard the soundtrack "Apocalypse" from the 2006 video game "" composed by Kyd and decided to work with him. Kyd felt the "Tumbbad" team wanted the soundtrack to be between a western and an Indian sound.


title: Tumbbad

text: Prasad sent Kyd a sample of Laxmikant–Pyarelal's track from "Ram Lakhan" (1989) for reference; Kyd also watched videos of street drummers and "The Sinful Dwarf" (1973). Kyd recorded the choir with Bulgarian music called "Descending" which was the first track he wrote for the film. Both Prasad and Kyd used to interact with each other through Skype. The score involved live recording with cello and violin as well as the real sound of crickets. Kyd made three different types of sound for the film's three parts. The album consists of 22 tracks and was released on 10 November 2018.


title: Tumbbad

text: "Tumbbad" premiered in the critics' week section of the 75th Venice International Film Festival, becoming the first Indian film to be screened there. It was also screened at: the 2018 Fantastic Fest, Sitges Film Festival, the Screamfest Horror Film Festival, the El Gouna Film Festival, 23rd International Film Festival of Kerala, Morbido Film Fest, Brooklyn Horror Film Festival and Nitte International Film Festival. Before the film's release, a special screening was held by Aanand L. Rai which was attended by the film's team and several other filmmakers. "Tumbbad" was released in India on 12 October 2018 on 575 screens. It is also available on Amazon Prime Video in Hindi, Tamil and Telugu language.


title: Tumbbad

text: "Tumbbad" opened to mostly positive critical reviews. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, it holds an approval rating of 87% based on 23 reviews, with an average rating of 7.67/10.


title: Tumbbad

text: Rachit Gupta of "The Times of India" called the film "moody and atmospheric" and said that fans of Hollywood horror films will be reminded of "Pan's Labyrinth" (2006) and "Eraserhead" (1977). Baradwaj Rangan wrote: "It’s been a while since something genre-based turned out so rich and mysterious, so defiantly its own thing." Raja Sen called the film "an ambitious one, artistic and attentively made, reminding me of the trippy stylings of filmmaker Tarsem Singh." "The Indian Express"s Shubhra Gupta called it "highly unusual, visually stunning, richly atmospheric concoction of genres and themes."


title: Tumbbad

text: Sanjukta Sharma of Scroll.in felt the film subverts genres "astutely, without any gimmicks": "It has been a while since a horror film spoke so eloquently about something as primal as greed and remained true to its Indian setting." "Mint"s Udita Jhunjhunwala cited the film as "eerie, imaginatively designed, stunningly filmed and well directed." Anupama Chopra felt the film was nothing like "you have seen before in Hindi cinema", calling it "the most visually stunning film I've seen since "Padmaavat"". Subhash K. Jha praised the visuals and wrote: "If you think cinema is predominantly a visual medium then don't miss "Tumbbad"". Rediff.com's Sreehari Nair observed that "our apprehensions are raised lazily and we wait like masochists for the manipulations to arrive, but what we get instead is a single-line moral." Namrata Joshi gave a positive review and wrote: "The atmosphere, landscape, and themes in "Tumbbad" are accentuated by a sense of Gothic dread and an eerie expectancy of the diabolical."


title: Tumbbad

text: Suparna Sharma of the "Deccan Chronicle" noted that the film has "the beauty and horror of imagination, and it stalks you gently, long after you’ve left the theatre." Reuters' Shilpa Jamkhandikar said that the "true star here is Barve, who takes what could have been a regular horror film and elevates it to another level." Stutee Ghosh of The Quint wrote: "It excels is in its ability to weave together a formidable canvas with fear, fantasy and folklore blending in seamlessly to give us an unrelenting ominous journey." Anna M. M. Vetticad wrote: "The joy of watching "Tumbbad" comes from the fact that Barve and his co-writers offer no answers, making this a delightfully intriguing film." Rajeev Masand called it "a wildly original film with a look and feel that is of the highest standard." Jai Arjun Singh called the film "spooky, majestic and affecting, and these qualities come from the set design, the use of music, and the evocation of a place that is like a breathing thing, corroding the thoughts and actions of the people in it."


