The many moods of Ganesha


The many moods of Ganesha

He's playful. He's strong. He's protective. He's the most popular deity in the pantheon of Hindu gods. With the Ganpati celebrations raging in the city, it's time to take a look at how you place Ganesha in your homes.


Ganesha is known as the remover of all obstacles and as the lord of success and prosperity. Not surprisingly, he is wellloved and you will see a multitude of interpretations of this beloved god in people's homes and offices. Uncovering the many faces of Ganesha is indeed a herculean task and no one can do complete justice to it! But here's what the city offers as different interpretations of Ganesha, for
those who wish to get him home for posterity!

These silver plated and sterling silver idols are for preserving till eternity. Add an element of luxury to your décor with these jewel-like pieces.
At: Episode, Lower Parel Price: from 2530 to 16,530


When it comes to Ganesha, we have to mention Satgurus. Known for their fresh, creative and yet traditional take on Ganapatis every year, this year too they do justice to renditions of Lord Ganesha!
At: Satgurus, Khar Price: On request


These traditional Ganeshas will sit snug and comfortable in your inner sanctum.
At: Sanctum, Khar Price: On request


The Lladro craftsmanship needs no introduction. This Padmasana Ganesha, (base included) shows a simple but strong interpretation of the elephant headed god.
At: Lladro outlets Price: Rs. 55,000


Bathed in silver, these jewels will adorn your home.
At: www. jewelskart.com Price: Rs. 1900 and 1300


This Ganesha becomes a wooden piece of art.
At: Serenity-Blissful Living, Bandra Price: On request


Little ways by which the lord can be incorporated into your life!
At: Ecocorner, Lower Parel Price: Rs. 550-850




This mural combines painting with sculpture and gives Ganesha a new dimension.
At: Serenity-Blissful Living, Bandra Price: On request



    These earthly Ganpatis in varied poses display the versatility of emotions depicted by the deity.
At: Baaya Design, Lower Parel
Price: Rs. 475- 525


Whether it is the abundance of colours or the striking teal idol, these handcrafted Ganeshas bring in an element of bright playfulness in your home.
At: Serenity-Blissful Living, Bandra Price: On request

Using tech to make e-tail as real as retail

Using tech to make e-tail as real as retail

Technology is the backbone of e-tailing (that is, retail via the electronic medium of the internet, mobile phones and other hand-held devices), given that the very platform for e-tailing is technological in nature. It is also apparent that technological developments will continue to play a critical role in the growth and adoption of e-tailing, primarily by reducing the divide between physical and online stores and by ensuring efficient execution.

Enhancing user experience

Unlike physical stores, wherein a customer can examine products at first hand, e-tailers do not possess a direct connection with their customers. Consequently, a crucial part of the investment in e-tailing worldwide is spent on technologies that help replicate the physical store experience. One example of such innovations is the virtual trial room, or ‘Virtual Try-on’ introduced by Fashionista.com and US-based online fashion boutique Tobi.com which helps consumers “trial” apparel virtually.

Other retailers who have opted for this technology are Banana Flame in apparel, and Vision Express, Tortoise and Blonde Eyewear in the eyewear category in the UK. A further advancement to Virtual Try-on is the ‘Virtual Fitting Room’ developed by Estonia’s Fits.me that uses a robotic mannequin to enable trying-on clothes in the virtual world. The company claims that retailers adopting the virtual fitting room technology have seen sales grow by an estimated 50-60% and a nearly 28% reduction in returns.

While these technologies have shifted the user experience paradigm positively and consequently boosted (virtual) store traffic, there are other advantages offered by the format, including co-shopping, which allows people in different places to examine the same product via the internet and make comparisons. Retailers have also implemented customer tagging – a way of allowing registered customers to “tag” or review a certain product as a guide for other customers, and have Price Drop Alerts sent through e-mail. Another tool that is still under development is ‘Haptics’, which allows users to “touch” and “feel” the product (that is, texture of cloth in case of apparel) in an imitation of the real experience.

Although India is still far behind in adoption of these technologies, efforts have been made in this direction. Several players are now providing a “zoom” feature to facilitate better product views. For example, eyewear retailer GKB Opticals offers a ‘Try-on Virtual Mirror’ and a ‘Face Shape Guide’ that helps consumers choose and try products prior to making a purchase. Recently, e-tailer Zovi.com launched its virtual trial room ‘Zovi Eye’ through which consumers can stand in front of a webcam to see how an image of a garment fits on them. This simulates trying-on the product in front of a mirror. With further growth of the e-tailing space in India, such technological facilitators will become better-entrenched into the e-tailer’s user interface.

Efficient back-end systems

Another aspect of technological intervention is the streamlining of operations via the management and more efficient execution of back-end processes. Players who adopt new technologies well ahead of others, and more effectively, will have an edge over others. To this end, customer relationship management, or CRM, solutions are important to e-tailers as they help map the browsing and shopping behaviour of consumers. This helps them customise and promote products in line with user preferences and also provides feedback useful in improving the interface.

Further, internet-based systems are also important in ensuring a smooth supply chain through the integration of consumer orders to vendors, suppliers, warehouses, so on, in an efficient manner. The delivery and execution of orders can also be tracked in real time through this medium.

Similarly, players need to adopt and popularise payment solutions like prepaid cards and equal monthly installment options, and promote usage of net banking and credit cards by, say, incentivising payments (that is, additional discounts on use of these payment mediums).

However, the biggest concern with the online channel remains security. The internet, despite all its facilities, has also opened up many avenues of fraudulent activities which can compromise the security of e-tailing websites. To combat this, both existing and new security solutions will have to be continuously upgraded.

Ultimately, technology is both beneficial to and benefiting from e-tailing. On one hand, it enables this modern retail format and provides the necessary tools to ensure the security, comfort and ease of customers. On the other, it provides impetus for driving further innovation in connected domains which in turn sustain e-tailing. This process will most certainly continue for the foreseeable future.

The writer is associate director (retail)

at Technopak Advisors.

Email: pragya.singh@technopak.com

Illinois, US-based World Kitchen, owner of premium kitchenware and cutlery brands like Corelle, Corningware and Pyrex, has forayed into India’s kitchen storage space

‘The Rs.1,925 cr storage mart is ripe for a 3rd brand’
Illinois, US-based World Kitchen, owner of premium kitchenware and cutlery brands like Corelle, Corningware and Pyrex, has forayed into India’s kitchen storage space. It has launched a set of products for the Indian kitchen under its brand Snapware, which is known for its airtight, space-saving boxes, containers, canisters, jars, bottles, so on, made of plastic or glass in ergonomic designs and eye-pleasing colours and shapes. Joseph T Mallof, president and CEO, shares with Nupur Anand the company’s plans and the growth opportunity he sees in the kitchen storage segment in India


The kitchen storage segment in India is still very fragmented. How do you see the industry shaping up?
The industry is at a very nascent stage and therefore the market prospects are huge. The market in India is largely dominated by local plastic players. To give you an idea, the storage market in India is pegged at only $620 million. Out of which the food storage market is just 58% which is $360 million (Rs 1,925 crore). Considering that the market is not very big, we see huge growth opportunity.
How different is the market in India?
If you look at the industry globally, the scenario is completely different. It is dominated mainly by branded players. Storage market in India is where it was several years ago in other countries. The kind of products sold outside is also different. In other countries, the demand is more for big containers where as in India, the focus is more on small, compact storage boxes. Here, the branded players have been able to capture only 30% of the total market. And there are only two branded players in India at the moment. So we think that there is definitely place for a third brand that is ready to offer innovative organisation storage for Indian homes. Snapware is a product that World Kitchen has in its portfolio globally. And it has done very well in different markets. We expect the same response in India.
You are going to face competition both from established branded players and the local ones. How do you plan to tackle that?
Our product offering caters to demand in the premium segment. So that in itself cuts competition from the local players. Our product can be used in microwaves, there are no health hazards, it is easy to store and clean. And we believe that the product quality will help us in carving out a niche in the specialised storage market. And in the branded segment, there are just two players at the moment. The focus is more on building and expanding the market. And given the fact that branded players have already started educating the Indian consumer, we believe that their presence will just help us in expanding the reach.
Indian consumers are price-conscious, so will that be a challenge?
Our products are more longer-lasting than the cheaper variants. So, at the point of purchase, it may pinch you. But the fact that we score on the quality front will push consumers to pay a little extra. So we expect consumers to make this value-conscious decision. Moreover, increase in disposable incomes and demand for aesthetic products will also fuel demand for branded products in the storage space.
What are the marketing plans for the product?
We are launching just before the festive season kicks in. So we will try and make our products more visible during the Diwali and gifting season. We will be present in both big store retail format and the local departmental store, making sure that accessibility is not a problem. We will also be present in stores via our partner TTK Prestige, that makes and markets kitchen appliances. We are also present in the e-commerce space in the US and other countries and at a later stage we may look at exploring the option in India too.
Would you import your products into India?
The products under Snapware are at the moment being exported from other countries in Asia and the US. If the market evolves in line with expectations then we will be willing to explore local production opportunity.

