bit project

8/2/2019 Bit Project

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Introduction

Organization Profile

Name of Organization Future Group

Type Public

Industry Conglomerate

Founder Kishore Biyani (MD & CEO)

Headquarters Mumbai, Maharashtra, India

Products Discount Stores, Super Centers

Employees 35,000

Website futuregroup.in

Future Group, led by its founder and Group CEO, Mr. Kishore Biyani, operates some of Indias

most popular retail formats that include Pantaloons, Big Bazaar, Central, Home

Town, Ezone and Food Bazaar. While retail forms the core business activity of Future Group, the

group has developed significant presence in consumer finance, capital, insurance, brand

development, retail media and logistics.

The groups retail formats bring in around 250 million customer footfalls every year and provide

a platform for over 30,000 small, medium and large entrepreneurs in India to sell their products

and services to these customers. The group has a retail presence in 85 cities and 65 rural

destinations and employs over 35,000 people directly.

The groups flagship enterprise, Pantaloon Retail India Limited was founded in 1987 and is

listed in the Bombay Stock Exchange and National Stock Exchange since 1991. The company

along with its subsidiaries operates around 16,000,000 square feet (1,500,000 m2) of retail space

in the country. Other group companies include, Future Capital Holdings, a financial services

company, Future Ventures, engaged in operating and investing in allied businesses, Future

Supply Chain Limited which operates a nation-wide logistics and warehousing network, Future

Brands India Limited, a brand and intellectual property rights development corporation and

Future Human Development Limited, an educational and manpower training company with


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campuses in Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Kolkata that offers degree programs in association

with IGNOU.

Future Group believes in developing strong insights on Indian consumers and building

businesses based on Indian ideas, as espoused in the groups core value of Indianness. Thegroups corporate credo is, Rewrite rules, Retain values.This fundamental belief created a new

kind of marketplace, forever transforming Indian retail. Today their core values continue to

guide how they do business and improve the quality of life of the people they serve.

Future Group is committed to being a catalyst of positive change in the communities, societies

and business sectors in which we operate. They envision Indias transformation into the

legendary 'Sone Ki Chidiya' (golden bird), taking wings once again to reach greater heights.

Mission

The vision and belief that their customers and stakeholders shall be served only by creating and

executing future scenarios in the consumption space leading to economic development.

To be the trendsetters in evolving delivery formats, creating retail realty, making consumption

affordable for all customer segmentsfor classes and for masses.

To infuse Indian brands with confidence and renewed ambition. To be efficient, cost- conscious and committed to quality in whatever we do.

To ensure that their positive attitude, sincerity, humility and united determination shall be the

driving forces to make them successful.

Strategy

A new normal is being defined in the Indian consumer market every day. With far-

reaching socio-economic changes that India has undergone in the last decade, the drivers in

urban and rural India are maturing fast.

With a growth strategy tempered with localization and an inclusive business model, Future

Group is the only pure play local retailer poised to lead Indias consumption story with

sustainable value creation.


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The multi-format retail strategy captures almost the entire consumption basket of Indian

customers. As modern retail drives new demand, efficiency and consumption in new categories,

Future Groups strategy is based on their deep understanding of Indian consumers. They

understand the varied buying behaviour of the Indian consumer across regional ethnicities and is

constantly innovating to craft strategies that address the subtle differences.

They believe that modern Indian retail rests on the strength of two pillars scale and

efficiencies. As front-runners in both areas, they firmly believe that their core responsibility lies

in providing protection to customers from the overall rate of inflation. While the scale and size of

their operations helps them improve efficiencies, they also ensure they deliver greater value to

their customers.

Their retail thrust is focused on four principal verticals of Food, Fashion, General Merchandise

and Home. These four categories together account for nearly 65% of the consumption in the

country and represent mass consumer aspirations. Acknowledging this, they are creating retail

pure play through divestment and demerger of non-retail businesses to concentrate their efforts

on these verticals.

Indias retail boom is being driven by resurgence in the economy. Modern retail still has around

6% share of the total retail spend in the country, which is estimated at around US $ 400 billion.

Thus, the potential for modern retail growth in India is huge. Currently, leading retailers in


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mature markets occupy the top three slots by turnover, employment and value creation. As the

Indian economy matures, it is upon them to make the same happen in country.


