League of Champions

India’s time is now, as its wealthiest blaze to the top in Asia...

To be candid with you, I was almost beginning to feel world-weary with the Forbes list of our planet’s richest billionaires. Year after year, it invariably read the same: Bill Gates at the peak, with Warren Buffett in close succession, the illustrious from ‘developed’ economies like the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan and France ruling the upper echelons of the global affluent, and India representing a flash-in-the-pan dotting the horizon somewhere, flaunting a handful of ubiquitous names that made it big.

So a few days back, when Forbes rolled out its latest rankings for the year, and India dethroned Japan for the numero uno slot among Asia’s most flourishing individuals, it was, to express it mildly – a pleasant surprise! Now boasting 36 billionaires with a combined net share of $191 billion between them, in contrast to Japan’s coterie of 24 worth a net aggregate of $64 billion, we didn’t just dethrone, rather we steamrollered Japan to end its 20-year-old dominion over the continent! With 14 newcomers striding into the high-game highway in 2007, and second only in number to the United States so far as the first-ten tier is concerned, the occasion does mark a landmark of sorts. And pleasant as the happenstance may be, I’d say it comes across as anything but as a surprise.

Two facts shine through: One, India’s traditionally super-rich players are steadily marching towards the pinnacle of international prosperity (a fact acknowledged by Forbes itself), and what is far more significant and a trend indicative of one likely to eventually rule the roost, the ascent of new-world entrepreneurs into the global big-ticket bandwagon (delightful coincidence that last year, at precisely this time, I had penned a piece on India Inc.’s resourceful fresh entrants gracing the world stage in times to come). So, apart from the uber-rich like L. N. Mittal, the Ambani Brothers, Azim Premji and Kumara Mangalam Birla, who constantly do our nation proud by exponentially reinforcing their legacy, I feel it’s the entrepreneurial talent on the list of the lately-arrived that merits close consideration.

Take the case of 39-year-old maverick Jignesh Shah, who created India’s biggest commodities exchange MCX or 41-year-old Kalanithi Maran of Sun TV, who took a very average publishing business to an enterprising conglomerate operating 14 channels and 4 radio stations, besides magazines and newspapers. Then of course, there’s the relatively older but no less spirited, Ramesh Chandra, who started off with a consulting company and amassed his billions providing homes for the country’s burgeoning middle-class. And K. Dinesh, among the founders of the legend that the world now knows as Infosys, who appears to give fellow founder Nandan Nilekani good company!

And then, of course, dazzle the prodigies of raw inventive genius that evoke inspiration. Sunil Mittal is a man who needs scant introduction, surging ahead to frontiers anew till today. 35-year-old IIT-Delhi Graduate, Anurag Dikshit, who moved to Gibraltar and produced a revolution with his online gaming portal PartyGaming, and Tulsi Tanti, who transited from the textile industry to alternative energy, resulting in the genesis of the country’s 15th most priced company, Suzlon. Subhash Chandra, Naresh Goyal...the legion continues to expand!

And while we rejoice in such individual accomplishments, the stark contradiction of circumstances that manifests itself in the malaise of poverty India is still ridden with, and the yawning per capita income chasm that exists between us and advanced nations, if allowed to endure, will shackle us from achieving – and making – true sense of any superpower vision. If anything than superficial, the current moment of glory must be construed as a vindication of the hope that a progressive and ethically sound entrepreneurial cluster that possesses the inherent gift of spawning opportunity, employment and talent, will unlock a veritable ‘world’ of wealth for a nation whose time has irresistibly dawned…

Written On:

25-10-2007

Strength of a woman!

A new-age India witnesses the dawn of eve power... all the way!

As 4Ps Business & Marketing completes two magnificent years of its existence and we present our much cherished readers with yet another one-of-a-kind special feature – showcasing India’s forty most prolific women achievers under the age of forty – the occasion sweeps me with what is at once a sense of pride and pleasure at the giant strides that the Indian woman of today has paced forward within the last decade, casting an indelible impression of accomplishment in practically every realm of business and society. Be it the corporate arena, the fields of literature and art, sports, politics, information technology, entertainment or media, there’s more than the traditional handful of women flying the country’s flag high into the new millennium you could identify with, domestically and globally.

And while it may well be considered rude to ask a girl her age and weight, the gravity with which these stellar livewires have descended into public consciousness coupled with the magnitude of their achievements is impossible to ignore. We’ve basked in the now familiar glory of Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, whose efforts at Biocon made her the nation’s wealthiest businesswoman; Chanda Kochhar, Shikha Sharma and Renuka Ramnath – each a phenomenon in their own right who have spearheaded the ICICI success saga – Naina Lal Kidwai of HSBC and Vidya Mohan Chhabria of the behemoth Jumbo Electronics company, making it to the echelons of the prestigious 50 most powerful women in international business compiled by Fortune, a few years back. With these role models to emulate in the foreground, the present has been blessed with the phenomenal ascent of the young female Indian professional and businesswoman, catapulting into an erstwhile pre-conceived, male-dominated bastion of senior and top-rung management names like Madhabi Puri-Buch, Kiran Chhabria, Monisha Shah, Vedika Bhandarkar, Shireen Bhan, Ekta Kapoor, Barkha Dutt, Renuka Jaipal and Priti Nair Chakravarthy, besides dynamic young business leaders of the ilk of Sulajja Firodia Motwani, Pia Singh, Schauna Chauhan, Manisha Girotra and Pooja Jain, each a formidable force in their functional domain. Then there springs to mind the ladies to whom we owe international acclaim: the likes of Indra Nooyi, who rose to the position of PepsiCo’s global CEO last year and earned Fortune’s No.1 title for the Most Powerful Woman in Business (2006), Booker Prize winners Arundhati Roy and Kiran Desai, Pulitzer Prize awardee Jhumpa Lahiri, to name a few. I personally have admired Rajita Chaudhuri (Dean-Undergratuate Studies - IIPM) more than most. Simply because of the fact that she not just makes an amazing teacher – where all her students that I have known swear by her to have made a difference in their lives most positively – but also her management and motivational skills are absolutely extraordinary. And also like most ideal a woman should be, she makes a great mother and wife who just brilliantly balances the entire mix of sheer brilliance of a woman.

