Innholdsfortegnelse for 3-Nov-19 i Business Today

It is my absolute honour and privilege to lead a brand that I have always admired and have now worked for, for more than a decade. I take charge with deep gratitude to former editors who have nurtured and honed Business Today for all these years. Especially my predecessor and dear colleague for many years, Prosenjit Datta, who led the magazine through five very fruitful years. The world is changing. So is Business Today. In the coming weeks and months, as we put together our refreshingly new “Digital First” philosophy into action, we have already kicked off some of the most innovative and exciting offerings on our fast-growing web platform BusinessToday.in. It will be ably complemented by the magazine in a new avataar that is best suited for the new…

THE ERA OF ZERO commissions has come in. Charles Schwab has made online stock trading free in the US. In India, while discount broking firms do offer zero fees in the cash segment, intraday and F&O trades attract a fixed rate of ₹10-20. Most traditional brokerages still charge a percentage of the trading amount as fee. Unlike in the US, brokerages in India earn a large chunk of revenues via commissions. US brokerages earn interest on idle cash in trading accounts and receive fee from exchanges for creating liquidity. They can sell order flow to high frequency traders and make money via securities lending also. Indian firms cannot do most of it. The recent regulation has put a limit on how much they can earn via margin funding as well.…

US, CHINA REACH INTERIM DEAL Two-day trade talks between the US and China ended on a positive note. The two reached an interim deal, delaying the 30 per cent hike in tariffs on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods from October 15. In return, China agreed to increase its purchase of US agricultural goods and further open up its market to foreign financial services companies. However, another 15 per cent tariff hike on almost all remaining Chinese imports, including laptops, smartphones, footwear and clothing, might still be imposed on December 15, unless a final deal can be reached. U.S. President Donald Trump termed the outcome as a “very substantial phase one deal”, adding that progress had been made on allegations of currency manipulation, intellectual property theft and other issues. The…

Economic Prospects 20% expect conditions to improve Order Book/Demand Only 19% expect an improvement Utilisation of Production Close to a quarter expect an improvement Sales Pickup A high 65% see no change Hiring Pickup 21% expect an improvement Profit Pickup 31% expect pressure to continue Do you think that the corporate tax cut would help arrest the fall in economic growth? Do you plan to invest in your business following a series of measures announced by the government over the past few weeks?…

Between 2014/15 and 2019/20, the number of Common Admission Test (CAT) applications has gone up from 197,000 to 241,000 Many new IIMs have been established during the current decade (2010 onwards): six second generation IIMs were added during 2010/11; and seven third generation IIMs during 2015/16. Thus, the total number of IIMs in the country is now 20 Some leading B-schools are expanding their footprint by starting more campuses inside and outside India. These include, MDI, SPJIMR, IIFT, Great Lakes, ISB, IMT, NMIMS, and more IIM Calcutta is the only management institute in the country to have all three renowned international accreditations – AACSB, Association of MBAs (AMBA) and European Quality Improvement System (EQUIS) In 2019, the average annual salary of top-10 B-schools increased to ₹21.75 lakh from ₹20.68 lakh…

INTERNATIONAL placements and high salaries that come with it have traditionally been an important highlight of placement reports from business schools. This time, however, the Business Today-MDRA study has thrown up data to the contrary. As many as 11 of the top 25 B-schools in the study saw no international placements in the last round of placements on their campuses, versus just eight institutes in the previous year. Kanwal Kapil, Professor of Marketing, and Dean, Continuing Education, Consulting, Placement and Alumni at MDI, Gurgaon, says a combination of factors have led to this development at some of the leading B-schools, including MDI. He says that while there is talk of sluggish growth in India, there are enough domestic opportunities for students, which in many cases seem more attractive than international…