title: Tumbbad

text: Lee Marshall of "Screen International" called it an "initially atmospheric yarn let down by weak stock characters and a long veer into fright-free period drama in its over-long middle section". "The Hollywood Reporter"s Deborah Young called the film "atmospheric, heavy on mythology and scary as hell." J. Hurtado of Screen Anarchy had a positive response and wrote: "A slow burn whose finale is wonderfully unexpected and yet fitting, "Tumbbad" is a great film and hopefully the start of a new trend in India." He also included it on his list of 14 Favorite Indian Films of 2018.


title: Tumbbad

text: Dread Central's Jonathan Barkan wrote that the film "is more focused on the horror of human behavior than it is on creaking doors and the terror of what lurks in the dark." He also felt that the film's second half was "overly drawn out". Matt Donato of /Film wrote: "Mad creature-feature designs, Academy-worthy blends of color and pristine optical packaging, despicable character work meant to provoke heartlessness traded for materialistic grandiosity – "Tumbbad" is a full genre package seasoned with a pungent foreign kick." Trace Thurman of Bloody Disgusting wrote in his review: "With a compelling story of greed that spans more than 30 years, a memorable monster and some truly beautiful cinematography, "Tumbbad" is not to be missed." Jacob Trussell of Film School Rejects called the film "Indian folk horror at its finest" that offers "an Indian film about Indian culture, removed of the trappings of the musical and replaced with stories of little known Indian theology."


title: Tumbbad

text: "Tumbbad" was made on a production budget of . It collected in its opening day at the box office. The collection increased after positive word of mouth and the film earned on its second and on its third day, making a total of during the first weekend. At the end of its first week, the film earned a total of , it was followed by in its second week and in its third week. At the end of its nine-week theatrical run, "Tumbbad" earned a total of at the box office.


title: Tumbbad

text: In November 2018, it was announced that Sohum Shah is working on the film's sequel. It will take place in the Tumbbad village and will feature Hastar.


title: Time in the United States

text: Time in the United States, by law, is divided into nine standard time zones covering the states, territories and other US possessions, with most of the United States observing daylight saving time (DST) for approximately the spring, summer, and fall months. The time zone boundaries and DST observance are regulated by the Department of Transportation, but no single map of those existed until the agency announced intentions to make one in September 2022. Official and highly precise timekeeping services (clocks) are provided by two federal agencies: the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) (an agency of the Department of Commerce); and the United States Naval Observatory (USNO). The clocks run by these services are kept synchronized with each other as well as with those of other international timekeeping organizations.


title: Time in the United States

text: It is the combination of the time zone and daylight saving rules, along with the timekeeping services, which determines the legal civil time for any U.S. location at any moment.


title: Time in the United States

text: Before the adoption of four standard time zones for the continental United States, many towns and cities set their clocks to noon when the sun passed their local meridian, pre-corrected for the equation of time on the date of observation, to form local mean solar time. Noon occurred at different times but time differences between distant locations were barely noticeable prior to the 19th century because of long travel times and the lack of long-distance instant communications prior to the development of the telegraph.


title: Time in the United States

text: The use of local solar time became increasingly awkward as railways and telecommunications improved. American railroads maintained many different time zones during the late 1800s. Each train station set its own clock making it difficult to coordinate train schedules and confusing passengers. Time calculation became a serious problem for people traveling by train (sometimes hundreds of miles in a day), according to the Library of Congress. Train drivers must recalculate their own clocks in order to know departure time. Every city in the United States used a different time standard so there were more than 300 local sun times to choose from. Time zones were therefore a compromise, relaxing the complex geographic dependence while still allowing local time to be approximate with mean solar time. Railroad managers tried to address the problem by establishing 100 railroad time zones, but this was only a partial solution to the problem.


title: Time in the United States

text: Weather service chief Cleveland Abbe introduced four standard time zones for his weather stations, an idea which he offered to the railroads. Operators of the new railroad lines needed a new time plan that would offer a uniform train schedule for departures and arrivals. Four standard time zones for the continental United States were introduced at noon on November 18, 1883, in Chicago, IL, when the telegraph lines transmitted time signals to all major cities.


title: Time in the United States

text: In October 1884, the International Meridian Conference at Washington, D.C., decided that the prime meridian for longitude and timekeeping should be one that passes through the center of the transit instrument at the Greenwich Observatory in the United Kingdom. The conference therefore established the Greenwich Meridian as the prime meridian and Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) as the world's time standard. The U.S. time-zone system grew from this, in which all zones referred back to GMT on the prime meridian.