If people don't laugh at your dream, then maybe it is not big enough


 
Chetan Indap, Founder of Oncontract.com


What is Oncontract.com all about?

We provide an Online Internet based marketplace for hiring people on Contract basis (for short periods). The platform is meant to be used by Companies of all sizes, especially SMEs in India. Our marketplace provides skills across industries, functions, levels and locations.


You are an entrepreneur because....?

I was always the round peg in a square hole. I always grew wanting to think differently and do things differently. I was a born dreamer and later become an Ideator. While I have worked in a Corporate environment for many years, I always achieved success because of my ability to have a different perspective than the norm.


Your most critical moment while starting out?
My first venture was when I had just graduated out of my Engineering college (1992). A bunch of friends got together and started a company, with small personal funds. We successfully sold that venture after 18 months. We did not continue because for one, my partners wanted to pursue studies abroad and two, we did not know how to raise capital for expansion.
So my critical moment when I started oncontract was to ensure that I won't have any partners to start with (hence no dependence) and that I will start the process of fund raising much earlier in the life-cycle.

Did you really cut it fine at some point?

While I started the fund raising process quite early, by the time we closed our first round of funding took 8 months. Till this time, I was bootstrapping all the way and paying for a 8 people team. I had cashed all my stock investments and almost nearing finishing my other savings. So by the time the funds came, I had only about 2 months cash reserve to play with. If for some reason we had not received our funding in time, we would be sitting on a fine edge...

Did you Goof up?

Inspite of very rich experience of over 18 years working in India, US and UK, I have to admit that I had to unlearn all of it and start afresh.
On fund raising roadshows, one meets several investors, who have either run companies or have good experience. The biggest goofup, I did was to listen to all of them and try to implement a piece of their advise.

Unforgettable Quotes:

If people don't laugh at your dream, then maybe it is not big enough!

What did I learn?

a.       Don't get scared of trying. Most of the time trying results in mistakes. But 80% of success formula is hidden in those mistakes.

b.      Hang-in there. Don't let go. It's always the darkest before the dawn


Comments on your journey...

When I was working, I would wait for the day to end so I could get back home; since I have become an entrepreneur, I wait for another day to begin so I can get back to work!

Chetan Indap: has over 20 yrs exp within the IT Services industry. He has a strong track record of starting multiple businesses from grounds up of which he sold one in 1993. In 2007 he helped his wife get into early childhood education to teach English Reading to 4-6 year olds using Phonics technique. Today  Phonickids,  is a profitable business with current student strength exceeding 1000 and 2 additional Franchisee Centers in Mumbai.

Is the e-commerce space really promising enough?




With the growing internet penetration in the country the Indian e-commerce industry is beginning to enter a new phase. More and more start ups are looking at ways of biting into the e-commerce pie. But is there room for all? 

SME mentor interviews the guru of e-commerce, Alok Kejriwal, founder of Games2win, who talks to us on the current scenario of this sector and its potential to grow.

Q: Whether or not there is an ecommerce boom the truth is, you and I as consumers have suddenly been bombarded with spams in our inboxes from online retail stores. How do you see this trend from a business perspective?
Alok: There are 3 or 4 key things here.
• First: It's the laziest internet business to start today. It really doesn't take anything to start an ecommerce portal. All that you need to spend is on the domain that costs 500 rupees. You don't pay for the software. You are selling something to somebody, using someone else payment gateway and someone else's courier. And above all, someone else's money to do all of that! So actually someone else's business that you are executing!!
I think the challenge is that a lot of people love to be entrepreneurs. And ecommerce is the first standard class they all enter thinking that they will graduate from there. But graduation happens in the 12th. And they seem to have forgotten that.
• Second: The challenge is that people are looking at the glory and the glamour of the business and not the nitty-gritty's.
• Third: VC's are indulging the entrepreneur. There seems to be a phantom, a ghost. The ghost of Silicon Valley which will supposedly come, acquire them and take them home like a bride. But little do they know that their knight in shining Armour will come and drink their blood. So I actually see them becoming the brides for the Dracula!!

Do most of these ecommerce websites actually have the infrastructure to make it big?
Alok: I don't think they do. I think that a lot of these guys pretend to be having big backends, but they have these stand alone software and they are running around shoving things here and there. They are not thinking. They need to think. They need to take a step back and look at what they are trying to really do for people.

Q: A lot of entrepreneurs and experts are questioning the cash on delivery option in India.  Companies have claimed that 40-50% of their deliveries are being returned due to this mode of payment.  Do you really think Cash on Delivery works for Indians?
Alok:  I think COD, the cash on delivery model certainly works. I am saying it's not a food item and how do you change your mind because in India everybody is doing cash on delivery. It is a culture. In fact in India the culture is show me first then I will pay.  When was the last time you ordered Pizza from Dominos, brownies and told the guy that you didn't want to buy it. We all call medicines, soft drinks from shops, so we often ask for deliveries. Do you ever say after calling for delivery to go away? That means people in India pay.

Q: What about portals specializing in one product line like bags or shoes and are  eventually aspiring to become Amazon.com?
Alok: I get a mail from an online retail store every single day, at 2.30 in the afternoon to buy a bed. Everyday? I got a bed when I married 22 years ago. It's doing fine. Nothing's wrong with it. Even after I die, it will exist. This is just an example, but everybody has become so desperate to show sale. In India they say, if one is selling onions and potatoes that person will be able to make his daily bread comfortably, however, the minute he decides to sell zucchini, he will have to call 20 people, make that extra effort to sell his stock. 

Q: Should companies focus on a single product or spread their wings?
Alok: Just to give you an example I buy coffee only from one shop in colaba which is 300 years old and its divine. And even if they raise the price by 300 rupees I will pay for it.
I think curating the product is far more worthwhile than curating the sales of your company. You need to be more fascinated about the fact that product happens rather than overall sales. Infact I would say you should have the mentality of a small shopkeeper, a "nukkad ki dukan", rather than becoming a Westside. But then be the best at it. If you are selling agarbattis, become the King of Agargbattis!

Where do you see Flipkart going?
Alok: They have had a great first mover advantage. It's the first brand that comes to me when I think of buying. I certainly don't say that it's the only brand. For instance I have been buying this autobiography of yogi and I have given away 250 books this year. Now I'm beginning to think, is there a place where I can buy it cheaper? Since the book is the same. I know that another delay and I will certainly not remain committed anymore.
However I do see a positive about flipkart. One thing that really stunned me about them recently was their recommendation. Their recommendation of books was perfect! They send me a recommendation of 10 books and I am going to buy 8 out of them. To me that's incredible. They have really got into my mind.

What is the future of e-commerce in India and is there scope for everyone to grow?
Alok: I think there is scope for everyone to have a common funeral. They should all buy funeral pyres and sit in them and become Sati, Thats it. That will be their real outcome. There is no scope for so many of them to exists and hope that they will exist. They will die, they will burn, they will extinguish themselves.
However, what I do feel is there has been a large institutional play in ecommerce. All the offline biggies like Croma, Shopperstop, Crossword, Mad-over-donuts who actually have the brand and the customers are eventually going to turn online and will be the real heros.
If you see the Kemp's Corner Crossword shop it is at least 30,000 sq feet, it must be at least Rs 1 crore in rent. It might be easier for them to turn online. Its only a matter of time. So all these satis that are going to be sitting in the end when the fires are lit, the biggies will come and buy all of them and put them in their house. They will all become managers in Shoppers Stop and the Croma.

Incase you are immensely passionate about online retail and if you are looking at ways of innovating,

Picking a gift for your brother, guy friend or your boyfriend more often than not seems like a herculean task. We bring you 10 gifting ideas that guys will thank you for

The guy zone
Picking a gift for your brother, guy friend or your boyfriend more often than not seems like a herculean task. We bring you 10 gifting ideas that guys will thank you for

1-Gadgets When someone said that diamonds are a woman’s best friend, they forgot to mention that for a man it was gadgets. There’s nothing easier — be it a mobile phone or a DVD player, a camera, or the new X-box he has been eyeing. Just make sure you know exactly what he likes.

2-Renew his DVD subscription If movies are what he is hooked to most of the time, make it a point to renew his subscription. There is nothing better than seeing his face light up, when he knows you care about his movies as much as he does.