THIS IS THE FIFTH year that Business Today and Marketing & Development Research Associates (MDRA) are bringing out India’s most exhaustive list of B-schools offering full-time management courses (PGDM/MBA) established at least five years ago and with a minimum of three graduating batches. The objective questionnaire was fine-tuned to obtain the latest and most relevant information from institutes on each parameter or sub-parameter and was put on websites of MDRA and BT. Over 2,350 B-schools, fulfilling the qualification criteria for participation were contacted through emails, telephonic calls and advertisements in the magazine. In all, 285 institutes submitted data within the timeline and were considered for ranking. One institute did not fulfil the criteria and was excluded from the final ranking. After receiving the data, every aspect of the details provided…

Are you planning to buy a car – perhaps your first wheels or a second one for a family member or a much-coveted upgrade? Traditionally, the festive season is the best time to make a prestige purchase as carmakers, dealers and lenders often come up with substantial discounts and lucrative schemes. Even then, new cars got more expensive year after year. Well, not any more. Economic uncertainties, rise of ride-sharing and car leasing and stringent emission norms have led to a double-digit fall in car sales. As per data from the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), overall sales of passenger vehicles declined by 23.54 per cent in April-August 2019 compared to the same period last year. Sales of passenger cars, utility vehicles and vans dipped by 29.41 per cent,…

Some of the developers are offering no GST on ready-to-move-in projects, but you should know that there is no GST applicable on them in any case. Be wary of subvention schemes as they have been banned by NHB Do not fall for limited offers as you may get some discount after the festive season. So, take your time to analyse the deal. While going for price discounts, check the overall market price in that area to see if the developer has already jacked up the price. Always prefer cash or price discounts over other things. Once you finalise the location, look for schemes offered by other projects in that area. Check the track record of the developer; do not just go by the freebies offered.…

DETECTING CONGESTIVE heart failure, or CHF, will no longer be a difficult task. A new study from the University of Surrey led to the development of a neural network approach that can identify CHF with 100 per cent accuracy by analysing just one raw ECG heartbeats. CHF, as many of us know, is a chronic progressive medical condition that weakens the heart’s muscles and they are no longer effective at pumping blood. It is widely prevalent, affecting some 26 million people worldwide, and eventually fatal – often detected when it is late in its progression. Surrey researcher Dr Sebastiano Massaro, along with Mihaela Porumb and Dr Leandro Pecchia from the University of Warwick and Ernesto Iadanza from the University of Florence, found a way of using convolutional neural networks, or…

WHAT DO GREAT B-SCHOOLS TEACH US? A REMARKABLE COMBINATION OF ART, SCIENCE AND BUSINESS, WHICH IS ALL ABOUT MAKING ORGANISATIONS SUSTAINABLE, MAKING OUR WORK MORE FULFILLING AND DRIVING PEOPLE’S PASSION. IF YOU FEEL UP TO THE TASK AND WANT TO THINK OUT OF THE BOX, HERE IS A CURATED LIST OF BOOKS THAT BRINGS A BREATH OF FRESH AIR TO DONE-AND-DUSTED MANAGEMENT IDEAS AND BUSINESS PRINCIPLES. The Coffee Bean: A Simple Lesson to Create Positive Change By Jon Gordon and Damon West John Wiley & Sons ₹1,762 (HB) No Hard Feelings: The Secret Power of Embracing Emotions at Work By Liz Fosslien and Mollie West Duffy Portfolio ₹1,944 (HB) Range: How Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World By David Epstein Macmillan ₹2,638 (HB) Brave New Work: Are You Ready to…

STAY CONNECTED WITH US ON www.facebook.com/BusinessToday@BT_India India’s NBFC Billionaires Shrink; Promoter Market Cap Down 50 Per Cent The value of promoter stake in the NBFC industry is down to $11 billion from around $18 billion in 2018. And the biggest cut has been witnessed by promoters of housing finance companies, vehicle financiers, SME lenders and brokerages businesstoday.in/nbfc-haircut TRAI Needs to Set the Record Straight on Ringing Time Spat Between Jio and Airtel There are enough merits and demerits of maintaining a high ringing time. The call response time varies from person to person businesstoday.in/ringingtime-jio.airtelspat No Takers for Junk-priced Rotomac, LML, Moser Baer Brands in Liquidation Three years down the line, resolution professionals have been able to dissolve just 11 companies so far under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code businesstoday.in/bankruptcy-companies NEWS…