title: Time in the United States

text: In 1960, the International Radio Consultative Committee formalized the concept of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), which became the new international civil time standard. UTC is, within about 1 second, mean solar time at 0°. UTC does not observe daylight saving time.


title: Time in the United States

text: For most purposes, UTC is considered interchangeable with GMT, but GMT is no longer precisely defined by the scientific community. UTC is one of several closely related successors to GMT.


title: Time in the United States

text: Standard time zones in the United States and other regions are currently defined at the federal level by law 15 USC §260. The federal law also establishes the transition dates and times at which daylight saving time occurs, if observed. It is ultimately the authority of the secretary of transportation, in coordination with the states, to determine which regions will observe which of the standard time zones and if they will observe daylight saving time. As of August 9, 2007, the standard time zones are defined in terms of hourly offsets from UTC. Prior to this they were based upon the mean solar time at several meridians 15° apart west of Greenwich (GMT).


title: Time in the United States

text: Only the full-time zone names listed below are official; abbreviations are by common use conventions, and duplicated elsewhere in the world for different time zones.


title: Time in the United States

text: Some United States Minor Outlying Islands are outside the time zones defined by 15 U.S.C. §260 and exist in waters defined by nautical time. In practice, military crews may simply use Zulu time () when on these islands. Baker Island and Howland Island are in , while Wake Island is in . Because they exist on opposite sides of the International Date Line, it can, for example, be noon Thursday on Baker and Howland islands while simultaneously being noon Friday on Wake Island. Other outlying islands include Jarvis Island, Midway Atoll, Palmyra Atoll, and Kingman Reef (); Johnston Atoll (); and Navassa Island, Bajo Nuevo Bank, and Serranilla Bank ().


title: Time in the United States

text: In Antarctica, the U.S. research facility Palmer Station is in , while McMurdo Station and Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station use in order to coordinate with their main supply base in New Zealand.


title: Time in the United States

text: Daylight saving time (DST) begins on the second Sunday of March and ends on the first Sunday of November.


title: Time in the United States

text: Clocks are set ahead one hour at 2:00 a.m. on the following start dates and set back one hour at 2:00 a.m. on the corresponding end dates:


title: Time in the United States

text: In response to the Uniform Time Act of 1966, each state has officially chosen to apply one of two rules over its entire territory:


title: Time in the United States

text: The Energy Policy Act of 2005 extended daylight saving time (DST) for an additional month beginning in 2007.