Blessed as this trend is, and far too significant to form a matter of mere fluke, the fact remains that the quantum of women managers and leaders at the higher-ranking, strategic and directorial levels of corporate hierarchy is still sparse, internationally and more so closer home. Whilst globalisation and the arrival of multinationals in India has translated, over a period of time, into a stupendous number of opportunities and considerably led to moulding conventional mindsets towards women employees occupying positions of executive power and administrative influence, I believe that we’re yet to transcend nascence in this regard. And the benefits are only for corporations to revel in. At the risk of sounding a feminist, I feel we need to appreciate what is a well-documented truth: women possess the uncanny ability to accept and tackle situations in a more detached and rational manner than their male counterparts. They are known to discern with perfect clarity the objectives and output they desire, besides the very critical element of empathy and intuitive thinking they bring to the table as a natural attribute (and yes, on a lighter note, why do they always do better at studies?!). Think of it, if you were to design a marketing strategy for a consumer product knowing for sure that more than 50% of your target audience would evidently comprise the opposite gender, whom would you be better off hiring to create your blueprint?! So I say, shatter that proverbial glass ceiling with finality and think beyond the barriers of illiteracy and prejudice, with a line from Shaggy that goes out to all the women I know… So amazing how this world was made, I wonder if GOD is a woman…

Written On:

05-06-2010

Freedom Under Siege

“Like adequate education, freedom of expression is no longer a political nicety, but a precondition for economic competitiveness,” or so mused American creative thinking great, Alvin Toffler. Well, leave aside economic spirit, judging by the events that have transpired in the last month, I don’t quite believe it is even a political nicety in our country anymore. Case in point is the Broadcasting Services Regulation Bill 2006, devised purportedly by the Information & Broadcasting Ministry with the noble objective of thwarting the emergence of monopolies in Indian media.

Fair enough... you would presume, and probably not tender it much consideration beyond what media tycoons of the land now have to contend with, with the draft intending to fix a ceiling on cross-media ownership – across broadcasting and cable networks, radio and DTH – portending a realignment of shareholding structures. But sneak a glance into what lies beneath, and the proposed bill bears in its fold some extremely tyrannical legislations.

According to the plan, “In the event of war or a natural calamity of national magnitude, the Central Government may, in public interest, take over the control and management of any of the broadcasting services or any facility connected therewith, suspend its operation or entrust the public service broadcaster to manage it, in the manner directed by the Government for such period as it deems fit.” Further, the draft also contains provisions for penalising and repealing licenses of those breaching its instructions, besides a prearranged ‘content code’ for all broadcasters to incorporate!

If you thought that was enough already, the bill recommends the founding of a Broadcasting Regulatory Authority of India (BRAI), with an official on the payroll of the Government as its Secretary/CEO. Surprise Surprise! And if this didn’t suffice, here’s more: If, at any time, a broadcaster’s service is “considered prejudicial to friendly relations with a foreign country, public order, communal harmony or security of the state,” brother BRAI could brandish its sword and snatch your right to air your programme, temporarily or better still, for keeps.

Every sanctioned BRAI administrator – as wide-ranging as a district magistrate, sub-divisional magistrate or police commissioner – according to the bill blueprint, would wield the clout to inspect, search, and seize broadcasting equipment on receipt of complaint, or restrict service providers from playing or replaying a show or channel “if it is not in conformity with the prescribed content code, or if it is likely to promote feelings of disharmony or of enmity, hatred or ill-will between religious, racial, linguistic or regional groups or castes or communities or which is likely to disturb public tranquillity.”

And if the draft bill were ever to materialise into an Act, it’s ‘Hasta la Vista, Baby’ to sting journalism, hidden cameras and media revelations of concerns involving high-flying politicos or celebrities, without “identifiable public interest reason.”

And here’s the mother lode – the Government, in consonance with the draft, will not only embrace the privilege to frame fresh regulations for the media as and when it pleases, but the proposed BRAI-officials’ adventures cannot even be contested in the court! Well, where does one even begin to fathom or react to this brilliant masterstroke of media management? Were it not so horrendously high-handed, it might even have been hilarious.

It’s nothing short of a grim reminder of times during the Emergency (1975-77), when newspapers were obligated to relinquish their subject matter for shearing by the Government, before it decided what was ‘suitable’ for printing. Today, when we are well and truly living in the information age, with the media more often than not proving the one sane source and link to transparency, this sort of all-encompassing command to the state could effectively castrate the spirit of the free press, with tenets of the bill open for exploitation to the hilt by the powers that be.

The words of the Honourable I&B Minister, Shri Priyaranjan Dasmunsi, “I can say with responsibility that the bill will be a media friendly, progressive legislation not seen anywhere in the world,” seem true only in the final clause. Very few places on the planet indeed, would have even heard of such a prejudiced regulation. Worse still is the initial unilateralist attitude with which the ministry first approached the matter – never at first consulting media concerns nor industry representatives – instead proclaiming the draft bill would neither be “diluted” or “polluted.”

Almost equally baffling was the I&B minister’s volte-face on television, urging that the provisions of the bill did not seek to address established national channels, but to curb the unmitigated multitude of cable operators and regional networks that have emerged in areas of unrest in the country.

We’ve seen it before; the stark reality is that every Government or ruling authority of whichever kind in the universe would rub its hands in glee with the prospect of controlling the media, for it’s perhaps the one inexorable opponent that brings the elements of accountability and transparency – or at least fear of these – to any administration’s operative proclivities. So, be it subtle stratagems of smothering the media by forbidding news on FM radio or mercilessly ripping away parts from felicitated films or relegating television programming to ‘Universal’-rated themes or outright asphyxiation of the media, it might as well not ring as too much trepidation.

I think the truth lies bare before us all: Be it the Tsunami in South India, the earthquake in Kashmir, the floods or the blasts in Mumbai, media-persons were at the heart of each calamity much before anyone else decided to awaken. The courageous new avatar of journalism in India has seen too many skeletons popping out of parliamentary closets, too many beans being spilt on covert escapades, and in the unravelling of this truth lies the bone of contention, that leads to the very likely possibility of such totalitarian legislations even being conceived.

And while it is fortunate enough that the current broadcast bill may not finally be tabled in this monsoon session of Parliament and with any luck, die a natural death (much like it’s predecessors in 1998 and 2000), the burden of duty is now on the shoulders of the country’s media and broadcasting industry to organise and present unitedly a solution that is put in order with a degree of finality.

