Innholdsfortegnelse for 17-Nov-19 i Business Today

The kirana apocalypse – that dreaded wipe-out by e-tail of your friendly neighbourhood grocery store – never took place. And now, probably, never will. With barely 3 per cent share of India’s $795 billion retail market after plodding through two decades, e-tail hardly turned out the kirana killer it was made out to be. Call him Lala, Pansari, Parchun or grocery, your neighbourhood kirana – the equivalent of American mom-and-pop stores – has not just survived but flourished. Now he’s the centre of attraction as e-tail and consumer firms realise that “If you can’t beat them, join ’em”. In our cover story this week, some of India’s consumer giants, including HUL, Reliance Retail, Amazon and Walmart-Flipkart, are vying with each other for the kirana’s undivided attention. They are getting kiranas…

THE RESERVE BANK Of India’s (RBI’s) interest rate easing window is narrowing with a sharp rise in consumer price inflation (CPI) by 71 basis points to 4 per cent in September. There are also concerns of higher fiscal deficit after the recent corporate tax rate cut where the government is expected to suffer revenue losses of ₹1.45 lakh crore. The fiscal deficit target for the Centre is 3.3 per cent for 2019/20. Another looming danger is from state finances which are not in good shape. India Ratings last week said the combined fiscal deficit of states for 2018/19 will be 2.9 per cent instead of the budgeted 2.6 per cent due to expansionary policies followed by state governments. Farm loan waivers and social schemes for the poor are being promised…

BREXIT PLAN STALLED AGAIN The UK parliament voted in favour of Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal but rejected his proposal that they should give it their final approval within three days. In retaliation, the PM threatened to withdraw the deal and go for early polls. Johnson said lawmakers could continue their debates on Brexit if they would agree to a December 12 election. He, however, agreed to talk to EU leaders before making his next move. Britain was scheduled to leave the bloc by October 31 but is likely to miss that deadline. The country has already requested a three-month delay, but it is not clear whether all 27 other EU leaders would agree to it. If they do, Britain will be postponing its departure date for the third…

TikTok is under the scanner again. This time, U.S. Senators have alleged that the short video-sharing platform could be a security threat due to its censorship, data insecurity and link to the Chinese government. “TikTok reportedly censors materials deemed politically sensitive to the Chinese Communist Party, including content related to the recent Hong Kong protests, as well as references to Tiananmen Square, Tibetan and Taiwanese independence, and the treatment of the Uighurs,” they wrote. They also think TikTok has the potential to influence the next general election in India. TikTok, in its statement, said it had never received any request from the Chinese government, and even if it does, it will not comply. INSTA ALERT IMAGE-SHARING APP INSTAGRAM MAY SOON PUT A LIMIT ON THE TIME SPENT ON THE PLATFORM…

Retailers and FMCG companies are pushing kirana stores to digitise so that the stores can capture the spending patterns of customers, which is valuable information. Using this data, companies can supply the right SKUs Last-mile delivery is a big cost and challenge for all retailers. The cost of delivery of each packet to a consumer’s home is about ₹100. There are difficulties in locating addresses, maintaining stock points and fulfilling deliveries. There is also the additional cost of picking up return packets. By getting a kirana partner to do the delivery, the delivery cost is reduced by at least ₹20. Plus, as the kirana also knows the locality well, locating an address is easier The store also serves as a pick-up point for consumers in case they are not at…

The corporate tax rate cut announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in September is not turning out to be the silver bullet the government thought it was. The decision, under which the government offered companies a tax rate of 22 per cent if they did not avail of incentives or exemptions, has been unable to enthuse many big names of India Inc. “At present, for Infosys standalone, the India effective tax rate is less than 25 per cent. We are close to 23-24 per cent. So, I think at the moment, we are staying in the current regime. We will start evaluating as we look ahead through the next few years, but for now, we’re continuing with the existing tax holiday regime,” Salil Parekh, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director,…

September 20 Whistleblowers write to Infosys accusing the company of following ‘disturbing unethical practices’ September 27 They write to SEC on accounting irregularities September 30 A board member receives two anonymous complaints October 3 Whistleblowers again write to SEC; send e-mails and voice recordings as additional information October 10/11 Complaints placed before the company’s Audit Committee and non-executive members of the board October 21 Infosys acknowledges complaints in a statement to stock exchanges October 23 SEBI seeks clarification for non-disclosure of information about the whistleblower complaint October 24 Infosys says SEC has initiated an investigation on the complaints…