title: Time in the United States

text: The Sunshine Protection Act of 2021 passed the United States Senate in March of 2022. The bill would make Daylight Time the time year-round in the entire United States. The bill is yet to be voted on by the House of Representatives.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Bharti Airtel Limited, commonly known as Airtel, is an Indian multinational telecommunications services company based in New Delhi. It operates in 18 countries across South Asia and Africa, as well as the Channel Islands. Currently, Airtel provides 4G and 4G+ services all over India and 5G service in selected cities. Currently offered services include fixed-line broadband, and voice services depending upon the country of operation. Airtel had also rolled out its VoLTE technology across all Indian telecom circles. It is the second largest mobile network operator in India and the second largest mobile network operator in the world. Airtel was named India's 2nd most valuable brand in the first ever Brandz ranking by Millward Brown and WPP plc.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel is credited with pioneering the business strategy of outsourcing all of its business operations except marketing, sales and finance and building the 'minutes factory' model of low cost and high volumes. The strategy has since been adopted by several operators. Airtel's equipment is provided and maintained by Ericsson, Huawei, and Nokia Networks whereas IT support is provided by Amdocs. The transmission towers are maintained by subsidiaries and joint venture companies of Bharti including Bharti Infratel and Indus Towers in India. Ericsson agreed for the first time to be paid by the minute for installation and maintenance of their equipment rather than being paid upfront, which allowed Airtel to provide low call rates of /minute.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In 1984, Sunil Mittal started assembling push-button phones in India, which he earlier used to import from a Singaporean company, Singtel, replacing the old-fashioned, bulky rotary phones that were in use in the country then. Bharti Telecom Limited (BTL) was incorporated and entered into a technical tie-up with Siemens AG of Germany for the manufacture of electronic push-button phones. By the early 1990s, Bharti was making fax machines, cordless phones and other telecom gear. He named his first push-button phone as 'Mitbrau'.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In 1992, he successfully bid for one of the four mobile phone network licenses auctioned in India. One of the conditions for the Delhi cellular licenses was that the bidder have some experience as a telecom operator. So, Mittal clinched a deal with the French telecom group Vivendi. He was one of the first Indian entrepreneurs to identify the mobile telecom business as a major growth area. His plans were finally approved by the Government in 1994 and he launched services in Delhi in 1995, when Bharti Cellular Limited (BCL) was formed to offer cellular services under the brand name AirTel. Within a few years, Bharti became the first telecom company to cross the 2 million mobile subscriber mark. Bharti also brought down the STD/ISD cellular rates in India under the brand name 'India one'.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In 1999, Bharti Enterprises acquired control of JT Holdings, and extended cellular operations to Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. In 2000, Bharti acquired control of Skycell Communications, in Chennai. In 2001, the company acquired control of Spice Cell in Calcutta. Bharti Enterprises went public in 2002, and the company was listed on Bombay Stock Exchange and National Stock Exchange of India. In 2003, the cellular phone operations were re-branded under the single Airtel brand. In 2004, Bharti acquired control of Hexacom and entered Rajasthan. In 2005, Bharti extended its network to Andaman and Nicobar. This expansion allowed it to offer voice services all across India.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel launched "Hello Tunes", a caller ring back tone service (CRBT), in July 2004 becoming the first operator in India to do so. The Airtel theme song, composed by A.R. Rahman, was the most popular tune in that year.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In May 2008, it emerged that Airtel was exploring the possibility of buying the MTN Group, a South Africa-based telecommunications company with coverage in 21 countries in Africa and the Middle East. "The Financial Times" reported that Bharti was considering offering 45 billion for a 100% stake in MTN, which would be the largest overseas acquisition ever by an Indian firm. However, both sides emphasize the tentative nature of the talks, while "The Economist" magazine noted, "If anything, Bharti would be marrying up," as MTN has more subscribers, higher revenues and broader geographic coverage. However, the talks fell apart as MTN Group tried to reverse the negotiations by making Bharti almost a subsidiary of the new company. In May 2009, Bharti Airtel again confirmed that it was in talks with MTN and the companies agreed to discuss the potential transaction exclusively by 31 July 2009. Talks eventually ended without agreement, some sources stating that this was due to opposition from the South African government.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In 2009, Bharti negotiated for its strategic partner Alcatel-Lucent to manage the network infrastructure for the fixed-line business. Later, Bharti Airtel awarded the three-year contract to Alcatel-Lucent for setting up an Internet Protocol access network across the country. This would help consumers access internet at faster-speed and high-quality internet browsing on mobile handsets.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In 2009, Airtel launched its first international mobile network in Sri Lanka. In June 2010, Bharti acquired the African business of Zain Telecom for $10.7 billion making it the largest ever acquisition by an Indian telecom firm. In 2012, Bharti tied up with Wal-Mart, the US retail giant, to start a number of retail stores across India. In 2014, Bharti planned to acquire Loop Mobile for , but the deal was called off later.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 18 November 2010, Airtel rebranded itself in India in the first phase of a global rebranding strategy. The company unveiled a new logo with 'airtel' written in lower case. Designed by London-based brand agency, The Brand Union, the new logo is the letter 'a' in lowercase, with 'airtel' written in lowercase under the logo. On 23 November 2010, Airtel's Africa operations were rebranded to 'airtel'. Sri Lanka followed on 28 November 2010 and on 20 December 2010, Warid Telecom rebranded to 'airtel' in Bangladesh.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In May 2005, it emerged that Airtel was exploring the possibility of buying the MTN Group, a South Africa-based telecommunications company with operations in 21 countries in Africa and the Middle East. "The Financial Times" reported that Bharti was considering offering US$45 billion for a 100% stake in MTN, which would be the largest overseas acquisition ever by an Indian firm. However, both sides emphasized the tentative nature of the talks. "The Economist" magazine noted, "If anything, Bharti would be marrying up", as MTN had more subscribers, higher revenues and broader geographic coverage. However, the talks fell apart as MTN Group tried to reverse the negotiations by making Bharti almost a subsidiary of the new company.