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Problems in Future Group before IT implementation

1. Future group relied on an integrated network composed of multiple proprietary solutions-

they had a distributed data center operation that allowed limited scalability and support

for Strategic Business Unit. The complex architecture did not allow for virtualization,

hence leading to low resource utilization and increased power consumption.

2. Wide geographical and diverse coverage by Future Group has lead to slow reconciliation

and closing process along with no provision for real time information availability lead to

delay in strategic decision making.

3. Lack of connectivity among stores in different part of country. Due to large range of

product and customer base it becomes difficult to supply products as and when required

which lead to large loss. Lack of proper maintenance and storing capacity could lead tovery heavy losses as it becomes difficult to manage wide variety of goods at a time

without organized system.

4. Customer Retention and Customer acquisition has been the main aim of any retail

organization as it is heavily dependent on loyal customers. Without a proper channel in

place it is not possible to provide all the benefits to customer and provide full satisfaction.

Future Group was able to cover a large customer base it was difficult to retain the

customer as well as increase the base.

5. High Promotion cost that is only targeting a limited customer base is impeding Future

Group from providing product at cheaper rates.

6. Retail Stores allows Future Group to target only limited customer base in the

surrounding region. But once these consumers are covered there is no other scope of

development in retail sector. Expansion of business is a major issue for Future Group.

7. Lack of Common Platform for information sharing among employees. Feedback channel

is a missing link in the complete business strategy.


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Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared

resources, software and information are provided to computers and other devices as a utility (like

the electricity grid) over a network (typically the Internet).

Infrastructure as a Service (SONA)

With aggressive growth projections for the next 3 5 years the IT team had to adopt a strategy

that would allow them to rapidly scale the network from 100 outlets to 3000 outlets. Reliability,

security and availability were very important considerations as the business would rely heavily

on its IT infrastructure. Future group relied on an integrated network composed of multiple

proprietary solutions- they had a distributed data center operation that allowed limited scalability

and support for Strategic Business Unit. The complex architecture did not allow for

virtualization, hence leading to low resource utilization and increased power consumption. In

addition, performance and SLA management was a challenge. The lack of an efficient and


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effective integrated retail management solution resulted in an overly complex technical

environment that impeded employee productivity. Future group faced the problem of reducing

cost of promotions and yet no compromise with objectives of increasing customer base.

Service Oriented Network Architecture

The Service Oriented Network Architecture (SONA) is Ciscos architectural approach to

designing advanced network capabilities into the infrastructure. The importance of having good

network architecture helps ensure that business strategy and IT investments are aligned. As the

backbone for IT communications, the network element of enterprise architecture is increasingly

critical. SONA provided Future Group with guidance, best practices, and blueprints for

connecting their network services and applications to enable business solutions.

The foundation of SONA is built on two core layers First is the Network Systems layer which

consists of foundational network designs and related essential services that create basic building

blocks for the network infrastructure. In essence, this layer provides a sound technical blueprint

for designing network modules or building blocks that can deliver flexibility, security, resilience,

scalability, and performance. Second is the Integrated Network Services layer, which is the most


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important layer build in the framework. This layer establishes guidelines to enable, accelerate,

and optimize applications deployment. Integrated Network Services can also be categorized into

two general service typestransparent services and exposed services. Transparent services can

be used to accelerate or optimize the manner in which applications run across the network, and

are characteristic of transport type services. Transparent services operate in a manner that is

transparent to application-level functions and systems. Some examples of transparent services

include:

Dynamic Routing

Switching and VLANs

Server Load Balancing

MPLS and MPLS VPNs

Firewalls

Intrusion Detection System (IDS) and Intrusion Prevention System (IPS)

Wide Area Application Services (WAAS) such as Payload Compression

Analysis

Because SONA is an open framework for network-based services, it allowed Future Group to

achieve the following business results

A Service Oriented Data Center

Consolidation, virtualization and business continuity

Optimal performance and low power consumption

Ability to turn on services instantly, and operate those services at line rate without

compromising network performance or availability (service on demand)

Scale to include all SBUs and meet future growth projections

Scale to manage hyper growth

Was able to roll out a highly efficient and effective service delivery

Enable mobility and uniformity of experience

Security and Compliance

Be more responsiveness, flexibility and resilience

Better Time-to-Service

And contribute to their green initiative


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Software as a Service (SaaS)

Software as a service (SaaS, typically pronounced [ss]), sometimes referred to as "on-demand

software," is a software delivery model in which software and its associated data are hosted centrally

(typically in the (Internet) cloud) and are typically accessed by users using a thin client, normally using

a web browser over the Internet.