Robotic surgery was pioneered by US-based Intuitive Surgical in 2000. It has a lion’s share of the market. It is now making fourth-generation da Vinci Systems. Patent protection (20 years in the US) was one reason the others could not invest into the area. “The technology is complex and investments required are big. India does not have the ecosystem, technology and scientists in this field and still majority of the companies are in the US, and some in Europe like France,” says Mandeep Singh Kumar, VP and General Manager, India, Intuitive Surgical. Gloabally, once the big pharma and other technology companies saw the opportunity, they started acquiring start-ups in the area. Johnson & Johnson (J&J) made its foray four years ago when it formed Verb Surgical, a joint venture with…

DILIP Suryavanshi, the CMD of the Bhopal-based ₹5,500 crore road construction company Dilip Buildcon is like a typical first generation entrepreneur who has built a fortune. Suryavanshi is a man of few words, but his work in road construction speaks volumes. Dilip Buildcon, a 32-year-old company, has expertise in building roads and highways under the Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) model. It has built roads across 17 states, and has running projects in 11 states. The company prides itself for being among the few construction companies in the country that have never delayed any project. In its investor presentation ahead of the first quarter results this year, it claimed that 90 per cent of its projects were completed ahead of time. Suryavanshi credits this to its team’s preparation and ability…

UNLIKE MOST other government-owned companies, NHDC (earlier Narmada Hydroelectric Development Corporation) is leaner and meaner. Not only does it have relatively fewer employees (595 in all), it has been generating profit from the very first day. NHDC, a joint venture between central government-owned NHPC (51 per cent) and MP government (49 per cent), was incorporated in August 2000 to build and run two hydropower plants — Indira Sagar (1,000 MW) and Omkareshwar (520 MW) — in the Narmada river basin. It built the two plants in less than four years, 2004 and 2007, respectively. “We have given the MP government much more in dividend than its equity investment," says Arun Kumar Mishra, Managing Director. NHDC’s expertise is in constructing and running mega hydro power projects, but since MP has little…

VECTUS INDUSTRIES, a manufacturer of water storage tanks and pipes and fittings, operates in 16 states, with Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh being its largest markets. MP contributes 20 per cent to its overall revenues of ₹750 crore. “We have three manufacturing units in MP out of a total of 13 across India. In MP, our production capacity is ₹300 crore,” says Atul Ladha, Managing Director. The company claims to be the second-largest water tank manufacturer in the country after Sintex in terms of both volumes and revenues. Ladha says they benefitted from GST implementation — it depressed demand but also enabled the company to shut eight depots and warehouses in some states. Demonetisation, however, was tough. Ladha, who started Vectus with his cousin Ashish Baheti in 2004, says, “My…

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) is now found almost everywhere – in smartphones and smart homes, in schools, on factory floors and even in big-scale 3D printing units (the latest revelation is that AI robots can 3D-print entire rockets). So, it is not surprising that your kids’ toys will also get a big dose of AI. The market for AI toys is expected to grow at a CAGR of more than 35 per cent till 2026, as per a study by The Research Insights, a Pune-based analytics and advisory firm. Another report by digital publication TechRadar pegs it at $54 billion by 2024. Connected toys come in all shapes, sizes and colours, and many are already within your easy reach, like the intelligent robots sold on Amazon. But there are no benchmarks…

The Reluctant Billionaire: How Dilip Shanghvi Became the Richest Self-Made Indian By Soma Das Publisher: Penguin Portfolio Pages: 520 Price: ₹799 IN THE LATE 1970s, a young man called Dilip Shanghvi, son of a Calcutta-based (now Kolkata) wholesale distributor of medicines, decided to set up a drug company. As for assets, he had his father’s medicine shop (the sole Calcutta stockist of Torrent, the only Indian pharma company that focussed on psychiatry at the time), a few friends and a big dream. Shanghvi started his business with a psychiatric drug, sourced from a local manufacturer, added more products in that speciality, and by 1983, set up his plant in Vapi, Gujarat. In 1994, Sun Pharmaceutical Industries became a public enterprise through stock exchange listing. Over the years, the company grew…