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In May 2009, Airtel confirmed that it was again in talks with MTN and both companies agreed to discuss the potential transaction exclusively by 31 July 2009. Airtel said "Bharti Airtel Ltd is pleased to announce that it has renewed its effort for a significant partnership with MTN Group". The exclusivity period was extended twice up to 30 September 2009. Talks eventually ended without agreement.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: A solution was proposed where the new company would be listed on two stock exchanges, one in South Africa and one in India. However, dual-listing of companies is not permitted by Indian law.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In June 2010, Bharti struck a deal to buy Zain's mobile operations in 15 African countries, in India's second-biggest overseas acquisition after Tata Steel's $13 billion buy of Corus in 2007. Bharti Airtel completed its $10.7 billion acquisition of African operations from the Kuwaiti firm on 8 June 2010, making Airtel the world's fifth largest wireless carrier by subscriber base. Airtel has reported that its revenues for the fourth quarter of 2010 grew by 53% to US$3.2 billion compared to the previous year, newly acquired Zain Africa division contributed US$911 million to the total. However, net profits dropped by 41% from US$470 million in 2009 to US$291 million in 2010 due to a US$188 million increase in radio spectrum charges in India and an increase of US$106 million in debt interest.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In 2010, Warid Telecom sold a majority 70.90% stake in the company to Bharti Airtel for US$300 million. The Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission approved the deal on 4 January 2010. Bharti Airtel Limited took management control of the company and its board, and rebranded the company's services under its own "airtel" brand from 20 December 2010. Warid Telecom sold its remaining 30% share to Bharti Airtel's Singapore-based concern Bharti Airtel Holdings Pte Limited in March 2013.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 16 November 2016, airtel Bangladesh was merged into Robi as a product brand of Robi, where Robi Axiata Limited is the licensee of airtel brand in Bangladesh. Robi is a joint venture between Malaysian telecom operator Axiata holding 61.82% and Bharti Airtel holding 28.18%.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 11 August 2010, Bharti Airtel announced that it would acquire a 100% stake in Telecom Seychelles for US$62 million taking its global presence to 19 countries. Telecom Seychelles began operations in 1998 and operates 3G, fixed-line, ship to shore services, satellite telephony, among value added services like VSAT and Gateways for International Traffic across Seychelles under the Airtel brand. The company has over 57% share of the mobile market of Seychelles. Airtel announced plans to invest US$10 million in its fixed and mobile telecoms network in Seychelles over three years, whilst also participating in the Seychelles East Africa submarine cable (SEAS) project. The US$34 million SEAS project is aimed at improving Seychelles' global connectivity by building a 2,000 km undersea high-speed link to Dar es Salaam in Tanzania.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 24 May 2012, Airtel announced an agreement to acquire a 40% stake in Wireless Business Services Private Limited (WBSPL) at an investment of . WBSPL was a joint venture founded by Qualcomm and held BWA spectrum in the telecom circles of Delhi, Haryana, Kerala and Mumbai. Qualcomm had spent US$1 billion to acquire BWA spectrum in those 4 circles. The deal gave Airtel a 4G presence in 18 circles. On 4 July 2013, Airtel announced that it had acquired an additional 5% equity share capital (making its stake 51%) in all the four BWA entities of Qualcomm, thereby making them its subsidiaries. On 18 October 2013, Airtel announced that it had acquired 100 percent equity shares of WBSPL for an undisclosed sum, making it a wholly owned subsidiary.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel purchased Augere Wireless Broadband India Private Limited, a company that owned 4G spectrum in the Chhattisgarh-Madhya Pradesh circle for an undisclosed sum in December 2015. "The Economic Times" estimated Augere's spectrum to be worth . On 16 February 2017, Airtel announced that the merger of Augere Wireless into Bharti Airtel Limited had been completed.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 2 January 2017, "The Economic Times" reported that Airtel had entered into discussions with Telenor India to acquire the latter. On 23 February 2017, Airtel announced that it had entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Telenor. As part of the deal, Airtel will acquire Telenor India's assets and customers in all seven telecom circles that the latter operates in - Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh (East), Uttar Pradesh (West) and Assam. Airtel will gain a 43.4 MHz spectrum in the 1800 MHz band from the Telenor acquisition. "Business Standard" reported that it was a no-cash deal, but would cost Airtel 1,600 crore over a 10-year period due to spectrum license payments.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 23 March 2017, "The Economic Times" reported that Airtel had acquired Tikona Digital Networks Pvt. Ltd's 4G spectrum for approximately 1,600 crores. The deal also includes Tikona's 350 cellular sites in 5 circles. Tikona had purchased 20 MHz of 4G spectrum in the 2,300 MHz band in the 2010 auctions in Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh (East), Uttar Pradesh (West) and Rajasthan for 1,058 crores. Prior to the deal, Airtel did not hold any spectrum in the 2300 MHz band in UP (East), UP (West) and Rajasthan, and held 10 MHz each in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh. Tikona's co-founder Rajesh Tiwari sent a legal notice to both companies for not providing details regarding the splitting of proceeds among shareholders.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Bharti Airtel announced on 12 December 2017 that its Rwandan subsidiary had signed an agreement with Millicom to acquire complete control of the latter's Rwandan subsidiary which operates under the brand name of Tigo Rwanda. The deal was estimated to be worth $60–70 million. The company operated as Airtel-Tigo following the merger, until it was rebranded as Airtel Rwanda in January 2020.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In October 2017, Bharti Airtel announced that it would acquire the consumer mobile businesses of Tata Teleservices, Tata Docomo and Tata Teleservices Maharashtra Ltd (TTML), in a debt-free cash-free deal. The deal will essentially be free for Airtel which will only incur TTSL's unpaid spectrum payment liability. TTSL will continue to operate its enterprise, fixed -line and broadband businesses and its stake in tower company Viom Networks. The deal received approval from the Competition Commission of India (CCI) in mid-November 2017. On 29 August 2018, Bharti Airtel got its shareholders' approval for the merger proposal with Tata Teleservices. On 17 January 2019, NCLT Delhi gave final approval for merger between Tata Docomo and Airtel. On July 1, 2019, the consumer mobile business of Tata Teleservices has become part of telecom operator Bharti Airtel.