Global alliance can bring money, not technology: Biyani

MUMBAI: World confederations would benefit Indian retailers in terms of money infusion, but they wouldn’t necessarily bring in better engineering to the market, said Kishore Biyani, the founding fathers of the country’s largest retailer Future Group.“They bring only fund. Technology is not a big thing, ” Biyani said at India Retail Forum in Mumbai on Wednesday. “Anyone can erect engineering, which does only 3 things — reduce room and time, and constructs social exchanges, ” he said.Biyani’s flagship company Future Retail is reportedly in talks with Amazon, Alibaba and Google to sell practically 10% stake in the next few weeks. India does not allow foreign direct investment( FDI) in multi-brand retail, but world companies can invest in a retail company as foreign portfolio investors. An Indian multi-brand retailer can dilute up to 49% stake to foreign portfolio investors, but a single FPI cannot maintain more than 10% stake in the firm.Future Group has been trying engineering integrating, known internally as Retail 3.0, which is being piloted through several EasyDay supermarkets, which are also used to examine shopping behaviour. “We are ahead of countries around the world in terms of technology, ” Biyani said. “In India, ecommerce rates are very high in terms of acquiring the consumers and bringing. They need to bring down the costs by one third.” India’s approximated $79.43 -billion, or about Rs 5,68, 000 crore, organised retail sell is increasingly getting disrupted by ecommerce corporations. Future Group itself has acquired ecommerce firms such as Koovs and FabFurrnish and has been rolling out efforts to divert online consumers to its storages. The company that runs formats such as Big Bazaar, Central and Brand factory, expects Rs 1,000 crore in online sales by next year, up from about Rs 300 crore now.Over the past six years, Biyani has acquired half a dozen supermarket storage chains and put together a total retail space of 13.6 million sq ft in 255 metropolis through more than 1,030 storages. The retailer has data on intake and buying frequency motif of a virtually 30 million loyal client base. Future Group also said it will target wider buyer segment by participating newer jobs such as amusement and may invest in movies.

Read more: economictimes.indiatimes.com