STAY CONNECTED WITH US ON www.facebook.com/BusinessToday@BT_India How Consumer Durables Brands Are Wooing Millennials Brands have not only started segmenting their offerings as per consumer profiles, they have also become more careful about ensuring that there isn’t much difference between their online exclusive and regular offerings businesstoday.in/consumerdurables-brands PERSPECTIVE Why OYO Hotels’ Recent Funding Round Is Like a Face-saving Act of SoftBank The existing investors, including SoftBank, Airbnb and Greenoaks Capital, want to plough another $800 million in the start-up. They see more potential in OYO’s valuation, as it has doubled from $5 billion to $10 billion in just over a year businesstoday.in/oyo-investment NEWS Insurers’ Honeymoon with Fasal Bima Yojana Seems to Be Getting Over The insurance companies initially raked in good profits, but things are changing now. The first one to…

THE GOVERNMENT is finally realising that the insolvency and bankruptcy system has been choked by frivolous and unnecessary cases and that it needs an alternative resolution mechanism to rescue the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC). Right from ministers and the MCA secretary to Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India Chairman, everyone has been saying that all default cases should not be referred to the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT), the adjudicating authority under the IBC. The refrain now, it seems, is that since it is a rigorous process, only cases which involve large outstanding amounts should be referred to the IBC. According to the government, so far, 21,000 default cases have been referred to the NCLT. Of that, 10,000 cases have been settled — 8,500 cases settled prior to admission…

ARE COMPANIES failing retail investors or are retail investors failing themselves? Latest shareholding pattern data suggests retail holding in 81 of the top 100 companies by market value is less than 10 per cent. Some companies such as Avenue Supermarts, Kotak Mahindra Bank, the Bajaj twins and Nestle India have been consistent performers in earnings over the last few years, and their stocks have also been rewarding – rising up to 95 per cent in the last one year. Yet retail investors find them expensive. Instead, they chased companies where news commentary has been detrimental. Cox & Kings, DHFL, Kwality, Reliance Infra and YES Bank have seen retail holding rise at least 10 per cent in a year even as these stocks have fallen 60-95 per cent in the same…

THE INSOLVENCY and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) has been tested many times in different courts, since its inception in 2016. But the move of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to attach the plant and property of Bhushan Power and Steel (BPSL), for which JSW Steel emerged as the lead bidder in the resolution process, has bewildered investors in distressed assets. ED had attached the assets worth ₹4,025 crore under Section 5 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002, for alleged loan fraud and money laundering, involving earlier promoter Sanjay Singhal. Eventually, it has become a battle of commercial law and criminal act. The Delhi High Court, in its ruling in April, had held that relevant laws on money laundering take precedence over the bankruptcy law. If that is so, why should…

1) Founders Ram N. Kumar, Abhishek Gupta and Shrey Jain. A graduate in Computer Science from Sikkim Manipal University, Kumar used to run a digitech firm called Marketech before launching NirogStreet (registered as Hi Nirog Healthtech). Gupta, Founder of Brahm Ayurved (NirogStreet acqui-hired it), and Jain, an investment analyst at a start-up studio called Technology 9 Labs, joined as Co-founders in 2018. 2) The Trigger Kumar experienced the power of ayurveda when he contracted Hepatitis C and recovered fully, thanks to ayurvedic treatment. At the time, he was wondering why ayurveda had not been included in mainstream medical care. He understood from his doctor that patients do not trust ayurvedic doctors and the medicines they recommend. “As I had benefited immensely from ayurveda, I decided to bridge this trust gap.”…

Though the partnership between organised and unorganised retailers seems like a win-win for both, kirana store owners are not convinced. Here’s what they say: I don't understand this business I have a small store, where will I keep additional merchandise? I am the only person at the store, how can I leave my store and go to deliver their products? If I order through the app, they most often don’t have the SKUs I want Most organised retailers don’t give extended credit They also don’t accept returns while the traditional distributor does…

'Himachal' meaning snowladen, is often called the 'Switzerland of India' as it is the home to spectacular snowy peaks, river valleys, thick forests and beautiful mountain ranges. I, on behalf of the people of Himachal Pradesh, extend a warm welcome to investors from India and abroad to come and visit our maiden Global Investors' Meet on 7th & 8th November, 2019 at Dharamshala. With coming to power of my government, there was a generational change in the state leadership and change in the mindset as well. With an aim to accelerate the economic growth of the state and make it an attractive destination for investors, my government is hosting Global Investors' Meet on November 07th and 08th, 2019 at Dharamshala with investment target of Rs 85000 crore. The state is…