SaaS has become a common delivery model for most business applications,

including accounting, collaboration, customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource

planning (ERP), invoicing, human resource management (HRM), and knowledge management (KM).

Analysis

Cloud Computing helped Future Group in reducing their cost on purchasing hardware for their

stores. They can now run their stores by purchasing system with least possible hardware

configuration. It helped in developing a well integrated common architecture where in they can

run all their systems under a common frame work. It also reduced their investment on purchase

of software as it has to only invest in particular software that the Future Group needs rather than

purchasing the whole package.

Along with all this advantages there are few disadvantages also since Cloud computing is open

source architecture. Data in such system are vulnerable since they are stored on third party space.There are issues like privacy also where in data may be shared without knowing whether it is to

be shared or not. This might be one of the concerns which Future Group might have over looked.


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Virtualization (VMware vSphere and VMware ESXi)

Virtualization, in computing, is the creation of a virtual (rather than actual) version of

something, such as a hardware platform, operating system, a storage device or network

resources.

Future Group had problem with the Data Server Sprawl which was increasing very rapidly so it

took help of Virtualization to get rid of this problem. It used Storage Virtualization so as to

separate logical and physical storage and this helped in reducing the increasing number of Data

Server.

The problem started to in 2008 when the total number of Data Server reached 100. Future Group

took this as a serious issue and started working on the matter. In February 2010, Future Group

deployed a virtualized infrastructure incorporating VMware vSphere and VMware ESXi running

on Sun server hardware. This infrastructure helped them in delivering point of sale, customer

loyalty program, gift voucher, floor planning and human resources systems.

It also helped them in coming up with a better working system where they can facilitate more

guest virtual machine. The guest virtual machines are now running on 10 Sun Fire X4450

servers, leaving plenty of capacity within the Future Group datacenter to sustain future growth.

Future Group has reduced its power consumption by up to 25kVA and cut the number of racks

required to house its datacenter hardware by three. It has also improved average server CPU

utilization from 10 percent to 40 percent.

Evaluation:

Future Group undertook a proof-of-concept of VMware server virtualization.

The organization tested VMware vSphere on two physical servers by provisioning

multiple virtual machines running the Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and CentOS

operating systems.

The test focused on how the virtual infrastructure performed in delivering business

critical point-of-sale and customer loyalty program applications.

Future Group reviewed the VMware vMotion features ability to migrate live virtual

machines from one physical server to another with no downtime. It also analyzed the ease

of manageability of the virtualized infrastructure and its reporting tools.


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Analysis

Virtualization not only helped Future Group in improving its data storing capacity but it also

helped them in improving the processing ability of the servers. Thus Data was now better and

quickly processed then it used to be before. It also helped in reducing the power consumption.

Thus Future Groups investment in IT are in-line with its business strategy and that it has helped

Future Group in scaling up the data centers and helped reducing the power consumption and thus

overall helped in gaining cost benefits.


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Enterprise Resource Planning (SAP General Ledger)

Due to the companys geographical spread and the nature of their business, the key to the success

of their IT strategy lay in the ability to network all nation-wide company locations in a secure

and organised manner.

Problems Faced:

With more than 2,000 sites across India, the company had difficulty tracking the financial

information of each location.

Enhance decision making by providing real-time information.

Expedite the reconciliation and closing processes.

Initially Pantaloons implanted SAPs ERP Financial solution which had general ledger solutions.

But as the companys operations grew, it decided to migrate to the SAP General Ledger

application. It integrated the General Ledger application simultaneously across all its 12 different

group companies.

Earlier version of SAP had separate Ledgers to cover different requirements thus it was very

difficult for Future Group to reconcile data at the end of the year. With the introduction of

General Ledger the number of individual ledgers was reduced, which also alleviated the problem

of reconciling different sets of figures.This section deals with defining, assigning, and posting to

the leading ledger and the non-leading ledgers. Using several ledgers allows you to apply

different accounting standards. Using non-leading ledgers also allows you to use different fiscal

year variants within the same company code.

With the General Ledger application it wanted to take advantage of document splitting features& the real-time integration between financial accounting and controlling.