One would submit that private television – and media as a whole today – is driven to a large extent by corporate advertising, and content many-a-times ventures into the realm of the mindless and the crude, but overriding measures such as this draft bill can hardly be expected to act as alleviative

measures. The remedy, in my opinion, is for the private broadcasting community to mutually craft a code of conduct on programming, with an autonomous media body designated to implement its guiding principles. There lies too ominous the probability of compromise of justice in giving the bureaucracy, police and the Government the right to interfere blatantly with media functioning, anywhere in the world.

Free speech is not just a fundamental right, but more aptly the most sacred of all rights, devoid of which, neither would any hunt for truth be possible, nor the discovery of any truth valuable…

Wriiten On:

17-10-2006

Executive Precision!

The top guns of India Inc. are roaring, and with good reason…

Think of our nation’s spectacular ascent to the economic high ground it is perched on today in the context of 21st century global dynamics, and there’s an intriguing paradox that strikes home. While the quantum leap in progress the Indian economy has taken since the decade-and-a-half of liberalisation is a feat the world bears testament to, that setting shop successfully in India does not exactly equate a walk in the park is also a fact nearly everyone who means business in the land will agree to!

Yet, though the World Bank’s ‘Doing Business 2007’ Report awards India a no. 134 slot among 175 countries on an index of ease of operating an enterprise from end-to-end, the benefits of commercial prosperity dazzle like never before on consumers and companies alike. Flipping through another edition of a refreshing special issue 4Ps B&M dished out last fortnight, I couldn’t but muse over one of the pivotal factors spearheading this revolutionary trend of advancement and growth – those three letters spelling out the pizzazz of modern-day India’s passionate change agents – C-E-O.

We’re only too familiar with the attributes in general that constitute the fabric of a great leader. On this occasion, however, let’s dwell on the mettle that relegates CEOs functioning in the Indian marketspace to a formidable league, one that well… you’ll discover in the course of this discussion, is quite their own. So what makes the Indian CEO so special?

Foremost, I believe is a characteristic that has proved itself near-inherent to successful corporate leaders in India – ‘innovation’; an ability to consciously encourage creative visualisation & deployment of skills to engender products & services equally unique in their value proposition. Far more than ever, today’s fiercely competitive & globalised marketplace milieu compels the existence of innovation not as a mere frill, but as an inescapable necessity! Be it the iconic Narayana Murthy who ensures innovation stays vibrant from the top in Infosys’ bloodstream, the bold Sunil Mittal with his revolutionary operating philosophy that outsources everything except marketing & customer management at Bharti Tele-ventures Ltd., or the perennially-on-the-move Dr. Vijay Mallya who quite aptly brought the ‘good times’ to Indian air travellers, this focus towards innovation as a tool for competitive advantage is truly providing India Inc. an edge over the international pack.

A relentless pursuit of novel concepts, techniques to better manage information, the latest technology and brainstorming to constantly improvise and masterfully deliver customised offerings to a discerning consumer base is another trait that outlines the majority of India’s head honchos, when placed against the greater priority to intangibles like corporate image and goodwill accorded in America and Europe. Much in distinction to their global contemporaries (and contrary to what television soaps would like us to believe!), the man at the helm in corporate India possesses scant regard for bickering while work, preferring to limit both the rumour mill and conversations pertaining to a personal nature. Finally, and most significantly, is the willingness and propensity of the Indian business leader to not just adapt, but thrive in a regulatory ambience austere and laborious enough (and that’s stating it mildly!) to daunt even the best!

There are drawbacks, I agree, when it comes to harbouring that essential measure of emotional intelligence apart from technical acumen, an enhanced appreciation of employee welfare or the very need for such perseverance as manifested to sustain one’s own in the midst of a hundred formalities required for conducting business in a nation fast cutting inroads into global superpowerdom. The number of acquisitions effected by Indian organisations in the last year alone is evidence enough of a trend the international community has not just taken cognisance of, but is increasingly becoming wary of. Yet, both the corporate fraternity & the government need to tighten their acts to further the development of the labour class and the poor through fair and equitable distribution of incomes across the lower socioeconomic strata if India is to be viewed as an economic behemoth in the right perspective.

Be that as it may, what’s just as incontrovertible is that we’re well on our way to becoming masters of the game, and as this Independence Day augurs the dawn on a nation emerging as the world’s largest truly democratic superpower blazing its glorious trail on the economic highway, Chak de India Inc!!!

Written On:

25-10-2007

A Bombshell Called Branding

A couple of months back I happened to be in Germany on a business visit, and as I sipped on a latte at a Starbucks outlet swarming with a veritable sea of populace one morning, it was an overwhelming thought that popped in my mind. What in the world would make people willing enough to spend the equivalent of nearly three dollars worth on a cup of coffee, when the same could easily be enjoyed with a way much lesser dent in the wallet at other reasonable coffee joints? Evidently, that all too familiar denominator of purchase, the majority of the consumer breed call ‘price’ was on the backseat here.

The answer is loud and clear: Superbly valuable branding! It’s the Starbucks brand experience that 20 million customers a week in the world revel in, that makes them revisit the outlet. And guess what, even with more than six thousand outlets in over thirty countries and growing by a thousand outlets annually, the company owns a minuscule 7% share of the coffee consumers within the United States and less than 1% beyond America. What’s more, it’s marketing spend is not even 1% of its earnings!

Let’s consider a few more examples before delving further into this very ‘real’ phenomenon that has attached the prefix ‘iconic’ to the brand legacy of some of the planet’s most successful companies... Nike presents a classic case study in the art of strategic brand establishment and reinforcement, creating a swoosh that eyeballs across the globe identify with anywhere (they could, pun unintended, Just do it!). Or consider the story of Pepsi, a brand that for years on end focussed on contending with Coke on the basis of its taste. And then, it decided to throw a bit (a big ‘bit’ at that) of caution to the winds and crafted a brand positioning tactic that was on a completely diverse tangent – “The Pepsi Generation” – that proved a stupendous success in entrenching the brand firmly into the consciousness of the youth. Though the eternal conflict over the Coke-Pepsi market share endures, what’s equally indisputable is the fact that one ‘brand’ new initiative was what it took the giant to create the kind of brand value it has ever since buttressed.

It’s more than merely fabricating an emblem and a punch-line, though. Establishing brand value and loyalty is more of a psychological process, which prompts customers walking the tightrope between cognition and anticipation to crossover to the realm of acceptance, time and over. Here, creating a genuine emotional connect is a potent force, of which I feel McDonald’s represents the perfect exemplar with nearly every promotional approach of the company tugging at the heartstrings of its target audience. Considering Nike again, the brand has played on the aspirations of millions who believe they too can do just about anything if their favourite sportstar brandishing his magic Nikes could.