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel will absorb the Tata Sons-owned telco's consumer mobile operations in 19 circles across India—17 under Tata Teleservices and two under Tata Teleservices (Maharashtra) Ltd. As part of the proposed agreement, Airtel will also take over a small portion of the unpaid spectrum liability of Tata Teleservices. Bharti Airtel will get an additional 178.5 MHz of spectrum in three bands—1800 MHz, 2100 MHz and 850 MHz—that are widely used for 4G, an area where Airtel is expanding fast to keep pace with Reliance Jio Infocomm.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel will also add about 13 million of Tata Tele's mobile subscribers as of April 2019 to its nearly 322 million users. But most of Tata Tele's mobile users are inactive, as per the regulator.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In February 2022, Bharti Airtel announced that it has acquired a strategic stake in a blockchain startup Aqilliz via its "Airtel Startup Accelerator Program". Singapore-based Aqilliz is a blockchain-enabled MediaTech startup offering a new age middleware technology for the media marketplace and create a more collaborative digital marketing environment.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Bharti Telecom (BTL) is a holding company of Bharti Airtel with Bharti Enterprises and Singtel owning 50.56 percent and 49.44 percent, respectively, in BTL, which in turn owns 35.80 percent of Bharti Airtel.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel India is the second largest provider of mobile telephony after Jio and the second largest provider of fixed telephony in India and is also a provider of broadband and subscription television services. It offers its telecom services under the Airtel brand, and is headed by Sunil Bharti Mittal.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel provides broadband internet access through DSL, internet leased lines and MPLS (multiprotocol label switching) solutions, as well as IPTV and fixed line telephone services. Until 18 September 2004, Bharti provided fixed line telephony and broadband services under the Touchtel brand. Bharti now provides all telecom services including fixed line services under the common brand Airtel. As of June 2019, Airtel provides Telemedia services; in 99 cities. As on 30 June 2019, Airtel had 2.342 million broadband subscribers.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel Broadband provides broadband and IPTV services. Airtel provides both capped as well as unlimited download plans. However, Airtel's unlimited plans are subject to free usage policy (FUP), which reduces speed after the customer crosses a certain data usage limit. In most of the plans, Airtel provides only 64KByte/second beyond FUP which is equal to other competitors' tariffs. The maximum speed available for home users under the new V-Fiber program is up to 300Mbit/s and with DSL is 16Mbit/s.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In May 2012, Airtel Broadband and some other Indian ISPs temporarily blocked file sharing websites such as vimeo.com, megavideo.com, and thepiratebay.se, without giving any legal information to customers.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In June 2011, "The" "Economic Times" reported that the Telemedia business was merged with Mobile and DTH businesses.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: The digital television business provides Direct-to-Home (DTH) TV services across India under the brand name Airtel digital TV. It started services on 9 October 2008 and had about 16.027 million customers at the end of June 2019.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel Business consists largely of six products: cloud and managed services, digital signage, NLD/ILD connectivity (VSAT / MPLS / IPLC and Ethernet products), Wi-Fi dongles, voice solutions (like toll-free numbers, TracMate, and automated media reading) and conferencing solutions (VoIP, audio, video, and web conferencing), serving industry verticals like BFSI, IT/ITeS, manufacturing, hospitality and government.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel Business, the B2B arm of Bharti Airtel, has rolled out a first of its kind dedicated digital platform to serve the growing connectivity, communication and collaboration requirements of emerging businesses, including SMEs and startups. The digital platform will offer solutions to emerging enterprises to enable ease of business and faster time to market.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Beetel Teletech Ltd., a unit of Bharti Enterprises Ltd., on 18 August 2011, launched a 7-inch tablet in India based on Google Inc.'s Android operating system. The offering is intended to capitalise on the expected demand for cheap computing devices in the world's fastest-growing and second-largest mobile phone market.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel is the third- largest mobile operator in the world by subscriber base and has a commercial presence in 17 countries and the Channel Islands.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel Africa is a subsidiary of Bharti Airtel, which provides telecommunications and mobile money services in 14 countries in Africa, primarily in East, Central, and West Africa. Airtel Nigeria is the most profitable unit of Airtel Africa, due to its cheap data plans in Nigeria. As of March 2019, Airtel had over 99 million subscribers on the continent. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 8 June 2010, Bharti Airtel completed the purchase of mobile operations in 15 African countries from Zain, a Kuwaiti operator.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 11 August 2010, Bharti Airtel announced that it would acquire Telecom Seychelles for US$62 million.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 15 August 2017, Bharti Airtel and Millicom's Tigo in Ghana merged to form new company AirtelTigo. On 27 October 2020, Airtel announced that it planned to exit its business in Ghana, and that it had entered into "advanced stages of discussions" for sale of shares in AirtelTigo to the Government of Ghana.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 13 January 2016, France-based Orange SA and Bharti Airtel inked a deal to sell Airtel's operations in Burkina Faso and Sierra Leone to Orange. On 19 July 2016, Airtel completed the deal.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: airtel Bangladesh Ltd. was a GSM-based cellular operator in Bangladesh. Airtel was the sixth mobile phone carrier to enter the Bangladesh market, and originally launched commercial operations under the brand name "Warid Telecom" on 10 May 2007. Warid Telecom International LLC, an Abu Dhabi–based consortium, sold a majority 70% stake in the company to India's Bharti Airtel Limited for US$300 million.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 16 November 2016, airtel Bangladesh was merged into Robi as a product brand of Robi Axiata, where Robi Axiata Limited is the licensee of the Airtel brand in Bangladesh. Robi at present is a joint venture between Axiata Group of Malaysia, Bharti Airtel of India and NTT Docomo Inc. of Japan. Axiata holds 68.7% controlling stake in the entity, Bharti holds 25% while the remaining 6.3% is held by NTT Docomo of Japan.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Bharti Airtel Lanka (Pvt) Ltd is a subsidiary of Bharti Airtel Limited. Bharti Airtel has been featured in Forbes Asia's Fab 50 list, rated amongst the best-performing companies in the world in the "BusinessWeek" IT 100 list 2007, and voted as India's most innovative company in a survey by "The Wall Street Journal."