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Analysis

Financial & Strategic

Greater business insights through more accurate and timely financial information

Lower costs via convergence of financial accounting and controlling

Enhanced data quality

Easier compliance with regulatory requirements via the SAP parallel accounting feature

Operational

Greater visibility of AR and AP throughout profit centers

Increased business transparency via drilldown reporting capabilities

Easier to make unified reports for ensuring compliance with a variety of regulatory

requirements.

Real-time, continuous reconciliation of cost elements and expense accounts, freeing up

personnel for more value-added activities

Ability to close books 15% to 20% faster, due to tight integration between financials and

controlling components and real-time reconciliation capabilities.

5% to 10% reduction in them in accounts receivables

Reduced infrastructure & processing costs


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Reduced database growth by around 500 GB per year via documentation summarization

at profit centre level & with data stored only once, data redundancy is no longer an issue

SAP Retail Solution Benefits

Product Development

Sourcing & Procurement

Managing the supply chain

Selling goods across a variety of channels to customers

We noticed that due to long queues, customers leave trolleys full of goods and walk out, which is

a business loss. We have provided some staff at a few Big Bazaar outlets with handheld

scanners. Thus, while customers are still in the queue, their goods are scanned, so by the time

they reach the cash counter they just have to pay and move on.

We expect several business benefits to accrue from the enhanced network. As there will be a free

flow of information between the HO and other outlets, it will be easier to create sales and

analysis reports. It will also enable us to store customer profiles; by using the BI tool, we can

predict customer behaviour and create targeted ad campaigns. For instance, if a particular shirt is

in demand at a particular store, we can make a requisition from a central location to ensure that

the particular item is available at that store. Features such as these count since they trim cost and

provide transparency in the supply chain.


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Supply Chain Management

WMS (Warehouse Management System)

A warehouse management system, or WMS, is a key part of the supply chain and primarily aims

to control the movement and storage of materials within a warehouse and process the associated

transactions, including shipping, receiving, put away and picking.

Warehouse management systems often utilize Auto ID Data Capture (AIDC) technology, such

as barcode scanners, mobile computers, wireless LANs and potentially Radio-frequency

identification (RFID) to efficiently monitor the flow of products. Once data has been collected,there is either batch synchronization with, or a real-time wireless transmission to a central

database. The database can then provide useful reports about the status of goods in the

warehouse.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_chainhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warehousehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automated_identification_and_data_capturehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barcode_scannerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_computerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_LANhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RFIDhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RFIDhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RFIDhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RFIDhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_LANhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_computerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barcode_scannerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automated_identification_and_data_capturehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warehousehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_chain


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RFID (Radio Frequency Identification)

At the backend of Future Retail's extensive operations in India, almost three million pieces are

scanned six times everyday. That makes it 18 million scans per day only to keep stock of

inventory. Considering the growth in volumes of their retail business, they believe that by theyear 2010-11, they will need to scan close to 30 million pieces per day. That is humanly

impossible and RFID became the essential ingredient.

RFID increases efficiency levels as it offers complete visibility in the supply chain and will be

very effective in decision making or dealing with goods that age or perish.

The technology provides an accurate knowledge of the current inventory. In an academic

study performed at Wal-Mart, RFID reduced Out-of-Stocks by 30 percent for products selling

between 0.1 and 15 units a day. Other benefits of using RFID include the reduction of labor

costs, the simplification of business processes, and the reduction of inventory inaccuracies.

Attribute RFID Barcode

Line of Site Not required (in most cases) Required

Read Range Passive UHF RFID:

- Up to 40 feet (fixed readers)

- Up to 20 feet (handheld

readers)

Active RFID:

- Up to 100's of feet or more

Several inches up to several

feet

Read Rate 10's, 100's or 1000's

simultaneously

Only one at a time

Identification Can uniquely identify each

item/asset tagged.

Most barcodes only identify

the type of item (UPC Code)

but not uniquely.

Read/Write Many RFID tags are Read/Write Read only

Technology RF (Radio Frequency) Optical (Laser)


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Interference

Like the TSA (Transportation

Security Administration), some

RFID frequencies don't like

Metal and Liquids. They can

interfere with some RF

Frequencies.

Obstructed barcodes cannot be

read (dirt covering barcode,

torn barcode, etc.)