A RECENT note by a business intelligence platform said Flipkart’s parent in Singapore has made changes to the shareholders' agreement empowering the company to make additional appointments to its board. From the current nine, the company can now have up to 11 board members. At present, Walmart has three board positions, and former CEO Binny Bansal still retains a board seat as founder-nominee. While Chinese investor Tencent‘s James Gorden Mitchell is also a nominee director, the others are independent directors. With two additional board seats up for grabs, analysts believe current group CEO Kalyan Krishnamurthy has a strong case for an entry. With the company working towards listing in a definitive time frame and Walmart bolstering the company’s compliance standards to prepare for an IPO, it would not be surprising…

APEX STANDARD setting and monitoring body Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has often been criticised for partnering with private organisations and companies with apparent conflict of interests for various awareness campaigns related to health and food habits. While there may or may not be merit in such allegations, it is safer to be transparent and accountable. And that is what FSSAI seems to have decided as it has come out with draft guidelines that chart out the dos and don'ts for such collaborations. Such a guideline is important because there are several areas where regulators collaborate with the private sector. One of these is to upgrade the quality of testing and standards of the regulator in a world of fast changing technology. The other is to get…

THE GOVERNMENT’S fiscal math seems to be in disarray after various institutions including the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) revised downward their GDP growth rate estimates for 2019/20. While RBI has cut the estimate from 6.9 per cent to 6.1 per cent, rating agency Moody’s has lowered the growth estimates to 5.8 per cent in 2019/20. The government’s fiscal deficit target of 3.3 per cent of GDP was based on the assumption that the nominal GDP growth would be 12 per cent at ₹211 lakh crore. However, with real GDP languishing around 6 per cent and the average inflation around 3-3.5 per cent, all it can expect is a nominal GDP growth rate of 9-9.5 per cent. At this rate, the country’s GDP would be ₹206-207 lakh crore, which means…

AVERAGE ROI HAS BEEN FALLING… …AS FEE RISES SHARPLY ₹ 17.8 LAKH Average salary offers at top 25 B-schools in India in 2019 compared to ₹12.64 lakh in 2014 ₹ 14.27 LAKH Average tuition fee of top 10 B-schools in 2019; it has been growing at a CAGR of 8 per cent over the last five years 80% Proportion of top 25 B-schools that offered foreign exchange programmes in academic year 2019; this was 68 per cent in 2014 1.73 Average RoI of top 100 government B-schools in 2019; for private schools, this was 0.90 52:48 Ratio of government business schools to private schools in top 25; in the top 76-100 category, this drops to 8:92 248 Current average batch strength of top 100 private B-schools; for government schools, it…

Dr. Khanna is the Director and Marketing Professor at K J Somaiya Institute of Management Studies & Research (SIMSR). An experienced academician and professional with around 28 years of experience in Industry and Academia, her specializations include Brand Management, Marketing Research, and Services Marketing. She has also worked in the areas of Engineering & lndustriaantol Automation. Dr. Khanna has won several awards including the case study competitions held by the Aditya V Birla India Centre at the London Business School, awards for excellence in teaching by Bombay Management Association, Higher Education Forum, Somaiya Vidyavihar, and recently Y K Bhushan Award for 100 Most Dedicated Teachers of India. She is also an elected member of the Managing Council of All India Management Association (AIMA), New Delhi for AY 2019-21. How is…

THE NUMBERS that the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) throws up for postgraduate institutes of management show a worrying trend – the number of institutions have been steadily declining. The total number of these institutions is 3,038 for 2019/20, which is 557 less than the 3,587 schools in 2014/15. What could be the reasons behind the drop? Those who were willing to speak to Business Today on this, including senior faculty members of schools that are doing well, requested anonymity. Call it an Anna Karenina syndrome of sorts – much like happy schools seem alike, failing schools seem alike too in the nature of woes that are hurting them. From late-1990s till about 2010 was a period that saw business schools of all manner mushrooming across the country.…

