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From just an electrical channel partner, Vashi Electricals has grown to become a company of procurement specialists, helping customers from various verticals, including infrastructure equipment. Sanjeev Bhatia, Partner, elaborates more on the company and its vision for future. <p></p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Could you brief us about your company and its core competencies?</span><br />Vashi Electricals is India's largest channel partner of reputed Indian and international brands of industrial products. Started in 1978, the family business with a humble beginning and king size dreams initiated the change in pattern of response and service to the customer. The business process designed was committed to service customers in time. Focused commitment and efforts resulted in manifold growth and expansion of the network.</p><p>Today, Vashi Electricals is more than an electrical channel partner. We are a company of procurement specialists helping customers to lower supply chain cost with increase in efficiency. We provide a basket of products under one roof to meet project or emergency maintenance requirements. Our strong workforce of over 500 team members is working tirelessly delivering in-time what we commit.</p><p>Our company today has its presence across India to cater to the local project needs of every region. </p><p>We have a combined warehouse area of four lakh sq ft spread across 12 locations pan-India with more than 50,000 different products being stocked to cater to the diversified customer needs in time. This is made possible with the help of the state-of-the-art SAP ERP software, systems and processes, and customer portal which works as the backbone of our organisation.</p><p> Our customer-related core competencies are defined through our Prism Services:<br />19 world-class brands under one roof<br />In-house technical support -service centres and brand teams<br />24x7 services<br />Pan India rate contract - 12 warehouse locations<br />Tatkal delivery ex-stock<br />Web portal access - to our ERP system and e-commerce site<br />Pan India door delivery</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">What are the key achievements of the company in various industry verticals?</span><br />Since 1978, we started the journey of building relations, system and process of understanding, and satisfying needs of diversified buyers for industrial electrical products in various industrial verticals and customer segments. We bridge the gap between world-class products, manufacturers and users with simple processes to ensure timely and prompt delivery. Our partnership with principals is based on trust and commitment to serve customers with the same level of quality as envisaged by them. Our partnership is built on the 3C concept - Capacity, Capability and Commitment. Our primary responsibility is to understand and satisfy the needs of every industry vertical and related customer segments (control panel manufactures, original equipment manufacturers, end-users, new project customers and electrical contractors) with innovative service and solutions for industrial electrical products. This has helped us to leave our footprints with more than 20,000 customers spread across various industry verticals in India.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Being a channel partner for different industrial products, how do you look at the current industry scenario in infrastructure development and construction?</span><br />After recording a spectacular growth of over 12 per cent, more than the country's GDP in the past half-decade, the Indian construction sector lost stream in last fiscal, largely due to global financial turmoil. Not just this, the turmoil tremors created multiple impacts across sectors including steel, cement, power, petroleum, aluminium, IT and ports. Now the construction activities have started picking up. Government has issued various contracts relating to projects in mining, railway, infrastructure, commercial buildings, and some of the construction companies are also coasting along with a steady flow of contracts. </p><p>The next 2-3 years are going to be the moment of reckoning for the construction industry to demonstrate its managerial, financial and technical prowess to establish new benchmarks in construction management, construction quality, imparting value addition to its products and services in critical construction equipment product line. To resist such like present global meltdown, the industry has to look within to develop its competitiveness across segments through enhancing their capabilities in R&amp;D to leverage innovation through indigenous capability and expertise. They need to exploit and build on their own inherent labour and material cost advantage and resource savings to manage crisis. The present time is the best time to revisit some of these and other strategies and explore new growth avenues not only to mere recovery from such situations, but also to prepare itself for new global shocks. With or without stimulus packages, the best means for the well being and growth come from within. What matters most is to put one's best foot forward in recession, recover fast and emerge stronger than ever.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">How do you look at the business opportunities and growth in infrastructure equipment segment?</span><br />Investments in infrastructure are the main growth drivers of the infrastructure equipment industry. In the near future in India, the bulk of construction growth is likely to come from growth in transportation infrastructure (roads, rail, airports, ports), urban infrastructure (mass rail transit systems, water supply and sanitation, urban housing) and rural infrastructure (rural roads, irrigation, rural housing) - three important sectors for driving infrastructure equipment demand. </p><p>The market is expected to grow by a healthy 20-25 per cent over the next few years. This would imply a $16-21 billion market, up from today's $3 billion. The broad-based growth is expected across products, with each segment expected to see double-digit growth. A rise in the use of concrete will also create demand for concrete equipment in infrastructure and housing projects.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">With the construction equipment market is growing, what are your plans to further expand association with this segment? </span><br />We are simultaneously working on various initiatives in our organisation. Apart from strengthening our product profile, we have created 'Brand' teams within the organisation to support our sales team. We have also collated data industry segment wise and will have specialised team members to take care of various industry verticals. We are also working on adding more brands in our portfolio to cater to various industry demands. Post GST, even our customers are coming forward to advise us on enhancing our portfolio so that they can have a single reliable partner for their buying needs. In a nutshell, our plans for future are to have specialised teams for various verticals including construction equipment and build our brand profile to cater to large base of customers.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">What are your future business expansion plans?</span><br />Our future plans are simple. We would like to be 'Amazon' of electrical trade business. Our ultimate aim is to bill one lakh customers in a year. We would like to reach every nook and corner of India and also make our presence felt globally. The main purpose of Vashi's existence has been availability of the stock and ease of business. We have invested in the state-of-the-art fulfillment centres across major industrial towns. Further, we will be launching our e-commerce portal and that will help us strengthen our position pan India. Aggressive online and offline marketing will help us gain more market share, especially from the retail world. With GST coming in, we see ample opportunities. Our new facility of e-commerce portal is a key strategy to expand growth across India. It will enable us to provide local support and service to our existing customers and to expand further into the market for retail world. Also, there is a 'Core Committee' within the organisation, which is working on this thought process, taking various initiatives and building our infrastructure and organisation to reach this goal within not a very distant future.</p><p> The next 2-3 years are going to be the moment of reckoning for the construction industry to demonstrate its managerial, financial and technical prowess to establish new benchmarks in construction management, construction quality, imparting value addition to its products and services in critical construction equipment product line.'</p><p> 'With GST coming in, we see ample opportunities. Our new facility of e-commerce portal is a key strategy to expand growth across India. It will enable us to provide local support and service to our existing customers and to expand further into the market for retail world.'</p>