Q: The global economy is cooling. How does that impact the services business? A: It depends. I am not of the opinion that services necessarily follow macro demand cycles. Very often, it is counter cyclical. So if people are tightening belts, they will outsource certain tasks to others. But (one must) also recognise that services is a cottage industry and nobody has more than 3-4 per cent share. Regardless of the macro demand, I will always want my team to spend more time with customers than our competitors to make sure we get a fair share of the market, to make sure that we gain share. Due to the shift to digital transformation and because of the agendas of the C-suite (beyond the CIO), growth will be in digital. How…

IN JUST one quarter, the fortunes of the aviation sector have gone from best to worst. The second quarter earnings of India’s largest carrier, IndiGo, have come has a shock. Low-cost carrier (LCC) IndiGo, which controls 48.2 per cent of the market, posted a net loss of ₹1,062 crore in the July-to-September period, which is in sharp contrast to its record-high net profits of ₹1,203 crore in the previous quarter. The LCC blamed the falling rupee for its losses. The second quarter results of other carriers in all likelihood are going to be equally disappointing. The chain of events that contributed to the (now what seems like a short-lived) revival of the sector is beginning to reverse: ATF (aviation turbine fuel) prices are rising, rupee is depreciating, and benefits from…

WHEN JET AIRWAYS was about to shut down, just after the resignation of its then Chairman Naresh Goyal, the aviation sector looked around for professionals who could turn around the airline. Nearly all the people whose names came up, it turned out, were foreign professionals, including Michael Swiatek (former chief planning officer of IndiGo), Neil Mills (former CEO of SpiceJet), Mark Dunkerley (former CEO of Hawaiian Airlines) and Fred Reid (of Airbnb). The lack of local leadership talent and dependence of expat CXOs have been a matter of concern for airlines in India. IndiGo, the largest airline by market share, has hired a number of expats. For instance, its COO Wolfgang Prock-Schauer, and CCO Willy Boulter are foreign nationals. The current CEO, Ronojoy Dutta, has spent most of his work-life…

THE SNACK food business always attracted the Kumat brothers, Apoorva and Amit, who founded Indore-based ₹1,160 crore Prataap Snacks along with Arvind Mehta. The company’s Yellow Diamond brand of chips started with a seed capital of ₹15 lakh in 2003 and a contract manufacturer. Then they started their own operations and the first-year revenue was ₹22 lakh. A decade later, it hopes to clock ₹1,500 crore (end of 2019/20). It had been growing at a robust 15-20 per cent year-on-year until the slowdown last fiscal when growth tapered to 8 per cent. But in the first quarter of FY20, its overall revenue grew 23 per cent. “We started recovering from the first quarter and now we are back on track,” says Amit Kumat, MD and CEO. However, what turned around…

POLICY CHANGES in the aftermath of the balance of payment crisis in 1991 mandated that a company that imported raw material would have to have an equal share of exports of any commodity. Kriti Industries, which was set up in 1982 by Shiv Singh Mehta, and manufactured pipes, imported large quantities of PVC as raw material. In 1992, Mehta zeroed in on branded edible oil as an option that would generate enough opportunity for exports and set up a plant at Dewas under Kriti Industry’s newly created oil division. Twenty seven years later, Kriti Nutrients has a market share of about 13 per cent in the total edible oil market in Madhya Pradesh. Its share in branded edible oil is about 40 per cent. “In 2018, the company invested in…

IN SEPTEMBER 2019, Madhya Pradesh-based InfoBeans Technologies, which specialises in enterprise software development, acquired Philosophie, an innovation and design consulting US firm. This was the company’s first overseas acquisition, one it had been chasing ever since it raised ₹37 crore through a public listing on the NSE two years ago. Philosophie, which registered an annual revenue of $10 million (about ₹70 crore), is expected to help Info-Beans touch the ₹200 crore-turnover milestone in 2019/20. It had registered a compound annual growth rate of 29 per cent EBITA and 33 per cent PAT in the last four years from a business segment known for cut-throat competition. “We are growth hungry people. We have been aiming to double our revenues every two years. In 2014/15 our revenue was ₹43 crore. It touched…

WEDDING-Horseshoe-Broccoli, Trample-Punctuate-Supper, Dives-Topped-Scenes – no, not gobbledegook but a unique way of outfitting the planet with precise addresses. A London-based startup, what3words, says it has assigned a unique address to each 3x3m square in the world. The words are generated using the company’s app and guide the location seeker to the precise place. “Three-word addresses are easy to say and share, and are as accurate as GPS co-ordinates,” says the company’s website. The start-up encodes geographic co-ordinates into three dictionary words and the encoding is permanently fixed. The company helps with situations where there are no precise addresses or where Google does not lead straight to the spot. The app claims to have rescued lost people as well. According to the company, its revenue comes from charging businesses for high…