Branding at its ultimate best! You may ask, How the above organisations – legends in every context of the word – managed to reach such stellar heights of brand awareness and equity. The secret is as elusive as it is elementary: Every great company plainly comprehends the population it is targeting, the manner in which it needs to position itself to cater to this segment of populace, how it needs to proceed about the task of communicating the message it stands for to its audience base, and very critically, the vital importance of reinforcing this missive with every opportunity it derives to share its brand experience with a customer.

I figure it this way: The first time a customer chooses your brand, you have stepped into a friendly affiliation with that customer, and how a customer decides and continues to value that relationship will determine how much value the company further derives from the association. Louis Vuitton, Cartier, Mercedes, Lexus, Google, Microsoft, Nokia, Wal-Mart, Gillette, China Mobile; name any brand worth its name: that’s precisely the practice that each of them have learnt, mastered and perfected…

In this age of globalisation, it comes as small surprise then, that the ‘unseen’ brand value benefit is in fact a key driver of shareholder value, amounting to nearly one-third of the valuation of the world’s Fortune 500 companies (according to prominent research consulting firm Millward Brown).Without a shade of a doubt, every brand needs to depict a compelling story for it to be successful. Then again, brands are the stories that unite us all in a common purpose within an enterprise and connect us with the people we serve on the outside. These brand stories give meaning to who we are and what we do. They’re a special kind of story – they’re strategic; over time they build on themselves chapter by chapter; they grow as they respond to changing customers and changing markets. Brand stories are, in fact, also what drive in reality an enterprise’s vital interface with its customers and stakeholders. The more consistent and convincing the brand story, the more it will propel the success of an organisation.

When all is done and dusted, I believe crafting a robust brand story, one that drives key business decisions as well as marketing communications requires the three vital ingredients of simplicity, steadiness and spirit.

In other words, first and foremost, a company needs to make sure it realises clearly what it wishes to state. This presents the content of its brand; who it is, what it does, who it does it for, why it matters to the organisation, and how it’s different from anyone else in the marketplace. Then, it needs to make sure it says it (and demonstrates it too) in the same way, wherever and with whomever it goes about conducting business. This is the manner in which all its communications, actions and accomplishments being to function in tandem, building up into the unity that constitutes its brand presence in the market milieu. And ultimately, an organisation needs to render all of the above with a touch of flair and gusto. This is where brand personality rises to the surface. It’s what connects the brand at an emotional level. It’s what makes people want to connect with the brand’s promise and transforms requisite into yearning.

On a different note, while American and Japanese brands continue to parade their dominance on the world stage, back home the scenario could, and will, positively change. While the regular mega-league brands pave their path slowly and surely into global rankings of the likes of Fortune and Forbes, there hardly exists an indigenous brand that could stake claim to being a champion on the global stage when pure awareness and recall are taken into consideration.

Sure, Indian Oil Corporation, ONGC, Infosys, Satyam Computers, ICICI and HDFC are big in their own right. But I feel it is the emerging breed of entrepreneurs and enterprises that need to stake their claim to brand glory and strike when their time is ripe. That would directly imply a commitment to proactive branding, meaning not merely a promotional manoeuvre here and there, but an approach that attracts customers to your organization, to your products and services, without conscious thought or question on their part. And which in turn leads to a kind of ‘internal branding’: why talented people are drawn to work with you and who in turn disseminate the company’s brand message outward to consumers and the world. The ironic part is that while the average person may dismiss it as a supplemental notion, branding is serious business. Everything you do or don’t do carries a promise to your customers. Branding is simply your image and your reputation, built on everything that you did or did not do, committed or did not commit, delivered or failed to deliver.

Like I said last year as well, this is why you can never ignore branding, for even if you don’t control it, you will be branded! So, I say, harness this subdued but very strapping power to drive and sustain organisational productivity and profitability, for it presents the one primary element that truly distinguishes the really good players from the very great ones…

Written On:

25-10-2007

The Entrepreneur’s Day Out

Media tycoon Ted Turner’s jocular one-liner, “My son is now an ‘entrepreneur’. That’s what you’re called when you don’t have a job,” couldn’t ring truer, in contrast, if you take the prevalent Indian business scenario into perspective. Consider any domain of business operation creating ripples – from airlines to organised retail to telecom to software, I would venture (pun intended!) safely to state that the big poppa pop on the block today is none other in most cases but a virtual unknown, someone who would most likely have been pooh-poohed before he or she swept the rug of complacence from beneath the traditional players’ unsuspecting feet.

The names are ubiquitous and the success stories scripted are legends in their own right, and by every other right that could exist. Take the undisputed king of calls, Sunil Bharti Mittal, a man who needs little introduction and whose company, Bharti Enterprises, currently boasts of a humongous market capitalisation of Rs.727 billion. But much more significantly, it’s fascinating to note that the same individual – who began by dabbling in a bicycle parts concern in Punjab – today owns the sixth-largest listed company on the Indian stock market. He was an entrepreneur then, and remains the same now, from being a near non-entity to leaving behind feared and seasoned conglomerates like Reliance and Tata in the telecom sector. Fly on to the once state-monopolised aviation industry in the nation. While the formerly invincible government carrier, Indian Airlines, watched bemused, Naresh Goyal has literally ‘Jet’ted past – and by the time he too cannot afford to get too comfortable today – as, much akin to his own self, the Mallyas and the Wadias take wing, not to mention a certain Captain G. R. Gopinath (I’m sure no one reacts with a “Captain who?!” to that today!), whose self-styled Air Deccan has flourished into a laudable enterprise.

Plenty more of these stellar fellas abound! Sheer mavericks with a mere business plan and unflinching conviction, their ideas have rocked the marketplace. Take the ingenious Subhash Chandra, who started with a theme-park and moved on to herald the era of satellite television in India, or the exemplary Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, whose path-breaking ideology, that is Biocon, lent unprecedented impetus to the country’s biotechnology sector. From news channel czars, Prannoy Roy & Raghav Behl, to the world icons of software and services, Narayana Murthy & Aziz Premji, the galaxy of India’s entrepreneurial superstars is as drawn-out as it is illustrious. Not surprising that this year Forbes’ listing of the wealthiest has more billionaire additions from India than any other nation, apart from the US.

