Thought of the Day:
“It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool, than to talk and remove all doubt of it.”
Maurice Switzer
Did you know?
Both Hitler and Osama Bin Laden were announced dead on May 1.
India:
International:
“It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool, than to talk and remove all doubt of it.”
Maurice Switzer
Did you know?
Both Hitler and Osama Bin Laden were announced dead on May 1.
India:
- From 10,000 to $1 Billion, Bansals’ e-Special Journey: It was a 10,000-a-month allowance from their parents for almost 18 months that helped Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal launch an ecommerce website retailing books in October 2007. Today, the near-20% stake they hold, along with the top management, in Flipkart is valued at almost . 2,000 crore. Sachin Bansal, the chief executive of Bangalore-based Flipkart, says he has a knack for underestimation. That is exactly what happened in March 2011 when he and Binny Bansal, who are not related to each other, announced they would reach the $1-billion (. 6,100-crore) sales mark in 2015. Last week, the site, which now sells everything from books to electronics, apparel and jewellery, reached the milestone, a full year ahead of the target. “To say billion-dollar in 2011 was crazy when we were doing a $10 million (. 61 crore) run rate,” says Sachin, 32, in his first interview after the firm achieved the sales target. “It was just a belief.” Bansals are Demanding Bosses Sachin, like his co-founder, grew up in Chandigarh. That is not the only coincidence. Both went to IIT Delhi and worked at different companies for about a year before ending up in the same team at Amazon. It was during this stint that the two decided to start up. The duo pooled in . 2 lakh each and with two computers launched the site from their two-bedroom apartment in Koramangala, a primarily residential locality in Bangalore where the company now has multiple offices. For 10 days, the site did not see a single sale and then a customer from Andhra Pradesh placed the first order for the book ‘Leaving Microsoft to Change the World’ by John Wood. “We were not thinking about numbers then, but we knew something big can be built out of ecommerce,” says Binny. The two are demanding bosses, say their employees. “Both have high expectations, but that raises our bar. That makes working with them rewarding as well,” says Amod Malviya, head of engineering at Flipkart. He says the Bansals have complementary personalities. While Binny is analytical and driven by logic, Sachin is more instinctive and is driven by emotion and passion, says Malviya, who joined the company in 2010 as a senior manager. Experts say the success of Flipkart can be chalked down to the founders’ attitude.
- Back to Ground Zero: Zero percent EMI schemes are back. Not that they'd gone away altogether, but offers had dwindled as banks got cold feet after the Reserve Bank of India frowned upon the practice because it seemed to be a way of concealing charges. However, with customers staying away, retailers are entering into business arrangements with brands to draw them back to showrooms, bypassing the banks. Under the new arrangement, retailers and manufacturers will share the interest cost on such offers that were earlier taken on by banks and brands. All such offers will be on the (lower) market operating price and not the maximum retail price (MRP) as it often used to be earlier, another grey area that the central bank had pointed out in September last year. The country’s largest cellphone retail chain, Essar Group-owned The Mobile Store, launched a zero percent scheme 10 days ago in partnership with Samsung, Sony and Nokia on smartphones bought through credit cards. Other chains such as Next Retail, PlanetM Retail and Future Group said they are in the process of launching such schemes, while Tata-owned Croma and Reliance Digital said they would be evaluating such programmes. Sony has relaunched a scheme for its televisions, but it's taking on all of the interest cost. The Mobile Store CEO Himanshu Chakrawarti said there has been a sudden pickup in sales, up 30-35% in the last seven days, through the plan. “Sales are at par with Diwali. A bridge such as interest-free EMI (equated monthly installment) was required and hence we relaunched the zero EMI offer across all brands and banks,” he said.
- Pakistani fashion retailers eye e-commerce to woo Indian markets: Pakistan might not yet have granted India the long-promised most favoured nation (MFN) status but that hasn't dampened the enthusiasm of fashion-retail chains here who view e-commerce as a means of fostering cross-border business and penetrating new global markets. One of the pioneers of Pakistan's fashion-retail chains, Zahir Rahimtoola, became the first to open an e-store of its established Labels brand in August 2012. The idea was to reach out to a new customer base not only in Pakistan but in other countries as well, with India being one of them. "Pakistan doesn't have the luxury of a transient population because of the political situation, and more so in Karachi which is perceived as a dangerous city. There is a scare perception that restricts a lot of tourist and transient activity in the country," Rahimtoola, the CEO of Labels, told a visiting IANS correspondent recently. "What happens in Pakistan is that you are basically catering to the same audience and in the retail operation everything flattens out in such a closed system. So, the next best thing we thought for our business was to go online because there is a huge Indo-Pak diaspora across the world," he added, saying shipments are sent to countries like Canada, the US, Afghanistan, Botswana, and Brunei. While Rahimtoola claims he gets orders of around 8-10 outfits from Indian customers every day, another well-known Pakistani brand Khaadi, whose fashion aesthetics are similar to Indian ethnic fashion label Fab India's philosophy, launched its e-store in January and is planning to start shipping to India shortly.