Automation

Most "fixed" readers don't

require human involement to

collect data (automated)

Most barcode scanners require

a human to operate (labor

intensive)

Cross Docking

Cross-docking is a practice in logistics of unloading materials from an incoming semi-trailer

truck or railroad car and loading these materials directly into outbound trucks, trailers, or rail

cars, with little or no storage in between. This may be done to change type of conveyance, to sort

material intended for different destinations, or to combine material from different origins into

transport vehicles (or containers) with the same, or similar destination.

Advantages of Retail Cross-Docking

Streamlines the supply chain from point of origin to point of sale

Reduces handling costs, operating costs, and the storage of inventory

Products get to the distributor and consequently to the customer faster

Reduces, or eliminates warehousing costs

May increase available retail sales space.

TMS (Transportation Management System) or Vehicle Visibility System

A vehicle tracking system combines the installation of an electronic device in a vehicle, or fleet

of vehicles, with purpose-designed computer software at least at one operational base to enable
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_softwarehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_software


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the owner or a third party to track the vehicle's location, collecting data in the process from the

field and deliver it to the base of operation. Modern vehicle tracking systems commonly

use GPS technology for locating the vehicle. Vehicle information can be viewed on electronic

maps via the Internet or specialized software.

Active" devices also collect the same information but usually transmit the data in real-time via

cellular or satellite networks to a computer or data centre for evaluation. Many modern vehicle

tracking devices combine both active and passive tracking abilities: when a cellular network is

available and a tracking device is connected it transmits data to a server; when a network is not

available the device stores data in internal memory and will transmit stored data to the server

later when the network becomes available again.

Put to Light System

Put to Light is often referred to as Pick to Light in reverse. In a Pick to Light system, lights guide

operators to SKU locations where they select or 'pick' items from. A Put system uses light

modules direct operators to the correct location to sort or 'put' items into.

One of the most popular applications for Put systems is sort batch picked products into

individual orders. Batch picking is when multiple orders are picked during each pass through the

warehouse, optimizing fulfillment operations where there are a high number of SKUs and long

pick paths. This works best in environments where products and orders are smaller, enabling

pickers to carry several boxes on a cart at the same time.

Downstream these products must be sorted into the appropriate orders. Traditionally carts travel

to pack stations where items are manually sorted by reading pick tickets, shipping or other paper

lists. This approach is slow and prone to mistakes.

If your products feature bar code labels, then a Put to Light system is a faster and more accurate

way to execute this sorting. With Put to Light, the operator simply grabs an item and scans the

label with an RF unit. Lights illuminate at locations requiring that item, and the quantities needed

to fill the order. The process is repeated until the orders are completed.

The Put to Light approach is extremely fast and accurate. The RF scan and lights increase sort

rates and reduce reading errors.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_Systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_System


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Faster sorting rates, on average 40% superior to paper-based or RF-only based methods.

Cost effective for operations with a large number of SKUs, as Put does not require a light

module at every product location like a Pick to Light system does.

Space efficient, often allowing operations with limited facility space to still gain added capacity

Viable technology choice to optimize a wide variety of sorting applications.

Suggestions

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How Site to Store Works

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SYNCHRONIZED PLANNING ACROSS THE SUPPLY-CHAIN

Synchronized planning, in the form of collaborative forecasting and replenishment, coordinated

production, inventory and capacity plans, information integration, and direct linkages ofERP

systems, is one of the most exciting developments in supply chain management in many

industries (Synchronous). Synchronized Planning involves key steps.

Information integration

Planning synchronization

Workflow coordination

New business models

First, information integration requires information sharing and transparency. It is the sharing of

information among the members of the supply chain. Information exchanged may include

inventory levels, production schedules, and shipment schedules. The benefits include better job

scheduling and a reduction of the bullwhip effect. The effect indicates a lack of synchronization

among supply chain members. Even a slight change in consumer sales ripples backward in the

form of magnified oscillations upstream, resembling the result of a flick of a bullwhip handle.

Planning synchronization defines what is to be done with the information that is shared. This can

include collaborative planning and joint design. The benefits are lower cost and improved

service.

If planning synchronization is the what is to be done with shared information, workflow

coordination is the how it is done. Operations that can be coordinated include procurement,

engineering and design changes, and production planning. Benefits include early time to market,

improved service, and gains in efficiency. Synchronized planning can lead to new business

models. Not only can these new business models redefine workflow, they can lead to changes in

responsibility for different parts of the supply-chain. A redefined supply-chain can jointly create

new products and lead to expansion into new markets.

