Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Strategies & Market Trends : India Coffee House -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mohan Marette who wrote (4556)	6/14/1999 1:33:00 AM
From: Mohan Marette	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 12475

Modi group plans to focus on consumer goods sector modicorp.com modicorp.com Tina Edwin -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- New Delhi, June 13: Umesh Kumar Modi's Rs 500-crore Modi group of industries has identified consumers goods and pharmaceuticals as future growth areas. The company is planning several new ventures which would position the group as a consumer goods company in the near future. In an interview with The Financial Express, Modi said he anticipated a quantum increase in consumer demand for branded products. The managing director and president of the group said he would like to steer his group into areas which were poised for growth in the coming years. The group would foray into branded agri-based and non-agri-based consumer goods in the coming years. At present, Modi group of industries has interest in areas as wide as sugar, sponge iron and steel, cosmetics, engineering and power as well as pharmaceuticals. In an effort to enhance its presence in consumer goods business, the group is launching branded sugar next month. This would be followed up with launch of refined sugar early next year. The branded sugar,to be sold as Modi Sugar, will be initially available one kilogram pack and subsequently in five-kilogram packs also. The product is currently being test marketed. In the pharmaceuticals business, Modi said, he was in negotiations to acquire technologies for new drugs. Modi has two pharmaceuticals companies -- ModiMundipharma and WinMedicare -- engaged in manufacture and marketing of certain drugs. The company has, as a rule, sourced technologies pharmaceuticals and healthcare products from laboratories in the US, Germany and Switzerland, instead of investing in research and development of new drugs, a process that is capital intensive as well as time consuming. Elaborating on his foray into marketing branded sugar, Modi said the group expected to sell 25 per cent of the 1.44 lakh tonnes of sugar manufactured by its two factories -- Modi Sugar Mills and SBEC Sugar -- in packaged format. The branded sugar is expected to contribute about 40 per cent of the sales revenues from sugar business, Modi added. TheModi companies are, at present, in the process of establishing a distribution network for the branded sugar. It is expected that the sugar packs would be sold out of upmarket shops, super stores and super bazaar outlets across the country. Modi Sugar will be first launched in Delhi and thereafter, it will be put on the shelves in other northern and eastern cities. By end-September, the group proposes to make available the package sugar across the country. "We will be the first company to enter the branded sugar business nationally," stated Modi. Other players in branded sugar, such as DCM with Daurala brand is present only in the cubes and sachet segment, while other players have restricted themselves to smaller geographical areas. Modi Sugar will be priced at Rs 21 for a kilo gram, as against Rs 16-18 a kilo for loose sugar in the open market. The refined sugar is expected to be priced at Rs 40 a kilo and is expected to be sold under a different brand name. Modi said the details are still befinalised. On promotion and brand building for Modi Sugar, he said, in the first phase the activity would be limited to point of purchase materials, adverts in newspaper and some activities in the residential localities where the product will be positioned as good, pure, vegetarian sugar. However, after the refined sugar is launched next year, the group will make a splash with massive advertising campaigns, he said. financialexpress.com