A cocktail of slow growth, economic nationalism and protectionism is troubling the global economy. Where do you see globalisation headed? The reasons for deceleration in the global economy are interrelated and reinforce each other. The phenomenal upswing cycle in global economic growth that we have seen in the past was caused or prolonged by qualitative easing. We had an artificial driver in global economic growth rates in many countries. That ammunition of monetary easing has come to an end. So, we have to go for fiscal policies, though there are some questions over whether fiscal policies in the current situation will lead to an invigoration of economy or not. Another factor (that contributed to this economic slowdown) is that people are losing trust in the future. Trade wars, populism, Brexit…

What are the takeaways for the insured from the recent regulatory changes? The changes are aimed at standardising the base health insurance cover to make purchases by first-time buyers easier, simplifying processes related to existing products and widening the coverage by encouraging insurers to innovate. We can expect insurers to launch improved variants of their approved products more quickly than before. The IRDAI is working on "sandbox" regulations. Do you think these will be a game changer? How helpful will they be for consumers? Sandbox rings in a welcome change where the IRDAI will allow process and product innovation on an experimental basis for six months. At the end of the period, if the new product/process is successful, the IRDAI may regularise the product/process for commercial sale. This is likely…

DEVENDRA CHAWLA MD AND CEO, SPENCER’S RETAIL A consumer specialist, he is known for finding gaps and building brands which fulfil crucial needs of consumers. He played a key role in the company’s acquisition of Godrej Nature’s Basket. Q. The biggest challenge in your career A. Challenge is part of life. I remember the time early in my career when I was heading the largest bottling unit for Coca Cola, and the issue of pesticides in colas created doubt among consumers. Suddenly, business volume collapsed, and everyone around us started doubting and questioning the brand’s promise. Earning back the trust of customers, stakeholders and regulators was the biggest challenge and learning experience. Q. Your best teacher in business A. Everyone around you is a teacher. I have worked with MNCs,…

THE COOPERATIVE banking sector has survived many failures and scams. But it remained untouched, mostly due to political affiliation — a large number of these banks are controlled by politicians. The power equation is largely responsible for the slow progress in overhauling the regulatory framework for cooperative banks. These banks have poor governance structures, lack professional managements and boards, and have weak risk management systems. Yet, gullible depositors repose their trust and money in these small banks, which is keeping them alive. They account for 3.87 per cent in total banking deposits and 3.20 per cent in advances. The debacle of Punjab and Maharashtra Bank (PMC Bank) is not the first or last case of misgovernance. There are at least a dozen urban cooperative banks under the RBI administrator. After the…

FREE TRADE agreements (FTA) facilitate market access for exporters but invite intense competition in the domestic market due to cut in import duties and easing of non-tariff barriers. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) that is in the final stage of negotiations between India, the 10-nation Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and five others, including China, has become a highly sensitive issue due to the same reason. Domestic industry is vehemently opposing this mega FTA as it fears a surge in cheap imports, especially from China. Swadeshi elements that form part of the ideological framework of the ruling dispensation argue that even exporters will not make significant gains as their ability to penetrate countries with which India already has FTAs remains unproven. The advocates of the FTA see…

WITH THE LATEST round of investments worth $1.5 billion in Oyo Hotels and Homes, the homegrown chain has caught everyone’s attention. Oyo, which was started by Ritesh Agarwal over six years ago, has seen valuation going up to $10 billion after the recent investment – that’s a big jump for a start-up that was valued at $5 billion last September when it had raised $1 billion from Japan’s Soft-Bank and others. SoftBank’s entry into Oyo was a turning point for the hotel chain, which has put the pedal to the metal ever since by expanding base in geographies like China and the US, and getting into newer segments, apart from strengthening its presence in India. The latest funding round, where Agarwal is buying back shares worth $700 million, seems like…