Synchronized planning, however, cannot be accomplished without a tight linkage of all

companies in the supply chain. Channels of communication must be well defined and the

performance of each member in the chain must be monitored. The integrated supply-chain must


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hold members responsible for their part in the process. As product life cycles grow shorter and

shorter, efficient synchronization of the supply-chain grows in importance. To ensure that the

supply-chain is driven by consumer demand, and to decrease the bullwhip effect, synchronized

planning is critical.


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Customer Relationship Management (Customer Loyalty Program)

Why CRM?

Want to focus both on acquisition & Retention To convert daily footfalls into loyal customers Extraordinary service and customer satisfaction Increase customer share

Customer Loyalty Program

Customer Relationship Management is used by Future Group for its flagship store i.e.

Pantaloons. Customer Loyalty Program is used for this purpose which is executed using a

Green Card program. Under this customer information is collected by filling up a form which

consists of following data mainly.

Name

Address

Contact Number

Birth Date

Like/Dislikes

And customer Experience details

This data is stored into database using common software named Customer Loyalty Program. A

card is issued to customer which can be used to avail discounts during future purchase. Different

discounts are provided according to time duration for which customer is a Green Card holder.

This has helped Pantaloons in retaining its customer as well increasing the customer share.

Customer registered under Green Card program are informed about latest happening at its

nearest store. Special discounts are offered on birthdays and other special occasion in the life of

customer.


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The following pictures will give brief idea about the Customer Loyalty Program.


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Analysis

Customer Loyalty Program has helped Pantaloons in retaining its existing customer and also

helped increasing customer share. It provided a feedback channel for customer where they can

easily give reviews about their experience at store. Though CRM provided many advantages to

Pantaloons but there is a very large scope of improvement in this system.

The data that is available with Pantaloons is somehow vulnerable and that why it is available to

telemarketers. This loophole might stop Pantaloons from becoming a invincible leader of market

as customer might stop using this facility provided by Pantaloons.


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Social Media (FACEBOOK)

Future group is in organized retail sector. Organized retail sector is characterized by low profit

margins, high competition and profits are dependent on loyal customer base. As a firm which is

operating in highly competitive market pressures to reduce prices is always there. Future group is

known for its low priced retail chain. The only way left in such a situation is to reduce cost by

attaining high degree of efficiency; so that price pressure is met and yet profits do not erode. The

major chunk of cost is attributed to promotional efforts such as advertisements, print media, etc.

Customer retention and building loyalty with help of these are highly expensive.

Future group faced the problem of reducing cost of promotions and yet no compromise

with objectives of increasing customer base.

Social media is embedded in our daily lives. It is no longer the trend, it is the web and continues

to weave and wrap itself into every corner and crevice of the internet as we know it.

The addiction, like crack cocaine has spread and 650 million people on Facebook, 225 million on

Twitter and 100 million on LinkedIn are evidence of this compelling attraction.

Social media used by Future Group

Facebook and Twitter are two social networking sites widely used by Future group. Future group

is much more active on Facebook in comparison to twitter, reason being facebook is more

interactive and more popular than twitter. They have more than 15 interactive pages on facebook

which are updated daily. Below is analysis of one of the most active page on facebook which is

Big Bazaar on Facebook.


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Official Page of Big Bazaar on Facebook

On wall of this page user can write about their experiences, their suggestions and their

grievances. This page acts as a source of information for user, grievances redressal, and store

locator. This page is also used for advertising about new offers at Big Bazaar. Wednesday used

to be the least sales day for big bazaar. In order to overcome this they launched Wednesday

Bazaar-sabse sasta din concept. Wednesday bazaar is promoted on the web page with least cost.

This page is made more interactive by various contests such as Mahabachat Contest. Users

participate in these competitions which ensure that user traffic is maintained on page and they do

get information.


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Analysis:

1. It spreads:

Social medias viral capacity lies in its one to many and then the many to many

amplification of ideas and content on a worldwide scale. The low friction of sharing (how

easy is it to hit a like button or a retweet icon) with social media provides the power to

make ideas spread. Any new scheme is made popular with the help of social media. New

schemes, offers are spread effectively, with minimum efforts.

2. It helps FG to connect:

Ranking on the first page of a search engine is the Holy Grail for businesses (it is where 90%

of all clicks to websites occur). FG connects with ease to its most loyal customers and

attracts new one with social media. Future-Bazaar.com also provides feature to make a

purchase online while surfing from one page of Facebook to another.