Definitely and increasingly, the last decade has witnessed a new generation of ‘prudent’ entrepreneurship, so to speak, shaping the Great Indian Economic Dream. And trust me, the timing couldn’t be more propitious. Scope for business and profit aside, there are deeper facts to rein into consideration. As a recent Nasscom-McKinsey & Co. report projects, the number of Indians on the lookout for jobs in the next ten years will reach 110-130 million, with 80-100 million of the populace seeking first-time recruitment. The above figure does not, mind you, take into account the problem of disguised unemployment of over 50% among the 230 million in the villages of the country. So where am I heading? I’m simply alluding to the basic fact of the matter, which is that neither the government, nor the railways or police, nor the defence forces of India have the capacity to cater to this gargantuan figure that will beg employment, ditto the conventional organisational milieu – that is bound to expand, no doubt – but nowhere near the proportion of the need to staff that will arise. Hope floats close though, with the singular remedy locked in the fists of the entrepreneurial class, that harbours the innate potential to generate jobs, opportunities and, by extension, wealth for the nation.

It’s no nuclear secret, really. Entrepreneurs give birth to employment. TiE – The Indo-US entrepreneurs – a non-profit organisation promoting entrepreneurship, offers that each entrepreneur produces thirty jobs, clearly defining the pace for an economy to thrive, in stark contrast to those seeking sole employment. Further, entrepreneurs are largely characterised by a fiery vision and ambition, which is in turn, bolstered by the people they train and mould into leaders to drive profits for the organisation, which with broader implications, acts in the benefit of the society these employees populate. On an economic tangent, if we’re to come remotely close to that very-elusive ‘developed’ nation status, poverty has to necessarily bid adieu. Ten million jobs need to be in order by the year 2020 as estimated by CII and Nasscom, so entrepreneurial contribution towards this cause assumes critical importance.

Then there are the subtle but crucial advantages that, heaven forbid, we should ever feel the need to test. For instance, in a country like China, where the bulk of business operation is in control of either state-owned corporations or foreign firms, with a small proportion of entrepreneurs, the effects of a global recession are bound to be hard-felt. However, in an economy where a significant mass of the wealth is self-generated – much like ours is on the path to being right now – the impact of a similar slump would tend to be lesser. Again, a greater degree of entrepreneurship would naturally tend to curtail the incidence of monopoly and collusion.

I know it’s heartening to see entrepreneurial bliss streaming around, but there still remains a plethora of issues pertaining to policies and procedures that limit the boundless growth that could otherwise be possible. These primarily pertain to entry norms, such as cost and time of registering a new entity and obtaining licences, among others. According to the ‘Doing Business 2006’ report of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), India scores a rank of 116 out of 155 countries studied in terms of overall business facilitation, and alarmingly, figures below all South Asian countries barring Afghanistan! Get a hold of this – it would take an Indian entrepreneur an antagonising 270 days to get a licence, whereas should the hapless soul ever choose to import anything, he or she would necessarily need to hand over 15 documents and elicit 21 signatures – enough to make a few fingers fall off!

So, while we continue to march forth all guns blazing, a few imperatives deserve attention to nurture the vast reservoir of entrepreneurial genius that India possesses. Administrative wrangles apart, ensuring that a business environment conducive to encouraging entrepreneur growth – with the elements of sufficing infrastructure, ease of interaction with ‘angel investors’ and venture capitalists, augmenting the ultra-consequential link with higher centres of knowledge like colleges and business schools to equip these as vital support systems for existing and budding entrepreneurs, and facilitating information interchange between entrepreneurs and managers alike – is essential. The Indian innovator is today on starburst mode, and the days when the L.N. Mittals had to flee the country to mint fortunes are done and dusted. As India gets closer to stepping into its ‘demographic window’ projected 2010 onwards – when it’s human capital will comprise of an age mix favouring economic growth – our vision of emerging as a superpower by 2020 will pivot momentously on entrepreneurial shoulders.

Knowledge capital reigns supreme, and the future is here and now...and how! If the cutting-edge of business is about marketing new ideas and creating dramatic superbrands, then make no mistake this time, the enterprising will surely form the fuel of tomorrow’s business and economy.

It takes an Indian entrepreneur an antagonising 270 days to get a licence, whereas should the hapless soul ever choose to import anything, he would necessarily need to hand over 15 documents & elicit 21 signatures – enough to make a few fingers fall off!

I know it’s heartening to see entrepreneurial bliss streaming around, but there still remains a plethora of issues pertaining to procedures that limit boundless growth..

Written On:

13/04/2006

The Romp of the Indian Multinational

A distant dream one time, global integration never sounded sweeter than today…

As we usher in the New Year, there’s reason enough to be jubilant – and more so on the commercial front. It’s not just a matter that gladdens the heart with pleasant surprise, but a development of great pride: 2006 will go down in corporate history as a banner year for Indian business and economy for the record-shattering levels of Foreign Direct Investment, both inward and outward. And here’s the part I’m sure has left everyone in raptures – for the first time ever, India Inc. deployed more capital overseas than the influx of FDI into the country.

With an incoming investment of more than $6 billion for the period April to October in 2006 and an outflow of $8 billion on mergers, acquisitions and augmentation abroad (that is well poised to surpass $10 billion by the end of the current fiscal), the Indian multinational declared its arrival, and with much aplomb!

Be it Tata Tea’s acquisition of American food and beverage company, Energy Brands, valued at $677 million, Suzlon Energy’s takeover of Belgian power firm Hanson Transmission for $565 million, Aban Loyd’s conquest of Norwegian oil firm Sinvest pegged at $425 million, Ranbaxy’s $324 million stake in Romanian drug major Terapia or Tata Steel’s historic $11.1 billion bid for British steel manufacturer Corus, ONGC Videsh’s $425 million offer for Omimex de Colombia, Videocon’s $695 million proposition for Daewoo Electronics of South Korea, Dr. Reddy’s $572 million acquisition of German pharmaceutical behemoth Betapharm Arzneimittel, from large, medium & small, the year marked a definitive moment in the era of global integration.