3-Buy special merchandise Most guys are hooked to sports, so gifting something that interests them is the best idea. If his favourite team is Manchester United, buy him some cool team merchandise that you know he will like. It could be shoes, bags, tees or a simple keychain.

4-Be the ‘buddy’ If there is anything he looks forward to the most, then it is his time with his buddies. Be that buddy for a change and take him to his favourite restaurant or just play video games together.

5-Boxers If you are looking for innovative options, then gift him a really cool pair of boxers. There are lots of funky ones available in the market today. But just remember, it qualifies as quite a personal gift.

6-Miniature automobiles There is nothing more exciting than gifting your friend a miniature edition of a sports bike or car model that you know he is lusting after.

7-Passes to his favourite match Surprise him with tickets to an upcoming cricket match. Even better, put on your cheer leader outfit and tag along with him to watch it.

8-Gift him a vacation If you know your friend has been wanting to go on a vacation, do all the bookings and hand over the tickets. He will be pleasantly surprised by the gesture.

9-Add a personalised touch This could be something as simple as getting his name engraved on the ipod you are gifting him. You can never go wrong with this.

10-A leisure day It is a myth that men do not enjoy being pampered. Gift him a day at the spa or even a head massage.


Retail FDI note raises more questions than it answers

Retail FDI note raises more questions than it answers

The government’s media release announcing up to 51% foreign direct investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail raises several interesting points as well as questions.
One of the major points is that organised retail outlets may be set up only in cities with a population of more than 10 lakh as per 2011 census. There are 45 cities in India that meet this requirement.
Currently eight states, the national capital territory of Delhi and the union territories of Daman, Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli have agreed to allow FDI in multi-brand retail. But as per the 2011 census, only 20 of the 45 cities are in states that have agreed to FDI in muti-brand retail.
Interestingly, the census has two classifications. One, “cities” having population of one lakh and above. Two, “urban agglomerations/cities” having population of one lakh and above. As per the former definition, India has 45 cities which have a population of 10 lakh or more. As per the latter definition, India has 53 urban agglomerations/cities with a population of 10 lakh or more.
For the sake of this analysis, “cities” has been used because the government’s press note uses the word “cities” very clearly and not “cities/urban agglomerations”. But even if one works with the assumption of 53 cities, the analysis that follows doesn’t change much. Nevertheless, the government needs to clear this confusion.
Maharashtra leads the pack with 10 cities out of the 20 which qualify for big retail. These are Aurangabad, Kalyan-Dombivili, Navi Mumbai, Mumbai, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Pune, Nagpur, Nashik, Thane and Vasai-Virar. In Andhra Pradesh, three cities meet the criteria: Hyderabad, Vijayawada and Vishakapatnam. Three cities in Rajasthan also do: Kota, Jaipur and Jodhpur. Srinagar in Jammu & Kashmir, Faridabad in Haryana (and not the fancied Gurgaon which has a population of 8,76,824 as per the 2011 census), New Delhi and Chandigarh are the four other cities that make the list. Chandigarh is the capital of Haryana which has agreed to allow FDI in big retail. But it is also the capital of Punjab, which hasn’t.
Interestingly, 50% of the cities eligible for big retail are in one state, Maharashtra. It also means that there are no cities in Assam, Manipur and the union territories of Daman, Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli which meet the criteria.
To get around this, the government note allows companies to set up retail outlets in cities of their choice, preferably the largest, in states and union territories not having cities with population of more than 10 lakh as per 2011 census.
But the most interesting part of the note is that most of the policies elucidated in the note are only enabling in nature. Hence, governments in states and union territories are free to make their own policies. This means that it is very well possible that states might allow big retail to set shop in places with a population of less than ten lakh. What stops the state of Haryana from allowing big retail presence in the city of Gurgaon? Or Maharashtra allowing big retail in Mira Road-Bhayander which has a population of 8,14,655 as per the 2011 census? The same can be said about Secunderabad, which is Hyderabad’s twin city, and Jammu which is the second largest city in Jammu & Kashmir.
Another point in the note is that at least 50% of total FDI brought in shall be invested in ‘back-end infrastructure’ within three years of the first tranche of FDI. The note doesn’t specify whether this investment is to be limited in states that have allowed big retail. So the conclusion is that this investment can be made all across India. But here is where practical problems might crop up.
A company like Wal-Mart may set up back-end infrastructure in a state like Himachal Pradesh to source apples. But as we know, Himachal Pradesh isn’t on the list of states that have allowed FDI in big retail. So we will end up with a situation where big retail is present in a state at the back-end but at the same time it’s not allowed to set up a front-end retail store. That would not be an ideal situation.
Another major problem can crop up because of the decision being left to the states. The states that have agreed to big retail are all Congress-ruled (except Kerala which is ruled by the Congress-led United Democratic Front but hasn’t said yes to big retail). Now what happens if the Congress party loses the next election in these states? Can the party or the front which comes to power reverse the earlier decision?

The note also points out that the government will have the first right to procurement of agricultural products. What is implied by this? At the same time, the note points out that at least 30% of the value of procurement of manufactured/processed products purchased, shall be sourced from Indian ‘small industries’ which have a total investment in plant and machinery not exceeding $1 million. This will be a huge problem for big retail companies which play on economies of scale.
But the note is silent on international procurement of goods and products by these companies. This means that companies which invest in big retail can source their products internationally. Hence, a Wal-Mart can source products for the Indian market from China. “More than 70% of the goods sold in Wal-Mart stores around the world are made in China,” point out Garry Gereffi and Ryan Ong in a case study titled Wal-Mart in China which was published in the Harvard Asia Pacific Review. Sourcing from China has been the backbone of Wal-Mart’s everyday low-pricing strategy.
The state governments that allow FDI in big retail can change any of the policies mentioned above and frame their own policies because these policies are only enabling in nature. The only part that they cannot change is retail trading by means of e-commerce.

Animation means many things to many people Within India, experts have envisaged that even though growth for animation industry will be exponential in the short-term, the industry would need to ramp up the number of trained manpower

Animation means many things to many people
Within India, experts have envisaged that even though growth for animation industry will be exponential in the short-term, the industry would need to ramp up the number of trained manpower

Animation
as a form of entertainment has evolved considerably and transcended age barriers. With its new approach, the genre now appeals to adults as much as to children. Within India itself, experts have envisaged that even though growth for this industry will be exponential in the short-term, the industry would need to ramp up the numbers of trained manpower. But India has a lot to catch up on. Animation movies began being made only a decade ago, compared to the West where such movies were embarked upon in the 1920s.

Obviously, therefore, there are concerns about a demand-supply mismatch and the industry’s ability to realise its untapped potential. Is it the fault of the students? Do they have expectations beyond their level of competence? What do employers look for?

DNA’s Vijay Pandya, discussed the current scenario and what lies ahead with a cross-section of industry representatives. The panel included (in alphabetical order) Chand RK, director, Digitales Studios and co-founder, www.cgtantra.com; Arnab Choudhary, director, Arjuna The Warrior Prince; Bhavika Chouhan, Sr VP - marketing, Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics; Mehul Hirani, creative director, Crest Animation Studios Ltd.; Kireet Khurana, director, Toonpur Ka Superhero and chief creative officer, Frameboxx; Easo Thampy Mathew, country head, Arena Animation; Sapan Narula, managing partner, Epic Studios; Ram Warrier, head - corporate marketing, Aptech Ltd.
Given below are edited excerpts.
Skills required

Choudhary: By making a clear distinction among various job roles ranging from the artist to technician, is largely how the studios operate and you will hire workforce accordingly. You will hire people with the stipulation: “30% of my staff needs to be technically sound, but need not be visionaries. They need to be able to operate the tools, but they don’t need to be able to create original IP [intellectual property] or design a character or anything else.” So there is a certain balance that needs to be maintained and as long as that balance is a healthy one, we’re heading in the right direction.
Chand: My creative team is asking, “Who gives the guy coming through an institute with the choice [of career]? Who makes them realize that after five years or six years or seven years, is he going to be a technician and work ahead on the path like this, or you’re going to be a thinking animator or a director and then, how do you guys handle it?” Because what we are facing, and I’m sure all of us are facing, is a similar question: “Is it that the guy who comes to us as a fresher doesn’t know [the growth path of the job he is meant to do]? Is it that he doesn’t know maybe because when he was being taught, or he was undergoing training, that part of training was not part of the course?” I mean I don’t know if that’s the missing part of the puzzle.

Chouhan: Culturally also, the way education has evolved in India, it is very different from the way it is abroad. Over there, creativity is built into a child from very early ages whereas here that’s not the case. The emphasis is more on academic orientation… So that has been always a critical factor – how to evoke in them the culture of India and something like creativity.

