Chennai-based Redington (India) Ltd is all set to broad base its distribution
business. The company recently got into consumer electronics and home appliance
distribution signing up with LG Electronics. “To start with, we took up
distribution in Chennai and have now taken it up in Madurai as well. Soon, we
will get into Bangalore and then Delhi, before spreading our wings across the
country. We are in talks with several leading vendors and it is only a matter of
time before we start with other brands,” said Jitendra Kulkarni, CEO,
Redington India.
Explaining the rationale behind the move he said that the basics of
distribution are the same and the company will only have to build the top layer
to suit different industry demands. The company is trying to replicate its
success in IT distribution to other fields also. “The pipe is available and it
is up to us to push any product through it. Of course, we need to do a bit of
customization and modifi-cation wherever required. But, the fundamentals remain
the same,” he explained.
Redington is looking at a quantum jump in business and the company is
expected to change the rules of game in distribution. Soon, many IT distribution
companies may follow suit. “Except IT, no other industry in the country has
such an organized distribution model with national level players involved in it.
The national distributors can bring incremental value to both the vendor and the
retailer. In fact, we have received this feedback in the last six months of
operations here,” Kulkarni pointed out.
Stocking, logistics, credit management, risk taking and inventory management
are some of the services a distributor can offer in business. “Above all, a
national distributor has financial muscle, large scale operations, management
depth, systems and process in place. Their consistency of interface with the
channels is very high and they bring comfortability to both vendors and partners
in business,” he claimed.
Redington is not going to limit itself to just consumer electronics and home
appliances. It has identified many other new areas to explore and expand its
business. “It is just the beginning and more excit-ing things are on the way.
We will announce it at the appropriate time,” Kulkarni elaborated.
Two months back, the com-pany signed up with Microsoft to distribute their
Xbox in the country. And, again gaming was a new product line for Redington,
where it is engaged in developing and dealing with new set of channel partners.
“We are working on many new things and gaming is highly retail oriented.
Still, we enjoy the learning process and it is a high value business,” he
quipped.
With LG Electronics, Reding-ton has done about Rs 8 crore business
distributing white goods. Redington is also distributing LG mobile phones in the
market.
S Gopikrishna Chennai, June 30