The statistics tell the story of home-grown companies establishing a robust measure of credence overseas with conviction. India is well and truly ahead of the BRIC economies – Brazil, Russia and China – placing 43rd in the Global Competitiveness Index (GCI) rankings for 2006-07, besides having dethroned Japan as the second-biggest investor in the UK, with Indian firms enhancing their presence from a mere 19 in number, four years ago to over a 100 today. And it’s not just the big fry, but the global ambitions of small and medium indigenous businesses that have added momentum to the overseas expansion juggernaut, according to a research conducted by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the Credit Rating Information and Services Organisation (CRISIL) recently. And back home, an extent of amalgamation never witnessed before, hoisting the net worth of mergers and acquisitions in the country to $9.5 billion in 2006 (up from $5.36 billion last year) has meant that India’s proportion in foreign transactions has leaped from 0.72% to 1.3%. The Boston Consulting Group identifies 20% of the 100 BRIC companies which are anticipated as the drivers of the future, to be of Indian origin.

Quantitatively and qualitatively, international consolidation has lent a fresh dimension and depth to the country’s corporate arena. It is also an overwhelming reflection of the fact that the outlook abroad on the expertise and efficiency of Indian firms has widened dramatically from one of caution to that of appreciation in recent times. I’m confident that 2007, and the years to come, will observe the sectors of IT, telecom, retail, automobiles, infrastructure and hospitality create ripples of unprecedented growth for our nation. The Indian business – with its irresistible combine of skill, cost and technological prowess – has not just held its own in markets at home, but is geared to mark an indelible presence on the global vista. Perhaps, I believe, there’s not much room for any choice either...

As India becomes the preferred haven for companies yonder to arrive and invest in, we face the challenge of sustaining progress domestically – and the stupendous opportunity to integrate globally. Not just the traditional giants, but the next level of firms needs to mobilise operations on a scale it harbours tremendous potential to, if the present omens are anything to go by. And I’m sure it’s an occasion to which India Inc. will rise gloriously. When indigenous turns ingenious, it’s time for the world to watch out...!

Written On:

25/10/2007

Dabur’s three pronged strategy

Global forays are likely to be the growth drivers

Setting ambitious targets for itself, fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) major Dabur India has announced plans to double both its revenue and profits by the financial year 2010. Unveiling its Vision 2010, Dabur has identified three main growth drivers for the company – international business, homecare and healthcare & foods. Sunil Duggal, CEO, Dabur India Limited elaborates, “as a part of our vision strategy, we plan to develop a more balanced portfolio of businesses. International business, Home Care, Healthcare and Foods will be our main drivers of growth. We plan to increase our presence across new segments...”

The Indian FMCG giant is eyeing revenues to the tune of $350 million this fiscal. Though the company wants to increase the contribution of its international business to its overall business to 16% from the present 4%, it remains to be seen how successful would a “balanced” focus be. The Rs.15.37 billion company has six overseas manufacturing facilities and is looking to take both – the organic and inorganic route – for expansion. With a war chest of about Rs.1 billion (amounting to about 4% of the revenue) set aside for the inorganic expansion, the company does claim to be high on the M&A uptake. However, it is quite clear that the past has never shown Dabur being action oriented with respect to M&A strategies.

Interestingly, Dabur has already launched Hajmola in Pakistan, which currently accounts for half of Dabur’s sales there. The home grown giant now seems well poised to take on global giants like Unilever, Procter & Gamble and Nestle. On another note, Pakistani actress Zara Sheikh has been signed on as the Dabur Pakistan brand ambassador – Hopefully not for their stomach cleansing medicines.

And who, may I ask, are we to throw our arms up in protest against a contorted display of prejudice on Reality television? It takes only but a microscopic measure of introspection to realise the supremacy in expertise that we, in this country, possess when it comes to the extremely fine art and (un)polished act of discrimination and intolerance.

Beginning from the pages of matrimonial advertisements to loutish vernacular nomenclature accorded to nearly every community to firestorms raging every second day due to dogmatism and sectarianism associated with caste, religion, language, locality or colour. From stray incidents on the road to deliberate outbursts of irrational resentment, it’s hardly the sort of stuff that would do anyone proud. Yet, teeming millions in our land revel in this form of bigotry.

I feel the broader and more ‘real’ concern, so to speak, is that of an intrinsic element of racism at every level of society – domestic and global – subtle at the harmless end of the spectrum or definitively pronounced on the extreme. Be it a fixation with social order, class or creed that forms part of humdrum existence to the complex, aggravated state of apprehension and insecurity leading to antagonism against the Asian community at large post 9/11, the fact remains that discrimination is a legacy of human DNA.

And in that sense, however unfortunate, it might even be termed natural. What is unnatural though, is the kind of reaction and uproar generated when a semblance of the same is created in a reality show!

Respect, restraint and forbearance of disparate origins, opinions and value-systems in a world that is only poised to become increasingly inter-connected present the singular solution to the malaise of racial, national and cultural bias.

And while we walk down the (un)beaten path and strive towards that evolution, let’s take pride in the fact that the green-eyed monster called ‘jealousy’, symbolises an apt barometer of success... more power to the steamrollering commercial might of India and Big Brother’s Winsome Winner!!

Written On:

8/11/2007

Men in (Black &) Blue

From ‘ad’ nauseam to ‘ad’ terminum, Team India’s ad hoc antics scream introspection...

Even as countless hordes of the Indian diaspora watched agape in horror (to put it mildly) and utter dismay, the lackluster manner in which a cricket-crazy nation’s dreams were consigned to the trash can, we of the media and ad frat were already counting a million upshots in the very likely event of our heroes’ jaunt in Jamaica meeting an inglorious demise.

With a whopping 70 endorsers embracing the game’s most vaunted (pun unintended!) arena on television – a figure nearly double that of the last Cricket World Cup edition – one can only imagine the sentiments of advertisers, broadcast networks, and the media planning and buying entourage; as they returned crying to their coffers.

Think for a second of the rank of clients, pouring in truckloads of green into the event, hanging on the hopes of, if not a victory, then in the least a fairly impressive showing by the country’s most adulated (well, they were in the past tense!) icons…Nokia, Pepsi, Hutch, Hero Honda, LG, Indian Oil, Maruti, Visa, Diageo, besides the scores of mega brands that adorn our cricketing contingent’s busybody lifestyles like second skin – Reebok, Adidas, ITC, Visa, Nike – to name but a handful, and the writing that Rahul Dravid’s wall is smattered with, is ghastly enough to evoke a marketing Frankenstein none would have envisioned! With losses in advertising revenue projected to the tune of Rs. 3.5 billion (that’s just in the TV ad segment), along with a staggering hit of US $300 million estimated for the sponsorship biggies, this marketing googly is one which has the present tense and the future far from perfect, one manifestation of which is the fate of ICC international sponsorship tenders worth around US $ 80 million now leaving the bidders hanging in the balance. Forget the airlines, travel and tour operators who were rubbing their hands in glee prior to the debacle, who must feel the need for a permanent vacation of sorts themselves, as things have panned out to be!

