Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Indian market
Mr Banerjee is chief executive of Futurebazaar.com , the online shopping website of India's largest retailer, the Future Group, which hopes to become India's Amazon.com.
The one-year-old website generates more than 90 per cent of its sales in India on thousands of items from mobile phones and televisions to frying pans and steam irons. Products are delivered to customers within days from warehouses spread across India.
But after Future noticed a size-able number of international credit cards being used at its stores, Futurebazaar.com decided to target Indians living in the US and UK. It encourages these people to register on its site.
Mr Banerjee reckons that overseas Indians buying items for relatives in India could account for 20 to 30 per cent of Future-bazaar.com's business next year, which would translate into sales worth up to Dollars 18m(Pounds 9m). There are between 20m and 25m Indians working and living overseas, a diaspora that "offers huge potential as a catalyst for India's economic growth and ongoing global economic integration", according to a 2006 JPMorgan report.
The retailer is one of a growing number of companies, from banks to carmakers, that have set their sights on "non-resident Indians". Indian telecom group Reliance Communications has sold 1.5m phone cards in the US, the UK and Australia, mainly to NRIs who want to call India.
The one-year-old website generates more than 90 per cent of its sales in India on thousands of items from mobile phones and televisions to frying pans and steam irons. Products are delivered to customers within days from warehouses spread across India.
But after Future noticed a size-able number of international credit cards being used at its stores, Futurebazaar.com decided to target Indians living in the US and UK. It encourages these people to register on its site.
Mr Banerjee reckons that overseas Indians buying items for relatives in India could account for 20 to 30 per cent of Future-bazaar.com's business next year, which would translate into sales worth up to Dollars 18m(Pounds 9m). There are between 20m and 25m Indians working and living overseas, a diaspora that "offers huge potential as a catalyst for India's economic growth and ongoing global economic integration", according to a 2006 JPMorgan report.
The retailer is one of a growing number of companies, from banks to carmakers, that have set their sights on "non-resident Indians". Indian telecom group Reliance Communications has sold 1.5m phone cards in the US, the UK and Australia, mainly to NRIs who want to call India.
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