Matthew: The student’s perception of anything is to find a job. That’s the very base of their strategy. And if you look at animation, the perception started with is the IT base. So their approach was from that point of view -- they were trying to learn tools. There is nothing wrong in it. The student perceives that “I need to get a job”. And so if learning these tools is going to get him a new job, that’s it. That’s where he will start. If you look at the international scenario, there the perception is totally different; there is a culture of understanding. So all of a sudden we cannot say that the animation training institutes or the animation industry should be creating only intellectuals. It doesn’t have to. I need a job. That’s the perception. The industry required, at that point of time, labourers or tools-oriented people. So institutes catered to this need, and it’s evolving.

Khurana: Most of the animation education space is actually with training institutes, where people are essentially being trained in software. That’s the way we started, which is need-based training. What really needs to be done is basically move from need-based training to value-based education, which is a holistic understanding and a holistic revamp of the entire curriculum. The job is to create thinking animators, because that’s how we’ll be going up in the value chain.

Hirani: I agree that the number of students, who come out, whom you can really absorb into your studio, is not adequate. But my personal experience has been that I have found some really, really clean freshers, who have performed amazingly well, so I don’t want to take away that skill from them. But there are students, even artists, who do not know why they have come into this industry – it is not very clear to them. The day the student’s understanding becomes clearer -- that I am here just because I really love to do what I am doing – that is when his work will cease to appear as hard work.

Warrier: The way I understand it, in any which way you look at it, studios typically operate with their own proprietary software, with their own methodologies of what they prepare. So what we do is to prepare students only up to a particular stage. After that they are anyway taken into the studios. What is important for us is to impart -- apart from tools and knowledge of software stuff like that – are the very fundamentals of the concepts involved. And if we are able to work on that properly, and are able to give the student who is going to the studios those very basics, it would make the students more relevant to their employers. The studios would welcome it.

Narula: It becomes very difficult to find the right people. Most of the people in the industry are all operators. They can operate software. But finding a person who can understand concepts and work on visual effects, is good with colours and good at visualising how it’s going to be at the end of the day, how the output will turn out to be, is not easy. This is even true in the case of animation, where like with modelling, they need to be trained in the very aesthetics.

The training scenario in India

Chouhan: Earlier it was very difficult for a child to go back home and say that I want to do a course in animation. ‘You are going to make cartoons?’ was the immediate reaction of the parent. This is no longer a fact today. In the major metros, mini metros as well as tier-three cities also, animation has now evolved as a career; it has got established. People are quite keen in terms of sending their kids into animation as they understand what’s happening in this industry. And at the same time, there is enough hard work also. So there are two kinds of people here; there is a creative side as well as a labour side. Though it’s a new age career, there are lots of aspirations. A lot of hype is also there in terms of the industry glamour. So they coming into the system thinking that “okay, we’re going to be James Cameron from day one or we’re going to be Steven Spielberg from day one”.

In fact, we also have evolved lot at our end, primarily to overcome the mismatch between their expectations and workplace reality. We had a dedicated two-month sketching program initially but slowly realised that they don’t want to go through that kind of a rigorous training program. From day one they want to be on software. So we tried to evolve, to find some other way, so that creativity is instilled into them. We must also recognise the fact that this generation is also very different, expectations are very high from their end and that they are very impatient. Everything must be got immediately.

Warrier: Obviously, the guys who come to us are pretty young and not probably clear on what they want to do and haven’t decided or

Walmart plans three-five more India wholesale stores

A cash and carry joint venture between Wal-Mart Stores (WMT.N) and Bharti Enterprises plans to add three-five stores by end of the year, a spokeswoman for the world's largest retailer said on Tuesday.
U.S. group Walmart operates 17 cash and carry, or wholesale stores, in India in partnership with Bharti Enterprises, which owns India's top mobile telecoms operator Bharti Airtel Ltd (BRTI.NS).
Foreign ownership regulations in India do not allow global hypermarket and supermarket chains such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT.N) and Carrefour SA (CARR.PA) to set up shops in the country and tap the over $450 billion retail market.
Foreign players are, however, allowed to operate wholesale stores.
In December last year, the government backtracked on its decision to allow such chains to own 51 percent in India's multi-brand retail sector after a huge political backlash.
Walmart also plans to ramp up the headcount at its unit, @WalmartLabs, in Bangalore to about 200 by end 2012 from 125 now, Jermey King, Chief technical Officer of Global e-Commerce, Walmart.com, told reporters.
The unit's job is to help Wal-Mart capture more online sales from the proliferation of smartphones and social networking.

Entrepreneurship: Taking the first step

Entrepreneurship: Taking the first step
 
Express Money
 
Ritu Kant Ojha

After his engineering from IIT Delhi, Yahish Dahiya did his management program from IIM Ahmedabad and then an MBA from Insead and was set for his innings in the corporate world – as a management consultant in Bain & Company. He later worked as a chief executive of First Europa and then as a managing director of ebookers –a travel company that employed 2,000 people across 13 countries in Europe. It could have been a dream run for any pass out from ivy league management institute, but luck had something else in store for Yashish. In 2005 ebookers got sold off to some other company. “While the promoters made 2 million pounds, I could only manage 16,000 pounds. This was because I never thought about equity in the company; I was happy getting a good salary. It was after this shock that I started planning for a venture,” says Dahiya. Despite having such a good educational background and having worked at the top level, Dahiya had to go through his share of pain like any other entrepreneur while establishing Policy Bazaar (in 2008), a website that provides comparative analysis of various insurance products.
“I went through immense frustrations for several months after starting up. There was no money to pay salaries including my own and there were about 20 of us. Motivating and keeping the team intact was the toughest task,” he explained. “We started paying the salaries only after getting funding from Info Edge,” he added. After Info Edge, Policy Bazaar was able to raise money from Intel Capital and is now one of the top ten companies in the e-commerce space in India in terms of revenue.
What his story tells us is that there are no short cuts and anyone who wants to start a business has to go through some pain. However, it all starts with taking the first step.
TAKING THE FIRST STEP
Overcoming the anxiety of leaving the cushion of a job, working all seven days, worries about initial capital, will the idea succeed, will I be able to make money are some of the questions every first time entrepreneur faces. The process towards establishing a business starts with an idea. “The idea must identify a problem and devise a way to fix it. It must be a genuine problem and not
artificial. Then s/ he must assess how big is it, find the least cost model to solve that problem and create a business around it,” suggests Shekhar Kirani, Partner, Accel Partners.
Most budding entrepreneurs fail to assess whether they need funding first or they need to start first. A large number planning a start-up look for funding first. This is like putting the cart before the horse. The successful entrepreneurs suggest that it is important to create ‘something’ before one approaches any investor. Experts in the business of providing risk capital advise that an entrepreneur must tap personal savings, some help from family and friends to start a business and run it for at least 12 months before looking for any kind of funding.
FUNDING STAGES
Once you have run your start-up for some time and have clarity about the competition, growth prospects, revenue model, and challenges etc, and you feel capital is needed to reach the next stage, it is time to look for funding.
The first step is to understand how angel investors, venture capitalists, and private equity firms work. You must have a clear idea about factors such as risks involved and exit options. “People looking to start a business are so much in love with the idea itself that they ignore many other factors which are important to find out whether it is a viable business or not. No investor will invest blindly. An entrepreneur must be ready with lots of research and data points before thinking about raising capital,” suggests Pradeep Tagare, investment director, Intel Capital.
There are various stages of funding which must be properly understood:
Angel Investing: This stage carries highest risk for the investors since there is no existing project to evaluate for funding and while you could be convinced about your future revenue projections, the investor might not. This is the most important stage as many start-ups die in the initial 12-24 months. This level of funding could range from R 5 lakh to R 25 lakh. The team and how strong is the idea are the key determinants of getting funding at this stage.
Seed funding: This traditionally constitutes a range of R 50 lakh to R 5 crore of funding. Seed funding enables founders to hire better team and create bigger infrastructure.
Venture Capital (VC) funding: This is typically done for high potential, high risk, growth start-ups and involves amounts ranging from R 5 crore and above. This is a much complex model than seed funding as it involves detailed paperwork and contracts. It is an attractive option for the early stage companies that are too small to raise public money. In exchange for the high risk that venture capitalists take by investing in such companies, they get significant control over company decisions in addition to significant chunk of the company's ownership. There are various series involved in VC investing depending on the stages.
Private equity (PE) funding: The PE firms normally invest R 50 crore and above and the process is a little complex than the venture capital funding. Most of the PE firms consist of institutional investors who can commit large amounts of money for long periods. Before investing, they evaluate a proper exit option such as an initial public offer or sale to another company.
According to Kirani, only 10 out of 1,000 pitches made for funding are finally selected by his team. This means that before you plan to make a pitch to an investor, the homework has to be solid as there is tough competition. Before you take the first step towards becoming an entrepreneur here is Dahiya's advice for you – “get into a business only if you are passionate about it and are ready to invest at least 10 years in it. Otherwise you would end up wasting your time and investor's money.”
For people who have some exposure of sales and marketing, the process becomes easier. Those who have never sold anything may consider going through some good books on marketing and try and understand the various processes involved in running a business, experts advise. Most businesses which become successful in the long term were able to create maximum value for their target group and in the process created money for themselves as well as the investors. So make a firm business plan and give wings to your dreams.
—ritukant.ojha@expressindia.com
Key takeaways
* Establish how much and for what
* Have answer to how much the team has put
* Plan for 12-18 months' need at early stage
* Typically takes 6 months to raise funds
* Plan for cash flows and not profit and loss
* Presentation may need multiple rounds