XIAOMI HAS DONE an excellent job this time in terms of utility, precision and affordability. This fitness band is lightweight, much like the previous editions, has a simple design but has loads of features and a power-packed battery. At the centre of the capsule-shaped body is a 0.95-inch OLED screen with good touch response and excellent sunlight legibility. Just below the display is a circular capacitive touch button for going back to the previous screen. The silicon straps are comfortable, and you can sport a new band face now and then, choosing from a long list of options. To get started, I paired the device with the Mi Fit app. The home screen displays time, date and day along with battery status and step count. I could access a host…

Game India: Seven Strategic Advantages That Can Steer India to Wealth By R.N. Bhaskar Penguin Portfolio ₹499 A FEEL-GOOD BOOK that details how India’s resourceful people can lead the country to incredible wealth. The author, a former journalist, focusses on seven strategic and inherent advantages that India can leverage. And the entire book is filled with overly simplistic yet pleasing solutions, mind-boggling data points and interesting anecdotes. To make his point, Bhaskar uses the example of ‘wealth in waste’. With the use of a table titled Big S**t Spells Big Money, he shows how India can generate 2,62,631 million cubic metres of biogas (one cubic metre of biogas is equal to one litre of diesel). This could be huge because India’s annual diesel consumption amounts to 69 million cubic metres.…

THE WORLD HEALTH Organisation Expert Committee on Biologic Standardization is looking to update its 10-year-old Guidelines on Evaluation of Similar Biotherapeutic Products at its upcoming meeting in Geneva. The Committee will take into account the technological advances for characterisation of biotherapeutic products and may look into the possibility of demonstrating the quality of the medicine through well-designed pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic studies instead of expensive large-scale clinical trials. If the jury is convinced of the robustness of this method, it will bring down the cost of developing biosimilar drugs significantly. Indian biogeneric manufacturers will definitely benefit, but more than that, it will be a critical step to expedite access to biologic medicines, especially those included in the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines. Given the prohibitive cost of life saving biologics, it…

IT’S A CASE OF INCREASED competition in fuel retail. The petroleum ministry is working on a strategy to set up 78,493 more fuel retail in the outlets in next few years, more than doubling the existing 64,624 outlets. It has for the first time opened fuel retail to non-oil companies and lowered the net worth restrictions to ₹250 crore. The state-owned oil marketing companies–IndianOil, Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum could face renewed competition over a period of time from the new entrants. What this means is that like in the developed world, one could see large retailers set up fuel outlets at their large stores. More importantly, as the focus shifts towards electric vehicles, these outlets could offer fast charging facilities too which the current fuel outlets do not offer.…

THANKS TO AN extended monsoon, drug sales in India are on the recovery path, while leading companies are struggling with sales in major export markets, especially the US. Domestic pharmaceutical sales recorded a growth of 11.5 per cent during July-September, the best growth in the past four quarters as local drug sales stagnated to single-digit growth. While sales grew 3.2 per cent in volume terms, price wise growth was 5.5 per cent, said drug sales tracking agency firm AIOCD Awacs. Leading drug maker Sun Pharma’s domestic sales grew over 11 per cent during the period, compared to a 3 per cent negative growth in the corresponding quarter of last year. Domestic sales of Dr Reddy's, Torrent and Lupin grew 10 per cent, for Glenmark it grew 12 per cent. Anti-diabetic…

RESIDENTS OF NAVJIVAN Cooperative Society, a quiet mid-market residential complex in the western suburbs of Mumbai, have in the past few months got used to a small Flipkart truck entering their premises between 10 am and 10.30 am every day. “It’s a bit of a nuisance for us, but at least Mahesh gets to make extra money,” murmurs an elderly resident, as Mahesh Gamre, owner of Deepika General Stores, rushes out of his 200 sq. ft-store. The Flipkart truck offloads 45-50 packages, which Gamre quickly keeps in his store, the ground floor of his one-room flat where he lives with his wife and parents. Gamre’s wife, Geeta, takes charge of the shop, which stocks rice, dal, sugar and even detergent or soap. Soon, Gamre sets out on his scooty wearing…