- US Firms Picks Up 62-Cr Stake in Sanghvi Brands: American asset management firm Tano Capital has bought a significant minority stake in Sanghvi Brands, which operates international wellness brands such as L’Occitane spas and Warren Tricomi salons in India, for $10 million, or about . 62 crore. Tano Capital, founded by former Franklin Templeton Investments co-president Chuck Johnson, has picked up around 20-30% in Sanghvi Brands, said Sushant Bhansali, vice-president at Ambit Holdings, who advised the transaction. “This is the first round of PE funding for Sanghvi and the investment will be used for its overseas expansions,” Bhansali said. Darpan Sanghvi, managing director at Sanghvi Brands, said, “We are looking for growth capital as our company is already making profits.” His firm holds the exclusive rights in India for French luxury brand L’Occitane spas, boxing legend Evander Holyfield’s brand Holyfield Gyms, American salon brand Warren Tricomi and Hollywood celebrity fitness trainer Ramona Braganza. According to Bhansali, Sanghvi Brands has also received the licence to develop L’Occitane spas in Mauritius, the Maldives, Sri Lanka and Seychelles, and is in talks to launch Warren Tricomi salons in more countries. The four-year-old company currently has 28 spas, gyms and salons across 15 cities in the country. It plans to add 70 more centres in the country in two to three years.
- Consumers shift to unorganized retailers to buy gold jewellery: Companies such as Titan Co. Ltd, which weaned customers away from small stand-alone jewellery stores with the promise of purity, honesty, superior design and standardization, have faced the brunt of the volatility in gold prices, and import curbs on the metal put in place by the government. Since January 2012, the government, through a series of duty increases, had raised the import levy on gold to discourage imports of the precious metal and control the rising current account deficit. Customs duty on gold, silver and platinum now stand at 10%. In August 2013, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) introduced quantitative restrictions on the import of gold by linking it to the amount exported, which restricted supply and gave rise to a large grey market. According to a recent estimate from the World Gold Council, approximately 150-200 tonnes in gold were smuggled into India in 2013, compared with 112 tonnes in 2012. The result has been a lower price in local stores. “Buying from Tanishq was becoming very expensive, whereas my local jeweller is giving me very good deals,” said Suchita Bhanushali, a 34-year-old professional who has switched to buying her jewellery from a smaller jeweller, rather than the Titan-owned Tanishq stores. Titan’s management, however, says it has not noticed a shift in buying patterns, adding that smaller unorganized shops are more susceptible to the volatility in the gold market.
- Kisan group enters food business, launches three products: The city-based Kisan Group of companies, entered the food business today by launching three products. The group is involved in various businesses, including manufacturing cement, agricultural equipment and cotton ginning, and is known for its 'Hi Bond' brand of cement. "We are focussing on entering the food industry phase wise. Initially we will launch our products in Saurashtra and Kutch. Gradually, we will expand our network in Gujarat. We plan to cover entire Gujarat by end of the next financial year," Vadalia Foods managing director Rajan Vadalia said here. Considering that the food industry is the fifth largest growing sector, Vadalia said the food industry is growing at a 20 per cent growth rate, while the processed food industry's growth was around 36 per cent last year.
International:
- The World Wide Web turns 25: Twenty-five years ago, the World Wide Web was just an idea in a technical paper from an obscure, young computer scientist at a European physics lab. That idea from Tim Berners-Lee at the CERN lab in Switzerland, outlining a way to easily access files on linked computers, paved the way for a global phenomenon that has touched the lives of billions of people. He presented the paper on 12 March 1989, which history has marked as the birthday of the Web. But the idea was so bold, it almost didn’t happen.“There was a tremendous amount of hubris in the project at the beginning,” said Marc Weber, creator and curator of the Internet history program at the Computer History Museum in Silicon Valley. “Tim Berners-Lee proposed it out of the blue, unrequested.”At first, said Weber, the CERN colleagues “completely ignored the proposal”. The US military began studying the idea of connected computer networks in the 1950s, and in 1969 launched Arpanet, the forerunner to the Internet. But the World Wide Web was just one of several ideas to connect the public. Berners-Lee convinced CERN to adopt his system, demonstrating its usefulness by compiling a lab phone book into an online index.
- Retailing's Battlefield: Fight for Market Share: Fashion’s become a street fight for market share. To grow and keep ravenous investors happy, retailers need to do everything they can to push their competitors out of the consumer’s mind — in the process squaring off against everyone from the store across the mall to the hot new line, the latest gadget, the new food trend, the most popular app and more. For retailers, every dollar spent elsewhere is a problem in a world where so few new stores are opening and C and D malls are in danger of going dark. The market share battle is growing even more intense given the increasing pressure on physical stores as retailers go bankrupt (most recently, Dots), struggle with paradigm shifts (Radio Shack, Best Buy) or simply trim their store portfolios to focus on the best-performing units (J.C. Penney Co. Inc., Macy’s, Sears, Nordstrom, Saks Fifth Avenue, Abercrombie & Fitch and more). The only solution is for companies to constantly up their game. To win, brands and retailers — even channels of distribution — need to be more stylish, faster and, if not cheaper, then serving up more value to customers. That might mean better sales staff, finer workmanship, some new digital feature or just a little more sizzle.