Brands and their digital buzz

Year 2000 versus year 2012: It’s hard to believe how much the world has transformed in the past decade! Consumers today connect with brands in fundamentally new ways, often through social media channels as traditional marketing strategies fall short in this new world.
What’s more, a purchase is no longer the end of the relationship! Now consumers often enter into an on-going relationship with the brand during which they enjoy, advocate for and bond with it. ‘Digital marketing’ was born through this change. Some of the key changes that have taken place are all linked to the amount of information we can now consume about products and services without a single face-to-face discussion with like-minded people and friends! By sharing their experiences, people have now become bigger spokesmen of brands than ever before (experiences, comparisons, reviews and comments are taken 10 times more seriously than brands speaking about themselves!).
Brands such as Samsung run strong influencer relationship programmes that help them get positive word of mouth and recommendation. Bloggers are becoming a huge community with the ability to present credible third party points of view to people searching for advice.
As digital communication increases, crafting content and conversations around the brand become more and more important. Although the commonality of the online space with the traditional mediums is in the “story-telling approach”, telling a story about the brand online is about consumers co-creating these stories through narratives of their own personal experiences with the brand.
One of the reasons for the heightened interest of marketers in the online space is the kind of targeted message delivery and consumer engagement that the medium delivers most cost-effectively! What is better than serving messages around your brand or category when people are actually searching for information? Search marketing (SEM) is now considered as one of the top lead generation methodologies by several categories including financial services, automotives and durables.
Technology, too, is playing an important role -- with increasingly better connectivity, consumers are finding it easier and more convenient to get their information through the internet.
While digital marketing is critical, the recognition that there is more than one screen in play with consumers is crucial. Customers can hop from one screen to another at any point of time. This is why mobile phones, tablets and game consoles have become as important as the television and the PC. Imagine a scenario where a family sees an advertisement on 3D television. This starts an argument around which TV set to buy. The father clicks open his laptop to see how much it costs. Simultaneously his son flicks his Samsung Tab to get onto eBay to see the latest offers even as the younger son watches the demonstration of a game played on a 3D TV. This multi-user, multi-device, multi-platform engagement is now a reality.
The digital world is growing bigger! It is estimated that by the beginning of 2013 India may have almost 200 million internet users (mobile internet and PC-web). A recent study shows that social media has more than 95% reach with the internet audiences. With more and more Indians spending time on social media it is becoming imperative for brands to have a serious presence on social media. This move is not only confined to big brands, very often, digital can be used to launch and sustain niche brands too.
As the digital space becomes more evolved, brands are evaluating e-commerce. Several brands, including FMCG brands, are now offering commerce on the web. The big adopters are mobile, telecom, banking and finance (apart from travel and hotels). Technology is also playing a major role in the spread of digital with several easy e-commerce plug-and-play options.
The writer is president of Digitas India

Flipkart raises close to $150 m from investors

Naspers Group, Iconiq Capital join online retailer’s funding list
Online retailer Flipkart.com on Friday said that it has raised funding from two new investors — MIH, part of the Naspers Group, and Iconiq Capital —along with its existing investors, Tiger Global and Accel Partners. The company did not disclose the amount, but according to sources, it is expected to be about $150 million.
With this round of funding, MIH has now joined the board, the company said. South Africa-based Naspers is a leading multinational group of media and e-commerce platforms, listed on the Johannesburg stock exchange, while Iconiq Capital is a global multi-family firm, headquartered in San Francisco.
The company plans to utilise the fund in expanding supply chain capacities, launching new categories and in growing the talent pool to continue building its leadership position.
“This will help us achieve our stated ambition of hitting $1 billion in gross merchandise value by 2015,” said Sachin Bansal, co-founder and CEO of Flipkart.com. The Bangalore-based e-commerce player has earlier raised more than $80 million in four rounds of funding from leading global investors.
Started by IIT batchmates Sachin Bansal (30) and Binny Bansal (29) in 2007, Flipkart has become a household name in the e-commerce space servicing about 50,000 orders a day.
“The focus on building a strong brand and differentiating it through delightful customer service has worked really well for us so far,” said Binny Bansal, co-founder and COO, Flipkart.
Flipkart, which has a user base of 4.5 million, currently has 4,800 employees. The online retail major raised an undisclosed amount late last year from its existing investors, Accel Partners and Tiger Global. In an interview to FE, the founders said they expected to clock revenue of around R2,500 crore by March 2013 and initiate their international foray in a few years. Early this year, the online retail firm acquired Gurgaon-based startup Letsbuy.com.
The acquisition was funded through a combination of cash and equity, but the company did not disclose value of the deal. Letsbuy.com, started by Hitesh Dhingra and Amanpreet Bajaj in 2009, had a reasonable presence in the consumer electronics space.

Unlisted cos may get to tap foreign markets

The finance ministry is examining a proposal to permit unlisted Indian companies to raise money from overseas stock exchanges. The move would help companies in new-age segments like e-commerce and bio-pharma as well as some long-gestation infrastructure projects — which do not have much investor appetite locally — raise funds at attractive valuations abroad, analysts said.
Indian regulators currently allow only listed firms to tap foreign stock markets, since they have control over such companies. While industry chambers and many corporates favour the move as it will help raise foreign capital, some experts and local stock exchanges are opposed to the proposal, which they feel affects development of local stock markets.
“A presentation (on the proposal) was recently made to economic affairs secretary Arvind Mayaram. The government and Sebi are studying the proposal,” an official familiar with the matter said. “If concerns of money laundering and round-tripping are taken care of, there should not be much of a problem in permitting unlisted firms to raise money in the overseas equity market. But the issue needs to be examined in detail,” he added.
Unlisted Indian companies were permitted to list overseas in the 1990s but this was changed in 2005. Sebi and the RBI have since endorsed this position barring unlisted firms from floating evening American depository receipts (ADRs) or global depository receipts (GDRs).
However, some unlisted companies have worked around this by creating overseas subsidiaries. MakeMyTrip.com — which is not listed in India — listed on the Nasdaq last year with a valuation of $1 billion. It first created a local subsidiary with a holding company in Mauritius. The subsidiary, in turn, raised funds from the US market.
But such corporate structuring becomes difficult and expensive for smaller companies.
According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, China was the world’s largest IPO market in 2011, with companies raising around 286 billion yuan. Despite stringent overseas listing norms, around 40 Chinese companies listed on Nasdaq last year. In comparison, only one Indian company, MakeMyTrip.com, got listed on Nasdaq in 2011. Indian firms including Sify and Rediff.com listed abroad earlier, but are not listed in India.
“Our market typically prefers stable and traditional IPOs whereas new-age segments like e-commerce and bio-pharma have very long gestation periods to attain profitability. Hence, it becomes difficult to get the right valuation in the Indian market. Exchanges like Nasdaq are much more mature in valuing such companies,” said an analyst.
Srei Infrastructure Finance CMD Hemant Kanoria said unlisted firms should be permitted to list abroad, especially since it would not have any adverse affect on Indian investors. There are in-built checks and balances, since such overseas listings always run the risk of failing, he said.
However, Prithvi Haldea, managing director at Prime Database and an expert in capital markets, is firmly opposed to the proposal. This would mean Sebi does not have any control over Indian unlisted companies dealing with overseas public money, he said. According to Haldea, the provision is prone to misuse and Indian regulators will not have any control if any wrongdoing comes to light. Sebi recently barred seven companies from issuing any shares or convertible instruments or alter their capital structure in any manner till further directions, after it detected evidence of manipulation in GDR issues.
When unlisted Indian companies have multiple avenues to raise foreign funding including FDI, private equity, venture capital and qualified foreign investment, why should they go abroad, Haldea wondered.
Another capital market expert, who did not want to be named, said only some specific sectors, which do not have investor appetite in India but are received well abroad, should be given such a permission. “A blanket approval to unlisted companies across-the-board would ensure the closure of BSE and NSE,” he said.

