Organised by India Supply Chain Council, and Third Eyesight as Knowledge Partner

Venue: Shangri-La hotel, 19, Ashoka Road, Connaught Place, New Delhi 110001, India

Registrations: Email services [at] 3isite [dot] com or call us on +91 (124) 4112493, 4112494, 4112495

The fast pace of the India retail industry presents many companies with a host of daily challenges. Maintaining competitive advantage in the face of increasing competition requires many retailers in India to improve facility flow-through, drive down the amount of inventory in their supply chain and meet escalating store and customer demands - all while operating within tight margins.

On May 9, 2007, the India Supply Chain Council will organize its first Retail Supply Chain Summit to explore retailer's challenges and possible solutions for India. Through real-life case studies, the event will focus on what leading retailers are doing to get products into consumers' hands consistently and at the lowest cost in India.

The Retail Supply Chain Summit will give you the opportunity to learn about new developments, discuss common issues and challenges and hear recommendations and solutions on retail supply chain operations. This conference will feature keynote presentations from retail specialists, case study presentations from leading retailers and panel discussions led by top experts in the field. There are many retail conferences in India but very few have explored best practices in retail supply chain, logistics and stores operations. The goal of the event is also to allow retailers and suppliers forge stronger links through supply chain management initiatives and innovations.

Confirmed Speakers Include:

Leveraging Supply Chain to improve Retail Profitability - Deepak Gupta, Director, Product Supply, Greater China, PROCTER & GAMBLE
Shelf-centric collaboration between Manufacturer and Retail is critical in creating loss free supply chains that fuel and accelrate the top and bottom line growth. Understanding the collaboration touch points will help retailers in developing a supply chain that matches replenishment and retail velocity to eliminate non-value-added inventory and remnants and improve shelf availability.

Challenges in Building Fresh Produce Supply Chain - Raman Ahuja, General Manager, Business Development & International Sales with FIELDFRESH FOODS PVT. LTD. (an equal partnership venture of BHARTI ENTERPRISES & THE ROTHSCHILD FAMILY)
Fresh Produce (fruits & vegetables) has a very small presence in the modern retailing scene in India. This is primarily due to the highly fragmeneted nature of the supply chain.This, however, has not detered the early retailers in aggressively setting up back end systems to feed the ever growing demand of fresh produce. The session will focus on highlighting some key challenges and also suggest possible solutions to stay 'fresh' in this highly perishable category.

Experiences from the Domino's Pizza Supply Chain - Harsharan Marwah, Head - Supply Chain, DOMINO'S PIZZA INDIA LTD.
Mr. Marhwah will share experiences from one of the foremost international quick-service franchises in India, and will speak on:

• The complexities caused by the unique requirements from raw materials and vendors on the one hand, and market dynamics on the other, in the case of Domino's
• Balancing the need for controlling costs, achieving quality standards (right up to delivering to the customer's doorstep), and compliance
• Business partner relationship strategy and other key strategies deployed by Domino's to overcome its unique challenges

Impact of Modern Retail in Supply Chain Evolution - Devangshu Dutta, Chief Executive, THIRD EYESIGHT
Observers, supporters and critics of the development of modern or organized retailing in India argue about many things, but one is seldom disputed – that organized retailing can have a tremendous beneficial impact on the supply chain. However, what is this impact, and has any of it been already seen in the past, for us to be so confident that it will happen in the future? Devangshu Dutta, chief executive of Third Eyesight, will share insights from Indian experiences and case studies of what impact organized retailing is having in the country.

Logistics Infrastructure in India – Warehousing Issues - Makrand Inamdar, Head-Business Development & Distribution, RELIANCE LOGISTICS
For a country with 3.28 Million Sq.Km area and with a 1.80 Billion population the basic logistics infrastructure required is in terms of Roads, Rail network, Ports and Airports. While the roads comprise only of 3.3 Million Kms, the Railway network is 53,000 Kms. The Country has 12 major and 185 minor ports, 11 international and 89 domestic airports. The major infrastructure issues are inadequate and poor quality of roads, high cost of haulage per MT for Railways, quality and productivity issues in cargo handling at ports and congestion and heightened security concerns resulting delay in air-cargo clearance. Due to these shortcomings, warehousing takes a hit on the basic aspects of Supply Chain Operations i.e. Inventory in the system, Customer Service Levels and Freight and Transport Management. To overcome these issues, private sector is getting geared up in terms of cargo consolidation, reducing transportation costs, increasing stake in the business of professional service providers, investing in logistics directly or through partnerships and investments in Systems and Technology.