- Original Penguin Opens N.Y. Flagship: Original Penguin has opened a flagship in a high-traffic location in the East Village here designed to appeal to the Millennial customer. The store, at 654 Broadway at Bond Street, in the heart of the New York University campus, measures 2,800 square feet and replaces a smaller unit on Greene Street in SoHo. The company also operates a store farther uptown near Bryant Park. The new unit features an updated design aesthetic that includes walnut wood accents against white walls and a large back-lit Original Penguin logo behind the cash register. The store features leather seating, metal tables and fixtures that incorporate the brand’s logo. There are also two “focal walls” — one in the front for the brand’s signature Earl Polo shirt, and another that showcases an expanded assortment of accessories such as shoes, socks, belts, ties, hats, sunglasses and bags. Other classifications include sport shirts, casual suits, jeans and lightweight jackets. “This is the first store with this look and feel,” said James Ha, vice president of marketing. “It’s a big shift away from the post-modern blues and greens that we have in other stores. It’s a contemporary interpretation that is clean and streamlined.” The design elements found in this unit will serve as a prototype for all future stores, he said.
- Quiksilver Sees Big Challenges for Small Accounts: Quiksilver Inc. expects continued pressure on smaller accounts in its wholesale business in mature markets as it continues to gear itself more to special makeup business for its larger customers. After disclosing first-quarter results which fell below analysts’ consensus estimates on both the top and bottom lines, Andy Mooney, president and chief executive officer of the Huntington Beach, Calif., apparel and footwear firm, told analysts on a conference call, “I think increasingly the larger retailers aren’t really interested in what our line is. What they are interested in is what their line is. Each of those retailers are increasingly looking for custom designed lines that appeal to both their unique consumer as they see it and certainly their business objectives.” Reflecting on his two decades with Nike, he noted that stores veered toward products they could sell exclusively so “they could control their own margin destiny. That’s now become the norm, that every retailer in the mall is looking down the mall to see what their competitor has from the same brand and if they have something similar they’re not that interested in carrying the brand.”
- Fabric Imports Post Double-Digit Increases in January: Fabric imports from China, India, Taiwan, Turkey and Indonesia all posted double-digit increases in January — a potential sign that a rebound in U.S. apparel manufacturing is taking hold. The monthly trade report released by the Commerce Department Friday showed textile imports to the U.S. from the world, which includes fabrics, rose 14 percent to 2.9 billion square meter equivalents in January from a year earlier. Apparel imports, meanwhile, increased 3.4 percent to 2.1 billion SME. Combined textile and apparel shipments to the U.S. were up 9.2 percent in January to 5 billion square meter equivalents. While there has been anecdotal evidence and some data supporting a small but burgeoning rebound in Made in America production, the new import data appears to bolster the argument that there is growing momentum in U.S. apparel production. Though apparel employment fell by 900 to 136,700 jobs in February, mills making apparel fabrics and yarns added 1,100 jobs to employ 117,500 in the month, another potential sign of a domestic production turnaround. “I would think that it is a sign that there is some uptick in domestic manufacturing,” said Nate Herman, vice president of international trade at the American Apparel & Footwear Association. “Just because apparel employment went down, doesn’t mean apparel manufacturing is not on the rise.”
Currency:
· 1 USD= ₹ 61.283
· 1 EUR= ₹ 85.088
· 1 GBP= ₹ 102.554
· 1 AUD= ₹ 55.407
Glitter Meter: India
Gold (INR/10g) | Silver (INR/kg) | |||
City | Current | Change | Current | Change |
Chennai | 30460.00 | 60 | 46880.00 | 215 |
Mumbai | 29970.00 | 50 | 46880.00 | 215 |
Delhi | 29720.00 | 50 | 46880.00 | 215 |
Kolkata | 29840.00 | 40 | 46880.00 | 215 |
World Indices:
Exchange | Last | Change |
DJIA | 16452.72 | +30.83 |
FTSE 100 | 6712.67 | -75.82 |
CAC 40 | 4366.42 | -50.62 |
DAX | 9350.75 | -192.12 |
Nikkei | 15121.33 | -152.74 |
Hang Seng | 22283.37 | -377.12 |
Sensex | 21940.87 | +21.08 |
NASDAQ | 4336.22 | -15.90 |
*Disclaimer:
World One Consulting Pvt Ltd will not accept any liability for loss or damage as a result of reliance on the information contained within this newsletter including data, quotes, charts and buy/sell signals.
World One Consulting Pvt Ltd will not accept any liability for loss or damage as a result of reliance on the information contained within this newsletter including data, quotes, charts and buy/sell signals.