OVER THE PAST five quarters, most economic indicators have been on a slide. In the first quarter of 2019/20, GDP growth slumped to a six-year low of 5 per cent. Private consumption decelerated to an 18-quarter low of 3.1 per cent in the June quarter. Then, the Reserve Bank of India trimmed the 2019/20 GDP growth projection from 6.9 per cent to 6.1 per cent. To provide a booster shot to the economy, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced a series of measures, including cutting the corporate tax rate to 22 per cent. Yet, sentiment is weak. Private investment has slowed considerably while exports are on a slow track. In the first half of 2019/20, exports, at $159.6 billion, were 2.4 per cent below the $163.5 billion achieved in the first…

As on October 10, RCEP negotiating countries had reached consensus on 21 out of 25 issues. The four chapters that were not concluded dealt with Investment, Electronic Commerce, Rules of Origin and Trade Remedies. Here are the key stumbling blocks: BASE YEAR India’s Stand: Should be 2019; India has raised tariffs between 2014 and 2019 Majority’s Stand: Should be 2013, when talks began RATCHET CLAUSE India’s Stand: Freedom to increase tariff rates Majority’s Stand: Once reduced, tariffs should only go down RULES OF ORIGIN India’s Stand: Strictly from the country of import Majority’s Stand: Anywhere within the RCEP region TARIFF LINES India’s Stand: Country-specific negotiation Majority’s Stand: Should be more or less uniform DATA LOCALISATION India’s Stand: Control over flow of e-data Majority’s Stand: Free flow of data, except for…

SOME COMPANIES go to extraordinary lengths to build bonds among workers. At disk-drive maker Seagate Technology, for example, former CEO Bill Watkins used to take groups of 200 employees on a 40-kilometre adventure race through the middle of New Zealand. Fortune’s Jeffrey O’Brien described Seagate’s “Eco week” as a pep rally that existed not as a reward but as an attempt at extreme team building. Watkins, O’Brien wrote, “thinks Eco week…helps build a more collaborative, team-oriented company.” Most efforts at team building are considerably more mundane. Many corporations plan outings that include such things as ropes courses, trust falls, and gameplaying. Even those consume time, attention, and money. Worse yet, many participants find them to have no value; trust falls have become a frequently mocked, Dilbertesque symbol of managers’ wrongheaded…

Overall economic slowdown has affected the aviation market as well with consumers cutting back on corporate and leisure travel The sharp drop in capacity following Jet’s shutdown led to rise in fares, which is affecting ticket sales Aggressive capacity addition of domestic airlines is expected to bring down fares gradually, and could result in losses for airlines The market is expected to recover in about six months if the liquidity situation improves, consumption grows and the job market revives…

IndiGo is hiring many expats to run its operations. Its current CEO, Ronojoy Dutta, is an Indian but has spent most of his work-life outside India Airlines like SpiceJet and GoAir don’t have professional CEOs and are managed by promoters themselves The only private full-service carrier Vistara has been sourcing its leadership from the talent pool of parent Singapore Airlines If Jet finds a buyer, the chances are that the new promoter will struggle to appoint a new CEO from within India…

Best of Best Dilip Buildcon Best Manufacturing Company (>₹2,500 crore) Grasim Industries Best Manufacturing Company (>₹1,000 crore but < ₹2,500 crore Prataap Snacks Best Manufacturing Company (>₹500 crore but < ₹1,000 crore) Vectus Industries Best FMCG & Food Company (>₹1,000 crore but < ₹2,500 crore Prataap Snacks Best FMCG & Food Company (> ₹500 crore but < ₹1,000 crore Kriti Nutrients Best Services Company (>₹2,500 crore) Agarwal Coal Corporation Best PSU NHDC Best Exporting Company InfoBeans Technologies…

GRASIM Industries was incorporated just 10 days after independence and Nagda village in MP became a prominent supplier of cotton and fibre. Within 16 years, Grasim became the world’s first completely integrated Viscose Staple Fibre (VSF) maker. Dilip Gaur, MD, Grasim Industries, says the Aditya Birla Group has invested about ₹30,000 crore in manufacturing in Madhya Pradesh, which includes UltraTech’s investments in Dhar and Hindalco’s in Mahan, besides Grasim’s investments. “The replacement value of the facility at Nagda will be around ₹15,000 crore today,” he says. It is now largely into specialty products, which form 30 per cent of the basket, and includes the Liva brand. The company plans to strengthen the pulp and fibre business and specialty portfolio towards value-added, green textile solutions. They also plan a third-generation fibre…