Case Study of designing a Greenfield Retail network for Pan-India Retailer – Evaluation of Best Practice Retail Supply Chain Configurations - Somya Basu, Senior Manager, CHAINalytics INDIA
The presentation will focus on the case study of designing a Greenfield retail supply chain network for a pan-India, multi-format retailer. Key aspects of the problem including the problem definition, key steps in designing the network will be covered. Special emphasis will be given on discussion/comparison of different network configurations that exist in the retail industry in the developed nations and in evaluating their applicability for an India based retail business. Also covered will be the choice between having a single network strategy for the entire retail supply chain vs. having hybrid supply chain comprising of various network configurations catering to the specificities of different product categories/store formats that constitute the retail chain

Designing Supply Chain to avoid stock outs and improve service levels - Radha Mohan Gupta, Head - Logistics, RECKITT BENCKISER INDIA
In today’s dynamic market where the product differentiation is decreasing day by day, product life cycle is shrinking and sourcing is becoming global, customer is demanding a variety of product mix at affordable prices. In fact supply chain is playing an enviable role in today’s competitive market place to ensure value to customers in all the offerings which an organization decide for his customers… be it service , cost or agility to respond to ever changing preferences of consumers. With modern trade catching up in India , Supply chains need to be much more adaptive and responsive to customers demand. There is a need to be collaborative and cost efficient to win over competition. While aspects like…product life cycle , demand predictability , product variety and lead-times are important factors , Supply Chains can be designed basis the type of the products . The design and architecture of supply chain will depend on wether the product is functional or innovative. A mismatch between type of product and type of supply chain may cost heavily in today’s scenario. On contrary a carefully designed supply chain with supportive policies on “ Inventory Management”, “ Collaborative Planning and forecasting” and also “ Flexible Manufacturing “ can bring in results which will not only satisfy but delight the customers.

Logisitics in Retail in India - Bharat Joshi, Director, ACTL
The Indian retail sector is one of the fastest growing segments in the country and is currently valued at USD 180 - 200 billion and is estimated to contribute to 10% of India's GDP. Due to the strong interest that foreign investors and large Indian conglomerates have been taking in this segment – growth rates are expected to rise into the realms of 30-40% per annum. Overall penetration for 3PL activity in the retail sector however was valued at approximately 6-7% since Indian retailers are not totally open to outsourcing their supply chain requirements due to various reasons. However, with increased competition and the stupendous growth expected in this segment, it is anticipated that Indian retailers will start expanding their use of 3PL service providers. This paper shall initially talk about industry challenges that particularly large Indian conglomerates / foreign players entering the retail sector may face in the Indian environment. The second part of the paper will stress on the need for sophisticated supply chain solutions in the retail sector and the strategy that logistics companies should have to best serve large Indian retailers with strong pan-country ambitions.

Keeping eye on the three legs of supply chain stool - Mukundan Seshadri, CEO, BLUEFILE
Optimizing USD 6 Billion revenue company’s supply chain to improve customer satisfaction through shorter TAT, dependable delivery window and lower total cost of ownership” . This case resulted in lower supply chain cost as a percentage of revenue, with approx. saving of USD 20 M+ annually. This key project helped this product leadership company to reach customers with a mix of built to order Instruments, retail distribution of off-the shelf instruments, short-shelf life consumable and spares. Inbound supply chain considered cost and predictability while outbound distribution strategy looked at global manufacturing footprint, Trade challenges, Regional distribution centers and country warehouses. IT investment and ROI computation for forward and reverse logistics were meshed in to gain good visibility on cost drivers for future (reliable) forecast

Creating a Customer-Centric Global Education Supply Chain--Experiences in China and Application to India - Dr. K. Ravi Kumar, Professor of Information and Operations Management & Associate Dean for International Programs, MARSHALL SCHOOL OF BUSINESS
Like all other industries, manufacturing and services, the education industry is trying to globalize and is searching for operational models that can be effectively implemented. A key limiting resource for any educational institution is its outstanding faculty and it is very difficult to leverage this resource physically in global education. Information technology based on the internet has been suggested as a way to overcome the physical disadvantages of moving faculty or students but there are limitations to this channel of distribution of educational curriculum. In this talk, we describe The University of Southern California Marshall School of Business five-year experience delivering our Global EMBA in Shanghai in partnership with Shanghai Jiao Tong University and our current plans to launch a Global Supply Chain management degree program in India."

Other confirmed / invited speakers include:

- Mr. Chitranjan Dar, CEO, ITC-LIFESTYLE BUSINESS DIVISION

- Gaurav Mahajan, Head of Merchandising, TRENT-WESTSIDE

- Dr. Amit Shekhar, GM & Global Head, Supply Chain Management, HCL TECHNOLOGIES

- Mr. Suchinto Chatterji, ILF ADVOCATES

- Mr. Ravi Vaidyanathan, AVP, ORIENT CRAFT

- Anil Jain, Head-CRM & Research, WCE, KIRBY BUILDING SYSTEMS INDIA

- Dr. Sreedhar Kavil, Vice Chairman, INDIAN AMERICAN UNITED STATES CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, INC

REGISTRATION CHARGES: Rs. 7,990 for India Supply Chain Council Members, Rs. 12,888 for non-members.

TRIPLE BENEFIT : Membership + Event Pass + Eligibility for discounts on future events = Rs. 21,500