Compound the above, with a very real regressive visibility impact parameter on such ads currently playing (the ones that dare to, at least, keeping in mind the dampening effect they now have on the sulkaholic Indian viewer), and it doesn’t take long to realise the imperative for a long-term solution to this promotional conundrum. And although the tangible back draft on bottom lines may eventually be short-term with clients rescheduling adverts around other content, it’s time enough to examine afresh the processes and procedures of the value paradigm long overshadowed by the hype surrounding the sport in our land. Here, I believe the much-touted merit linked reward mechanism must finally find place. Like it or not, Indian cricket is an industry as much (and more) than any other, and like the multitudes investing their moolah into it, every member must be made accountable for its action or inaction. So, if a Dhoni enjoys being roped in for a ramp walk, he must know the worth of every correct step and the gravity of any excessive falter (perhaps a process that could involve taking into account output averages of sorts and remunerating the ambassador in accordance). This would also help go the distance in the bigger, more significant revolution that has become the dire necessity of our once-territorial sport.

As with all measures of redemption, it’s easier said than done. A change of guard, a fresh vision, is without a doubt sorely required for giving Team India a new lease of life. But the bigger, more critical, change has to be in none else but we, the people, ourselves. Hark back for a moment to India emphatically hauling the shorts off the minnow-among-minnows Bermuda, and the almost psychosomatic endowment of praise that followed, treating the previous shock defeat as a one-off lapse! And like all revolutions are characterise themselves, collective reality for all – players, people, and all stakeholders – is of the essence before our clichéd Gods of the game truly evolve to the next league, the league of collective spirit, world-beating attitude and most importantly accountability…

Written On:

6/12/2007

Outsourcing’s inhouse con capers

Dazzling performance apart, data security needs cognisance

Picture this: Five friends working in a leading call centre are hit by a masterstroke of genius one fine day (or night, if you would) and decide to swindle the BPO’s customers by siphoning off funds close to half-a-million dollars from end-user accounts into their own, not once or twice, but during the course of four months before being spotted! The idea is nothing shorn of awesome to marvel at in a thriller or a story, but when the rip-off occurs in your own country, in an industry whose progress has been stupendous and a major contributory factor towards the kind of international glory we revel in our servicing standards, it assumes the form of a stark reality that would be imprudent to overlook. If you were as stunned at the magnitude of the crime and the dangerous repercussions the episode could portend if it were to transform into a trend, you know what I’m alluding to – India’s first electronic banking bamboozlement at MphasiS BFL’s outsourcing unit in Pune earlier this year – not another petty fraud but a sensational occurrence in terms of the unprecedented scale it took place on.

Club this incident with incidents in the past such as the infamous Sun newspaper sting operation that showed illicit trading of financial details regarding British citizens, with an undercover journalist acquiring information on a thousand British bank and credit card account-holders for a measly amount of three pounds apiece, or Australian media claiming a call center in Gurgaon had indulged in illegitimate sharing of customer information.

It is a matter of escalating perception that when foreign clients delight in leveraging India’s intrinsic outsourcing cost benefits, they may well be doing so at the risk of information security, more so in the country’s highly aggressive call centre sector, where companies are constantly under pressure to augment the bottomline. I feel that for an industry, which has taken blazing strides thus far, with exports amounting to $5.2 billion in the fiscal 2004-05, and anticipated to increase by more than 40% in the current fiscal year (credit rating agency ICRA projects India’s ITES-BPO sector to reach approximately $12 billion this year, with an employment of 40 lakh professionals!), any digression from the robust brand image in IT that India has carefully nurtured over the years would mean a disaster.

While it may be accurate to state that scams in India’s BPO sector hardly account for a significant proportion if compared to those in the US and the UK, the sector cannot afford to let itself slotted in the notorious bracket and nip its potential in the bud. It is a widely held belief that India’s cyberlaw system, as it stands, focusses to a greater degree on measures to curb breaches in e-commerce, and not much on enforcing data fortification, with an Information Technology Act that was framed five years back and desperately craves revision with the times. What compounds security matters further is the fact that in an entirely white-collar operational segment of industry, any kind of criminal record warehousing is difficult, with the likelihood of nearly every offender being an educated “con-man” from an affluent household.

Nasscom – the apex industry body for IT and IT-enabled services – which initially underplayed fraud occurrences in the sector, has recently announced plans to establish an autonomous self-regulatory organisation, with the objective of implementing policies pertaining to security of data in outsourcing. Measures like instituting cyber labs and expansion of police force dedicated to the field of cyber crime may augur well; I think what is imperative, however, is sufficient training of this force in contemporary aspects of information security violation. It’s improbable that this malaise, due to its very obscure and remote nature, will diminish automatically.

For a nation that prides itself on being a global outsourcing hub, shaking off complacency with regarding to client information safety is of critical importance. For the first time, India’s shining BPO industry will need to take a long, hard look at the security procedures it presently has in order...

Written On:

9/11/2006

The Great Indian Retail Dream

A reality check would well be in order

You don’t need me to wax eloquent on the revolution that is the Indian retail sector at this moment. Shoppers’ Stop, Trent, Pantaloon, RPG, Future Group, Reliance Industries, ITC, Bharti and K Raheja Group; Tommy Hilfiger, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Wal-Mart — existing domestic players, emerging fresh entrants, established Indian conglomerates and international powerhouses — companies evincing an interest (and that’s understating it grossly!) in India’s ever-expanding retail rainbow are swelling by the day.

It’s the kind of stuff case studies are made of: the conventional marketplace taking a backseat with the dawn of the departmental store, specialty store and supermarket era, not to mention the advent of the discount hypermarket.

