Exploring the bottom of the pyramid - ITC eChoupal visit

The students of IIM Lucknow recently visited the ITC e-Choupal project running in Hardoi which is 2.5 Km from Lucknow. e-Choupal is an initiative of ITC Limited, a large multi business conglomerate in India, to link directly with rural farmers via the Internet for procurement of agricultural and aquaculture products like soybeans, wheat, coffee, and prawns. e-Choupal was conceived to tackle the challenges posed by the unique features of Indian agriculture, characterized by fragmented farms, weak infrastructure and the involvement of numerous intermediaries. The programme involves the installation of computers with Internet access in rural areas of India to offer farmers up-to-date marketing and agricultural information. As a part of the day long visit the students visited three places

•    E-Choupal – Present in villages usually at the house of a prominent person in the village. In this case, it was a schoolteacher in the Madhavpur village who has been running this e-Choupal for the last 10 years. He is the sanchalak and he disseminates information about prices, weather, fertilizers, seeds etc. to the farmers in the village. He has a computer set-up at his house and he receives information through it on a daily basis.

•    Choupal Saagar – This is where the farmers bring their produce to be sold to ITC. This is accompanied by a retail outlet where these farmers can buy various kinds of daily necessities. A lot of students purchased stuff from this store lured by the heavy discounts.

•    The Hub – This is where the purchased produce is stored. In UP, it is mainly wheat. This is in juxtaposition to the Choupal Saagar

The students got an insight into how the scheme of things works at one of the most popular rural models which is garnering attention worldwide. The students enjoyed the visit thoroughly and made the very best of the trip by interacting with the farmers and gathering insights that can be instrumental in the development of rural India.

SPORTS & CELEBRITY MANAGEMENT – TALK AT IIM LUCKNOW!

Miss. Khaneja

To give the students a sneak-peak into the field of Sports and Celebrity Management, the Industry Interaction Cell (iic) of IIM Lucknow organized a session by Miss. Latika Khaneja, founder and director of Collage Sports Management. Miss Khaneja talked about her “virgin attempt at sports marketing” which was basically her effort towards helping budding cricketers establish their foothold in the cricketing world. What started off as a simple non-profit cricketing club has now diversified into one of the largest sports management company in India.

Among her illustrious clientele are Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Ishant Sharma and Abhinav Bindra, besides a whole gamut of others. The highlight of the session was the story of Virender Sehwag, of how the company leveraged his boy next door image to transform him into one of the biggest brands of India. Miss Khaneja deliberated on the difference between sports marketing and sports sponsorship. She mentioned that while sports sponsorship is more about garnering financial support for the players, sports marketing is a different genre of activity that comprises a win-win situation for both the player and the company.  Mentioning about the new avenues of sports management she also shared her thoughts about Team Tennis - a new project by Collage towards professional training in tennis.

The session received rave reviews from the student community. Mukund a second year student had to say “The session was quite informative. It would definitely motivate the students to consider such offbeat career options in the future”. The talk session was hosted as a part of Colloquy – The talk series by the Industry Interaction Cell of IIM Lucknow. IIM Lucknow is slated to host some of the biggest names in Sports and Bollywood this year to give its students exposure to new career paths. The elite Management school believes in strong industry exposure to complement the curriculum, and with the curriculum being made highly contemporary, the Industry Interaction Cell is opening up channels across India’s twin loves – Bollywood and Cricket to make the course learning consummate.

Business of Entertainment - Workshop by Tarun Tripathi!