3. Low cost and high effectiveness:

One of the main advantages of effective utilization of social media is the low cost. The

number of customer connected and interacted with help of social media is higher. At a

relatively cheap cost FG is able to effectively interact with consumers and built brandloyalty.


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E-commerce and E-business (Future Bazaar)

Expansion of business without opening new stores was a major challenge for Future Group as

retail industry becomes stagnant after it has covered majority of cities. Future Group came up

with a creative solution to this problem in collaboration with IT.

FutureBazaar.com is the e-commerce arm of the Future Group. FutureBazaar provides an

integrated shopping site where consumers are able to buy products from our flagship stores

including eZone, Pantaloons and Big Bazaar online and get home delivery of products.

FutureBazaar.com is owned and operated by Future Bazaar India Ltd. (FBIL). FBIL is a part of

the Future Group, Indias largest retail conglomerate. FBIL is the e-commerce arm of the Future

Group. The company was incorporated in 2006 and began business in 2007.

In 2007, Wipro infotech provided an end-to-end turnkey solution that includes design,implementation, integration and substance of the system. The solution also uses Sun Java Caps

as the integration middleware to GurureBazaar's SAP backbone. Future Group also selected

ATG Commerce suite from Bostan-based ATG, the world's leading e-commerce solution

provider as the platform of choice.

The ATG Commerce suite would allow FutureBazaar to offer a more flexible, intuitive shopping

experience to its customers with a host of new value-added features such as affinity-based

recommendations, gift registers and personalised store-fronts.

FUTURE BAZAARS KEY DIFFERENTIATION

1. Brick and Mortar Strategy as against Marketplace Model.

2. Unconditional Return within 15 days.

3. Multi- logistic mode.

4. Good discount and free delivery.

5. Delivery across more than 1500 cities and towns in India covering around 16,000

pin codes6. Fast deliveriestie ups with world leaders in logistics & transportation services

7. A dedicated Customer Care helpline for any queries.

8. Always offering Manufacturers guarantee as opposed to Sellers guarantee, which

most of the other online shopping sites offer.

9. Aggressive PricesFutureBazaar.com has the benefit of leveraging the sourcing

network of the Future Groups retail chains. This sourcing network straddles a wide


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range of product requirements, thus being able to offer them economies of scale

thereby - unbelievable prices to its customers

10.Unmatched Selection of Products and Brandsthey have more than 20,000 products

which create the flexibility to offer a large range of choices to customers. They also

have partnerships with most of the brands available in the country, which allows them

to get the latest in the range to their customers. They have been able to create some

major popularity ripples with their corporate clients with products like mobiles,

electronics, laptops, MP3 players, T-shirts, Gift Vouchers and so on.

11.Seamless end-to-end Logistics SolutionThey pride themselves in having built an

end-to-end logistics solution; right from stocking, dispatching, and delivery

confirmation up to post-sales support. Their back-end infrastructure enables them to

service around 15000 pin codes across India.

12.Dedicated Customer Care for online customers as well as corporate clients - They

have a dedicated team straddling client servicing, sourcing, logistics and customer

service for all their customers.13."Brand Association" - Most importantly out parentage & association with

humungous retail brands like Big Bazaar, Pantaloons, Central and many more,

lends tremendous amount of trust & credibility to the end consumers.

Analysis


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Recommendation for future investment

Knowledge Management

Retailers in the developed world are incorporating knowledge management into their processes

to gain advantage over their competitors, enabling executives and lower level managers to

quickly run reports on sales and other performance measures, to handle inventory better and to

gain a clearer understanding of their products.

Objective:

1. Developing a feedback channel and common platform for information sharing.

2. Improved financial competitiveness.

3. Efficiency of operation.

4. Gain competitive advantage over others.

Future Groups knowledge-based system utilizes interactive capabilities and attempts to

standardize valuable knowledge in a properly stored format in order to make available to those

employees that would benefit the most. Among other benefits of its knowledge-management

system, data mining and support for the front-end personnel could be especially enumerated. It is

recommended that the company should pay closer attention to the scalability of the system andthe technologies involved, since it would be the key of successful future development. The

primary feature is that the posted content is essentially owned and managed by the particular

business area and reviewed on a periodic basis; thus the shared information through the various

departments and knowledge shared is not permanent.

bit project

Documents