A recent AT Kearney Report placed India second in the Global Retail Development Index among 30 developing countries. The report further pegs the country’s aggregate retail market at $202.6 billion and projects it to develop at a compounded rate of 30% during the course of the coming five years. With the organised retail segment progressing at between 25-30% each year, the year 2010 is anticipated to treble their earnings, from the present $7.7 billion to $24 billion! Why then, you may wonder, do I perceive the need to write this piece in the first place? While it’s true that several of us couldn’t, with complete certainty, state that we’re sure the humongous quantum of investments that companies have declared their intent to pour into this sector will materialise, or, if barring a few, the wannabe lot will find it hard to endure the administrative pressures of glorious beginnings and elaborate expansions, I don’t believe this to be much of a predicament. As in any business, it’s eventually the competent who survive and the remainder is weeded out, so let’s keep this aspect at bay for now. Also, let’s leave out the FDI rigmarole for now.

Pondering on matters far more critical, what I wish to inquire firstly is how do you substantiate the availability of an adequate supply base for such colossal plans? Retail players would need to have in their inventory a vast variety of wares, for which the relatively frail framework of the supply end would require delivering exponential quantities at enhanced output standards and reduced charges. Think it’s going to happen in pace with the proposed extent of blazing growth in the sector? Or will the result be everyone’s nightmare, with all players flocking to the same supplier who will happily escalate his price and adversely impact the already-tight retail margins? Your guess is as good as mine.

Then there’s the issue of insufficient infrastructure that is bound to obviate a pan-India supplier channel, thereby increasing costs further, and the glaring asymmetry in the demand and availability of real estate, forget about appropriateness of location. With every big company announcing its retail plans with chains of hundreds of hypermarkets and supermarkets, it’s likely many will have to cool their heels for reasons they simply cannot help: the Indian Government and public sector units preside over maximum land in the country’s metropolitan landscape.

Skilled manpower, especially at the junior and middle levels, is the third vital area of unease. There’s just not enough existent to even contemplate commensuration with the grand plans under implementation. And that’s a fact you could well bear a testimony to, with a visit to the nearest retail store.

By no means am I in apprehension of the stupendous opportunities that India’s retail revolution has in its fold; the occasion is one every company worth its salt would do well to rise to. What’s more, the rural segment of retail presents a prospect of its own. According to an NCAER survey, the figure of lower middle income populace in rural India is double that of its urban equivalent, where organised retail is just begging to happen in befitting fashion. The need of the hour is, however, recognition and resolution of certain ground realities, be it urban, rural or satellite towns, to transform the Indian retail dream into an enduring reality...

Written On:

23/11/2006

Abhimanyu Ghosh - CEO Planman Media

I am compelled to get back to the days when we as a team sat down and discussed this project which is very close to all our hearts. Powerbrands came into existence, because of our very strong belief that India deserves a book on brands, which deserve their stories to be read. Brands fight it out, a war as potent as anything possible today and in a market, which is the most idiosyncratic in the world. Powerbrands is a salutation to the brands that mesmerise the Indian con-sumers with their brilliant brand strategies.

However for us as a team the biggest problem was to choose the most powerful brands in India. It was difficult, it was confusing and it was troublesome because there are just too many brands, which are doing outstanding and we had to choose only a few. So as the content team and ICMR team kept discussing, various new possibilities came out and so did many combinations. We tried our level best to ensure that the research that comes out has to be authentic and full-proof. ICMR team led by Shivalee Kaushik did a fantastic job of coming to me with a grid of choosing brands through a nation-wide research that looked totally convincing and very scientific. It took both qualitative and quantitative aspects, which delved deep into most important factors of a brand driven by perceptions. After researching 50 industries and various sub-industries, they gave us a list that looked pristine. However most exciting part of the ICMR survey was the path-breaking POWER-FACTOR research grid that was developed and executed for every brand selected to be a POWERBRANDS 2010-2011.

For all the selected brands ICMR went directly to the target market and analysed the trust, recall and emotional levels of the brand. We have incorporated the essence of POWER-FACTOR research as a part of the content. POWERBRANDS 2010-2011 is a pristine thought process, super research and genuinely made consumer recognized process. While we were on a path of creating a credible research report in the shape of a coffee table book format, we kept getting constant demands from various brands that they wanted to be featured in an innovative format inside the book. I am glad to say that Powerbrands is not just a result of quality research but the design execution in the Mega edition book is a first of its kind attempt made globally and is a visual treat. I want to thank Yogesh Gajwani for some remarkable designs and Devdeep Singh who worked on the content grid of the book. Powerbrands is a compilation of India’s most powerful brands and hence the book also needed to be a powerful property. We tried everything possible in this project which makes the total proposition of Powerbrands, the most well done project on brands for the first time in India. According to our initial plans, Powerbrands was only a research report with a very well written coffee table format. But as we progressed with our work and the project kept getting stronger, we did some change in our planning.

For the entire team of Powerbrands, it was always the most important thing to deliver to the Indian readers a book that really showcased brands, which stand for-”excellence”. A coffee table would be restricted to few, so as a part of the plan to reach out to every brand enthusiast in India, POWER-BRANDS 2010-2011 is coming out in two different versions. A coffee table Mega edition and a corporate edition at a much lesser cost. In the making of Powerbrands, I would like to thank the Chairman, CEO and company spokesperson of every brand whom I or my team met as a process to understand the soul of these brands. Powerbrands is an eclectic blend of super-lative content, design and production making it the most unique book on brands ever published. I want to thank Tara, Sumer, Vikram and Yasir for writing some wonder-fully drafted content and specially mention the contributions of  Sakshi, Manvi, Sushmeet, Sarmad, Muneeb, Anisha, Preity, Preeti and Sunita for their tireless efforts of coordinating with each brand for the re-search, content and all other information on specific brands. Kanchan Chatterjee & Shahnawaz Ahmed for their designs and Sivam Ojha for managing the website.

Their contributions have been invaluable in the making of this project. Amim Ahmed has been my biggest support system. He went out of his way in helping to make this project a grand success with his great networking and marketing skills. The Mega edition has been printed by Pragati Printers who with their state of the art printing technology were able to give shape. Powerbrands has truly been a combined effort of a big human spirit called passion and team work. And that’s why we have the highest belief in it and we are sure everyone else will.I would like to thank Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri from the deepest point in my heart for being a support system for everyone working with the Planman and IIPM group. He encourages, motivates and gives freedom to give a shape to ones dream. Also big thanks to the Planman Media editorial, photo and production teams for the support that they gave in the making of Powerbrands. We put in our most sincere effort in making this book authentic in its research, world class in its looks and innovative with its design in the Mega edition and content that should justify all of it. I hope you love reading it as much we loved making it.