Mr. Tarun Tripathi is the Former Head of Marketing, Yash Raj Films (YRF) and Mr. Tarun Tripathi is the Former Head of Marketing, Yash Raj Films (YRF) and ex-Director, MySpace India. He joined YRF in 2002 and has been responsible for film marketing tie-ups, the most significant being that of ‘Hum Tum’, ‘Dhoom’ and  ‘Bunty Aur Babli’. Following a productive 5-year stint at Yash Raj Films, he joined MySpace.com as Director-Marketing and Content, for its India operations. The social networking site launched its customised Indian beta version under his supervision. Prior to joining YRF, he worked with global advertising agency Grey Worldwide (Mauritius) and KPMG (Mauritius). Mr. Tarun Tripathi currently teaches the course – “Business of Entertainment” at MICA. Tarun is a master of the Entertainment game. Be it the fundamentals of entertainment as defined through cultural entities or creative dimensions in marketing movies, he is IIM Lucknow's undisputed entertainment guru. He held the audience spell bound with his insights on the music industry and the marketing strategies used for Hum Tum. Tarun's most endearing trait is his passion for giving back to IIM Lucknow. The 8 hour workshop which spanned two days took the students through a comprehensive journey of the Culture Industry of which Entertainment Business is a part. The workshop was not the only delight though. Tarun also floated 2 competitions - a Case study contest and a Live Project. The case study contest focussed on emerging trends in social media while the Live Project was floated in association with Star One. Both competitions were of high significance to the student community best indexed by participation by over 160 students from the second year batch alone! On the whole, the workshop offered great insights into an industry that has recruited very few professionals and it opened up channels for new career options to IIM Lucknow's whiz kids. He joined YRF in 2002 and has been responsible for film marketing tie-ups, the most significant being that of ‘Hum Tum’, ‘Dhoom’ & ‘Bunty Aur Babli’. Following a productive 5-year stint at Yash Raj Films, he joined MySpace.com as Director-Marketing and Content, for its India operations. The social networking site launched its customised Indian beta version under his supervision. Prior to joining YRF, he worked with global advertising agency Grey Worldwide (Mauritius) and KPMG (Mauritius). Mr. Tarun Tripathi currently teaches the course – “Business of Entertainment” at MICA. Tarun is a master of the Entertainment game. Be it the fundamentals of entertainment as defined through cultural entities or creative dimensions in marketing movies, he is IIM Lucknow's undisputed entertainment guru. He held the audience spell bound with his insights on the music industry and the marketing strategies used for Hum Tum. Tarun's most endearing trait is his passion for giving back to IIM Lucknow. The 8 hour workshop which spanned two days took the students through a comprehensive journey of the Culture Industry of which Entertainment Business is a part. The workshop was not the only delight though. Tarun also floated 2 competitions - a Case study contest and a Live Project. The case study contest focussed on emerging trends in social media while the Live Project was floated in association with Star One. Both competitions were of high significance to the student community best indexed by participation by over 160 students from the second year batch alone! On the whole, the workshop offered great insights into an industry that has recruited very few professionals and it opened up channels for new career options to IIM Lucknow's whiz kids

Ex. MD Technopak, visits IIM Lucknow for Retail Consulting talk

The Industry Interaction Cell of IIM Lucknow invites industry experts to deliver domain specific talks in the campus under the “Colloquy” talk series.

Mr. Harminder Sahni, MD, Wazir Advisors, Ex MD Technopak visited IIM Lucknow on August 5^th and conducted an interactive session with the students. Mr. Harminder has extensive industry experience in Retail sector business including  launch of new brands, implementation of new projects for clients and for brand licensee and supply partnerships between Indian and international firms. He has consulted for clients in India, Sri Lanka, Philippines, Hong Kong, Europe, North America and South America , including manufacturers, marketers and retailers.

The theme of the session was “Retail Consulting in India – Challenges and Best Practices”.

Mr. Harminder talked about organized and unorganized retail formats and shared his insights on how the micro segmentation of the consumer base  is taking place in Modern retail stores. The absence of talent gunning to enter the industry -- one of the biggest challenges facing the industry -- was also delved upon.

Students were curious to know about the key strategies behind private labels and the same was reflected in the number of questions they posed to the speaker. Current issues in Retail such as failure of Subhiksha and the debt restructuring at Vishal Retail was also discussed.

Overall the session provided an excellent insight into the ground realities of Retail in India. The session made for an excellent learning opportunity for students interested in pursuing a career in retail marketing management.