“Margins are higher in C-class towns”

With 400 stores, Digiworld, the retail initiative from the Videocon Group, has a pan-India presence. It now plans to increase the number of stores to 1000 by the end of 2013 with a special focus on tier II and tier III markets. In an interview with FE’s Twishy, Jaideep Rathore, chief operating officer, Digiworld, speaks about the sales trends in rural markets, Digiworld’s new brand identity and the threat from e-commerce sites. Edited excerpts.

Can you explain how the Digiworld business model works?
The franchisees directly deal with the individual brands. Representatives from these brands frequently visit the stores and analyse the trends. A franchisee gets everything that it needs at the store level, thus helping it push sales. In terms of after-sales service, all these franchisees are again linked to the brands.

What is the strategy that you have adopted for rural markets?
We are present in B-class towns but this year we want to expand to the C-class towns aggressively. The stores are similar to the ones found in urban areas, and tier II and tier III cities account for 65% of our business. The big cities don’t witness exponential growth in the middle range of products but there is high margin in the C-class towns because there is hardly any competition in these markets. The major challenge is to provide logistics support. We have connected all the brands directly to the franchisees so that they have 24/7 access to the actual brands, which is an experiment done for the first time in the retail market.

What was the idea behind reintroducing Digiworld under a new name DW?
The new brand identity is in tune with the brand’s growth, thus giving it a progressive, dynamic and contemporary look. The logo is the abbreviated form of Digiworld (DW) in orange, red and blue to specify the three product divisions of the brand, namely, consumer electronics, home appliances and mobile phone. The tagline is now ‘Digitally WOW’. The essence of this new brand positioning is friendlier and happier communication with consumers.

What are the hot selling products at DigiWorld?
We have all the group brands such as Videocon, Kelvinator, Kenstar and Sansui. We are doing well in the electronics category with home theatres and DVD players selling very well. In the appliances category, the top-selling item is air-conditioners followed by washing machines and refrigerators. We are the largest sellers of iPhones and Samsung Galaxy smartphones. In tier II and III cities, mobile phones are doing well followed by sub-32-inch LCDs. Sub-300 litre refrigerators and washing machines up to 6.5-7 kg capacity are selling well.

What is DigiWorld’s target for this fiscal?
Within the organised business in some of the categories, we have a share of more than 20%. We have more than 400 stores and our turnover last year was Rs 700 crore and we are aiming at Rs 1200 crore this year. By the end of 2013, we plan to have 1,000 stores.

Do you see small stores going out of business after a period of time?
Yes, they will. Sooner or later, foreign direct investment (FDI) will come in and only organised retail will stay. However, these pop-and-mom stores will not shut down but they will have difficulty in managing themselves and competing with organised retail. They may get amalgamated into some kind of association with the retail giants. It is a big possibility and there is always an opportunity for them to become a DigiWorld franchisee.

Do you see e-commerce sites as a threat?
E-commerce is growing but Indians are not comfortable buying off the online rack as they want to have a feel of the product and then buy it unlike that of people in the West. India will take another five to six years to adapt to the e-commerce model but it is a very important part of the retail industry. We have our own e-commerce model, but we are limiting ourselves to technology products only as that business will take time to shape up as it is still a developing one.

FDI implementation will be a welcome step: Kishore Biyani

Implementation of FDI in multi-brand retail will be a welcome step as it would provide much-needed capital for the sector, Future Group founder and chief executive officer Kishore Biyani has said.
“Modern retail is very expensive business. You have to build up the entire distribution, you have to build up the entire supply chain, you have to build retail stores. Today for us the access to capital to build our business is a scarcity. You need capital. We need capital in some form or the other. If FDI comes in, then it is a welcome step. You will drive consumption and ultimately consumption will drive growth,” he said here.
“FDI is a subject that we talk about too much in this country. India is the only country where we use the word multi-brand retail. Nowhere in the world we understand this terminology.”
“If there are challenges in opening up super market or food sector in retail, there are other sectors which can be opened up. Ultimately, India never had that kind of capital to grow or change an ecosystem,” he said.
The Central government had last year allowed 51 per cent FDI in multi-brand retail, but the same could not be implemented in the face of strong opposition from UPA allies, including Trinamool Congress, and several state governments.
Biyani further said the Goods and Services Tax (GST), when implemented, will also be a major game changer for the industry. Today small retailers have bigger advantage as the tax they pay is different.
“I think GST can be a game changer for us as a physical retailer also. It is a big game changer,” he said.
On the e-commerce industry in the country, Biyani said, “E-commerce is doing well in the US because it is a very consumption-driven economy. We are learning to consume value-added products in this country. There are challenges in e-commerce like cost of delivery, cost of technology, among others. We are still 3-4 years away from this business taking off in a significant and profitable manner.”
“I think for e-commerce to supply to 15,000 pin codes, we need to create infrastructure, products and demand. We are making efforts, but the major products which are selling are low-margin ones, in which you can’t get money like electronics or mobile phones.
“We need to get more value-added products, where there is enough margin so that you can sustain the delivery cost,” Biyani said.
Biyani admitted mistakes in his ventures and added that new entrepreneurs need mentors to guide them in not committing those mistakes.
“Entrepreneurs need mentors who can help them, who can tell them what you should not do rather than telling them what to do. Being an entrepreneur myself, I know I have made all the mistakes... We have created many entrepreneurs. My attempt with future ventures didn’t do well. My public issue didn’t do well. My shares are still languishing. The companies in which I invested are doing fantastic,” Future Group CEO said.

Google struggles to log Amazon off as Web’s most popular mall

Whether you are looking to buy a power tool or neon jeans online, chances are you start your search on Google or Amazon.com. But which one?
Behind the scenes, the two companies are waging a war to become the pre-eminent online mall. And e-commerce sites large and small are caught in the cross-fire. As for consumers, the question is whether they will see a full range of products available online.
Google is a search engine, not a store, but it is increasingly inching into e-commerce with products like its comparison-shopping service, Google Shopping. At the same time, more people are using Amazon, a retailer, as a search engine to look for what they want to buy.
Trying to stave off the competition from Amazon, Google has recently changed Google Shopping to require e-commerce companies to pay to be included in shopping results, so product listings are now ads. Inclusion used to be free.
Google says the change will improve its shopping results because retailers are more likely to list accurate and up-to-date items if they are paying. It says the service had become polluted with product listings that were out of date or misled consumers about things like shipping prices.
By requiring retailers to pay for listings, “incentives are aligned to make sure the data we’re receiving is of a higher quality,” said Sameer Samat, vice president for product management for Google Shopping, which used to be called Google Product Search and, before that, Froogle. “With better data, we can build a better experience for users.”
Although some retailers agree, and say the move could even help their sales, others are panicking. Some say they will not pay for listings or will include fewer products, which could shrink the selection shoppers see on Google.
The move is a way for Google to make more money from retailers, some of its most lucrative advertisers, but it also needs to improve product listings to keep valuable customers from going to Amazon.
“Google and Amazon both have the same end goal, to be the destination that people go to to do their product searches, and Amazon’s winning that battle,” said Michael Griffin, founder and chief technology officer of Adlucent, which does search marketing for online retailers and formerly managed Amazon’s paid search.
The shift to paid listings on Google Shopping began this summer and will be complete this fall. It is part of Google’s expanding e-commerce playbook, which also includes Wallet for payments, Offers for daily deals and the Google Shopper mobile app for finding items nearby.