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel Lanka commenced commercial operations of services on 13 January 2009. Granted a license in 2007 in accordance with the Sri Lanka Telecommunications Act No. 25 of 1991, it is also a registered company under the Board of Investment of Sri Lanka. Under the license, the company provides digital mobile services to Sri Lanka. This is inclusive of voice telephony, voicemail, data services and GSM-based services. All of these services are provided under the Airtel brand.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 1 May 2007, Jersey Airtel and Guernsey Airtel, both wholly-owned subsidiaries of the Bharti Group, announced they would launch mobile services in the British Crown Dependency islands of Jersey and Guernsey under the brand name Airtel-Vodafone after signing an agreement with Vodafone. Airtel-Vodafone operates a 4G network in Jersey and Guernsey.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Bharti Airtel has about 303.08 million subscribers worldwide—264.58 million in India and South Asia and 50.949 million in Africa as of December 2011. The numbers include mobile services subscribers in 19 countries and Indian Telemedia services and Digital services subscribers.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: One Network is a mobile phone network that allows Airtel customers to use the service in a number of countries at the same price as their home network. Customers can place outgoing calls at the same rate as their local network, and incoming calls are free. , the service is available in Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, Congo Brazzaville, Gabon, Ghana, India, Kenya, Madagascar, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia only for international roamers from Airtel Africa