PROFIT HUNT WHAT: AVCJ India Forum WHEN: December 3-4, Mumbai WHAT TO LOOK FOR: The 20th edition of the event will have influential international investors and Indian fund managers discuss latest trends, challenges and opportunities in the private equity space. More than 250 participants are expected from across 15 countries. FUTURE WORKPLACE WHAT: Culture Summit WHEN: December 4, Mumbai WHAT TO LOOK FOR: The summit will give an opportunity to learn innovative culture development strategies to increase employee engagement. Experts will share insights on future of the workplace culture. OFFLINE TO ONLINE WHAT: Industrial Internet of Things India WHEN: December 5, Delhi WHAT TO LOOK FOR: The event will focus on sharing ideas and information on smart manufacturing and infrastructure value chain. Technology solution providers, enablers, end-users and potential IoT…

A mid the gloom and doom, the latest findings of the Business Today’s Business Confidence Index (BCI) show that the slowdown seems to have bottomed out. The BCI for the July-September quarter rose on expectations of improvement in economic growth after the corporate tax cuts announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman last month to boost investment, revive growth and create jobs. The BCI – on a scale of 100 – was at 49.1 compared with 48.5 in the previous quarter and 49.7 in the quarter before that. Market research agency C fore quizzed 500 CEOs and chief financial officers in 12 cities for the survey. Bandhan Bank’s Chief Economist and Head of Research Siddhartha Sanyal says sentiment is subdued at the moment and the way it had deteriorated over the…

A NEW PHENOMENA has taken shape recently – top-rated B-schools are spreading their wings rapidly while many at the bottom are finding it difficult to sustain. In five decades (1961-2009), seven Indian Institutes of Management, or IIMs, were set up in the country. The current decade (2010-19) has witnessed establishment of 13 new IIMs. Similarly, other top rated B-schools have opened multiple campuses. This has impacted the rankings of mid-rung B-schools. Many are concerned. As part of the ranking exercise, we physically audit a good number of B-schools. During a recent visit to a B-school, the director raised a concern: “Despite all our efforts, our rank is not improving and we are nowhere near the top-rated B-schools. What can we do?” After interacting with a few faculty members, staff and…

An aspiring young commerce graduate is filled with ambition and a sincere passion to either be employed by a reputable corporate firm or to be known as a successful entrepreneur. In the immensely competitive market of today’s time, there are various elements to a student’s personality that can set him/her apart: education from a prestigious college, experience in the industry, and a personality that is ripe with exposure, confidence and determination. The Lexicon Group of Institutes recognises the need for students to excel by being equipped with all these essentials of success, and offers an unmatched pathway for students: Lexicon Management Institute of Leadership and Excellence. At Lexicon Management Institute of Leadership and Excellence, the primary goal is to expose students to inspiration, innovation and discovery. This has ensured that…

Are B-schools millennial and generation Z ready? The millennial and the up-and-coming Z Generation are active, assertive, and determined. The young people of today are a product of the modern, highly-interconnected world, yet are established within. Today’s youth are not only bursting with raw energy but are also consciously channelizing it to make a place for themselves in this dynamic world which they envision aligning with the ideals they believe in as well. Now that we have established that we are not dealing with novice, we should also move beyond the assumption that as educators we are tasked with 'raising' young students into 'responsible' adults or 'mature' professionals. Instead, the new approach to pedagogy at all learning institutions across India should be centered on encouraging, enabling, and empowering the inherent…

A Human’s Guide To Machine Intelligence: How Algorithms Are Shaping Our Lives and How We Can Stay in Control By Kartik Hosanagar Publisher: Viking Pages: 272 Price: ₹1,919 FOR THOSE WHO ARE not its practitioners, artificial intelligence (AI) is a black box. It is both intriguing and vexing. That is probably because much of today’s debate is around the potential of exponential technologies to wipe out jobs across many industries. The jobs lens is just one element of fear. There are those such as Elon Musk who think of AI as an “existential threat”. What if weapons of mass destruction, controlled by automated algorithms, run amok? Then, there are practitioners or for-profit companies which use AI for business outcomes. From self-learning bots that can answer questions around personal banking (the…