‘Online fashion market will keep growing 100% yoy’

For Mukesh Bansal (36), founder and CEO of Myntra.com, becoming an entrepreneur was not an accident. Since his early days in IIT-Kanpur, Bansal was clear that he wanted to start his own venture. Having worked with four Silicon valley start-ups in the e-commerce and software space, he picked up the nuances of running a successful business going way back to 1999. Backed by a funding of $70 million from leading global investors, the online fashion retailer is aiming for an IPO in the US market in the next two years. In conversation with Darlington Jose Hector and Debojyoti Ghosh, Bansal talks about his plans for the company and how his start-up is reaching out to the aspirational consumer of middle India and taking the e-commerce phenomenon to smaller cities.
In any sunrise industry, if there is a credible opportunity, a lot of people tend to come in. There is a gold rush kind of mentality. Too many players are crowding the market today but you can see this in two ways. On the one hand, this validates the credibility of the opportunity. On the other hand, not all of the players are likely to get funded. To achieve scale, you need to get the right team, investors and application of the right technology. Already there is some consolidation happening. Some companies have started to fold up. Over the next 3-4 years, 1-2 very big horizontal players will emerge, vertically there will be 2-3 players dominating the show. They will have 80-85% of the market between them.
What kind of players will survive?
E-commerce is mostly about execution and requires a lot of funding. Subsequent rounds of investments will only go to people who are number 1-2 in their categories. For numbers 3, 4 and 5, it will be very difficult to find investors. Small players won’t be able to compete with the larger ones. They will have to settle for being a small player, growing organically and trying to get to profitability. Or they will have to sell out to a larger player. Or shut shop. I’m sure we will see all three cases happening, depending on the entrepreneurs’ mindset.
How big is the addressable e-commerce market in the country? What is the growth rate?
Overall, the off-line fashion and lifestyle market in India is about $50 billion (around R2.5 lakh crore). Of the overall market, online constitutes a very small portion, which is estimated to be about R2,000-2,500 crore currently. We see the online fashion segment growing 100% yoy. In the next 4-5 years we see the market touching R15,000-20,000 crore. Wherever e-commerce has grown, growth has been more than 100% yoy. In China, for instance, growth has been more than 100% yoy over the last 5 years.
People say that the cash-on-delivery model is not sustainable over a period of time. But it is also one of the key drivers of the e-commerce business in India.
Cash-on-delivery is a huge part of Indian e-commerce. It offers a comfort factor. I feel the cash-on-delivery model is here to stay. E-commerce companies have to make this model more efficient and cost effective. To make this model more efficient, we have invested heavily in logistics, so that we are able to offer a better cash-on-delivery experience. We now get cash on the same day and not in 2-3 days. Currently our cash-on-delivery return rates are 5-6% and if we can bring this down to 3-4%, that will be very healthy.
What do you think will enable you to continue to be in the forefront of this sector?
Today our size is our strength. We had multiple rounds of investments and have raised about $70 million in funding so far. After Flipkart, we are the second-best-funded company in the space and the second-largest. We have a very strong team in place at both the management and the mid-management levels. The brand is fairly well established, as people know Myntra and what it stands for. We have invested heavily in a number of areas like call centres, supply chains and product experience. We have built a very strong technology team. Myntra has about 60 engineers; most of them are IIT graduates and from leading product companies like Google, Yahoo and Amazon. Barring 2-3 e-commerce companies, not many are investing in technology. I think a lot of the players aren’t approaching technology in the right way.
We are seeing a lot of e-commerce players enter the high-margin apparel space. How is Myntra handling the online apparel business, which is your core business?
Apparel as a category offers about 30-40% margin depending on the brand and price point. It is one of the higher margin categories. There is a lot of interest among start-ups in the fashion and lifestyle business, to enter the apparel space. Even other horizontal players are getting into this. The market for apparel is very big and overall it is a very healthy business model compared to other categories in the e-commerce business. We are doing close to 8,000 transactions per day in the apparel segment. And this segment has been growing steadily month on month. On an average, we are growing 50% every quarter. For us, apparel is half of our business, and the rest includes footwear and accessories. I feel other players may not be able to do justice in retailing fashion, as the market is already crowded.
You were into apparel, accessories and shoes, but recently you have forayed into cosmetics. Are you looking at expanding into newer segments?
Our overall focus is fashion and everything that people use and need in order to look good, which basically covers apparel, footwear, jewellery, accessories and cosmetics. We will never get into categories like books, electronics and toys. Myntra is only focused on fashion and lifestyle. We will continue to expand our existing segments and keep adding more brands. We are now focused on bringing some international brands, which are not available in India. The cosmetics category was recently launched and we are already doing 300 transactions per day.
Which are the global brands you are looking to tie up with?
I’m hopeful of launching at least 4-5 new brands this year. These brands will be mostly from the US. However, like Fabindia and New Balance, we are not looking at any exclusive tie-ups right now as most brands are reluctant. We are positioned as a current-season full price player and do very little discounting other than with the end-of-season sale. Brands certainly feel very good about that. Myntra deals with brands directly and this has helped establish strong relationships with the brands. They give us a preview of the latest collections before going into the market. Recently, Puma did an exclusive launch with us 4 weeks before it introduced the same collection in their own stores.
How do you see businesses in the tier II and III markets where penetration is still low?
About 50% of our sales come from outside the top 10 cities, from around 400 cities. We reach out to these markets through TV campaigns. We have also done targeted campaigns in cities like Lucknow, Pune and Chandigarh, through billboards and local newspapers. Facebook has a huge penetration in tier II and III cities, and we have utilised this platform to reach out to young consumers. The cash-on-delivery model helps. And the aspiration for brands is very high as people are willing to spend money to buy branded fashion items.
How did you hit upon this idea of online fashion retailing?
I was in the US for 10 years. I have worked with four different start-ups in the Silicon Valley. I’m from IIT-Kanpur. After IIT, I worked with Deloitte for two years and then moved to the US. I was very clear that I wanted to work with start-ups. I had this idea of starting something of my own. In 2006-07 this ‘personalisation’ business (personalising coffee cups, t-shirts etc) was getting very big in the US. The initial inspiration for Myntra came from there. But I realised that was a very niche category for India and too ahead of its time. That’s when we decided to move to fashion and lifestyle.
Now, we aspire to have an IPO, hopefully in the next 2-2.5 years. It is important for investors to get an exit. An IPO also gives you a reasonable amount of funds for future growth. It is a good thing for all the stakeholders. We are looking for a listing in the US. Meanwhile, we are very well funded for the next two years.

Snapdeal bets big on brand stores, mobile commerce

Snapdeal expects the recently launched 'brand stores' concept, which allows retailers to create their own store on the e-commerce major's website, to contribute 50 per cent to its sales in the next 12 months.
The company that has set a target of Rs 600 crore revenue in the current fiscal is also bullish on mobile commerce and expects nearly half of the purchases on its site to be
executed through the mobile platform in the next two years, an official said.
"With brand stores, Snapdeal aims to be an enabler for the many local/offline retailers to reach out to the growing online shopping population.
"Brands will be able to decide the look and feel of their page, customise product selection, manage promotions and exclusive launches," Snapdeal.com Founder and CEO Kunal Bahl said.
While the brands will be able to sign up for free, Bahl added there would be a revenue-share model based on the products sold.
At present, Snapdeal has about 3,000 odd stores operating through 'brand stores'. The company is in talk with about 2,000 more brands who "should be onbroard soon".
"We plans to have 10,000 brand stores in the next 12months," he said.
Snapdeal sees a lot of opportunity in 'brand stores' and will continue to build on the concept and offer further innovations in it, Bahl added.
He said, "Many brands, even the larger ones, do not have an e-commerce site. Some do not have the expertise to handle the back-end operations, such as logistics and payment. We will also help drive traffic to the sites."
The company is also bullish about mobile commerce.
Bahl said, "20 per cent of our traffic comes from mobiles -- both the application and the mobile site. We believe mobile commerce will account for about 50 per cent of total sales in the next two years."