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In July 2011, Bharti signed a five-year agreement with Ericsson, who will manage and optimize Airtel's mobile networks in Africa. Ericsson will modernize and upgrade Airtel's mobile networks in Africa with the latest technology including its multi-standard RBS 6000 base station. As part of the modernization, Ericsson will also provide technology consulting, network planning & design and network deployment. Ericsson has been the managed services and network technology partner in Asian operations.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: On 9 May 2009, Airtel signed a major deal with Manchester United. As a result of the deal, Airtel had the rights to broadcast the matches played by the team to its customers.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Bharti Airtel signed a five-year deal with ESPN Star Sports to become the title sponsor of the Champions League Twenty20 cricket tournament.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: Airtel is also the main sponsor of Airtel Super Singer and Airtel Super Singer Junior since 2006, which are currently broadcast on Vijay TV.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: The signature tune of Airtel is composed by Indian musician A. R. Rahman. The tune became hugely popular and is the world's most downloaded mobile music, with over 150 million downloads. Rahman along with Anu Malik re-used the same tune in a 2004 Kannada movie "Love". A new version of the song was released on 18 November 2010, as part of the rebranding of the company. This version was also composed by Rahman.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In February 2014, Gopal Vittal, CEO of Airtel's India operations, said that companies offering free messaging apps like Skype, Line and WhatsApp should be regulated similar to telecom operators. In August 2014, TRAI rejected a proposal from telecom companies to make messaging application firms share part of their revenue with the carriers or the government. In November 2014, TRAI began investigating if Airtel was implementing preferential access by offering special internet packs which allowed WhatsApp and Facebook data at rates that were lower than its standard data rates. The statements of Chua Sock Koong, Group CEO of Singtel and also a shareholder (32.15%) of Bharti Airtel share similar statements about the Anti-Net Neutrality position.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In December 2014, Airtel changed its service terms for 2G and 3G data packs so that VoIP data was excluded from the set amount of free data. A standard data charge of per 10 KB for 3G service and per 10 KB (more than for 1 GB) for 2G service was levied on VoIP data. A few days later, Airtel announced a separate internet pack for VoIP apps, it offered 75 MB for with a validity of 28 days. The TRAI chief Rahul Khullar said that Airtel cannot be held responsible for violating net neutrality because India has no regulation that demands net neutrality. Airtel's move faced criticism on social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and Reddit. Later on 29 December 2014, Airtel announced that it would not be implementing the planned changes, pointing out that there were reports that TRAI would be soon releasing a consultation paper on the issue.


title: Bharti Airtel

text: In April 2015, Airtel announced the "Airtel Zero" scheme. Under the scheme, app firms will sign a contract and Airtel will provide the apps for free to its customers. The reports of Flipkart, an e-commerce firm, joining the "Airtel Zero" scheme drew negative response. People began to give the one-star rating to its app on Google Play. Following the protest, Flipkart decided to pull out of Airtel Zero. The e-commerce giant confirmed the news in an official statement, saying, "We will be walking away from the ongoing discussions with Airtel for their platform Airtel Zero."