A team of three students from Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta won the IRF India Rising Star Challenge, 2017, for devising a business plan that maximises the use of digitisation for an existing retail business.
The theme this year was ‘Digitally re-imagine an existing Indian retail business through a clear digital strategy’. It was chosen keeping in mind the remarkable evolution in Indian consumer markets over the past two decades.
The participants -- Breety Majumdar, Harshul Jain, and Saurabh Kapil -- who were a part of Team Maven of IIM Calcutta, chose Arvind Mills and proposed a strategy for its digital makeover.
“Arvind Mills has multiple brands on both the online and offline platform; we came up with the idea of creating a single brand identity -- Arevo -- to market all their products on a single platform,” Majumdar said.
More than 300 students from B-schools across the country participated in the contest to bring forth their business ideas in retail. The teams from IIM Ahmedabad, ISB, XLRI, XIMB and IIM Calcutta made their way up to the finals.
Participants were required to draw up a business plan that would include the impact of digitisation on sales revenue across channels and provide a clear roadmap for multi-channel management for the business under the recommended strategic digital outlook.
The IIM-C team also proposed having a customisation platform for the company’s consumers. “The company could have a platform which would allow buyers to customise their choice by choosing the kind of fabric, cut and fit,” Kapil said.
The Rising Star Challenge was introduced in 2011 to act as a podium for potential management students who are willing to go that extra mile to nurture their talent and introduce fresh and unique ideas to the table.