Keeping competition at bay

Think of online shopping, and eBay would be one of the top names that pops up. The world’s renowned online marketplace came to India in 2005 after acquiring Bazee.com. This was a time when there were hardly any e-commerce players in the country and the potential of this space was still to be realised. Though the categories eBay offers now in India have not increased substantially since then, Abhimanyu Lal, head, category management at eBay feels that the depth of these categories in terms of various products has definitely increased. More importantly, the e-commerce company knows from where the growth is coming in the country and where the future potential lies — non metros, mobile commerce and sale of gadgets.
Says Lal, “India is a very dynamic market in gadgets and consumer electronics. The major trend that we are seeing is uptake in the sale of mobile phone category. Since everybody is moving towards smartphones globally, even India is catching up. Phone is no longer a luxury in India, it is an absolutely essential category. It is an individual device and these days every house has two to three phones.” On an average day on eBay India, a mobile handset sells every three minutes. This is higher as compared to a laptop that sells every nine minutes, a digital camera that sells every 19 minutes and a TV sells every 54 minutes.
Even for players like Flipkart and Snapdeal, gadgets and consumer electronics is a sweet spot. Kashyap Vadapalli, chief marketing officer, eBay India, says, “Gadgets have always been very popular on eBay India. With our extensive range of gadgets across brands, models and budgets which enable our consumers to get easy access to the best deals and widest selection online, we see a great demand coming from consumers across metros, tier II and tier III cities. Interestingly, non metro consumers are actually shopping for more gadgets than metro consumers.”
In the April-June quarter of this year, eBay saw phenomenal growth from non metros, reason being easy accessibility of products to consumers, through online shopping. During the same quarter, non-metros such as Thiruvananthapuram, Coimbatore, Kochi, Ghaziabad, Surat, Vadodara, Faridabad and Madurai were amongst the top 20 gadget cities. As much as 52% of transactions came from non-metros, which includes all cities except the top eight metros.
Lal feels that mobile commerce will uptake in a big way in India. “Mobile phones have 700 million users and Internet has only 100 million users in india. So you can imagine the potential in mobile e-commerce. For the same, we have come up with various apps which makes mobile shopping easier,” he says.
Competition from India
Asked whether eBay finds the Indian e-commerce market too cluttered with a plethora of ecommerce players in the country? Lal has an optimistic view, “I believe that competition is a great thing. It is helping in building an e-commerce ecosystem in India and is creating awareness among consumers to buy online. Other players are helping in expanding the message of e-commerce.” The top five competitors for eBay are Flipkart, Snapdeal, Myntra, Yebhi and Fashion & You.
Globally, eBay was founded in 1995 and definitely has a better experience of functioning in different geographies as compared to other newer players. Lal believes that there is no better time to enter the e-commerce market in India, and that is what start-ups should do. But he confesses, “The market readiness is definitely there for start ups and new companies, but I am not sure about the perspective of VC funding for the future.”
eBay does not hold inventory and that is the business model which has worked for the company globally. After all even in India it offers 6 million items in 2000 categories. Thus, a marketplace model (no inventory hold) helps in saving cost and earning better margins. “The benefits of not holding inventory are that one can sell anything from anywhere,” says Lal. He also feels that this can be a good cost saving method for start ups.
Broadly, there are already 15-20 million people who buy products online, amongst the 100 million internet users. So whether is it an established brand like eBay or a start up—there is scope for all!

Assocham expects festive season to push online sales by 140%

The upcoming festive season is likely to push the sales of e-commerce portals by about 140 per cent, industry body Assocham has said.
During key festivals like Karva Chauth, Dhanteras, Diwali, online shopping portals will see a growth of 135-140 per cent, Assocham Secretary General D S Rawat said in a statement.
Articles like electronic items, idols of gods and goddesses, sweets, clothes and jewellery are likely to be in huge demand mainly due to discounts which range from 10-15 per cent to 80-90 per cent.
According to a recent study by Forrester and Assocham, the e-commerce revenues in India will increase from USD 1.6 billion in 2012 to USD 8.8 billion in 2016.
The industry body further stated that factors such as home delivery, and '24x7' shopping are pushing the growth of e-commerce in India.
"The online shopping industry in India is fast catching on, not just in the larger metros but also in the smaller cities. At present the market is estimated at Rs 6,000 crore and is growing at over 250 per cent per year," Rawat said.
The industry body also stated that in 2011, e-shopping population in Delhi stood at 60 per cent and in Mumbai it was 72 per cent.
"The percentage increase for e-shoppers in 2012 would touch atleast 85 per cent in case of Mumbai, while in Delhi it is expected beyond 70 per cent," Assocham said.
The industry body also estimated that "for any shopping site, the sales are expected to go up by around 20-30 per cent month-on-month during October."

e-Leap of faith

It is never too late to fall for entrepreneurship. And the Indian e-commerce scenario epitomises this situation. Leaving a comfortable and cushy job in a big brand and starting your own company is not easy. Still quite a few have taken this step in the recent past, courtesy backing by venture capitalists to start ups in the e-commerce domain — accompanied by the wisdom these entrepreneurs have earned in their past working experience. A look at the statistics: Over $250-300 million has been invested in e-commerce start-ups between 2008 and 2011. In the last seven years, $750 million worth investment has gone by PE and VC in e-commerce. However, the bigger question remains whether this is the right time to start an e-commerce company in India? Or is the place too cluttered? To get a perspective of both sides, we talk to three entrepreneurs who left their job and started an e-commerce company.
Founder : Sandeep Aggarwal
Venture started : Shopclues.com in 2012
Prior to entrepreneurship : 16 years work experience
Last job: Internet analyst at Silicon valley
Sandeep is an analyst turned entrepreneur and weighs what he does. He recalls his life as an employee, “I used to earn $1 million a year as compensation and had an intellectually satisfying job. So, coming back to India from silicon valley and starting on my own was not an easy step.” But as an analyst who had studied the internet business closely in various geographies, he knew what will work and what will not work.
So what triggered the business idea? Tells Sandeep, “Two years back, MakeMyTrip was getting listed in NASDAQ and I decided to cover it in an analyst report. The real action in e-commerce began 2-3 years ago in India and globally it began 15-17 years ago. In India, e-commerce is here to stay. But most of the companies here in India are inventory based and globally this model has not worked.”
Shopclues sells in 250 different categories and has 2500 sellers on its website. The idea is to be like a mall and sell everything. “Our benefits are that we have a great selection and a large catalog . We do not have any inventory risk and are less dependent on capital. There is a healthy competition among pricing as well,” explains Sandeep. But the company indisputably faces a lot of competition from established players like Snapdeal, Flipkart and Myntra.
However, Agarwal is clear about the scope in e-commerce, “In the US, 6.5% of the retail is e-commerce, and it is only 0.1 % in India. So one can imagine the potential players like us have ahead,” his eyes sparkle.
Founder : Sridhar Seshadri
Venture started : Hushbabies.com in Jan 2012
Prior to entrepreneurship : 16 years work experience
Last job: Head, online sales and operations, Google India
‘Nothing is sacrosanct in a young company’, feels Seshadri. He loves the fact that his baby, ‘Hushbabies.com’ is faster in speed, encourages crazy ideas and takes nothing for granted unlike a big company. In his experience of more than 16 years in large companies like ICICI Bank and Google, across various senior leadership positions he experienced an environment where everything happens on tested grounds and ideas take time to be implemented.
Early this year, his baby happened to him which he feels is the result of an encounter he had with IndoUS Venture Partners last year. “I always wanted to do something of my own and my frequency matched very well with the investors then. I had worked with Google from 2007 to 2011 and had seen consumers going online in a big way,” he says. Seshadri realised the potential in digital domain and then there was no looking back.
Hushbabies.com is a one-stop online shopping source for parents and parents-to-be and Seshadri feels that the new parents are technology savvy and this market is very capital efficient. From January to November this year, the company has grown 15% month-on-month and does about 1000 orders a day. It faces online competition from firstcry.com and offline competition from famous retail store Mom& Me.The challenge remains to educate parents on innovative products which are used for childproofing in homes.
Do you also need parents in your team to educate parents? He laughs and says, “So when we are strategising, I make sure that the team is full of parents. Half of the employees in the organisation are parents.” The total headcount is 100.
Probed whether this is the right time for anybody to start an e-commerce company, even though the place is cluttered, he replies, “It is never too late. Investors always follow great ideas. You need to decide what problem you can solve through your business idea. It should be a problem which you can solve better than other players in the market.”
Founder : Manmohan Agarwal
Venture started : Yebhi.com in 2009
Prior to entrepreneurship : 20 years work experience
Last job: CEO at Vishal Retail
If Seshadri had expertise in dealing with online businesses, Manmohan started Yebhi.com after rich experience in the retail sector. “It was a tough call both mentally and emotionally to leave a job and start Yebhi.com, but I always wanted to be my own master. I chose e-commerce because I am from a retail background and I realised the opportunity in online retail back in 2009,” he says. He has also worked with names like Onicra Credit Rating Agency of India Limited as the COO and as an Operations Controller at Xerox Modicorp.
Manmohan claims that when he entered this space, e-commerce was not actually happening in India. But the story is different now, “We started with selling shoes, and now we have diversified into many areas. This was preplanned. We have already had three rounds of funding and experienced a handsome growth for the last two years,” he informs.
Bigshoebazaar, now re-branded Yebhi.com has expanded its catalogue extensively to offer a vast range of shoes, apparels, lifestyle, electronics, home furnishing, jewellery etc. Yebhi.com has received Rs 150 crore in three rounds of funding and continues to grow in product offering.
Unlike his own case, Manmohan is not very sure if this is the right time for anybody else to initiate a start up in the e-commerce space at present.“It is too late for anybody to start an e-commerce company in India today. People will have to do much more hardwork now to make a mark. Though they will have a clearer path, but will have an undecided future. For me, the e-commerce space only comprises top five companies- Snapdeal, Myntra, Flipkart, Yebhi and Fashion & You,” he says.
But one thing is clear with Manmohan, “I do not want to be the Amazon of India, I want to be the Yebhi of India.” This means that he is focusing on a business model which handles 100% inventory and the delivery time is quicker.